Hohhot, Inner Mongolia’s 'blue Sky City'
[Photo by Bruce Connolly/chinadaily.com.cn]
However, to understand more of both the city’s history and indeed that of Inner Mongolia, a visit to the regional museum proved beneficial. Amusingly for many of the visitors that sunny morning, I felt I was the exhibit as even at that time, 1997, many locals possibly had never met a westerner! Inner Mongolia occupies a vast area of land taking in several different climatic zones. I was fascinated with the costumes, the lifestyle of the different ethnic groups ranging from dwellers of deserts and grasslands to bitterly cold northern forests. Totally unfamiliar musical instruments were on display alongside many illustrations of the summer Naadam Festival held annually on the grasslands. Equally fascinating was the paleontology section showing that dinosaurs and mammoths once roamed the region.
