Pictured below are Joe, Joe's girlfriend (I forget her name), Nina, Michael, Amily (Michael's girlfriend), and me.
The thing I will remember most about Shaoxing
While we were on the bus to Shaoxing, someone pointed out that it was great we were coming on a Monday and would therefore miss the weekend tourist crunch. At the time I agreed, but within two minutes of arriving, I began to think maybe that wasn't a good thing.
We were soon inundated with eager cab drivers and salespeople - to the point that we pretty much had to run away to escape. Later the experience was repeated. The second picture gives you a small sense of the persistence of the rickshaw drivers...we had literally a train that followed us for quite a long way, shouting incessantly. As our intentions were just to wander a bit and we didn't have a solid gameplan, it was pretty tough to think amid all their noise.
On top of that, the emphasis on tourism in the city has caused some costs to skyrocket - attractions that cost Y15 barely three years ago now cost Y60 - and my obvious foreignness caused many sellers to be completely unreasonable to us, despite the fact that one my Chinese friends was local. In fact, when it was time to find a cheap place to eat lunch, I literally hid in an alleyway while they scouted around for good prices.
Don't get me wrong, it was a great trip, but that was certainly a memorable part of it.
Lu Xun's Home
Lu Xun was a brilliant modern writer in the beginning of the 20th century (I felt cool having read many of his short stories in my History 342 class). His childhood home is one of the main attractions of Shaoxing.
We also spent some time wandering around and talking with street vendors. It was a pleasant area of town.
Taking the back route
We got separated from Michael and Amily (who took a cab) and took the bus to East Lake. Instead of asking where the entrance was, we followed a footpath which took us through some fields and into a very poor neighborhood. After several minutes of being completely lost, we eventually stumbled upon the East Lake.
East Lake
In reality, the "East Lake" is more of a river than a lake, but it is very pleasant - and beautiful in a different sense than the West Lake is beautiful. Mining in years past created the small, geometric cliffs you see pictured.
Boat Tour
The boats are hand and foot operated, and the twenty minute tour took us into a few caverns and scenic spots of the river. Michael and Amily, still separated from our group, spotted us as we passed and we photographed each other.
My favorite moment of the trip was here; Joe proposed we compose a poem to commemorate our journey. Laughing, we took turns writing a line, which we shouted at the top of our lungs when our boat got to a certain echo cavern. Joe is such a funny kid, I love him.
The rest of the day
We didn't have time to go to this big calligraphy museum I was interested in, but we did get to spend an hour or so walking around the city. Many famous figures in Chinese history have connections to Shaoxing, and we visited a few memorials and former residences, including the Zhou Enlai Memorial (pictured below). That was cool/meaningful to me because I studied him in college and respect who he was. (Although many outside of China say he was just a "yes man" of Mao, I believe he did the most good he could have given his circumstances, and was a real benefit to the country.)
