Dali homecoming

Living abroad gave a Yunnan native a chance to see her birthplace with new eyes. In a new book, Zhang Mei reconnects with the places and people she loves through a hunk of pork she once took for granted, she tells Mike Peters.

Like author Zhang Mei, I am fascinated by Chief Li, the ethnic Bai leader of the Stone Dragon Village. It's a tiny place, with about a thousand folks tucked into the mountains near Dali in Yunnan province.

Chief Li's position suggests he's a small-town bureaucrat, but as I read Zhang's new book, Travels Through Dali With a Leg of Ham, a different picture emerges. Chief Li sees himself in charge not of a place or its people, but its music. He tells Zhang, and clearly anyone else who asks, that he is known as the "Folk Music King".