China: Day 6 - Lijiang - On Cooking Pots of Meat

“If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding. How can you have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat?”
Pink Floyd, 'Another Brick in the Wall, Part II (1979)

Mornings are the most pleasant part of the Yunnan winter. The sun shines on you and warms your soul. With mountains enveloped in soft white haze gazing down at us in the distance, we wandered through Shuhe Town.

This town is designed for tourists. The town seems to have no other occupation but to cater to the needs of ignorant tourists such as me and others.

We followed the waterways upstream towards the clear water springs. These waterways, like the ones in Dali, are used by all the shopkeepers for all their domestic purposes. I did wonder about the ones who lives downstream. Classic problems to keep economists busy.

In the midst of all the touristy stuff, we found little indicators of the communist regime. Absolutely no propaganda. And trust me, I did hunt for it.  That was until I found beautiful life-size statues of workers in the act of working, paying ode to, well, the workers.
It was heartening and inspiring. Communist symbolism has always touched my heart, and this did too. Of course these were right in the middle of the busy market place, and did get me wondering at their intended purpose. Maybe they were just yet another prop for the cameras. That would truly be ironic. Like the man who painted himself black, held a gun and pretended to be a (painted?) soldier or the Bai women who wore their traditional dresses, all for us, the tourists, and a few extra bucks.

We tried the local food - dumplings and fried cakes of noodles, found them unappealing, and ended out short stay at Shuhe. I repeat my sagely advice - stay away from tourist towns like Shuhe. They are boring.

Bruce graciously offered to drive us to our hotel at Lijiang Old Town. Now Bruce had been the perfect host. They ended their hospitality by writing on a slip of paper the words 'hot pot - 1/2 kilo lamb meat) in Chinese. It was their noblest act, one that we shall remember for the rest of our lives. I still have the slip lying with me, just in case I land in China again.

Our hotel was good. Really good. Naxi-style architecture in a modern setting. Beautifully decorated. And warm. Sooo warm. We stood under the air-conditioning, soaking our cold toes and fingers in warm air.

It was late afternoon. So we head out to have the complementary tea which consisted of cold 'English tea' and cold 'coffee'. And fruits and nuts. We do not know the names of anything we had.
But there is a rule that most people on low budgets know about  - Everything free tastes good.

So we ate. And then we ate a little more.

Lijiang Old Town was once again a reconstructed old new city. The town has a history going back to more than 800 years, and has been declared a UN Heritage city.  Most of the architecture is reflective of the Naxi style, a rather unique design not found anywhere else in China .

The place itself had waterways and bridges, and mostly just inns and restaurants, and tourist shops, and music shops. It was a hippie paradise, with music flowing through every street.

The main Lijiang city is outside the Old Town, and is like most towns in China. Smooth beautiful roads with rows of identical buildings, and government run monopolies. Our dinner adventure at night consisted of roaming around these roads with Bruce's slip of paper and hunting for a place that sold hot-pots. We found ourselves the friendliest place we could find, and began our culinary adventure.

So this is how I figured a hot-pot works (explained by a helpful Chinese girl in slow Mandarin, and many laughing waitresses) -

Take a large pot and throw in meat and water. Watch it boil in front of your eyes. You shall receive a tray filled with vegetables. Look around to see what the others are doing. Give up when no one offers to help. Toss the vegetables that suit your fancy into the pot, without realizing that every vegetable you use will cost extra.

There shall be many spices on your table - one that shall look like bean curd and another one that shall make your pee change colour. You need to then awkwardly take the boiled vegetables from the hotpot using the chopsticks, dip it into the spices, put it in your mouth, and love the taste. The boiling water is a soup that you shall keep drinking. When the meat is cooked, you eat the meat similarly.

After an hour or so, you would be done. The pot shall now contain many pieces of intestines and other parts of an animal that didn't look edible. You, on the other hand shall be full and ready to pay the rather moderate amount they charge for such a complete dish.

With this meal we ended our first night in Lijiang.