I have already done posts on both of these places (actually if you go back years this will now be my third time adding pictures of Yuyuan Gardens) so I'm not going to add a lot of description. While Mum was visiting I wanted to take her to check out Yuyuan Gardens and Shezhuang Temple.
That is a Chinese Opera stage. Clara was performing in front. Behind me there was a group of people also taking pictures of Clara's performance.
Love the Vans and McDonalds sign in the bottom of the shot.
Clara loves these Guardian Lion statues. We actually now have a pair of (much much smaller) lions in our house. The concept started with Buddhism. A lot of buildings here have these at the entrance (I have also seen them in other Asian countries). The meaning of the Lions is quite lovely. The lions come in pairs - a male and a female - representing yin and yang. The female lion has a cub under her paw. She protects the buildings inhabitants and is considered a nurturer. The male has a ball under his paw which is representative of the world. He acts as a protection to the building's inhabitants from external forces.
Hiding from Nan.
Clara was running through a list of items she would like to throw into the water. I said 'no' to all of them.
Gigantic fairy floss!
Shezhuang Temple is the old temple just a short walk from our house. It isn't particularly notable as a tourist destination, but is interesting to visit if coming from our house because it feels like you step into another world. It was a rainy day and we debated waiting for another time, but it turned out to be a great day to visit. The monks (not sure if they are actually called monks, I could be incorrect there) were performing a ceremony.
You can see the group performing the ceremony on the bottom level of the temple. I didn't want to walk right up to them and start taking pictures. There were another 4/5 men sitting to the side at tables who were ringing bells/cymbals.
The temple from the outside. It used to be surrounded by a migrant village, but this has almost entirely been knocked down now. More had been removed even in just the couple of months between my visits.
This is what the ceremony sounded like. I'm not entirely sure of the purpose. I will ask next time I visit because there is one lady there who speaks some English. They were also burning piles of paper on the ground of the courtyard. At other times there was a lot of singing (but it wasn't really melodic, more like calling out as the bells were rung).
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