OLD SUZHOU MARKET: SHANGTANGJIE

This is my favorite picture of ShangTang
(all photos by Cameron Ishee)

My host family took me to a famous street in Old Suzhou called ShangTang. We stayed there until it got dark, and then the whole place lit up in a dozen colors of light. It was beautiful, this slightly bewildering mix of the very old and very new that's everywhere in China.

This is my second favorite picture from ShangTang

I took this as the sun was setting, filtering through the trees and backlighting the rooftops.

If anyone has the slightest idea what this fruit thing is, please let me know! There are trees all over Suzhou that are dropping this red flower-like thing, and nobody's been able to tell me what it is!

This is the ceiling of a small ice cream shop tucked into a corner of ShangTangJie. People from all over the world come to write their wished on...well, really on anything. 

There were currencies from a dozen different countries, playing cards, tickets from busses, trains, planes and boats, and an overabundance of sticky notes. They are taped to the walls, shoved into the wickerwork of the chairs, left propped on the windowsill...and taped to the ceiling, stapled to each other in long, fluttering, downright kaleidoscopic chains that blow in front of the lights and make the room flicker and shimmer whenever the wind blows.

I didn't write a wish, for a fairly silly reason: I want some tangible reason to return to Suzhou. Aside from the abstract, emotional reasons that are hard to lay out and make sense of, I feel like I need to leave some specific thing conspicuously undone, as a kind of insurance that I will come back here. 

The canal that ShangTangJie is sort of based around seemed perpetually full of people in boats. They use these long, rectangular vessels to transport everything from trash to people. Swishing a tiller around in the back, like a paddle, is the most common way to propel the boats (after electricity), but when it comes to landing or pushing off, the...sailors (canal-ers? Is this sailing?) like to use long wooden poles, not unlike those used in the West in times gone by.

Carroll, this is a clue for you, as to your present that I'm bringing back :)

I.M. PEI'S FINAL MASTERPIECE: THE SUZHOU MUSEUM

Suzhou Museum
Photo by Kerun Ip, Pei Partnership Architects

Cameron's class recently visited the Suzhou Museum, built by I.M. Pei, the world-renowned architect whose ancestral roots are in Jiangsu Province. There is a fascinating story behind the design and construction of the museum. 

This project is eloquently described by the PBS series, American Masters, which aired a 2010 episode called I.M. Pei: Building China Modern.

I.M Pei has been called the most important living modern architect,  defining the landscapes of some of the world’s greatest cities.  A monumental figure in his field and a laureate of the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize, Pei is the senior statesman of modernism and last surviving link to such great early architects as Corbusier, Gropius, and Mies van der Rohe.   Entering into the twilight of his career and well into his eighties, Pei returns to his ancestral home of Suzhou, China to work on his most personal project to date.   He is commissioned to build a modern museum in the city’s oldest neighborhood which is populated by classical structures from the Ming and Qing dynasties.  For the architect who placed the pyramid at the Louvre, the test to integrate the new with the old is familiar but still difficult.  The enormous task is to help advance China architecturally without compromising its heritage.  In the end, what began as his greatest challenge and a labor of sentiment, says Pei, ultimately becomes “my biography.”

Suzhou Museum 
Photo by Kerun Ip, Pei Partnership Architects

~ Posted by Pam Hughes

A SURVEY AT THE SUZHOU ZOO

Cameron with young zoogoers in Suzhou, August 2012

Last year in Shanghai, Cameron's final school project involved exercising her conversation skills. She was supposed to talk with five Mandarin speakers and designed a brief survey exploring their attitudes toward dogs. Being Cameron, she ended up interviewing 50 people in a shopping mall, then analyzed demographic information for a class presentation and made conclusions based on age and gender.

This year in Suzhou, Cameron chose a similar project, with a twist. During her independent study for High Tech High, she had interviewed Chinese families visiting the San Diego Zoo about their perceptions of similarities and differences with Chinese zoos.

Cameron interviews Chinese tourists at San Diego Zoo in May 2012 

In Suzhou, she followed up with a 50-person survey at the Suzhou Zoo. 

Cameron with children at Suzhou Zoo, August 2012

Among other queries, Cameron asked visitors what, if anything, bothered them about animal care at the zoo. She found that very few visitors noticed things that Cameron perceived as deficiencies, such as an animal lacking water. 

Cameron interviews families at Suzhou Zoo, August 2012

She also took a tip from a student survey, designed by Dr. Chia Tan of the San Diego Zoo, measuring attitudes of primary school children in rural Guizhou Province, and asked each person to name their favorite animal. Interestingly, most people had difficulty naming a favorite animal, even while at the zoo, as if they hadn't ever considered it! 

Just one more cultural clue to aid Cameron in understanding the evolution of Chinese attitudes toward animal welfare, the influence of zoos on those attitudes, and the development of effective conservation education programs for Chinese children. 

~ Posted by Pam Hughes

SUZHOU GARDEN TOUR

Master of the Nets Window, Photo by Jerome Silbergeld

Cameron's group toured some of Suzhou's cultural sites, including two of its famous gardens: Master of the Nets Garden and Lingering Garden.


Only one acre, Master of the Nets is the smallest of Suzhou's historically significant gardens. A latticed window that resembles a fishing net gives it its name. Some of its features include "Shooting at Ducks Walkway", "Pavilion Where the Moon Meets the Wind", and "Chapel of Accumulated Emptiness". An online guide from the University of Washington can be found here: http://depts.washington.edu/chinaciv/3wangshy.htm#netwindow 

Master of the Nets Garden, Photo by Cultural-China.com

Cameron & friends at Master of the Nets Garden

The students also visited the 30-acre Lingering Garden, built in 1583 during the Ming Dynasty. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is one of the four most significant classical gardens in all of China. 

Cloud-capped Peak at Lingering Garden

Distinguishing features include elegant buildings, hundreds of calligraphy-carved steles and a tall pillar of limestone, known as Cloud-capped Peak. 

Lingering Garden, Suzhou (Photo by China5000Year.blogspot.com)

The man-made mountains and lakes are meant to resemble a scrolled classical Chinese landscape painting. A brief description of Lingering Garden can be found here: http://www.7wonders.org/wonders/asia/china/suzhou/the-lingering-garden.aspx

Students in front of Cloud-capped Peak (Photo by Claire Balani)

~ Posted by Pam Hughes