A little something on Suzhou (Marcus)

Man what a week it has been. I don't think i have ever been this sick for this long(and continue to be!). I think I am on the improve - little by little, and i am hoping that another solid two days of rest will do the trick - if not it's back to the clinic for x-rays.

However, I wanted to write a few things about our visit to Suzhou last weekend before too much time passes and I cannot remember some of the smaller details.

When we first arrived in China we were taken by surprise by the smog - well at least I was, I am not sure how Courtney felt about it initially. I knew it would be here, and I knew it could be pretty bad, but i didn't think somehow that it would be so overwhelmingly here.

I remember flying in to Shanghai airport and trying to get a decent look outside the plane windows - though unfortunately we were trapped in the middle section - and saw us coming in over what looked like farming fields of some description, and a heavy white fog. I thought this initially must have been actual fog, or we were still coming through the cloud, but no, it was smog alright. And on first view it appeared white, but ever-since, it's identifiable by it's light blue colour - you know, smoke.

The 3 hour drive from Shanghai to WuXi was a bit of an eye-opener for Courtney and I. Initially we marveled at how different everything looked to everything we knew back home, but as the trip went on, the landscape didn't change. Oh it did - it was filled with every conceivable variety of people doing every conceivable type of activity, but the smoggy dirty grey wasteland I have often tried to describe didn't change.

We never really seemed to pass any actual towns though. There were outcroppings of apartments seemingly just randomly put down, and every now and then we'd see what looked more like commercial buildings. About 2 hours out I asked Michelle, one of the English teachers who had come to meet us, "What town is that?" and she said...to my surprise, "Oh we're still in Shanghai." I distinctly remember looking over Courtney and mouthing..er what the fck!

So between Shanghai and Wuxi we had this voyage through the muck and I was expecting at any time we would break out of it, and suddenly be overwhelmed by visions of lovely green bamboo forests, leaping deers and kung fu monks practicing as silhouettes against sun lit mountainous backdrops...nope!

We got to this point where Michelle said, "We're in WuXi now!" and we were like, um yay.

I think it's important to remember those early impressions as they have largely burned an image into our minds of China. Seemingly in these parts, everywhere looks the same. The longer we stay here the more we know(obviously) that there is actually some very different things to see, but the general China-China as we know it pretty much unchanges - that is, random blocks of apartments, rows upon rows of tiny shops that sell the same things - ie: either unrefrigerated drinks, cigarettes or...safety equipment(we still boggle at this too).

So to us, we envisioned Suzhou as potentially being WuXi, but with some canals here and there and the odd garden. This is what we were worried about. Hell it's only 15 minutes away by Bullet Train(then again, the Moon is probably only 40 minutes away by Bullet train when you think about it), and well we just hoped it wouldn't be so.


One thing about China we have come to understand is that you will get a greatly different view of things living here opposed to just dropping into the middle of a city, visiting a few attractions then moving on to the next place. Much of that sameness you will completely miss - though I suppose that applies to anywhere in the world.

Our first impression of Suzhou was comparable to our first impression of Shanghai - without the rain thankfully. Argh! As Courtney previously wrote, the Train station was just a fiasco of activity and I was really surprised at how much of a dump the whole area there was. Here was one of China's primary tourist cities(supposedly), yet your first welcoming impression is Shitville!

Just like Shanghai however, the more we explored, the more we liked it, and the more we found it's own individual character buried within it.

Suzhou was established in something like 500 BC....that to me is almost Dinosaur land. It is WAY old. It is immediately different to WuXi as it's streets are long and straight, making them an absolute shocker for traffic. Busses and taxi's had completely clogged up the main thoroughfare, though the push-bike rickshaws everywhere seemed to be making good money because of this - and I would say that's just life here.

We stayed in the Old City of Suzhou - being more interested in the historical aspect than the glitz of the 'New City' - to which we saw briefly and was almost the same as WuXi's CBD anyway.

The whole area is carved up by narrow canals - most of them quite stinky and not overly picturesque, but some area's sported some really nice ornate bridges. I think to actually see this side of Suzhou is where you need to spend more time in the city. We somewhat powered around it the three days we were there, hampered only by impending sickness and declining weather, but we still managed to see enough to differentiate it from it's surrounding areas - so to us, it was an enjoyable visit.

Behind the main streets are a criss-cross of quite narrow roads which is where most of the older architecture is situated. For Suzhou, it seems to be a white-washed brick type style. Dotted in amongst these are the ancient and famous gardens. It is when you wander around these areas that you truly start to get a feel for the 'ancient' China you hoped to see but couldn't initially find. Unfortunately at the actual Gardens and places of interest themselves, the number of Chinese monkey's..er tourists is somewhere in the extreme level, which can suck the enjoyment factor out, but at least they cant ruin the general feel of the place, and that is what I liked most.

The Garden of the Master of the Nets

When I call them Monkey's I mean because they are absolutely bloody excitable monkey pricks when it comes to being tourists!! In the second garden we visited, the Lion Grove garden, here was a combination of ornate rockeries, ponds, bridges and so on. The rockeries were quite vivid in their detail - all hand carved, and said to resemble lions. They cut in and out of the place in seemingly random paths, and you can climb all over them on those paths. The Chinese do this..but they also go everywhere else too. They climb up and on things, are practically swinging from the rafters, posing before every flower bush, hanging off every bridge, it's a nightmare!!

They're like super-excitable! In the Humble Administrators garden, which really was a lovely place, it was packed, absolutely packed. The 'tourist' moment that stuck out the most for me was - there was this ancient tree which was off behind a small ankle high fence which had grown in such a way that the middle of it was hollowed out and you could effectively stand in it. Someone was taking a photo of a young Chinese man with shocking hair fonzy style glasses doing his Mr Cool pose. Another group of Chinese came from the other direction, saw this and went berserk! First this man with a video camera rushes up and starts filming it. Oh my god! Oh my god!!! Next his entourage catches up to him and are quickly ushered across the fence to stand next in the tree, but another group has caught on and is moving to intercept also. Everyone now wants their photo taken in the tree - and the best part is it wasnt even on a path. Trample on garden? Noo problemo!

I was saying to Courtney - what do you think would have happened if someone had chance seen me getting her to put that Mask on for a photo in the Master of Net's garden we saw at night? "We would have gotten into trouble?" she said, "NO, FREAKIN STAMPEDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The Garden of the Master of the Nets

The gardens themselves were all beautiful in their own ways and as you wandered around you could clearly see where they had been created to provide as many viewing angles as possible. Each garden had literally hundreds of little nooks and crannies with subtlety added seating for you to enjoy a particular area. It was just a shame that there were so many people in them.

My favourite part about them was probably not the gardens themselves, but how they were framed. Two things in particular stood out.

The entrance to the Master of Net's garden was set back off the road down a short alleyway. You entered through a very Chinese looking doorway/arch and there you are, you're in it. So simple, and I could imagine so peaceful if devoid of people.

The Humble Administrators garden was surrounded by these huge thick white walls, all ornately tiled on top, some with dragons and other sculptures. They just look like something out of a movie to me. The Humble Administrator's garden looked like a movie set from the outside - or so I thought.

Suzhou was a nice place and we plan on visiting it again. It was a shame we didn't do more novelty shopping(due to relying on the night market being good) but we have another 11 months to sort that out.

The Garden of the Master of the Nets - It was nice to see at least one of the garden's at night. Whilst you miss out on some things, you see some lovely lighting and silhouettes.

Lion Grove Garden. If you don't look for it, you won't even notice most of this stuff.

Lion Grove Garden - Spring has all the tree's in flower oh and look, the warmth has brought out the monkeys.

Lion Grove Garden. Chinese gardens aim to create tranquility and balance between rocks, water and plants. Most trees have been cunningly placed so that they will almost precisely fall over a pool of water in a precise way.

The huge old ancient gates leading into the Humble Administrator's Garden. The wall it was part of was white, massive and very impressive.

Humble Administrator's Garden. Very serene and unfortunately very populated. The mist of this day added a lot to that classic Chinese feel you want to take from a day like this. And I think it actually largely was mist/fog rather than just smog that day, as it was quite drizzly by nightfall.