Surprising Jingzhou

One of the greatest aspects of my relatively new life as a vlogger and social media commentator in China is that, as my audience grows, I often get asked to visit places that I would not have usually visited. The “fee”, if we’d like to call it that is that I’m asked to speak to the camera a few times and express my views. To be honest, it isn’t hard to be positive about the things China does and Hubei just gave me the opportunity to do this.

However, this one was unusual because, I was invited by the Hubei International Communications Centre, to visit two cities, both of which I’ve been to several times before and both of which, for most people outside of China, are relatively unknown.

Both should be better known so I’m going to make a video about each of them to introduce them to my audience Jingzhou, which I cycled through in 2014 and again in 2019 and Yichang, which is home to the massive three Gorges Dam project. I first visited Yichang in 2005 after getting off a cruise starting in Chongqing and passing through the Three Gorges. I went there again a few years later with my late father and again just a couple of years ago with my wife.

What’s really important to me is seeing the changes and being able to report on them. Historically, the inside of Jingzhou city would have been wealthy, living outside the city would have been farmers and itinerant traders but that’s all changed now, the population has risen so much that few people live inside the city walls now, and the outside has been developed to house the more than 5 million people who live here now

Both cities are well developed, there is good infrastructure in both there are international brand hotels, Western branded products and, in each city there is clear evidence of massive, and quite recent investment.

Jingzhou is a superb tourist destination, the city walls, if only they could talk would have many things to tell us. It was the capital of the country under the period known as the Three Kingdoms. Historically, very wealthy people would have gravitated to this city and sought the protection it offered behind massive city walls built on the banks of the Yangtze River. Trade from here would have gone both ways, inland through the gorges and out to the East Coast but there were also many great battles in the region, hence the importance of the city walls and the great Guanyu who is well known in China as both a “god of war” and a “god of loyalty” because of his great friendships during the lat Han Dynasty.

On another note, Guanyu’s birthplace is in Shanxi and we cycled through it just a few weeks ago.

There’s evidence that people have lived in Jingzhou for as long as 6000 years but believe it or not, there are still written records being recovered and preserved going back to a period before Christ was born. Writing on bamboo, something I knew was used but had no idea that such a thing would still be able to be read and that’s all because of one centre. It’s not a museum so, it’s opportunities like this, when I’m with a media tour group that make trips like this so worthwhile, without this trip I would never have known that there is a place in China where archaeologists and museums can send sodden lumps of rotten bamboo, pulled out of the ground to be restored and that’s what makes it so exciting.

Imagine reading the diary of a trader who worked in the centre of China at the same time the Romans were building roads through Europe. History doesn’t need to be guessed at, it’s available in the records painstakingly recovered and restored through here – they’re covered over because I’m not allowed to show you everything, these records belong to museums who have sent them here to be restored, they will eventually be on display in places around China and on loan to museums around the world but the process is something I can tell you about.

A sodden mess of sludge is recovered from an archaeological dig and sent here, the individual pieces are carefully separated, placed in a solution where they can be cleaned, after cleaning, they are placed in another solution where they are de-coloured because they were once light brown and they’re currently black, the entire process takes about 6 months but once it’s finished, the bamboos are sealed into a container and can be displayed and read – of course some of the characters are different so it might take an historian to translate them but one that I was looking at was obviously a school or tutorial textbook as it showed simple multiplication of numbers.

Moving from this room to another one on the same floor, we saw lacquer wood being restored and again, some of these items will be on display in museums across China in a few months time. The process uses exactly the same minerals and dye sources as were used 3 or 4 thousand years ago.

The ancient world is coming to life again but equally important, if not more so, is that the modern world exists here too – outside of the town, along the G207, a road I’ve actually cycled up and down at different times, we went to a vineyard, a place where grapes are grown but wine isn’t made here, the grapes are sold globally as well as domestically and, during the full season, there would be many sellers here, all livestreaming through 5G, selling a product that came off the vine today and could be on your dining tables tomorrow through express delivery – something China has excelled at developing with incredibly reasonable prices.

If you enjoyed this video, stick with me because in a few days time, I’ll tell you all about what I learnt in Yichang, which has far more to see than a huge dam.

Through ancient history into modern technology, like the rest of China, Hubei is leading the world and yet, hardly any tourists go there. I’d strongly suggest that needs to change.