Travels in China - Eric's Last Day

Tomorrow is my brother's last day in China.  He has been here for 3 months, studying in Shanghai for a month, traveling for a few weeks and teaching English in a rural village.  We have traveled together for the last week; a few days in Shanghai, a few days in Beijing, ending our trip in the Guangxi province in Southern China.  We are staying in Xingping, near Yangshuo.  This area of China is relatively rural (water buffalo, people in traditional Chinese hats, lots of rice fields, etc) and is known for the limestone peaks that surround the region.  In fact, the Chinese 20 Yuan note has a famous picture of the limestone hills that are a 15-20 minute walk from Xingping village.

Over the last few days we have hiked up various hills/mtns and walked to rural fishing villages.  We also did a Cormorant fishing trip (please refer to Eric's goofy picture in this blog entry).  Quite an interesting ordeal; some random guy led us out to the river at night and to a boat with 10 birds on it.  The birds are Cormorants, water birds that are very adept swimmers and fisherman.  In China, these birds have been used for centuries to catch fish.  In order to prevent the birds from eating the fish a string is tied around their necks.  The string is just tight enough to prevent the birds from swallowing the bigger, more desirable fish, but leaves enough room to allow the birds to eat the smaller fish they catch.  The Cormorants swim along with the boat (never attempting to escape) and dive down to catch fish (the fish are attracted to the light at the front of the boat).  The birds must surface in order to eat and if they have a large enough fish (which you can see get stuck in their throats) the fisherman takes a long bamboo pole, grabs the bird by the attached string and hoists them into the boat.  He then very "gingerly" takes the fish out of their mouths (ha, just kidding, he is not nice to the birds, it actually made me cringe, seeing that i am the "bird man" and did spend a semester studying Cormorants while in college).  The fisherman and birds do, however, seem to have a nice symbiotic relationship.  The birds get to eat some fish and the fisherman helps them catch the fish with the boat's light (making their work quite easy).  Although this "Cormorant fishing" was not quite authentic, it was a reasonably accurate (although modernized) reflection of traditional Chinese culture.

It is too bad that Eric must leave tomorrow, but he is ready to go after being in China for 3 months and he is excited to get back to his girlfriend in DC (my parents also seriously need to breathe a sigh of relief once he gets home).   After Eric leaves, i will officially be traveling on my own without an organized trip (for the first time since the travels started in Africa).  The next 2 weeks should prove exciting, I only have a flight booked to the Yunnan province, no accommodation, no travel plans, only ideas.  Hope to meet some interesting people along the way and see some of the most remote parts of (non-Tibetan) China.  Until the next update.  See ya.  

dave