Hangzhou
For today’s adventure, Ken and I went to a place he likes to go on some days off, a lakeside city called Hangzhou (“Hahng-zow”). We made sure to get up early so we could catch the train–it’s a two-hour ride from Shanghai (I write this as we are taking the train ride back).
On trains in China (or at least hereabouts), you can get “hard” or “soft” accommodations (seats or sleepers), the “softness” referring to the luxury of the appointments. Not exactly the difference between “first class” and “steerage,” but still, there is a difference. We’re taking the soft seats, of course.
There’s not really too much to say about Hangzhou; it’s a nice city, fewer beggars and hard-tactic salespeople, but otherwise much like Shanghai–except you’ve got the lakefront, which is very nice. I’ll let the photos below explain a lot of it. Shopping streets, a long lakefront park, that kind of thing. We walked, boiled in the heat, stopped to drink every so often, ate lunch (KFC–I can’t get popcorn chicken in Japan), ate dinner (ramen, Japanese-style). Went back to the station.
Still, another day well-spent. Tomorrow, we take a day off, sleep in, shop locally, watch videos. I have got to give my feet a rest. They’re killing me. And that’s with good shoes.
They were selling bubble guns, and this lady was kind enough to demonstrate
For some reason, the KFC clerks were dancing outside… don’t know if it was a promotion or a hobby…
Ken was able to chat with some very charming young women at the pagoda
A crowd gathered in the park around a man singing to musical accompaniment
A very nice Starbucks here
More photos later…
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i’ve been folowing your travels through china with a serious case of envy. i was in china in 1990, spenf=ding a week in beijing, then a week in wuhan, guanzhou and finally a week in honk kong. there was a delegation of americans (of which i was one) there for the first sinop-american symposium on aids. very surreal, let me assure you). science and public health issues aside, what still sticks on my mind from my time there are the children, the sounds, the explosion of bicycles and uttrly ordered chaos (how i referred to the cab driving), the buildings, the scale of everything and the antiquity. no romanticizing, just a reality. the exit walk from the forbidden city to all of the sudden pass thru the two huge doors and go from b.c.e. time to c.e. time and stand looking across the highway into tiannamen square. the abrupt passing of time between the forbidden city and tiannamen square took my breath literally away and almost caused me to cry. centuries existed in the matter of steps (i remember how one of my travel mates was thrilled to find the site in the forbidden city where the tennis match was played in “the last emperor” which — irony of all ironies — was showing on the televisions in our hotel rooms (pay-per-view of sorts).
your journal entries made me sad to not be there now, made me happy to have been fortunagte enough to have experienced china, and pouring through my packs and packs of photos i took when i was there.
guanzhou was rainy; beijing was overwhelming; wuhan was so remote; the great wall was as close to a religious experience as i have ever had; the forbidden city remains the one place i will forever long to see again; kowloon reminded me of manhattan or london; and i miss the red bean dessert. the bok choy harvest was huge the year i was there, so everything had a possible bok choy side dish. everything. i have not eaten bok choy since i was in china — i ate my life-supply while there.
xie-xie for the journal.
Feel really happy when you said you like China!
And I hope you can visit Mount Yellow if having a chance.
the scenery is abusolutely beautiful!