Last year Lijiang, the capital city of the Naxis, welcomed more than 3.5 million Chinese visitors. Here, one discovers how the Naxi culture became the most popular tourist attraction in the area. Will the impacts of tourism development gradually support or destroy their thousand-year-old culture?
Located in the Yunnan province of southwest China, Lijiang is the capital city of the Naxi ethnic minority. In 1995, a severe earthquake hit this jewel of traditional architecture. It was later rebuilt the way it looked like 700 years ago and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Lijiang, the Venice of China, has become a world economic stake in tourism development. It is currently a major destination for first generation Chinese tourists with almost four million visitors in 2005.
Benefiting from paid leave, the newly rich of the big Chinese urban agglomerations are beginning to discover the charms of the city, experience Naxi folklore, souvenir shops and Dongba religious rites.
Hu hua is a young Dongba (meaning ?wise man?). He has been hired by local administration to translate into Mandarin Chinese the sacred books that were confiscated during the Cultural Revolution.
He understands the meaning and the mysterious construction of the three thousand pictograms of the Naxi written language, the last pictographic writing system still used in the world.
Hu Hua has been invited together with the other Dongbas from Lijiang to the Jade Spring Park, a tourist amusement park based on Dongba religion.
To promote Dongba culture and local tourism, they will celebrate the traditional sky ceremony thus making the park director - a young and successful local company director - happy.
Lijiang is alive day and night. Chinese tourists dance with the old Naxi men in the marketplace, and then go to bars where everyone is encouraged to sing along with young women singers from the mountains. The Naxis come in droves to Chao?s first concert, the new pop star of the Naxi minority.
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