Black Dragon Cafe

A wall mural on Baita road, Kunming.

Each of the cartoons is about a metre high, a series of public information posters aimed at government officials. My translation is very loose, and I’ve added bits to make the meaning clearer.

The key character not shown below but written repeatedly on the wall around the posters is “廉” lian2, which means integrity, honesty, incorruptibility.

With bribes of gifts in his house he felt uneasy,
so he sought advice from Zhuge Liang
who gave him a wise answer.
He opened the scroll and the message read: Confess!

Don’t accept dinner invitations as a bribe, nor dine out using public funds
Don’t take monetary bribes
Don’t indulge in vice, don’t visit houses of ill repute
Assess yourself often using the Three Represents as your yardstick

“Your exemplary leadership is important!” says the boy with the People’s democracy t-shirt to the boy with the Party democracy t-shirt (meaning that first democracy should be established within the party then used as an example to be followed by the People).

This poster is aimed at the wife of the official (the bit after the “=” is my own interpretation to make it clearer):

Be considerate = Take care of your husband at home, he works hard as an official.
Be charitable = Donate to worthy causes
Be patient… “As an official you should stay on the right track.” [The characters in white say “The Virtuous Wife.”]
Be tough… “Don’t you come in this house [with your dirty money]” = Help your husband to resist bribes

Above door: Govern for the People
Left door: Supervise public opinion
Right door: Supervise the media
White characters: Meet [the People] with total sincerity and honesty

Next to these cartoons is a long poster with an image of a cormorant, a lake and a snow capped mountain. Over this image is a large amount of text with stories of righteous officials from different dynasties, and how they dealt with bribery and corruption. The stories range from Southern and Northern dynasties (5th – 6th century AD) up to the Qing. It strikes me as odd that they use examples from imperial Chinese history as models of good government, but when I asked Chinese friends about it they didn’t see anything strange.

Shang Kaiwei owns and runs a chain of driving schools and several taxi cab firms. A successful businessman in his sixties, he has long been a collector, though his collections are a little diverse. They include Mao badges and photographs from the Cultural Revolution, laughing Buddha statues, weird crystal formations, American-made toy cars, bonsai, millstones and antiques.

Millstones	Photo of Zhu De meeting Mei Lanfang.	Each draw contains over one hundred badges, a collection of thousands.

These hand-turned millstones were used to grind various grains and legumes (soy beans and peas) into a paste. They’ve now largely been replaced by machines.

The car collection….

It may be a little difficult to make out from the photo, but it’s a model of President Kennedy’s car just before a shadowy figure poked his head above a grassy knoll.

I found these in an online book about Chinese superstitions. My favourite:

It is taboo for a pregnant woman to put an onion in her armpit : If this taboo is broken, the child will be born with bad body odour. (From Zhengzhou, Henan province).

Why a pregnant woman would wander around with onions under her arms is not clear. Some of the superstitions were not all bad, such as the mother should be given whatever she wants to eat, the reason given that her craving is actually the baby’s craving, fulfilling the baby’s needs. However, the result of denying her that food was that the deprived child would be born with “red eyes” (红眼病), this means literally bloodshot eyes, but also the Chinese belief that red eyes is synonymous with jealousy / covetousness (corresponding to green eyes, green-eyed monster in the West).

Other pregnancy taboos about foods that are forbidden for the expectant mother to eat include:

Fish: (Also from Henan) If the pregnant mother eats fish, her child will be born with scales. In ancient times, it was believed that pregnant mothers who ate dried carp would give birth to a child suffering from bad skin.

Dog: Dog meat is believed to be a good food for warming the body, so is eaten in winter and is especially popular in northern China. However, in Heilongjiang, it is taboo for pregnant women to eat dog meat in case their children are born wanting to bite people, which will cause the mother trouble when feeding the baby (ow). Henan also has this taboo – in Yucheng county in the east of the province it is black dog meat (the finest dog flesh) should be avoided, as it can cause birth defects and miscarriage. In times past, Han Chinese also held the same taboo believing it would lead to a difficult labour.

Crab: (Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Taiwan) Eating crab will cause a difficult labour in which the baby is born sideways, a belief said to have been recorded as far back as the Song Dynasty (食螃蟹，令子横生). It is also said that the child will drool, with bubbles coming out of its mouth just like a crab. In Taiwan they say the child will claw at peoples hands and feet (an ankle biter?)

Soft-shelled Turtle: An old superstition that says the child will be born short necked (短项), connected with the way the turtle withdraws its head back into its shell.

Plum and pear: Another ancient superstition, that eating these fruit will make the child blind . The pear is already a “cold” (寒) foodstuff according to traditional Chinese medicine, so the expecting mother shouldn’t eat it anyway.

Rabbit: The child will be born with a cleft lip (looking like a rabbit’s mouth).

Donkey: The child will be stubborn and misbehave, not listening to his parents (just like a donkey).

Cockerel: The baby will cry at night.

Ginger: To prevent the child having six fingers.

(Chinese) Soft-shelled turtle 鳖 bie1 Other official names: 甲鱼, 团鱼, in English it also known by its Japanese name, Suppon. Their most distinguishing feature is the long pointed snout that allows them to snorkel with just their nostrils above the water surface. Their soft shells are actually soft, being made up mostly of thickened skin. For more see www.answers.com/topic/chinese-softshell-turtle and a very detailed description www.anapsid.org The soft-shelled turtle is used in Chinese traditional medicine, and apart from being good for lowering fever, night sweats and “steaming bones”*, it is also valued for increasing male potency (壮阳 ). I’m guessing the phallic connection is why the colloquial name for the turtle – 王八 wang2 ba1 – is also a term of abuse, as 王八 or 王八蛋 (literally “turtle egg”) equivalent to bastard or son-of-a-bitch.

Here is a Soft-shelled Turtle with Cream Sauce, from the Suzhou Government Website	And a Common Soft-shelled Turtle from Blue Ridge Biological
And an (American) Eastern Spiny Soft-Shell from Kawartha Turtle Trauma Centre

Image source: Prunus salicina fruit, flower
Prunus mume fruit, flower

The following is pretty much how all the Kunming weddings I’ve been to have been organized (these pictures are from my sister-in-law’s):

First the groom and his family come to the bride’s home. Through begging and bribery (the hong bao – little red envelopes of money – shoved under the door), the groom has to convince the bride and bridesmaids to let him in – they usually make the most of this, getting him to serenade his true love, agree to do all the washing up for a year, etc.

Once the groom is allowed in, he has to find the bride’s shoes which have been hidden somewhere in the bedroom.

	Once the shoes are found, the groom washes the bride’s feet – supposedly because this is the only time he serves his wife, who now has a lifetime of servitude to look forward to. But this is a throw back to less enlightened times, before the glories of Communism and equality of the sexes.   The bride and groom offer tea (敬茶) to the bride’s family, and in return receive hongbao.
	The groom then has to carry the bride from the house to the car. She’s not supposed to touch the ground, which can be a killer if it’s a sixth floor apartment.
	Next the entire wedding party is chauffeured around the city in expensive cars (rented mostly, with a few lent by well-to-do relatives). There is a stop off for photos somewhere scenic, beside Dianchi Lake or at the Expo Gardens, before going to the hotel.
The hotel is the venue for the main event, a feast for friends and co-workers. The bride and groom greet guests at the entrance accepting more hong bao, the bride gives a cigarette to male guests, and lights it. The tradition of giving red envelopes of money means that the couple getting married actually make a profit, and the more people you invite the more money you get. This has led things to getting out of hand (there are even cases of people holding a second wedding when they are a bit short of cash). When the guests arrive at the hotel banqueting hall, the couple go up on stage and are teased by a compere, usually in a good humoured way (like the best man’s speech in a Western wedding), and the parents are invited up to say a few words. The bride changes again (she changes several times throughout the day – Western white wedding dress and red Chinese qipao/cheongsam is standard), then they go round all the tables toasting (敬酒), often changing again to see people off (送客).
	The last event of the day is nao xin fang (闹新房), which much like a stag night is a chance for the bride and groom’s close friends to torment them before they become mature adults.
Traditionally it takes place in the bedroom of the couple’s new house, but nowadays usually the hotel where they had the banquet will provide a room because it gets messy – food fights, people getting drunk and sick – so the hotel can take care of the clean up. The bride and groom have to play various games, such as the bride having to move an egg from one of the grooms trouser legs to the other using only her mouth, or the groom has to find peanuts hidden in the brides clothes. Luckily my brother-in-law had drunk himself unconscious by this point, and so was spared. The photo above was taken when the couple were still in the restaurant toasting every table. Their friends gave the bride a glass of baijiu and wasabi – at this point, the bridesmaid (or best man) can take the couple’s place when drinking.

A Nakhi friend of ours, Okui, turned up today with his family and friends. They’d come to Dali to carry out tshethar – the Buddhist practise of releasing animals back into the wild. In fact, it was more his friend Yongshun who was the devout religious one; for Okui and the others it was more just a good day out for the kids, all of whom were clutching black plastic bags filled with turtles, crabs and eels they’d picked up at the market.

Unfortunately, after the ten of us had all squeezed into the van one of the bags broke spraying eels across the floor. I missed most of the scenery on the way to the lake, scrabbling around trying to collect the little buggers and wondering what that meant for my karma.

On the boat, the children decided that the turtles were the most entertaining of the animals, and played with them like toy cars. The excitement was briefly broken by Yongshun saying Tibetan prayers over them, blessing them with peace, health and long life, before the kids gave the turtles their baptism into freedom by lobbing them hand-grenade style across the water.

The black plastic carrier bags of eels were then unceremoniously dumped from the side of the boat, but it turned out that the crabs (huge things, their shells bigger than my outstretched hand) were, not for freedom but for dinner. This, along with the prayer beads made of ivory, didn’t really fit into my understanding of the karmic balance.

There was a twist to the tale as during the drive to a lakeside restaurant the van suddenly swerved left to right in zigzags down the road before rolling to a slow stop on the verge. Yongshun stumbled out from the drivers seat holding a massive crab, which had managed to escape and run down the length of the van, then insert itself under the brake pedal, so that we were effectively without brakes (unless he braked very hard).

We arrived at the restaurant without further incident, and Yongshun told me (over steamed crab) that nowadays among the Nakhi people there are very few who believe in the old Dongba shamanistic tradition. Though increasing freedom has meant that interest in religion has grown, the majority tend to believe in the pick and mix faith: a bit of Tibetan Buddhism, a bit of Han Chinese Buddhism, a bit of local superstition, a bit of Daoism. Most people go along with whatever local practices have sprung up: it can’t hurt to throw your coin in the wishing well, just on the off-chance.

Tibetan Buddhism has become increasingly popular among a wide section of Yunnanese, especially for the 30-somethings. For many Chinese, Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism have the same grip on the imagination that they do in the West, a certain mysterious cachet that has grown over the last few years, partly because so many blatant abuses have been observed in monks of the Han Chinese Buddhism (not observing their own rules, taking a lot of money, in Kunming they’re even seen hailing taxis to go to the KTV). Then there is increased tourism and accessibility of Tibet, and its portrayal in popular culture such as through singer Han Hong [韩红] (whose popularity is a mystery in itself) and the best-selling novel Zang Ao [藏獒 "Tibetan Mastiff"].

Shaxi is a town in northern Dali prefecture, about three hours drive from Lijiang. By public transport, you can get there by taking a bus to Jinhua (in Jianchuan county) and then getting a minibus to Shaxi.     The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zürich has set up a conservation and sustainable development project here, their Shaxi Rehabilitation Project website says:

the old village of Sideng [Shaxi], a once vibrant staging post along the Tea and Horse Caravan Trail, primarily channeled trade in tea, horses and other valuables between diverse ethnic groups residing along the eastern Himalayan riff beginning in the Tang Dynasty (618 – 907). Sideng flourished over five centuries throughout the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368 – 1911) before stalling under the changing economic, political and industrial landscape of the mid-20th century.

Dr Jacques Feiner, who began the project, is quoted on the Global Heritage Fund site:

“When I first told my guides in China that the dilapidated market square of Sideng was their main [site with tourist] potential they did not believe it. Later, after Shaxi had been selected for the WMF List of the 100 most endangered sites, the attitude of the local government reversed completely to the other extreme. At that time, they virtually believed that they could build a second Lijiang in two years’ time. Despite us telling the government from the start that this was neither possible nor desirable, their dreams were ‘flying high’ and the deception was therefore even stronger when they realized that their plans were in fact not possible in Shaxi and neither were the enormous profits,” Feiner said.

Quite different from the fashion of Chinese government officials, the project people are preaching slow development without excessive commercialization, or what Feiner calls “Lijiangization” of the Shaxi Valley.

Sources: For excellent information on the tea and horse caravan road, see the Silk Road Foundation Newsletter

The market square in Sideng, Shaxi:

If you look closely at the photo above of the opera stage in the market square you can still just make out the characters 农业学大寨, “In Agriculture Study From Dazhai” on the side of the building.

These two statues (of the figures Heng and Ha) stand in the temple opposite the market square’s stage.

These two mythical generals come from a novel written in the Ming dynasty, called Creation of the Gods, which found inspiration from the two guardian deities that stand outside Buddhist temple entrances. They are the fearsome duo Zheng Lun, who destroyed enemies by blowing white steam from his nose (making a “heng” noise), and Chen Qi, who vanquished enemies by blowing yellow gas (with a “ha” sound) from his mouth.

The tale the Creation of the Gods says that the evil Zheng Lun served the notorious King Zhou of the Shang Dynasty, his power to use magic steam given to him by his mentor, the immortal Du’er. When Zheng Lun snorted it sounded like a defening bell, and two rays of white light shot forth from his nostrils sucking up people’s souls. Later he was caught by King Wen of the Zhou dynasty, who reformed Zheng Lun into an upstanding member of society.

Chen Qi was also a general of King Zhou, secretly given his magical yellow gas power by a mysterious, shadowy individual. Chen Qi was taught how to create yellow gas in his stomach, so that whenever he uttered the gutteral “Ha!”, the yellow gas burst forth sending the souls of all who witnessed this to oblivion. Later he was killed by Nezha.

When the prime minister (immortal Jiang Ziya) canonized the gods, he promoted Zheng Lun and Chen Qi as guardians, proselytizers of Buddhism and protectors of Buddhist Law. Thus Heng and Ha entered Chinese folklore. If you want to know which is which, try saying Heng and Ha to yourself, and you can tell from their facial expressions.

哼哈二将 heng1 ha1 – er4 jiang4Zheng Lun [郑伦Zheng4 Lun2] and Chen Qi [陈奇Chen2 Qi2]. In fact these two characters have even older roots, as the Vajrayaksa, protector of Buddhist Law 金刚夜叉Jin1 gang1 ye4 cha (Chin-kang-ch’a in Wade-Giles, Kongoyasha in Japanese). The 金刚 part is interesting, it’s also another word for diamond (usually 钻石zuan4 shi2), the Chinese name for King Kong, and for cars that change into giant robots: 变形金刚 bian4 xing2 Transformers! More Than Meets the Eye…

Creation of the Gods《封神演义》feng1 shen2 yan3 yi4 封 means “to confer a [noble] title upon”, related to 封建 Feudal. There is a Chinese – English bilingual version of Creation of the Gods, the answers.com page says that 演义 can loosely be translated as “epic” (as in 三国演义).

“blowing white steam from his nose” 能鼻哼白气制敌 actually the “white steam” is 白气
the immortal Du’er 昆仑度厄真人 kun1 lun2 du4 e4 zhen1 ren2(真人 is the Daoist word for immortal, as opposed to the usual 神仙shen2 xian)

From “his power to use magic steam given to him by his mentor” 窍中二气 qiao4 zhong1 er4 qi4 窍 qiao4is an old Chinese word that can refer to any of the individual organs of the senses, the ears are two 窍, the eyes two 窍, the mouth one 窍 etc. If someone is really angry, you can describe them as 七窍生烟qi1 qiao4 sheng1 yan1 (even in spoken Chinese) which means, literally, smoke blows from every orifice in the head (much like something off of Tom and Jerry).