China-Animals in China

Who are you?

Animals might pose a dodgy subject when related to China. Animals are adored in this country. People seem devoted to their dogs, who are pampered and granted many liberties. But there's also a different class of dogs, who end up on the menu's in restaurants.

Dogs in the luggage compartment of a sleeper bus. Quo vadis? Will they be on the menu or the life long pet of somebody real nice?

That last fact is a bit hard to swallow for the Western throat. Speaking about swallowing; recently a restaurant was opened that solely serves animals penises. Another dish that may not go down well in many tourists are snakes and other kind of reptiles.

This woman said she was an apprenctice-snake charmer. She was about to end her trainee period with an act with a boa constrictor. She was confident that she could handle this fierce animal.

At first the snake seemed to cooperate, but it became soon clear that it was inpenetrable by the woman's charms.

After this scene, things got really messy. We of Baskadiyarlar are not the kind of reporters that keep standing by reporting while other people are in mortal danger. We prefer participating and helping out. The woman was saved and that night we ate boa constrictor. Which doens't taste at all like chicken.

Cockfight near Jinghong

Good cocks are highly respected. The bad ones end up in the restaurant.

Hardly any part of chicken goes to waste in China. We love chicken, but one of the Baskadiyarlar-team members still has problems to appreciate it when it comes served with the head and one claw sticking out the bowl of soup.

In many rural parts the water buffalo is still widely used for agricultural purposes.

Usually, theuy are occupied with plowing paddies, here I saw herds of them loafing around a rubber plantation grazing and cruising.

By far the cutest member of the Chinese animal kingdom is the giant panda. It is hard to think of an animal that arouses more feelings of tenderness. However, most pandas alive are living in one of the breeding centre's like this one in Chengdu. These centres breed the animals with increasing succes, but it is unlikely that those creatures will ever live as independent bears. These one year old cubs play as if they have been trained 3 years to behave so endearingly clumsy. Unwittingly they resemble professional performers in bear suits. As bears, they have a credibility problem because they also resemble loafers on welfare.
Who wouldn't want to squeeze and cuddle such a huggable creature? The same question must have gone through the head of the people in charge of the breeding centre, and the answer is ofcourse; thousands! It's doubtful however, if this encounter resembles the fantasies of all those hapless romantics who fork out 40 euros. They are led to a mature animal sitting on a bench. The tourist are given are given plastic gloves and is asked to stand behind the animal and strike a pose for the picture. No hugging was attempted with the animal is constantly fed apples and ignores what goes on.

Crickets are both populars snacks as sought after for their cosy tsjirping.

This is mot the place for theorising, but could the masks and make up used in Chinese opera's be inspired by the wonderful colours of the faces of monkeys, like this one on Emei Shan?

We'd like to urge the readers of this blog to bring strong insect repellants when travelling to the south of China. Here you see the back of one of the members of the Baskadiyarlar-team after he just fell onto the bed one night without bothering to cover his body with a solid coating of Deet. Whe don't know the name of the bionic mosquitos who did this, but they mean business.