Watersplashing in Yongping
Ask for the Watersplashing Festival, or Poshuijie 泼水节, and everyone will tell you to go to Jinghong, capital of Yunnan's Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Region: the 'biggest and best' Dai celebrations to mark their New Year are taking place there. And big it is. Thousands of Han Chinese and foreign tourist flock to Jinghong every year. Jinghong's Poshuijie certainly is big -- and very commercial. If big crowds and big events are your thing, go to Jinghong.
In Huize, the old capital of copper in Yunnan, many splendid guildhalls survive.
Jim Goodman: Children of the Jade Dragon: the Naxi of Lijiang and their mountain neighbours the Yi
In the first half of the 1990s Lijiang had barely made its appearance on the Chinese tourism stage, even less so the then remote mountains of Ningland and Lugu Lake. Jim Goodman's account of the Naxi and the Yi draws back to a time where not everything was staged for mass tourism: an account of a lost world.
A number of Chinese historic texts covering life and politics in Yunnan have survived over the centuries. I have translated a few of them.
Traditional toys in Jianchuan county.
John Israel: Lianda: A Chinese University in War and Revolution
Everyone knows about the Mao's Long March, but a few years later another long march took place: that of Chinese students leaving their cushy campuses on the east coast, trekking all the way to Yunnan where their universities reformed as Lianda, the united university. Kunming, then a total backwater, became a hotbed for new ideas, not just scientific. We liked the section of east coast girls scampering around Mengzi in their latest fashion.
Biggest festival in the Dali region, once Bai New Year.
Unspoiled Weishan boast Yunnan's most beautiful county town, an important Taoist mountain and areas of strong Muslim and Yi tradition.
Upcoming Festivals
| Name | Date |
|---|---|
| Pear Flower Festival | 17 Mar |
| Men's Festival | 17 Mar |
| New Moon Ritual | 19 Mar |
| Aluowuluo | 19 Mar |
| Madeng Trade Fair | 19 Mar |
| Weibaoshan Pilgrimage | 19 Mar |
| Kaixinjie | 19 Mar |
| Benzhu Worship (Fengyu) | 19 Mar |
| Wrestling Festival | 20 Mar |
| Dragon Worship | 20 Mar |
| Dragon Worship | 20 Mar |
| Benzhu Festival | 20 Mar |