10th February, 2001.
Guilin Landscape: Willow Pattern Rhyme On Dinner Plates. Short Pedicab Tour On First Visit: Outside Humidity Causes Driver Perspiration
August, 1987.
The Guilin landscape delighted the group of 30 people who arrived in the town in 1987. Only three of them had ever been to China before; it was my first visit. The Guilin landscape made me remember my mother telling me, many years ago, the rhyme describing the "Willow Pattern" on our dinner plates and maybe it was then that my fascination with the mysterious country of China began.
Two pigeons flying high,
Chinese vessel sailing by.
Weeping willow hanging o'er
Bridge with three men,if not four.
Chinese temples there they stand,
Seem to take up all the land.
Apple trees with apples on,
A pretty fence to end my song.
The Guilin landscape with its mountains and river was better than I had imagined and although the view from the bedroom window in the hotel was not that of the Willow Pattern, it was the first chance to enjoy scenery seen previously only in pictures or dreams. In the distance were some of the famous high peaked karst mountains of Guilin, and below us a lake and a zigzag bridge leading to a small island bordered by willows. As I opened the window to have a better view and to take some photographs, my glasses, and the lens on the camera were steamed up by the outside humidity, a warning we heeded when we first ventured onto the streets in the cool of the evening. By the entrance to the hotel a pedicab driver waited for passengers so we hired him to take us on a short tour of the nearby town streets
. On the following day we hired him again to take us around the lake, but as it was in the afternoon, he had a much harder time in the heat, with the perspiration dripping from his face and arms. Half way around the lake we decided to pay him off, so that we could cross the zig zag bridge to the island. Having bought him a drink and given him a good tip, we left him to pick up two other members of our group who were nearby. The weight of his second lot of passengers, must have been nearly twice as much as Trung and I, so he struggled to push the pedicab for a short distance, before he jumped back on, to start pedalling !
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