My Chinese Spring Festival Trip-experience

In the following parts, I would like to share my trip with Stacy to Shilin (Stone Forest), Kunming of China during Spring Festival.

I keep buying a number of car diagnostic tools (like Autel DS708, TECH2, CK-100, Nexiq and more) from CHINAOBD2.com for 3 years, UOBD2 is a good online shop which always provides me nice service. But, once Chinese traditional Spring Festival is coming, UOBD2 staff will have some days’ vocation, they will go home for celebrating Spring Festival with their family, Spring Festival is the grandest and the most important festival for Chinese people, it is the time for the whole families to get together, which is similar with Christmas Day to the westerners. Then, during their vocation, I could buy nothing.

On 27^th, Jan-the first day

Every year after UOBD2 customer service-Stacy come back from Spring Festival, I couldn’t help asking her a lot about how her family celebrates the Spring Festival.

This year, warm-hearted Stacy invites me to China for celebrating the Festival with her family. This make me very excited, it must be a gorgeous trip with a lot of interesting thing to happen. Then I booked a plane ticket from Los Angeles to Kunming China on 27^th, Jan (PS: Stacy’s family is in Kunming).

After a long-time flight, I arrived at Kunming at 11pm, 28^th, Stacy and her family picked me up at the airport, they are very kind and friendly which make me felt very warm. After half an hour’s driving, we back to Stacy’s home, for a whole night, they treat me very nice, they bought me Crossing-the-bridge noodles (it is a rice noodle soup from Yunnan province, China. It is one of the most well-known dishes), the dish is served with a large bowl of boiling hot broth and the soup ingredients separate. The soup ingredients include thin slices of ham, chunks of chicken, chicken skin, strips of bean curd sheets, chives, sprouts, chili oil and rice noodles. Once added into the broth, it cooks quickly with a layer of schmaltz and oil glistening on top. The soup takes a few minutes to cook, I can’t help try a little chili, it is spicy but worth to try, only with chili can the crossing-the-bridge noodles taste better.

After enjoying the delicious noodles, Stacy’s father made Pu-erh tea, we sited together drinking tea and chat, it was 2.am 29^th before we realized. My first Chinese traveling day ends; it was the time to sleep.

On 28^th, Jan-the second day

Today, Stacy’s father drove us to visit Stacy’s grandpa and grandmother in the countryside, and they were planning to celebrate the festival with them for 5 days.

After one-hour’s driving, we arrived and were treated by Stacy’s grandpa, grandmother and aunt’s family. They are all very kindly.

To celebrate the festival, Stacy’s aunt family will kill a big pig with several village men help, after one-day’s hard work, the invited friends and relatives came her home for supper, the host is very busy and also very happy, I am informed the more relatives come for supper, the more happier the host is, it means this host is very popular and have a great harvest this year. For a whole night, the whole family is very nice to me; they try to make me felt at home.

On 29^th, Jan-the third day

We went to Stone Forest (Shilin), it is in Shilin Nationality Autonomous County, which is about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Kunming and requires only a 2-hour drive.

We visited Greater & Lesser Stone Forests (大、小石林) – also known as the Lizijing Stone Forest (李子菁石林), Naigu Stone Forest (乃古石林), Lake Chang (长湖 literally Long Lake), Dadie Waterfall (大叠水), Qifeng Cave (奇峰洞), this was a wonderful and excited day with so much gorgeous scenic areas.

On 30th, Lunar Jan

This is a very busy day, the whole family is busy to prepare New Year’s eve family dinner,

They prepared as many as 15 dishes including: fish, pork, beef, chicken, duck and vegetables; there are fried, steamed, stewed and pickled. The dinner is so lavish that I can’t help eat too much. When we enjoy the dinner, we enjoy The CCTV New Year’s Gala (中国中央电视台春节联欢晚会) from 8.pm to 12pm.

1^st day of 1st Lunar month

The 1st day of Lunar January, we enjoy the Yi people’ dance, it is very special and interesting.

I am here to share some photos.

2st day of 1st Lunar month

This morning, every family go to pray gods in the temple wishing for good weather, health to animals, development of the people, and peace.

3st day of 1st Lunar month

We left for Shilin (Stone Forest) again to watch wrestling competition and bullfighting,  I was informed that Each year on the 24th day of the sixth lunar month, many Yi minority celebrate the Torch Festival (火把节 Huǒbă Jié), which features folk dances and wrestling competitions. A Yi story holds that one of the pillars of the Stone Forest is in fact a girl named Ashima who turned to stone after she was forbidden from marrying her love. She’s a key figure to the Torch Festival, where many of the young Yi court potential suitors through dance and song. But that’s just one part of the incredibly elaborate festival.

However, during the past years, we can also watch bullfighting competition during spring festival. Maybe the bullfighting competition becomes an entertainment.

4st day of 1st Lunar month

I left China reluctantly and with many special products Stacy packed for me including: Pu-erh tea, Xuanwei ham, Yunnan’s 18 Oddities and more.