Looking at a map, you will see that northwest China's Gansu Province is shaped like a dumbbell, long and narrow. It stretches more than 1,000 kilometers from the country's northwest to its southeast. A city called Dunhuang lies in the western part of Gansu Province.
After an early three-hour flight from Beijing, I arrived in Dunhuang, an oasis at the western end of the Hexi Corridor in Gansu Province.
The airport is a little far from the city center. During the 30-minute taxi ride, my first impression of Duhuang was: cold and sparsely populated, with tall trees scattering here and there.
But once I was in the downtown area, that impression changed. A stone sculpture of "Feitian", or flying beings, a typical dancing figure in Dunhuang art and culture, stands on the busiest street of the city.
Dunhuang is well-known for Feitian performances. Luckily, I encountered one such performance in a small hall.
The group's manager told me that Dunhuang dance combines ethnic dance styles from central and western China. The performance features some traditional musical instruments such as harps, bamboo flutes and zithers. The show aims to give the audience a general overview of Dunhuang art and culture.
The grand finale is the "Thousand Hands" dance.
It features the 1,000-hand Kwan-yin, the goddess of mercy in Buddhism. With breathtaking beauty and elegance, all the dancers perform in sync as one, in rhythm with the music.
Every visitor to Dunhuang would go to Mogao Grottos, also known as the Caves of a Thousand Buddha. I wouldn't want to be an exception.
There are altogether 2,000 statues in the 1,600-year-old Mogao Grottos, about 25 kilometers southwest of the city. The largest is 33 meters high, while the smallest is only 10 centimeters. It was carved into the desert cliffs of Mingsha Mountain and lined both the north face and the south face of the 600-meter-long cliff.
In the caves, I saw vivid statutes of Buddha. They are primarily made of clay and coated with a kind of plaster surface that allows for the final painting or engraving.
Besides the statues, what impressed me the most were the splendid frescos on the inner walls and roofs of the caves. The paintings depict Buddhist stories as well as the daily lives of the region's inhabitants over the centuries.
From the paintings, you can see that music and dance played an important role in people's lives across the centuries.
To better study and protect the grottos, China established the Dunhuang Academy in the 1940s. It has made many new discoveries since then.
Seventy-year-old Peng Jinzhang is a senior researcher at the academy. He has been working on the northern parts of the grottoes for 20 years.
"There had never been thorough research work done on the northern parts. People could only guess that they served as living quarters for the painters and sculptors who excavated the southern caves. But that was a hypothesis and had never been proven."
Peng Jinzhang's findings have been far beyond anyone's expectations. He not only has verified the hypothesis on the function of the northern caves, but also has discovered more grottoes.
"There are altogether 248 caves in the northern section. Only five of these were previously marked. Old records before 1995 said there were only 492 marked caves, now the number stands at 735."
The researcher said all the caves have been subjected to some degree of damage, from long-term erosion by wind and water to thefts by looters.
Tourists can also harm the grottoes because the moisture from their breath damages the frescos that have survived for centuries in the dry desert climate.
To protect the Mogao Grottos, only about 60 of the hundreds of caves are opened to the public every year.
For tour guides who see the Mogao Grottos every day, they all remain a big attraction.
Zhang Wen said she enjoys every moment of the place.
"This is a very quiet place, which is very different from the big noisy cities. Actually, almost every interpreter at the Dunhuang Academy has been to big Chinese cities such as Beijing, and Shanghai to learn foreign languages. All of them chose to come back, although they had many good opportunities and temptations in the big cities."
That sentiment could be fairly understood. I decided to end my wonderful day tour with a tasty dinner. One good thing about Dunhuang is the night market where you can get cheap but genuine local food.
Shazhou Market is an ideal place to learn about Dunhuang folk-customs and life. It is the largest outdoor market in the city, unofficially divided into several areas, including snacks, artware, a teahouse and an area for special ethnic products. Amateur singers and actors perform fun and entertaining street opera shows.
Dunhuang food revolves around wheat flour noodles as the main staple of the local diet. They are served with lamb, chicken or beef.
Every restaurant here seems very busy and has no shortage of customers.
I entered a small restaurant with a five-star certificate authorized by relevant local authorities. A woman was making very short noodles called "cuoyuzi."
Reporter: "How do you make cuoyuzi?
Woman: Rub. Rub one by one.
Reporter: "What are they made of?"
Woman: "They are made of wheat flour."
The restaurant owner told me that making cuoyuzi is a folk custom in Dunhuang.
"This noodle is substantial. People always feel full after eating it, so lots of local residents and tourists like to order it."
He also recommended another noodle to me.
"You can try "saozi", also called "birthday noodle" or "long-life noodle." My mother always cooks the noodle whenever one of her children has a birthday. Old people like to eat one piece of saozi noodle to celebrate their longevity. Every strand is at least one meter long!"
Ma said that handmade saozi noodles are known far and wide in China. They are generally thin and are accompanied by a soup made with meat and vegetables. I couldn't resist any food temptations. The result was that I had eaten too much and couldn't fall asleep that night.
If you're in Dunhuang, you should also go to Mingsha Mountain and the Crescent Spring. Normally oil and water cannot mix, springs and deserts can hardly go together. But these two natural wonders are an exception. They're just five kilometers southwest of Dunhuang.
It was quite a sandy environment at first sight. Then I found a crescent-shaped lake at the center of this barren area with many trees surrounding it. A sign post reads: "Mountain and spring coexist. Sand and water live together."
Zhang Hongxia, a tour guide who has worked at the scenic spot for about two years, talked about an amazing fact.
"Mingsha Dunes and the Crescent Spring have already existed for more than 2,000 years, but as you can see, their shapes have almost never changed much."
The sand never gets into the spring, so the water is never muddy, and the spring does not dry up. The Crescent Spring can be called a natural wonder in the Gobi Desert.
Zhang Hongxia explained that due to the special geographical location, the wind always blows the sands upward instead of into the water. It creates and maintains the crescent landform's depression. As the cross-ventilated theory states, the falling sands from the surrounding mountains are blown to the other side of nearby Mingsha Mountain instead of clogging the spring. This maintains the harmonious and almost paradoxical existence of the spring and the sand dunes.
Unlike the always-peaceful Mogao Grottoes, here you can enjoy not only the rare vistas where an oasis meets the desert, but also do some camel-riding, "dune surfing" and sand sliding.
I ventured into camel riding. My lesson: It was scary. I would never do it again!
But a group of American tourists seemed to be enjoying the rides. Pauller Maier said she was excited:
"[The camel] is very wonderful. It is easy to get on because he kneeled down, but riding on it is much like riding on a horse. It feels very similar. It's a little slower than a horse, a little slower, but I don't ride on a horse very fast."
When asked about her impression of this scenic spot, Maier had all the nice words.
"It's beautiful. It's nice weather. Sure, it's not so cold for me; it's just fine. We've had great weather here. A wonderful trip in China! It's just been a great trip!"
Happy time always flies. It was time to say good-bye to Dunhuang. On our departure route, the view was the same as when we arrived: cold and sparsely populated, with tall trees scattering around.
The difference now was that Dunhuang, the art gallery in the desert, is well preserved in my memories.
Author: Wang Jing Date: Feb 22, 2008
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