The Most Beautiful Village in China?

Morning in Jiaju Village

Driving out of the Erlongshan Tunnel and down the steep mountain road that leads into Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, there are a series of large billboards advertising the tourist attractions of each county in the area. Jialong county, for example, proclaims itself the home of Sichuan Pepper, and has a vast picture of the ubiquitous little devils flowering on a bush. Isaac, who had eaten a whole one by mistake in a mouthful of vegetables the evening before, laughed out loud at that and said was one place he never wanted to go. But he did reflect that it would be a draw for most Sichuanese tourists.

Danba County, which was our first planned stop, has a picture of a hillside village with the area's famous stone towers and a sign proclaiming it "the most beautiful village
in China." When we eventually arrived in Danba the next day, we started to look for signs to the village of Jiaju where we had booked into a homestay. On a corkscrew bend of the mountain road we were directed to, we saw the same billboard with the same claim: apparently Jiaju is that village. My pictures don't really do it justice, but I think they have a strong argument.

Jiaju Village







On the recommendation of friends, we stayed at the home of Baosheng, who turned out to be the man responsible for the village's self-promotion. When he retired from his government job nine years ago he was asked to supervise tourism development and he has done a very thorough job. His major achievement must be the paved road that winds a tortuous 4 km from the valley floor up the steep mountainside to the village. Without it, very few visitors would ever reach Jiaju in the first place. I spent a long time puzzling over a similar village on the other side of the valley and wondering how the residents ever managed to leave home. Eventually I made out the faint zigzag line of a footpath twisting across the hillside, but I wouldn't have wanted to stop by there for tea.

When you reach the end of the impressive road to Jiaju, there is a gate and reception center and a formidable-looking man who asks for 30 yuan entrance fee per adult. We said we had booked to stay at Baosheng's place and he hesitated, but then said we had to pay anyway. Perhaps we could have argued around it, in the spirit of our budget-travel youth, but those days are gone: there we were in our large all-terrain vehicle and they had to pay for their road somehow. Later, as we sat on Baosheng's roof terrace drinking butter tea, he told us that five years of entrance fees had almost finished paying off the loans for the road. Up until now, 90% of the fees have gone to road upkeep and repayment, and the other 10% has been shared among the villagers, but from this year they will only need 50% for upkeep and can share out the other 50.

But Baosheng is concerned that they haven't yet figured out a fair way to share the profits among the villagers. He is certain that everyone should benefit from Jiaju's new identity as the most beautiful village in China, but not everyone participates to the same degree. About a dozen families have set up tourist homestays and others staff the gate or dress up in traditional clothes for photographs, but many don't want to get involved, or perhaps resent the intrusion. Baosheng wants everyone to be responsible for keeping the place tidy, for building clean toilets and for maintaining architectural traditions, but he hasn't yet figured out how to do it equitably. It's easy to imagine the kind of disputes that might arise, if someone wants to use their tourist income to build a modern house for example. Jiaju won't keep its label for long if that happens. Baosheng even apologized for the cement roof we were sitting on, saying that he knew it wasn't traditional, but it was very good at keeping the rain out. We agreed that it's possible to incorporate modern technology into traditional buildings and still preserve their beauty.



















The homestay where we spent the night

These aren't unusual issues. Villages all over China, and many other parts of the world, are struggling with similar questions. The fact that the people of Jiaju are asking them, and that someone as capable and thoughtful as Baosheng is guiding the process, gives them real hope of figuring out manageable solutions. What is most impressive is that they are doing it themselves, by their own choice and with the active participation of most of the community.

Several small groups of tourists from Chengdu and Xi'an were also staying at Baosheng's place. It's a fairly intrepid type of Chinese tourist who chooses to spend their holiday driving around Ganzi instead of at home eating and setting off fireworks. It's a bit like a British family going on a road trip through eastern Europe over Christmas. These people were all friendly and pleasant. We exchanged travel stories and road news as we ate our dinner of many different varities of pork. The next morning one guy had to reverse his large car several hundred yards along a narrow muddy track in order to let us out, but you don't make it all the way from Xi'an to Jiaju in the first place to let that kind of maneuver faze you.

As we left, the women from Xi'an were up on the roof with Baosheng's daughters-in-law, giggling as they tried on Tibetan clothes and took each other's photos. The prettiest daughter in particular clearly loved this part, as there was an entire noticeboard of photos of her, presumably taken by guests and mailed back to the family. This was different from the bored women who stand around at tourist attractions with cameras and tired looking ethnic outfits, charging a lot of money to take dress-up pictures. Everyone was having a good time. I hope that continues to be the case for the villagers of Jiaju, and that they can hold onto their proud claim of being the most beautiful, without feeling they have given up too much.















Winter supplies of dried pork and corn at our homestay