Day Three: Saturday,8 November 2014.

We didn’t have time to visit the Western Hills also known as the Buddha Hills, as the shape of the mountain looks from afar like a man lying on his back.

To get there we have to buy tickets for the cable car, known as ropeway here, across the Dianchi Lake up to the mountain. It cost us Y 70 (about $12 or B 380) each. The exciting part of the trip is when we get to the shoulder of the mountain and change from the cabin-like gondolas to the open air one which is just like a chair for two with nothing to hold on but the arms of the chair and a wooden bar in front of us. Of course, there are signs along the ropeway warning naughty old people like me not to swing the chair back and forth thereby endangering both companion oneself and one’s companion.

There is nothing much else to say about the trip up the mountain except that the view is superb. The lake is 298 square kilometers, nearly 3 times as large as our Inlay lake.

We then puff up and down the stone stairs both along the side and inside of the mountain until we get to its holy destination: the Dragon Gate. The signs on the way are all written in two languages: Chinese and Thai.

The only remarkable thing to mention here is about the lady who is repeating by rote on the merits of the tea bags she’s trying to sell innocent travelers like me. Of course, after listening to her and drunk some of her tea, we feel ashamed enough of ourselves to buy some of her products. She then moves to the next table to recite her magic words to other prospective customers.

During our return, I remember one of the semi-legendary events in the Shan history books and recount it to my cousins who have never heard of it before.

Maybe you haven’t either. So here it is:

Kunming, according to Shan Scholars, used to be known as Nawng Hsae (The Lake of the Dragon). At the time of this story, it was ruled by Hkun Lu Fong aka Ko-Lo-Feng (748-779). He had a beautiful daughter named Narg Khae aka Nang Pabhavadee, whose hand was eagerly sought by young men far and near, high and low.

The king, unable to choose a son-in-law to his liking, moved the princess to a palace built in the lake and announced that any man who could reach it and strike the gong there without using a bridge or a boat, or getting himself wet, would be given her hand.

Hkun Teung Kham from Mongmao (today’s Ruili), whose mother was a dragon and whose father had been given a stick by her to strike the water 3 times when he needed her, did as he was instructed by his father. The dragon appeared and asked him who he was and what he wanted. When she learned he was her son and what his purpose was, she took him to the palace on her back thereby fulfilling the king’s wish.

Whether the story is true or not isn’t important. What is important is that he married Hkun Lu Fong’s daughter and established a princedom in 763 at Mongmao out of which emerged several famous kings, especially Hso Khan Fa (1311-1364), whose suzerignty,  according to J.G. Scott, stretched as far Assam in the west and almost all of today’s Burma except Arakan.

It is a lovely day. The rains have stopped since my arrival. And seagulls from Siberia have started to arrive.

 I return to the hotel to watch news about APEC proceedings in Beijing and tomorrow’s referendum in Catalonia, where its non-Spanish Catalan people have been calling for a separate nationhood.

 Well, for Spain, for Shans and all of us, nothing remains the same.

As the late Louis L’amour wrote:

A ship doesn’t sail with yesterday’s wind. Neither does a mill runs with the water that is past.