丽江英文介绍

丽江英文介绍 Lijiang: The Heart of Naxi Culture By Li Xu During my first visit to Lijiang, Yunnan Province, I was enchanted by the streams that crisscross the entire city. There are so many of them, looping into dwellings and out of enclosing walls, then disappearing in a maze of narrow streets and back alleys, only to make about-turns and come into sight once again. Quite a few of them run directly into kitchens so that a housewife can fetch water without much ado. These brooks and rivulets, which the local people call "jade streams," flow from the half-kilometer-around Black-Dragon Pool in the north of the city. They are bordered on both sides by dense growths of weeping willow. Quite a few ancient-looking arched stone bridges over them also add a distinctive grace to the landscape. It was not raining the day I arrived, yet the city looked as if newly washed by a downpour. The many-hued flagstone streets were so clean they shone, as did the masonry at street corners. It turned out that it was "Street Washing Day," and river water had been dammed up and released to wash down the roads. The city's name, Lijiang, meaning "beautiful rivers," is derived from its sparkling streams and rivers, one of them being the picturesque Jinsha River. Lijiang, nestled at the foot of the Snowy Yulong Mountains, is bordered on three sides by rivers. Its land takes the shape of a da yan (giant inkslab), and that is why in bygone days it was also known as "Dayan Town.'' Dayan Town was established during the Song-Yuan interregnum, and by the Ming Dynasty it had grown into a settlement of more than a thousand families. In his travelogue, Xu Xiake (1586-1641), a celebrated Ming-dynasty geographer and traveler, described Dayan as a city where brick-and-tile dwellings stood eave to eave with one another, and he was surprised to see that the mansion of the local chieftain was as splendid as the palace of a king. Unlike other ancient Chinese cities, Dayan had no city walls because, it's said, the chieftain who lived in town did not like to put a wall around his surname Mu and thus create (hardship). The ancient city is clustered with shops with courtyards in the back. The streets are laid out on a T-shaped plan. So many Ts are linked and entangled that they form a mind-boggling maze. Lying in the center of the city is Square Street, a six-mu plaza lined on four sides with shops selling every conceivable variety of goods. This is where leather goods, bronzeware and other commodities catering to minority people's needs are distributed. However, Square Street, along with the city of Lijiang, is better known in Yunnan, Tibet and Sichuan as the venue of a horse fair held annually in the sixth lunar month. "Square City" -- a typical example of Naxi architecture.In ancient times Lijiang was known as the "Kingdom of Flowery-hide Horses," a southern Chinese thoroughbred which though small in stature was tenaciously capable of climbing mountains and ravines. During the annual horse fair, Tibetan, Bai and Han people arrived in huge numbers to select and buy these horses. The merchants that frequented the ancient city of Lijiang were mostly Bai people from Dali and Heqing. Today the city's tiny antique and curio shops are attracting buyers with a motley of goods attributed to various ages -- but beware of fakes. Wineshops are numerous in Dayan Town, where a kind of plum wine loved by the local Naxi people is sold. In the past, those who came to town for business would regularly stop by such a wineshop, set their baskets down from their backs onto a streetside counter, and buy a bowl of plum wine to drink, without bothering to find a seat. Today these wineshops, especially those which have been refurbished and are attached to restaurants, are favorites with the city's foreign tourists. Sitting in threes or fours under unusually large lanterns, they love to look out of the latticed windows at the gurgling streams and shifting street scenes, or write in diaries about the day's experiences in the city. They tend to wine and dine in these shops unhurriedly, wearing happy, relaxed countenances. Foreigners visiting Lijiang often choose to stay for some time. A filmmaker from Britain, for instance, lived in Dayan Town for two years for the shooting of a six-hour television documentary about life in a number of Naxi families. The six-hour documentary, entitled "Beyond the Clouds," proved a hit when it was shown in two uninterrupted sections on US public television.