Suzhou and Qing Ming Festival (Courtney)

As the title suggests, China is currently celebrating Qing Ming Festival, or Tomb Sweeping Festival. We have had the last four days off (well, including the weekend!) and headed up to Suzhou. There is a Chinese saying that goes something along the lines of "Earth has heaven, China has Suzhou". I know that's not verbatim, but you get the idea. We have constantly read and been told that Suzhou is akin to a paradise, the "Venice of China", and were curious to see for ourselves. Having read so much about it, then witnessed the surrounding area (eg, where we live!) we found it kinda hard to believe that such a gorgeous place could be so close.

However, Suzhou did not disappoint. Whilst I wouldn't go so far as to say it was a paradise, it was a beautiful town, in a very Chinese way and I'm already looking forward to going back and exploring some more. It is definately a town in China that I would recommend people not miss if they ever travel here. Whilst it still had all the usual Chinese suspects - grey skies, smog, dirt, rubble - it was a very charming place. Suzhou is known for its canals, bridges, gardens and silk..and I can safely say we covered all areas! I wont write a huge post..as I'm sure Marcus will hit you with one of those, but I thought I would put up some photos for anyone looking for their Monday morning blog hit. So here goes....

Our first sight of beautiful Suzhou...and oh what a shithole it looked like. This is looking back at the train station. As we left Wuxi I made comment to Marcus how China didn't feel as overwhelming as it used to. That all changed when we got to Suzhou. The train station was one huge melting pot of sheer chaos...the people!!! Everywhere, there was so much noise and so many people, it was crazy. We had to fight our way out of the place, then were followed around by touts trying to get our business. All we wanted to do was find either a taxi (a legal one) or the main street Renmin Lu. We ended up finding the street after buying a map from a little old lady. It was like nothing I had experienced before. Suzhou is a lot busier than Wuxi, I think because of the holiday, and also it being a tourist town. Whilst it is an international tourist town, it is also a Chinese tourist town, and the place was packed. Bumper to bumper traffic, scooters and bikes everywhere, you name it. Whilst walking along Renmin Lu we were constantly hearing "Hello, hellloooo..", all manner of guys wanting our business and to take us places. Being stubborn idiots we refused all of their offers...and proceeded to walk for an hour and a half to our hotel. By the time we got to the hotel we had been on the go for three hours - might I point out the train ride took 15 minutes!!! Of course then the hotel had no record of our booking (or of me having already paid)...but we eventually got it sorted and collapsed in our room.

Even the beggars in Suzhou were more abrupt (that's not the right word, but definately more in your face). Here we had beggars grab our arms, push their begging bowls into our stomachs...for a little while I found it pretty confronting. But, that is what happens in a tourist town. There is so much poverty and despair that us Westerners are viewed as the money ticket. We try to give, but there are so many people and so many problems. We literally could have given money to every person we saw and come home with not a cent left...and it still would be the tip of the iceberg. I gave this guy some money then asked to take his photo, which of course required me giving him more money, but that's no different to a lot of places! On Friday night as we left the hotel we were approached by this young kid, who claimed to be 15 but who knows. He was clearly not well and just rambled and rambled at the speed of light in English about how we should help him and give him money. I'm not sure how he learnt such good English, but think a lot of it was just a very well practised speel and beyond that he probably couldn't say much more. He decided that if we helped him we could be his second parents...sorry kiddo.

On Friday night we walked to the Garden of the Master of the Nets, which wasn't far from where we were staying. During the nicer months they have nightly performances of traditional Chinese art (done in a completley touristy way of course!) We couldn't refuse seeing one of the gardens at night, as they all close by 5pm. The garden was really gorgeous, and was so much quieter than others we visited during the day. We kept catching up with tour groups which was frustrating as we were happy just wandering around by ourselves, and even sometimes having a section of garden to ourselves! These two guys above were so cool. After their performance off came the masks and they sat along one of the walls deep in conversation. They looked so cool I asked to take their photo. They ran and got the masks, thinking I wanted to get them in costume, I tried to explain but to no avail.

However I went back later and managed to snap them! How cool is the guy on the right in his Justin Timberlake/trilby hat?! To me he looks like he should be hanging in a bar in New Orleans, playing the blues...

Of course, we found ourselves "backstage" where I snuck on one of the masks...it stank.

In one section of the garden was a large lake with a quaint little path around it. Hanging from the roof of a little pavilion was this beautiful string of lanterns. I took so many photos trying to capture them, then Marcus comes along and trumps me with this great shot.

Saturday was garden day. I had mapped out our plan of attack. A couple of guide books mention the "Couples Garden". Much smaller and less visited than the big tourist gardens, and supposedly quite beautiful. I made it my mission to find said garden...with absolutely no luck. We caught a cab in the vague direction. I didn't think the cabbie knew where I was pointing, and turned out he didn't as he took us to the zoo. But the garden was supposedly down a street nearby. I checked with a fruit stall owner and he motioned us down this street. Well we walked and walked down this little alley which was strewn with rubbish and broken stones and this bumpy road, thinking to ourselves, hmm...doesn't look like the garden is down here, but Lonely Planet did say it was off the tourist track...turns out we never found the garden but I loved walking down the street. It was great to see Suzhou from a different perspective, I doubt many westerners ever stumble down this little street (going by some of the looks we received!) and we got to witness people just going about their lives. Washing clothes in the canal, little shops, and check out the two cuties above and below! The lady had a spectacular (and unexpected) laugh, a real chuckle, and her husband just has the best smile. The two kiddies below were "playing" with their bucket of water, so cute.

Back onto the main street...and of course vendors doing what they do best!

What's this you ask? Yup, we were finally brave enough to jump into a bike/rickshaw thing. (Alternatively known as voiding our travel insurance!) Marcus has been keen, me not so much. We ended up using a few of them throughout the day, and somehow each time we ended up with an impossibly old man. I felt so sorry for them lugging us westerners around!

Marcus and his new love, Zhen Zhu Nai Cha.

Beautiful old rooftops in the Lion Grove Garden, originally built by monks. Of the gardens we saw I enjoyed this one the most. It was mostly rocks, which had been hand placed to form steps, caves and all sorts of areas. Some of them were so smooth after years of wear, you weaved your way in and around them. Or over and on top of them as the Chinese did..

My fave building in the Humble Administrators Garden. This jutted out over a lake, and was just a large room with these wonderful windows, parts of which were a deep blue. It looked like such a great place to sit in summer and watch the lake. This garden is gianormous and packed to the brim with tourists. There were parts where it was virtually impossible to move, and the noise! The gardens were beautiful, and would have been even more amazing if they could have been enjoyed as originally intended - in peace and quiet where you could meander along and contemplate. However, there was incessant yelling, phones ringing, cameras shooting, people pushing past, people climbing over things (no need to stick to the paths here)...it was madness. This is what I mean by Suzhou being beautiful in a very Chinese way.

Again, me and my desire to see "different" things. I had also read about a night market, which was on the other side of town. It wasn't marked on any map, but I had read that it was a lively place full of great buys and food. Throughout the day we had seen so many things we wanted to buy, but we told ourselves to wait until the night market, rather than buying from the touristy stores outside the gardens. We passed up amazing ink paintings, embroidered pictures (sound weird but were very cool), fans, the cutest silk pj's that I wanted to buy for May...so many things. We caught a cab to the market, armed with cash and a willingness to spend it. What did we find? A street with food. Lively yes, great to look at with its pretty lights and bustling vibe...but not a thing to buy anywhere! Sigh...It was probably for the best though as Marcus seems to be coming down with my illness and it started bucketing down, so we headed back...and ordered room service!! He he..I've never done that before, and it was good!

And finally, Leonard hanging with an old friend in downtown Suzhou.

I wish we could have stayed longer, sadly it's back to teaching tomorrow! On an unrelated note, I had a disturbing realisation in Suzhou...I have a favourite type of squat toilet. Yes, I never thought I'd see the day where I preferred one type of squat toilet over another!