Memories on the Ruins of Lijiang

Author: Huang Dami He Jinwu
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-01-01
Features: The two authors, who first published the article "The Wedding of Nankena Naba Cong" in the Taiwan-based newspaper "Zhong Shi Late" in the late 1980s, were widely copied by young readers and caused a sensation at the time. Over the next fifteen or sixteen years, the two have been inseparable, exploring the hell on earth in the Golden Triangle and the pure land on earth in Tibet. One writes, and the other photographs, publishing books such as "Women Who Tamed the Golden Triangle," "Pilgrimage to Meili Snow Mountain," and "Sacred Games." In the year 1996, Lijiang Ancient Town celebrated its 630th anniversary. The ancient town, with its stone bridges, flowing water, small courtyards, and households, was a picturesque scene where people wrote poems and painted under water pavilions, played the lute and flute among bamboo and plum blossoms in the courtyard—a yellowed scroll of a secluded and yet worldly scene. On the evening of February 3, a sudden magnitude-7 earthquake struck, collapsing one-third of the buildings and claiming the lives of over 300 people. This six-century-old, small-scale, leisurely market town at the foot of the snow-capped mountains was torn apart. The otherworldly ancient town became a memory.
After this earthquake, the People's Republic of China received its first international disaster relief aid. It was precisely because of this that Lijiang gained worldwide fame. The earthquake brought Lijiang into the limelight! Looking back at that time, facing the ruins, one is filled with even deeper and more profound reflections.