October 8 to 13, 2019
Population: 3.3 million
550 miles from Chengdu, 1,615 miles from Beijing
Originally, Salah chose to stay in Kunming to explore the Yunnan area, a mountainous region not far from Tibet, with rice terraces. To the risk of repeating ourselves, we had to book all our destinations - especially lodging - for our visa applications. Even though we wanted e-visas (which did not require a preset itinerary), Salah had made all the hotel reservations. And he was right to do so: when we had to revert back to regular visa applications, we had all these bookings already made and just had to share them with China’s visa services.
I had heard about Kunming twice in my life:
1. It’s in high altitude
Wink back at my 1st job at Airbus, supporting the A320 fleet - that’s when I first heard about Kunming, especially its airport. The engines were struggling to deliver the thrust required and reaching their N1 red limit rather often than not... due to the altitude.
Geography bubble: Kunming is on the Yunnan-Guizhou plateau, at 6,250 ft above sea level, and is surrounded with mountains that don’t seem quite high (like the one we climbed... see below) but are actually between 8,200' to 9,800' of altitude.
2. My grand-father had walked 680 miles to get to Kunming during WWII
His brother recently refreshed my memory, given the fact that I was going there. My grand-father and his siblings were born and raised in Saigon, Indochina. On March 9, 1945, the Japanese, desperate, did a coup in Indochina, which they occupied since 1941 but was still under French commandment. They arrested most of the French civil and military leaders, making 8,500 prisoners and killing 1,000 people. My grand-father, drafted, fled the country with his troop that day, to the risk of being executed too. Several troops fled and that movement was coined the Alessandri’s column (by the name of the General who organized the retreat). These unprepared guys walked 680 miles in the jungle, through Burma and into China, ending the journey in Kunming. I have not known with grand-father (my Dad’s dad) who passed of lung cancer before I was born but I have heard great stories about him.
So, being in Kunming took another dimension, creating a bond with my ancestor. That sky that I was sleeping under, he had seen the same, exhausted of that food-deprived, sleep-deprived journey that had turned lives upside down. How many of his friends had he seen die of hunger, illness or exhaustion? Kunming was the light at the end of the tunnel for these souls - or a springboard (from there, my grand-father enrolled in a training and went to Trincomalee, Sri Lanka, to prepare for a landing in Indochina during the Fall 1945). As we all know, Japan surrendered in August 1945 so he was able to head back to his family in Indochina (which had been proclaimed independent by Ho Chi Minh in September but that’s another story). All this to say that visiting Kunming meant a lot to me (and I could not stop stretching the point to the girls too)... and I was very thankful to go visit the city under peaceful auspices another 74 years later. FYI I will talk more about my family history in Indochina when we visit Vietnam.
Now, let’s move back to our trip…
October 7, the day before departure, we had been to the train station to pick up our tickets (for some reason we omitted to pick them up on arrival) and it was crazy packed. October 8 marks the end of the Golden week and all the vacationers need to be back at work so October 7 is a big travelling day. And we totally experienced it getting in and out of both subway and train stations that were filled with people. Fortunately, picking up tickets was pretty quick. The subway rides were horrible, even when we thought the car was full, people kept pouring in. And when getting off, the platform was filled with travelers and luggage.
The next day, October 8, was smoother, less travelers in the subway and at the train station but still a full train. But the trip to the train station was not uneventful. Departure was at 9h49 and we like to be at the station 1h in advance. When we went through security at the subway station, they noticed the Swiss Army knife that we carry and wanted to check it out. They called some reinforcement, including the police. Even though we couldn’t understand what was said, we knew they would not give it back. Salah was trying to negotiate but Naema started crying because of the tense exchanges. Although it sucks to lose a souvenir from Switzerland, we can get another one. Plus, we will stop getting annoyed by security and their randomness any time we travel. So, we let go! By the way during the whole exchange with the police, we were recorded on a portable webcam that the policewoman was pointing at us. Then, we were good to go to the train station, a 45 minute-ride.
After going through security at the train station, we had to get some food for lunch. Then, we painfully got on the train amongst the Chinese who love cutting lines and have no empathy whatsoever for kids or parents carrying 35 lb backpacks each!
But we shed some weight and left some of our things in the hotel room: 3 books and some stuff that we had not used since we started the trip. Hope this will be used by some.
We took a G train (fastest train) from Chengdu, which took 6 hours to cover 550 miles. Typically, there are 8 to 10 stops along the way so despite the fact that the train runs close to 185 mph, the average speed is much lower.
The trip was flawless: Naema doing homework and reading a French book, Lana doing activities (we are starting to work sight words) and taking a nap.
On the road
Kunming was a huge train station (again). The Chinese seem to have a standard design for train and subway stations because they look very similar from one city to another.
To note: subway was created in 2011 in Xi’an and 2012 in Kunming. Today, they respectively have 5 and 4 lines. Large-scale infrastructure projects emerge quickly in China and continue to grow.
Our host in Kunming had recommended to take a cab to the 3-bedroom apartment because it was only 20 yuan and would be much quicker than public transit (taking 1h). We followed the advice without knowing that the 20 yuan was from another, closer train station. We ended up paying 100 yuan, because the station was much further than our host thought it was, and we hit some traffic because of peak hours.
Note for next time: don’t follow an advice blindly but make our own sounded decision based on facts!
When we got to the apartment, we were in awe because it was spacey, each girl could have their own bedroom, we had a washer. And, there was a shower curtain therefore we would not spray the whole bathroom when taking a shower, unlike many bathrooms we have had.
We went to do some grocery and along the way, found a bakery. The Chinese owner had traveled across Europe and learned bread-making techniques. He makes his bread with French flour and water. We had to try! The next morning, toasted, it was crispy and delicious!
Yay a big apartment!
Before we got to Kunming, we had done some research to go to Lijiang, 3h east of Kunming. It had been recommended by Amid, a former colleague from P&WC and looked awesome. Unfortunately, the trains were full. So, we established that we would focus on the Kunming area this time and put Lijiang on our bucket list for later. We tend to think that we can cover it all in 1 year, well you can see that it’s not the case! Plus, it’s good to keep things for later too… otherwise life would be boring!
Kunming had plenty to discover! And it is known as the “Eternal Spring city” because of flowers blooming all year round and its mild climate. While we were there, temperatures were nice during the day (slightly colder than places we had been before) – we were just wearing a tee-shirt but, in the evening, a light jacket was nice.
Green Lake park
We went to visit the park, central to Kunming. We saw drinking water fountains, which was interesting because, so far, the water in China was not of drinking quality and we have been buying bottled water. Is it linked to the Museum of tap water present in Kunming? hmmm… we have not had the time to investigate!
The park is definitely a hangout for locals! We saw groups of people of all ages dancing and singing, a violin player and some souvenir shops.
Green Lake park (top right picture: cameras are everywhere in China)
We continued on to a neighborhood where an English bookstore is located (to find the next volumes of the Chronicles of Narnia for Naema). The area was surprisingly very cosmopolitan – we saw a lot of expats and foreign students as well as European restaurants, including a place named the French café.
At the bookstore, we could not find Narnia but we found Chinese and Tibetan tales in French that we got for Lana (a nice souvenir for her bookshelves). Salah had noticed a music store where we went to check out the guitars, he even got to play for a few minutes. He was super happy, I think he misses his instruments (which made it safe and sound to Toulouse with the rest of our container)!
Next stop, a glass of wine at the French Café (the 1st one in China due to the high price of bottles and glasses of wine not being available everywhere) and Salah found another guitar there, so he played for us. It was great!
Of course, we bought baguettes for the next morning. Man, this city is nice! 😃 For dinner, we tried a vegan restaurant, managed by a Malaysian girl and her staff. We had fried potatoes and sushi with homemade mayo… wonderful.
Baguette, butter, jam ...or the perfect breakfast 😉
Western Hills
The next day, we went to the very popular Western Hills (or Westmount for our Montreal friends 😜). It is packed on week-ends because it is popular amongst Kunmingnians, so we went on a Friday. The 2018 edition Lonely Planet said that the subway would soon be extended to reach the mountains. In October 2019, the subway station exists. Decision-making seems to be quick in China and execution too. The same thing in Montreal would take a few more years!😉
The hills are 14km away from our place, at the very end of Line 2. When we got out of the station, we were solicited by people selling mini-van rides to the top but we wanted to hike. Then, we went through a strip of street food. Even though we had a picnic, we bought a couple of breads stuffed, one with onions and the other one with rose petals (a specialty of the region). The Chinese love to eat anytime anywhere and it is impossible to starve there. A food stand is never too far (except in Guangzhou see next post).
Western Mounts
Next, we started hiking. The walk up was uninteresting because of no trail but a road shared with cars and frequent bus shuttles.
Ready to hike!
Along the way, there was a thunderstorm and we took refuge in Tai Hua monastery, over 700 years old, we could relax while smelling incense and hearing incantations of on-going prayers.
History bubble: In the 19th century, a Muslim revolt caused the city to lose most of its wealth and caused the destruction of many buddhist temples.
Tai Hua monastery
After the rain, we found a trail and kept going up for 30 minutes of stairs until we reached another touristy place with souvenir shops and restaurants. Naema and Lana were walking non-stop without even a complaint.
From there, we bought tickets for the Dragon’s gate, including a chair lift ride and a shuttle bus back. The 20-minute chair lift ride took us to another peak, and allowed us to enjoy the outstanding views over Lake Dianchi and Kunming.
In the chairlift
From the other summit, we started our hike down. We followed the signs religiously as it was pretty uncrowded and had we missed any, no one would have helped us. We went down a load of stairs, this time, they were carved in the mountain, slippery, unleveled but that was unique! We even went down a flight of underground stairs and tunnels. Eventually, we got to Dragon’s gate, a carved stone edifice and grotto with a Buddha figure. Then we walked along the cliff, continuing down the stone stairway featuring non-slippery treads because of the humidity of the area.
After 30 minutes of continuously walking down, we got to the meeting point where the shuttle took us back to the little touristy place where we had bought the tickets. We had already logged 10km and both girls had walked the whole way… they broke another record! We were getting tired ourselves and given the fact that the walk down was 5km on the road, we decided to take the bus to the subway station.
Views on the lake and Dragon's gate
Once we were back in the city, we wanted to see one of Kunming’s night market but never ended up finding it. After 30 minutes of circling around pointlessly, we took a taxi (our technique has improved since Xi’an ☺️) and got back to the neighborhood of the French café. We ended up at Salvador’s, another café with international food and visitors. We had falafel salad, and chicken quesadillas. Again, it feels so good to be connected to the world out there being through food served or languages spoken there. By the way, we met a Québec couple of retirees there. They had just left their son who is teaching English in China and they will be roaming through South-East Asia until mid-November.
After this long day, Naema had walked 10 miles and Lana somewhere around 8.5 miles. The girls got a certificate the next day for their great achievement!
East and West pagodas
The next day, the last one in Kunming, we thought we would go easy on the walking and just go the pagodas, using the subway. But subway stations are far from one another so we still walked 10km that day.
On our way there, we looked for a restaurant that had moved but the new address had not been updated on Maps.me or google maps (which does not work in China and explains why it is not kept up-to-date). So, we were starving and desperate for food, same as for the night market the day before.
The street between East and West pagodas
We found the East pagoda but decided to first have lunch. We found a gem on the short street separating the 2 pagodas. We tried the across-the-bridge noodles, a typical Yunnan dish, consisting of a hot broth in which ingredients are added: meat, eggs, veggies, flower petals, and rice noodles.
The heat of the soup cooks everything through and the soup becomes infused with all the flavors. It was delicious. We also tried tofu, prepared and baked on the outdoor stove of the restaurant. It had a strong taste (was hard to tell which one) which was not my favorite. We also tried a typical dessert, glutinous pearls with a brown sweet powder (very good).
Then, we were more inclined to visit the landmarks.
History bubble: The pagodas were built between 824 and 859 in the Tang Dynasty. The East pagoda was destroyed by an earthquake (some say it was destroyed by the Muslim revolt in the mid-19th century).
Overall, we loved our stay in Kunming and its openness to other cultures. It felt different after more than 3 weeks in China. Despite the high-rising residential buildings across the city, avenues were large and it didn’t feel suffocating. We noticed that there are very few small wooded parks in the neighborhoods of big Chinese cities (unlike North America). However, in Kunming, there was a river flowing close to our apartment, and which was turning into a social area at night with dance classes, tai-chi, singers and music players.
The girls also loved having a playground right outside our building. This was the 1st one we had come across during our stay, although we saw a lot of street workout parks throughout all cities.
In the end, we were able to find the chronicles of Narnia’s volume 5 for Naema in another bookshop downtown Kunming, in both Chinese and English. She was eager to start as soon as she finished her French book.
Although we walked 31 miles in 5 days, we also took our time at home because the apartment was big enough for the 4 of us. We caught up with our washing, but also cooked, read, homeschooled, and danced on Lion King songs.
Life's good in Kunming!
Coralie
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