Cormorant canal
(Cormorant and owner in a boat: Zhouzhuang, China)
Today’s excursion for Ying’s mum and I was Zhouzhuang; the best water village in China. Apparently it is the ‘Venice of the East’, though I’ve heard that phrase connected to Suzhou and others. This town has the entire centre protected by barriers with admission by ticket only, and the ticket, by Chinese standards, is pretty hefty at 100 yuan (just shy of £10).
This was the first picture I took today and in utter surprise, spotted a lady rowing her boat, which is complete with a token cormorant, across the canal. My guess is that she and her long necked friend are going to install themselves somewhere for some tourist picture opportunity, but I do know in some parts of China they still use these birds for fishing*. We did see a gentleman lounging next to a boat positively festooned with cormorants and pointing avidly at photographs of happy tourists, basking amongst them. It is very common here, to offer a ‘diverting’ scene and charge a fee for any photographs, but often the scene is a rather pitiful one. The inner town of Zhouzhuang is another very beautiful place, but it is ruined slightly by the sheer volume of tourists. It reminded me very much of Nanxun, a small canal town I visited back in July, except it remains relatively unspoilt by throngs of sight-seers.
*From what I saw on a film, it’s not practice in this region, but in Guilin. They tie a cord around the bird’s neck, just tight enough so they can breathe but not swallow large fish. The birds are trained to dive from the boat and bring back fish, which of course they cannot swallow, and it is stolen from them. The cormorant is rewarded with a tiny fish which it can reasonably swallow through the neck band.
