The many faces of China-Shanghai-Suzhou

China for me at least has many faces; we experienced them in the two days (5 if you include Hong Kong) we were there. There are the sad and serious faces in the street, the rowdy school kids, the giggling teenagers, the worried grandparents, serene elderly, happy mums bespectacled and responsible fathers, blacksuited and sobre business men, hard working poorer classes washing their clothes in polluted canals and every one it seemed hanging up their clothes to dry on billions (I mean it!) of balconies in the miles and endless miles of tall apartment buildings which we barely managed to escape in Shanghai. There are clothes on lines outside shops and on tiny house verandas. The toddlers are delightful, taxi drivers are dour and unhelpful, young women in McDonalds and Dunkin' Donuts speak with American accents and actually speak English, our guides were smiling, helpful and spoke excellent English learned at school...no matter how fluent and colloqial they sound none had been outside China! Apart from them and a few glamour girls in stores and at the front desks of swanky hotels almost no one spoke English....perhaps the very rich and 'travelling class' but even then their English is often heavily accented and hard to understand.



Shanghai has a huge population, 17 million is the figure we were quoted. It is an attractive city in the centre; the sky scrapers are each of a different despign unlike the huge cubes and rectangles we're more used to. Some have fluted tops, some are so 'thin' they look as though they'd topple in a strong wind, some have roof top arches. From our balcony on board we could see a good selection and there is the tall red ball on top of a structure like the CN towe in Toronto but apparently not as tall...our guide actually mentioned the CN tower with some awe, we were quite puffed up!



Hidden among these towers are the old colonial buildings Liz of your era. Solid, gracious, attractive, obviously British or French built....all along the Bund which you might remember? This is the street where we saw most of these lovely buildings from the pre-WW2 days. I was told that you probably lived in what is called the French/British Concession where most of the expatriots lived. We didn't have time to find or visit it unfortunately, our days were too full. I don't think you would recognise Shanghai....even peole who had last visited a few years ago saw massive changes. China is building and building.....everywhere there is a hive of industry; helmeted workmen digging, climbing and drilling.



The roads are amazing, flyways upon flyways upon flyways. They are architecturally beautiful from some angles but I never managed to photograph them to advantage, we were speeding along in our bus or stuck behind the huge supports. This was when we were on our two hour drive to Suzhou....city of canals and gardens and, thank heavens, no skyscrapers. A world heritage site and glimpse of the old China when there was time to plan and grow things, time to enjoy and meditate. The gardens were utterly beautiful; rocks, trees, flowers and water all in wonderful balance and composition. As if the designer had studied beauty and knew all the angles ( in the literal sense) and how best to stir the spirit and emotions. If only we could have seen them people-less! Everywhere I turned was an unforgettable corner, a photo I mustn't miss, a place I just had to sit. We saw three gardens in all but the first and smallest was my favourite, the smaller sections had an element of 'cosiness' which the larger more open gardens, which were beautiful nevertheless, did not. They also seemed more crowded.

The food we had in China, apart from the wonderful Manchurian meal which Randy gave us, were disappointing in their almost consistent blandness. There were odd exceptions to this but not many. The tastiest meat we ate was lamb off a skewer and cooked on a street grill ( Chinese from the north) at Randy's behest...it was scrumptious!

China is a power growing in significance on the world stage; the Chinese people we met and spoke to were by turns cheerful, proud, sweet, jolly, dour, irritable....just like te rest of us you may say. However each quality was magnified and intensified because our encounters were so short and significant. Some people on the ship have discussed their fear that such a raw untutored nation (inevitable with its massive population I would suggest) could wield so much power in the future. I felt no such qualms but I am not knowledgeable about China and its politics.