Zhouzhuang Water Village
I was over at Zhouzhuang (ZZ, thereafter), the very popular but over commercialized water village nearly two hours bus ride from Shanghai Stadium to the ZZ destination. ZZ took a bad face lift so many years ago when tourists poured into the small town, now a small city well equipped with badly located hotels and restaurants every where. The rickshaw riders were everywhere; for RMB5 they will take you around town, to the destination you want to go. They are indeed those poor farmers who plough for other trades nearby. They were very decent people though. I enjoyed looking at their over sun drenched face, very brownish but with the most friendly eyes contacts I have ever seen in so many tour spots. These riders they didn't hound me at all. They were polite to stay away when I said no to them.
There were so many tourists around everywhere, ever turning corner one can smell their presence, by the window they peek out aiming their cameras, oop, now digital cam at a distance, and walking in troupe with their tour guides holding small triangular colorful flag attractive enough for the tourists to be able to spot the flags at distance and to keep their troupe together as well. And I also smelled real bad under hot summer sun; mopping my hands and face, the thick white towel turned sooty right away. Wow, I was so badly polluted and only walking around for less than three hours by the waterways with boats full of tourists. Wow, great charm of the water village!
But tourists were easily hounded by those local vendors asking one to take lunch or dinner at their individual restaurants. My friend interpreted that as being very warm with welcome but I saw them as bees buzzing around like mad, in fact, it is precisely harassment in many respects. I avoided like disease. Wonder, don't they know how to leave one alone? I just want to be leisure and enjoy the great beauty of the water village. Sorry, but I am not interested in your trades for we already had it when we were small. Then, looking for local trades, they do have around. Many pretty ladies were doing the embroideries by their stalls set up smacked right at the entrances of their shops, selling me their sweetest smiles and voices asking me to buy for my wife. I told them I must go get a wife first then I will be back to buy from them.
Plying on the narrow embossed stone paved street filled with trailing tourists trying to give way to each other due to crowd, I thought I could fall in love and get married sooner. Unfortunately, luck was never on my side but there was just not one single marriage registry ever ready for my luck. I came home heart broken but choked with, not tears, the so many teeny tiny bones of the local Ba-fish during the late evening dinner. Well, the dinner was under the flowing willow tree, under the red lantern, by the river, and all boats with tourists gone by now, and with songstresses in their 50s and 60s of age singing farm songs next to me. It cost me RMB5 to listen to two songs. Again, I was so heart broken for they are not exactly those Miss Right for me. Alas! I hate ZZ and I had many bad dreams at night.
ZZ is rather a big water village. One needs all day to walk around, with as many as 16 so called tour spots to look at, to take pictures, and to pause and to ponder around time and history now and then. The most popular tour spot was the twin bridge, one connects to each other immediately next to but at right angle to each other, and taking one to walk into four differing directions. This is such a popular place one had to take turn to take shot with the twin bridge as the backdrop.
I had A-Po Tea (literally, Grandma Tea), A-Po Vegetable, a type of local vegetable made into pickled, this time I had this was rather milder compared to last time it was saltish. I also had the local Wansan cake. Well, perhaps not particularly suiting my taste buds, I thought it was nothing to shout about. But the Wansan person was long dead and everybody cashed in on his once famous name equated with the cake now continued to be made popular by the local vendors. I did not see too many selling but at one or two stalls, I stood by to see a lady cutting with skills. The cleaver cut into the very soft, tissue like cake but every piece of it equals in thickness. This is truly great craft practiced after so many years standing by their stalls and cutting for so many tourists daily.
Speaking of tourists, I talked to a lady caretaker of a tour spot. Out of my curiosity to strike up conversation and be friendly to the locals to dig for more information about local things, this lady told me the daily arrival at ZZ was about 6 to 7 thousands on weekdays, and this can escalate up and over 10,000 tourists arrival by weekend. Wow, just imaging per entry is RMB100, ZZ makes RMB1,000,000 per weekend. And times 52 weekends, this makes close to RMB52,000,000. Well, I guess it’s about time to turn our own neighborhood, open up your homes, your staircases, your bedrooms, and don’t forget to open wide your wallets or purses to attract some foreigners. Turn your place into a human zoo. This helps. Be sure to put up some make up on your nice decent looking faces, put on nice decent t-shirt or CK Jeans, sit around at home waiting for foreigners to walk by, peek into, browse around; and be sure to smile at them with your taut cheek faces, to show that we are in the modern living of the year 2004 to attract some foreign villagers to see our contemporary life in the city.
Well, so much and yet so unending to describe about the ZZ water Village.
Take care
Jeremy
September 16th 2004
I was over at Zhouzhuang (ZZ, thereafter), the very popular but over commercialized water village nearly two hours bus ride from Shanghai Stadium to the ZZ destination. ZZ took a bad face lift so many years ago when tourists poured into the small town, now a small city well equipped with badly located hotels and restaurants every where. The rickshaw riders were everywhere; for RMB5 they will take you around town, to the destination you want to go. They are indeed those poor farmers who plough for other trades nearby. They were very decent people though. I enjoyed looking at their over sun drenched face, very brownish but with the most friendly eyes contacts I have ever seen in so many tour spots. These riders they didn't hound me at all. They were polite to stay away when I said no to them.
There were so many tourists around everywhere, ever turning corner one can smell their presence, by the window they peek out aiming their cameras, oop, now digital cam at a distance, and walking in troupe with their tour guides holding small triangular colorful flag attractive enough for the tourists to be able to spot the flags at distance and to keep their troupe together as well. And I also smelled real bad under hot summer sun; mopping my hands and face, the thick white towel turned sooty right away. Wow, I was so badly polluted and only walking around for less than three hours by the waterways with boats full of tourists. Wow, great charm of the water village!
But tourists were easily hounded by those local vendors asking one to take lunch or dinner at their individual restaurants. My friend interpreted that as being very warm with welcome but I saw them as bees buzzing around like mad, in fact, it is precisely harassment in many respects. I avoided like disease. Wonder, don't they know how to leave one alone? I just want to be leisure and enjoy the great beauty of the water village. Sorry, but I am not interested in your trades for we already had it when we were small. Then, looking for local trades, they do have around. Many pretty ladies were doing the embroideries by their stalls set up smacked right at the entrances of their shops, selling me their sweetest smiles and voices asking me to buy for my wife. I told them I must go get a wife first then I will be back to buy from them.
Plying on the narrow embossed stone paved street filled with trailing tourists trying to give way to each other due to crowd, I thought I could fall in love and get married sooner. Unfortunately, luck was never on my side but there was just not one single marriage registry ever ready for my luck. I came home heart broken but choked with, not tears, the so many teeny tiny bones of the local Ba-fish during the late evening dinner. Well, the dinner was under the flowing willow tree, under the red lantern, by the river, and all boats with tourists gone by now, and with songstresses in their 50s and 60s of age singing farm songs next to me. It cost me RMB5 to listen to two songs. Again, I was so heart broken for they are not exactly those Miss Right for me. Alas! I hate ZZ and I had many bad dreams at night.
ZZ is rather a big water village. One needs all day to walk around, with as many as 16 so called tour spots to look at, to take pictures, and to pause and to ponder around time and history now and then. The most popular tour spot was the twin bridge, one connects to each other immediately next to but at right angle to each other, and taking one to walk into four differing directions. This is such a popular place one had to take turn to take shot with the twin bridge as the backdrop.
I had A-Po Tea (literally, Grandma Tea), A-Po Vegetable, a type of local vegetable made into pickled, this time I had this was rather milder compared to last time it was saltish. I also had the local Wansan cake. Well, perhaps not particularly suiting my taste buds, I thought it was nothing to shout about. But the Wansan person was long dead and everybody cashed in on his once famous name equated with the cake now continued to be made popular by the local vendors. I did not see too many selling but at one or two stalls, I stood by to see a lady cutting with skills. The cleaver cut into the very soft, tissue like cake but every piece of it equals in thickness. This is truly great craft practiced after so many years standing by their stalls and cutting for so many tourists daily.
Speaking of tourists, I talked to a lady caretaker of a tour spot. Out of my curiosity to strike up conversation and be friendly to the locals to dig for more information about local things, this lady told me the daily arrival at ZZ was about 6 to 7 thousands on weekdays, and this can escalate up and over 10,000 tourists arrival by weekend. Wow, just imaging per entry is RMB100, ZZ makes RMB1,000,000 per weekend. And times 52 weekends, this makes close to RMB52,000,000. Well, I guess it’s about time to turn our own neighborhood, open up your homes, your staircases, your bedrooms, and don’t forget to open wide your wallets or purses to attract some foreigners. Turn your place into a human zoo. This helps. Be sure to put up some make up on your nice decent looking faces, put on nice decent t-shirt or CK Jeans, sit around at home waiting for foreigners to walk by, peek into, browse around; and be sure to smile at them with your taut cheek faces, to show that we are in the modern living of the year 2004 to attract some foreign villagers to see our contemporary life in the city.
Well, so much and yet so unending to describe about the ZZ water Village.
Take care
Jeremy
September 16th 2004
To all again
Sorry for many of you took a bad whip from my bad language for I wrote that last piece of travelogue (to Zhouzhuang!) in a matter of an hour without actually coming around to edit or to spruce up all the horribly structured sentences. Just whipped it out all I could think of the trip and emailed. I sincerely apologize.
Well, I am back again. I am trying to recall more details on the trip to Zhouzhuang (ZZ, thereafter) over the last weekend. I remember the deserted outlying area immediately outside the now barricaded and well guarded ZZ water village. There mushrooming burgeoning replicas of the true ZZ were so badly imitated and built in a hurry. The planning appears doom and gloom when one walked around this hinterland of ZZ. Few tourists check out this hinterland for they are indeed a part of the extended thought contemporary development of the traditionally accepted idea of ZZ. Unfortunately, the new development from what I see professionally did not grow or fit well with the exiting historical context of ZZ. To be precise, the score is a failure. This part of town is going to take another century, I believe, to take on its extended character from the so called original ZZ.
Pertaining to business, there were just way too many vendors on the streets hounding the tourists. And too many rickshaw riders around as well for many of them just slept so soundly with one leg high cross over another, many show indecency since I know they wear only underpants (from the point of view of city folks). For these trying to meet end means day to day fro the tourists, they couldn't care less for how they look. They need to eat is the first thing in mind, just like any one of us. Also, many also 'disguised' as tour guide to pull business for their restaurant or gift shops. A licensed tour guide is always with a name tag with his or her name on it. So bear in mind if you ever travel in China to look for the qualifying ones. There are actually the proper set up of tourist information with tour guides ever ready for your service if you ever need one. Indeed, many are very well trained and show pride in their local flavor.
Personally, traditionally Chinese architecture is really some undying frozen art on earth. They are so beautiful, and I speak from my heart. I speak from professional terms. And I wonder why they just don't do things beautiful anymore, and yet so greatly interested in replicates or duplicates from beyond the borders!? Perhaps, it's time for me to play my role here, if any one of you does not care to protest. Haha! Really, where have all the genuine beauties gone to? Where? Lost in time, lost in translation, or lost in humanity? Ah...so much to ponder about. Too deep for too many of us who are more interested in the daily indulgence of existence and subsistence on every day life, matters, and materials.
I must reveal this to you that the villagers are really friendly. I enjoyed the brief conversational moments with many of them. They told me to visit their art galleries upstairs. They asked me to check out their shops. They even smiled at me. Wow. Smiling! I mean it, smiling! They have the faces that say: genuine, congenial, affectionate, simple, easy going, care free.... And no wonder so many outsiders easily fall for these oozingly charming villages with willow trees lined the waterway right by rows and rows of village housing butting too close to each other. And way too close, and I guess, this is why they learn to thrive as a closely knit neighborhood with great sense of tolerance we the average urbanites do not possess the benign human traits like they naturally possess. I would say I easily strike up conversation with any one of them. Seeing the village kids play around, gather around with their families and neighbors, all these make up the long gone basic humanity we all always lament about. It is precisely urbanization we have craved for, demarcate and drive us all further apart, but now we all salivate over yet not available.
Take care
Jeremy
Sorry for many of you took a bad whip from my bad language for I wrote that last piece of travelogue (to Zhouzhuang!) in a matter of an hour without actually coming around to edit or to spruce up all the horribly structured sentences. Just whipped it out all I could think of the trip and emailed. I sincerely apologize.
Well, I am back again. I am trying to recall more details on the trip to Zhouzhuang (ZZ, thereafter) over the last weekend. I remember the deserted outlying area immediately outside the now barricaded and well guarded ZZ water village. There mushrooming burgeoning replicas of the true ZZ were so badly imitated and built in a hurry. The planning appears doom and gloom when one walked around this hinterland of ZZ. Few tourists check out this hinterland for they are indeed a part of the extended thought contemporary development of the traditionally accepted idea of ZZ. Unfortunately, the new development from what I see professionally did not grow or fit well with the exiting historical context of ZZ. To be precise, the score is a failure. This part of town is going to take another century, I believe, to take on its extended character from the so called original ZZ.
Pertaining to business, there were just way too many vendors on the streets hounding the tourists. And too many rickshaw riders around as well for many of them just slept so soundly with one leg high cross over another, many show indecency since I know they wear only underpants (from the point of view of city folks). For these trying to meet end means day to day fro the tourists, they couldn't care less for how they look. They need to eat is the first thing in mind, just like any one of us. Also, many also 'disguised' as tour guide to pull business for their restaurant or gift shops. A licensed tour guide is always with a name tag with his or her name on it. So bear in mind if you ever travel in China to look for the qualifying ones. There are actually the proper set up of tourist information with tour guides ever ready for your service if you ever need one. Indeed, many are very well trained and show pride in their local flavor.
Personally, traditionally Chinese architecture is really some undying frozen art on earth. They are so beautiful, and I speak from my heart. I speak from professional terms. And I wonder why they just don't do things beautiful anymore, and yet so greatly interested in replicates or duplicates from beyond the borders!? Perhaps, it's time for me to play my role here, if any one of you does not care to protest. Haha! Really, where have all the genuine beauties gone to? Where? Lost in time, lost in translation, or lost in humanity? Ah...so much to ponder about. Too deep for too many of us who are more interested in the daily indulgence of existence and subsistence on every day life, matters, and materials.
I must reveal this to you that the villagers are really friendly. I enjoyed the brief conversational moments with many of them. They told me to visit their art galleries upstairs. They asked me to check out their shops. They even smiled at me. Wow. Smiling! I mean it, smiling! They have the faces that say: genuine, congenial, affectionate, simple, easy going, care free.... And no wonder so many outsiders easily fall for these oozingly charming villages with willow trees lined the waterway right by rows and rows of village housing butting too close to each other. And way too close, and I guess, this is why they learn to thrive as a closely knit neighborhood with great sense of tolerance we the average urbanites do not possess the benign human traits like they naturally possess. I would say I easily strike up conversation with any one of them. Seeing the village kids play around, gather around with their families and neighbors, all these make up the long gone basic humanity we all always lament about. It is precisely urbanization we have craved for, demarcate and drive us all further apart, but now we all salivate over yet not available.
Take care
Jeremy
Hi jeremy,
Agreed with you fully. China can be proud of their arts, literatures, culture and history. When I saw the modern architecture in China and Taiwan, it does not exhibit the true creations and creativity that the chinese was once the great creator and inventor of many beautiful things during the olden dynasty and proudly put themselves in the book of history. However, the mentality of the mainland china now appear to be somewhat laidback and arrogant as they keep priding themselves over past historical achievements of their ancestors. They're progressing fast ahead but mainly for power and economic reasons - sports, businesses, manufacturing, etc. In fact, they can learnt so much from the Taiwanese, the Vietnamese, the Koreans, and especially so the Japanese as these nations had once learnt from China and became successful in their own right. Because of some stupid pride and arrogance, they refuse to forgive and forget the past and wasted the many good potentials that bilateral relationship can reap in going forward.
You can play your role as an architect there and contribute in your own stride as I believe you have what it takes. I believe you are collecting all these messages you have been sending to all of us as it contains a great deal of good information and expresses in your own way or coming from your own angles. Every small contibutions and encouragement given for the good cause will eventually prevails in the end.
Talk to you again as Michelle is waiting for me to go to shopping at Tampines Mall.
Best Regards,
Hi Jeremy,
No need to apologise I thought, just your very stream of consciousness,
which is a way of capturing thought without editing and which allows the
writer to engage a flow of consciousness in the moment.
Keep writing. I particularly like the point of losing to modernity that
sense of directness and purity, lost through new fashions on what it is to
be sophisticated. Not easy in the midst of extreme comodification and new
media.
Off to Sydney for some research work in three wks time, as usual, not ready
with the work that they want. But will just have to make do with what has
unfolded in the mind for now.
Cheerz,
yewlie
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