Chen Lu, An Ancient Chinese City

Here's a preview of what we experienced on Friday this week.

This is the letter Kim wrote to our family this week.  I'll let his words be my blog post today. 

Yesterday I had the most memorable and meaningful experience that I have had in all the places we’ve been to, and all the things we have done in China.  Our good friend Meghan who teaches with us and lives in the Expert Building with us, took us on a day trip to the ancient Chinese city of Chen Lu.  She rented a car for the day and the driver picked us up at 8:30 in the morning.  He drove us out of Xi’an on the freeway towards the mountains.  It was interesting to get a new perspective of the city, rather than the crowded streets, buses, and subways.  Their freeways look very much like our own.  As we got closer to the mountains, it reminded me of driving west out of Denver towards the mountains on I-70.  We headed up through the mountains on the freeway, then got to some more open farmland.  After an hour or so we got off the freeway and came to a very interesting smaller city.  I would have loved to explore it.  The traffic was terrible.  We sat without moving for almost an hour. :(

After leaving this city we headed up into the mountains.  They were all terraced like Guilin, but with wheat instead of rice.  The paved road ended and changed to a terrible dirt road.  Our driver decided not to go any further and turned around. He found an old man on the side of the road whom I assume told him about a detour to take.  We took the bumpy dirt-road detour.  I was in front and Rhonda and Meghan were in the back laughing.  Bottom line, we finally made it to the top of the mountain where the ancient city of Chen Lu is.  When I say ancient, I mean ancient.  It was so interesting.  It is famous for making ceramic pots.  The streets and paths are all made of broken pieces of pottery. 

 

This woman was digging up her courtyard getting ready to plant her garden.

Meghan had been there before and arranged to have lunch with one of the local families.  Life changing experience!  This family was so poor, but so happy and gracious.  They lived in a 2 room cave type house.  They wanted to give us a tour.  They were so proud that their house had 2 rooms, not just one.  I saw no running water in the house.  They had an outhouse outside in their courtyard that was shared with several families.  They had one big bed in the corner, no mattress, just hard vinyl covering with pillows and blankets stacked in the corner.  The mother of the house showed us her kitchen. They showed us a picture book of their 2 grandchildren.  Her husband and their son was there helping with the meal. They were always smiling and so happy to have us in their home. 

 

The Daughter-in-Law and Grandson.  He wasn't sure what to think of us!

They started the meal with some kind of yellow tea.  I don’t know what it was, but it was hot and drinkable.  Then they brought us out a bowl full of English walnuts and a nutcracker.  We cracked a few and ate them, but they wanted us to eat more.  I’m sure they were a special treat for them.  When we left they insisted on filling our pockets with walnuts.  They brought out two bowls of food.  Hard to describe them, not sure I’ve seen that kind of food before.  One bowl was cooked greens, looked almost like spinach with sticks in it.  Cautiously I tried it.  It really tasted good.  Not sure what it was.  The other bowl also contained something I’ve never seen before.  It was light brown, looked kind of like noodles but flaky.  Tasted like potatoes.  We asked if it had potatoes in it and they said no.  It was DELICIOUS!  I loved it.  Neither dish was spicy.  Then she brought out a huge plate of homemade dumplings and a big round piece of thick flat bread.  She was so proud of them.  They also were delicious.  There was more food than 10 people could eat.  When we were done, we went to pay them.  We decided to give them 100 yuan, which is about $15.  They immediately said, No no no.  They thought it was way too much.  Megan gave them the 100 yuan note and they tried to give her back change.  They really had nothing compared to what we have, but would have gladly fed us for nothing.

This woman sold us some whistles.

We loved the smile on this man's face as he carried his bucket of coal.

I think I want one of these vehicles.

One of the more prestigious walkways--but they were all made from pieces of pottery.

You don't pipes like this everywhere you go!

Of course, we had to buy some pottery.  BEAUTIFUL!

This is the man that told us to go on up and visit the school. 

After lunch we wondered through the village.  A Kodak moment every 10 feet.  We came across what looked like a school.  I wanted to take a look, but it had a large medal gate that was locked with guards inside.  I was ready to turn back, but Meghan, who is so adventurous and knows some Chinese, asked the guards if we could come in.  We showed them our XISU faculty cards and told them that we were teachers from America.  They let us in and called, whom I assume was their principal.  He was a young man in his early 30’s.  He spoke a few words of English.  He called one of his teachers to come out.  She spoke a bit more English.  I showed them pictures of my school in Lehi.  They then invited us to come in.  School was just getting out and the students were leaving for the day.  It turned out to be a preschool.  The children were 3 to 5 years old.  I shook hands with the children and Rhonda and Meghan sang, Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree to them.  They were soooooo cute!  After the kids left, the teachers wanted to show us their classrooms and their students’ artwork.  We were celebrities.  I don’t think there has ever been a westerner in their school. It was a nice but very modest building, but you could tell that they were very proud of it.  After lots of picture taking and handshaking we left.  LIFE CHANGING EXPERIENCE.

Each classroom door had a Mickey Mouse Balloon engraving.

Rhonda speaking:  After visiting the school, we made our way back through the village, bought some more pottery and thrilled the villagers just by being there.

The "crowd" that gathered to watch us purchase pots.

These men were thrilled when Kim gave this man an American dollar.

Back to Kim: Finally we made our way back to the “main drag” of town where they were selling beautiful ceramics.  We bought lots.  There was a vase that Rhonda wanted.  She couldn’t decide between two that she liked.   She asked how much and the man said 100 Yuan.  She told him OK, then he picked it up and wrap both in newspaper and sold them to her for 100.  She would have bought one for that price.  I bought a beautiful vase with an dragon on it.  After I paid the guy, I pulled out a $1 bill and gave it to him.  You would have thought I gave him a million dollars.  I had to have my picture taken with him and the dollar bill and all his buddies.  

A bit of confusion here....am I safe to enter?

Rhonda: This was my favorite place we have visited, including everywhere we went last year.  These people live very simple lives, but they seem to be happy and content.  We could learn a lot from them.