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Xi
Shuang Banna is a most southern county of the chinese
Yunnan Province (in green on the map). Located on the
banks of the Lancang (Mekong) River in the Southernmost
part of Yunnan Province, bordering on Myanmar (Burma)
and Laos, is the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture.
The Lancang River links it to the countries in Southeast
Asia, including Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Xishuangbanna
covers a total area of 20000 square km, and is home
to 13 ethnic national minorities groups (mainly the
Han, Dai, Hani, Blang, Lahu, Jino, Yao and Yi). The
local capital is Jinghong city and the district's name
is more Thai than Chinese. "Sip song pan na"
is Thai for "Twelve thousand rice fields",
and that's what the fertile district has been called
among the local Thai, or Dai, population for centuries. |
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As
far as the population of this southernmost part of Yunnan
is concerned, it is indeed more Thai than Chinese. In
this district, the DAIS chinese minority are actually
the majority. Of the district's population of more 650,000,
more than half belong to the Dais who are just as closely
related to the Thais of Thailand as the name suggests.
The Han Chinese make only about a quarter of the population.
Xishuangbanna
can be seen as China's Mini-Thailand, because there is
a similarity of tourist attractions even if Thailand has
indeed a much more developed tourism activity. There is
also a Water Festival, which is equivalent to Songkran
in Thailand, falls on the same date (April 13 to 15),
and has the same traditional meaning of greeting a new
year by the Thai, and Dai, calendar.
Xishuangbanna has a tropical rain forest climate, With
abundant sunshine, plentiful rain and frequent dense fog.
It has a reputation for beautiful subtropical landscapes
and typical folk-culture attractions. Special places of
interest in Xishuangbanna include Ganlanba, Menglun and
the Wild Elephant Valley.
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The
Lancang (Mekong) river spoted 1 hours drive north of Jinhong city.
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mostly a mountainous and tropical environment
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Hundreds
of meters long of ropeway stands 20m above the ground in some
tropical forest sites... |
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impressive hight trees roots off the ground. |
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The Hani (Aini) Minority : |
The
The Hani ethnic group share the same origin with the
Yi and Lahu ethnic groups. According to the historical
records, they all evolved from the ancient Qiang people.
The Qiang people used to be a nomadic tribe living
in the Qinghai-Tibet plateau. Later one branch of
them moved south and early by the 3rd century, their
forefathers had inhabited the swampland along the
Dadu River and Yalong River. In the 7th century, they
immigrated into the area near Mt. Ailao and Mt. Wuliang.
In the Tang and Song dynasties, the Nanzhao and Dali
kingdoms successively reined in this area. The Yuan
Dynasty (1271-1368) established a prefecture to rule
the Hani and other ethnic groups in Yunnan. The Ming
Dynasty (1368-1644) exercised its rule through local
chieftains, who were granted official posts. During
the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) court officials replaced
the chieftains.
The
Hani ethnic group comprises over twenty subgroups.
They used to be called Hani”, Heni”, Budu”,
Biyue”, Yani”, etc. With the founding
of the PRC in 1949, following consultation with the
ethnic group, it was decided to agree upon the official
name of Hani ethnic group.
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The
Hani people have their own language. Their language consists
of three dialects and belongs to the Yi branch of the
Tibetan-Burmese language group of the Chinese-Tibetan
language family. They have no written script in the past
and used to keep records by carving notches on sticks.
In 1957, with the help of the central government, a script
system based on the Roman alphabet was created, but failed
to achieve a popular use. The Hani (also known in adjacent
countries as the Akha) are of Tibetan origin. The Hani
people live wooden houses that are warm in the winter
and cool in the summer. The roofs are flat and used to
dry grain. They stick to the hills, cultivating rice corn
and the occasional poppy. Trading takes place at weekly
markets where the Dai obviously dominate the Hani, who
seem only too keen to scamper back to their mountain retreats.
The practice polytheism and ancestor worship.
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Above,
afirst kind of typical Dai traditional house, converted into a restaurant.
Hereunder,
another typical Dai house, nearby a temple.
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Farmers
working in ricefields. Almost no agricultural modern equipment available
in this county.
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Above,
a Dai Temple's entry with inscriptions written in both Dai
dialect and Chinese.
Inside
the temple, the architecture style and colors are very similar
to the the temples in Thailand.
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