Yesterday in Yibin

From my hotel room I looked across the round about surrounding the freshly painted Grand Viewing Pavilion, once the geographical center of Shuifu. Modern music from numerous boutiques and shops below competed for my attention and mingled with the ringing bells of pedi cabs as they passed otherwise silently beneath my third floor window. A very modern Yibin now surrounds the once Grand Viewing Pavilion but a short walk in any direction will quickly fill your senses with images of the past. Neat tree lined streets radiate from here to points of the compass.

Strolling north from the Grand Viewing Pavilion along the walking street with it’s modern shops and small eateries on your way to the Min Jiang you’ll also find, a Protestant Church and one of two remaining Catholic churches in the city. Walking a few blocks east you’ll discover the other ‘mosaic tile’ clad Catholic Church on Xianxi Jie just a block from the only remaining city gate. The East Gate overlooks a small harbour on the Min Jiang and today serves as a teahouse/restaurant. As though challenging time to stand still a plethora of teahouses, both old and new line the streets and banks enticing residents and visitors to stop and chat and drink a leisurely cup of tea.

Walking south from the Grand Viewing Pavilion you’ll arrive on the banks of the Jinsha where a new boardwalk and food street has been built adding a certain carnival atmosphere to the area. Crossing the river to the south bank affords a great view back to the peninsular on which the old town sits. Continue along the boardwalk downstream and return via the new orange bridge just a few hundred meters from the junction of the rivers. A section of the old city wall has been restored here along side the new plaza and boardwalks overlooking the rivers.

Despite the new urban sprawl typical of all Chinese cities, Yibin still retains a little of the old town atmosphere of yesterday. As the last major port on the upper reaches of the Chang Jiang, Yibin was also a prosperous and bustling ‘foreign’ treaty port and a trading hub in southwestern China. It’s not a large city by Chinese standards and has a rather comfortable mix of old and new, fast and slow.

Once a walled city with four gates, old Shuifu is surrounded on three sides by rivers and the hills of Chuiping Park to the west. Built at the confluence of the Jinsha and the Min Jiang, which at one time was thought to be the source of the Chang Jiang, Shuifu was the last significant port on the upper reaches of the Chang Jiang. The Jinsha Jiang as it is known upstream from Yibin was later discovered to be the longer of the two rivers having already flowed more than 2000 kms by the time the rivers merge, one green, the other brown. With the coming of the expressway, river traffic has slowed and several boats have been converted and moored around the peninsular, offering great riverside dining on fresh seafood.

Almost defying the move to modernize, a remnant of the old town remains perched above the river watching as it has for centuries. Several stately courtyard homes built more than 100 years ago by wealthy merchants still stand close to the riverbank. The decoration of their gray stone firewalls, eaves and lintels testify of their once affluent owners. In stark contrast today many of them are home to more than 10 families each with outdoor kitchens in the courtyards, living cheek by jowl, some for more than thirty years. Soon these will be lovingly restored while their long term residents will move into something more befitting China’s growing affluence.

And yet this subtle blend of past and present is overwhelmingly vivid with street markets and stalls, the elderly playing cards, mahjong or simply chatting outside, vendors hawking their services and wares, peddle cabs jingling their bells incessantly, a pile of rubbish creating riot of colour on the street. A women gathering drying duck feathers to sell to the down coat maker, a man sits reading by his front door, a young mother prepares the evening meal in her rough kitchen in a courtyard. A couple sit outside their eatery deftly skinning live frogs, a butcher hangs large slabs of pork fat from hooks on bamboo rails above his trestle table, across the street the fruit stall offers half peeled tangerines the size of soccer balls and children ride scooters up and down and in between.

I stood a few moment soaking up the atmosphere of yesterday in Yibin.

More photos

Want to see more of Yibin?
Why not view my photo album series Yesterday in Yibin