scribbler at large

I was still high on my trip to Shanghai when I hopped another southbound to train, this one going to Taiyuan, the capital of Shanxi Province (not to be confused with Shaanxi Province, although obviously that’s a big ask). Taiyuan (pronounced tie-you-ann) is southwest of Beijing, and was formerly known as China’s most polluted city. Lately, the air quality is on the mend, though, thanks to some heavy-duty initiatives—all taxis are now electric, for example. Taiyuan is not much of a tourist destination for the expat crowd, although Shanxi Province is a big producer of vinegar—a super popular dumpling condiment around here—and the landscape is really striking. So why did I go to Taiyuan? Well. Since I had time on my hands, I joined my friend’s church group on a trip to check out the ongoing projects of a Christian nonprofit in Taiyuan called Evergreen. The big draw for me was a cheese operation (cool!) which I’ll talk more about later.

Yellow Valley cheeses, ready to be eaten.

First, a brief overview of Evergreen: back in the early 1920s, a Norwegian teenager named Peter Torjesen decided he wanted to commit his life to missionary work in China. He and his wife moved to Shanxi Province to do just that, and he was given the Chinese name of “leaf evergreen.” During the Japanese invasion of mainland China in the late 1930s, the Torjesens sheltered hundreds of refugees in their home. In 1939 Peter was killed by the Japanese, and his family returned to Norway. Decades later, in 1988, the government of Hequ county in Shanxi Province reached out the Torjesens, saying they wanted to erect a monument in Peter’s honor and describing him as one of the “people’s martyrs.” At the monument’s unveiling in 1990, the local government invited Finn, Peter’s grandson, to return to China to help Shanxi Province manage its social and economic needs. Finn agreed, and moved his family to Taiyuan, along with a small startup staff. Together they established Evergreen, which now has several ongoing initiatives to include cheesemaking, artistic paper cutting, christian summer/winter camp for children, libraries, and orphan care. They’ve done all of their work alongside the locals, rather than imposing initiatives on the local economy, and as a result Evergreen has a uniquely strong relationship with the local government. Evergreen's projects are staffed by locals and Christians from around the world.

We left Beijing in the evening, and landed 3.5 hours later in the hands of a friendly missionary at about 10pm. We went straight to the Jinjiang Inn, a modest hotel in downtown Taiyuan that charged a “whopping” $30 per night. I did a paranoid bedbug check and in the process found more than one gross corner of the room (boogers! hairs! skin particles!), BUT the threat level, I decided, was tolerably low. The next morning our group convened for a cheapo hot breakfast at a jianbing stand down the street. I’ve already talked about jianbing, but if you missed it, I’m talking about a crepe-like pancake folded around egg, hot pepper, cilantro, scallions, and some kinda brown sauce, AS WELL as a crispy wonton (the best part). The lovely people of Taiyuan are much less accustomed to foreigners than Beijingers/Shanghainese, so we got stared at while we ate on the side of the street.

Colorful side street off the pedestrian shopping street in Taiyuan.

That first morning we visited the Special needs, Orphaned, or Abandoned children’s Resources (SOAR) village, where missionaries and local staff care for orphaned and abandoned children. I didn’t know this, but orphanages in China are typically home to children with some kind of mental or physical disability. The cold, hard truth is that the societal regard for these kids is low, and often they get dropped off at orphanages when parents realize the baby is disabled. The visit was interesting, but sobering. The rest of our day was spent visiting the community libraries Evergreen has set up, and checking out their paper cutting operation. You may have seen samples of Chinese paper cutting before—it’s a super cool art form. Evergreen makes holiday cards that are simple but attractive, often featuring scenes from the the bible or quotes from scripture.

Used skewer sticks on the pedestrian shopping street in Taiyuan.

That night we ate at a Xinjiang restaurant (Xinjiang Province is in the far west of China and has a majority Muslim population) and went for a stroll down a shopping street near our hotel. It was clean and bustling, and full of great-looking snacks. I bought a pair of slippers for RMB10, which is about $1.50. When I got back to our hotel I regretted my color choice, so I revisited the slipper dude (who had his wares laid out on a towel on the sidewalk), and exchanged the pair I’d bought for a better color. Feeling great about my purchase, I bought a beer at a convenience store and sipped it while strolling around the neighborhood. This turned out to be more fun in my imagination than in real life. A solo foreign lady drinking a beer on the street is highly irregular, and the stares and comments were not subtle (drinking beer is less of a lady thing than a man thing here, to boot). I retreated to my hotel.

On the second day we visited Yellow Valley Cheese, which is a tiny cheese operation run out of a dairy farm. It was first started in 2004 by a Dutch man who hoped to bring Dutch cheese to China. He carved out a foothold in the market and was distributing cheese to western grocery stores in Beijing until the melamine scandal in 2008. Although big dairy companies were the clear culprits, the government cracked down on small operations, claiming their practices weren’t up to standard. As a result, the Evergreen cheese biz was forced to shut down in 2011.

I think this is their "herbs de provence" flavor.

Happily, things restarted in 2015—the cheesemaker built a cheese room and aging cave on the property of a dairy farmer in a kind of “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” arrangement. Although the cheese is called gouda, it doesn’t taste much like the gouda I know—perhaps by design. Cheese is not big in China, so the cheesemaker may have tweaked the recipe to fit the local palate. The company isn’t yet licensed for retail, so the cheese can only be distributed informally. But maybe that will change soon! In any case, we got to look at the cheese room and the aging cheeses, and say hello to some cows.

These two dudes (possibly the farmers?) were fascinated by us. Seen here spying on us while we looked at the cheese.

After the cheese factory, we visited two Catholic churches in Yangqu (the next county over from Taiyuan). The first church was built five years ago and was super elaborate and impressive. An enormous meeting of some kind was going on inside, so we tiptoed around while attracting much interest from local folks.

Fancy new Catholic church, complete with creepy inflatable angels out front. #china

Several people asked to take my picture in rapid succession, so I smiled and said sure thing. Then a young kid—maybe 8 years old—came running up to me holding a phone. “Jie jie, Jie jie” he said, which means “big sister” and is an affectionate-but-respectful term for a woman older than you. “Can I take a picture of you?” he asked. I agreed, so he snapped a couple of shots and then took off. I watched him run all the way across the courtyard in front of the church to a car parked on the opposite side of the road (we’re talking a significant distance from where I stood). An adult man—the kid’s dad, I assume—stood next to the car waiting, and was visibly DELIGHTED to see the photos on the phone. It was clear he'd spotted a foreigner while driving by the church, pulled over in great haste, and sent his kid to carpe this diem. Imagine if we did that in America.

Our next stop was a church at the top of a mountain. A very steep, long road led up to it, with the stations of the cross demarcated at intervals alongside it. Dozens of people were hiking the road on foot, a few pushing folks in wheelchairs. We had to park the van downhill from the church near a smaller monument, and walk the last leg.

The final monument before reaching the church.

More incredible than a church at this altitude was a huge statue of Jesus, a la Rio de Janeiro, his arms outstretched, looming on a mountain behind the church. Wow, I did not anticipate seeing something like that in China. The church was packed and mass was in full swing—we heard it before we saw it, since the congregants were singing. A group of musicians stood in the back holding traditional Chinese instruments getting ready to play.

Standing on the steps of the church looking down.

Witnessing this group of people convened on a steep mountain to worship in a country where atheism rules was quite the experience. I came unprepared, and was floored by the energy and faith on display. The gift shop just outside the church brought me back to reality, however, with a broad array of plastic Jesus and Mary tchotchkes, including a neon pink crucifixion scene, giant posters of (a very white-skinned Jesus) and countless necklaces and bracelets sporting crosses, pictures of Jesus and Mary, and manger scenes). Nothing like the commodification of Jesus to remind you that you’re in China.

Jesus on the mountaintop, with a wind turbine in the background.

My understanding of Christianity in China before this trip was that it’s generally frowned upon and Christians often get mistreated by the government. While I don’t doubt the truth of this, it seems that the full picture is a bit more complex, and that perhaps the Christian movement, having become organically strong, is now more accepted in certain parts of the country than I understood it to be. Definitely worth more research.

Looking down the mountain from the church.

After hitting up all these very religious sights, we stopped for lunch and chilled out for a bit. Incredibly, our entire lunch for 9 people was a total of RMB110, which is somewhere between $15-$20. Whoa. We’re not in Beijing anymore. Our final stop was the Shanxi Museum, which we did in 20 minutes—not because there was nothing to see, we were just on a tight schedule. I zipped through a display of very old artifacts, my brain function at the level of deer-in-the-headlights. After that, I spent most of my 20 minutes watching a young, smartly-dressed girl (9 years old, maybe?) giving mini speeches about a succession of specific artifacts to an audience of zero folks (minus me). Maybe she was preparing for a school project? Either way, it was charming.

The only photo I took at the museum. The museum is actually behind me in this photo...apparently this fountain was more fascinating.

By the time we got to the train station we were all a bit cranky from riding around in the stuffy van for hours (it should be noted that this van had an extra, unexpected row of seats which drastically cut down on leg-room). But back on the high speed train, in the air conditioning, we could relax. While the scenery on my trip to Shanghai was all about fields and factories, and a few mountains, this trip featured steep, jagged mountains and deep ravines that zigzagged out from the train tracks. The soil looks toasted and sandy, and orange-tinted, in contrast to the green grass/foliage. I meant to read a book, but I was afraid to look away from the window in case I missed something.

In the end, this excursion really supported my suspicion that living in Beijing is unlike living anywhere else in this country. Each province, city, town, has its own personality and distinctive features, and often the things I’ve come to believe about China through living in Beijing don’t really apply to anywhere else.

That’s all for now, but more soon! Also, what do you think this drink is about?