Canals and Flaming Candles

Checked out a bit of the nightlife in Shanghai last night. Went to a place called Shin Tien Di, which translates to New Sky Earth. It is an adaptive reuse project of a site that originally had blocks of Lilongs, which are alley homes originally developed by the British as high density housing. Shanghai's skyline was comprised of Lilongs as far as the eye can see before the recent spur of skyscrapers and redevelopment. The redeveloped site consisted of office, retail, and restaurants, and have retained many of the unique elements of the Lilongs, such as the lane and open space structure, and some of the entryways. This project has been very successful and has since become a model of adaptive reuse for other projects.

We arrived in Suzhou this morning after a quick ride on the high speed train from Shanghai. Suzhou is known as the Venice of the East, with its network of canals that reach as far as Beijing. It is also known for its silk production, beautiful gardens, and beautiful women.

Two planners from Suzhou's parks department gave us an overview of the planning and history of this city of 2 million. It is developing as the second industrial center in China, after Shanghai, all within the last 15 years. The city is ancient with city walls that predate the Great Wall. We took a stroll through the Lingering Garden and Master of the Nets garden, both of which have extensive rock sculptures, pergolas, mosaic stone paths, all around a central pond feature. The buildings, screen details, bridges, and landscaping is exquisite. You can find out more at http://www.ylj.suzhou.gov.cn/en/garden/right.htm

We then took a boat tour through the canal. Lots of bats under the bridge and lots of mosquitos looking for a meal, but luckily we remembered to bring the insect repellent. at trees dotting the canalThe canals were lit with strings of red lanterns, stringed lights over the bridges and walls. I sat on the open rear deck of the boat and took some great pictures of the reflection of these lights on the water.

We dined at a muslim restaurant, where they brought out dish after dish of mutton with big bits of bone, tofu, sweet squash and melons, mutton stewed in sauce, noodles, mutton on skewers, eggplant with tomatoes, spicy celery salad, bread, and more mutton. Sadly, they did not have a vegetarian protein mutton substitute, but the veggie dishes they did have were plentify and delicious. Unbeknownst to me, my friend Juan tipped off our tour guide that it was my birthday today. Back when we were in Macao, I learned that another guy on this tour shared the same birthday, and we're a year apart. Our guide arranged for two birthday cakes, each equipped with a lotus bud candle that, when lit, the petals open one by one to reveal a tall flame in the middle and little candles on each of its petals. The pyrotechnic show wowed us all, and we enjoyed a bit of dancing afterwards. But wait, there's more. The lotus candle also sang the birthday song, and it sang and sang until we could not handle it anymore, so my friend Ed killed the candle and we all rejoiced. This is a birthday I won't soon forget.