--- title: China Daily - TIME - Partner Content - Waterways that keep history alive description: Waterways that keep history alive canonical: https://time.com/branded-content/china-daily/waterways-that-keep-history-alive/ article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-10-27T08:01:13.729Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-27T08:00:08.734Z article:section: Paid Partner Content og:title: China Daily - TIME - Partner Content - Waterways that keep history alive og:description: Waterways that keep history alive og:url: https://time.com/branded-content/china-daily/waterways-that-keep-history-alive/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt688accd85d7d38d0/6ae059bd9443608e9d64fd66/5_Waterways_that_keep_history_alive.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1575 og:image:height: 886 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: China Daily - TIME - Partner Content - Waterways that keep history alive twitter:description: Waterways that keep history alive twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt688accd85d7d38d0/6ae059bd9443608e9d64fd66/5_Waterways_that_keep_history_alive.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Waterways that keep history alive > Sponsored content. 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Its journalism is reported and edited by a professional newsroom led by Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs, with named correspondents on politics, climate, health, technology and culture. It reaches 1 million US print subscribers and 1.15 million globally, plus more than 1.1 million newsletter readers. #### How do I subscribe to TIME magazine? Subscriptions are at time.com/subscribe-agent. Choose digital only at $20 a year, or print and digital from $29 a year or $49 for two years. TIME also publishes seven free email newsletters at time.com/newsletters, which do not require a subscription. #### Can I cancel a TIME subscription? Yes. TIME states that subscriptions can be cancelled at any time. #### Does TIME have free newsletters? Yes. TIME publishes seven free email newsletters reaching more than 1.1 million readers, covering daily news, Washington politics, health, AI, climate and energy, culture, and the newsroom itself. They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-sub-2026q3/newsletters?i=3eccc493-c8ba-4527-bd5d-9ca9c1c00ba6&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1) * TIME Subscriptions: [time.com/subscribe-agent](/c/time-sub-2026q3/subscribe?i=3eccc493-c8ba-4527-bd5d-9ca9c1c00ba6&cr=time-sub-2026q3-v1)  _At Sifang Square, the heart of the Old Town, locals perform traditional Naxi folk songs and dances, weaving ethnic customs into the fabric of everyday life. PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY_ By YANG FEIYUE and LI YINGQING Mu Li usually wakes up to the sound of running water. “When I was a child we fetched drinking water from the river before 6 a.m.,” recalls Mu, who was born and raised in the Old Town of Lijiang, Yunnan province. “Our elders always told us: Never throw anything into the river, or your mouth will rot.” For generations such unwritten rules had governed daily life in the Old Town, where waterways have long been both a lifeline and a guardian. The Old Town of Lijiang, founded during the late Song (960-1279) and early Yuan (1271-1368) dynasties, has stood for about 800 years. According to Mu, people of the Naxi ethnic group first established settlements in Baisha, an ancient town north of Lijiang, before gradually moving south to Dayan, the historical name for the area that later became what is now Lijiang Old Town. Drawn by a basin sheltered by surrounding mountains, they built their homes around the waterways. They diverted a single stream through the settlement. Over time it branched into three waterways, around which houses, lanes and markets gradually took shape, following the natural contours of the land. “Few settlements of this scale have preserved such an integrated water system,” Mu says. More than 350 stone and wood bridges link homes, courtyards and winding alleys. Water has never been merely ornamental. It supplied drinking water, sustained daily life and agriculture, and helped regulate floods. Every week residents near the town’s Sifang Square still open the wooden sluice gates to release water from the Yuhe (Jade) River, allowing it to cascade down the gently sloping square and wash the stone streets clean. A few steps away from the bustling streets stands Hengyugong, a traditional courtyard completed in 1875\. It is a classic Naxi residence, featuring a four-sided courtyard. The compound, covering more than 6,400 square ft., comprises four wings arranged around a central quadrangle. The courtyard still holds Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) gilded carvings on its doors and windows. Li Junxing, affectionately known as Uncle Six, is its fourth-generation keeper. “I’ve been running this museum for 16 years,” he says. “It’s a living museum because we still live here.” Visitors tour the front courtyard while his family continues everyday life in the rear residence, separated only by a single wooden door. When a devastating earthquake struck Lijiang in 1996, Hengyugong emerged almost unscathed. The Li family traces its roots in Lijiang back about 400 years, when their ancestors arrived from Nanjing, Jiangsu province, to serve the Mu family. During the Qing Dynasty the family shifted from scholarship to commerce, establishing the Hengyugong trading house in 1868\. The present courtyard followed seven years later. Every morning Li wipes down the wooden doors and sweeps the courtyard before welcoming visitors. “A house needs people,” he says. “Only when people live in it does it stay alive.” Tucked away in another quiet alley is the Shoudao Lijiang Folk Handicraft Art Museum, where He Xiuchang, an inheritor of Dongba papermaking, has practiced the craft for more than 30 years. The paper begins with a humble shrub called _raohua_ (_Wikstroemia canescens_), which grows only on limestone slopes at an elevation of around 7,200 ft. above sea level in the Jinsha River valley. Left untouched, the shrub lives for about 13 to 15 years before naturally dying. However, if harvested earlier it sprouts again. “It’s just like cutting scallions,” he says. Transforming the bark into paper requires at least 34 steps, including stripping, boiling, washing, fermenting and pounding the fibers into pulp, before forming each sheet by hand. Dongba paper is prized for three distinctive qualities. Insects rarely damage it because the plant itself contains medicinal compounds. It can remain intact after prolonged water immersion and, when burned, it releases a fragrance resembling temple incense. Today Dongba paper has found new uses beyond calligraphy and ancient manuscripts. Artists paint on it, and designers incorporate it into creative products. In 2003 ancient Dongba manuscripts, many written on this handmade paper, were inscribed on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register. Unlike many historical districts that have gradually become open-air museums, the Old Town of Lijiang remains a functioning community. More than 25,000 original residents continue to live in it, with more than 5,000 businesses. Last year the town welcomed more than 24 million visitors, and during the Spring Festival holiday this year more than 2.4 million people visited, local authorities said. Many newcomers have also made the Old Town their permanent home. A cafe owner from North China’s Tianjin, a merchant from Wuhan in Central China’s Hubei province and a clothing shop owner from Wenzhou in eastern China’s Zhejiang province all arrived years ago intending to stay briefly, only to remain. For Mu Li, the water still runs the same way it did when she was a child. What has changed, she says, is the understanding that a historical site is not preserved by walls and regulations alone. “People are the soul of this town,” Mu says. “We have to respect the market forces that have always been part of this place, but we also have to keep it alive — not as a relic, but as a home.” [](https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/) ## China Daily Website - Connecting China Connecting the World Since its launch in 1981, China Daily has grown to become the nation’s leading English-language newspaper. 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