Day 18 - Zhujiajiao
We went on our first weekend excursion to Zhujiajiao, an hour away from People’s Square, and finally met up with another fellow archi, GAIL!
Archis in Shanghai: 3
Libo’s iPad made the trip to the Zhujiajiao…WONDERFUL. Fishballs is absolutely the best game ever. It makes me want an iPad, so that I can just practice playing all the time. I think Libo’s fingers have more muscles than mine. Go Libo!
Zhujiajiao is an old “canal town” in China with a famous bridge called, Fansheng Bridge. A lot of vendors selling fish and turtle are around here trying to get you to buy a fish or turtle to put back in the river. This reminded me of the time when I went to my grandma’s cemetery in Suzhou, and the countryside people sold us flowers and then when we left, they left took the flowers back to sell again. Not okay. Just leave the fish and turtles in the water!
On the boat ride, so many people took pictures of us! I guess our farmer hats and being on a boat just made awesome pictures. We made peace signs and posed. Our farmer hats really caused a scene. It was pretty hilarious.
When we went to Kezhi Gardens, we fed fishes and rode an ox. (Waiting on that photo from Libo.) It was really fun being in Zhujiajiao for the day, but it was really tiring, too. On the ride home, a girl from Zhujiajiao talked to me to practice her English (I guess), and she made me realize that people actually do live in Zhujiajiao. It’s not just a tourist town like it has become today. It’s tough because I can’t decide whether I like the town before or after their commercialization. It’s more accessible now, but at the same time, it loses a little bit of its culture. I guess to survive financially, it needs to exploit its resources, a la zhong zi, fish, turtles, and sticky candy.
At least I didn’t have to use a squatter there.
