Day 4 (26/6) - Tongli (Part 2)
After the sex museum was Gufeng Garden.
It was quite small, unfortunately. There was an exhibition on beds in the premises, but the only interesting tidbit was from Li Yu, a bed connoisseur: "My bed has been with me for half of my life. For me, it is more important than my wife."
For a sorta lunch I had te kar. I asked the man selling it what it went with (eg rice, buns), and he said beer. It was a bit too salty and oily to finish on its own, especially with the fat, but maybe that's because it needed rice. Or beer. So I ate as much as I could stomach (most of it) and dumped the rest.
Tuisi garden tea hall/floral (?) hall
Grand reception hall
Courtyard of Tower of Fanning Delight
At this point, my photo captions get a bit confused since I don't know what refers to what. I should write down approximate photo times next time so I can check the EXIF tags, but this is too anal and time-consuming even for one such as I.
Courtyard with land boat (?)
Osmanthus Fragrans (?)
Lour hall (???)
While walking through the grounds, I heard zither music playing. Finding its source was not easy and at first I thought it came from speakers playing piped music, but then since this was China it'd have been cheaper to hire someone to do it. After a while, I found a room by the pond (one of the many structures around it) inside of which I saw a figure playing. There was no way to get into the room - the best access was afforded by a doorway which was nonetheless barred. I thought that this was because there was an animatronic figure inside playing the zither, but then since this was China it'd have been much cheaper to hire someone to do it.
Sedan chair in tea hall, 'valankeera' (???)
Chen Residence, Pearl Pagoda (?)
Ancient Stage (raised)
Wharf
By this stage I was suddenly feeling a lot more under the weather despite (or because) of a Walls ice cream I had.
I went to the (or one) toilet on the grounds, and noticed that in both of them (I walked past the other) one cubicle had no door. Metal bars were fixed to the wall around the cubicle. Presumably this was for disabled users. How considerate. Except that, with no cubicle door, their modesty would've been compromised. I guess you can't have everything. However, the usefulness of this gesture was nullified by the approach to the toilets having steps, making them generally impassable for someone on a wheelchair.
Ancestral temple
Well they dumped errant family women into, euphemistically christened "Heart-washing well"
Exiting ancestral temple
Memorial archway of Chen family
Fragrant reading building
Great Plan Hall (IIRC)
Archway opposite Great Plan Hall
Then I walked out of the large complex and on to Gengle Hall.
Walking down this stretch was like running the gauntlet. Actually, it was like running the gauntlet in Geylang, with Chinese women entreating me every few steps I walked. At least they didn't ask me if I wanted "an4 mo2" (massage).
Gengle Hall had a lot of wood carvings.
Buddha flammule illuminating (sic) all places)
Hill abundant with fruits and flowers
Gengele Hall
There was also a 400 year old and some 200 year old trees, but since they weren't labelled I didn't bother testing my botanical skills.
Tai'an bridge. Jili bridge in the background.
At Suzhou train station on the way back to Shanghai, I saw a sign for drinking water. I was very happy until I went there, discovering that it was just a hot water dispenser for tea. Gah. I wonder if the drains of the water dispensers here clog from tea leaves. Then again they probably anticipate this problem in their design.
"No jumping off the platform and onto the track"
Seen in a Shanghai metro station (aboveground)
Hands down, this is the most hilarious sign I saw in China. It makes you wonder how deprived the Shanghainese are, in that they jump off the platforms for entertainment.
"Wheelchair of love" (on a train platform)
They really love their handicapped.
"Be a cute Shanghainese". Right.
To change between lines 1 and 3 in Shanghai railway station you need to pay again. Gah. I discovered this when I walked into the wrong line, foolishly assuming that all of them were linked.
I was not surprised to be MRT-ed in Shanghai (when the doors open, people rush in without letting other commuters out). As such I was happily bashing my way through the bastards. Unfortunately I wasn't equipped with my Athens equipment (a huge backpack behind me an a smaller backpack in front of me, and an umbrella in one hand) so I couldn't bang past as many people.
The bus and metro systems in Shanghai are nominally bilingual, so there stops are announced in English. However, although their pronunciation is better than that of the staff in the Butt Plug, it's still off. They pronounce "road" as "lao2" for example.
The metro stations have timers which count down to the arrival of the next few trains - to the station.
The Shanghai metro trains and buses have TV screens, though usually you can't hear anything so it's not as annoying as TV Mobile (the image also doesn't freeze and jerk every 10 minutes). At one point they were showing a video: "Sharks at risk". It featured divers and sharks in the wild. Ironically they didn't show people eating Shark's Fin soup in a Chinese Restaurant.
I saw a sign of a shop: "Scien... ology Bookshop". At first I was wondering if they'd let Scientology into the country, to have one Evil Cult battle another (Falungong). Then I saw that it said "Science and Technology Bookshop".
Potemkin village
YuCheng claimed you shouldn't eat the roadside food because he saw on a local documentary that some of the roadside stalls use carcass or buttock meat, and filter the oil coming out from hotel/restaurant drains to use. Given that China is the land of cardboard buns and White Rabbit sweets that mummify you, I wouldn't put it past many of them. While someone and my brother-in-law ate roadside food in their 2 weeks there last year, my friend who's been in Shanghai for a month (and eats it occasionally) has already gotten diarrhea thrice.