Mountain Gift Pop-Up shop opening party brought South-Western Chinese crafts, food, and singing to central London.
Mountain Gift pop-up shop selling a collection of handicrafts, clothing, jewellery, and more from southwestern China celebrated its recent opening with a party on the evening of November 21st. Visitors got to browse through the various goods on offer while experiencing Yunnanese food and singing throughout the night.
It was set up by Yi Crafts, an organisation that offers craft workshops teaching the handicrafts of Chinese ethnic minorities. They partnered with various other small companies with connections to Yunnan in southwestern China for the Mountain Gift pop-up shop. They included Brut Tea, Lala Tounge, and INOASIS.
Located in southwestern China, Yunnan borders Vietnam, Laos, and Myanmar. It is a region famed for its natural beauty with great mountains and valleys. Yunnan province also has great cultural diversity with large populations of Yi, Bai, Miao, and other ethnic minorities.
Amongst them is Yiran Duan, from the Bai ethnic minority she runs Yi Crafts and set up Mountain Gifts. Welcoming visitors throughout the evening in a traditional Bai costume, she explained to China Minutes that: “I really wanted to make Yunnan culture more accessible to people. I wanted to create a place that uses items from my home, gifts from the mountain, as gifts to give to the people of London.”
Guests booked around 200 tickets for the opening party from 6 pm to 9 pm, leaving the cosy shop packed throughout the night. Inside, they could explore the goods on offer. Lala Tounge was selling Chilli Paste and Chilli Oil, bringing some of the spice of Southwestern China to London. Brut Tea also offered Yunnanese tea in the form of ‘tea tokens’, small discs of compact tea leaves. Yunnan is known for its Pu’er tea in particular and is supposedly the region where tea originated. Also on offer was southwestern Chinese clothing, candles by INOASIS, and plenty of jewellery. Many people know Yunnan’s minorities for their unique silver jewellery and accessories. All the way from Dali, the Wa Mao Lai Le (瓦猫来了) brand brought small tile cats – clay cat-like creatures that are traditionally placed on the roofs of houses by the Bai people.
With the shop packed, at times barely able to move, guests also spilt out into the cold London night. There, YUN Cross Bridge Rice Noodles 云过桥米线 had set up a table giving out free servings of milk tea, Yunnan Beef Jerky and a spicy-sour Yunnanese salad. This Brick Lane-based restaurant specialises in food from Yunnan province of southwestern China and is the only restaurant in London like it.
During the evening, there were also performances of Yunnanese Folk songs by Gaodan Yue (高丹悦). In Chinese known as 山歌, literally Mountain Songs, these traditional folk songs have been passed down for generations. She sang several songs including ‘The Bee Misses the Flower, The Flower Misses the Honey” in the Bai language. Originally, from Dali in Yunnan province, she studied ethnic vocal music at the opera department of Shanghai Conservatory of Music.
Yiran explained she had strong memories of her mum singing it to her when she was young. “It’s a strong childhood memory and talks about the daily life of the Bai people and how sweet life is.”
“We wanted to sing in London and hear our voice in London, just like songs sung in Mountain echo, it’s an echo of Yunnan in London.”
Overall, she was “Really happy that a lot of people turned up in the cold to support a little shop!” Adding that “I think it was really successful, we got lots of people who said it was meaningful to them. People from Yunnan who said it reminded them of their home and made them feel welcome in London, especially at Christmas which in Western culture is all about home. Also for people not from Yunnan, it allowed them to connect to a different culture. They could see, hear, taste and smell Yunnan.”
The shop opened on 18th November and will operate until December 18th. They are at 5 Hastings St, London WC1H 9PZ, close to King Cross Station.
If you liked this article why not read: Yunnan Cultural Festival Dazzles London
