Yellow Crane Pagoda

The Yellow Crane Pagoda peeking through the leaves. It is considered one of the most important pagodas in China as it overlooks the Yangtze River. It even has an elevator in the middle! But you have to pay 2RMB to get on it so I opted for the staircase.

Inside the YCP -- the Chinese love to pose, yep even men. Also notice how dressed up the woman is? I went hiking once near Tibet and some women wore high heels!

View of the Hanyang District of Wuhan from the YCP...

Bell tower and gazebo on Snake Hill next to the YCP.

The Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai was so inspired at the YCP 1,500 years ago that he wrote this poem:

My old friend said goodbye, here at Yellow Crane Tower,
In the third month, under a cloud of willow blossoms, he's going down to Yangzhou.
The lonely sail is now a distant shadow, on the edge of a blue emptiness,
All I see is the Yangtze River flow to the heaven in the horizon.

If Mr. Li were alive today, this is what he'd see: a very congested bridge (probably takes an hour just to get on the bridge! the worst bottleneck ever!), the Yangtze barely visible, a television tower and blocks and blocks of urban concrete... not too inspiring. But alas, I shall use my imagination: a beautiful misty river, lined with willow blossoms, and a lone sail, sailing slowly but surely to the horizon...

Ce@sorship

Hmmm, youtube is blocked here... now, nytimes and facebook too. Oh, facebook came back up, but hotmail went down... Chinese ce@nsorship is weird...a bureaucrat is probably sitting at his desk somewhere, eating melon seeds, sipping on tea, and randomly turning switches on and off... what a job. But funnily, I went to a local supermarket, and there were porn videos on the lower shelves, lest children can't reach them...tsk tsk tsk.

More from Wuhan...

Just went out for a walk, had lunch/dinner, and bought some water and cookies from Carrefour (which is a French owned Hypermart here, I call it a Hypermart cuz it has loud music, signs everywhere, it's like Ralph's plus Target plus Bestbuy all rolled into one and throw in some Chinese chaotic-ness and loud-ness)...

Three buck meal at Chinese equivalent of McDonald's -- it's a Taiwanese chain and they are even selling shaved ice!

Lotus flower bulb (?) sellers in the rain... life is pretty hard for some people. I guess this is the season before the Lotus flowers bloom. I saw several vendors selling the flower bulb -- there is some type of seed inside (the size of pistacchio) and they would pry it out and eat it.

Rainy Wuhan

I've arrived in Wuhan. I've been here once before in 2007. Chinese cities change so fast. I notice they are building a new subway and new apartments are springing up everywhere. It feels like dinner time, but it's only 11 in the morning here! Hope y'all are having a good night back in the good 'ol USA.

More from Bella...

More pics from Bella... have a good weekend!

Ewe... slug... but slugs deserve dignity and respect too!

Droplet in Leaf... or is it a 10 carat diamond? Bella, hiding anything from us?

In honor of Independence Day... oh say can you see...

Obey the Kitteh!

Cat sightings have been rampant lately! Remember to obey the kitty, otherwise I will send y'all to kitty gulag for some re-education, muahahaha...

Paartaaay at Cat's

Meow! I will be hosting a dumpling party soon (eh, like in 2 months, after L comes in and rescues my place and cleans my litter box, :-)... if you can't find my pad, follow the sign below: