Matt's Shanghai

Huzhou and Nanxun

Last weekend I had a chance to visit Huzhou and Nanxun with the university level exchange students of Fudan University. Our office sponsored the trip and let me to tag along for the day. I spent most of the day with Ralph and two halarious Candian girls.


Map of Huzhou and Nanxun

After a two hour bus drive to Huzhou, we went to an old home and garden of a Qing dynasty family. All of the gardens are running together in my mind now, so it's hard to recall even small details. The gardens had their own family library and family history museum. It took most of the morning to tour and then we ate lunch at a hotel in near the gardens.

After Huzhou, we went to Nanxun, just a 45 minute drive west of Huzhou. In order to visit a Buddhist monastery in town, we had to drive up this one lane road which went from near sea level to about 2,000 feet above... needless to say, it was an interesting drive up the mountain, especially when they're building a highway tunnel straight through it and there's construction on this one lane road. The view from the top was worth it though. It really made me feel at home, like looking off Howard's Knob or Pilot Mountain on a clear day. The wind was blowing and the air was clean for once. There were three temples in the monastery, one of which held a rare female image of Buddha. In fact the temple with the female Buddha is said to be the holiest on the mountain because it lasted through all of the cultural revolution, where the other two did not. I learned that during the Cultural Revolution, most of the Buddha heads were cut off from their bodies; even the smallest statues of Buddha were beheaded. Most of the Buddha's you see in China have had their head replaced in the last twenty years after. The Buddha's that survived untouched are said to be the most sacred Buddha's to pray to.

I learned more about what materials the Communist Party of China (CPC) allows its members to pocess. They can not have any religious "paraphanelia". It was interesting to

In town, off of the mountain, we visited a small temple with Asia's largest lying Buddha. This was one of the most amazing Buddhas I've ever seen, second only to the Big Buddha in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, they would not allow any pictures of the lying Buddha.

Overall it was an awesome day and allowed me to get out of Shanghai for a few hours. The almost three hour bus drive home was too bumby to sleep and my iPod died... so it was quiet ride back to Shanghai in the dark.

You can view the pictures from the day at www.mattdull.com.

posted by Matt Dull @ 1:34 PM