The Battle of Yiling Cave

My friend Wei and Yuening  said I should visit Yiling Cave, a cultural and natural site a few miles outside of Nanning – Yuening and her 11 year old daughter, Liang Xi were my guides for this trip and almost every foray that I took in SW China. As with every other day since I left Missouri, it is overcast and drizzly. The streets here are swept daily, but a covering of mud and grime persist and the resulting vile soup when mixed with rain is tracked everywhere by the millions of tires and shoes that traverse every square inch on an apparently minute-by-minute basis. We left the noodle stall where I got breakfast every morning and started on our umbrella- covered way. A quick taxi to the bus terminal and the adventure began.

I waited with Liang Xi (the "Xi" is pronounce "she") for a few minutes while Yuening got directions for the bus. As we waited for Yuening, I received more than the usual number of stares and mutters, probably because I was accompanied by a pretty Chinese child. Who knows what passers-by were thinking about that. Liang Xi is almost as tall as her mother (about 4’11"), and smiles a lot while constantly moving around with excitement at the trip, like any 11 year old might do.

Yuening comes back and points to the right conveyance, a stubby and shabby 20-seater affair, covered in mud and grime like the other 80-90 busses of varying vintages and sizes mulling about in the terminal designed to hold probably 20 small busses when it was built. We boarded and the 2 Yuan fare (about 25 cents) was collected by the driver’s helper. This helper also directs stopping points, passes out little 8" tall stools to those unlucky enough to not get a seat and carefully made sure that the screwdriver that served as door latch was in place after every stop. We were first on and got seats because the other potential passengers were too busy staring at me to remember their intended rush to get a seat for the 40-minute ride into the mountains. After 15 or passengers and their rolls of carpet, boxes, luggage, bags, chickens, vegetables and other accoutrements were settled, we were off.

We bounced through an industrial/commercial district on a 4-lane highway shared by scooters, pedal-rickshaws, semi-trucks, bicycles, cars, busses and pedestrians. This is probably a good point to discuss streets and roads in China; they are all rough as cobbles, way over-crowded and apparently impassable. As with all others I have seen in Asia, there are no traffic laws to obey, or at least none that are enforced. When a driver (bicycle or semi-truck), wants to turn, they start edging over until they get where they want to be. Usually, other drivers slow or meander to let them make the appropriate maneuver, and there is surprisingly little horn blowing and gesticulation to accompany the process. Passing is another story.

When our driver stopped for various passengers on the roadside, he would head back into traffic and we were full-throttle on our way. As he overtook a slower conveyance, he'd lay on the horn and swing out to pass, usually clearing the slower vehicle by inches and causing me to grip something quickly and wish I were Catholic so I could mutter a prayer while fingering a rosary. If there was another vehicle passing in the opposite direction, they and our driver would have a quick duel of the horns and the loudest one won, accompanied by some swerving and bouncing around as we missed each by centimeters. Our horn was deafening and we made it to the Yiling cultural area alive and mostly intact. Yuening and Liang Xi talked throughout the trip, apparently unaware of our 40-minute near death experience. As soon as we arrived at the park, I found out what a tenacious and determined person Yuening really was.

We stopped at one of the ubiquitous stands selling soda, candy, rolls and other things that appear to serve as fuel for the Chinese existence. After some bottled water and a hole-less doughnut, we went to the window to get a ticket for the cultural show. The sign next to the window was in Chinese and English, and I read it while Yuening got tickets. I noticed that students were allowed half-price tickets and pointed to the Chinese version. Yuening, who has little English, read the Chinese version, dashed over to the window and began a spate of rapid Chinese with the woman there who stoically refunded the price difference of 7.5 Yuan (about 90 cents). It got better in anther ½ hour.

We started the tour through the traditional cultural area. First we were greeted with a ceremonial thimble-sized cup of rice wine by a girl in traditional garb and then ushered to tables where we had small portions of traditional rice for greeting guests. In the next area we had to dance between 8 bamboo poles held by 8 people about 10 cm above the floor, one at each end holding 2 pole ends. The moved the poles together and apart rapidly, necessitating visitors to dance and hop our way past; somewhat like skipping rope in a meat tenderizer. Yuening did great; I passed and walked around. We then climbed the cave entrance above the top of the hill and that’s where the Battle of Yiling Cave started.

When we got to the window where you pay for the cave tour, Yuening said a word or two, the ticket seller replied and the conflict began – imagine the 1812 Overture playing as barrage followed by counter barrage of rapid-Chinese verbal artillery broke the quiet of the countryside, accompanied by much hand waving and pointing. Liang Xi stood stoically and apparently unconcerned while these Titans pursed their lips, shook their heads, waived their hands in the air and alternately used sweet-talk, threats of calling the cave authorities while pointing to a phone number on a sign and waving a cell phone, and other verbal weapons and body language to settle whatever the difference was. Another woman ran all the way down the hill to consult with higher authority while this 20-minute clash continued. When she returned, she said a few words, everyone smiled and about 3$ changed hands. We were waved to the cave entrance when our guide arrived. I found out later that the incident started when the ticket seller wanted to charge us about 400 Yuan ($50 USD) to supply an English-speaking guide. This was because there was 3 of us and she said we were a "group". Yuening apparently set her straight on what a "group" consists of in no uncertain terms during the Battle of Yiling Cave. The cave tour was good, but anticlimactic in comparison to the battle of the tickets. I never point out anything to Yuening for the duration of my stay; my heart can’t take that much excitement more than once a week.

Inside Yiling cave we were about 10 yards into the tour when we came upon a man with a 35mm camera on a tripod. He was there to take our picture for 15 RMB ($1.75). We did 2 pictures so we could both have one and continued on our way. The pretty young guide used a flashlight to point out shapes in the rocks, most of which were backlit by colored fluorescent lights, as well. There were camels, lions and tigers and bears – oh my! I could actually see most of these, which was pretty good considering my unimaginative view sometimes. There were many mythical and historical figures that I, as a westerner, could never see, like the popular Monkey King, etc; the Chinese have an incredibly romantic and rich imagination to rival the Romans and Greeks. Of course, they had a couple of thousand years of written history to archive before we heard much from their Mediterranean counterparts. I told the tour guide that Americans might see something very different in the rocks. She has shown us the 2 old men playing chess at a table with 100 little rocks that are people waiting to play next. I said an American might see 2 old men eating at McDonald's with 100 people waiting in line. She laughed ‘til tears ran from her eyes.

After running into the same photographer 2 more times without his having passed us on our way, I figured he had some nefarious path with somewhat different gods that allowed him to keep ahead of the customers in this dark and cold place. We exited the cave after thanking the guide, whose English allowed me to see the figures in the stone, and by the time we got to the bottom of the hill, the film was developed and pretty good prints were ready for us. A great tour next time you’re in Nanning. I highly recommend it.