Xishuangbanna

Xishuangbanna is the Chinese pinyin spelling of a Dai phrase which means Twelve Thousand Rice Fields. A thousand rice fields constituted an administrative district under the medieval Dai princes. A couple of the Banna were lost to French Laos, but most were incorporated into this border prefecture in this century. The historical capital, called Cheli in Dai (Daybreak City) when the Mekong Expedition explorers passed through, was little more than an overgrown village at that time. Now it is the busy city of Jinghong. Sprawling west from the bank of the Lancangjiang, it is the largest and most important city in the prefecture......