Mengzi City

Mengzi (Chinese: 蒙自; pinyin: Méngzì; Hani: Maoqziif Siif) is a city in the southeast of Yunnan Province, China. Administratively, it is a county-level city and the prefectural capital of the Honghe Hani and Yi Autonomous Prefecture, located about 243 kilometres (151 mi) southeast from Kunming, and 400 kilometres northwest from Hanoi, Vietnam. It is situated in the centre of a fertile valley basin on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau 1,310 metres (4,300 ft) above the sea level and was home to about 590,300 inhabitants as of 2021 census. Mengzi was formerly Mengzi County (蒙自县) until October 2010, when it was upgraded to a county-level city. Mengzi is the core area of South Yunnan Central City Cluster, which is officially regarded as the political, economic, cultural, and military centre of South Yunnan.

Mengzi City borders Wenshan City to the east, Gejiu, Pingbian County, Jinping County and Yuanyang County, Yunnan to the south, Gejiu to the west, and Kaiyuan, Yunnan and Yanshan County, Yunnan to the north.

A widely accepted statement is that the name "Mengzi" (蒙自) was originated from Muze Mountain (now named as Lianhua Mountain) located in the west of Mengzi and now belongs to Gejiu. In Yi language, Muze Mountain means a towering mountain.

As with many other places in China, a variety of Romanized spellings were used for the name of Mengzi city in the past. The traditional French spelling was Mongtseu; the postal, Mengtsz, Mengtzu or Mongtze. Some works in English used the spelling Mêng-tse or Mengtsze.

The municipal seat is in Guanlan Subdistrict.

At present, Mengzi City has 5 subdistricts, 4 towns, 2 townships and 2 ethnic townships.

Located within 30 arc minutes south of the Tropic of Cancer, Mengzi, as with much of southern Yunnan, has a warm humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cwa), with muddled distinction between the seasons and daytime temperatures remaining warm year-round. Highs peak in May before the core of the rainy season and reach a minimum in December; however, the warmest and coolest months are June and December, respectively at 23.2 °C (73.8 °F) and 12.3 °C (54.1 °F); the annual mean is 18.65 °C (65.6 °F). June thru September accounts for over 60% of the annual rainfall of 857 mm (33.7 in) and during this time, some rainfall occurs on a majority of days, resulting in a marked reduction in sunshine. With monthly percent possible sunshine ranging from 34% in June and July to 64% in February, the city receives 2,161 hours of bright sunshine annually.

The Mengzi region is well known for a dish called guoqiao mixian ("Over the Bridge Rice Noodle"), made with long rice-flour noodles.