Venice Baby! / Zhouzhuang

  Zhouzhuang, Jiangsu, China
Thursday, April 24, 2008

Zhouzhaung map

Suzhou claims the title of "Venice of the East".  Granted...I have never been to Venice, but I do not see how this city could compare to what I imagine Venice would look like.  I have been to the Venetian in Las Vegas and Suzhou is no Venetian.  However our next stop on the bus tour, Zhouzhuang, has a legitimate claim to the title of "Venice of the East"

Zhouzhuang is a little village between Suzhou and Shanghai.  A network of willow tree lined canals criss-crossed the village.  Along the canals you can find numerous restaurants, tea houses and souvenir shops.  Most of the restaurants were serving the local specialty, pig's feet, also known as ham hocks to you Southerners.  The other dining option was a selection of creatures fished out of the canal and kept in an aquarium until it is cooked.  What I could not understand is how these restaurants make any money if everyone serves the same dishes?  I guess the sheer number of "red hats" can keep all the restaurants' heads above water.

Main canal

In the canals we can see a line of row boats filled with tourists.  Each boat has one person working a single oar at the aft (back end) of the boat and 6-8 passengers.  Interestingly, most of the "red hats" are sitting along the canal or perched on one of the numerous arch bridges watching the foreign tourists ride the row boats.   I am wondering if the tour pamphlets contain the enticement "come to Zhouzhuang and see the foreigners ride the boats".  It was funny seeing Chinese tourists taking pictures of the tourists in the boat taking pictures of the Chinese tourists.

After making it through the gauntlet of souvenir shops, we arrived at the boat house.  It cost 80 RMB for a ride, so I can see why most "red hats" chose to be spectators.  The fee was included in the tour package and this time the tour guide did not try to graft the fee from us.  As we approached restaurant row, our oarman started to sing.

Singing Oarman

  He must have chosen a popular song because some of the "red hats" along the canal joined in.  Also along the canal I saw art students painting scenes of the waterway, which they eagerly sold.  I could not help but to snap a picture of this...along with a picture of someone taking a picture of me.

Town center

The  tour group disembarked at a different section of the village.  It was common area which the villagers probably used for local festivals.  Our tour guide had the unenviable task of shepherding people to the bus.  It was not easy to keep track of everyone because you had people stopping to take pictures, shopping and I believe some folks actually ate some of the Chinese ham hocks.  One tall, blond Canadian was the object of a lot of attention.  She made the mistake of agreeing to take a picture with one Chinese family.  All of a sudden there was a mob of Chinese people around her.  Once we eventually freed our celebrity from the crowd, we started the long bus ride back to Shanghai.