For most people, the term “Morin Dawa” is nothing but the name of a remote, unfamiliar place. But for more than 100,000 Daur people living around China, it means a lot more: it is the hometown of their ancestors and a spiritual home – a holy land worthy of pilgrimage.

Sweet Home

Located at the easternmost edge of Inner Mongolia’s Hulun Buir Grassland, Morin Dawa, meaning “mountains only traversable by riding horses” in Daur language, is the only Daur autonomous region in China. The Nenjiang River meanders along its eastern border, while the dramatic Greater Hinggan Mountains shelter the land to the north. The middle ground is crisscrossed with rolling hills while the boundless Songnen Plain lies to the south. Morin Dawa boasts a vast expanse of untilled lands, swamps, grasslands and wetlands. A total of 56 rivers snake across this pristine landscape, along which live a dozen ethnic groups.

One of these is the Daur. Their villages feature thatched houses with clay gables, and each home is surrounded by decorative fences woven with rose willow twigs. In the courtyards, cattle sheds are placed far away from living quarters for the sake of cleanliness. Traditional Daur residences feature frames made of pine or birch timber, clay walls, and straw-thatched roofs. Typically, the front doors and windows face south to allow more sunlight inside. The bedroom usually has three heated kang (brick beds) that are connected together. Such beds are necessary especially during the chilly winters.

Morin Dawa covers an area of 11,000 square kilometers, and has a population of 300,000. Although sparsely populated, the land is far from desolate. In summer, vast expanses of sunflowers appear in full bloom, while canola fields on the hillsides form a sea of yellow flowers that stretches to the horizon. On the untilled land grow waist-high weeds, dotted with an eclectic mix of wild flowers in every color of the rainbow.