We gathered outside for our van trip outside the big city to the ‘Garden City’ of Suzhou. The two hour trip passed quickly with stories, banter, snoozers, and my trying to decipher Chinese characters on the signs. Academics are a fun bunch to travel with.
Suzhou is on a canal that flows from Beijing to Hangzhou—a long way. On the water, boats shaped like fat Italian gondolas, natural wood color, were being pushed by bargemen with paddles that also resembled those used by gondoliers. Is this where the Italians (Marco Polo) got the idea?
Inside the yellow city walls while our tickets were being bought, we were set upon by little old ladies, no insult intended, trying to sell us small bracelets and brooches made of real flowers. They smelled wonderful, a cross between a gardenia and a honeysuckle. (Mine still smells great on the desk as I write this.) Sarah and I both got one each. The fresh blooms are wired together in such a way that they hung from your shirt neckline, and so that long strings of them can be broken into smaller sections should you choose not to invest in the entire thing. It was a lovely aroma to have so close to one’s nose. Shall I just note that they were so welcome after visiting the facilities with archaic plumbing, known to westerners as Turkish toilets. Enough of that subject.
Our group of 12 got on our motorized cart for a ride up the steep winding road to the top of a hill. Perched on the top is a brown brick pagoda, dating from 1000 years ago. It was leaning slightly. We wandered around for a while, mostly following hordes of tourists to look at what they were looking at. Like carp and a turtle in a pool beneath ancient stone walls. After an ice cream snack (chocolate covered vanilla with black sesame seeds), we walked back down the hill. When every sight is a new one, all sights are of equal interest to me. I found the snacks the locals were consuming at the base of the hill to be of the same interest as the pagoda. Like the do-it-yourself taffy. You buy a little blob of soft hot sugar mixture and get three bamboo skewers. Then you quickly sort of knead and stretch the hot mixture before it all slumps and falls to the ground. Everyone doing it was giggling. The ever present corn on the cob on sticks, noodle bowls, and kabobs were in evidence as well.
Our guide led us through a few maze-like alleys to our van, and we were off for lunch. We were dropped off in a modern part of the city in a series of pedestrian streets lined with upscale shops, department stores and a bookstore. The latter was filled with people squatting and sitting on the floor reading rather dog-eared books. They all looked so engrossed like the final exam was tomorrow.
Bruce and I decided to eat street food, which we had rather been warned against. Anyway, we got 4 kabobs for 5 RMB and they were good. Well marinated mutton we think. Bruce set off for a drink while I people-watched from in front of the temple. He returned with Black Pearl tea without even knowing it, as none of the drinks at any of the food stalls was labelled in English or even illustrated as is sometimes the case. In the U.S. this is called bubble tea. It was a cup of milk, maybe soy, with BLACK tapioca balls in the bottom. Perhaps a hundred ¼ inch chewy things like gummies in the bottom that you slurp up through a big fat straw, mixed in with the milk. Sound delish? It was indeed quite tasty. Look carefully at the straw in Sue’s left hand.
After lunch we wandered a bit more. The streets were very crowded, but people were dressed in their Sunday best enjoying the warm day. Two school aged children said ‘hello’ to me in passing. They appeared to be brother and sister with their mother. I convinced them to come closer and have a chat with me. A foreigner. They were thrilled that their English lessons worked and we could communicate. The girl was so excited to practice her English with a native speaker that she was jumping up and down. It was very cute and hopefully they will remember it for a long time and work even harder on their lessons.
Sue wrote most of the above and then went to bed. Bruce takes over now and then does the processing required to insert the picture and videos.
It was almost time to rejoin our group, but we decided to first take a quick dash through the Suzhou Peoples Store Co., Ltd., largely to see whether the insides of it matched the drab impression created by its name. See pictures below.
You’ve got it—Mao drab is out and never coming back. It’s color, style, and casual or elegant everywhere, with a bit of funk thrown in, especially on the tee shirts.
Then it was back into the van and getting a bit late in the afternoon. Our gracious and generous hosts from the Shanghai Sports University were keen on a few more stops before getting us back to Shanghai, but we negotiated for just a brief one at the Lake of the Golden Cock on the outskirts of town. It was extremely placid, and the ever present haze obscured any view we might have had of the far bank and thus contributed to its appearance of being endless. Pedestrian density was much lower than in town, as was the level of background sound, so this stop was indeed a welcome respite from our time amidst the masses. The large modern homes surrounding the lake were evidence to the financial success of those living in the area.
Back to Shanghai at rush hour, busy as always despite it being a Sunday. Happy Hour gathering in the lounge upstairs, marked by intriguing snacks such as smoked trout and by top brand drinks.
We check out of here on Monday morning. Plan to head back to the Shanghai Museum in the afternoon, rejoin the official travelers, have dinner, and then take a late flight to Beijing. It will be very late when we arrive, so faithful readers might have to wait till Tuesday for their next blog fix.
Note that there is a new entry, Map, in the Links section of the sidebar at the top of the page. To help you visualize our travels we’ve marked the three major cities of our itinerary there. This will soon be joined by two other links, Impressions and FAQ. In Impressions we plan to record things large and small that struck us as interesting, without regard to where they fit in the chronology of our journey. I’m sure we’ll continue adding to that for a while after we return home and continue to process the memories. FAQ will summarize a few things about the blog itself. Stay tuned!
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