Canton (Guangzhou)

Our latest weekend getaway was to Canton (Guangzhou in Cantonese) from May 14-16.  We joined a group of 15 eager and curious Hong Kong expats on an AWA (American Women's Association) trip led by Jason Wordie, Hong Kong's amazing local historian.   Jeff and I didn't have much time before the trip to do our usual "homework", so almost everything about the weekend was a wonderful surprise.
Canton is China's third largest city (after Shanghai and Beijing), with a population of 15 million.  That's almost half the population of Canada! (Pearl River Delta map)
The group met at the station in Kowloon, and took the evening train to Canton.  In the not-too-distant past (pre-1997), when HK was still a British colony, passengers had to disembark at the China border, have their visas stamped, and then board a Chinese train to Canton.  Once in Canton, foreigners were restricted to a small area of the city where trade shows took place (thank you to Uncle Shelly for his reminiscences).  These days the trip is an easy non-stop two-hour ride.  The trains resemble ViaRail's outdated cars, but an ultra-modern high speed line is in the offing, amid protests that the construction of this line will destroy villages and displace people along the way (like the Cross-Bronx expressway did in New York thanks to Robert Moses).  This has been one of the more interesting ongoing human-interest stories in our local English papers for the past few months.  This morning, the papers reported that construction may be delayed due to a manpower shortage.  The government is considering importing more mainland workers for the project.
But I digress (as usual) ...

The focus of the visit was historical Canton.  We began our Saturday walk in Shamian (pronounced Sha Meen), the small island where British and French traders operated during Canton's boom years in the first half of the 20th century.  Unlike Hong Kong, where a lot of beautiful colonial buildings have been torn down to make way for high rise structures, the mansions of Canton have remained intact.  They were not destroyed during the Japanese invasion or during the Cultural Revolution, however, many of them were covered in grey "Shanghai plaster".  The restoration of this neighbourhood began 12 months ago, and will be completed in another 18 months.  (Another digression - in China, when a project begins, it will almost always be finished on time, a striking difference to Toronto, where the new St. Claire streetcar line has taken 5 years to build so far, and Montreal where the "super hospital" is still a dream on paper after 15 years.  It's amazing what you can do with an unlimited government budget and abundant cheap labour).  The boulevards in Shamian have been designed for pedestrian traffic only, and the completed buildings are being filled with restaurants, shops, artist studios, and even Starbucks.  The atmosphere is upscale New Orleans.  Flowers, playgrounds, and whimsical statues line the streets.

We crossed a modern bridge linking Shamian to the Bund, the old financial centre of Canton.  The Art Deco buildings blend with colonial masterpieces such as the domed British Customs House.  There is also a beautiful flatiron building which was the first high rise in Canton.  It has recently been transformed into an expensive hotel.  Next to the flatiron hotel is the Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hospital, the first western hospital built in China (1850s).  Not far from the Bund was the Catholic cathedral, built in the 1860s.  We noticed that the gargoyles looked like the figurines on Chinese temples!  They reminded us of a historic church that we visited in Ecuador that had native-looking saints decorating the doorway arch.

No tour buses for our intrepid group:  we took the subway (modelled after Hong Kong) to the Sun Yat Sen Memorial.  There are many places in China that honour SYS, even though he was a Republican revolutionary rather than a Communist.   The Canton memorial is a concert hall/museum.  The architect combined Western and Chinese features in the structure.  The rest of the hot and sticky afternoon was spent walking up to the Zhen Hai  museum in Yuexiu Park (no, we don't know how to pronounce it).  Hidden in the park was a Cold War bomb shelter!

One of the highlights of the weekend was Saturday night dinner.  Jason ordered many local delicacies including fried eel (yup, that's me enjoying? it) and chopped fish on duck web (Jeff).
Jeff's rule is:  taste anything new, and ask what it is after you've swallowed it!

On Sunday, we visited Liang Garden, the former estate of a wealthy Cantonese official during the Qing dynasty.  A performance of Chinese opera (an acquired taste) was taking place in one of the open-air pavilions.  The gardens were filled with bonsai trees, flowers, tai chi practitioners, and old men playing Go.

Dale's rule:  no trip is complete without shopping!  Jason took us to Foshan (pronounced Fotsan), which is the pottery centre of China.  The gaudy figures and humorous bas reliefs found on Chinese temples are all made here.  The pottery market is colourful and jam-packed with stores selling ceramic vases, pagodas, buddhas, and figurines.  We bought a statue of a Mandarin fanning himself and drinking tea.

After lunch it was on to the jade market, which Jason assured us was cheaper than the jade market in Kowloon.  (We noticed HK jewellers buying jade in the wholesale area).  I was determined to buy some jade bangles, but I could only squeeze my hand into one of the thousands that were on display!  Jeff bought a jade tea set - his collection is growing! (Jeff's rule: only one tea pot per city)

Our group got on the train with a huge number of parcels, and we all dashed to the taxi stand upon arrival in Hong Kong.  Even though we were only away for a few days, we felt like we bonded.  Here are photos of the group (minus Jeff the photographer):