My View from Here

A Winnipegger's life abroad in Asia and parts currently unknown.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Hangzhou Redux

Ok, so Blogger seems to be letting me upload pics now, but I can't see them until I actually view my blog. So don't get on my case for having crappy lay out ok?

Anyhow I went to Hangzhou while I was in Shanghai a couple of weeks ago. I went there on a mission to see the sights and to relive some grand experiences I had when I was a kid. See when I was young, my folks took me and my siblings to China for a vacation. It was a great experience for me as I had the chance to see my roots and get a sense of where I fit into the world. Anyhow about twenty years later, I returned to see Hangzhou.

Anyways, we saw the West Lake and it was beautiful. The sky was overcast and there was a foggy haze everywhere so the water reflected the greyness. It sort of gave off an over all feeling of peace and timelessness. The water stretched out as far as you could see and from its thin horizon came the edge of the sky. No one said anything as we looked at the view. Its kinda like looking into the distance and seeing yourself in return.



We also had a chance to try the local Hun Tun and Long Jing tea. Quite tasty as we were damn hungry, but we totally got screwed on the price. Oh well. It came to $30 bucks Canadian for the three of us so it's ok. Damn it...

We walked the length of the perimeter of the lake and saw the different views, islands, pagodas and such. Then we eventually got to the tomb of General Yue Fei.

If you don't know, he was a famous general of the Song Dynasty who was loved by the people. Well like in Ridley Scott's "Gladiator" the emperor's subordinates schemed to have Yue Fei executed for fear of losing power to him. So after his death the public out cry demanded retribution and so they created this tomb for Yue Fei and his first son, whom both were executed.

Well when I saw the tomb again, it was a lot smaller than I remembered. Then again, I was a lot smaller back then too!



Anyhow we spent the rest of our time poking around Hangzhou before hitting a local bar. Then we took the train back to Shanghai. Unfortunately it was the slow ass train and what was supposed to be a two hour ride took four! That would never have happened if Yue Fei was still around!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home