Shanghai: Day 2

We began our first full day in Shanghai at the Yuyuan Garden and Market. Our tour guide, Mico, helped us understand what we were seeing by explaining the history of the garden (it is a private garden built by Pan Yunduan in 1557 to please his parents) and the significance of many of its rooms and features.
Later, on the way to lunch, Mico also told us about daily life in Shanghai - we were eager to learn more about how the people of Shanghai live.

After the visit to the Garden, many of us attended a tea tasting. We enjoyed hearing about the different varieties of tea (green, black, oolong, and herbal), and we eagerly tasted the samples that were prepared for us. Perhaps the most exciting variety of tea was the Jasmine blooming flower tea. We sampled two varieties: Romeo and Juliet. We all enjoyed watching the flower inside the tea "bloom" right before our eyes!

Before:

After:

In the Yuyuan Market adjacent to the Garden, we also learned that we have arrived in China at the beginning of the harvest season for the most popular tea in China: Dragonwell. The Market was crowded with locals and visitors sampling tea and celebrating.

After lunch, we traveled to the Lu Xun Museum for a talk by Ma Yuanxi on the famous Chinese writer, Lu Xun (1881-1936), author of The True Story of Ah Q and Call to Arms. We learned that among other things, Lu Xun supported the art of woodcutting among the youth. During a tour of Lu Xun's last residence, we learned that he had one son, Haiying.

Tomorrow we will visit the Shanghai Museum - the forecast is calling for rain, so it's a good thing we'll be inside for most of the day!