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Wrapping up China

Posted by Rick Hosmer on March 21 2009| 2 Comments

Today we left the hotel in Hangzhou and headed to West Lake. This is a beautiful lake with many stories and myths about it. The lake is a favorite place for residents and tourists to visit, especially on a Saturday. 45 million domestic tourists visit Hangzhou each year. The people there live longer than any where else in China. Our guide says it is because of the slower pace of life and all the greenery. The air is noticeably cleaner there than in Beijing or Suzhou.

We boarded a boat and took a cruise on the lake while our guide, Emily, told stories about the Romeo and Juliet love affairs and other old stories that were centered around the lake.

After our lake cruise, we drove to a tea plantation, where we saw workers picking and processing Dragon Well Tea. This is a green tea, which means it is unfermented. We were given an entertaining introduction to tea by a Chinese guy who called himself Dr. Tea. He actually went to college for 4 years majoring in tea (only in China!) We learned how to properly brew green tea, how to judge it’s quality, and how to make a green tea face mask to keep from getting wrinkles. I bought a 1/2 pound of the best Dragon Well Tea. It really is good, and is full of antioxidents.

Following our immersion into tea, we went to the Lingyin Buddhist Temple. The temple was founded in 326 AD and once housed 3,000 monks. Now thousands of people come to visit and worship there every day. In one of the temples is a very large, camphor wood Buddha statue that is covered with real gold. The smell of incense and the site of the faithful praying and worshiping was other-worldly.

After checking out the Linying Temple, we had a 3 1/2 hour bus trip to Shanghai. Shanghai is an amazing city. Founded nearly 900 years ago (thanks for helping check the date, Wang Zhi), it is the most densely populated city in China, with over 2,000 people per square kilometer. There are 21 million people in the city, making it one of the largest cities in the world. 75% of Fortune 500 companies have operations in Shanghai. The city has 4,000 skyscrapers, including the tallest building in the world, and the third-highest TV tower. Almost all of the business development and construction has occurred since 1990. There is a LOT of money in Shanghai. Tonight we ate dinner downtown and then walked the waterfront to see the famous Bund with it’s lit up buildings with neon and huge video screens. Unbelievable.

On the drive here, I reflected on the contrasts that I have noticed. China is a land of contrasts. Here are some that I wrote in my journal:

• A 12-story luxury apartment building towering over hand-tilled raised bed farm fields and old shack where the farmer lives.

• Men sweeping newly built high-speed roadways with handmade willow brooms.

• Ancient, rusty bicycles carrying huge piles of produce or boxes of goods, sharing the roadway with brand new BMWs, Audis, and even Ferraris.

• Beggars with no hands and deformed legs begging outside the Buddhist temple, while sunglass-wearing Chinese youth walk by in designer clothes, listening to iPods.

• American basketball players reverse-dunking over their awestruck Chinese teammates as broadcast on Chinese ESPN.

• A brand new steel and glass high-rise office building across the road from a 1,600 year old monastery.

The more I think about China, the more it confuses and intrigues me. It is a nation as old as time and as modern as anywhere on the planet. As I watch the young people on the street, in the restaurants and traveling about the cities on electric scooters, I can’t help but feel that the ancient heart of this country still beats inside of them.

Sometimes I can’t believe I am actually here.