We are “beneath the clouds” in the province of Yunnan, wonderfully described in Marco polo accounts of travel and exploration. This subjective and intangible out of time haven features great cultural and ethnic varieties. The province of Yunnan provides us with its rich and red lands, the arid plateaus of the Tibetan mountains, the terraced rice fields and the magnificent “Pu era” fermented tea.

Missionaries with amazing courage have been victims of lamaseries and of the communist regime since the middle of the 19th century. Tsekou church was completely destroyed and rebuild between 1907 and 1911 in the village of Cizhong in the northwest corner of Yunnan at about 2000 meters high. Alexandra David Néel stayed there in 1923.

These few photographs were taken during the christmas season in Cizhong.