Dunan Flower Market Finally

Today Matthew and I finally made it to Dunan Flower Market. We tried to go yesterday but couldn't figure out the bus route and ended up walking around in a part of the city were everything is still being built. I'm just really glad that all of Kunming isn't like this. It was really dirty, dusty and just not as nice as the rest of Kunming. Yesterday we got up and got on the bus and headed out. We had two bus transfers and made the first transfer to 65 alright but then we could not figure out where to catch the 12. We ended up walking for a really long time on a big road with super highway, not finished yet, stretching up into the sky above us. We walked down to the end of the upper highway were it turned into a gravel road.

When we started walking back towards the bus stop we started seeing big semis with flat beds stacked high with boxes. We also saw big trees dug up and in put in the beds of trucks to be taken to be planted. They hadn't been painted white on the trunks yet which all of the trees in the city are.

The one thing I saw that I had been wanting to get a picture of was the little ponies pulling carts. Near our apartment they often pull carts full of watermelons or vegetables. Out here in the more industrial part of the city they seem to pull more parts for building, boxes, and pipes. The ponies seem really small to me compared to what they are pulling.

After walking for about an hour Matthew and I gave up on finding the right bus as we figured that if we got to the flower market after a certain time they wouldn't even be open or have any vendors. We had read something which said that they did most of their business at around 2 or 3 in the morning so that the flowers could get to the stalls for those early morning people. Matthew and I took it easy when we got back to the apartment. We had decided to take a plane to Guilin instead of a train. So we had to go and get money out so we could pay for the flight. Jinpeng booked it for us because we couldn't without a Chinese credit card. We got money and then walked over to the flower market near the apartment and got some Gerber daisies. We spent the rest of the day bemoaning the clouds and trying to plan out our trips the rest of the week.

Today we finally got to the flower market. We got on a bus and it took us all over the place. I thought I saw the airport but I'm not sure about that. We got stuck in traffic for a while and the woman standing in front of me looked like she really was uncomfortable. She kept clearing her throat and finally she took out a kleenex and spit in it and then she throw it out the window. I thought it was kind of strange but one does not keep a used kleenex for any reason. It must be discarded. So what I find repulsive, throwing it out the window, is just so that she doesn't have to do what she would find repulsive, keeping it.

Finally, after peering out the window and trying to read road signs to figure out where we were, we read the buses off the stop and there was 12. We got off the bus really fast. We stood there and waited and a C12 came. So we tried to ask if they were a 12 and the driver said no. So we waited some more. The bench at the stop was metal and was missing some of the bars. It only had two bars and was not very comfortable. But I was really tired of standing on the bus. I think we waited about 30 minutes for the bus to come then we were watching for the place we should have gotten on. When we found that we looked for where we should get off the bus to walk to the flower market. We rode past lots of greenhouse fields.

When we got off we started walking up a road. It had signs for the flower market so we hoped it was the right way. There were lots of greenhouses with all different kinds of plants. Some of them looked like a greenhouse but they had vases and really large pots. Matthew and I really stuck out here. I think we were probably the only white people and we really got some looks. We kept seeing people with big bundles of straw flowers but we still didn't see the big flower market. We were just thinking we should turn around because it looked like it was turning into a residential area.


We decided to walk up to the street a little bit farther and there it was. It was a not exactly what I had expected. I thought it would have been more like a large metal building, kind of like the tiny storage buildings that people put up in their yard. However, it was more like a big warehouse. By the time we got there around noon with all of the bus rides, waiting, and walking, there wasn't really much left. We did get to see the aftermath of the flower market. There were flowers strewn across the floor, and a big truck full of the discarded flowers and stems. There were a couple vendors left with flowers. They had everything in bulk. I don't think I could have gotten just one bird of paradise if that had been what I wanted. The carnations, straw flowers, and a flower I'm unfamiliar with, it looks a bit like a thistle, where bundled into huge groups.

The only thing that was really still there were the fake flowers and they had lots of fake flowers. More than I could have imagined. Many of them were not even that nice. They were very colorful and bright. There were orchids, daisies of all colors, and flowers that didn't look too much like flowers. I would rather have real flowers any day over the fake ones. We wandered through the building and then headed back to the bus. We didn't stay very long at the market because it was later and there wasn't really all that much to see.

I am glade we went as now I know were the flowers come from and it was interesting to see. It also took us to a new part of the city. I think that Dounan is a town and not part of Kunming even though there really isn't much that divides them.

While we were walking back to the bus stop we saw a police truck with trees in the back of it. Matthew wanted a picture of it so I took one. It turned out blurry, but one of the officers saw me do it. I thought for sure they would come over and ask us to delete it or worse, take the camera. They didn't do anything, though, so we got to keep our blurry picture and they camera.

Matthew and I ate a granola bar while we waited for the bus to come. It took a while for the bus but it was mostly empty so we were able to sit. We rode it to where we were supposed to catch the 1 bus which would take us back up to Green Lake and the part of the city we knew. We got on the bus and it stopped maybe once and they we were on the highway and Kunming was disappearing into the distance. We visited the Western bus station briefly and then got back on 1 and rode it back to the stop where we had gotten on. We didn't want to take a chance with it again so we walked until we found a stop with 5 which was a bus we knew would go where we wanted to go.

Getting to and from Dounan was quite an ordeal for us with the buses. If it hadn't been cloudy I think we would have ended up skipping it.

We had some lunch at Prague Cafe. A very late lunch. We went to the bird and flower market after lunch and I bartered for a Jade bracelet and looked for the tear drop jade earrings I really wanted. I didn't find them right away and when I did I probably paid more for them than I should have. We tried to find gifts to take back. For the most part China does not seem to have a really large dependence on tourism because it seems like there are not that many places that are really touristy. For Kunming the bird and flower market is really the place that caters to tourists the most.

We left the market and headed back to the apartment. I think we are going to try and get an early start tomorrow and go to the Western Mountain even it  it is cloudy as we are starting to run out of time in Kunming and they say that if you haven't visited the Western Mountain you haven't really been to Kunming.