Chinese Geography: Lesson 2; China Proper

Well I had so much fun making that map and writing the last post that I think I'll continue. I think maybe I'll just start zeroing in on Kaifeng, and then see where we go from there.

So the in the last post we looked at what China isn't. So now we're going to explore what remains, which would be China proper. Cue the new map!

Click on it to make it big as well.

Well as you can see I've further narrowed down the map of China to "China Proper". I've also further divided it into various regions. A lot of this is my own interpretation as there is no standardized way of further subdividing the place.

Here are the major Geographic regions and what makes them special:

• North China or the North China Plain. It is a mostly flat broad area whose relationship with the Yellow River cannot be underestimated. Much of the sediment that makes up the land beneath my apartment where I sit comes from the river. The river and the sediment it brings enriches the land and fertilizes the crops. And often the river and (often because of) its sediment, floods in massive cataclysmic disasters drowning cities, killing millions and displacing millions more. (The Song dynasty capital of Bianjing is buried beneath the earth on which the modern city of Kaifeng currently resides.) Chinese people still farm here much as they have for many thousands of years on small plots of land just outside their villages. Beijing, the massive, growing, pulsing, modern city, is located in this region. But so is Henan province (where Kaifeng is), Henan is currently the most populous of the all the provinces at about 100 million. These 100 million are squeezed into an area about the size of Wisconsin. It is no wonder that Henan ranks as one of the poorest provinces in China. In addition to modern Beijing and dirt poor Henan, the region boasts many of China's historical places and artifacts. All but two of China's ancient capitals are located here. Confucius, Mencius, Laozi (Lao-tzu, founder of Daoism), Sunzi (Sun-tzu, and his art of war), and whole host of other famous historical personages were born and lived in the North China Plain. History is everywhere here.
• The North West is made up of many mountains and a large plateau. It along with the North China Plain was home to China's ancient past. The Yellow River runs through the Loess Plateau where it picks up the sediment that give it its name and color. Today the region is dry and getting more so. In fact most of northern China is drying out. This process has been going on for at least the past two millennia. Just over a thousand years ago this region was deeply forested and two thousand years ago it was wet and lush enough to support elephants, tigers, lions, and rhinos. The modern city of Xian (Shee-an) is located here. In the past it was known as Changan and was the capital of many dynasties. Just outside the city lie countless un-excavated imperial tombs as well as the famous terracotta warriors. Today this region has a large population of Hui (Hway) people. Though almost entirely indistinguishable from the majority Han Chinese, the Hui are technically one of China's 55 officially recognized ethnic minority groups. The thing which sets them apart is their religion, Islam. The Hui are the largest Muslim group in China. They exist all over China, mostly in the north, in pockets. Their unofficial capital is in Lanzhou (lan-joe) 300 miles to the west of Xian. (hmm, looks like I'll need another map...) There is a large Hui community here in Kaifeng, most of them live right around the campus. Their communities boast many Central Asian styled mosques (white tiled buildings with green onion domes and gold filigree). The men and some women (especially the older ones) wear white skull caps. They do not eat pork and their food contains lots of lamb and mutton. As well as many spices not usually associated with Chinese cuisine. Their food is much closer to Chinese cuisine than the Uygurs' is and many dishes overlap. And there is much more that they share with the Han Chinese than they don't. Hui people speak Mandarin Chinese and I've not met any that speak or read Arabic (even though there is often some Arabic on their restaurant signs which denotes the place as being halal -basically Islamic Kosher). I don't know to what particular kind of Islam they subscribe to but it seems rather mild compared to say Saudi Arabia. Although generally the Hui do not eat pork, many do drink alcohol and some even serve it in their restaurants. I've also visited a few Hui mosques with female imams (a Muslim religious leader) something completely unheard of in the Middle East. I've traveled a lot in this region; it is relatively close to Kaifeng and easy to get to and yet quite different from my part of China.
• Sichuan (suh-chwan) known perhaps to frequent Chinese restaurant goers as Szechuan (same pronunciation). The region of Sichuan in my map incorporates two provinces (well, one province and one giant municipality governed as a province) but really it is one entity. The province was only recently split 10 years ago, and most Chinese people still think of it as such. Geographically, Sichuan is a huge basin surrounded by mountains on four sides. The basin comprises the eastern half of the area shaded green in my map above. The western half of the province is made up of the Tibetan Plateau and really should be considered part of that region. (Most regions in China do not actually correspond well to the provinces. I've used them because it is easy, I'm sure in the future I'll be able to provide some better maps.) Sichuan is densely populated like Henan. The two provinces taken together dwarf Henan in terms of population (one out of every 50 people on earth is Sichuanese). Sichuan in Chinese is: 四川 (si4chuan1) meaning "four rivers", there are many more than four rivers which run through the province but this name surely speaks to the rich countryside which is able to feed its massive population. Though I have yet to visit, I find Sichuan to be particularly intriguing. Probably this has to do with the food; Sichuan style is my favorite kind of Chinese food. Known for its liberal use of spicy chili peppers in just about every dish. Sichuan cuisine also uses the Sichuan peppercorn (which is not related to either Indian black pepper or the New world peppers) which has quite a unique flavor. The Chinese call it 麻 (ma2) which means: numbing; and they can leave your mouth tingling afterwards. Often the dishes in Sichuan restaurants are 麻辣 (ma2la4), "spicy and numbing".
• South China, is an often used and yet poorly defined term. South China is, simply, everything that is not North China. I've heard numerous definitions for what and where South China is. I've heard its everything south of the Yellow river (probably the least true), everything south of the Yangzi river, everything south of the Huai river/ Qinling mountains, and even just the area around the cities of Hong Kong and Guanzhou (Canton). I've heard my professor from last year refer to Shanghai as being in the south, which at the time seemed pretty weird since it sure looks on the map that if Shanghai is anywhere it is in East China. But no. To him East China referred to the province directly to the north-east of Henan. So who knows. Really the difference depends on who you ask and where you are when you ask that question. The reason for this is that the idea of South China has as much to do with culture and language than latitude. The first thing to know about South China is that it contains most of China's diverse languages and ethnic groups. Where as North China is pretty homogeneous by comparison. (I'll get into the languages in another post, I'm sure) South China contains so much diversity because of one reason: its geography. The whole area is full of rivers, valleys, large lakes, and lots of mountain ranges which all chop up the area into many separate localities. For the longest time early Chinese migrants to the south settled in the river valleys where they found much isolation and where they developed many of their own customs and languages. South China is also home to many non-Chinese ethnic groups, whose languages and customs are quite different from that of the Han Chinese. (More on South China and its diversity later.)