Lingering Garden

Today’s garden was the Lingering Garden, which is touted as one of the 4 most famous gardens in China, and “one of the best in Suzhou”.  We’re not ready to give that title just yet, but it was quite lovely.  As we approached the garden we walked by the parking lot, which held about 15 buses, and 3 more were unloading.  Even though we left the house at 8:45, it was a beautiful sunny day and it looked like many people had the same idea we had to enjoy the weather and a garden.  At first I wanted to bolt when we were stuck in a cue of about 400-500 people crawling along various paths, but we quickly skirted around the tours with guides talking into extremely loud headphones and found some quiet corners of this extensive garden.  The miniature tree area was beautiful, but I believe my favorite today were the “stone mountains”, limestone peaks which were either set on a pedestal in a tableau, or in small ponds as mountains rising from the water.  I do love the aesthetic at work in the Chinese gardens, as it is ingenious and beauteous.  We want to go back to the garden when a few less hundred people are there, perhaps deep winter here, whatever that feels like, to see more of the structure, and to actually linger, as the title suggests.

Pics of this garden and 2 previous gardens we visited but I failed to blog about due to busy weeks:

LINGERING GARDEN:  https://flic.kr/s/aHsk4SdinP

GARDEN OF CULTIVATION:  https://flic.kr/s/aHsk42WWEX

Couple’s Retreat Garden (contender for best of season):  https://flic.kr/s/aHsk42Wm7P

Shanghai, China's Maximum City

Our family recently reunited in Shanghai, albeit for a few hours while Cameroon-bound Daughter #2 flew through Shanghai after leaving Chengdu, where she was visiting daughter #1.  Shanghai was what you expect it to be:  full of lights, full of people, full of restaurants and shops.  We visited the famous knock-off mall, where I was able to pick up boots, a new billfold, a purse, and a cashmere/wool winter coat tailored just for me for pennies to the dollar.  The rest of the family was able to find items as well, so a good time and hard bargaining was had by all.
We visited many of the sights of Shanghai:  the Bund with its famous skylight starring "the Pearl", the old town alleys, which have mostly been converted into huge tourist "items" venues, and a beautiful central park.  We had the vexing experience of using an app for locating some of our places, only to find once we arrived at the location, it was now a different place, usually a bank.  I believe that quickly changing landscape says a lot about the lightning speed with which China has evolved into a consumer driven society.

Hanging Red Lanterns for National Day

Wednesday began the multiple-day National Day Holidays, and so Tuesday evening at the train station we were one of perhaps 10,000 people who were taking trains to their homes.  Probably more, but the orderliness of the lines and efficiency of moving that many people was impressive.  And a little unnerving, but mostly impressive.  The speed train between Suzhou and Shanghai takes about 23 minutes, and it is very clean and very quiet.  We were glad to get back to relative quiet and calm of Suzhou to relax a few days before beginning work again next week.  Here are some pics of our first Shanghai adventure. https://flic.kr/s/aHsk4DpUBC