Tong Li

Emboldened by our ability to speak some Mandarin ( we now have 40 verbs and probably at least 200 words that we know and might remember under pressure!) and the fact that my friend G is heading home this week, and I will be leaving in a few short weeks, we decided to venture out from the big city. Last weekend we went with an organized tour, and although we liked the sites, we felt that we could do a better job. We asked our teacher for a few stock phrases to help us with location and time of buses (platforms etc), and we studied the Lonely Planet guide for Shanghai for extra guidance. We met at the stadium subway station and with the aid of our cell phones located each other at the correct exit. We had a false start down the wrong road, but quickly found our way and with plenty of time to connect with the bus going to Tong Li. In fact, we had enough time to enter the coffee shop that time forgot- it felt like the late 1970's in there- to have a glass of juice. One hour and thirty minutes after boarding the bus, we arrived in our second Chinese water city in a week. Tong li is about 1000 years old and one of the really good examples of Chinese water towns.

We set off walking towards the general direction of the old town. China has been making some superb efforts to increase the number of English signs to try and encourage tourism, but in some spots, only people who persevere will find the way. It took about 20 minutes to walk from the bus depot to the town; There was a shuttle, but our Chinese (and English ) speaking fellow traveler did not share her knowledge with us (bad word has been erased here). No matter- we got the extra exercise! Without a map of the area, we were content to wander around and follow the occasional sign posts, take photos, shop a little, and talk a lot.


Our first foray was into a museum that specialized in dendrites. Now for you non-geology types, dendrites are crystal formations in rock that are often mistaken for fossils. Some avid collector donated all of his framed slices of rock to this town, and they house them in an historic setting. The rocks were not very interesting to us, but we wandered out of the beating sun for a few minutes and enjoyed the rambling pattern of the rooms. We then found the garden. This took us at least an hour to wander through and admire the setting. There were pine trees, rock gardens, ponds with carp and brideges over the water. They also recreated the interior of the houses/pagoda as it was many years ago (sorry- can't tell you exactly which dates- there were not many signs and those present were not legible to us). We also entered a really well preserved example of a private residence that was now host to some really creepy wood carvings. We were unable to/uninterested in finding the Sexual cultural museum complete with 6500 pieces of historic artwork and artifacts(!). Over all, we walked around for about 4.5 hours. In the very late afternoon, we finally decided to find a spot away from the river to eat something. As lovely as the canal side cafes are, there are far too many mosquitoes in the area to sit still for an hour; we had our quota of bites for the day. As the sole customers for that time, we received our food quickly. Our scrambled eggs with tomatoes, a plate of stir fried vegetables and a bowl of rice were the perfect food for two starved and weary women. We were even able to tell her that the food was delicious. We walked back to wait for the bus, and then endured the 1.5 hour bus ride back in Friday night Shanghai rush hour. Overall, it was a great trip- G bought pashmina scarves for gifts at a great price, and I managed to get a couple of things too, we saw a great water village, had an opportunity to strengthen our friendship, and were able to communicate to the locals.

I hope that you like the photos. I had a to significantly pare down the amount photos that I wanted to show you. I am usually a conservative photo taker, but for some reason I felt compelled to try and capture absolutely everything that I saw. This is a city well worth visiting again- you might see more photos when visitors come and stay.