Cleaning

Where do I start?

The Chinese people always seem to be cleaning - sweeping, mopping, sweeping and mopping, but things seldom get clean. Let me explain. The pollution here is really visible some days and it is as if the air is "thick" with something, and I think it is. Maybe dust - but certainly fine fibres from the many textile factories here.

There is little carpet - which is a good idea - but acres of tiles. Mostly polished tiles. At the college the cleaners are continually mopping the corridors, but we get the sense that they are really just moving the dust around. They don't use buckets very much - so the mop (made of fabric) is moved back and forth along the tiles. Cleaning? I think not.

The "cleaners" in the classroom are students who do little more than "tidy" and remove large items of rubbish (students tend to leave a lot of debris in each class),
They sweep using a pretty ineffective little broom, and mostly move the dust particles around.

I tend to think that better quality brooms and mops might help! It seems a lot of time and effort is wasted.

I have a cleaner to clean my apartment. A lovely lady whose English is zilch, but who comes most Thursdays and sweeps with these funny little ineffective brooms, and then mops with my squeegee mop, but often scrapes it along the floor using the metal edge. I'm not sure what she is trying to achieve. If I could speak Chinese well, we might make some changes, but as she is also one of the college cleaners, I reckon she is doing the best that she can.

Perhaps cleaning lessons would be good. I guess all our Aussie brooms, and rakes are made in China, but they don't use the same style that we do. Even the streets and gardens are raked with what looks like a rake make of twigs. They are actually twigs, fashioned in a particular style.

Everywhere we go we see men and women sweeping parks and streets with this strange rakes or brooms. Just rearranging the dust.

Wuzhen Fire Station

I'm sure there is a more modern fire station somewhere in the busy metropolis of Wuzhen, but this is the one in the ancient township.

Sweet making in Wuzhen

We saw two men in different parts of Wuzhen making candy in the street. It was interesting to watch as they stretched the mixture over and over again to make the mixture shine, but I'm not sure I'd like to eat candy made in this way in a busy dusty street.

How the ancient Chinese lived in Wuzhen

Blue and White fabric at Wuzhen

This exhibit was especially spectacular. We entered this museum via a shop that sold a wide variety of items in dark blue and white. There were tableclothes, clothes for adults and children, toys, fans etc all in fabric with flower patterns in white on a drk blue background.

The first area was a "forest" of fabric floating from a high bamboo structure, which looked spectacular. Another room told much of the story of the dying, and as we went along we saw the process in action.

There are stencils and the workers push a type of clay over the stencil, which is dried on a rack and then the fabric is put into big vats where they dye is. The dye is from a locally grown plant which is why the fabric is only blue. It has been a tradition for many many years to make this blue and white fabric here. There was a garden showing the growing of the plant that provides the dye.

During the day I purchased a tablecloth and some fabric.

The Wood carving Museum at Wuzhen

This doesn't look oriental, but this smiling carving graces the museum.

The carvings in this museum date back hundreds of years and some are extra ordinarily intricate. It is hard to imagine how much time and effort that would be required to complete such works. There were many wonderful exhibits of wood carving in this museum.

More photos of Wuzhen

Soon the alley ways are busy with visitors.

Narrow alley way

Lunch being cooked in the street