Lijiang, Shangri-la, Kunming – April 2009

On the fourth month of the ninth year of the twenty-first century, I returned to the Motherland. I found the Mother sitting in the middle of the world, her back before me, chunks of ash from the cigar in her hand falling to her feet.

Piqued by the lack of a welcome, I called, “Black lungs make no one beautiful.”

She did not turn around and I wondered if she knew I was there. As I watched the puffs of smoke rise, I heard her ask, “What do you know of beauty?”

Glass lake from the bus to Yunshanping in Lijiang

Yak milk is...interesting. It's got a bit of a punch in the end.

Yunshanping

Carpets for hire in Lijiang's Old Town

The occupation of the Old Town

Picking up after yourself is pretty important to the Naxi religion

Childhood in Yunnan

Arise! People who refuse to be slaves!

Bridge in the Tiger Leaping Gorge

Songzanlin Lamasery in Shangri-la / Zhongdian / Gyalthang

My National Geographic moment on the way to the lamasery

Can't be paradise without the Internet

The Old Town in Shangri-la

The steppes of Shangri-la

On the Diqing tarmac, on the way to Kunming