Zhangzhou Changtai (Xiamen's Backyard)

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AmoyMagic--Guide to Xiamen & Fujian
Copyright 2001-7 by Sue Brown & Dr. Bill Order Books Xiamenguide Forum
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Set browser for Simplified Chinese! Changtai Journey
Chángtài ,Xiamen's "Backyard"
长泰，厦门的后花园
(Fujian Sites Page 4)
Zhangli--Light Side of a Dark Decade
The Wenchangge Pagoda
Closed Cycle Recycle
The Falls That Doesn't (fall, th:at is)!
Fujian'sw Biggest Tree--sort of
Mountain Goat Stone Fortress
Lindun Town Old Village Wall林敦—古城墙
Opium Baron’s Manor鸦片大王的房子
Humorous Cultural Revolution Tales:
3=12, Sometimes! Mice & Men
4 She Tribe Surnames Ring a Bell
Fishy Tales
Python in the Power Station
Tourists Flip Over Mǎyángxī Kayak Center 马洋溪皮划艇训练中心
A Driven Driver

Click for Page 1: Intro to Fujian, and Quanzhou
Click for Page 2: Zhangzhou Journey
Click for Page 3: Dongshan Island--Fujian's Hawaii 东山岛，福建的夏威夷
Info adapted from Magic Fujian, Fujian Adventure, Mystic Quanzhou, Amoy Magic, Discover Gulangyu, etc. Note: Zhangzhou was also spelled Changchow

Continued from "Dongshan Island" page.... In the meantime…let’s head to Changtai, “Xiamen’s Backyard,” and Kayaking capital of China!
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Changtai—Xiamen’s Backyard
Free of frogs 328 days a year! Or so claims the brochure. They also boast average raindrops of 1.5 meters. But I finally figured out the English brochure really meant frost, not frogs, and rainfall, not raindrops. Even so, Changtai is an amazing place, regardless of rainfall or frogs.

Stone Age pygmies settled Changtai, but later the tattooed folk were displaced by the She minority, who appreciated such a mild climate (free of frogs?) that locals can reap three harvests a year of dozens of varieties of grains, vegetables, and some of China’s best citrus.

General Chen Yuanguang led an army from Henan to Guangzhou, then up to Zhangzhou, and finally to Changtai, which became a county in AD 955. General Chen brought not just military might but also central plains culture, technology, and arts. The She that had not already fled intermarried with the Han, though Changtai’s Banli remains a She village to this day.

Chinese not only have a long history, but also a memory longer than an elephant’s. A Zhangpu village forbids marriage to anyone named Chen because of a disagreement with General Chen—1000 years ago. And a Shanghang hamlet forbids marriages between a Liu and a Wang because a Wang tried to usurp a Liu’s throne—over 2,000 years ago.
I hope I never get on any local’s blacklist!11

Zhangli—The Light Side of a Dark Decade!
I set out for Changtai in Toy Ota after first picking up my two guides for the day: the acclaimed writer Mr. Zhangli (??)and historian Mr. Gongjie (??).

Zhangli had a special place in his heart for Changtai, which we visited many times together. The irrepressible Zhangli was the image of health, and I had no idea it was my last trip with him. He passed away two months later—but he last left his mark on many lives, including my own.
Like millions of urban Chinese, Zhangli was sent to the countryside during the Cultural Revolution, but nothing could break his sense of humor. He had endless hilarious stories about the light side of a very dark decade.
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Zhangli eventually returned to labor as a lowly dockworker in Xiamen. After writing stories in his spare time he was hired by XMTV. Over the years he wrote five TV series, (the author played the bad guy in one), one movie, and six books. He received 33 awards for writing, including 7 national level and 15 provincial. He most enjoyed writing his highly acclaimed children’s book. “It was easy,” he said. “It just flowed, and I finished it in only two months. Children laugh at it, and enjoy it.”

For all his brilliance, Zhangli was a child at heart, and best illustrated to me the truth of the Bible verse, “Except ye become as children, ye shall not enter the kingdom.” I trust he’s there now.

Xiamen Museum Curator, Professor Gongjie (??) also accompanied us to show us what he believes is a newly recognized fifth style of Fujian architecture—the Stone Fortress (shibao, or ??). It is hidden away so deeply in a remote Changtai valley that we’d have never found it without him—or perhaps never have come back! For as in Middle Earth,

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Lord of the Rings”

Changing Changtai In my eyes every Road or Sea is a path to new adventures—even if I’ve been up that road a dozen times. And as Toy Ota forged west on the 319 National Highway toward Changtai, I imagined myself once again driving Toy Ota to the otherworldly Himalayan heights of Tibet. Someday. But today my meandering was more mundane. Just west of Jiaomei town I cut a right and ascended the narrow road separating Xiamen from ancient Changtai—and found adventure in my own backyard!
I thought I was in the absolute middle of nowhere until I saw a highway worker in an international orange safety vest pulling weeds from between the giant boulders piled helter-skelter on the mountains. It reminded me that in China there is no ‘nowhere,’ for every place in the country has been inhabited and explored for the past 5,014 years.

The Wenchangge Pagoda (???) hailed us from a distance as we approached Changtai. It was first built during the Tang Dynasty, and has been struck twice by lightning. It burned down during the Ming Dynasty and was rebuilt in stone. The stone eventually collapsed, and it was rebuilt yet again in the year 2000. Given its record—I’ll admire it from a safe distance.
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Modern, clean Changtai City is worlds apart from the backward hamlet I first visited several years ago. Only a few years ago the river was a dark, smelly channel for local factories’ pollutants. Today, the pristine river is China’s Kayaking Capital!

Like Xiamen’s former mayor Hong Yong Shi, Changtai’s young magistrate, Mr. Yang, determined to avoid the West’s “pollution then solution” approach to development. He closed many polluting factories and set strict controls on the rest, and restricted the quarrying that was scarring the scenic mountains that have inspired centuries of poets and artists. Where only five years ago decrepit buildings once lined the river, there is now a broad park and a clean white pavilion.

Closed-Cycle Recycling Changtai recycles waste from 30,000 dairy cows. Cow urine provides methane for cooking and lightning, and manure provides fertilizer for the mushrooming fruit and mushroom industries.
Reforms and tightening the belt were tough at first, but today Changtai is a model for other counties that seek to balance development and ecological preservation.

The Falls That Doesn't Fall “Shorts and sandals!” Zhangli exclaimed, as we set out on a hike to Baizhangya Falls (?? ???)

“But you said we were walking to the waterfall!” I said.
“That’s true,” Zhangli said, and he laughed. And when they hauled out hoes, machetes and pickaxes, I knew we were doomed.
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We hacked more than hiked across hills blanketed in bushes with beautiful white flowers—and enough thorns to make us regret wearing shorts. And the trail’s rough rocks cut into our thin sandals. But the lush valley was beautiful, and the turquoise river roared over giant polished boulders flung across its path. It was a river rafting paradise. But there was a serpent in paradise.

A green bamboo viper slithering through ferns half half a meter off the trail blended in so well no one else saw him. I motioned to the others, and pointed. One guy almost fainted, but another took videos. The viper eyed us intently, but fearlessly. He was one of nature’s deadliest snakes, and knew it.

Power from On High A hydroelectric plant in this natural grandeur jars the senses about like a crayon drawing in a Van Gogh exhibit. This eyesore lies on the disputed bordern between Anxi and Changtai counties, and is the reason that Baizhangya falls rarely falls anymore. Unless tourists are coming, Anxi diverts the flow and this mighty 70 meter falls looks more like something Mother Nature delegated to a husband with prostate problems.

The Taiwanese who invested $250,000 USD in the falls for tourism was fit to be tied.12 “This falls is unique,” he said. “The rock at the bottom looks like a leaping carp, and when the water falls heavily, the mouth appears to open and shut. I can show you the video!”

I too was indignant. “I should draw a cartoon of tourists visiting a dry falls, with Anxi people above turning off the faucet.” But every coin has two sides—and an edge. Susan Marie said, “You could also draw Changtai tourists enjoying the falls and Anxi peasants reading by candlelight.”

I hope to visit the falls again someday, but I’ll phone ahead first to make sure the water’s turned on.

From Changtai city we took the road’s north fork (because there wasn’t a chopstick) and insinuated ourselves deeper into remote narrow valleys that harbored tigers and foxes right into the 1960s. Changtai is still a haven for rare pangolin (a scale-covered ant eater, like an armadillo), 100-year-old giant tortoises, wolves, mountain goats, wild boar, and plenty of snakes.

An odd round pagoda like a Mongolian yurt has a Hindu-looking tower above. I was told it was built by the Mongol conquerors, who I was told were influenced somewhat by Tibetan Lamaism. A small tree and sign in the middle of the road announced the humble hamlet of Shanchong (山重村).

Fujian's Biggest Tree? A villager boasted, “This 700-year-old tree is Fujian’s biggest!”
I said, “I thought the biggest trees were in West Fujian.”
He was undaunted. Grinning, he said, “Well, it’s the biggest to us anyway.”
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Mountain Goat Stone Fortress (ShanYangLou 山羊搂) was built in 1623 as a defense against the “midget barbarians” (the rather derogatory Chinese term for Japanese pirates, but its no wonder they bore little love for them).

October 16th, 1580, the Japanese attacked. Over 1000 locals created the Prosperous Peace Army (Fu’anjun, 副安军), which was to fight off Japanese attacks for over a century.

The three story Stone Fortress’ walls are 1.6 meters thick at the base, 90 centimeters at the top, and 6 meters high. The holes in the wall were for cannon that shot jagged bits of metal.

Granny acted like foreign devils dropped by every day! She grinned, adjusted the baby strapped on her back, and said, in the local dialect, “M’dei!” Have some tea! (The English word “tea” comes from the Minnan “dei.”).

Like a magician casting spells, Granny waved her arms about as she gave us the penny tour of the cluttered courtyard and old stone house. She led us up the narrow wooden stairs to the upper loft. Almost everything, from cradle to furniture, was handmade.

Wooden farm implements, darkened with age, looked like museum exhibits.
Their design probably hasn’t changed in 1,000 years, but there’s no point in reinventing the wheel. Their ancient implements do the job. So does their homemade dump truck!

We bid granny and company farewell, then headed for Lindun town. It was close as the fly flies but we had to go around a mountain to get there so it took almost an hour.

Lindun Town Our first stop in Lindun (林敦, “Forest of Honesty”) was the hot springs restaurant. It was run by Mr. Lin, which was no surprise since most Lindun people are surnamed Lin. The foyer had a large painting of the Lin in charge back during the Ming Dynasty. Before the painting was a round wooden table with offerings of incense, cups of tea, nuts, flour-coated peanuts, and a bottle of mineral water to quench the extinguished gentleman’s thirst.
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Lindun Lunch included fat noodles, similar to Japanese Udon noodles. Even the pronunciation, “oudong,” was similar. It turned out they were imported from Japan. How ironic—importing midget barbarian noodles!
Wild mountain plants and “green” veggies (no pesticides or fertilizers) figured heavily on the menu. Green vegetables are so popular now that many towns have ‘green markets,’ and Wuyi Mountain even has an annual “Green Food Exhibition.”
We enjoyed fish with green peppers, pork, long mussels, clay pots of bitter melon and large intestines (which took guts13 to get down), and boiled mountain goat that was tougher than shoe leather (sole food, perhaps). I could not sink my teeth into it—but neither could anyone else. This really got the host’s goat14, and the goat was sent back to the kitchen.

Tofu I love tofu--fried or fried, oiled or boiled, I’ll eat it. But Spirit Mountain Tofu (神仙豆腐 Shenxian Doufu) turned out to be not tofu but beans and potatoes, which a Hunan factory processes into a delightful flowery, chewy, tofu-like substance.

While I feasted on fake tofu and other delights, Zhangli regaled us with Humorous Cultural Revolution-era Tales:

3 = 12, sometimes! Or so said Zhangli. When he was sent to the countryside, peasants met him at the bus stop, grabbed his bag, and said follow us, then lead him up a narrow mountain trail.
“How far?” Zhangli asked.
“About 3 li (about ? mile).”
An hour later Zhangli asked, “How much further?”
“About 3 li,” they said. And later he was told a third time, “About 3 li.” It turned out to be 12 li, not 3. The farmers were afraid that if Zhangli knew the trust from the outset he’d have balked, so they didn't tell him the truth until he was too far to turn back.

Four She Surnames. Zhangli said the She minority got their four names in this manner. A maiden married a dog, and when the first child was born, lightning struck—so it was named Lei. The second child was put in a basket, so named Lan. The third child was placed in a pot, so named Pan, and bells tolled for the fourth’s birth, so it was named Zhong.

I’ve not met very many Zhongs, but I guess the name does ring a bell.
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Nothing to Lose Then Changtai She have a secret totem, but in 1983, they allowed an outsider to view it after making him vow not to photograph it or write about it. He broke his vow, they cursed him with bad luck, and no outsider has seen the secret totem since.
Zhang Li astutely observed, “Back then people probably took it lightly because they had nothing to lose. Today they might think twice.”

Singing for Supper The host asked me to sing karaoke but I assured them my singing would bring their lunch up much faster than it went down. So a cute young lass with short hair and a shorter mini-skirt serenaded us. I’m not sure if she was an employee or if the boss was trying to marry his daughter off.

She let out a blood-curdling cry as the tape deck played something like a cross between Chinese pop disco and Oriental Michael Jackson, but it settled down into a beautiful folk tune, and everyone asked for an encore. And then we visited the Opium Baron’s Manor.

The Opium Baron’s Manor, which locals call Big Intersection Building (大路口楼) was built 180 years ago by Xiamen tobacco king Lin Tianding (林天定). And he built it to last! One granite block is 6.1 meters long, 60 cm. wide, and 26 cm. thick. The tall wooden columns are thicker than telephone poles, and mounted on granite globes. The clay roof tiles are still intact, though coated in rich green mold. But what time hasn’t taken, vandals have. The old inscription above the front door had been stolen only months earlier.

Opium poppies blanketed the hillsides before Liberation the surrounding hillsides were covered in opium poppies, and from 1940 to 1945, the building was used to process opium.
The opium baron, Yewenlong (叶文龙), was finally executed in 1940 by Chiang Kai Shek’s KMT (which also sold opium, and was probably just eliminating competition).

Lindun’s ancient walls (林敦古城) still stand—and I’d had no idea, even though I’ve visited this hamlet 4 times. I’d have missed them this time as well were it not for my guides, whose tales breathed life back into the crumbling ruins.
Built to keep out Japanese pirates, they were once six meters high, two meters thick, and surrounded the entire village. Oddly, there was also a wall down the middle of town, supposedly separating two factions who were at each other’s throats except when fighting the midget barbarians.

Two grannies have commandeered the 350-year-old house once used by a military leader. They greeted us with a hearty, “M’dei!” “Have some tea!” They were good natured but camera shy, and they blushed when I stole a few photos.
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Gate God A village god resides in the small shrine outside the 6?-foot arched southern gate . He was smaller than the incense sticks and mineral water being offered him, but he seemed happy enough, with his big grin and a belly that looked 8 months with child.

Concrete Preservation Ideas Two of my companions debated about how to preserve the beauty of the shady hillock above the wall. “Concrete tables and benches!” cried one. “Keep it natural,” cried the other. “Sit on the ground!” The singer from lunch, who had accompanied us, offered no opinion. She was too busy dancing about like a little emperor on the warpath, swatting mosquitoes that had been at her mini-skirted legs ever since we’d left the Opium Baron’s manor.

Shiftless! When I tried backing down the narrow road we’d come, I discovered Toy Ota had no gears. It was quite a feat making it back to Changtai City and Xiamen, up and down and around winding mountain roads and highways, with no gears. But I made it so no one can accuse me of being shiftless.16

“You never showed up!” the manager of the Kayak Center complained. “We had lunch prepared!”
“Sorry,” Zhangli said. “We went straight to the Stone Fortress.”
“No problem—we’ve saved it for supper.”
“But the van has lost its gears,” I said. “We need to get—”
“—You need to eat! Then you can worry about gears.”
So we settled down for three hours of unforgettable mountain delicacies, local tales, and, of course, more Zhangli stories.
Half a dozen giant tortoises roamed freely around the restaurant’s floor. “Do you eat these?” I asked.
“Of course not! They’re over 100 years old. We’d never eat anything that old.”
But another man murmured, “Well, maybe the smallest ones.”
Last month, I returned to find all the tortoises gone. “Released into the wild,” I was told. Go in peace.
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Fishy Tales “This fish crawls on land!” My host said of one exceptionally tasty fish. Called ‘manli,’ it crawls up riverbanks by night and eats birds, frogs and ducklings, leaving a trail of slime to finds it way back to water.

“We cover the slime trail with flour,” my host said. “This confuses them enough that we can catch them. Some reach 45 pounds!”
Table Talk For some reason, the thought of eating walking fish hit me wrong, but the table talk helped take my mind off fishy17 fish. We discussed everything from politics, apples, pears, America, and girls, to Taiwan and local heroes like Zhuyigui, a duck raiser who fought the Dutch with Koxinga in Taiwan. Sadly, the Qing executed him. It was a sad ending for this patriotic duck raiser who refused to duck18 his duty.
The Ming Dynasty official Tang Tai (唐泰) is another local hero. He missed is hometown so much that he resigned his high post, returned to Changtai, and donated all his properties to build educational institutions.
Changtai also boasts the famous Taoist alchemist, Dong Feng (董风), who made pills of immortality, but they don’t seem to have done him much good because he’s long gone. It reminds me of a Qing Dynasty tale:
A dying doctor promised a dose of his secret elixir of immortality to anyone who could cure him. He promised, “My elixir will make you live for centuries!”
He was asked, “If you have such a miracle drug, why not take it yourself?”
The doctor replied indignantly, “A good doctor does not write prescriptions for himself!”

Pythons and Field Mice During a lull in the conversation, Zhangli whipped out two more tall but true tales:
“I found two field mice in a banana stalk. Country mice are cute—not at all like dirty city rats. I could not bring myself to kill them. So I waited until dark, when no one could see me and laugh. I wrapped the mice in paper, and set them free on top of a mountain. Good thing no one saw me!”
Maybe not—but now I’ve ratted on him.
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Python in the Power Station! “One night back in Shanghang,” Zhangli continued, “The lights started flickering. We found a 16-foot python wrapped around the power turbine. I shot it in the head with a rifle, and we pulled it out. I heard that in Vietnam they killed a 29-meter python with two cows in its stomach.”
A 29-meter python? I found that hard to swallow.

Silent Toasts Chinese meals are usually noisy, with nonstop cries of Ganbei! (Dry Glass!) But eventually folks started toasting each other by silently clinking their wine glasses together. My host said, “When you know each other well enough, words are unnecessary.”
I think my wife Susan Marie would find that hard to swallow.

Tourists literally flip over Changtai’s 2?-hour kayaking trips down the Mayang Xi. Some, like Susan Marie, flip in it, but lifeguards are always nearby.
The Kayak Center has hosted the International Kayaking Championship, the First National Kayak Championship, and China’s 9th National Athletics Championship in Kayaking.
Many teams have practiced here, including groups from Germany, America, the U.K., Brazil, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Russia, Belize, and France. Kayak teams, as well as tourists, stay in the center’s hotel, which has 50 rooms and a conference center.
The Kayak Center manager said, “In 1900, eight countries attacked a weak China, and destroyed Beijing. I hope that some day representatives of those same eight countries will all visit Changtai together, as friends!”
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A Driven Driver It’s no surprise the owner of the kayak center used to be a driver. He’s obviously a very driven man. He saved 120,000 Yuan to go into business for himself. Today, the kayak business accounts for only 1/6 of his multi-million Yuan annual income. Yet, in spite of his wealth, he refuses to pay 3,000 Yuan for Changtai residency. It would mean giving up his ancestral home. He showed me his residence card and said, “I’m rich, but I’m still just a peasant.” As a peasant, his children cannot attend the better schools of Changtai City, so he sends them to Singapore. His children are his life, and he joked, “I don’t fear heaven or earth—but I fear my children.” Fortunately, he is an “Economic Policeman” on the side, and carries a gun.
I asked him if the rigid rules like residency bother him and he shrugged. “That’s just the way it is. But some things must change—like the way Chinese do business. To succeed, you must do all you can, and go the extra mile. Today the rain wet the ping-pong tables, yet nobody bothered wiping them off. I did it myself.
“If you see something that needs to be done, do it. Don’t wait for someone to tell you. If a guest has to be fed, feed them yourself.”
“Times are changing,” he said. “‘Tu yang jie he (????).’ Adapt foreign ideas to China to improve and progress. It doesn’t matter if it’s foreign or local; do whatever necessary to succeed. That’s how to be successful.”

Black cats or white, Chinese or Foreign, Laowai or Laonei, Changtai is going for it!

And now, we travel to visit people whom neither Laowai nor Laonei can ever get in a corner because they live in round houses!
See you in Hakkaland! Click Here to read about Hakka earthen houses.

Read more about Zhangzhou!

Contents of "Zhangzhou Journey" (Page 2)
Zhangzhou's famous“100 Flower Village” 百花村
Lónghái Volcano Beach 龙海古火山口 (best beach near Xiamen!)
Tianbao Banana Plantation
Liudoushan Tropical Rain Forest
Zhangzhou's Little People -- Famous Hand Puppets
Zhangzhou's Famous Water Sprite
Zhào Family Palace 赵家堡 (Song Dynasty Castle)

Contents of "Dongshan Island" Fujian's Hawaii (Page 3) 东山岛，福建的夏威夷
Tēnfú Tea Museum (World’s Largest) 天福茶庄, 世界上最大的茶博物馆
Dongshan Chow -- Chopsticks Wars; Chinese Hot Dogs
Incensed "Seaweed 'R Us!" Stone Temple
Mischievous Prime Minister Fortune Cookies Stone Monkey Smoke?
Sunken Palaces and Ghosts Widow’s Museum 寡妇村博物馆
What a Gas Free Dongshan Hotel Rooms !!

Contents of "Changtai Journey"
Chángtài ,长泰，厦门的后花园 Xiamen's "backyard"
Zhangli--Light Side of a Dark Decade The Wenchangge Pagoda
Closed Cycle Recycle--Manure, Mushrooms & Methane!
The Falls That Doesn't (fall, th:at is)!
Fujian's Biggest Tree--sort of Mountain Goat Stone Fortress
Lindun Town Ancient Walled Village 林敦—古城墙
Opium Baron’s Manor鸦片大王的房子
Humorous Cultural Revolution Tales: 3=12, Sometimes! Mice & Men
4 She Tribe Surnames Ring a Bell Fishy Tales
Python in the Power Station
Tourists Flip Over Mǎyángxī Kayak Center 马洋溪皮划艇训练中心
A Driven Driver

Read more about the rest of Fujian!
Fujian's Marvelous Wooden Bridges! Beautiful stone bridges, as well as exquisite covered wooden bridges, some of them 700 years old!
Zhangzhou Ancient City of Flowers; see
Hakka Roundhouses Unique earthen castles
Ningde Birthplaces of S. China Civilization?
Water World (Sandu'ao) Fishing Villages Upon the Sea!
Xiapu Rafting, Kukai's Temple (Japanese), Seafood, deng deng!
Zhouning (my favorite!) Zhouning Thumbnails Delightful place--China's largest waterfalls complex, Kungfu fighting highlanders, carp worshippers...
Wuyi Mountain Amazing historical, cultural and natural attractions

Fujian Foto Album!!!

More on Fujian? Read Scott Ballantynes Travelogues
Other Miscellaneous Writings on Chinese Subjects
Note: An XMU Professor told me China had 5,000 years of history, but that was 1988, so now it's 5018 years of history (and two months).
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TRAVEL LINKS Favorite Fujian Sites Fujian Foto Album Xiamen Gulangyu Fujian Guides Quanzhou Z hangzhou Longyan Wuyi Mtn Ningde Putian Sanming
Zhouning Taimu Mtn. Roundhouses Bridges Jiangxi Guilin Order Books
Readers' Letters