In Shaoxing during my visit to the Lu Xun Native Place I visited many of the exhibits. Each corner I turned I found something else of interest - and had a lot more questions to ask, but often no one to ask.
In one small corner I found a small room with a table on which there were many Shaoxing Wine Jars, and two young ladies painstakingly painting them. They did not look up, just kept on with their work. Perhaps the wine bottles were on sale in one or more of the wine shops in the place, but I did not see the finished article in my journey. Perhaps they are boxed for sale, I do not know.
There was no sign in English that explained what was going on - I can only guess that these wine bottles would be filled with the famous Shaoxing Yellow Rice Wine. Perhaps getting ready for the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival.
It took me a long time to discover these places. Sadly there didn't appear to be any brochures/information in English, so bit by bit I found my way around to these interesting places.
Shen's Garden is not far from Lu Xun's Native Place - in fact the area has quite a few interesting places as I discovered.
Shen's Garden was tucked away behind some shops and the sign "Shenyuan Viewarea" was a bit misleading. If I wasn't actually looking for "Shen's" garden I might have missed it!
Again I used my Tourist Card, but this time had to supply my fingerprint. There was a pad that I had to press my finger on before I was admitted. Anyway, they let me in.
The garden is some 600 years old and of course belonged to the family Shen, and there is a lot of history here. Not that I learned much about it. There was of course a lake, and performance areas, and I could see that turning up to visit on my last day in Shaoxing was NOT a good idea. Why hadn't anyone told me about the regular performances here? Oh, well, next time........
There were in fact several performance areas in the gardens. These gardens did look a little sad on the day I visited, but it was mid winter. I shall surely visit if I am in Shaoxing in spring!
I wandered around taking photos, and as it turned out having photos taken of me! Yes, in China any foreigner is likely to be part of family photos of Chinese families and I wonder how many photo albums I turn up in! Again I found the Chinese friendly and in one pavilion had quite a chat with a Chinese family. They are all keen to help us, and the sales folk all keen to sell us more stuff, but I was all shopped out. I didn't think there was any room for anything in my luggage now. And by this time I had sent the last of my boxes of things back to Australia. All four of them!
When I came out of Shen's Garden - I had walked through the garden and the exit was a block away. I found it was next to another Shaoxing Museum - and the Shaoxing Library. The latter I might have peeked in, as I am sure there was little I could read there, but the Museum might have been worth a visit. Next time perhaps.
Eventually I found a taxi and returned to the college - but there was obviously a nasty car accident just along from Shen's Garden as their was an almighty traffic jam. On the journey home we passed another accident, where a car and a motor bike had collided and the ambulance had just arrived. How I wish I had my camera at the ready as we passed as the two nurses, complete with white uniform and white nurses caps climbed out of the ambulance to help the injured as we just drove by.
It would have been a good photo to capture!
I've gone from a country with -6 degrees (Shaoxing China on 15th January) to 43 degrees (Adelaide , South Australia, January 28th) - and my poor wracked body is "feeling the heat" in more ways than one. I think I heard that it was likely to be the worst heat wave since 1908!
My folks live in the lovely city of Adelaide - so they were keen to see me after my China adventure, but it always seems to be some record of temperature when I am here (coldest, wettest, hottest etc) so it is no surprise about this heatwave in the midst of summer.
That's just the way it is. No air conditioning in my parents' or sister's homes, but I will manage. Keeping quiet - doing little.
Maybe time to catch up on my writing................................
I knew I would "run out of time" - there was so much to see and so much to do. There were two places in particular that I had to visit before my departure. I had often walked through Lu Xun Native Place. I'd discovered the little shops, and purchased the lovely sugar candy from the shops there, but I'd never been IN to the various places.
Lu Xun, was born in Shaoxing, and is considered to be one of the greatest Chinese writers of the 20th Century. In this place on either side of the main walking street are places of great interest in Lu Xun's life. His real name was Zhou Shujian. The Zhou family home is there - and the family garden.
Lu Xun's former residence and the small private school, which is known as Sanwei Shu Wu (Three Flavor Study), that Lu Xun attended are open to visitors.
Lu Xun Memorial Hall is there, and many other exhibits. Lu Xun apparently studied medicine in Japan, so he is also popular in Japan and Japanese tourists visit this tourist place.
I wished I had taken the time to visit this historic place before - certainly NOT the place to visit in a hurry as there is so much to see. I found that in most places there was adequate English to understand. In fact each room had Chinese and English explanations.
The reality is I think this is the most perfect exhibition of ancient China - the gardens, old kitchen, old water tanks, bedrooms, etc. I know that when I return to China - and I am sure I will - I will make my way back to Lu Xun NativePlace again. And take more time next time. I hope that I would have done more research BEFORE I return too.
My companion for the two days in Hangzhou was a fellow teacher from Australia - and despite a lot of differences we got on well. She was a nurse, I had been a nurse, she was from Tasmania and I was from the mainland, she liked to smoke, I hate smoking - and so it went. She also liked to stay up late at night, while I liked an early night, and she enjoyed sleeping in while I was an "early bird", so the next morning I was up early, dressed and headed out for breakfast at Starbucks. (Not that I am a great fan of Starbucks, but the food is pretty good and it was close by!)
The lake was a wonderful picture as you can see from the photos. Around the lake in the parks are often groups of people doing their morning exercise. This is a common sight all around China, and even if they do not go out into the parks, people do their daily exercises religiously. It is important for "good health."
I sat and enjoyed my breakfast before setting off to Hefung St. The tourist books said this opened at 8 am - but perhaps that is summer. In any case I set of along Yan'an Road enjoying the new scenery.
At one stage a man came "flying" towards me on roller blades and said "hello". I replied "hello" and he said "Great, you speak English." These sort of conversations are common - not all light skinned foreigners are English speakers! He was asking for direction. Now, of course, I'd not be the best person to ask directions would I? I mean, I'm not a local. But where did he want to go?
Starbucks! How funny! As I had not long ago walked out the door, I certainly knew where it was, and I laughed as I told him the directions! Funny world, isn't it?
When I reached Hefung Street it was mostly deserted, but some of the stalls and shops were beginning to open. I had come specifically for the music one, but it didn't open in the time I was there.
However, it was great to wander around without crowds milling around and I wandered the whole length of this historic street taking photos and looking in the shops.
I met a calligrapher and he showed me some of his work and I was delighted to buy a little piece, and then I bought a magic trick for my grandson, before I headed back to Wushen Square and caught a taxi back to Starbucks where my fellow traveller was enjoying her breakfast.
We went back to the hotel and grabbed our bags, checked out (and yes, ) we did get the balance of the "deposit" back. However, we did think it was very funny. "Wait a moment" the receptionist said - and the young man who was also working on the counter went up to check. Perhaps he counted the condoms, perhaps the towels, but he soon appeared and we saw his "thumbs up" from the staircase and the money was duly handed over to us.
We found a taxi and headed for the East bus station and got our tickets - and only had to wait 10 minutes for the bus to Shaoxing.
We were back by early afternoon after an uneventful bus journey. Time to finish off preparing for our departure from Shaoxing back to Australia.
We set out initially to go to a Holiday Inn Hotel but discovered that it was way out of Hangzhou - we were interested in the buffet and we had asked a young Chinese girl if she could explain where it was - we had an advertisement from More Hangzhou, but she explained it would take 100 RMB in a taxi to get there, so we changed our plans.The magazine had great things to say about Peppino's at the Shangri La Hotel, which is on the other side of the West Lake from where we were, so we hopped in a taxi and travelled to the hotel that was set in beautiful gardens high above the lake. Now this is a place that I MUST go back to if I return to China. It was a shame that we only had the opportunity to see this place after dark. The hotel was certainly splendid - with a most wonderful piece of artwork in the foyer and another in the restaurant. The food? Absolutely fabulous! We had the Antipasto Buffet - which had a wonderful array of foods. We started with three fabulous breads, and a bottle of great Australian wine. The buffet included real smoked salmon, pate, vegetables as only the Italians do for their antipastos, and real cheese. Now this is something we really missed. CHEESE. The Chinese are not cheese eaters, so this was one of the many Western foods we craved. What a meal! So enjoyable. We noticed that many "foreigners" also enjoyed the restaurant, but there was a fair sprinkling of Chinese too.
After the meal we went back into the little shop near the foyer. These shops are a feature of most upmarket hotels and they sell all manner of expensive Chinese artifacts including Jade jewelery, Jade figurines, tea sets etc. And to our surprise (due to the financial turmoil we were told) there was a 90% discount! Oh, if only we (a) had more room in our suitcases and (b) had money to spare! Initially we were going to get a taxi from the foyer, but I suggested we at least go down to the lake edge and see the view. I'm glad we did. It was around 10 pm and the night was still, cool, but comfortable and the view of the lights around the lake was almost breathtaking. In the end we walked back to our hotel along the pathway at the edge of the lake. We heard the ducks, we saw the lights and quite amazingly an "airship" flew overhead with one side of it a screen where advertising was being played. We found a little place for a coffee near the West Lake before walking the last few paces to the hotel.
