Hi all-- we’re having an amazing time here in China. We’ve climbed on the Great Wall, visited the Forbidden City and Tianamen square, amazing gardens, canals, silk and jade factories etc. Two more days to go…
I bought several flutelike instruments too. Two are 8 hole ocarinas (different sizes) except they have an embouchure hole instead of a fipple. The other has a reed in a gourd, with a 6 holed tube coming out the bottom. I’ll post pics when we return.
Always wanted to go there 
I was in Turkey some years back, found a traditional music shop filled with hand made flutes, whistles, and many unfamiliar blown instruments. I was in the shop for ages tooting on them.
have a great time !
cheers Chris
It’s for sure an “hulusi”, I own one in blackwood, very interesting instrument.
If you find one buy a “bawu”, it’s another chinese reed instrument but transverse not straight, and with a deeper fascinating sound, it’s a wonderful instrument IMO.
Have a great time Paul. Looking forward to seeing the pics.
You visited the Forbidenn City?
I thought that was forbidden.
(Sounds like a great time 
)
Jason
that clay instument is xun(塤) not ocarina. more about xun
I think it’s hulusi(葫蘆絲)
Hulu(葫蘆) is Calabash 
Xun it is. Mine are a lot less fancy than the ones in your link: a simple black matte color on the terra cotta, with an incised floral design and imprint of the maker’s chop on the bottom. They’re surprisingly well made and cost practically nothing: I think I paid $2 for the smaller one and $5 for the larger, and if I was a better haggler I could probably have gotten them for even less.
The gourd instrument is obviously a very cheap version (again, about $2 from a street vendor). The two drone tubes are dummies. We saw really nice ones in a music shop with working drones, but didn’t want to spend that much on an instrument that we frankly wouldn’t play very much.
Here’s the vendor of my Xun:
You can see about 50 of the nearly 800 pics I took here:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v69/Brewerpaul/China2008/?albumview=grid
If they ask for a password, it’s Swordfish
(bonus question: where did I get the password "Swordfish:?)