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COVER STORY
WANDERERS OF THE MIDDLE KINGDOM 他们比我们走得更远 We track six intrepid explorers who, over the course of nearly 2,000 years, have left an indelible mark on China’s culture and cartography
COVER STORY
40 ADVENTURE JUNKIES 探险者们的别样世界 Contemporary Chinese adventurers reveal what spurred them to drive, dive, jump, climb and glide into a life less ordinary
Issue 3/2012
30 YEARS
50 30 YEARS OF BACKPACKING 背包客三十年 How low-budget traveling went from revolutionary injunction to a quest for self-discovery among China’s youth
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ON THE ROAD
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TAKING THE LONG ROAD 我的黔东南马拉松之行
A British amateur runner finds himself an unwitting star in a 100km race through the wilds of Guizhou
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盗墓口语大观
CHINA'S LAST WILDERNESS
Learn the black-market lingo of China’s favorite adventure anti-heroes: grave robbers
A journey to eastern Tibet unveils monasteries, nomads and roads frozen in time
SOCIAL CHINESE
OF TOMBS, TRAPS & THE INTREPID 84
CHI LE MA PIGS’ FEET 美容猪蹄 Botox be damned, the real secret to staying young and beautiful is the humble pig trotter
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KALEIDOSCOPE
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穿越康巴
92 PIONEER WE DON'T DO TOURS, WE CREATE EXPERIENCES 对话WildChina创始人张玫 How WildChina founder Mei Zhang went from a rustic Yunnan upbringing to a Harvard MBA and a passion for sharing a different China
1 EDITOR’S LETTER 卷首语
6 NEWS 新闻
8 THE HARD SEAT 多棱镜
9 STRANGE BUT TRUE 趣闻 C F P ( F i lm )
13 STREET TALK 14 DON’T MISS 不可错过
17 MADE IN CHINA 中国制造
90 ON THE CHARACTER
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by fotoe
(Marathon), Tom Carter (Tibeten Woman), Liu Ling (Food), Gett y (L andscape)
and
街头俚语
CITY STROLL
TWO DAYS IN YANGZHOU
魅力汉字
9 5 ADVENTURES IN CHINESE 我学我行
96 THE GEEK CORNER 高手学堂
扬州两日
Photographs
Explore spring’s romance in the river town of Yangzhou, home to Tang poet reveries, willow-lined waterways and Huaiyang cuisine
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AUDIO-VISUAL WORLD UPROAR IN HEAVEN 3D 大闹天宫3D版 The Monkey King is back in 3D, almost 50 years after he first appeared in the benchmark animated film “Uproar in Heaven”
Issue 3/2012
WANT MORE LIKE THIS? You can find more articles like these on our newly revamped website, www. theworldofchinese. com, which is updated daily with recipes, dating advice, language lessons and more!
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0 3 三十 年 30 YEARS
Years
of
Backpacking B Y L I Z T U N G ( 董怡)
H o w ro u g h- an d- re ady t rav e l i n g w e n t f ro m a m i ssi o n o f re v o l u t i o n t o o n e o f se l f di sc o v e r y
从宣扬革命精神到自我发现， 背包旅行对每一代中国人的 意义都截然不同
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Photograph
by
Fotoe
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Fotoe by
to “take Beijing to the rest of the country.” Trains were rerouted, crash pads set up in factories and homes and the People’s Liberation Army made responsible for ensuring the Red Guards had enough to eat. The result was explosive. In a 1968 interview, quoted in the newspaper Revolutionary Worker, an American who was then studying in Beijing remembers the sudden influx of students. “They had heard about all these groovy people out in the streets, making revolution, following Chairman Mao, you got a right to rebel. So they came. Our school had 1,800 regular students. All of a sudden, there were 7,000 more from Tianjin, living all over the place. We figured we could spread the revolution by going outside of Beijing. The Central Committee decided that it was a good idea for us to travel.” As young revolutionaries from Beijing fanned out across the country, Red Guards from the countryside began making pilgrimages to the capital to see their leader—a wave that Louise Chipley Slavicek’s book “The Chinese Cultural Revolution” estimates to have encompassed 12 million people by the end of 1966. Among these pilgrims was a young Shandong woman surnamed Zhang, who at the age of 15 made the trip from her hometown to Beijing as a part of one of the first “Red Guard Great Exchanges” (红卫兵大串联 H5ngw-ib~ng D3chu3nli1n). For Zhang, now 62, it was a thrilling if grueling experience. “At that time, the trains were really, really crowded and had no seats. So we stood the 10-20 hours all the way to Beijing,” she remembers, noting that even young children whose parents wouldn’t let them go would often run away to join the movement. “At that time everyone worshipped Chairman Mao and wanted to see
Photograph
W
hen Xiao Hu and his girlfriend set out last spring from Beijing with two bikes, a tent and RMB15,000 in cash, the idea was to ride as far as their money would take them. Starting from Xiao Hu’s hometown in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, the couple planned to loop around China, hitting the wild corners of Gansu and Qinghai, crawling up the Tibetan plateaus and landing in the lush jungles of Yunnan—2,400 miles from their starting point. How did they prepare? “I played some soccer,” Xiao Hu says. “My girlfriend, she took walks to and from work.” The 23-year-old bartender and his girlfriend, a waitress, aren’t your typical protagonists in the dominant narratives of youth travel in China, which tend to revolve around the migration of poor rural kids to the cities or rich urban kids to the West. But the couple represents a long tradition of fly-by-the-seat-ofyour-pants backpacking that in China dates back either 25 or nearly 50 years, depending on how you look at it. Most travelers and travel historians date the beginning of the backpacking movement back to the late 80s, but the phenomenon of widespread youth travel kicked off in the mid-1960s with the Cultural Revolution. Up to then, filial tradition dictated that children stay by their parents’ sides, a sentiment captured in the Confucian saying, “When your parents are alive, don’t travel far.” (父母在，不远游。F&m^ z3i, b& yu2n y5u.) But in 1966, such notions were upended by a collective madness for revolution. That year, it was proclaimed that all Red Guards—middle and high school students—should ride the trains and buses for free as part of a push
"THE TRAINS WERE SO CROWDED, WE STOOD THE 20 HOURS TO BEIJING" him,” she says. The Central Committee conceived of other “great exchanges” in 1967, including a “Long March” to the Red Army base at Jinggangshan. “Every day we’d walk 70 or 80 li (20 to 25 miles),” Zhang says.“Every day we set out before the light had come… our feet would be swollen by the end of
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the day.” It was on these long journeys that the heady fun of the early days began to turn to weariness. “I was really tired,” she says. “It was just to learn the Red Army spirit’s ability to bear hardships, and try a taste of the Long March ourselves.” Red Guards weren’t the only ones pained by the chaotic waves of travel. According to another former Red Guard surnamed Li, the departures left parents heartbroken. “Although their parents supported them, they were also very troubled in their hearts, and very helpless,” he says. Despite the thrill that accompanied the Red Guard trips, Li is adamant
that these mass movements and other government-instigated journeys cannot be counted as traveling in the truest sense. “At that time, people simply didn’t have the power to decide their own fates,” he says. “They couldn’t just go wherever they wanted; it was impossible.” According to a study published by the US Library of Congress, official efforts to circumscribe free travel began as early as 1952 “with a series of measures designed to prevent individuals without special permission from moving to cities to take advantage of the generally higher living standards there.” Aside
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from approved parties, migration to the cities was limited during the Cultural Revolution for political and practical reasons. In 1967, the Red Guards also lost their free pass when it was decided that their train privileges should be revoked, and they should return to school. The largest remaining migration was that of the “educated or rusticated youth” (知识青年 Zhishi Q~ngni1n), intellectual young people who were sent to the countryside for re-education. Experts estimate that from 1962 to 1978, almost 18 million such people were sent to the countryside. From the early 70s on, individual travel was tightly regulated, and the logjam didn’t clear until well after the start of Reform and Opening Up in 1978. Though restrictions were relaxed in the late 70s and early 80s, when an increase in food supply allowed the cities to absorb more migrants, most people remained too poor to travel recreationally. That began to change on a small scale in the early 80s, when college students with money began making minor trips during their semester holidays. Among these was Cheng Yimu, who at age 17 left his small hometown in Anhui Province for university in the capital of Hefei. It was 1979, and for Cheng, the trip was a revelation. “At that time my feeling was, Hefei is so big,” he remembers. “This first trip included a lot of firsts in my life: the first time traveling so far away, the first time staying in a hotel, the first time seeing traffic lights and public
Photographs
From 1962 to the end of the 70s, 18 million urban intellectuals, known as “educated youth,” were shipped out to the countryside for reeducation.
transportation on the streets, the first time crossing the Yangtze River, the first time taking a train, the first time in a big city. This trip was the first step in opening the great door of life. From that time on I was no longer the small boy who’d never left his small town.” The trip planted a seed of wanderlust in Cheng; throughout college he took several trips to nearby cities like Nanjing and Wuhan. After graduating in 1983, Cheng moved to Beijing for work, spending his free time biking to every corner of the city. By then, Reform and Opening Up was in full swing, filling the country with hope. “The 80s were an era brimming with passion,” he says. “Young people dared to dream and dared to act. A lot of people were writing poetry, and I would often hear of people riding bikes to Xinjiang or Dongbei.” An over-300 kilometer bike trip to Zhangjiakou, where his brother was stationed, cemented Cheng’s love for rough, DIY travel. The term “backpacking” had not yet been invented, but the idea was starting to spread. “For my generation, the practice predates knowledge of the term,” he says. Yet even after the beginning of Reform and Opening Up, travelers in China were still few and far between. “During that era in China, there wasn’t even that much normal touring,” he says, “and there were hardly any backpackers… at least I never saw any.” Part of the reason was that most people then were still too poor to travel, and a sizeable portion of people’s living allowances came in the form of government tickets. “You needed tickets for so many things back then—rice, cotton, oil... And the price would be higher if you didn’t have any,” remembers Anne Gunn, an American who studied in China in the 1980s. “Tickets only worked in your own province unless you were privileged and had national tickets. So it was expensive to go away from home.” For those who could afford them, vacations were more likely to be reserved for destinations that earned bragging rights, like a capital city or historical monument. According to John Israel, another American who since 1978 has led bike tours through
RATION TICKETS Thanks to post-war shortages, in 1950 the government began issuing ration tickets to the public to buy basic necessities like food, clothes, toiletries and other daily items. The ticket system, which continued through the 1980s, limited movement around the country as tickets could only be used in one’s home province.
China, locals weren’t the only ones paying through the nose to travel. “At that time, foreign travelers in China (almost all organized tour groups) were not permitted to live anywhere except in approved top-end hotels,” he says. Israel tried to convince the China International Travel Service to join the international youth hostel movement to encourage more visitors, but says they were unwilling to give up foreign capital. “The deal-killer was the word ‘inexpensive’,” he says. A few independent travelers continued their maverick jaunts through China, but most Chinese stayed at home through the end of the 80s. Things started to shift in the 90s, when two important changes took hold: the growth of the economy and the introduction of a holiday system that gave most employees between seven and 15 vacation days a year. Nonetheless, for a country still recovering from 30 years of economic ravages, buying
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the bare necessities remained the priority. As a result, most people turned to an unlikely source for their vacations: work. “In the 90s, more people were traveling with public funds, mostly organized with their danwei (单位, work units),” says travel photographer and longtime backpacker Cheng Yuan. In a Sina blog entitled “The Rise of the Chinese Backpacker” he adds, “People didn’t understand the concept of paying for your own travel, and even felt it was a little foolish.” Independent travel growth was slow throughout that decade, but from the year 2000 the idea of travel as both a leisure activity and a means of self-enrichment began to take hold. “2000 to 2010 was an era of extreme growth for Chinese backpacking,” Cheng Yuan writes. Much of this was related to the economy, he says, which improved markedly during and after the 90s. “By the year 2000, there were more holidays from
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Xiao Hu takes a rest on the side of the road during his bike trip from Beijing to Sichuan.
"BACKPACKING IS ALL ABOUT FREEDOM AND SELF-DETERMINATION. THAT’S SOMETHING MY PARENTS DIDN’T HAVE"
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the workplace, and the new generation is more interested in the pursuit of the self. With so much social pressure, they all want a chance to escape from the stress, to go out and see the world. In addition, there are now discount tickets to travel abroad, and it’s much easier to get visas.” The Internet also had a major impact on the spread of backpacking as a culture and a philosophy. A popular traveling forum called “the Prosperity of Magnificence” (如火如 荼的兴旺) sprouted up on Sina.com, and the term “backpacker” began to gain traction. Much like their Western counterparts, Chinese backpackers defined themselves in opposition to traditional tourism. “These so-called backpackers, to summarize simply, make entire journeys themselves. For them,
traveling is a kind of learning experience, a way of life,” writes Cheng Yuan. The movement has sprouted a host of subcultures, ranging from bare-bones bike trips like Xiao Hu’s to elaborate expeditions by middle-aged mountain goats. The majority fall somewhere in between: young professionals who squeeze trips into holidays and weekends; students who journey to summer jobs in other cities; and migrants workers who spend a year or two saving money before launching shoestring trips that last as long as their money does. As Cheng Yuan notes, at this period in China’s backpacking history, mindset matters more than money: “They are traveling to reappraise the value of life. For them, the destination is of course important, but the learning experience
of travel itself is something to which they pay even more attention.” This mindset itself is an important development. A number of post-80s backpackers we talked to noted the gap between their own aspirations of self-discovery and development and their parents’ more practical—and fearful—attitudes. “I never told my parents about the trip,” Xiao Hu admits. “They wouldn’t understand. My parents never traveled in the true sense of the word. They didn’t have this way of thinking.” A Beijing barowner who goes by the nickname 69 and spent years backpacking shared a similar experience. “There’s definitely a generation gap there,” he says. “Backpacking is all about freedom and self-determination. That’s something my parents didn’t have when they were young. They didn’t understand why I wanted to do it, and they worried about me a lot.” Yet the rising popularity of backpacking among young people
is an indication of improvements in the financial and personal wellbeing that so worried their parents. Fifty years ago, trips of this kind would only have been made in the face of extreme hardship, political campaigns or even starvation. Today, they serve as a coming-of-age experience for young people with the means and the courage to do it. When Xiao Hu and his girlfriend returned to Beijing after three months of biking, he says he felt like a changed person. “After I came back, I was much more serious about the way I did things. Not like when I was younger… I shed a lot of the uncertainty of youth. Now I have a really clear-cut sense of what I want to do with my life and with work, what I’m struggling for. I know how to take things steadily, step by step, and move forward.” So does that mean he’s done with traveling? “Of course not!” he says. “If I have money and time, I’ll go traveling again. There are still a lot of places I want to go.”
CHINESE YOU NEED
backpacker
b8ib`ok-
背包客 DIY travel
There is no hostel for backpackers in this village. Zh-ge c$nzi li m9iy6u g4ng b8ib`ok- zh&s& de k-zh3n.
这个村子里没有供背包客住宿的客栈。 z#zh&y5u
Chen Yuan & Xiao Hui
自助游 hostel
self-discovery
k-zh3n
客栈
I want to go on a journey of self-discovery in India. W6 xi2ng q& Y#nd& k`ish@ x%nzh2o z#w6 zh~ l).
x%nzh2o z#w6
我想去印度开始寻找自我之旅。
Photographs
by
寻找自我
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57
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社交 汉语
SOCIAL CHINESE
T he se c re t l an g ua g e o f C hi n a’s g rav e ro bbe rs
I ll u s t r a t i o n
by
Liu Ling
盗墓是个技术活儿，需要望闻问切 “In modern times, simply finding the location of an ancient tomb is more difficult than the process of getting it open. All those spots marked by an obvious pile of earth, a stone stele or some such, have already been dug up. If you want to find those tombs that have lain hidden for centuries beneath the earth with no above-ground marking to signify their presence, then you’re going to need certain technical knowledge and apparatus, like gavelocks, Luoyang shovels, bamboo
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nails, drills and the like. Some specialists don’t rely on such tools, and instead search within ancient tomes for clues that will lead them to lost tombs. Even fewer still have a knowledge of the occult sciences, and use the techniques of geomancy to read the lay of the land in their search for the resting places of the dead. I myself belong to the latter category...” —Zhang Muye, “Ghost Blows Out the Light”《鬼吹灯》
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A
s a discipline, archaeology is mostly about taking soil samples. At its most exciting, it involves poking about in a wet ditch looking for bits of broken pottery. But don’t despair just yet, for there’s a black sheep in the extended archaeological family: grave robbery. Conducted under the cover of darkness, grave robbery is a dirty (both spiritually and physically) and highly illegal profession. Yet it has become wildly popular in China, thanks to a couple of pulp serials: “Grave Robbers’ Chronicals” (《盗 墓笔记》D3om& B@j#) and “Ghost Blows Out the Light” (《鬼吹灯》Gu@ Chu~ D8ng). Published over the last decade, these adventure-horror series have quickly become known as the Indiana Jones stories of China—only with fewer fedoras and bullwhips, and more Mao caps and feng shui compasses. The link with archaeology remains, however: Chinese grave robbers like to refer to themselves in polite company as “hobbyist archaeologists,” or kaoguxue aihaozhe (考古学爱好者).
Grave Robbers’ Mantra The techniques of grave robbing can be summed up with the four-character mantra:
望闻问切 (w3ng w9n w-n qi-), “look, smell, ask
and feel.”
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The Chestertonian paradox that thieves have a great respect for private property (they merely wish it to become their property “that they may more perfectly respect it”) has never been more true than for grave robbers. These are people who pride themselves on liberating long-forgotten treasures, be it for public good or personal gain. Grave robbers also learn to respect the inhabitants of the tombs, and the treasures that they contain, for not to do so can lead to... unpleasantness. It’s said that grave robbers from a certain tradition have a custom of lighting a candle in the southeast corner of a tomb upon entering. If the candle is extinguished, it means that the spirits within do not welcome the intrusion, and the grave robbers are obliged to leave empty-handed—hence the title of the book: “Ghost Blows Out the Light.”
said, if you enjoy scouring backstreet antique markets for obscure treasures, you’re more than likely to come across a stall or two operated by grimyfingered grave robbers... Chinese authorities estimate that as many as 100,000 grave robbers could be roaming the country, searching for
GRAVE ROBBERS’ PARLANCE
Be warned, for this is not the Chinese that your everyday salary-man or pen-pusher will be familiar with. That
Look (望 w3ng) means practicing feng shui, or examining the layout of the landscape (according to things like geographical features and cardinal directions) to locate the most auspicious spot where a tomb is likely to be located. Experts in this art can hunt down tombs simply by taking a close look at the terrain.
'Ghost Blows Out the Light' has sold more than half a million copies and has an estimated online readership of about six million.
Smell (闻 w9n) is the art of using one’s nose to smell the surface soil above a tomb to determine its age and whether or not the grave has already been robbed. It is said that the most skilled in this art can detect slight differences in odor between the earth excavated from tombs of the Han and Tang dynasties.
I ll u s t r a t i o n
by
Li Rui
ancient tombs to pilfer. Naturally, an illicit subculture of this size has its own argot, not unlike medieval thieves’ cant. Though the following sentences and vocabulary have been adapted from the aforementioned novels, a hobby archaeologist friend of mine confirms that the language is used in the actual communities. As with all sexy black market terminology, the grave robbers’ parlance was essentially designed to obfuscate potentially incriminating details: valuable scrolls of calligraphy or paintings are nonchalantly referred to as “paper” (纸儿 zh@r), while precious jade artifacts are simply “stones” (石头 sh!tou). Grave robbers themselves call their profession daodou (倒斗), or “emptying the ladle,” because a tomb resembles the shape of an inverted ladle. The novels are supposedly written by ex-grave robbers, and the narrative conceit is that they are true tales (or at most lightly embellished stories) of their
Ask (问 w-n) is the method of casing an area by talking to the locals, especially the elderly, and finding out information about the location of nearby tombs, and the wealth of those buried therein. Grave robbers skilled in this technique normally dress like a wandering feng shui master, and are blessed with the gift of the gab.
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exploits. It’s important to separate fact from fiction, as Chinese grave robbing is a very real problem, and China’s Ministry of Public Security estimates that some 200 million ancient Chinese graves were illicitly excavated in recent years alone. In the books, if not in real life, there are plenty of supernatural goings-on. In ancient China, people believed that death was merely the end of the physical body, and that the spirit lived on. Grave robbers have stories of the inhabitants of the tombs— the corpses—springing to life, and chasing after intruders, driven by a blind hunger for the very breath of the living, the invaluable life force known as yangqi (阳气). Naturally, there are words to classify different kinds of corpses in varying stages of decay. Fleshy, well-preserved corpses are named after the sticky triangular rice cakes known as zongzi (粽子), probably because naming corpses after a tasty snack of gloopy rice, itself embalmed in leaves of bamboo, is quite a delicious irony.
Decayed corpses that are little more than piles of bone are ganzongzi (干粽 子) or “dry zongzi,” while rouzongzi ( 肉粽子), “meaty zongzi,” refers to corpses that are adorned with valuables. What all grave robbers wish to avoid are the dazongzi (大粽 子), the “big zongzi,” which are the re-animated corpses out for blood, breath and brains. We have an ancient tomb here, and legend has it that the undead reside within. W6men zh-li y6u g- g^m&, t~ngshu4 l@bian y6u d3 z7ngzi.
我们这里有个古墓，听说里边有 大粽子。 When two grave robbers get together to discuss their profession, an outsider listening in is likely to be left scratching his head in confusion. Take for example the following simple exchange:
Feel (切 qi-) is the art of finding the quickest and most direct route from the surface to the coffin chamber. It also entails finding the most valuable items in the tomb by opening the coffin and examining the corpse, including its various bodily orifices (corpses of female nobility often contained precious jade in the mouth cavity).
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May I ask this most skilled of associates, whereabouts do you search for tombs, and what kind of tomb are you most adept at entering? G2n w-n zh- w-i d@ngsh3ng yu1nli1ng, z3i h9f`ng f8n gu7 sh`nji2, ch`iji0 de j@ d3o qi$m9n?
敢问这位顶上元良，在何方分过 山甲，拆解得几道丘门？ Here yuanliang (元良), literally “great virtue,” is an honorific term used by grave robbers to denote someone of the same profession. Fen shanjia (分山甲), literally “part the shell of the mountains,” means “to prospect for tombs to rob,” and chaijie qiumen (拆解丘门) means “to break into a tomb and disassemble its traps” (丘门 literally means “grave door”).
Where there are grave robbers, there are countermeasures, which most commonly take the form of traps designed to catch intruders unawares. A few of the most common are: Crossbow trap 暗弩 3nn^
My skills are nothing really; what I know has merely been passed down from generation to generation in my family. I roam far and wide, and work on tombs from all eras.
The bread and butter of tomb-based anti-theft devices, the crossbow trap is triggered by tripping a cord or stepping on a mechanism that shoots a crossbow bolt from a hidden alcove. Legend has it that the tomb of the first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, is rife with crossbow traps.
W% y6u yu1nli1ng, sh`nsh3ng b`nch1i sh`nxi3 sh`ohu6, zh-g$ f8n sh`nji2, y3ozi ji0 qi$m9n.
Sand trap 流沙 li%sh`
无有元良，山上搬柴山下烧火， 鹧鸪分山甲，鹞子解丘门。 In reply, the speaker first modestly deflects the compliment, then utters the phrase “collect firewood on the mountain and make a fire at its foot” (山上搬柴山下烧火), to indicate that he learned his grave-robbing skills from his ancestors. Zhegu (鹧鸪, partridge) stands for “all around” in grave robber’s parlance, and yaozi (鹞 子, sparrow), means “in all ages.” TOOLS AND TRAPS
Information that may be of use during those unfortunate moments in life when one finds oneself trapped 10 feet underground in the antechamber of a labyrinthine Han Dynasty (206 B.C.–220 A.D.) mausoleum... Luoyang shovel 洛阳铲 Lu7y1ng ch2n
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Invented in 1923 by a grave robber from Luoyang, the shovel is the one article of archaeological equipment that no self-respecting grave robber should be without. A U-shaped cylinder some two inches in diameter, the Luoyang shovel allows the user to extract a long section of earth while preserving the soil structure. Thus the grave robber can analyze the soil for any evidence of underground structures.
In fiction, the sand trap involves a complex mechanism that, when triggered, drops a heap of sand on the unsuspecting intruder from above, thus burying them alive. In reality, tombs have been discovered in which the entire burial chamber is filled with fine sand. This protects it from being violated, as any prospective grave robber would simply find sand pouring out of any entrance hole they happen to unearth.
Revolving floor panel 连环翻板 li1nhu1n f`nb2n A favorite device in grave-robbing fiction, the revolving floor panel is a wooden floor board that covers a pit some three meters deep. The board is designed to give way when pressure is applied, before returning to its original position. The unfortunate trespasser is cast into the pit below, where sharp spears or wooden stakes await... -DUNCAN POUPARD
视听 空间
Uproar in Heaven (3D) 《大闹天宫3D版》 Director Zheng Baorui (郑保瑞) Writer Wan Laiming (万籁鸣) Li Keruo (李克弱) Producer Shanghai Animation Studio (上海美术电影制片厂)
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s he god, warrior or simply a naughty boy? The Monkey King’s conflicting personas are part of what makes the character so special, but Sun Wukong (孙 悟空) in “Uproar in Heaven 3D” (大 闹天宫 D3 N3o Ti`ng4ng) definitely has more of the latter. After all, this is a feature-length cartoon. The protagonist of Wu Cheng’en’s classic Chinese novel “Journey to the West” (《西游记》X~y5u J#), Sun Wukong, is a brave yet mischievous monkey assigned to protect the monk Xuanzang during his pilgrimage to India. Thanks to an array of TV dramas, movies, comics and videogames, his adventures are well known in China across all generations, particularly those who grew up watching the 1980s TV series starring Liuxiaolingtong. “Uproar in Heaven 3D” is a
AUDIO VISUAL WORLD
remake of another visualization of the Monkey King story, the original “Uproar in Heaven,” which was considered a landmark picture in the potted history of Chinese animated film. The original “Uproar” focused on the first seven chapters of the epic novel, covering the birth of this miraculous monkey and his rise to become the monk’s divine protector. For producer Wan Laiming, bringing what he considered to be one of the greatest Chinese narratives to life through animation was a long-cherished dream and perhaps the pinnacle of his life’s work. Wan, who pioneered Chinese animated film in 1941, was only able to begin work on “Uproar” after he became the main cartoonist and director of the newly established Shanghai Animation Film Studio (上海美术电影制片 厂 Sh3ngh2i M0ish& Di3ny@ng Zh#pi3nch2ng). The two-hour feature recounts the adventures of the Monkey King before his “Journey to the West,” when he challenged the powers of heaven and defeated an army of 100,000 celestial warriors. Upon its completion, Wan traveled the world and collected numerous awards
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LI YANG (李扬) A famous TV host on many of CCTV’s culture-focused programs, voice artist Li Yang is known for his distinctive voice, which had been used to dub a host of stars—just ask Donald Duck. His favorite
at film festivals, helping “Uproar” become the flagship work of China’s animation industry. Almost 50 years later, this year’s updated version gives the animation a facelift using modern special effects technology, the most obvious improvement being its rendering in 3D. The new version features a slightly longer edit that stays true to the spirit of the original film, as well as a new soundtrack that combines the original’s traditional Chinese opera arrangements with a symphonic score. Most importantly, the 3D remake introduces all new voices and a stellar cast to play them, including film stars Yao Chen and Chen Daoming. The voices of famous directors Chen Kaige and Feng Xiaogang also make an appearance, in homage to Sun Wukong and Wan Laiming. The story is well-known but never grows old in the retelling. Spawned from a stone egg, Sun Wukong quickly rises through the ranks to become king of the monkeys. Though playful, he is fearless and
character to ‘play’ has been Sun Wukong, whose voice he dubbed for the famous 1980s TV series. The mischievous monkey borrowed Li Yang’s voice again for “Uproar in Heaven 3D.”
The ‘As you will’ (如意金箍棒), a magical, 36,000 jin-heavy golden rod that can take any shape or size.
strong, so strong that to find a worthy weapon, he must dive to the depths of the ocean. Undaunted, he says: Me, old Sun, up to the sky or down to the earth: there’s nowhere I can’t go. 俺老孙上天入地，无所不能，哪里 有不能去的地方。 An L2o S$n sh3ng ti`n r& d#, w% su6 b& n9ng, n2l@ y6u b& n9ng q& de d#fang.
THE 3D REMAKE INTRODUCES ALL NEW VOICES AND A STELLAR CAST TO PLAY THEM
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Arriving in the deep, he steals the pillar supporting the sky vault in the Dragon Palace from the Dragon King of the East Sea (东海龙王 D4ngh2i l5ngw1ng). This becomes his legendary weapon, also known as the “As you will” (如意金箍棒 R%y# J~ng$b3ng), a magic golden staff weighing 36,000 jin that can be transformed into almost
any shape imaginable. The furious Dragon King (voiced by director Chen Kaige) is powerless to stop him and can only report his misdeeds to the Jade Emperor (玉帝 Y& D#): Today the evil monkey Sun Wukong, for no reason, disturbed the Dragon Palace and took away a treasure of the seas with his sorcery. The Palace will never be at peace until he is eliminated. I hope your majesty will take action. 今有妖猴孙悟空蛮横无理，大闹龙 宫，霸取我镇海之宝。此猴妖法甚 大，若不除去，龙宫永不得安宁， 望万岁为老臣作主。 J~n y6u y`oh5u S$n W&k4ng m1nh-ng w^l@, d3 n3o l5ngg4ng, b3 q^ w6 zh-n h2i zh~ b2o. C@ h5u y`of2 sh-n d3, ru7 b& ch%q&, l5ngg4ng
"YOU CAN ONLY SNEAK UP FROM BEHIND, STABBING ME IN THE BACK – YOU COWARD!"
Photographs
by
Fotoe & CFP
y6ng b& d9 `nn!ng, w3ng w3nsu# w-i l2och9n zu7zh^.
The mighty Jade Emperor decides to recruit the monkey in order to control him. Sun is lured in and appointed Guardian of the Imperial Stables, but soon realizes the emperor’s intentions and makes a swift exit. Some of heaven’s strongest soldiers are sent to stop the
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rebellious Sun, but he easily overcomes them. Later, Sun is enticed to guard the Heavenly Garden (蟠桃园 P1ot1o Yu1n), where the fruits of immortality grow, but the monkey again realizes he has been duped by the emperor:
Laojun, the divine personification of Taoist philosopher Lao Tzu (voiced by Feng Xiaogang.) It’s enough to push the emperor over the edge, and he bellows at his general:
Old Jade Emperor, you have cheated me, the old Sun, again and again; we’re irreconcilable. 玉帝老儿，你三番两次欺压俺老 孙。俺与你势不两立。
I order you to lead an army of one hundred thousand warriors to arrest the Monkey and bring him here to me. 令你带十万天兵天将，定要捉拿妖 猴见我。
Y&d# l2o 9r, n@ s`n f`n li2ng c# q~y` 2n L2o S$n. An y^ n@ sh# b& li2ng l#.
L#ng n@ d3i sh! w3n ti`nb~ng ti`nji3ng, d#ng y3o zhu4n1 y`oh5u ji3n w6.
The Monkey King continues to cause chaos in heaven, stealing all the delicacies and wine from the empress’s imperial banquet and the pills of immortality from Taishang
Sun fends off even this onslaught, but after a beautifully designed battle is finally captured through the wily magic tricks of Lao Tzu. Sun fumes at the deceit:
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WAN LAIMING (万籁鸣) The eldest of the “Wan Brothers” is considered the “founding father of Chinese animation.” Born in 1900, he completed the first Chinese animated film when
You can only sneak up from behind, stabbing me in the back ––you coward! 你们背地下手，暗箭伤人，算不得 什么好汉！ N@men b-id# xi3sh6u, 3nji3n sh`ngr9n, su3n b& d9 sh9nme h2oh3n!
Yet even when sentenced to death and pummeled with a variety of choice weapons, Sun remains unbroken. Lao Tzu then tries to incinerate him in his furnace, but it’s useless. Sun escapes the flames unscathed and takes revenge by destroying the Palace of Heaven, before returning to be embraced by a land of cheering monkeys. This rebellious clash with the authorities in heaven and subsequent welcoming by the clamoring masses has inspired commentators to draw comparisons between Sun Wukong and various figures from Chinese history. But the Monkey King is first and foremost a timeless character, and as such remains an inspiring model; “Uproar in Heaven” is a manifesto for all those strong and intrepid spirits who desire to stand out and make themselves heard. “Uproar in Heaven 3D” is fundamentally a commercial
The poster for 'Uproar' blends the colors and tones of the original version with the in-yourface visuals of the remake.
he was a young illustrator. After watching “Snow White,” Wan and his brothers decided to try and emulate its quality with something of their own. The result was
endeavor, but might help to inspire interest in the tale among younger generations. However, it’s not the first reinterpretation of the movie. A high-budget remake complete with whizz-bang computer graphics was also released in 1996, and there are a variety of plans in the pipeline to bring more of Sun Wukong’s adventures to TV and the big screen in the near future. Still, one of the peculiar values of the 3D edition is its integration of tradition with innovation, past and future, as demonstrated by the black and white stills of the original production work that roll during the final credits as a tribute to Wan and his crew.
The procession of fairies arrive at the Heavenly Garden to collect the peaches of immortality, only to find that Sun Wukong has eaten them all.
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“Iron Fan Princess” (1941), the first feature-length animation made in China. Escaping to Hong Kong during the Pacific War, he returned to Shanghai in 1954
and realized a lifelong dream of working at the new Shanghai Animation Film Studio, where he completed his final work, “Uproar in Heaven,” in 1965.
To stop the rebellious monkey, the Jade Emperor sends General Li with two of his best soldiers to face Sun Wukong, including Nezha (哪吒三太子). Originally a Taoist god, Nezha is eventually defeated by Sun Wukong and, in the novel, later aids the monkey.
Photographs
by cfp and cns
But despite all the technological trickery and modern re-styling, the original version from the sixties is the only big-screen rendering that, like the Monkey King himself, will live long in the public memory. With its lavish colors, stuttering animation, operatic soundtrack and visionary
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imagery, it has the charm and appeal of that old doll or teddy bear you used to love as a kid. It also feels like it was created when animation was new and exciting, and you can feel the fun the team had in bringing one of China’s favorite stories to a brand new medium. -EDOARDO GAGLIARDI
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