Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Huang Shan ban yun gong 黄山搬运工
Huang Shan Porter.
An extensive network of stairs trace Huang Shan from top to bottom. At first this was a bit annoying - if I wanted to climb stairs I could have stayed at home and hiked the 25 floors to our apartment - but you quickly realize these paths are absolutely necessary to handle the mass of tourists and intense climbing gradients. You may recall the Chinese like their climbs steep; Huang Shan was no exception.
There are no roads up the mountain, but on the peak is a thriving metropolis complete with several hotels, restaurants and even banks. To support this mountaintop economy, all the goods need to be hauled up (and back down) via China's favorite solution to such technological challenges - brute force manual labor. The specific method of choice in this case being a bamboo pole balanced across the back with a load teetering off either side. These mighty mights get paid by the kg per km and they have the completely ripped calf muscles to prove it.
To give you an idea, this ban yun gong (who must have been about 60 years old) said he was carrying over 50 kg, including incidentally, what happens to be the biggest dong gua (winter melon) I've ever seen in my life. Check out the look of amazement on the little girl's face at the old timer's feat of strength!
In addition to hauling all the basic necessities like food and bedsheets, the lazy laowai can also rent out a ban yun gong to carry his backpack up the mountain for the very reasonable price of 3 kuai/kg/km or the equivalent of about $20 for an average size pack. Or you can always indulge your imperialist fantasies and ride to the top in the stylish comfort of a hand drawn carriage like this lucky fellow.
Check my Flickr page for the complete set of Huang Shan photos.
An extensive network of stairs trace Huang Shan from top to bottom. At first this was a bit annoying - if I wanted to climb stairs I could have stayed at home and hiked the 25 floors to our apartment - but you quickly realize these paths are absolutely necessary to handle the mass of tourists and intense climbing gradients. You may recall the Chinese like their climbs steep; Huang Shan was no exception.
There are no roads up the mountain, but on the peak is a thriving metropolis complete with several hotels, restaurants and even banks. To support this mountaintop economy, all the goods need to be hauled up (and back down) via China's favorite solution to such technological challenges - brute force manual labor. The specific method of choice in this case being a bamboo pole balanced across the back with a load teetering off either side. These mighty mights get paid by the kg per km and they have the completely ripped calf muscles to prove it.
To give you an idea, this ban yun gong (who must have been about 60 years old) said he was carrying over 50 kg, including incidentally, what happens to be the biggest dong gua (winter melon) I've ever seen in my life. Check out the look of amazement on the little girl's face at the old timer's feat of strength!
In addition to hauling all the basic necessities like food and bedsheets, the lazy laowai can also rent out a ban yun gong to carry his backpack up the mountain for the very reasonable price of 3 kuai/kg/km or the equivalent of about $20 for an average size pack. Or you can always indulge your imperialist fantasies and ride to the top in the stylish comfort of a hand drawn carriage like this lucky fellow.
Check my Flickr page for the complete set of Huang Shan photos.
# posted by tim @ 8:24 PM 
Photos on Flickr
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