Yesterday was quite a long day. We had a car pick us up early to take us to Suzhou, a city almost two hours away. The area between Shanghai and Suzhou used to be all farmland – now it’s pretty much industrial, with small patches of farms scattered here and there.
You see buildings going up everywhere. They joke in China that the national bird is the crane – they mean the building crane, not the bird. Our guide told us that one quarter of the cranes in the world are in the Shanghai/Suzhou area.
There are sparkling modern new highways connecting the cities. In spite of the fact that these seem to have been built yesterday, one still encounters many traffic jams. Specifically, the tunnel connecting the old town of Shanghai from Pudong, the new area where we are staying, is packed all the time.
Suzhou was known as the retirement center for China in ancient times. Apparently government officials who had made a lot of money (don’t ask how) retired here because of the temperate climate. As a result there are dozens of beautiful gardens scattered throughout the city, which these wealthy men built for themselves.
Suzhou also is famous for its silk. Much of the world’s silk is made here. And finally, it’s known for its Grand Canal, built in 600 CE, running for over 1000 miles, to bring grains from Suzhou to Beijing.
We first visited the garden of the Master of the Nets – the owner built it around a fishing theme in admiration of their calm life style. Chinese gardens are quite different from ours. They have rocks, water, plants and pavilions, but few flowers. Everything has symbolism, such as carvings of bats, or the shape of the window …. it seems like half of the things mean longevity and the other half prosperity.
We then visited a silk factory. We saw the little worms that spin the cocoons, which are then unthreaded and woven into silk. It is amazing that this material is made by millions of little worms. The weaving machines were Jacquard looms, which of course had Lenny swooning. They were running very large punch card patterns to weave in the designs. Good silk has woven designs whereas cheaper silk just has the pattern printed on afterwards. Of course, the factory also had an enormous store for purchasing silk objects – it was hard to tear ourselves away from the shopping to continue our tour!
We continued on to the old town part of Suzhou for another excellent Chinese lunch. Here, among other delicacies, we tasted lotus roots with sticky rice.
After lunch we went to the Garden of the Humble Administrator. This garden’s creator apparently had a sense of humor because there was nothing humble about his garden. It was enormous – with many pavilions, islands, manmade mountains, carvings, and plants. It also had an impressive bonsai collection.
Then we took a ride on a gondola on a part of the canal system. Suzhou is called the “Venice of China” for its interconnected waterways. They decided that the canals made more sense than roads because it is a low area, with a lot of water, so the water was put to good use.
Private boats now are banned on the waterways, and only tourist gondolas are allowed. Apparently the canals used to be full of trash, which they aren’t now. In fact, I keep forgetting to mention how clean China is. Everything seems to be spotless. Garbage collectors are everywhere, picking up after people. We passed a garbage collecting gondola on the canal, for example, gathering up stray pieces of paper and flotsam. We see people sweeping the streets in the morning by hand as well.
Back to Suzhou. The canal ride was fun in that it gave us a chance to see houses and a life style that is a good bit older than all the modern high-rises we see everywhere. I particularly got a kick out of seeing the mops hanging from windows. You just lower them to dip them into the water, mop your floor, then rinse them out in the canal.
After a long ride back to Shanghai, we met my friend Len Baker’s son, Griff, and his girlfriend, Sissy, for a lovely dinner. Griff has lived in Shanghai for five years. We had a delicious dinner with a spectacular view of the Bund, the European designed area across the river from Pudong. We enjoyed hearing about life in Shanghai from Griff and Sissy.
-- Donna
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Saturday, November 1, 2008
We have a few minutes before leaving this morning, so I thought I’d write about a few of our observations.
First, the level of service here, such as in the hotels, is quite something to experience. They have a lot of people in China, as you know, and it seems like they are determined to put them all to work at the luxury hotels. They employ people to open the door for you as you come in and out – one per door on a double door. They employ people to stand at the elevator to help you press the button to call the elevator, in case that is a challenge for you. They employ people at the top of the elevator to gesture in the general direction of the lobby. They even employ people in the washroom to show you to the stall, and turn on the water for you when they emerge (seems like they rely on you to do the flush yourself … or perhaps they check when you’re gone!). Sometimes this level of service is helpful, but most of the time it feels a bit annoying, and you just want a little space.
My second observation is that we have been amazed at the evolution of the form of government here into a midpoint between democracy/capitalism and autocracy/communism. The government seems to be a benign autocracy that looks favorably upon capitalist endeavors. The businessmen we spoke with last night seemed happy with the situation, and didn’t mind giving up a bit of personal liberty in exchange for a government that can plan long term and invest in the future. The growth of the economy here is extremely robust. You don’t see much poverty around, or beggars. The business environment is positive, with people generally able to do what they want, even if it means setting up their company in the Cayman Islands. They point out here that they graduate six million students each year from the university, which seems to be an emblem of their optimism about the future. Even with the serious financial crisis reverberating through the world today, the Chinese seem to be on a roll.
-- Donna
First, the level of service here, such as in the hotels, is quite something to experience. They have a lot of people in China, as you know, and it seems like they are determined to put them all to work at the luxury hotels. They employ people to open the door for you as you come in and out – one per door on a double door. They employ people to stand at the elevator to help you press the button to call the elevator, in case that is a challenge for you. They employ people at the top of the elevator to gesture in the general direction of the lobby. They even employ people in the washroom to show you to the stall, and turn on the water for you when they emerge (seems like they rely on you to do the flush yourself … or perhaps they check when you’re gone!). Sometimes this level of service is helpful, but most of the time it feels a bit annoying, and you just want a little space.
My second observation is that we have been amazed at the evolution of the form of government here into a midpoint between democracy/capitalism and autocracy/communism. The government seems to be a benign autocracy that looks favorably upon capitalist endeavors. The businessmen we spoke with last night seemed happy with the situation, and didn’t mind giving up a bit of personal liberty in exchange for a government that can plan long term and invest in the future. The growth of the economy here is extremely robust. You don’t see much poverty around, or beggars. The business environment is positive, with people generally able to do what they want, even if it means setting up their company in the Cayman Islands. They point out here that they graduate six million students each year from the university, which seems to be an emblem of their optimism about the future. Even with the serious financial crisis reverberating through the world today, the Chinese seem to be on a roll.
-- Donna
The amazing wooden scale model of Shanghai in the Urban Planning Museum.
In old town Shanghai
Watching silk being unwound from cocoons.
The Shanghai Museum.
We are now touring with our friends Lev and Galina Leytes. We had a long day today, so I’ll keep to a short description (since I’m very ready for bed!).
We started the tour today at the Urban Development Museum, which had an amazing small scale replica of Shanghai, including building details down to the number of windows. It helped orient us to the city.
From there, we went into old town Shanghai, which was a frantically busy place both with locals as well as tourists. We visited the lovely Yu Garden, which was supposedly an oasis of calm in the busy city, but also was pretty crowded.
After a nice lunch in the old city, we stopped at the state run department store, where Galina and I picked up some silk to bring home.
We also visited a store that made silk. They had a machine running to demonstrate how the silk is made. It showed how they unwove the cocoon and then twisted it into silk thread. They also made silk comforters by stretching the cocoons instead of unthreading them.
We drove through the French concession – the former French section of the city – and then visited the Shanghai Museum. This was a fantastic museum – well laid out, with a good audio tour – but unfortunately we only had an hour there, so we hit a few highlights, and that was it.
For dinner this evening, our group met with a group of entrepreneurs and VCs from China. It was a blast to get to meet some Chinese to talk about how they do business today. I’ll save my comments for later, when I have more time!
-- Donna
We started the tour today at the Urban Development Museum, which had an amazing small scale replica of Shanghai, including building details down to the number of windows. It helped orient us to the city.
From there, we went into old town Shanghai, which was a frantically busy place both with locals as well as tourists. We visited the lovely Yu Garden, which was supposedly an oasis of calm in the busy city, but also was pretty crowded.
After a nice lunch in the old city, we stopped at the state run department store, where Galina and I picked up some silk to bring home.
We also visited a store that made silk. They had a machine running to demonstrate how the silk is made. It showed how they unwove the cocoon and then twisted it into silk thread. They also made silk comforters by stretching the cocoons instead of unthreading them.
We drove through the French concession – the former French section of the city – and then visited the Shanghai Museum. This was a fantastic museum – well laid out, with a good audio tour – but unfortunately we only had an hour there, so we hit a few highlights, and that was it.
For dinner this evening, our group met with a group of entrepreneurs and VCs from China. It was a blast to get to meet some Chinese to talk about how they do business today. I’ll save my comments for later, when I have more time!
-- Donna
Friday, October 31, 2008
Our dinner last night included an amazing “face-changing” demonstration. A dancer dressed in traditional costume swirled and spun around, and seemingly instantly changed the color and look of his face. It clearly was a series of masks, but you had no idea how he could possibly have changed them so fast. He also changed colors of his cape along the way.
This morning, Lenny and I took a walk on our own for an hour around town before leaving for the airport. It’s been hot and humid all week, and we really felt it even at 8:00am. We visited an old temple in town and watched the congregants lighting incense and praying. Hanging from the ceiling were loads of coils, both large and small, which we only later found out also were incense slowly burning. I guess this is for the people who are too busy to stay and burn their incense themselves …. “light, burn and go”, as it were.
We had an uneventful flight to Shanghai’s beautiful, modern airport. We were lucky to arrive at a time when no other flights arrived and sailed through an empty immigration hall. This airport is scaled for huge volumes. The hallways were so long it almost seemed like we were looking down a mirrored walkway.
Shanghai – at least the part we saw on the way from the airport – is thoroughly modern. I’m not sure what happened to the old communist Chinese thing, but the streets here are full of designer boutiques and international labels. The skyscrapers all seem to have been built in the last ten years, and the architecture is striking. They fortunately seem to have skipped the bland architecture of the mid 1900’s, and as a result, one building was more beautiful than the next. Although tall, the buildings are more spread out than in Hong Kong, so the place feels much less dense.
We are staying at the Grand Hyatt Pudong. The building is decorated on the outside with art-deco looking ironwork that gives it a strong, textured look. The most amazing thing is that the hotel lobby is on the 54th floor, and the hotel rooms are on the floors above that. Even at those heights, the hotel has a vast, open interior space going from the 56th floor to the top (86?), which all the rooms on a balcony around the edge.
We were going to dinner with those from our group who also continued to Shanghai, but got started late, and hit bad traffic, so arrived at the restaurant with no time, since we had tickets to a Chinese acrobat show. Our delightful host, Danny Lui, had ordered “take-out” for us, so we grabbed out bags, and headed out to the show. Our Abecrombie and Kent guide I’m sure was quite surprised to find her four guests frantically eating in the van on the way to the show.
The show was great – a bit like Cirque du Soleil. We had front row seats, so could almost see the sweat on their faces as the (very young) acrobats did amazing tricks and feats of strength.
-- Donna
This morning, Lenny and I took a walk on our own for an hour around town before leaving for the airport. It’s been hot and humid all week, and we really felt it even at 8:00am. We visited an old temple in town and watched the congregants lighting incense and praying. Hanging from the ceiling were loads of coils, both large and small, which we only later found out also were incense slowly burning. I guess this is for the people who are too busy to stay and burn their incense themselves …. “light, burn and go”, as it were.
We had an uneventful flight to Shanghai’s beautiful, modern airport. We were lucky to arrive at a time when no other flights arrived and sailed through an empty immigration hall. This airport is scaled for huge volumes. The hallways were so long it almost seemed like we were looking down a mirrored walkway.
Shanghai – at least the part we saw on the way from the airport – is thoroughly modern. I’m not sure what happened to the old communist Chinese thing, but the streets here are full of designer boutiques and international labels. The skyscrapers all seem to have been built in the last ten years, and the architecture is striking. They fortunately seem to have skipped the bland architecture of the mid 1900’s, and as a result, one building was more beautiful than the next. Although tall, the buildings are more spread out than in Hong Kong, so the place feels much less dense.
We are staying at the Grand Hyatt Pudong. The building is decorated on the outside with art-deco looking ironwork that gives it a strong, textured look. The most amazing thing is that the hotel lobby is on the 54th floor, and the hotel rooms are on the floors above that. Even at those heights, the hotel has a vast, open interior space going from the 56th floor to the top (86?), which all the rooms on a balcony around the edge.
We were going to dinner with those from our group who also continued to Shanghai, but got started late, and hit bad traffic, so arrived at the restaurant with no time, since we had tickets to a Chinese acrobat show. Our delightful host, Danny Lui, had ordered “take-out” for us, so we grabbed out bags, and headed out to the show. Our Abecrombie and Kent guide I’m sure was quite surprised to find her four guests frantically eating in the van on the way to the show.
The show was great – a bit like Cirque du Soleil. We had front row seats, so could almost see the sweat on their faces as the (very young) acrobats did amazing tricks and feats of strength.
-- Donna
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Today our little tour of five people from our group went to Lantau Island where we boarded a cable car (the kind that hang from a cable in the sky, like when you ski, not the kind that are on the ground, like in San Francisco). The cable car was extraordinary – it went for many kilometers and took about ½ hour. It soared above the water, took several turns along the way, and seemed to go at a treacherous angle up and down mountains. The countryside around looked like one of those Chinese paintings with steep mountains, water, and clouds. Along the way, we had an amazing view of the Hong Kong airport, which was constructed on landfill about ten years ago. I remember the old airport – coming in over tenement housing in Kowloon – and this one is quite different. It was fun to watch the planes take off and land from a vantage point above the airport.
The destination of the cable car was the Po Lin Monastery where there is a giant bronze Buddha. The place is quite the tourist attraction with a bunch of shops lining the road along the way to see the Buddha. We first visited the monastery where we saw pilgrims making incense offerings and bowing to the various smaller Buddha statues around. We ate lunch there, in the all-vegetarian café, where everything looked beautiful but each dish tasted more or less the same.
We next climbed the 256 steps up to visit the Buddha (Lenny counted and swore that there were only 254). This Buddha is quite attractive – a serene countenance and a rather gentle look for an enormous bronze piece. He also was surrounded by some other graceful statues making offerings of various delicacies.
We returned by cable car, and bus, to Hong Kong, making this one of those days with a rather high ratio of transportation relative to touring.
Lenny and I had the bus drop us off to see one of Hong Kong’s famous sites, an escalator! No kidding. They have an awesome escalator that goes up the side of the mountain. Actually, it’s a bunch of smaller escalators, one after the other, that during morning rush hour goes down the mountain, and the rest of the day goes up. There are shops and cafes along the side of the escalator, which is covered overhead but open on the sides. In other words, the escalator is actually a form of public transportation, and it was clear that many people commuted to and from work on it. Imagine telling people that you commute to work on an escalator. (Thanks for the suggestion to go see the escalator to John Hollar!)
We then rushed back to the hotel for a couple of spa treatments and will head out to dinner soon.
I realized that Hong Kong feels to me like a life-size version of the kids’ game Chutes & Ladders. The city is constructed alongside mountains on islands, laced throughout with elevated highways, tunnels, bridges, escalators, etc., and you seem as if you are always going in something, over something, or under something.
-- Donna
The destination of the cable car was the Po Lin Monastery where there is a giant bronze Buddha. The place is quite the tourist attraction with a bunch of shops lining the road along the way to see the Buddha. We first visited the monastery where we saw pilgrims making incense offerings and bowing to the various smaller Buddha statues around. We ate lunch there, in the all-vegetarian café, where everything looked beautiful but each dish tasted more or less the same.
We next climbed the 256 steps up to visit the Buddha (Lenny counted and swore that there were only 254). This Buddha is quite attractive – a serene countenance and a rather gentle look for an enormous bronze piece. He also was surrounded by some other graceful statues making offerings of various delicacies.
We returned by cable car, and bus, to Hong Kong, making this one of those days with a rather high ratio of transportation relative to touring.
Lenny and I had the bus drop us off to see one of Hong Kong’s famous sites, an escalator! No kidding. They have an awesome escalator that goes up the side of the mountain. Actually, it’s a bunch of smaller escalators, one after the other, that during morning rush hour goes down the mountain, and the rest of the day goes up. There are shops and cafes along the side of the escalator, which is covered overhead but open on the sides. In other words, the escalator is actually a form of public transportation, and it was clear that many people commuted to and from work on it. Imagine telling people that you commute to work on an escalator. (Thanks for the suggestion to go see the escalator to John Hollar!)
We then rushed back to the hotel for a couple of spa treatments and will head out to dinner soon.
I realized that Hong Kong feels to me like a life-size version of the kids’ game Chutes & Ladders. The city is constructed alongside mountains on islands, laced throughout with elevated highways, tunnels, bridges, escalators, etc., and you seem as if you are always going in something, over something, or under something.
-- Donna
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
The steep tram up to Victoria Peak -- like a cable car.
The previous generation of technology that drove the tram.
Fishing junks in the harbor.
The Stanley market -- lots of stalls.
Dim Sum lunch with part of our group.
The smoggy view of the harbor and skyline from Victoria Peak
On the way to dinner (arrived at by a 40 minute ride on a 150' yacht), we see the raw ingredients.
Which then get turned into dishes like this.
We’re staying at the beautiful Four Seasons in Hong Kong. It’s a very busy place that seems to not be the least bit disrupted by the financial crisis.
Last night, after we arrived, we joined our group for dinner at the Pacific Club, on the Kowloon side, looking back at the Hong Kong skyline. It is an incredible sight, the masses of sky-high buildings lit up against the backdrop of steep mountains.
Today, a small subgroup of about ten took a tour of Hong Kong city. We started the day by taking the tram up to the top of Victoria mountain. There were times when the tram seemed to go at a 45 degree angle to the hillside. It uses a cable mechanism similar to San Francisco’s cable cars (of course, Lenny took plenty of photos of the older mechanisms, which fortunately have been modernized).
At the top, we could see over a very smoggy Hong Kong. The folks here blame the mainland Chinese for their pollution woes. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but it sure does seem like they have a problem.
From Victoria, we went to the other side of the island to visit Aberdeen – the fishing village. It seems that most fisherman have given up fishing and instead take tourists around in sampan boats. There were dozens of sampans, lined with old rubber tires for a bumper effect, circling the few remaining fisherman in the harbor. By the way, half the names seem to be holdovers from the British Empire, like Aberdeen, whereas the rest all see to come off a Chinese menu, i.e. Kung Foo Young, or something like that.
Our third stop was at Stanley market, a combination of Chinese souvenirs with the Berryessa Flea Market. We bought Marina a small gift, but I won’t say what it is in case she is reading the blog!
Our last stop was back to the center for a superb dim sum lunch at one of Danny Lui’s (our host) favorite haunts. The food just came and came, and we did our best to keep up with it.
For dinner, our group headed out on an impressive 150’ yacht for an island that has a series of restaurants specializing in seafood. We were served all sorts of seafood, including abalone, but also some we couldn’t identify. This was definitely a local kind of place, with lots of families, and various groups playing cards and mah jongg.
We’re now exhausted and heading to bed, to hopefully sleep through the night, unlike last night, when we got up, wide awake, around 4:30am!
-- Donna
Last night, after we arrived, we joined our group for dinner at the Pacific Club, on the Kowloon side, looking back at the Hong Kong skyline. It is an incredible sight, the masses of sky-high buildings lit up against the backdrop of steep mountains.
Today, a small subgroup of about ten took a tour of Hong Kong city. We started the day by taking the tram up to the top of Victoria mountain. There were times when the tram seemed to go at a 45 degree angle to the hillside. It uses a cable mechanism similar to San Francisco’s cable cars (of course, Lenny took plenty of photos of the older mechanisms, which fortunately have been modernized).
At the top, we could see over a very smoggy Hong Kong. The folks here blame the mainland Chinese for their pollution woes. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but it sure does seem like they have a problem.
From Victoria, we went to the other side of the island to visit Aberdeen – the fishing village. It seems that most fisherman have given up fishing and instead take tourists around in sampan boats. There were dozens of sampans, lined with old rubber tires for a bumper effect, circling the few remaining fisherman in the harbor. By the way, half the names seem to be holdovers from the British Empire, like Aberdeen, whereas the rest all see to come off a Chinese menu, i.e. Kung Foo Young, or something like that.
Our third stop was at Stanley market, a combination of Chinese souvenirs with the Berryessa Flea Market. We bought Marina a small gift, but I won’t say what it is in case she is reading the blog!
Our last stop was back to the center for a superb dim sum lunch at one of Danny Lui’s (our host) favorite haunts. The food just came and came, and we did our best to keep up with it.
For dinner, our group headed out on an impressive 150’ yacht for an island that has a series of restaurants specializing in seafood. We were served all sorts of seafood, including abalone, but also some we couldn’t identify. This was definitely a local kind of place, with lots of families, and various groups playing cards and mah jongg.
We’re now exhausted and heading to bed, to hopefully sleep through the night, unlike last night, when we got up, wide awake, around 4:30am!
-- Donna
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Off on another adventure
Donna and I are leaving tomorrow on another international adventure for two weeks: China! We'll be in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Xian, and Beijing. Stay tuned...
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