Chengdu! Chengdu!

Better late then never. Here is what we did in Chengdu, Sichuan's capital and important city of ancient China with history including Shu kingdom of the famous Three kingdoms period. It was also the westernmost place we spent night in on our journey through Chinese heartland. Just to absorb the city in its entirety we stayed not one, not two but three nights altogether. Dreams Travel became our base for trips to nearby UNESCO and not-so-UNESCO sights.

Templing inside out
Due to its history Chengdu 'suffers' by temple abundance. Their exploration itself requires several days, not mentioning city parks. Oh, and those parks! By amount of green, Chengdu trashes any city in China (including current Urumqi with its new green dress). We started with nunnery near Wenshu palace and old town (Chengdu's answer to Shanghai's Yuyuan bazaar but much less crowded), then explored Wenshu itself. Wenshu temple is important Buddhist temple dating back to Tang emperors. Its grounds hide several tea houses and it is place where we started our education and observation of Sichuan's tea culture, sipped quality green tea and ate 'piskoty' (Central European version of sponge biscuits). I mean piskoty - domestically produced but anyway, in China! Also we had our first encounter with ear wax removers. This custom and occupation has a long tradition in Sichuan and advanced almost to form of art. 'Artists' venture into crowd with their palette of brushes of various sizes and shapes ringing iron poles to draw attention and customers. They can play with your ears for lofty 30 minutes, which could be exactly half an hour you crave for if you are same ear freak as me. Unfortunately, I was too amazed by the sight of somebody making his living by cleaning others ears to try this procedure, although I promised myself that next time I walk into Chengdu I would do it.

From Wenshu we continued along tree lined streets to tomb of Wang Jian, a mausoleum of the king of the different Shu kingdom (Former Shu of five dynasties, ten kingdoms period). Tomb is significant for reliefs depicting the whole band of musicians (the most complete of that period in the whole China). We continued our walk towards Green Ram temple (the biggest Taoist temple in Chengdu) where we arrived after the opening hours but armored with a true Central European arrogance entered through side gate and explored it thoroughly. During this exploration, we had an opportunity to witnessed tai chi practice of the master and his students literally from all over the world. Nearby Culture park offers expensive opportunity to visit Sichuan opera performance (tickets from 120 RMB / 12 EUR up). Also nearby is big complex of the so called Dufu's village. Cluster of historical buildings intertwined with poetry of Dufu (famous Chinese poet who completely skipped my radar) and other Sichuan based poets (same goes for the nearby park dedicated to poetry). Of course, beauty of Chinese poetry stays still hidden from my ignorant soul. Maybe one day when I will understand it or at least grasp mandarin to such an extent that I would be able to distinguish verses, when they will be recited to me (on the other hand, I have this problem even in my native language).

As it was already dark by the time we get out of Culture park, we decided to slowly return to the hostel. On our way back we discovered another interesting gem of Chengdu - red light district (literally, as it was lit by red lanterns) of Wuhuoci. It is in fact commercial area spreading around Wuhouci temple, where local shops and western restaurant, bars and pubs are vying for tourists' money. Wuhouci is a temple dedicated to Zhuge Liang and others from Three kingdoms. In there I experienced a Popperesque moment and saw a black swan :)

Sightseeing outside in
The biggest problem we encountered in Chengdu is the fact that there are too many sights to see in near vicinity. Besides temples in the city, there is Leshan Budha (the biggest Budha statue in the world), Emei shan (holly Buddhist mountain), Qingcheng shan (another holly, but Tao, mountain), Dujiangyan irrigation project (this is what made Chengdu and Sichuan so rich), nature reserves (Wolong & co.), and other Buddhist and Taoist monasteries. Of course, there are also those Giant Pandas :) Easily you can spent two weeks in and around Chengdu but as we had only three and a half days and I had already pleasure of visiting Leshan and Emei shan, we dignified Dujiangyan and Qingcheng shan with our presence only. And also those oversized lazy black and white crossbreeds of rat and bear.

Be aware that, following the earthquake in 2008, provincial government introduced so called Panda cards in order to lure back tourists. This Panda cards are issued one per each person (must be complemented with passport or ID) no matter whether you are Chinese or foreigner (another reason why I really love this province - no white person surcharges or 'special' offers). Each Panda card entitles its owner for one free entry to major sights in and around Chengdu (it works on virtually all of the sights in Chengdu plus 100km radius but I am not sure about those further away, e.g. Emei shan).

First we visited Qingcheng shan and combined it with quick visit to Dujiangyan irrigation project. We were joined (or rather we joined) Chinese girl who kindly offered us her help (thank you Melisa). With her help we were able to get through for 40 RMB (4 EUR) per person into otherwise 100 RMB (10 EUR) Qingcheng shan natural park (of course we were unaware that with Panda card you can get in for free). There we spent half a day hiking around Taoist temples with long, rich and colorful history (some temples were hiding places for partisans, generals or princes, and scholars). Usual Chinese hikes (steps, steps, and more steps) were made more lively by the fact that our 'guides' who got us through the gate system unharmed, took us to some remote place which gave us opportunity to hike through not so civilised area with some ladders and unpaved trails.

In the afternoon, after some sampling of local cuisine, we finally got to Dujiangyan irrigation project, a site I wanted to visit most. It is project which tamed river Min and made of Sichuan the granary of China. It was built more than 2300 years ago by prefect Li Bing in order to prevent flooding of Chengdu plain which was pretty much annual thing. This project diverts waters from Min into series of canals irrigating fields all the way down to Chengdu (60 km away). We had an opportunity to walk around main diversion called 'fish mouth' as it has shape of fish head (Chinese fantasy working full throttle) on the banks of river and canal. To give you some idea: under the name 'canal' please do not imagine something we know from back home - two meters deep and two meters wide ditch. Min river is c. 100m wide strong and quick stream river. Fish mouth divides it into two streams - inner and outer - whose through flow is regulated according to needs. Working up until today it divides waters in 60:40 ratio (inner : outer) during floods period and sand in the ratio of 20:80 (that is some engineering!). Legend has it that this this levy system is the reason for happy and laid back attitude of Sichuan people. It is due to the fact that after its completion no floods occurred and thus people had and still have nothing to worry about :) Furthermore, steep banks offered good defense position for defending Chengdu plain from invading north armies (barbarians and those Wei soldiers as well). Old guarding towers offer wonderful views of Dujiangyan city and Min river stream. Here we had opportunity to witness some damage caused by last years earthquake as not everything was repaired or masked.

Next day was the panda day as we elected to visit local breeding station of Giant pandas. There we witnessed those small (year old cubs), smaller (red pandas which are generally smaller than giant ones), and the smallest pandas (one really ugly blind, hairless little newborn). Whoever says you that pandas are lazy, do not believe him - they are just like any other animals. Cubs are fighting like crazy, they eat like crazy and run around happily until tired. When sun comes up the activity decreases as even pandas are not crazy enough to run around in 30 degrees heat (just like humans - ask your Spanish, Italian or Chinese friends). Maybe the morning fight is staged each day to entertain the tourists but then I have to admit pandas are better actors than wrestling professionals :) Cubs smashing and climbing over each other is sight to behold and to take picture of. Lucky me I had my camera with almost infinite capacity :)

This brings me to one last thing I want to mention about Chengdu. During our stay we had an opportunity to witness sun eclipse - the longest one for next three hundred years. Unfortunately, Chengdu was all cloudy on that particular morning (imagine our disappointment when we realized that Chongqing which we left behind just one day earlier was all sunny) except for one small glimpse of sunshine when it was almost all over... Even worse, with the sun eclipse come also eclipse of my mind and I formatted one of my cards deleting a week worth of pictures (there goes Yangzi cruise). Further adventures of the two foreigners making it through the heart of China will be summarized in next posts. Read on!