The Lazy Cherub Enigma: Dunhuang Deer Girl

Another drive through the desert and another welcome respite. This time it is 3 days in the oasis town of Dunhuang. A place literally in the middle of nowhere it is a modern mecca with one of the highest per capita incomes in China due to the booming wind and solar energy business (China will have 30% of its energy produced by these clean means by 2020). Coming into Duhuang one is met with miles upon miles of solar farms and so many wind turbines they are impossible to count. So how ironic that when we arrived the entire place was without power or water! No power, no water and Ken decides now is the time to do a "number 2" in our hotel toilet. Why Ken why?!?! (However, Ken was resourceful enough to “make it go away” even without the toilet having water!)

So with no water, power (or breathable air) in the room, the only thing left was to wander the streets in the hopes of a good latte – any latte to be honest. Success!! We found two places – Knight Coffee and Oasis Café, which served ILLY (and had generators)!! God I thought I died and went to heaven. There was also an awesome “Che and Mao” Coffee, art and bookstore (EXACTLY my kind of place in decor and ambiance but alas, their coffee machine was broken/smashed by the Red Guard.)

Of course the real reason to stop here are the Mogao Caves. Before you read any further I highly recommend you Google “Mogao Cave Images” and then spend some time marveling at their beauty. (No photos allowed on site so Ken’s talent was lost here). This, by far, was the premier highlight of our trip (next to the Jingle Pug). This is the largest repository of Buddhist art in the world, housed in 492 caves. The grotto paintings are beyond spectacular. A thousand years before we in the west had even begun to contemplate perspective drawing, painting using oil based mediums, writing on paper or the use of a printing press it was ALL happening here. At its peak, the Mogao Caves held 14 monasteries all dedicated to the high arts of literature, painting, sculpture, and music. This incredible spiritual and artistic community thrived from around 340 AD until the 1400’s and then fell into disuse. The Silk Road no longer passing by and the sands filling the caves until they became all but a faded memory. In the early 1900’s word got out to the British and Russians that ancient scriptures where being sold at local military trading posts for goods. The rest, as they say, is history. Aurel Stein and Paul Pelliot came and removed most of the 40,000 texts buried by time (they now reside in the British Museum and the Louvre). The Russians used the caves to house military troops and burn 2000-year-old temple wood to keep warm in winter. Eccentric Japanese and American “adventurers” came and tried to remove the frescos (unsuccessfully). Today the argument rages as to whether those in possession of the works should return them or if the “Foreign Devils” should be seen as heroes or thieves. Many other cave sites in this area were destroyed in the Cultural Revolution and by Islamic tribes. So who’s to say? I am just astounded that I never knew of this and one thing I am learning while here is how very white European male-centric our exposure to history has been.

That night we took in the “Dunhuang Goddess” performance at the local theatre. To give some perspective, imagine giving a 5-year-old complete artistic direction to a group of Cirque de Soleil performers and you get the idea of the absolute chaos and splendor that is Chinese theatre. The 8O minute performance is loosely based on the story of Deer Girl and her family (found in the grottoes of Mogao Cave and a very good example of feminist based mythology btw). I say loosely because even though each act has an intro to what is happening, nothing on stage remotely resembles that. But who cares! There were live camels, ballet, acrobatics, and belly dancing ALL AT THE SAME TIME throughout the entire performance. It was full on psychadelic frenzy. Other observations of Chinese theatre – No one claps and rules about photography and video are really just “guidelines”. As in, feel free to stand in the aisle and blatantly film or take flash photos even though the ticket and pre show announcement explicitly say DO NOT do that. Hell, stand up in front of other people and do it! Because no, its not bad form or the least bit creepy to have rows and rows of middle aged dudes with giant zoom lenses focusing right onto the scantily clad harem girl character. I guess the paintings they all bought of her topless from the lobby gift shop weren’t memorable enough.

The following day we succumbed to tourist hype and went to the Crescent Moon Lake – “where the desert and the oasis meet in a spectacular fashion (Lonely Planet). Spectacularly overpriced tacky tourist fashion is more like it and the “lake” is really a crescent shaped pond with gift shops styled as temples around it. The dunes were impressive but let’s face it – we’ve seen dunes (Namibia) and this is nowhere near as “spectacular”. Still, if you’ve never seen dunes then it’s better than nothing. We really only went for a camel ride which we had hoped was possible without entering the park (it is, we found out later, if you work something out at John’s Café) but over the last few years, the tourist business has steadily spread the fencing to enclose the dunes further and further into the “theme park”. In the end, I’d have to say the camel ride was worth the price of admission. We arrived in the morning so all the camels were folded up waiting for their day in the dunes. Asian camels are so beautiful and docile (and, I might add, very well loved and cared for) – nothing like the camels we rode in Egypt or India. Rows and rows of camels with carpets in between their humps – just like the Silk Road of old. We rode in a train of 5 led by a warm and generous local young woman. The strings of camels below and on the dunes were everything I could hope for. For an hour and 20 minutes we felt swept back in time. My camel figured out Ken had a full water bottle and was forever “nosing” him for a drink and head scratches.

That night we headed for the night market – a plethora of food stalls and drunken Karaoke. Another feast on a $3 CDN bowl of noodles. Street food in this country is top notch! Then it was off for a night walk along the river in all its glorious strobe light neon beauty. As we left the market, the SWAT team armed with machine guns looking very sure of where they were going, who they had come for and that whatever happened, they would win. Barry said they were heading for the donut shop and wanted to be sure to get at the head of the queue Ken however, still feeling the karma of the monk incident, ducked behind a scarf display. He had, after all, taken contraband photos at the Dunhuang Goddess performance…