M-whY

Still, since I'm here already, I might as well make the best of it. Ignoring the flag waving tour guides dressed in gaudy Bai outfits, I concentrated on what the cobbled streets had to offer. Steamed buns
,traditional stone architecture , forest covered mountains as the backdrop. White bearded men sporting black berets loitering in front of shops. Water from the aforementioned peaks flowing through the network of canals. "[Don't get too close or it'll wash you away!]" cautioned a mother to her son. That was probably the most interesting moment I had all morning.

I had some traditional Bai food for lunch, then returned to my hostel to await my bus. We were scheduled to leave at 2:20pm, but due to some holdup that never got explained to us, we didn't get going until nearly 3:30pm. The weather today was impeccable; Erhai Lake looked so much more impressive than it had two days ago. Around it were huge expanses of green in every direction. Staring out the window, you'd never guess that only a small portion of China is arable.

Three hours later, we were in Lijiang. Arriving in a new city is always disorienting, especially when there are three bus stations and I didn't know which one I was at. A few people carrying suitcases started heading in one direction. I figured they knew what they were doing, and followed close behind. As it turned out, it was the blind leading the blind, as they too were just guessing. At a major intersection, I pulled out my Lonely Planet and tried make sense of the map.

A man came up to me. "Hi! I speak english! Do you need help?"

Seven months of meeting strangers has made me a lot sharper at judging character on first impressions. I'm sure I still make mistakes, but this guy seemed like a person I could trust.

"[How do I get to old town?]" I asked (in mandarin). He looked at my english guidebook. "[I'm American, but I can speak a bit of chinese.]" I explained.

Turns out, he had spent several years in the US as well. His business card described him as a 'Professional Interpreter.' For no fee at all, he took me to the tourist district, the old town, and told me where I might find some guesthouses. "If you ever need any more help, just let me know," he said, and disappeared. I've heard different stories concerning local Chinese people. Some have warned me about their bad attitudes, others have called them the nicest people they've ever met. So far, the latter group seems to be winning.

The first guesthouse came to had really nice rooms for only 15 yuan (US$1 = 8 yuan) a night, so I plunked down my bags and checked in. Like Dali, the streets of Lijiang's old town were constructed of cobblestone, but whereas Dali's were in nice neat grids, here it resembled more of an intricate maze. Wandering around, I didn't come across many tourists, which I thought was great. Until I came to the old market square. Right. What was I thinking? Lijiang is a popular tourist destination. Of course there are going to be people.

The ethnic minority in this region are the Naxi people. One major draw of Lijiang is the world traveling Naxi Orchestra, featuring performances using traditional Naxi instruments. Of the twenty or so musicians, a good number of them were getting on in their years. Each year, the group loses a member or two to old age. Yet they still managed to crank out some pretty good stuff.

The only drawback had to be the speaker, whose long winded descriptions of each piece dragged out the performance. He repeated everything in two languages, first in mandarin, then in english, and the speech often lasted longer than the music. Maybe the breaks were necessary to give the old bones a breather, but after a while, I got tired of it all and skipped out on the last half.

In many ways, Lijiang is like Dali, and being not too thrilled with the latter, I probably won't be staying here very long. First thing in the morning, I'm off to the bus station again. In search of that quiet spot away from the all the tour buses and souvenir stands.

Thanks to everyone for their support and comments! Knowing people are reading keeps me motivated to continue the updates!