I have not been able to keep up with these posts! Sorry! Some material will arrive out of order.
March 31- Kaifeng. This city is famous for having become the capital of the Song dynasty as its border was pushed south.
There is a famous painting titled “Along the river duing the Qingming (festival)” in the form or an exceptionally long horizontal scroll.This is said to portray Kaifeng during the Song Dynasty. It is a wonderful work that encompasses rural scenes as well as life in the city itself.
Some of the scenes from the “Along the river…” painting are reproduced on a wall in a park.The “Iron Pagoda” is a famous landmark if KaifengImage of the detailed decoration of the Iron Pagoda
Lists, lists, lists…. China has had many historic capital cities over the many centuries, no millennia! of its existence. Lists of these capitals generally follow the format of: the 4 greatest ancient capitals… the 6, the 7, the 8… In the near future I will be working on the sixth and final installment of my “Capital cities of China”. That set of videos mostly focused on the capitals of provinces and autonomous regions. But the last installment will include an overview of the 8 most important ancient capital cities of China. Included in that list is Zhengzhou due to it’s role during the Shang dynasty (roughly 3,600 to 3,000 years ago!) Among the relics from that period are the earthen remains of the city walls of “Xiao” (as Zhengzhou was known at the time).
Heading north from Hangzhou by high speed rail, we got to Jim’s hometown. A nice meal at the home where he lives with his parents,
With Jim’s family
The next morning, a good friend of Jim’s drove to the car-ferry that communicates to Laozhouxiang – a large island in the middle of the Yangtze. The plan? A picnic in a park area at the southern tip of the island!
Vehicles and pedestrians getting ready to disembark as soon as the ferry gets to the islandCreative way to pull the three wheeler up the hill. Necessity is indeed the mother of invention!This was no half-hearted picnic!Wheat field with tree line in the background
As you get to the edge of the park you can look across the Yangtze to a heavy industrial site on the other bank of the river
Industry making a mess of the air!
Meanwhile an endless stream of large barges used the river as their superhighway
Barges on the Yangtze
After eating, I broke out a deck of Spanish playing cards. Jim and his friend had fun learning to play ‘Escoba’.
Then, time to cross the river again. We had a bit of extra time, so we explored their municipal park a bit
An important reason for my visit to Hangzhou was to visit a recently restored historical site dating to the Southern Song Dynasty: Deshou Palace.
But that attraction did not open until 9:30, so first we casually ambled around a lovely nearby neighborhood.
Drum Tower
Deshou Palace was an absolutely wonderful site. The building was a reconstruction carfully designed to match the original appearance. It was paced full of artifacts as well as artwork related to the history and culture if the era. Various panels provided text that gave historical background .
An interesting modern twist was a huge interactive video display with a seemingly random collection if Chinese written characters that floated downwards. If you touched a character, it triggered the screen to display a relevant poem!
Deshou Palace
Historically this palace had been a sort if retirement quarters for the emperor. It had included extensive gardens of which only a small section has yet been restored .
A beautiful place! I could easily have spent a whole day there. It was a shame that our train tickets forced us onward to Tongling, where Jim wanted to show me his hometown!
First I spent some time exploring the area around the Grand Canal. I viewed the canal from walkways along its bank. I also rode a “water- bus” to the picturesque Gongchen bridge.
Later I went to the far side of beautiful West Lake, and visited Leifeng Pagoda.
binary comment
Still later I met up with my good friend Jim ( the ” young scholar”), and we returned to Hangzhou by one of the wooden tourist boats that cross West Lake.
Tears fom the sky fell in torrents, driving visitors to seek any cover they could find. Tied to the dock these small boats echoed the pitter patter of falling raidrops. And they creaked and groaned in their helpless captivity, unable to fulfill the meaning to their existence.
Nanjing: the “Southern Capital”. This was my fourth visit to this former imperial capital city (also capital for a while during the Republic).
During this visit my focus was seeing my friend Violet, and a pair of historical sites related to Zheng He, the renowned admiral during the early Ming Dynasty whose immense “treasure fleet” explored southeast Asia, India, and even areas of Africa’s eastern shores! Unlike typical “western” expeditions, the goals were trade, goodwill, and world investigation.
Unlike the later Christopher Columbus, Zheng He actually *did* arrive in India, and was not so stupid as to confuse new, unknown regions with India.
Nor did Zheng He spread disease and enslave the people he met.
In Shanghai I visited my good friend Bamboo, and her husband Sun Yiyueh (Cyrus). This made me very happy! I met Bamboo many years ago on my second trip to Nanjing. Some of you are familiar with the various videos I produce to help “westerners” learn a bit about China. Bamboo has played a crucial role in the success of the videos. As originally produced, these used the “voice” from “Google translate” so demonstrate the Chinese pronunciation of various place-names. That Google audio was pretty terrible, and I wanted to improve it to better server the viewers. I remembered that Bamboo had done extensive work on Chinese television, so I asked her if there was any chance she’d help with the needed audio improvements. She graciously agreed to give me assistance and over the years has continued to provide audio clips for that series. This makes a huge difference for the viewers!
I suppose I “don’t get out much”. I had never seen such a thing, but starting with the hotel in Shanghai, I encountered robots at each Chinese hotel I stayed in! There are robots that vacuum the floor, and others who either pick up or deliver items to guests’ rooms! How cool is that!!!!???
Well, it was a “long haul”, but I made it to Shanghai. Getting there involved a 2.5 hour drive to Denver from our (new) hometown in Pueblo, Colorado. An overnight stay in a hotel in the general vicinity of Denver International Airport. then up before the roosters to catch a 6:00 AM flight to Dallas/Ft. Worth. There I boarded a flight to Shanghai. Ironically, about 75 minutes into the flight, the airplane flew directly over Pueblo… my starting point the day before! (I saw this on the “real time” in-flight monitor screen on the airplane!
