11.10.19 Lijiang and ShuHe Naxi Village

Ancient Tea Horse Caravan Trail
Lijiang, Yunnan
ShuHe Naxi Village, also called Longquan
Upon entering the village, about a 3 km walk from our hotel, we were greeted by this Dongba (Naxi religion) Aspiration Windbell. “ This is a miracle place. You call the heaven, it answers. You call the earth, it responds.” These wish cards are similar to the prayer cards that Priscilla Otani showed me at the Shinto shrines in Kyoto and which were part of my inspiration for the memory card component of my What [(Is It) About My) Memory community memory project.
Though this village also has shops offering local specialities to tourists, there are sections that retain the older buildings and the sophisticated water ways that channeled water from the mountain.
The lunch highlight was the Ba Ba, a thin, fried, warm potato cake filled with, what I think was, a mix of sesame and walnut pastes. Afterwards, we searched for, and found, a delicious mei qui (rose) filled moon cake and a delightful shop where we not only bought some of the mei qui liqueur, in traditional glazed, ceramic, corked bottles, but also discovered (trial sips are encouraged at these shops) a less intensely flavored and delicious pu’er tea variety.
In Dali and onwards, I have seen women sweeping streets, from small alley ways to the sides of busy two lane urban roads. Roadside construction has often been with non-electric tools. (There are many, massive infrastructure projects in the larger cities and between them.) The rhythm and pace and noise are, what has been a common descriptive for me on this trip, moderate, not rushed. Smiles come easily. As I move along, I find myself slowing down also.