A Night in Hunan: Local Cuisine and Captivating Conversations

Today on Go Nomad, we travel to the Middle Kingdom China, to the province of Hunan.

In the center of this large country.

We begin in Changsha, a modestly sized city of 8 million and Hunan's capital.

This city has an important distinction.

It's the birthplace of Mao Zedong, who lived here until he was a teen.

He grew up in nearby Shoushan, so the city of Changsha honors him with a gigantic statue of just his head and his locks flowing in the wind.

On Orange island in the middle of a river, the young Mao stands 105ft tall and attracts people from all over the country.

I arrived right in time to attend the Changsha Symphony, where a guest conductor from Bamberg, Germany was conducting a violin virtuoso named Wilde Frang.

The large packed symphony hall was filled with a good number of tiny tots who quietly listened with great rapture.

Symphony attendants were quick to whip out their laser pointers if anyone tried to pull out their phones to record the exquisite music of Beethoven and Dvorak.

I knew that the Chinese enjoyed classical music and was pleased that the fans even included the very young.

After the concert, I was eager to learn more about this province, home to 70 million in the center of China.

Dinner was as it was every night of our visit, around a large table for 10 with a lazy Susan groaning with all manner of fish, vegetables, poultry and tofu.

Often included unusual items I couldn't recognize.

One restaurant featured the same animal as found in a pond in the lobby.

Giant salamander.

And it was on the Lazy Susan as well.

The thing that I found even when dining in five star hotels in China is that they don't mind eating bones here.

Bones of fish, chicken.

They would hack up the chicken with cleavers, making sharp bones a prominent part of the meal.

Fish mostly had many small fine bones, so eating it was really difficult.

The variety, however, was stunning.

That Lazy Susan was always fully stocked.

My favorite for the whole trip was the hotel buffet breakfast.

These would include China's famous noodles, which you could pile high with so many treats like scallions and spinach, bok choy, flavorful broth and the famous Hunan peppers.

It was the best meal every day of the trip.

You start at the very top and you work your way down showing the layers of history that unfolded as they unearthed the mummy at the bottom.

And no photos please.

The next day it was still raining and we headed out of Shengsha to tour the Tungwan Yao ancient town.

An electric car train.

The trip began in a massive replica of a Ming dynasty royal courtyard.

The they were pottery making demonstrations and dancers in period costumes.

Then we escaped the rain in an IMAX theater where a feature was a 3D movie shot from the point of view of a bird flying over Shancha.

It is like the attraction at Disneyland soaring over California.

But it was much longer with the same shaking effects.

It was fun.

We moved to another area guarded by dozens of life size Star wars stormtrooper statues.

A full legion of inanimate plastic soldiers.

The complex was called the Mayhew International Culture and Arts center and it was designed by by Zaha Hadid architects and is spectacular.

We had another tourist trap coming up when we visited the Hutang town in Hunan near Ningjian city.

Here, these hot springs and spas were everywhere.

The big hotel is the Xilan Wan Hot Spring holiday hotel with 278 rooms perched up on a hill with dramatic views of the surrounding mountains.

And the rooms were cheap.

Only 49 to 89 US and it's a five star hotel.

But the highlight of visiting Ningjang City.

When my friend Bruce Northam suggested that after our hot spring soak we set off in taxis and check out the small village of Shoshan, coincidentally the birthplace of Mao.

Remember, we drove into the dim light of the main street a few miles down the mountain from the hotel.

The first thing I wanted to do was find a little red Communist party pin.

I found one in a shop and it cost 40 cents.

This was paid for not with money, but with my guide's phone.

Then we stopped at a roadside stand with a smoking grill and a young man grilling squid and tofu on skewers.

Again, our guide Oscar waved his phone to pay by WeChat and procured some of these delicious hot skewers that we brought to a little backroom bar.

Mao and Xi's portraits hung on the dirty walls and we sat and asked our guide so many questions about what it's like to live in China.

As I wrote in my story about the trip, this little visit in Hunan was a highlight.

Good local beer, a group of interesting writer friends, plenty of grilled tofu and squid, and interesting local conversation.

My recipe for a great night.