Blogs from Hangzhou , China, Asia

May Day is a holiday in China, and our holiday schedule gave us Sunday through Tuesday off from work. My roommate and I took the opportunity to attend (part of) a Buddhist meditation retreat at the nearby Guang Jue Monastery outside the small city of Lin'an, about 2 hours from Hangzhou. The Guang Jue Monastery is a Pure Land Buddhist monastery tucked away in the mountains outside the small town of Lin'an. There is an Australian man, now a monk, who organizes retreats and workshops for Westerners interested in learning about Buddhism. This week is a week-long meditation retreat, but due to my work schedule, I could only attend from Sunday to Tuesday. Once outside the city, the landscape quickly gives way to rolling hills and mountains covered in lush green forests. As usual for Chinese ... read more

DAY6: Suzhou/Hangzhou In short, today we drove to Drive to Hangzhou after breakfast. Hangzhou is one of the seven capitals of ancient China, known for its tea products. We took a boat on the West Lake, revealing some of the beauty of Hangzhou's willow draped islands and admire the Su Causeway. The day was a little overcast and this made for some gloomy looking pictures. The lake is however very pretty. As for tasting the Dragon Well Tea at Longjing Green Tea village, the taste was indeed very good and what is more the idea is to eat the leaves; have to admit that I loved the taste and wanted to actually buy some to take home. However, once you realize that this tea is very, very expensive, you understand that this is only for the ... read more

A Tesco entry seemed blogworthy when we first arrived, but I kept forgetting about it, and now it seems so normal. Anyway, I’ve had some requests so here you are: Tesco Chinese Style - complete with live bullfrogs, tea pic n mix, and the all important “buy a pack of yoghurt and get a pair of scissors free”. Actually, I couldn’t see one of these at the time, so I made do with “buy a pack of yoghurt and get a glass free.” Sometimes the freebie taped to the item you want to buy is so large it’s hard to tell which one you are buying and which one you are getting free. I kid you not, I have seen a fully sized fruit bowl taped to a carton of milk. Naturally we bought it.... read more

Es wird auch mal Zeit für ne chinesische Überschrift, in diesem Fall sowas wie hallo zusammen!:) seit einem guten monat ist eeendlich wieder schönes wetter hier und folglich können wir auch endlich mal wieder draußen sein. nach dem unterricht genießen wir meist alleman draußen auf dem hof die sonne, schnacken und genießen das leben. das lernen leidet etwas drunter aber natürlich nur ein bischen!:) da wir ja auch den scooter haben können wir endlich mal die gegend vernünftig erkunden was ziemlich spaß macht. ein paar mal sind wir zum wastlake um entweder nur rumzufahren oder iwo im grünen zu chillen. natürlich sind wir meist eine attraktion für die chinesen aber da sind wir nun mittlerweile dran gewöhnt. vor zwei wochen sind wir mit ein paar freunden einen tag lang in die yellow mountains ca 2std westlich ... read more

This is the same tea house I wrote about back in June last year. We stopped here on our way round the lake after a pretty exhausting time pushing through all the tourists flooding West Lake during Qingming. Turns out they also do snacks too – modelled here by the beautiful Miss Gardiner.... read more

I kept seeing these green things by the counter in the YouEasy stores, and eventually my curiosity got the better of me. A quick google search says they’re made from squeezed wormwood and glutinous rice with a red bean paste filling. (Though there are other varieties). They have a fairly inoffensive mild flavour, but it’s a bit like eating chewy playdough so I’d hesitate to recommend them. According to our Chinese teacher they’re always sold around the Qingming holiday. Qingming is a spring festival here – some people translate it as “tomb sweeping day” However by the look of West Lake, which was completely rammed, it’s just another bank holiday where the 8.7million people living in Hangzhou all decide to squeeze their way onto the Su causeway. Mei banfa.... read more