Countryside

Here is a typical Dai village in the middle of rice paddies near Mengzian on the flat bottomed valley between Jinghong and Menghun.

Ganlanba was interesting but it was almost exclusively Dai so I decided to spend a Saturday night in Menghun to see the various minorities in that flock in for the weekend market.

Countryside

No, it is not a shrine, it's only a well built Dai water well.

Mengxian

In most Dai villages, the beautiful wooden Dai houses that I love so much are being replaced by tile-faced brick houses, generally of the standard two-storied Chinese model. This new house has at least retained some of the typical Dai style!

Mengxian

An American tourist I met complained that the new bathroom tiled Chinese style houses were a terrible eye sore ruining the beauty of the land but she did reluctantly agree that if she had to choose, she would prefer to live in a brick house with running water and modern toilet facilities than in one of the old drafty wooden houses.

Menghun

Tractor taxis waiting for the crowd in front of the hotel where I stayed in Menghun. I paid only 13 Yuan (1.60US$) for a large clean room.

Menghun

The wine and spirits shop next door was ready for business...

Menghun

A little ways up the street, some Dai ladies were bagging rice paddy on the Menghun rice drying platform.

Menghun market

These two friendly Dai ladies had fruit stands in front of my hotel. They did not understand a word of English but we somehow managed to communicate and they were most helpful in identifying the various nationalities of the people I discretely pointed to. I was also helped in this manner by a gentleman selling crispy fried pork rinds in the market who could speak a little English.

I hope that I understood their indications correctly and did not make too many mistakes in what follows on this page and the next.