Further life and times of *liltayinchina*

August 26th, 2008

After our first day of classes on our first Tuesday in China, GXNU took us to Reed Flute Cave on the outskirts of Guilin. One of the first things I plan on doing upon returning to the UW is contacting the Geography professor who specializes in China to learn more about these Guilin formations. For not only are they curiously vertical and sloped and evenly distributed in a sort of reversal of a prairie dog’s burrows, but also many of them are riddled with caves. We visited the most famous of these. Qin Laoshi purchased our tickets and while I eyed the ascent to the top of the nearby mountain, the group made its way to the second floor gift shop for pre-cave purchases. It was to be our first of many such experiences: purchase first, view site second, and the first time Josh and I found it troubling. I’m not used to doing things in China in a group. My last two such experiences, in Xi’an with the terracotta warriors and outside of Shanghai with the sacred bamboo forests, didn’t leave warm fuzzy memories, but both Josh and I have sworn to look for the best in each experience and I’m really starting to see a world of multiple points of view in these circumstances. For example, it is terribly arrogant to visit this country and try and impose, even if only in my mind, my personal opinion of how a tourist site should be run, or maintained. In the case of the Reed Flute cave, I will have a hard time being open-minded, but for several of our other experiences, I think I can be more understanding of the Chinese perspective, or at least less opinionated as if I know what is “right” and “wrong”.

Cave 54 is actually Josh’s name for the Reed Flute cave. I cannot take credit for it, though when he said it, after we’d been walking through for a good twenty minutes, and had come to the pinnacle “floor show”, I immediately thought, “Why yes! If Studio 54 had gone ‘underground’ this is where it would have gone!” I must work you up to the zenith though. We entered the cave and from the beginning, as our tour guide plied us with stories of the fanciful creatures imagined in the stalactites and stalagmites, the cave was made visible through strategically placed neon lights of lime green, day-glow pink, acid blue and lemon yellow. It looked as though a pastel rainbow had puked on the cave walls. While a little garish, the formations were made more visible and more theatrical in the intense light. A few times, I accidentally used a flash and the photo that appeared rendered the formations a natural brown color. While less exciting than the 70s acid trip that we were walking through, these subdued images reminded me of caves I’ve walked through in the United States. Places where human manipulation is limited and one has the feeling of being very small, very insignificant in the wild, untouched tunnels. In Cave 54, I felt less like I was journeying toward the center of the earth and more like I was going to be frightened out of my wits by a Disney character at any moment.

In terms of space, though, this cave was incredibly vast. With each turn we came across wider and wider expanses of space where the formations were more and more impossible to believe. We were assured that although the cave floors had been cut through and planned, and the lighting wasn’t quite “authentic” – lighting in a cave, authentic? – the formations were pure nature. Several of us were even dripped upon, feeling the silty sliminess of the drips coming from the ceiling. These drips are the building blocks of stalactites and stalagmites and when you rub one between your finger, while looking at a towering formation, it boggles the mind.

By the time we got to the highlight of Cave 54, we were all entranced by the vastness of the space, realizing from time to time that we were inside a mountain, that that mountain was hollow despite its appearance of implacable sturdiness from the outside. The floor show set us back, two of us at least, quite a bit. We rounded a corner and saw the widest expanse yet, mostly confusing us because the cave floor had been cleared and a huge, flat floor fanned out at the center of the expanse. Our tour guide brought our attention to a huge, well-lit stalactite in the center of the ceiling, as if it were a ballroom chandelier. Suddenly the lights went out and music started to play. It was loud, grainy and suspiciously patriotic. Then neon of various colors swirled from formation to formation, in time with the music, sometimes slow and soft, at other times fast and bright. This went on for five minutes or so, the music trying to bring tears to everyone’s eyes and then, from behind three medium-sized stalagmites came, yes, bubbles. Four large bubble machines shot bubbles out onto the large floor and into the eyes of innocent bystanders. Someone from my group choked on one. I was choking on laughter and incredulity when lights inlaid in the vast floor and flush with the surface started blinking strobe-light style, further blinding the be-bubbled audience. And then it was over. Later, I saw a billboard advertising a Chinese version of the ballet Swan Lake, performed on this exact floor, inside the cave. After the show, Josh and I had to part ways for fear of being culturally insensitive with our critique of the cave and its floorshow. I kept to the back of the group and found myself lost in the formations. Taking pictures and seeing Chinese landscapes within the images reflected on my camera’s screen. When I have convenient access to the Internet again, I plan on looking for Chinese landscape paintings that somehow mirror some of the photos I took – I don’t expect it to be a difficult thing to do, especially since I feel as though I saw a few that will work in Seattle at the Asian Art Museum mere days before I departed for China.

Of course I’m grateful for the trip to the cave. It was incredible to see, incredible to witness such magnificent art growing inside a mountain. I only wonder at the flashy lights and theatrics. Would it be any less appealing were those things to be removed? What makes those things necessary in the eyes of the cave’s operators? Perhaps the question I should be asking is why do I think it’s so wrong, so sacrilegious? People seem to like it and the cave receives tens of thousands of visitors a month, most of whom know what to expect, unlike myself…why do I feel it’s somehow disrespecting the true beauty of the cave? I’ll have to ponder a bit for I still feel strongly that the cave (and its visitors) would be better off were it to lose the Studio 54 treatment and return to being, simply, a cave.