杭 HANGZHOU
Thursday 12 November 1015
So at seven in the morning, we are checking out of the hotel in Shanghai and arguing about whether to take metro (7 RMB, one hour and 20 minutes) or taxi (200 RMB, one hour), when the desk clerk calls to another customer, “Your taxi is here.” And where was this customer going? To the Pudong airport. And was he willing to share his cab? He was. What lovely synchronicity. It was the best taxi ride ever. The driver was in a uniform. He actually helped with the luggage. The cab was clean, and the ride smooth. How very very nice.
The day continued to be full of surprises. My seat mate on the bus from Shanghai to zHangzhou had just arrived from a conference in Las Vegas. He spoke good English and knew Hangzhou well. He located on the map all the sites we were coming to visit, translated the kanji into pinyin; gave me a Mandarin lesson, and recommended the brand name of a good portable charger.
In Hangzhou, early checkin was possible at the hotel, and the manager knew of a good bookstore where I could buy a present for Mr.Xue.
We wanted to take the present to Mr.Xue, and the hotel manger called him (Mr.Xue does not speak English) to ask if we could come to the Temple. Mr. Xue said it would be difficult for us to find him because we do not speak Mandarin And then the hotel manager offered to come with us and be the translator.
So off we went, the three of us, driving around beautiful Westlake to Ling Yin Temple in the rain (it always rains when I go to a temple, but no matter, they give us umbrellas). After present-giving and tea-drinking and lengthy discussion of Clarence James Gamble and his LingYin photos, Mr. Xue took us on a tour (in the rain) of rock carvings that go back to the North Song Dynasty (960-1279): Buddhas carved in the nocks and crannies of the caves, big Budders and rows of little Buddhas, all sizes and so many. We splashed about and had to duck our heads under the down-hanging spits of rock. We used the flashlights on our smart phones to see the bas relief figures hidden in the darkness of the cave’s shadows.
I was so enthralled, I forgot to take photos. The featured photo in the header is what we saw as given on Wikipedia. But above is the photo that I did take just outside a cave: this tree had looped itself up and back and over. What was that tree thinking?
