Dingtaifeng, the land of xiaolongbao 小龙饱 (small steamed juicy buns, or dumplings). it’s far more famous and delicious than Nan Xiang. DTF’s buns are smaller and lots more expensive, and I haven’t seen a single one being broken. Yes, sometimes the buns get broken at NX. I only visited this one in Taipei at Tienmu SOGO Department Store. Both times, we had to wait: one was 30 and second time was 45 minutes. However their operation was very smooth and attentive. Watching the employees, it happened to be all men making the buns; reportedly they need to fold exactly same number of pleats for each buns, makes me wonder: really no machine could duplicate that task?
It drawing power is just unbelievable. No matter what time of the day you go, you have to queue up. 3pm in the afternoon? Wait. At 11am on the mid autumn festival 中秋节 (9/22) DTF was a solid 30 minutes wait while the adjacent hall with various eateries was empty.
DTF gets a one star from Michelin. Wrestling a star out of Michelin is difficult and this is only some dumplings. Well, I want to go there again, again and again might say something. Well, what do I know about the Frenchies.
江南 jiangnan means South of Changjiang 长江 the Yangtze River?
I’m from Beijing (and loving it), grew up by the wide ChangAn Blvd 长安街 near TianAnMen, engulfed in the sand storm in the spring time, every year. Although we have the Summer Palace where I went often, as with Beihai Park 北海公园, etc. but there is something special neat about this southern city in Jiangsu province that neither BJ nor New York has. The smallness? The humidity? The tempo? Or simply the fact that I was just a day visitor who was still basking in a semi sedated mind after Xiao Pangu? Perhaps exquisite is to describe Yangzhou as magnificent is for Beijing? In that, I feel Yangzhou is like a 工笔画 gongbi painting (traditional Chinese realistic painting characterized by fine brushwork and close attention to detail.) while BJ or NY a 写意画 xieyi painting (freehand brushwork in traditional Chinese painting that characterized by vivid expression and bold outline).
The battery in my camera had exhausted after Geyuan, so I had make do with the crackberry, with only 2 megapixel capacity, an ancient quality.
I had been very lucky during the entire trip for no rain dropped while I was out there somewhere, except the following Sunday we spent at Zhujiajiao 朱家角. That Saturday, Yangzhou rained before my arrival and Shanghai poured after I left. The overcast sky made the summer heat less threatening.
We visited Slender West Lake 瘦西湖 first. It’s YZ’s largest but it wasn’t crowded. Caroline and I walked along the skinny lake, it was very tranquil. The boats in the lake were all manned by young girls in uniform.
Back in the 18th century, the Emperor Qianlong was to come .. to please him, the wealthy salt merchants of Yangzhou patched up this white pagoda with salt over night. The day I was there, the pagoda was surrounded by shelves under going renovation. I didn’t see many cranes and exquisite maybe too early but YZ is trying hard to improve itself, and many places showed the progress while few places were eyesores. A new airport will soon be open, now 2 hours’ drive to Nanjing International Airport.
“This new five star hotel has just been opened.” Caroline explained as we were driving along the Grand Canal. I perked up and then saw the name:
Ramada.
Ramada?
Five stars?
Shouldn’t the chain use a different name for its luxury line? What do I know.
Caroline is from Jinan, after graduated from college majored in English she took the job with Yangzhou government. Don’t know if she has the tour guide license (aspiring guides – mostly young girls – need to go to school and pass the exam to be licensed ..), she was adequate at it, perhaps has been doing it for a while. given the fact that she works at foreign affairs office.
If I remembered it right, the admissions from the public counts the bulk of the budget for Slender West Lake 瘦西湖.
Couple more gardens and short visit to the jade market, the Driver Zhao took me back to Zhenjiang train station. By then I was in no mood to wander around Zhenjiang but going back to Shanghai.
Geyuan Garden 个园 in Yangzhou is one of four major/best gardens in China
Geyuan Garden sits on the north of Dongguan Street in Yangzhou, was rebuilt by General Manager Huang Zhiyun, a salt industry official on a ruin in 1818. It has many bamboos in the garden. The bamboo leaves shape like the Chinese character 个 (Ge, indivudual) hence the name.
Phyllostachys vivax f. aureocalis, N.X.Ma 黄秆鸟哺鸡竹
Bambusa multiples (Lour) Raeuschel 孝顺竹 (I like this name better)
There are four small rockeries constructed with distinct colorations representing the four different seasons: 四季假山 Season Rockery.
The Little Pangu Garden in Yangzhou was one of my GG Grandfather Zhou Fu’s residences. I first learned about it from my cousin Li Yanxing of Hengyang (Hunan Province) when I was researching MD Chow, her grandfather, around 2005. Over the years, we spoke sporadically and I finally got to visit the Little Pangu
Auntie Jennie introduced this New Zealand honey to me:
“UMF” is the property which gives active manuka honey it’s special healing quality. UMF manuka honey with a rating of 16+ has the highest level of antibacterial activity, giving you faster, more reliable results.
It was a hot and sticky night in Ningbo 宁波 (ning bo means Tranquil Waves), a seaside little town in northeastern of Zhejiang province, or 280 km (174 mi) south of Shanghai, with little over 2 million inhabitants. After the museum, I went to the Drum Tower, and basically ate myself to death: two meals plus taro drink in two hours. Then went to check out a sporting store for tennis balls because Sheraton has a carpet court and they provide equipments: two rackets a a bag of used balls. The nature thing to do was to buy a can of balls. It cost RMB38 per can, about US$5.5 (at 6.8 exchange rate). I must have winced. The salesgirl immediately took out a plastic bag loaded with new lose tennis balls with brands I’ve never heard of.
“Wu yuan.” 5 yuan each.
I was somewhat incredulous to see new balls being taken out of the cans. Oh well, I’m only a frog in the well.
South of 余姚江 Yuyao River and 丰化江 Fenghua River where they converge with Yong River 甬江 is the city center. Ningbo is building a subway, and 中山东路 Zhongshan East Road is obviously part of the loop. 和义路 Heyi Lu/Road to my right is the new 5th Avenue where spacious and glittering Louis Vuitton leads the way. Behind the mall’s the water front of Yuyao river. Crossed over ZhongShan Dong Lu is the colossal shopping compound, Tianyi Square 天一广场. Note: the world is flat, really. It gets trite that everywhere you go, you see the same brands back here in the USA, they differ only in currency. American influence is undeniable but how long it is going to be?
It
Turned on Bloomberg TV this morning, a commercial was being played. A male voice over asking if you know where the fastest train that runs at over 400 kilometer an hour runs. He went on to give you a clue that it isn’t in France (TGV is stale … hmmmm … actually it has been keeping up with the Joneses ..), not in Japan (what’s there?) and not in the USA (does US have a train?) but in China (ha .. can you believe that?). Then the screen shows a train with blue logo CRH Hexie Hao 和谐号 runs, fast, I reckon?
Btw, it was In the Loop with Betty Liu, who was joined by two striking girls – Sheila Dharmarajan, etc., perhaps of Indian descent. Has Bloomberg gone Asia? Why Betty? Did she take a punch? She’s ugly with her nostrils facing the sky, hundred teeth, and pair of eyes more like a erotic dancer than .. oh I got it, it just what the station needs for its manly audience? Sara Eisen looks like a cheer leader than serious business reporter. Come on .. Whatever.
Let’s go back to the train talk.
I needed to go to Yangzhou but there isn’t a fast connection between Shanghai and Yangzhou (surprise), so I opted the D3002 from SHA (Hongqiao station – Rainbow Bridge) to ZhenJiang (6:48-8:36, cost CNY73, about US$11) and G7151 ZJ-SHA (16:57-18:34; CNY115). Then its about 30 minutes car ride to Yangzhou. There are also buses. The bus terminal is next to the train terminal in ZhenJiang 镇江.
Hongqiao station is a new gray structure. It blinded in with the surrounding well, especially in the misty early morning. One side is vacant flat land, farther down is vertical overlapping highways. But once stepping inside, instantly I felt I became a nothing; I was dwarfed by the open space and the emptiness. Might be it’s early in the morning or the station has filled to its capacity, there wasn
