| In Kunming, as in most places in the world, every day a little more of the old is replaced with something new and, in some ways, inferior. China doesn't have a building preservation tradition per se, but old buildings do survive, for an assortment of reasons. The pictures below represent a mixed collection of places we have visited over the past year. I have given a rating (my own uninformed opinion) to signify the likelihood that these buildings will continue to survive, giving one * to a building that is almost certainly doomed, and ***** to those destined to last an eternity. |
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In the heart of downtown Kunming there is a small park
where old people go to drink tea and play cards. In the center of the park
is this ancient teahouse. Deb and I like to visit here on Sundays, when
some retirees sing opera and others bring their birds in cages to hang
on the trees. All around this park are 30 story office buildings and four
lane highways. This is not so much of a tourist attraction; it costs only
3 yuan to get in and that entitles you to a bottomless glass of tea. I
think it is preserved as a refuge for the people who remember Kunming before
the skyscrapers.
Chances for survival: *** |
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While this courtyard once the family home of a government
official/warlord, the family ended up on the wrong side of the revolution.
Once the men were all safely beheaded, the house, which contains about
a dozen courtyards like this, became government property and in recent
years, a serious tourist attraction. Parts of the complex have been turned
into shops, another part has become a restaurant, and there are guest rooms
for rent as well.
Chances for survival: ***** |
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During a major Chinese festival, Deb and I
went to a major tourist town, and not surprisingly, had trouble finding
a hotel. But this story has a happy ending, because the scarcity forced
us to the outskirts of town, where we found this old guest house. The husband
of the couple that ran this place had been born here, and the house had
been in his family for over 100 years. But it could easily end if his son
chooses another line of work, or if a developer comes in with plans for
a more modern hotel.
Chances for survival: ** |
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This is a fairly typical city house in the old part of
Jianshui, a relatively small town in Yunnan. The banners on the door are
Chinese New Years decorations; they are as common as pictures of Santa
in the US at Christmastime. These are a bit unusual, because the warriors
are represented as PLA soldiers, rather than as men in ancient armor.
You no longer see many houses like this in Kunming; most of them have been torn down to make room for modern office buildings. Kunming has one shopping neighborhood downtown which seems to be treated as an historic district, where buildings like this will get restored. But smaller, poorer towns are much more likely to replace their old buildings rather than preserve them. Chances for survival: * |
Go to the next page to see the dragons