*Long post warning — this one goes on for a while, but there’s some pretty funny stuff if you hang on for a while.

(For all the great pics we took during our stay in Luxi, click here)

Forgive me readers, for I have sinned. It has been weeks since my last meaningful post, and so here is my shot at an act of contrition. Last time I wrote anything worthwhile, we were heading into the southwestern corner of Fujian (福建西南角) right before Spring Festival (春節).

Entrance to Shengwu Lou, falling apart in many places. By Andy

Once we had a night of sleep under our belts, we headed out into the villageside of Luxi (蘆溪鎮鄉村) to scope out the famous sister tulou (姐妹土樓) for which the city is apparently famous, even though most people had no idea where they were. Tulou #1, named Shengwu Lou (繩武樓), the first one we came across, defaced on the side facing the river with Maoist propaganda, was like a miniature Chinese rendition of the Roman Coliseum, made of earth and nestled amongst the rolling green mountains. As terribly magnificent the giant structure was to look at from the outside, it has clearly been the victim of historical stagnation (因凝滯而腐蝕).

The stucco exterior was cracked and falling apart in many places, and on the inside, it was mostly quiet, with most doors barricaded or otherwise locked. A woman emerged from the only open door and, as we were becoming used to, invited us inside her apartment within the tulou for some tea. Shortly thereafter, her husband, Mr. Ye (葉, everybody in Luxi is named Ye) entered the dark, damp, cave-like dwelling and took over tea-pouring duties. As he talked to us, his daughter of six jumped up and down from a wooden chair onto the stone block floor, and his wife tidied the tight apartment of maybe 30 square meters, dumping waste water into the slit in the floor, a feature apparently all tulou share.

Mr. Ye was born in the building, but like most young Chinese moved away to the city — in his case nearby Zhangzhou — to scrape together a living through hard labor (以苦工謀生). A few years ago when his father passed away, he moved back to his ancestral home to be one of only two families living in the giant, three-story structure which previously accommodated as many as 18 families at once. Mr. Ye, who pulls in between 10-20,000 yuan a year on — surprise! — pomelo trees, would love to move out of the “shabby house (破房子),” but he can’t afford to build a concrete home on the outside like anybody else as he doesn’t have family sending money back from the cities. Fortunately for Mr. Ye, a tall, thin man who speaks a rustic Mandarin very slowly, his shabby old house might promise some new revenue soon.

Alexis walking around Shengwu Lou. Big enough for ya? By Andy

“The government wants to renovate this tulou and charge admission. That will be very good for our family.” How would that be good for your family, I asked, since it would mean that the place would become like a museum?

“If they renovate it, they promised to give me a position as custodian, paying me to open and close the gate every day. Then we’ll have a little more money.”

He then took us on a tour of the tulou, not telling us much about its history since he himself knows next to nothing about the place where he was born and plans to continue living on in a functionary role. Before we left, he told us how a Dutch woman had lived with him for a week-long experience and how she had given him money for it. When he told Alexis, “Can you give me a little money? We don’t need much, just a little would be enough,” we knew that his prior offer to make us lunch carried ulterior motives, and we took our leave in the direction of Shengwu’s sister building. Say what you will about Mother Theresa and her kind, there’s something about being asked for charity that makes us uncomfortable, even though we’re clearly aware that our upbringing affords us a hell of a lot more opportunity than our poor host. Something about the lack of dignity in it, I suppose.

Zhibi Tulou surrounded by the expansion corridor were originally intended to house 1000 members of the Ye clan. Nestled between two giant mountains full of green green pomelo trees, it remains majestic to this day. By Andy

So we cut a line across the little village and Andy, never at a loss to spot photo ops (不曾忽視照相良機), led us over the muddiest hill of pomelo trees you ever saw, at the top of which we looked down to see, well, just look at the photo of it! Sometimes when we’re cruising around the armpits of China (such as the Pearl River Delta, from where I presently write), it’s easy to forget that there are some spectacular sights in this country despite its best self-destructive efforts.

Down the mountain, we came across the Zhibi Building (植碧樓), crusted with a very repugnant goddamn red star (which I suppose in reality we should be thankful for, since the place likely would have been sacked by the Red Guards without it). Inside Zhibi, an energetic, short, older gentleman surnamed — get ready for a shock — Ye ran out to greet us. “My nephew from Shengwu called and said you’d be coming! I know everything about these buildings – I can show you around!”

And show us around he did, pointing out every minute detail of the giant round castle covered in intricate wooden carvings in which he and several generations of his family had been born. “This building is 168 years old, a full 13 years older than the younger sister building you just saw, but much less ancient than the Hakka tulou on which our tulou are based.” “Look at the indentations on the doors facing south — that’s to keep the sun from coming in!” “All the drains in the individual apartments run to the local irrigation ditch!” “The well water in here has sweeter water than at the other building” “See that coffin up on the roof — our family has been making mummies for centuries! (我們這裡好幾百年都在做木乃伊!)”

Hold on, did you just say mummies? God knows if he’s full of crap, but he swears on his life that there are mummies on the property and that a book will be released soon comparing them to their Egyptian counterparts. Coming to a Barnes and Noble near you…? Anyhow, he was a swell guy, and after a long tour of the building, which despite being smaller than the first, still houses 5 families, he led us around the back corridor, introducing us to every Ye who crossed our path on the way. Apparently a long time ago the very powerful Ye family planned to fill the equally sized apartments of the round castle with its progeny and then began to build the surrounding rows of houses to take in the overflow. The original plan was to make a giant ring around the original tulou and eventually house over a thousand Ye’s, but their plan was cut short by that pesky Japanese invasion, followed by years of political turbulence. As such, the Ye family compound remains as you see it in the picture.

Eventually Mr. Ye took us around to his own house, which he had built recently to allow his nephew to occupy his own apartment in the tulou, for tea. Mr. Ye is quite the renaissance man actually (as much as one can be expected in rural Fujian at least). Having been a primary school math teacher for years, he speaks Mandarin far better than most people his age. He grows all his own vegetables and rice, in addition to keeping some pomelo trees, pigs, ducks, and chickens. In his storage room, he showed us all his culinary exploits: giant vats of rice, hanging rice cake (米粿), curing meat (臘肉) and sausages, vats of pickled mustard greens (酸芥菜) — a local specialty — and last but not least, two fifty liter plastic trash cans full of fermenting red rice wine (紅米酒) — the other local specialty. What was best was his attitude about development: “Yes, our area is undeveloped, and we don’t have any jobs for the young people, but as for staying alive, we know how to do everything on our own. If there’s development, and the government gives people jobs, then that’s good. If not, we peasants will survive — we don’t care! (我們農民無所謂!)”

Old Teacher Ye pours us some of his finest Tieguanyin while we chat. By Andy

As we talked, his wife, who speaks only Hokkien, scurried around silently preparing us a lunch of rice cakes, pork, pork liver, and duck. After the lunch, Mr. Ye explained that his son would be working in Zhangzhou during the Chinese New Year holiday, and so he’d be honored to host us in his house for Chuxi (link) dinner (除夕年飯), after which we’d really understand the flavor of rural Chinese life (你們跟我們過一個農村春節吧，這樣你們才會了解中國農村生活的味道!)

After an initial idiotic hesitation (I don’t know why we don’t automatically accept such good offers), we decided to accept his offer, and headed back to our hotel for some early rest. The next day would surely be chock full of shenanigans. And boy was it.

Shortly after we woke up on Chuxi (除夕), the functional equivalent of New Year’s eve, the owner of our hotel came up to our room to give us the gifts of: a jar of pickled duck feet, a 2 kilo bag of peanuts, three strings of sausage, and five kilograms (no, not liters) of red rice wine in what looked like a giant motor oil bottle. He didn’t want us to feel left out of the festivities and gave us the traditional gifts for the holiday. Awesome.

The long corridor around Zhibi, much much more full of energy a day later on Chuxi. By Andy

Around noon, we decided it would be a real waste to leave that five kg bottle uncracked and started rocking back the really pungent rice wine, until around 3pm, when we had sufficiently pre-gamed (God knows why we thought this was necessary) the festivities. Then, since we are men after all, we splurged 300 yuan on three of the most gigantic fireworks munitions you’ve ever seen, and slowly trudged through the cold rain toward Mr. Ye’s. On what would have been a dismal thirty minute walk to Zhibi Lou with abusively heavy boxes of fireworks on our shoulders, a very kind man driving a pickup truck told us to pile in and that he’d take us there, since it was New Year and it’s always good to help people in need.

An old woman working in the pomelo fields, a very ubiquitous sight around Luxi. By Andy

Once we arrived at the long corridor around Zhibi, which was teeming with young kids throwing fireworks in every direction, Mr. Ye was waiting for us, having been told by a relative in town who had called him that three foreigners were coming his direction. You gotta love the imbedded information networks out in the villages around here. Unfortunately, I had misunderstood what he had said about showing up “any time after 3pm,” since he and his wife had already eaten at 3pm. We presented our host with the traditional gifts of a jar of pickled duck feet and three strings of sausages (peanuts make a pretty good rice wine snack) and set down the No matter, he said, we’ll warm it all up again! And so his wife, never without a smile on her face, dutifully set about warming up all the delicious plates, pickled vegetables, turnip strips, duck, chicken, pork, rice cakes, and more. It might have been a most memorable meal, except that about five minutes into it, two prominent men showed up in Mr. Ye’s house.

The two new Mr. Ye’s, one in his 30s with a full mustache, and one in his late 50s with a rotund pot belly, fervently welcomed us to their little village and took seats at the table with us. “I’m the village party secretary (我是村委書記),” said the younger one, “and he is the former village chief (他以前是我們的村長)!” Once these two characters joined themselves to the party, the mild sipping of red rice wine which old teacher Ye had entreated us to drink slowly was usurped by wild drainings of the glass (乾杯) every five minutes. The party secretary was telling us with a really desperate look in his eyes about the improvements to local life the government had afforded and some of his experiences in the military in Vietnam (who knew they were still going to Vietnam?), but then at some point in there, we all slipped over the deep end.

“I need to go take a walk,” said Andy suddenly before slipping out of the door. I was seeing double, and old Teacher Ye took me over to the sitting area for some tea to sober me up. Alexis was overflowing with jubilation and got taken on another village tour by yet another relative named Ye. After about thirty minutes of intense shots of tieguanyin tea, I finally remembered that Andy was out somewhere probably face down in the mud, and so I ran out to figure out what the hell had happened to him.

“I’m on the mountain,” he slurred to me on his cell phone. It turned out that he had hidden himself on top of the muddy pomelo mountain and had just been staring at the thousands of little explosions going on everywhere. We managed over probably another thirty minutes to convince ourselves that we were sober enough to rejoin civilization and scurried back into the village to find Mr. Ye. It was at this time, 5pm, just minutes after dusk, that we had all those fireworks.

“You need to set those off now, while all the kids are still excited!” But, but, but… what will we do after midnight, when it’s the most exciting? “Don’t worry about that. You just need to use yours now.” We weren’t accustomed to being told what to do with our own explosives, but the masses of little pyromaniacs assembled outside his door at the time were menacing enough to convince us to drop our complaints. The little brats were so damn excited about our lighting the fireworks that we were forced to light them all in rapid succession, thus watching all 300 yuan of munitions go off in one quick spurt (video), a real disappointment actually. Thankfully we were still drunk enough not to care too much.

The rest of the night was somewhat of a blur, meeting various Ye’s and hearing all sorts of backgrounds and stories, this one manager in a factory in Shenzhen, that one chef in a restaurant in Xiamen, and of course lots and lots of pomelo farmers. Around 9pm, we were starving, and Mr. Ye’s wife again reheated all the food and set it out on the table, never once the whole time speaking to us directly or deigning to sit at the table while the men ate. After our last round of food, the whole place was actually starting to die down, and we realized why he had told us to set off the fireworks so early. It turns out that these country LBXes have a really quiet New Year when compared to the weeklong endless simulated aerial bombardments of Beijing and Shanghai.

So we thanked Mr. Ye profusely and bid his family adieu before trudging through the mud back toward the town, where we figured we might find more action. Another nice man with a truck saw us, and in the holiday spirit gave us yet another lift. What happens next is probably a little too complicated for this blog, since it involves more fireworks, more rice wine, a 2 hour long emotional outpouring of all the grievances of all three of us against the others (it just all gushed out for some reason around 10pm), and a session of drinking Heinekens and eating dumplings filled with tiny, dried shrimp with the hotel owner in his kitchen around 2am. All in all, it was a very interesting day.

We woke up on the day of New Year with the most crushing hangover I’ve ever had outside of the one time I was sent to the hospital in college (never ever ever drink cheap rum or homemade rice wine in large quantities! It’s always a bad idea). All three of us felt like death until late that night, and so the day was devoted largely to sitting in bed and watching movies. On the second day of New Year, now starving because everything in the countryside is closed for at least a week around the holiday, we mustered up all our manhood and strength to brave out into the cold rain and finally leave Luxi, as locational stagnation was already destroying our souls.

From there we wound through Hakka territory for several days without any stories of much interest. I am unhappy to report that the famous Tulou of Fujian have become a commercialized Disneyland-like hellhole full of exorbitant entrance tickets, which we, of course, refused to buy on principal. Thankfully we saw some of the last, unrestored Tulou and got to spend a wonderful Spring Festival right next to one, maybe one of the last such Festivals that tulou will see before it gets restored into tourism oblivion.

Then it was several days across the giant swath of Guangdong that the Hakkas occupy and finally to Shenzhen and Hong Kong, where all the visa chicanery went down. Ok, this is already epic, so I’ll put an end to it and bid all a pleasant March evening.