Yunnan Trip Part 1: beautiful and terrifying

I’m back from my two-week trip to the Yunnan province of China. It was a
mandatory academic excursion trip that focused on learning about and
interacting with some of the ethnic minorities in that region of China.
On the trip we stayed with five different ethnic minority groups in
their villages. In each village we were assigned a host family who we
spent the day with and then spent the night in their home. If you
pretend you're watching a national geographic movie where there are men
and women dressed in traditional village clothing dancing around a fire,
pooping in a hole in the ground, and eating bugs for lunch you can begin
to picture some of my experiences in the villages of Yunnan. I’m not
kidding – I’ve become an expert at the squat and go bathroom method.

The first village we stayed was home to the Yi people. This was actually
my favorite village because the food was actually really good and my
host mother was wonderful. The home where I stayed with a traditional
dwelling with minimal electricity (only a couple light bulbs), no heat,
and a rooster to wake you up early in the morning. When had a big lunch
with lots of dishes with local vegetables and pork from the freshly
slaughtered pig. We also had water containing a stick with leaves in it,
which I later learned was a local grass used to make tea. It was
actually really good but I couldn’t help thinking about the Polovick
side of my family joking about eating tree bark. Later we climbed into
the back of some trucks and rode up a nearby mountain to get to a lake
where the Yi women were going to perform their village dances. I
seriously thought I was going to fall off of a cliff and die as we drove
up the winding dirt road standing in the back of the truck with only
each other to hang on to. Fortunately I survived the ride and got to see
the Yi women perform their beautiful dances, especially their famous
dragon dance. I couldn’t believe that I was standing in a village in the
middle of nowhere China watching Yi women perform a dragon dance for
Chinese New Year. It was incredible. After the women finished performing
they tried to teach us the dragon dance. It was way harder than I
thought it would be. The women made it look so easy, but the dragon and
the sticks supporting it were really heavy! Being in the Yi village was
just the beginning of a trip that was like nothing I have ever
experienced before.

The second village we stayed in was a Hani village much higher up in the
mountains, which means that the people often turn to baijiu (a
disgusting tasting clear liquor with a 60% alcohol content). When I got
to my host families house after hiking up a ridiculously steep hill my
host father immediately insisted on pouring me and Emily, the other
student with me, a glass of baijiu. One sip was enough to make me cough,
but we had been warned not to reject the offering since it would be
extremely disrespectful. So we chocked down our glasses over lunch that
was one of the scariest meals I’ve ever seen or attempted to eat. There
were actual bugs in a dish on the table and my host brother was poping
them in his mouth just like they were the peanuts next to them. I ate
another dish which I didn’t know had bugs in it but quickly discovered
was not something I wanted anywhere near my mouth. After lunch we met up
with some local children to hike the rice terraces. The rice terraces
were absolutely beautiful. It was like looking at a postcard only I
could smell the freshness of the air and feel the mushy ground
 under my feet. My captivation of the beauty lasted until the terraces became as narrow as a balance beam and not falling off into the murky rice paddies became my top priority. I was getting a little scared at one point and out of no where a little Hani girl grabbed my hand to guide me on the path. It was so sweet, and such perfect moment of kindness and human connection that at least for a while I totally forgot about my fear of falling. The Hani village was beautiful and challenging and another part of the journey that has opened my eyes to a world I’ve never experienced before. 

The story of this journey will be continued in blogs to come…