2010 Inner Mongolia and Central China Trip (Part-1)

 

This is a brief personal photo journal of our “2010 Inner Mongolia and Central China Trip.” I prepared it as best as I could since I took no notes and did not do research. If there is error, please let me know so I can correct it. Sorry about the spacing problems on some lines, because I am not familiar with the Microsoft Word. The views expressed in this report were strictly personal.

 

Our tour consisted of 86 people from the U.S. , Canada , China , and Taiwan originally born or raised in Taiwan with an average age around 70 years old. My high school classmates and their spouses, John and Jean Hwang, Ing-wu and Han-yueh Yu, Ernie and Rosemary Wang, and Mia and I were later joined by Yuen-koh Kao and his wife Wang Ming in Datong . The group was divided into three subgroups, the Pine, Bamboo, and Plum . We belonged in the first group.

 

Mia and I arrived in Beijing one day earlier than the scheduled 17 days tour. On May 5, with our friends, John and Jean Hwang, we took subways to visit the 2008 Olympic Park in the north side of Beijing . The park was huge. The “Bird Nest” stadium was impressive.

 In a totalitarian state, obtaining such a large expanse of land to build public facilities was easier than most countries. At age 70, some of us were allowed to enter the giant stadium free with the passports verifying our ages. Looking at the stadium, the roars of the opening day’s show at the stadium seemed to echo at this Olympic stage.  I felt it was the night, that China wanted to show the world that it had “Arrived.”

Then we visited the Lugou Bridge (蘆溝橋) in the southwest of Beijing. This bridge was where the 1937 Sino-Japanese War got started. The 800+ years old bridge had been rebuilt. Parts of the old bridge were incorporated into the new bridge as shown in the following photo.

The bridge led to the walled city of Wan Pin ( 宛平.) The water of Yong Ding River (永定河 ) was not flowing but was dammed into a pool of water at the bridge.  The bridge was famous for its lion carvings on the railing. Marco Polo mentioned this bridge on his book.

There was an Anti-Japanese Memorial Hall nearby, which we walked through rather quickly. It exhibited photos, maps, and things of the long and tragic war.

 

That evening, all tour participants arrived at the well known Peking duck restaurant Quanjude (全聚德.)  I felt the ducks had not met its reputation. We could easily find crispier duck skins at restaurants in Taiwan or even in the U.S. It was a disappointment.

 

On May 6, we flew from Beijing to Hohhot (呼和浩特) the capital of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region. The broad streets lined with well trimmed flowers and trees and the general developments of the city looked new. The airport was built as a reserve for the Beijing Airport for the 2008 Olympics. Many of the buildings were decorated with typical Mongolian fashion (Blue represents sky, white represents milk, yellow represents earth, and red represents sun.)

We drove three and half hours to a famous Tibetan Buddhist temple called Wudanzhao. (五當召) shown in the following photo.

While we were visiting, a sand storm arrived, which quickly obscured our views.

We then took two more hours to arrive at the biggest city of the Autonomous Region, Baotou ( 包頭). The photo of Baotou as below.

It was an active but remote trading post of the northwest in ancient days but it had now turned into a rather modern city. Our friends Kao Yuen-koh and Wang Ming came to visit us at the hotel. They would eventually join our tour starting on May 10 at Da Tong (大同).

 

On May 7, we took 3 hours drive to visit the Xiang Sa Wan (響沙灣) in Erdos ( 鄂爾多斯 ) south of the Yellow River.

 There was a famous desert sand dune. We rode cable lift across the Hantai River  (罕台川) to reach it. The river was rather dry as shown in the following photo.

But the ensuing joy ride on the sand exploratory car to sand carvings (mostly ruined as they were made for an exhibition 6 years ago,) sand lake (merely a small water pond in the sand,) golf driving range and guest houses (there were golf balls and irons for people to shoot but the guest cabins were in total ruins and not in use,) which cost us $17, struck us that we were indeed taken for a ride. The sights were not at all beautiful as advertised. Compared to the Mingsa San (鳴沙山) in Dunhuang (敦煌) that we visited in 2006, it was much less attractive.

 

We then visited the mausoleum of Genghis Kan ( 成吉斯汗 ), who had risen to the status of deity in the Mongolian society. His belongings were said to be buried here.

His portrait was seen everywhere in private homes or shops. But it was mostly the portrait of his grandson Kublai Kan since there was a strong resemblance and the former had no portrait available. Genghis Kan ’s grave was never found. It was said that after his burial, thousands of horses ran over the grave to obscure the exact location of his burial site. The trident we saw on this large complex was a typical symbol of the Mongolian presence, which was called, “Suledin.“ Legend said that when Genghis Kan was on the march with his troops, his big flag was topped with the trident .

It displayed their presence and authority. It was seen everywhere in Inner Mongolia . We returned to Baotou that evening. 

 

On May 8, we crossed the Ying mountain (陰山) on the north toward the nearest grassland Shilamuren (希拉穆仁草原 ) to Hohhot. It was too early in the year to visit the grassland since there was no grass to be seen as the winter was barely over there. The following photo showed the winter scenery of the road leading to the grassland.

The weather there was much colder. With the strong gust whipping up sands we only took a car ride to visit some not so significant sites, which cost us $29 each. The painter’s goggle we were advised to bring came in very handy that day. The final site we visited was an Aou Bao (熬包).

It was a stone pile to show direction for the hunters at first but had now become a worshipping place for the Mongols by circling it three times clockwise. People placed Hada (scarf) on it to show their respect. Here the Suledins were placed on four sides of the Aou Bao. That night we stayed in a yurt made of bricks.

 

Due to the unusual cold to near freezing, it was quite an uncomfortable night., The hot water relying on solar power did not work for our yurt. The yurt was not heated. Mia bought a heating mat and rented a thick military overcoat in addition to two layers of futon the yurt office provided but it still gave her a difficult night. I wrapped in many layers of clothing and a Hokaron (heating pad for golfers’ hands in the cold) for my feet. I also did not have a good night sleep under two futons. Of course, we did not take shower that evening although the yurt was equipped with it. The following photo showed Mia wrapped up like a refugee with heating mat rolled up in hand.

On May 9, it was cold but sunny. Surprisingly the wind remained strong but it did not kick up the sands. The tour company had arranged a demonstration of a horse race and Mongolian wrestling match. Some people ventured out to take photos but most stayed and watched them in the bus for warmth. The performers also did it perfunctorily.

 

We drove back to Hohhot and went to the impressive ultramodern Inner Mongolian Museum

and Performing Art Center , which was on the right of the following photo.

We did not enter the latter building but only the museum on the left.

 

In the museum, the exhibits on Chinese space explorations were surprisingly impressive as the region was where several space explorations were held. The beautiful ancient headgear was made of kingfisher’s feathers and gems as shown in the following photo.

We then visited the mausoleum of Wang Zhaojun. (王昭君 ).

 The 33 meters high artificial mound called “Green Grave” (青塚)  was where her belongings were buried.

It was named such because the mound remained green even when the other vegetations turned brown. Her impacts to the Mongols and the peaceful coexistence of the Mongolians and the Western Han Dynasty were apparently great and she was highly regarded by the Mongolians. Then we also visited Dazhao Temple . (大召寺.) It was the first Tibetan Buddhist temple of Hohhot built in 1580.

 

On May 10, we found the superhighway to Datong was blocked completely by protesting truckers who parked the trucks on the highway. We had to take the local road to reach Datong . We visited the UNESCO World Culture Heritage site Yungan Grottoes (雲罔石窟) built 1500 years ago by the emperors of the Northern Wei Dynasty (北魏).

It was one of the highlights of this tour for many. The Buddhist sculptures there were strongly influenced by the Indian Buddhist art.

Some of them were destroyed or gauged out.  But the remains were still very graceful.

Ironically, just like the Europeans had discovered the treasures of the ancient civilizations for Egypt , the invaluableness of these grottoes were discovered by the Japanese in the early 1902. In the old days, Chinese seemed to have neglected their own cultural heritage until the 20th Century. Kao Yuen-Koh and Wang Ming met us there and joined our tour thereafter for the next nine days. A famous sculptor Yang Ying-feng (楊英風) in Taiwan had fashioned his Buddhist sculptures based on the Buddhist images here, which had given me a strong impression since I was in my teens. It was one historical sites that I was longing to visit.

 

On May 11, we drove 2 hours to arrive at another highlight of our tour, the “Suspended Temple” ( 懸空寺).

 It was built on a sheer cliff of the Golden Dragon Valley (青龍峽) of Heng Mountain (恒山 ) above a stream. The original idea was to build a place of worship, the top would not touch the sky and the bottom would not touch the ground. Thus, a spider web clinging onto a cliff came into the mind of the monk who built it 1400+ years ago. Lumbers were stuck into the holes of the rock surface and supported by vertically placed lumbers.

The temple was built on the surface of the cliff so it was rather shallow and had many small rooms. It worshipped Buddha, Lao-Tzu, and Confucius, which was unique in China . This temple was recognized as an engineering marvel. After getting up the narrow stairs and walking the narrow path of the temple, we all selfishly concluded that the tourists should be forbidden to enter it so it could survive for a longer time. It could easily get damaged by thousands of tourists trampling it daily.

Then we drove to Ying Xian and visited a 950+ years old Wooden Pagoda. (應縣木塔 )

It was said that a tooth of Sakyamuni was kept at the base of this tower. We were allowed to walk up to the second stories. This 67.31 meters high pagoda demonstrated the engineering ingenuities of a wooden structure without using a single nail.

 

Driving through hours of winding mountain road we arrived at one of the Mecca’s of Buddhism in China, Wu Tai Mountain (五台山). The following photo showed the scenery that we saw on the way there.

This place used to have more than 360 temples in the old days, now there are 48. It started in the Eastern Han Dynasty (東漢) as a Buddhist sacred land.

 

On May 12, we toured the Suxiang Temple ( 殊像寺 ) at the Pusa Ding ( 普薩頂 .)

It sit on a hill top.  It was the highest ranking Tibetan Buddhist temple out of ten such temples in the area. It was built in the Yuan Dynasty (元朝). This temple was repeatedly visited by the Kangxi (康熙) and Qianlong (乾隆) emperors of the Qing Dynasty ( 清朝). Thus, the roof tiles were made of yellow Liuli tiles similar to the Forbidden City . Then we walked downward to the Tayuan Temple (塔院寺,) where it stood a white stupa about 54 meters in height.

It had become the landmark of the Wu Tai Mountain. Later we also visited a Puhua Temple (普化寺), where there was a lying Buddha‘s sculpture. Some locals found a profile of the Buddha on the hill behind the temple but we did not find it in the following photo.

The following photo showed the colors of spring at Wu Tai Mountain.

On May 13, we drove five hours toward Taiyuan (太原), the capital of Shanxi Province.

We first visited a historical Jinci (晉祠 ), a temple built in Northern Wei Dynasty (北魏) to memorize initially the younger brother of Zhou Wu Wang. (周武王,) Tang Shu-yu. ( 唐叔虞).

It had a beautiful ground with flower gardens and cedars trees several thousand years old. The one in a 45 degree angle was called Zhou Bo (Cedar of the Zhou (周) Dynasty. The locals said that if arriving in Taiyuan , one must visit Jingci like one had to visit the Forbidden City if visiting Beijing .

 

Next :   2010 Inner Mongolia and Central China Trip (Part-2)