Tour Chengdu April 2014

TOUR CHENGDU

Our Air Asia Airbus 319, touched down at Chengdu Airport at 11pm. It was nearly midnight when we arrived at the Millennium Hotel about 20 minutes away. We were pleasantly surprised when we saw a welcome party of six hotel staff headed by the General Manager waiting at the entrance! It was the first time we were personally received by the GM and at midnight. We were upgraded to Executive Rooms (at 500 ringgit per night) with special privileges at the lounge with drinks and snacks. We received personal attention with senior staff to accompany us during our travel in the city and late checkout. Wifi was freely available. 

 Szechuan is one of the prosperous provinces in China, being a fertile basin with bountiful agriculture supporting a population of 80 million. Being relatively isolated in one corner of China surrounded by mountains (thus the name meaning four mountains), it was relatively free from war, except during the Three Kingdom period, when the famous general made Chengdu its headquarters. Recently, many industries have been located in the province. The capital city is the 4th largest in China with 13 million people. Most of the buildings are new, being around 10 storeys high. There are few tall skyscrapers. The streets are full with new cars, yet somehow the traffic moves rather smoothly. We arrived in spring and the weather was rather pleasant, being about 25 Celsius the day and 18 in the night. There were light showers off and on. The skies are however rather hazy due to the lower elevation as well as pollution. Many flowers are blossoming while the seasonal fruits are cherries, pineapples, peaches and pipa fruits. 

Our tour took us to Leshan about 2 hours away to see the largest sitting statue of Buddha in the world. It was about 71metres high, carved out of the side of the mountain. It seems that 100 people can sit on one of the feet! We had to take a ferry boat to cross the river. It was situated at the confluence of 3 rivers with swift currents, thus the statue was carved to provide protection. In the afternoon, we visited the thatched cottage of a famous poet Du Zu who lived during the Tang Dynasty. The next day we visited the Dujiang dam and ancient irrigation system across the Minjiang River which was constructed nearly 2000 years ago to provide irrigation as well as to reduce the incidence of flooding. What an engineering feat in ancient times! The Minjiang starts from Jiuzhaigou and flows to the Yangtse River. We passed through the earthquake area which has been almost completely rebuilt as there was little evidence of the destructive effects of the earthquake 6 years ago. We also visited the Jinta Archaeology site and museum where they recently discovered gold, bronze and jade artefacts that went back to the Shu people more than2500 years ago. 

Our visit to Panda Sanctuary was the highlight of stay in Chengdu. Of the known population of about 2000 pandas in the world, 90% are in China, and 90% of those in China are in Szechuan. The Chengdu Panda Research and Breeding Centre have about 200 pandas, though we only saw about 10. The Pandas belong to bear family but have changed their diet to live on just a few species of bamboo. Yet its teeth and digestive tract are still omnivorous and they can eat meat if necessary. Bamboo is not very nutritious, thus pandas are constantly eating and are not active otherwise. One of the reasons why there are so few Pandas is that the mother gives birth to only one baby at a time, after 5 months gestation to a premature 100 gram baby, dependant on the mother’s milk for 12-15 months. 

Szechuan food is considered by the mainland Chinese to be the next best cuisine after Cantonese. However they proved to be too spicy for our taste. They are full of pepper corns (seeds) in addition to the dried chillies and ginger. The famous Szechuan hotpot (steamboat) was not liked by us. Many of us preferred the non-spicy soup. In addition to usual chicken, meat and vegetables, there was pig’s stomach, sliced kidneys and brain! Meals at the local restaurants consist of 12-15 dishes, with an average cost of 50ringgit per person. We had tea in the People’s Park which was crowded with people drinking tea in the park and playing cards and chatting. Several people, wearing small torches on their forehead, walked around willing to clean your ears for a small fee. 

One evening, we walked through the Jinli Street with many stalls selling exotic foods and displaying handicrafts, a bigger scale of Jonker Street in Malacca. One night we saw the Szechuan opera, with shadow play, pouring tea from pots with long spouts, ancient musical instruments, and a child-size puppet which showed almost lifelike movements dexterously manipulated with one hand by the operator. Of course the highlight was the well-known Change of Mask, which originated in this province. There were seven people changing masks with the blink of the eye!