Potato!

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As I walked through the moun- tains between the Yangtze river towns of Wushan and Fengjie， I passed several turnoffs to work sites where the China Railways Tunnel Group was building sections of the freeway linking the two. On occasion and far below， I could see tunnel mouths and concrete pillars that would carry the highway. I was much in favor of it. The highway， when finished， would remove the long-distance buses from my country road.

Highway 103 twisted back and forth down the hillside， and I saw a path to the left that appeared to cut straight down from one level of the road to the next， and I started down it. I was overtaken by three children carrying firewood to a farmhouse below， and I asked if it was possible to get down to the next level of the road. They nodded.

I arrived at the farmhouse， rounded a mud-bricked corner and walked into a quagmire of mud in the front yard， covered by a massive blue tarpaulin that the day before was keeping off the rain and today was simply keeping the mud wet. A number of old men were sitting around the doorway of the farmhouse， which in the traditional way had no windows. Two of the men were banging metal rings onto crude， homemade paper sheets， making indentations about the size of a coin. I asked what it was for， and the answer was to create hell money to burn for dead people to spend on the Other Side.

There was a pause before I was invited to sit down， which was unusual. I talked with the people for a while， especially the kids， and got a 7-year-old girl called Wang Yan to write out her name for me， which she did pretty well.

I looked into the doorway and saw the room was dark with a candle burning on a table in front of an image of an old man. The old men were there because their friend had just died， which explained why this was just about the only time in the mountains that I was not offered tea at a farmhouse door. I felt uncomfortable about crashing a wake， so I stood up and asked for directions down the hill. They pointed into the vegetation， but I could see no obvious path. I looked around and Wang Yan was standing near me.

“Wang Yan， could you show me the way down？” I asked.

She looked round， her finger in her mouth and a woman said firmly： “No.”

And quite right too. I realized it was an entirely inappropriate request. But they showed me the path entrance and threw me a piece of bamboo to use as a walking stick and I clambered and slid my way down the slope， through terraces of ripening corn and various types of vegetables and stumbled out five messy minutes later on the next level of the road. I left the bamboo stick standing in between two rocks at the entrance to the “path” for the next person to use.

There were more colorful bugs on the road and more daubed slogans on the rock faces next to the road calling for the mountains to be sealed off and returned to Nature. Sunflowers were much in evidence in this valley， but I did not find even one that was pointing in the direction of the sun. Many were pointing at the earth， perhaps feeling depressed after all the rain and clouds. The flowers were huge and bees were busy assisting in the propagation of the species， working their way around the clock faces at the heart of the flowers.

The sound of water was all around， little cascades coming out of the rocks， with the liquid rumble of a major water flow coming from the valley floor. There was a metal guard railing alongside the outer edge of the road， beyond which the slope was sometimes almost perpendicular. Chinese writing– black， flowery and barely legible， but calligraphically interesting – began to appear on the railings and continued for thousands， maybe tens of thousands of characters： at least two kilometers of it. Unfortunately， at that point the valley floor was on my right， and so I was walking against the direction of the writing， which made it hard to read the sentences and follow the argument. But basically it was a political rant. “Out of 10，000 officials， 9，999 are corrupt，” said one typical sentence. It went on and on， like callers on talkback radio shows in more open societies， and I asked a farmer sitting by the road who had written it. “He lives near here. He’s about 30 years old. He keeps to himself，” the farmer said.

The writing followed me and ended， or rather began， next to a cornfield where， as a preamble， the man had written on the railing： “This corn is poisoned to stop thieves. Thieves please take note.” If it was poisoned， of course， then it was useless to everyone else as well.

Down below near the river， I could see the dayglo green of young paddy rice， the first I had seen for a long while. I passed a white painted slogan： “Fight SARS”， a reminder of that crisis in 2003 when the whole world wondered for a moment whether China had started another Black Death plague. “Don’t plant drugs in the for- est，” pleaded another sign.

I met an old peasant （there seemed to be no young ones） sweeping rocks and debris off the road. “Hello！” he said in English with a big smile， took off his straw hat and invited me to sit down. He looked up at the rock face and chose a shaded spot by the road which he presumably judged was unlikely to crash down upon us. “This will be safe，” he said.

I asked him what he grew and he said corn and potatoes， which he called yangyu.

“That is tudou in Mandarin，” he said. “What is it in English？”

“Potato，” I said， and he repeated it back to me pretty accurately.

“I am speaking English with an Englishman！” he exclaimed with a big grin. “How do you say corn？”

His name was Li and he was in his late 50s and retired. He had three children， all still living in the area， which was rare – mostly children are off working elsewhere. He said he had traveled outside the mountains only once to visit his daughter while she was working for a time in Jiangsu province， but he hated it. “Their language is just impossible to understand，” he said.

I asked him about opium， and he said it was widely grown up to around 2006 when the authorities started to crack down. “It was mostly used for medicinal purposes，” he said. “Taking the seeds is good for stomach ailments. But it was also smoked.”

He asked me if I had met any bad people on the road during my walk across China， and I said I had been lucky so far.

“But you went through Yichang， right？” he asked. “Yichang people are the worst. They will steal and grab anything. You have to be very careful. But you are a foreigner， so I suppose they are unlikely to touch you. Stealing from a foreigner would be a loss of face for the Chinese people.”

I said I did not think thieves were that concerned about face. My own theory of why I had so far not had anything bad happen to me was that I was such a random phenomenon and I appeared and disappeared so fast that people with evil thoughts didn’t have time to take action， even though the obvious and correct conclusion was that I probably had a pretty substantial sum of money in their terms in my pocket.

But I had been lucky， it was true.