32 degree Celsius: Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, China (27 & 28 January 2013)

PART 3: SUZHOU (JIANGSU)

There are two things people come to Suzhou for - the silk and their gardens. As for me, I came here for a little of everything. Greedily taking in every little detail Suzhou offered to me. We went to Tiger Hill, Shantang Street, The Humble Administrator's Garden, and Guanqian Street.

CL told me that the bridal gowns in Suzhou are one of the most popular. I did notice however, that their designs were a tad different to those in Malaysia and found them to be more princessy and poofy. I still prefer Malaysian bridal gowns for their generally more elegant appearance. But then again, bridal gowns are just another form of fashion and differs with each place. Outside these bridal stores, they would put out gowns which are out of season and they can go up to RMB100!!! (so cheap!). But the colour and design can be quite flamboyant, so pick wisely.

Walking a little further from the street that sold nothing but wedding gowns, we arrived at Tiger Hill.

Tiger Hill is so named for its hill that is shaped like a crouching tiger. The place is famous for both its natural beauty as well as historical value. At Tiger Hill, there were several stones, all with its own stories and you can slowly walk through the garden-like hill while understanding the respective stories behind each feature of the garden. Some interesting features would be the Sword-Testing Rock (a rock in two pieces that was supposedly cleaved cleanly by a legendary sword of extraordinary sharpness), Spring of simplicity and Honesty (a well that first appeared as a spring to an exhausted monk carrying water up the hill), Yunyang Pagoda (the leaning tower), Bonsai Garden, and Sword Pond.

Yunyang Pagoda *note the tilt

After walking through Tiger Hill, we made our way to Shantang Street, which is actually walking distance from Tiger Hill. However, you must be ready to walk quite a distance before finally reaching or else you might as well catch a cab. But the walk to Shantang Street was worth it as we so many locals and their residences while we were at it.

This picture was taken during our stroll to Shantang Street

Locals drying out their clothes

You will know when you have arrived at Shantang Street. The alley suddenly becomes much busier and more chaotic and there is so much to see and buy. It is like a typical market by the road, but it is special because it lends insight on what is sold in market frequented by locals, and not tourists like myself. We could see locals busying themselves with buying groceries for the week, dinner, or the occasional snack.

Then we saw this incredible queue, and the booth wasnt even selling anything yet! CL went to ask one of the people queueing what they were queueing for and when we found out they were selling mantaos (steamed buns), we joined the queue too. Mantaos are plain steamed buns but these were selling like hot cakes probably because they were fairly priced and probably were homemade. It tasted more tough than the typical microwaved mantaos you get from the convenient store.

Finally the selling begins. Each mantao costs RMB0.70, and locals were seen buying 16 or more at one go. @.@

The following day, we visited the Humble Administrator's Garden, one of UNESCO Cultural Heritage Sites. This place consists of three parts, east, central and west, and on the map, it looks huge. But it can easily be covered in two hours. Nope how much water the garden has. Practically more water than land in the west and central region!!!

Lunch was a light snack at a restaurant along Guanqian Street, CL's pick.

Cant really recall the name of the place but this is the menu so if you can read Chinese, you will know. This restuarant has been around there for some time and is a time-honoured brand. It even received an award for that. The place is a few shops away from Daily Queen and it is on the second floor.

Lotus stuffed with glutinour rice drizzled with some sweet sauce.. Very exquisite.

Some type of local delicacy. Sweet.

Fried pork cooked in sweet and sour sauce aka Gao lou rou

Then we finally relented to having Daily Queen ice cream for dessert. It's an ice cream franchise that we saw multiple times here and never once in Malaysia. I picked cheesecake with red berries, YK and PL choose raisins and cookie crumbs, and CL picked something with yoghurt. I liked mine enough but I think the cookie crumb in YK and PL's was nice! Not soggy, it was bordering on crispy despite being mixed with ice-cream.