Slideshows Yunnan
Honghe Hani and Yi Autonomous Prefecture 红河哈尼族彝族自治州

The 1846 murals at Luose Temple 罗色庙 on the southern side of Yilong Lake 异龙湖 near Shiping 石屏 depict an Yi battle against the Ming army. (Photographed through a crack in the door)

Market day in Shiping's Guanyin Temple Alley 观音寺巷 appears almost unchanged from twenty years ago.

Laoxudian 老旭甸 in Shiping 石屏 has been dubbed Fossil Village 化石村 as the houses are built from sandstone containing many fossilised plants. In a region mostly inhabited by Yi, this village is entirely Han with the families from the Zhou 周 clan.

New business, new festivals. Mushrooms, once a free addition to the local diet, are now big business in Yunnan. In the mountains north of Shiping the mushroom season now has its own festival, mixing Yi and Han influences.

The merchants of Shiping grew rich on the tin trade at the beginning of the century. Their family fortunes did not survive the times but some of their residences did. The communist revolution saw the families turned out of their homes and those that took their place were often too poor to modernize the buildings, leaving them largely intact. Today a number have been converted into lifeless museums, but others are inhabited by families who can claim them as home for half a century.

Stinky Tofu from Shiping 石屏臭豆腐 is a Yunnan delicacy. Here we have a look at how it is made. Bon appétit.

Bisezhai, near Mengzi, was once the second most important train station in Yunnan: passenger services between Kunming and Hanoi stopped here overnight and later a branch railway connected to the mines near Gejiu and Shiping. A fuel depot, ware-houses, accommodation for railway personnel, even a Greek-run guesthouse all developed around the station.

Mile County's Yi seem to specialize in a novel kind of festival: exclusively performed for paying photographers with a competition between the villages of who can host the most outrageous event. Hongwan went first and now a number of other villages have followed suit. This one here in Taowa eschews nudity but compensates with a not so novel use of big gourds. But everyone seemed to like it.

At the end of the Dragon Worship, which is now largely a paid-for performance for the benefit of photographers, each household in Taowa village receives a tray of food, each different. Here are some of them.

The Huayao Yi in Shiping are some of the best dressers in the province. Here they are seen at the Longpeng Mushroom Festival.

An invention to drive photographers to this remote township in Honghe county? If so, dressing Hani girls and women in hotpants has certainly worked, but the annual Girls' Festival is still one of the most enjoyable events in the province.

Chengzi 城子 is a beautiful Yi village in Luxi 泸西 county with hundreds of adobe dwellings nestled together on a hillside. In summer the red of the houses contrasts with the green of the rice fields below, while in autumn the yellow maize drying on the flat roofs gives a different dash of colour.