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The first thing that struck me was the glory of not being constantly sticky. Long gone was the humidiy of Guilin (although, with so many canals, not the mosquitoes) and 5 minutes after taking a shower I was - get this - fully dry. Sigh, so pleasant.
I slept late as I was still knackered from the train ride, and then explored the city a bit.
Suzhou used to be on the Silk Road, and so is famous for its silk and canal-ways. Also, for its gardens. I headed off to the Couple's Retreat Garden in the morning, so called because an elderly couple retired there after the end of his busy (political?) career. The garden is hidden quite ingeniously in the back ways of Suzhou (and my map utterly failed me by not showing most of the little byways) and so I spent a hot half and hour or so actually trying to find the place. Got there in the end.
I find Chinese gardens fascinating - no flowers, or very few, and no sweet smells, but a lot of different shades of green, lots of rocks, water and different perspectives. The landscaper had done very clever
things with perspective - lots of reflections and unexpected corners that made the whole thing look bigger than it actually was. Very clever, and very pretty.
There are also a lot of buildings - in fact, some gardens look more like courtyards (as was the case in the Summer Palace in Beijing). The buildings are a mixture of sitting rooms, studies, reception rooms and temples. The furnishings are sparse and I am not entirely sure whether that was because the site is now a pseudo-museum or whether the rooms would have looked like that in any event.
I chose the Couple's Retreat Garden because my guidebook said it was a rather neglected tourist site. Sure enough, there were only 2 group parties with the leader screaming in rapid Mandarin into her (invariably her) microphone for their benefit and our discomfort. I was also relieved to discover that, despite its name, the Couple's Garden was not too couply - or even at all.
Around lunchtime, I went to the Pan Theatre, and sat in on a live story-telling performance. It was all in Mandarin, obviously, but I could just about follow the gesturing - it seemed to be
Couple's Retreat Garden
The walls were mostly used to shape the garden and divide it into different sections, each with a different theme or layout. But the spaces between the sections were used as well.an old man telling the story of one episode of his life, during the Japanese invasion, I think - certainly the Japanese were involved - and painting quite vivid pictures of the characters he met. He kept tapping the table with a finger or the fan he held (his sole prop), although whether that was emphatic or just a tic, I wasn't sure. It was fun, and an experience, although much of it was lost on me.
I was about the only foreigner and more than one gentleman sitting around me (the audience was mostly made up of elderly gentlemen) asked me (I think) how much I had understood once it was all over. (I almost drifted off in the middle and I think at least one of them caught me at it, so I'm not sure how convinced they were by my reply that I understood "a little").
In the afternoon, I went to the Suzhou museum - the collection it housed was small, a bit like the V&A, but with some amazing artefacts from an ancient Buddhist temple, including this gorgeous wrought metal column, entwined with figures of the 8 immortals and a dragon.
What
was really worth seeing, though, was the architecture of the building. It was fairly modern, but light and spacious, with a central courtyard, complete with pond, pagoda and bridges. Like the Chinese garden I'd seen earlier, the architect had arranged the buildings to give the impression of more space than was actually there, and archways and windows often looked onto other windows in a mirror-like reflection.
I had intended to go to a concert in one of the other gardens that evening - but chickened out at the last moment because I suspected that I would be the youngest member of the audience by a good 20 years and couldn't quite face it. Also the price was quite extortionate for what, I am sure, would not have been a very virtuoso performance.
I had dinner in a Chinese fast food restaurant. No burgers, please. Instead it was like a buffet at the less nice class of Chinese restaurant in the UK. You chose your dish(es) and paid at the end. I opted for - get this - sweet and sour pork. With melon slices rather than the usual pineapple, but otherwise almost exactly the same dish as we
Couple's Retreat Garden
There was a whole rockery that could be clambered over and under... have in the UK. This after countless snobs had informed me (with a sneer) that the Chinese food we get in the UK is NOTHING compared to the authentic food in China. huh! Let me just head off the sceptics by pointing out that I was the only foreigner in the restaurant (the only one they had ever seen in there, from the looks on the servers' faces) so it was not a tourist spot.
I am, however, still unable to shake the suspicion that the dish appeared because the Chinese people were curious as to what the Europeans made so much fuss about...
Before turning in for the night, I decided to explore Pingjang Lu (Pingjang Alley), the street where my hostel was, which happens to be in the old part of Suzhou, and so is beautifully set out with canals and, as I had noticed in my brief foray to find food the night before, lit up at night. Dodging bats (and silently encouraging them to eat as many mosquitoes as they could) therefore, I strolled up and down savouring the atmosphere and taking photos.
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Rachael Williams
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The Pan Theatre sounds amazing - jealous! R xxxx