After Ding Zhen became popular, Litang changed and remained unchanged
At the end of May, in Renkang Ancient Street in the center of Litang County, Ganzi, Sichuan, tourists in twos and threes walked past the houses and basked in the sun on the small square.
Tibetans in national costumes recite the scriptures, pass the tourists who are visiting, and circle the prayer wheel.
At noon, the concentrated arrival of tour groups made the ancient street noisy, and the flow of people was constant but not crowded.
Every day from 12 to 15 is the busiest time here, and the roads along the ancient streets are full of tourist buses.
After the long holiday, May was the off-season for tourism in Litang.
During this period of the previous two years, there were few tourists on the ancient street, but this year is different.
As Ding Zhen and "City in the Sky" became popular, the number of tourists to Litang increased significantly.
After the "full" May Day of the scenic spot, the number of single-day tourists remained at four digits until the end of May. The number of individual tourists including Ding Zhen fans increased significantly, and the number of group tourists also increased.
As a priority industry, the tourism industry has been placed high hopes and vigorously supported by the local government in recent years.
Under the influence of the Ding Zhen effect, Litang achieved outstanding results during the May 1st Golden Week this year.
According to official statistics, Litang County received more than 84,000 tourists from May 1-5, achieving a year-on-year increase of 98.7% in comprehensive tourism revenue.
Things are changing.
But for Litang people, change or change is still a multiple-choice question.
Although tourism in Litang has become popular, for many Tibetans in Litang, whether they can make money from tourism is still a question mark.
In May, digging cordyceps was still their first choice for making money.
Most of the stalls on the ancient street were empty, and the local stall owner took a leave of absence and went up the mountain to dig cordyceps just after May 1st.
But at the same time, some people are optimistic about the development prospects of Litang tourism. Some people have given up or shortened the time of digging cordyceps and turned to prepare homestays to prepare for the coming peak tourist season from June to August.
Ding Zhen's influence
On the morning of May 27, it might have rained the night before, and there seemed to be less oxygen in the thin air in Litang.
Wang Xue, a Chongqing girl who has stayed in Litang for three days, feels that her altitude sickness has become severe again.
She was sitting in a black tent in the Micro Museum of Sound of the Himalayas, panting, and the promotional film "Ding Zhen World" was projected on the wall in front of her.
Although she had seen it countless times, she took out her phone and took a picture of Ding Zhen's smiling face.
Wang Xue is a self-driving enthusiast, wearing a sunscreen face towel and gloves, with only his eyes exposed.
In the past few years, she has traveled along the Western Sichuan Great Ring Road and drove all the way from Chongqing to Lhasa along National Highway 318, but she did not stop on the two trips.
"I have always known Litang and I want to see it, but the altitude is too high."
At the end of last year, liking Ding Zhen gave Wang Xue the motivation to go to Litang.
She deliberately chose this time at the end of May. The weather became warmer, oxygen was more abundant than winter, there were not many tourists, and the local reception pressure was low.
Wang Xue didn't make much planning for the itinerary in Litang, but just wanted to check in one by one according to the places Ding Zhen walked through in the short video and live broadcast.
"Super lucky!" Wang Xue just caught up with Ding Zhen and went to Renkang Ancient Street to shoot. In order to see Ding Zhen more, she ran around the shooting team a few times, and then had to go back to the hotel to lie down and take oxygen.
Walking in the scenic area of Letong Ancient Town, it is easy to recognize which tourists came specifically for Ding Zhen: two or three people walking together, dressed up in fashion, looking for "Teacher Gao" in the scenic area, that is, Litang County Cultural Tourism and Sports Investment Development Co., Ltd. (Hereinafter referred to as the travel investment company) Deputy General Manager Gao Xiaoping, Ding Zhen Chinese teacher.
On the third floor of the 318 Travel Memory Museum in the scenic area, there are messages written by tourists and memorials left on a long table.
There are guestbooks from 2013, as well as various pictures with "Ding Zhen" and "Zhenzhen" written on the back.
In the first few months of this year, the proportion of Ding Zhen fans among Litang tourists remained high. With the arrival of the Litang tourist season, the proportion of ordinary tourists has gradually increased.
At the end of May, Ronaldinho, an outdoor traveler from Chengdu, was stepping on a route near Litang.
When he chose outdoor routes a few years ago, he always deliberately bypassed Litang, even if it took two hours to drive the mountain road.
"The former county town was not much to look at. Tourists are still prone to opposing views and it is not worth it." Xiao Luo told the Beijing News reporter that if you stay overnight in Litang, travellers who often take part in plateau trekking will most likely experience physical discomfort.
"The altitude is too high."
Litang County is 4,014 meters above sea level, nearly 400 meters higher than Lhasa, and is known as the "City of the Sky".
Although the county seat is located at the intersection of National Highway 318 and National Highway 227, it is quite "remote" for ordinary tourists.
It takes at least one and a half hours to drive from the nearest Aden Airport to Litang County.
Taking into account the volatile climate in the plateau area, if there is a sudden snowstorm, the road section will freeze, and the travel time may be doubled.
In addition, the various scenic spots in Litang County are far apart. The famous mountain landscape Gnieshen Mountain in the outdoor sports circle is nearly 3 hours' drive away from the county seat.
This year, Xiao Luo added Litang County to the route plan and plans to arrange tourists to stay in Litang County for two or three hours. This change is not only because of Ding Zhen's fire, but also because "Letong Ancient Town is a highlight."
"Letong" is the Tibetan language of Litang, "Le" means bronze, "tong" means grassland, and the language means grassland that is flat like a bronze mirror.
According to the information on the official website of the ancient town, the construction of Letong Ancient Town-Qianhu Zangzhai Scenic Spot started in 2018 and won the national 4A scenic spot license in March of the following year. The main attractions include Renkang Ancient House, Renkang Ancient Street transformed from an old residential street, and Changqingqing Keer Temple, "Kangnan Buddhist Holy Land", about 1 km away from the North.
In the middle of the route, there are many miniature museums, such as the Kham Museum, Tibetan Opera Museum, and Tibetan Medicine Museum, or display traditional Tibetan culture.
There are also many tourist groups that add Litang to the route.
Tibetan tour guides in the ancient town used "full" to describe the "May 1st" small holiday that has just passed. More than 20,000 tourists swarmed into the 100-meter-long Renkang Ancient Street.
In 2010, Litang County received only 152,000 tourists throughout the year.
According to the data, during the May 1st of 2021, Litang's search volume ranked third in the list of famous Buddhist mountains, second only to Mount Wutai and Mount Putuo, and its popularity increased by 178% year-on-year.
"Let the guests feel like they are at home"
The rapid increase in the number of tourists makes Litang people happy but also stressed. The shortage of accommodation beds is one of the most important problems facing them.
At the beginning of this year, the branch secretary of Zhenga Village, Gaocheng Township, Litang, compiled a list of Tibetan villagers who were willing to transform their houses into guest houses. More than 40 households were involved and hundreds of beds were available, half of which had been transformed. , Can receive tourists at any time.
Zhenga Village also belongs to Qianhu Zangzhai, and it is only one street away from Renkang Ancient Street.
"The conditions are not high. I have a place at home, a water grid, convenient parking, and I can communicate in Chinese. I have the will." Ci Nai told the Beijing News reporter that the village is also divided into traditional houses and yards according to the conditions of the villagers’ houses and yards. Tibetan houses, Han houses, tent camping sites.
Taking into account the limited conditions of villagers-run homestays, the current price for each bed is only 40-60 yuan, and the venue fee for each tent is 20 yuan.
The bed and breakfast in Zhenga Village is part of the emergency plan for tourism in Litang County.
According to Bi Xuesong, deputy director of the County Bureau of Culture, Tourism, Radio, Film and Television, there are currently 93 hotels in Litang County that can provide more than 4,300 beds.
Taking into account the upcoming peak tourist season, especially the August 1st Horse Racing Festival, it is estimated that the number of overnight tourists in a single day may be close to 10,000. Litang County has formulated a red and yellow emergency plan to meet the accommodation needs of tourists.
If the number of tourists monitored by big data exceeds 4000, the yellow plan will be activated, and the staff in the surrounding villages of the ancient town will arrange for tourists to stay in the villagers’ homestays.
If it exceeds 5000, the red plan will be activated to coordinate tourists to live in surrounding towns and villages.
"At present, the residents of 9 villages around the scenic spot have been mobilized and can provide about 1,500 beds," said Bi Xuesong.
The home of Zezhuoma, a villager in Zhenga Village, is one of the families that has made the fastest progress in the renovation of the homestay.
There are two houses in Zezhuoma's family. One is a century-old double storey house built when Grandpa Zezhuoma was a child; and a two-story Han house was built by borrowing money a few years ago.
Although it is a Han room, the interior decoration is still Tibetan style, and the walls are full of golden paintings and copper pot decorations.
From her house, you can walk to the entrance of Renkang Ancient Street in 2 minutes.
"Guests can live in which room they want." This 31-year-old Tibetan girl has a delicate face, and her cheeks are imprinted with plateau red.
She is fluent in Chinese, and she speaks intermittently when she encounters complicated sentences, so she rarely speaks actively, just smiles.
In order to receive good guests, the eldest daughter who went to high school also plans to come back to help during the summer vacation.
There are a total of eight people in Zezhuoma's family, parents who are over 70 years old and in poor health, husband who is deaf and mute, husband's brother and three children, the youngest one is not yet in elementary school.
In the past, she, her husband and her younger brother went to the mountains to dig cordyceps from May to June each year, dig matsutake mushrooms in summer, and went out to do odd jobs at other times.
The family's annual income is less than 50,000 yuan.
"Our culture is not good, we can only do small jobs, not make money."
At the beginning of this year, after listening to the party secretary of Jinai that he could do a homestay and travel, Zezhuoma and her family agreed without much entanglement. Her only concern was that she would not make money.
This May, Zezhuoma didn't go to dig cordyceps and stayed at home and focused on transforming the bed and breakfast.
"I wash the sheets and cook for the guests at home, earn money, and take care of the children," she said.
At the end of April, her home test received 5 tourists.
Ci Nai helped her family calculate an account, 10 beds, calculated at 40 yuan / night / bed, a day can earn up to 400 yuan, enough for the family's daily expenses for three or four days.
In a few days, Zezhuoma's family is going to move to a small room on the east side of the yard, vacating all the best houses in the family for the guests, allowing them to experience the original storehouse.
On the wall of the remodeled room, there is still a family portrait of her family.
A few blocks away, the weeds and wildflowers in the yard of the villager Zhaxi’s house have appeared, and in a few weeks, this will become a large campground.
Both Zhaxi and his wife are over 70 years old, and it is difficult to communicate directly with people in Chinese. The operation of the hotel mainly relies on his daughter.
Now, Tashi's daughter is still digging cordyceps on the mountain, and the renovation of the family's homestay is almost at a standstill.
When his daughter came back in June, he planned to let her go to the county town to order a sign with "B&B" written on it, and then put his homestay on the Internet.
"Do your own thing"
Unlike Litang County’s active preparation of emergency plans for tourism and the rapid progress in the renovation of villagers’ homes, the staff and Tibetan residents in the ancient town are not likely to take the initiative to bring up Ding Zhen.
Everything seems to be the same as before Ding Zhen became popular, except for the increase in tourists, the graffiti wall and message board "Ding Zhen" name, the book wall of Cangyang Bookstore where fans donated books, and the people who set up stalls in the scenic spot A few more "Wang Youmei" (nickname of Ding Zhen fans).
The young Tibetan girls who are the same age as Ding Zhen, who are as handsome or beautiful as Ding Zhen, are still continuing their work of explanation and marketing, and the popularity of their companions seems to have little effect on them.
On May 25th, Ren Zhenquzha, an employee of the travel investment company, and his colleagues prepared an experience event of Tibetan woodblock printing on the ancient town square.
Visitors can rub the Tibetan verses of Cangyang Gyatso by hand, and then go to the Cangyang Gyatso Miniature Museum a few tens of meters away to find the corresponding Chinese translation.
"Ding Zhen let more people know Litang," Ren Zhen Quzha said.
When asked if he also wanted to become an Internet celebrity, he shook his head. He wanted to do his own thing better and attract more tourists to Litang.
This is what Gao Xiaoping emphasized many times in the staff training with the "children" in his eyes: do your job well and take it slow.
As the hostess of Gesang Meiduo, the first guest house in the ancient town, 51-year-old Ama Ge Rong is planning to expand the guest house.
She plans to invest about 1 million yuan to build a row of houses on the east side of her small courtyard into a two-story building and open a few more rooms.
In 2020, Ama Ge Rong, who was still doing cleaning in the ancient town, decided to convert her house into a guest house.
In October of that year, her "Ge Sang Mei Duo" B&B opened. One month later, Ding Zhen became popular on the Internet.
Because Ding Zhen had done several live broadcasts in Ama's homestay in Gerong, the homestay has been full from December to now.
In the first half of its business, the income from the three rooms has reached more than 100,000 yuan, which is about the income of the previous two or three years.
Diagonally across from Gesang Meiduo, Liang Min and her friend September, are busy decorating their high-end homestay.
The two worked together to open the first coffee shop in the ancient town, "Yi Ye Ye".
According to Liang Min, the stone and wood structure of their homestay is the style of Sichuan and Tibet, and the cloister and open balcony in the middle of the house are of the ancient Tubo period.
Open balconies are hard to see in the current Tibetan areas, but there are still some reservations in the Potala Palace.
They hope to show the historical context of Tibetan architecture.
"The homestay can also be a museum of traditional architecture and traditional handicrafts." Liang Min said.
In order to achieve this goal, their homestay has been built for 3 years.
Liang Minhe Jiuyue stubbornly insists on traditional craftsmanship. Every wooden board on the wall comes from Litang and is hand-polished by local craftsmen.
The level of economic development in Litang is not high, but the level of consumption is not low.
According to estimates in September, the cost of building a homestay of the same specifications in Chengdu may be nearly 50% lower.
However, the decoration work of the homestay has not been accelerated and lowered due to the popularity of Ding Zhen and the increase in tourists, even if an early opening means less investment and more income.
In Liang Min’s view, Ding Zhen not only brought the fire to Litang, but also promoted Tibetan culture, but the development of Tibetan culture cannot rely on one person alone. It takes a long time for the joint efforts of many people. She hopes that she can also make a contribution. force.
Litang's big plan
The planning of Letong Ancient Town began as early as 2016.
Zhang Xi, the person in charge of Litang State-owned Assets Group Corporation, who has been involved in the planning and construction of Litang tourism for a long time, told the Beijing News reporter that according to the plan, it is hoped that Letong Ancient Town can achieve a variety of cultural gatherings and displays, original ecological life scene experience, and non-material The goals of cultural heritage protection and inheritance, and Tibetan cultural innovation.
"The county has positioned the ancient town as an encyclopedia-like scenic spot in the Tibetan area, and we also hope to achieve this positioning." Zhang Xi said, for this reason, Letong Ancient Town plans to build a group of miniature museums.
At present, 10 museums have been built in the ancient town. In the next three to five years, it is planned to build 30 to 50 miniature museums.
"The future market is a customized market." Zhang Xi wanted to create a new model of ancient town construction: using local Tibetan culture for cultural innovation, launching products that can only be bought in Litang; rejecting ocarina and African drums Homogeneous products including, silverware and horn combs.
But he also admitted that this plan is quite "ideal." The construction of the mini-museum group will take several years, and the cultivation of cultural innovation consciousness may take longer.
"I don't know what the future will be. I need a batch of people to do it." Zhang Xi always laughed and said that he was a "bad guy" in the management committee of the ancient town, and he would reject projects that didn't fit the blueprint of the ancient town. outer.
For the future development of Litang, capital and talents are obstacles.
When describing the development status of Litang County, Zhang Xi quoted a jingle: The territory is like a province, the population is like a town, and the economy is like a village.
Litang County covers an area of 14,300 square kilometers, more than twice the area of Shanghai, and has a permanent population of less than 80,000.
Most local Tibetans live a self-sufficient life, and digging cordyceps and matsutake are their main sources of income.
At the beginning of 2020, Litang County officially took off its status as a poor county.
As a priority industry for poverty alleviation, tourism has been the development focus of Litang County since 2015, but the effect has not been satisfactory.
Because of its high altitude, Litang’s popularity and the number of tourists have always been lower than those of Kangding, Batang, and Daocheng, which belong to the same Ganzi Prefecture.
"If the funds are not enough, we will slowly repair it little by little." Zhang Xi said that Letong Ancient Town plans to invest 240 million yuan, and currently has invested more than 80 million yuan.
For Litang, if you can't keep outside talents, you can cultivate your own talents.
Ren Zhenquzha from Litang originally studied veterinary medicine, but joined the travel investment company in 2019 as a staff member in Letong Ancient Town.
Most of the colleagues who joined the company with him have similar characteristics: locals, in their early twenties, just graduated from high school or university, studying majors not related to tourism, and want to do something for the development of tourism in their hometown.
They are all talents reserved by travel investment companies for the development of Litang tourism.
Now, the tourism industry in Litang, which has been working hard for several years, is finally waiting for Ding Zhen to become popular. He is like a gust of wind blowing through Litang, bringing opportunities for tourism development, which may also bring other changes.
"Look at it slowly, it should develop very well," Zhang Xi said.
Beijing News reporter Han Qinke