Guangxi provence is renowned throughout China and the world for it's Karst landscape - cliff like hills rising quickly from the land. It is much like what I saw in Zhangjiajie/Wulingyuan but on a shorter scale. In Guilin I wandered about a number of Gardens, one of which had an incredible cave within one of the Karst mountains. I also enjoyed walking around the two main lakes in the center of the city at night. They were wonderfully lit up and included two pagodas and a number of stone bridges.
Yangshuo was a strange place. A small town, the area has been completely transformed into a tourist area. All restaurants have English menus and many are "western" themed. English is easily heard and vendors are aggressive in selling their goods. Though most of my time there was wet I managed to get one wonderful day in the countryside, biking along the Yulong river. It was great to get away from the cities and tourist centers - though vendors still pop up at intersections. During the week I also developed a cold. Without the others I felt comfortable in being lazy and though there was more that I wished I had scene the cool, grey days were not entirely unwelcome.
After the week by myself, I flew to Shanghai where I met up with my brother Matt at the Pudong Airport. For the past week we have been traveling together and we have another three weeks more. It was been both wonderful, strange, and difficult to have him here. These five months have been the longest I have gone without seeing any family- at school it would usually be about three or four weeks. Its exciting to have him here, to be able to share the country in which I have lived for five months and will continue to live for another five. Yet, at the strange time it is strange to connect people from home with my life and world here. I also feel a great amount of responsibility to ensure that Matt has a good trip. Though I have only been in China a few months and will be visiting mostly new places with him, I feel that I must play the part of "host." I know (some of) the language, he doesn't. I know (some of) the culture, he doesn't. I live here, he doesn't. When traveling with Karrin, Carrie, and Travis it was easier in someways because we all new what to expect, we all spoke some language, and we all were in a similar situation. After a week of travel and 3 cities - Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Suzhou - I've introduced him the chaos of travel here. Train and bus stations are loud, crowded and unorganized and taxi drivers will do their best to take advantage of you. Once you get away from that though, China really has some beautiful spots, interesting people, and endearing habits.
In Shanghai, we did essentially what I did in my last trip in October, but this time with more Museums. Our day and a half in Hangzhou - just an hour by fast train from Shanghai - was filled with enjoyable activities. We visited a silk museum, wandered about the famed West Lake, and ate a nice dinner our first day. The next we eventually managed to rent bicycles after some confusion and spent the day exploring Longjing village. Longjing village is known for its green tea and is among the most highly regarded an expensive tea in China. After peddling - sometimes walking - up hill we made it to the village where we were greeted by an older woman who asked us (in Chinese) if we wanted to have some tea. She seemed friendly enough and the price she offered was fair, so we followed her to her home from which her family runs a small tea house. The tea was delicious and we bought some to take home to friends and family. The tea came directly from the bag - the same from which we sampled - and she was kind and helpful in serving us the tea and showing us the area. Later that day we went to Linying Temple. Though we never actually made it into the temple (we explored the surrounding area a bit to thoroughly) the afternoon was really a wonderful experience. Leading to the temple are some 340 odd carvings of various Buddhist figures in the walls of the mountains. They have been there for centuries and many of the stones are highly polished from the thousands of hands that have used the rocks for support in climbing or touched the figures in religious acts.
After a full day, we woke early today to head to Suzhou, another city near Shanghai. Where Hangzhou is known for it's West Lake, Suzhou is known for its canals and gardens. Our hostel is on a beautiful, but quite pedestrian street that runs along one canal. We spent the afternoon visiting a Suzhou Opera museum and saw a Pingyin performance that included some singing and musical instrument playing and some "who's on first" type comedy. Though it was all in Chinese and we understood little, we enjoyed the show which at 4 yuan each including a few cups of tea was a steal. It was also nice because those at the show were all old retired Chinese men and women with no (or no noticeable) tourists.
After the show we walked to Humble Ambassador Garden, the largest of the gardens in Suzhou. It is a spectacularly constructed garden including a number of beautiful buildings. Like most gardens in China it included a large amount of stone sculptures and winding paths. We wandered about for a few hours, enjoy the beautiful weather - sunny and low 70s. For dinner we wandered the canal streets, picking up street for along the way. Tomorrow we are looking forward to visiting another few gardens and enjoying a lazy and relaxing day.
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