A day in the lives of the ancient Chinese 🇨🇳

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Have you ever wondered how it feels like to live a day as the ancient Chinese, like in all those Chinese 古装 shows? From Qing Dynasty to Tang/Song Dynasty, you can dress up and get your make up done at one of the many stores along the streets, and stroll along the river, and their gardens.

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Suzhou is most famously known for its well-preserved canals & bridges, interesting water towns, gardens and building structures. And then I say garden, I don't mean just a plain garden filled with grass and plants, like Botanical Gardens in SG. These classical "gardens", part of the UNESCO World Heritage List, are preserved buildings and pavilions surrounded by greenery and rocks. Many of these gardens were built by scholars back almost 1k years ago. In Suzhou alone, there are over 69 of such preserved gardens, 8 of which are on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

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Visiting Suzhou really feels like it transports you back to the ancient times, and it's such a different experience from just visiting attractions like the Forbidden City or Summer Palace in Beijing. Maybe because those felt so "distant" in the sense that it belonged to royalty. And the buildings here where you can wander freely, felt so much more "relatable." Like we're stepping foot into the life of a day as the normal, average ancient Chinese.

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Suzhou only has many water towns 水乡 nearby. As you can guess, these towns are called water towns because of the many canals that flow through the town. Hence these little towns are characterised by their bridges and boats. It's such an interesting experience to visit one, so I highly recommend visiting Suzhou. Besides, it's just a 1 hour journey by train from Shanghai!

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