In ancient China, the so-called Western Region was a term for the area west of Yumen Pass (Yumenguan) in present-day Gansu Province, including what is now Xinjiang and (parts of) Central Asia. In the Chinese classic novel Journey to the West that tells a story of the Monkey King Sun Wukong who escorts Tang Seng on his journey for the Buddhist scriptures, the "West" refers most probably to the above said " Western Region." Nowadays a "Go West" campaign is going on. This is the great drive to develop the western regions launched by the Chinese last year in a bid to narrow the broadening gap between its relatively poor landlocked western regions and the wealthy eastern regions, especially the coastal areas. The West or the western regions means west China, that includes Shaanxi, Yunan, Guizhou, Gansu, Sichuan and Qinghai provinces, Tibet, Ningxia and Xinjiang autonomous regions and
Chongqing Municipality. Guangxi and Inner Mongolia autonomous regions have also been included in the development strategy. At the end of August, I joined a small travel group that headed for the west. The trip was arranged by the Foreign Languages Publishing and Distribution Bureau to get a close-up and better knowledge of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. It was my first visit to Ningxia. Covering an area of 66,400 square kilometers, Ningxia is quite small compared with the other administrative regions in west China. After a smooth 75-minute flight from
Beijing covering a distance of more than 900 kilometers we landed at Hedong Airport, 26 kilometers from downtown Yinchuan, the capital of the autonomous region. Surprisingly, it is a new-built modern structure which can accommodate big-size aircraft. The express way connecting the airport and the capital city was excellent. The city was clean. I saw many new buildings in various styles and sizes. There were plenty of taxi cabs, and all were painted in uniform, the upper part metallic gray and the lower part red. Most of the city people, especially the younger generation, dressed fashionably. No,
Yinchuan is not as less developed as I imagined before. In the afternoon we visited the Ningxia Museum, a huge complex with several buildings that store innumerable relics and artifacts reflecting the long history and rich cultural heritage of Ningxia. We saw the cliff carvings and rock paintings found in the Helan Mountains and surrounding areas about 40 kilometers from Yinchuan. They depict the life and work of the northern nomads some 6,000 years ago. We learned about the existence of the "mysterious kingdom"- the Western Xia Kingdom established by the Dangxian tribe in 1038.
Yinchuan served as its capital. The kingdom was conquered by the Mongols under Genghis Khan in 1226. Inside the museum stands Chengtian (Heaven-sustaining) Temple, a Western-Xia Buddhist Pagoda built in 1050, towering 64.5 meters high. An independent discipline called Western Xia studies has come into being which attracts a large number of scholars from home and abroad. Important works and many other publications on Western Xia history, its language and script have been published in China and in other countries and regions such as Russia, Japan, the United States, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Another topic is the history of the Hui people. The Huis, one of the largest minorities in China, are widely distributed across the country. Since the mid-seventh century, great numbers of Arabs and Persians had come to China via the continental and maritime Silk Road as envoys, traders or religious pioneers. And then, in the early 13th century, when Genghis Khan conquered Central and West Asia, numerous Arabs, Persians and others from Central Asia were conscripted and emigrated to China. Those foreign people married locals who came from Han, Mongolian, Uygur and other ethnic backgrounds. Gradually, a new ethnic community -- the Hui people who believe in Islam -- took shape. At present, Huis number 8 million nationwide. The population of Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region is about 5.4 million, 33 percent of whom are of Hui origin. The region is home to 35 ethnic groups. A rare exhibit in the museum that amazed us very much was a tiny Qur'an that had the size of a small matchbox. It was brought to Ningxia hundreds of years ago from beyond the "west" along the Silk Road. From the museum, we went to the
Yinchuan Nan Guan Mosque. With a history of 400 years, it was formerly a grand ancient building in classic Chinese style, but was razed to the ground during the so-called cultural revolution. It was rebuilt in 1981 and is now the biggest and most magnificent mosque in the whole region that boasts 3,000 mosques. The Nan Guan Mosque bears specific Arabian features with five green domes and two 30-meter high minarets. Hundreds of people flock here every day. Another tourist attraction we visited that afternoon was the ancient 54-meter high Haibao (Sea Treasure) Pagoda that dated back to 407. It was damaged by an earthquake and rebuilt in the 18th century. This Buddhist temple is still functioning as a place of worship. Its uniqueness is that the roof is topped with an Islamic green dome. It was a fine sunny morning when we left our hotel for a popular tourist destination 56 kilometers northwest of Yinchuan. We rode along a beautiful highway. The Shahu (Sand Lake) Scenic Area covers a total area of 45 square kilometers, including 24 square kilometers of land, 8 square kilometers of water and 13 square kilometers of desert. The whole scene was marvelous, a blend of blue water of the lake which was dotted with so many green clusters of reed and the surrounding desert with its specific colors. Souvenir and food stalls, restaurants, exhibition halls and many recreation facilities made the scene more colorful. Sharing joy with the numerous tourists there, some of us took a camel ride on the wavy sand hills. It was my first ever in my life. Another attraction was a sledge ride down a sand hill slope. Then we boarded one of the many beautiful speedboats on the lake to enjoy a breath-taking high-speed ride criss-crossing the water surface. This large-scale entertainment center was established by a big state farm as one of its several projects to restructure itself and get out of the red. At lunch in one of the lake-side restaurants we got a delicious dish of a big fish head. This kind of fish is a product of the lake and can reach a weight of 60 to 70 kg. The lake with its unpolluted environment is also a habitat of numerous species of birds that number in the hundreds and thousands. Apart from a tourist hot spot, this enterprise is an investment hot spot too. After lunch, our minivan took us to the Western China Film and TV City in Zhenbeibao not so far away from Shahu Scenic Area. This gigantic theme park was founded by a prominent writer who is also a businessman and a native of Ningxia. It was built upon the ruins of two bastions of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Tens of films and TV dramas had been shot there, among others the well-known prize-winning movies Red Sorghum and Horse Tender. The settings of the movies and TV programs made here are now attractions for tourists. On that hot day a TV crew was shooting scenes. Then we visited the Western Xia mausoleum that consists of nine tombs of kings and about 200 others of ministers on a vast royal burial place of about 50 square kilometers located in the middle section of the eastern slopes of Helan Mountains, 35 kilometers west of Yinchuan. This historical site under state-level protection with its half-cone-half-pyramid-shaped tombs is lauded as "one of the wonders of the Far East." Just see and believe it. Next to the site stands the 53,000-square-meter Western Xia Museum. The magnificent building houses a display of hundreds of artifacts and hundreds of documents related to the ancient kingdom of the ethnic group that created a brilliant civilization and history. Our visit to the state-owned Baijitan Forest on the desert area east of Lingwu and south of
Yinchuan gave us an interesting knowledge in ecological conservation and environmental protection. The forest farm, established in as early as 1953, has an area of 259 thousand mu (1 hectare=15 mu) under management, including 158 thousand mu of forest. We saw different kinds of trees, shrubs and grass planted there that are suitable and effective for the purpose of afforestation, desert control and water conservation. The state-owned enterprise has planted a green defense of 42 kilometers in length and 10 kilometers in width. We saw vast tracts of desert-turned-orchards with full-grown fruit trees. In cooperation with a Japanese association and a county in Japan, the farm established two projects in 1995 and 1997. The Baijitan Nature Protection District is home to 115 species of vertebrates and 262 species of sandy plants. I was moved by those who do their job there full of dedication not bowing to hardships. They are the successors of the pioneers of the fifties and carry on the long-term task of developing the west. Not less interesting was our visit to the Guangxia (Yinchuan) Industry Company situated about 12 kilometers south of Yinchuan. We went straight to the vineyards of the company, which is not a state-owned enterprise but owned by shareholders. It has created three big vineyards from 2,640 acres of sandy land. The work started in 1998. In a quite short time, more than 1,000 sand hills had been leveled. Movable spraying irrigation system was applied. The grape seeds were imported from France, and French experts in vineyard cultivation and wine-making came here from Bordeaux to work in terms of three to six months. We were told, the best wine can be brewed only with the best grapes, and the best grapes can be grown only on the most suitable soil. Here, at the east of the Helan Mountains in
Yinchuan Plain, the soil is gritty, permeable, organic and dry, and is bestowed with conducive climatic and geographical conditions, therefore is just the most suitable one. We visited the modern winery, built in 1999 with technology and equipment from France and Italy. It has a capacity of 20,000 tons of wine. We went to another site which has a more stunning background. In 1996, the company started a great battle against the desert. Technicians and workers leveled about 3,000 sand hills more than 10 meters high, moved millions and millions cubic meters of sand, planted more than 2 million trees, built a series of canals, roads and power lines. And after three years, the result was the emergence of 1,500 acres of high standard land planted with mahuang (Chinese ephedra), gouqizi (Chinese wolf-berry) and other Chinese medicinal herbs. It has been proven that the soil is not only most suitable for grapes, but also for mahuang and gouqizi. It is said that Ningxia produce one-half of China's total output of mahuang, while China provides one-third of the world total. In its efforts to make more contributions to environmental protection and ecological conservation, to reclaim more arable land from desert, and to modernize and expand Chinese medicine and agricultural industrialization, the company is in dire need of help and investment from home and abroad. It was a nice day when we left
Yinchuan in the morning to head southwards for Guyuan about 380 kilometers away. On our way, we crossed the Yellow River, known as "the cradle of Chinese civilization," which flows through the central and the northern parts of the region stretching nearly 400 kilometers. Six bridges have been built across the river in Ningxia, which means one for every 57 kilometers on average. At noon we stopped in Tongxin, a country-level city in the southern part of central Ningxia, about 250 kilometers south of Yinchuan. We visited the Grand Mosque, a large ancient building in an original classic Chinese style of architecture, with yellow as the dominant color. The ahung told us that at the time of construction, people here had still no idea of Islamic architecture. In the city proper there are 19 mosques and there are 400 more ones in the surrounding villages. The autonomous region runs an Arabic language training school in Tongxin, mainly to help train local imams and religious administrators. About 50 kilometers northwest of Guyuan we stopped to visit a historical site known as the Xumishan (Buddha Mountain) Grottoes with its 130 grottoes or caves still preserved. It has a history of 1,500 years and is the largest Buddhist temple in Guyuan Prefecture. The grottoes are dispersed mainly on five cliffs spanning many kilometers from south to north. The biggest and most imposing among the stone statues is the sitting Buddha in Cave No 5, with a height of 20.6 meters. The hillsides were planted with trees which were still young so that we could see traces of barrenness. Here the preservation of cultural relics and environmental protection are closely connected. On our way to Guyuan we made a brief stop to take a close look at a stretch of hilly land adjacent to the roadside. Here people were used to plant crops but now the land is planted with trees instead. Reclaiming arable land for afforestation means fighting soil erosion and conserve water to improve ecological and environmental conditions. Increasing the area of forest land is of great importance in Ningxia, especially in its mountainous southern part. Late in the afternoon we reached Guyuan, the seat of Guyuan Prefecture and Guyuan County, and the political, financial and cultural hub of south Ningxia. We went straight to the Guyuan Museum. Built in 1988, the big building has a unique style showing modesty but an artistic blend of ancientness and modernity. And more astonishing is the fact that the museum stores a fantastic number of 10,000 of relics and artifacts reflecting the long and brilliant history of Guyuan, which called "Yuanzhou" in ancient times. In pre-historic times, the ancestors of the Chinese lived, worked and created human civilization here. Ancient kingdoms and dynasties waged many wars against each other, and the Guyuan area at the eastern foot of Liupan Mountains was made into battlefields and centers for stationing troops. According to historical records, the legendary hero Genghis Khan died of illness in this area in 1227 after having conquered Western Xia, but buried elsewhere. The 2,000-year-old Silk Road which started in Chang'an (today's Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi Province) and ran westward, passed through "Yuanzhou" and made it an important meeting point of ancient Chinese and Western civilizations. In the museum we admired among others a gilded silver carafe and a glass bowl unearthed from the grave of General Li
Xian of the Northern Zhou Dynasty (557-581). These two rare relics of great artistic and historical value originating from the Persian Sassanian Dynasty (226-651) are the only ones in China and the world. They show a glorious past of good Sino-foreign relations. Guyuan is regarded as one of the important sites for research and study of the Silk Road, and the Guyuan Museum is a center of research of its rich collection of the treasures of "Yuanzhou." It was really surprising to find such a wonderful museum in an "unknown" place. The next morning we made a trip to the Liupan Mountains which encompasses Ningxia, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. "Liupan" means "six bends" and indicates that on the way up there are six bends or twists. It has two main peaks, 2,928 and 2,942 meters above sea level respectively, both of which are in Guyuan County. At a site with an elevation of about 2,000 meters we stopped to take a look at the surroundings. At one side we saw lush green protected natural and artificial forests. In a mass afforestation campaign in 1979, thousands upon thousands of people planted trees there. At another side there is a new tunnel built two years ago. A highway runs through the 2,800-meter-long tunnel connecting Ningxia with Gansu Province. We saw different kinds of motor vehicles going in and out of the tunnel. We went further up along a winding road to stop and get out of our minivan at an elevation of about 2,800 meters. On a peak stood the Red Army's Long March Memorial Pavilion built in 1996 to commemorate the world-known 25,000-li (12,500 kilometers) trek of the Red Army led by Mao Zedong that crossed Liupan Mountains in Sept 1935. the Long March started in Oct 1934 from east China's Jiangxi and ended in Oct 1935 when the Red Army arrived at the base area of the borders of Shaanxi, Gansu and Ningxia. One side of the pavilion's stone pedestal was inscribed with a poem written by Mao Zedong in Oct 1935 entitled Mount Liupan. We were on a site belonging to a national park, the Liupanshan National Nature Reserve. It has a forest area of some 50,000 hectares and its average elevation is 2,300 meters. With dense forests, multi-shaped mountains and slopes, and lots of creek and brook, it is the birthplace of Jinghe River, Qinshui River and Hulu River. It is also the richest area of biological species resources in Ningxia. There are 788 species of plants, among which 150 are of economic value and 39 are important traditional Chinese medicinal materials. The nature reserve is also home to 213 species of vertebrates including first-grade protected animals such as red-belly golden pheasants and musk deer. Besides that, it still has 158 species of birds and 905 species of insects among which 10 species are rare, valuable butterflies. The Shuigou Forest Farm has planted different kinds of trees and completed afforetation on an area covering thousands of mu. The farm supplies more than two million saplings every year to be used in ecological conservation projects. On our way back to Guyuan we went through the tunnel we had seen before. We left Guyuan in the early afternoon and arrived in
Yinchuan at dusk. Back at the hotel I felt tired, but the journey and the visits are worth the trouble and all what I had seen were things worth seeing. Ningxia boasts bountiful historic and scenic resources. The tourist industry is booming. There is a developed agriculture. Ningxia has become one of the 12 grain suppliers in China and produces one-third of the national total production of potatoes. Heartening results have been recorded in poverty alleviation. And most important is that the efforts in environmental protection and ecological conservation have obtained tremendous achievements. More than 50 minerals have been found in Ningxia, and the region is especially rich in coal, gypsum and natural gas resources. The industrial structure includes many branches, among others mining, metallurgy, power, textiles, food processing, paper-making, high-tech and IT. Transportation and telecommunications have been much improved to the betterment of the investment climate. The region maintains trade and economic relations with more than 70 countries and regions. More and more foreign companies have set up businesses there. In terms of GDP, Ningxia ranks 20th in China, well above its 28th place in 1992. The six-day visit came to an end. I am very grateful to the relevant officials and functionaries at provincial and lower levels in Ningxia as well as to our "assistants" from the Foreign Languages Bureau for all the care, attention, help and facilities that have made the visit successful and unforgettable. I wish the people of Ningxia, who are determined to take the lead in the development of the west, good luck and greater successes in their march to their goal that is New Ningxia which is, as the vice governor put it, "small, affluent and beautiful."
