Chengdu
Chengdu is a comfortable, easy-to-navigate city and a good jumping off point for many of Sichuan’s sights. Within reach are beautiful national parks, mountains and valleys, and the Tibetan plateau to the far west of the region. Chengdu has a sparkling new (opened at the end of 2010) subway, and a laid-back population of about 14 million. The city itself has a few nice parks and temples among countless malls and shopping streets.
Chengdu, City of Gastronomy
Sichuan Province is known for its delicious, spicy cuisine, and we definitely had our fill while we were there. In 2011, Chengdu was oficially dcalred by UNESCO as an official city of gastronomy due to its own unique, savory cooking style! Our favorite dish, though it was probably the most simple, was Sichuan style string beans. The peppers give your tongue a sort if tingly feeling and have a very distinct flavor. There were also lots of noodles dishes and, of course, mapo doufu at the source. Chengdu is also a place to become intimately familiar with the hotpot. There are countless varieties, the most simple being the “red” version with chili pepper (hua jiao). There’s also an interesting version where the pot is split, and one side is red while the other is a non-spicy “white.” Just about anything you can think of can be thrown into this cauldron of liquid bubbling with chili oil. Items are then plucked from the pot and dipped into a dish of garlic, oil and spices before popping it in your mouth.
Around Town
One city walk took us by the Green Ram Temple (Qingyang Gong 青羊宫), which is said to be the birthplace of the founder of Taoism, Lao Tzu. There are two lamb sculptures inside, and people rub different parts of them, hoping for a cure to various ailments. At the front of the temple, the Eight Trigram Pavilion reflects the symbolic architectural design of Taoism according to Ying and Yang principles. The Baoguang Temple outside Chengdu is worth a visit as well. Renmin Park is a wonderful place for people watching. Jin Li Street is very quaint and atmospheric, with lots of yummy snack stands.
photo courtesy of www.uncorneredmarket.com
Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding
After some deliberation, we decided that the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding facility, not far outside of town, was worth a visit. We were a little worried it would be more like a zoo with the poor animals in cement cages with limited space. We had also seen a photo of a giant panda laying on an ice block when some other facility’s air conditioning was broken. Wild giant pandas live in higher altitudes where the climate is cool, and that’s the weather they like best.
We did some more reading, and the breeding research center really did sound like it was doing some good things toward the survival of this ancient species. After arriving, we saw the grounds with its large, outdoor natural enclosures and were glad we had come. The weather was in our favor too: cloudy, overcast and much cooler than recent days.
We found that watching pandas is quite humorous. They seem to bumble and stumble around then settle in to chow-down nonstop on bamboo, often while laying flat on their backs, using their ample belly as a table. They’ve also adapted a faux thumb that allows them to grip the stalks in one hand. They make stripping off the outer bark of the bamboo stalk seem effortless. They use their teeth to sort of peel it back, revealing the fresh, green part beneath.
After watching the adults finish their breakfast, we head over to the nursery. They had several cubs around a year old romping about with each other, lots of play fighting and rolling around. Then it was over to the baby section. There were about a half-dozen newborn cubs ranging from five days to about two weeks old. They were tiny! Baby pandas are born basically premature, weighing around 1/1000 of what their mother weighs. This is one of the factors of their low birth survival as the babies are completely helpless for at least their first three months until they become mobile. The one thing we didn’t agree with was the option to pay a bunch of money to hold a young panda. It really seems to go against what nature would dictate. How can this be of any benefit to the panda? Generating extra money for the program at the expense of the animals’ best interest seems counterproductive. As far as human participants, is the need to hold an endangered animal anything more than selfish? Why not just make a contribution? (Sorry for the rant.) At least they do limit the project to a very small number per day. In another area there were Red Pandas. They are substantially smaller than the giant panda, roughly the size of a North American raccoon, with similar color patterns. They too eat bamboo, but not exclusively.
Moving on . . .
Chengdu is also a good place from which to visit Emei-shan (Mt. Emei) and to see the Leshan Buddha. The mountain views are said to be gorgeous, though we opted not to make these side trips this time. Yearning to get out of the big city again and hit the countryside, we bought a ticket to Danba, in the mountains to the northwest, on the 6 am bus.
