Dr. Ho

Dr. Ho is one of the most popular and publicized characters in South West China. He lives in the traditional Naxi town of Bai-sha. From our home base in Lijiang, Yunnan Province, we decided to take a day trip to visit the famous Taoist physician in the hopes of receiving some natural remedies for EZ's knee ailments. Usually to get to Bai-sha the thing to do is depart by bike from Lijiang and cycle through the majestic country side. However, having just spent the last few days hiking through Tiger Leaping Gorge, we walked down to the Lijiang bus station and treated ourselves to a return trip car-hire (60 Yuan, $10).

Arriving in Bai-sha it didn't take long to find Dr. Ho's 'office'. The sign outside read, 'Jade Dragon Snow Mountain Chinese Herbal Medicine Clinic Lijiang'. This must be it!

We walked inside expecting a crowded house of packaged tour travellers but lucky for us the place was empty all but for the good doctor and his assistant (who may have been his wife, I'm not sure) sitting and waiting patiently for the next invalid. Seeing us enter, Dr. Ho sprung up from his seat quite spryly for an octogenarian and ordered his assistant to get us some tea. She poured and presented our drink with pleasure. Dr. Ho instructed us to sit down and asked us in plain english where we were from. "Canada", we replied. Instantly we were presented with a pile of literature praising and commenting on the life of Dr. Ho. All of the content was from Canadian media outlets. Under his gaze it appeared to be that we were not permitted to proceed to the next step of the experience until we had gone through each piece. For my next visit I hope he has not printed every blog article that has been written about him, as I'm certain there must be quite a few out there.

Next he sat down in front of us to share the story of his life, of which I am sure he has done so many times before. Throughout his impressive tale my mind wandered once or twice to think about the fact that here is a man who has had so many important people pass through his door and he is still willing to give the same experience to two travellers who held no video cameras or press credentials.

At the conclusion of the bio it was finally time for the appointment. EZ explained her knee problems and Dr. Ho approached her to make his assessment. He told her to stick out her tongue. Without questioning, she did and he inspected it. Then he told her to close her mouth. She did. He held her wrists with his thumbs pressed to the veins below her palms. "Hmmm, yes," he said. EZ and I leaned forward in anticipation of the prognosis after this odd assessment.

"You have poor circulation," he declared. He pounced up and beckoned us into the adjoining room. The second room was filled with buckets of herbs, leaves, powders and all sorts of natural remedies that he had gathered from around the region.

He muttered the prescription to his assistant and she set to work assembling what looked to be about 2 dozen ingredients into a plastic container. Meanwhile, using black paint Dr. Ho brushed his prescription onto the paper sack that would hold the concoction. He carefully poured the mixture into the sack and wrapped it up for us to take.

"Mix with hot water 3 times a day for one month."

"Okay. Thank you."

I reached into my wallet to pay the man. He shook his hand and said, "No money, no money, it's okay."

Like Yoda, he ambled out of this room and back into the makeshift media centre as other travellers had wandered in. He became preoccupied with the new faces and set out to begin the process all over again.

Fascinated, and standing with our natural remedy in hand, we slipped a small tip on the counter and left the doctor to his new patients. What an interesting and inspiring character. What a life.

A few months later...

We got home it and was later revealed that EZ had a partial tear of her MCL and a full tear of her ACL. Her circulation may have improved because of the natural 'tea' but Dr. Ho might benefit from an MRI machine.

In addition to lonelyplanet.com, this posting is also featured as a part of the Lonely Planet Blogsherpa Travel Carnival. Every two weeks one of Lonely Planet's favorite bloggers becomes the editor of a series of postings all centred around the same theme. This weeks editor is Camden at brinkofsomethingelse.com and the declared theme is "Encounters". Featured will be interesting portraits, unforgettable characters and downright strange people that Lonely Planets best bloggers have encountered on their travels. So visit brinkofsomethingelse.com on June 25 to read what the Blogsherpas came up with.

Rubber Stamp - Story 1 (without horror)

EZ and I had heard so many horror stories about travellers being denied VISA's into China, getting turned away at the border, having books such as Lonely Planet China confiscated by officials, that we were ready for anything when we began the process of getting our tourist Visas. Information on the government of Canada website led us to believe that travellers can only get their tourist Visa from a Chinese embassy in their native land. This was also false. We got ours at the Chinese Embassy in Singapore and the process could not have been smoother. Anticipating a lengthy bureaucratic process we went to the embassy on our first full day in Singapore. Within 48 hours I had a one-month multi-entry sticker on page sixteen of my passport. One day early. Independently getting your Chinese VISA should not be an issue, but, I'd still love to hear some more of those horror stories.

Visa's in hand, the next 'challenge' was the border crossing. We had slowly made our way through all of South-East Asia, took the night train from Hanoi to Lao Cai, avoided the throng of taxis headed to Sapa and made our way toward the Vietnam-Chinese border. Leaving Vietnam turned out to be a bit of a hassle. The border guards held onto EZ's passport for about a half-hour. We were directed to stand aside and wait. Over and over they looked at their computer monitors then up at us, silently skulking in the corner. Eventually EZ got it back, without incident. We were leaving their country after all, so why did they care? Who knows.


(The bridge between Vietnam and China.)


We walked across the bridge to China and the big moment had arrived. Our precious books were cleverly wrapped up and hidden inside our dirty laundry. Anticipating the worse but putting on a positive face, we confidently walked through the sliding glass doors and inside the customs building. We were greeted by a friendly official who gave us a form to fill out. Then we were greeted by another friendly official who instructed us where to put our backpacks. He also guided us to the customs clerk who greeted us with a cordial smile. While he was going over our documentation we noticed in front of him a tiny box that had buttons with images of very sad faces and a variety of happy faces. We were expected to 'grade' the performance of the border official by pushing the face that most represented our feeling about the experience. Efficiently the customs guard stamped us through and discreetly hinted toward the tiny box. Immediately I pushed the button with the happiest face, he smiled and we were on our way!

The first place we wanted to visit in China was the Yuanyang rice terraces so we walked to the Hekou bus terminal. We did not know that once you cross the border into China the clocks go ahead one hour. Lollygagging around the terminal we would have missed our bus had it not been for a kind Dutch couple who were also going our way. Thank you Hans and Ilona. I guess it all works out in the end, though, when it comes to my next story, the jury is still out on that...




In addition to lonelyplanet.com, this posting is also featured as a part of the Lonely Planet Blogsherpa Travel Carnival. Every two weeks one of Lonely Planet's favorite bloggers becomes the editor of a series of postings all centred around the same theme. This weeks editor is Georgia at gingerbeirut.com and her declared theme is "Rubber Stamp". Featured will be funny stories of border crossings, passport nightmares, baggage handlers, run-ins with the police, confiscated cameras, etc. So visit www.gingerbeirut.com on June 21 to read what the Blogsherpas came up with.