Wednesday May 23, 2012
It's been on my list of things to do for seven years...go to Moganshan. Moganshan is a National Park set in the hills north of Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province. It was once the playground of Shanghai's highfalutin pre-WWII expat crowd who would flock to their stone villas and swimming pools in the cooler mountain air during nineteenth and twentieth century summers. These days, it draws day-hikers and leisure drivers from all over the area including Shanghai and Zhejiang Province.
Its renown for beautiful greenery is well-deserved. The mountains are covered in lush bamboo groves, dotted here and there with green tea plantations that have been producing some of China's finest teas for hundreds of years. It was in this area that a British botanist, Robert Fortune, commenced one of the greatest thefts in all history: stealing the secrets of tea from China and exporting them to India. (His discoveries also led the British to disdain green tea and prefer black. This is all spelled out in Sarah Rose's book For all the Tea in China - a fantastic read.) The mountains are shrouded with this history and intrigue - so for many reasons, not least of which that it is so close to Shanghai - I've been wanting to visit.
Finally a few weeks ago, I traveled there with my family and a few of our friends. We stayed at the beautiful Le Passage Moganshan, a boutique hotel that prides itself on its eco-friendliness but I must laud it for its family-friendliness. Set on a tea plantation just down the mountain from Moganshan National Park, the hotel boasts sweeping views of the mountains. We enjoyed a fabulous hike to Moganshan's peak accompanied (and guided) by the owners' charming boys as well as many dips in Le Passage's heated saltwater pool. It was by far one of the most enjoyable weekends we've spent in China's countryside.
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Photos: above - a path leading up the mountain through the bamboo forest; below - the main houses at Le Passage Moganshan. © 2012 Sara Naumann, licensed to About.com.
Monday May 21, 2012
Who can tell me what these little nifty, colorful things are?
Photo: © 2012 Sara Naumann, licensed to About.com.
Saturday May 19, 2012
Every now and again, I escape the dalu (大陆), that's "mainland" in Mandarin, and scoot down to Hong Kong for some reason or another. This trip was riding on the coattails of my business-traveling husband with a free mileage ticket on Dragon Air. (Thank you, husband.) I managed to spend an afternoon at the Hong Kong International Art Fair, otherwise known as HK Art.
As a newly minted appreciator of contemporary art, thanks to Sheila Greenspan and Shanghai's Eastlink Gallery, I felt ready to take it on. The main take-away from Ms. Greenspan's course, for me, is this: when visiting a gallery, try not to see everything. Pick out one or two pieces and really study them.
I utilized this course of action for perhaps the first half of my visit to the massive HK Art fair. It was fun, just wandering here and there, going to look at whatever took my fancy. I fell in love with Chen Guangwu's works, represented by Alexander Ochs Gallery of Berlin and Beijing. The artist is a native of Guangxi Province but works out of Beijing. His rendering of traditional Chinese calligraphy is at once abstract, yet precisely designed. The scrolls look as if they've been machine printed, ready for wallpaper. But each stroke is handwritten with a calligrapher's brush, art that must take hours of meticulous work.
I also really liked the work of Wuhan artist Zhang Quan whose pieces on first glance are simply tiny, circular ink scribbles; but after you step back, you can see a landscape or scene take shape out of the scribble-fog. Both artists work primarily in black and white, something Ms. Greenspan drew our attention to in the course. Nominally that working in black and white is a basic form of Chinese art - that black characters on white rice paper sometimes form the first steps in any students' study of art in China: learning to write calligraphy.
After really taking my time in the first hall, I made my way up to the second hall where large installation pieces are a big draw, including Cong, a work by Ai Weiwei. The piece includes letters from government ministries regarding his investigation into the Sichuan Earthquake of 2008, and a 5,196-name-long list of the students who died in the earthquake because of faulty construction of schools.
HK Art is the most important art fair in Asia and next year, it joins the group that holds Art Basel and Art Basel Miami so its importance and prestige is cemented for the future.
More info:
Photos: above, a work by Chen Guangwu; below Ai Weiwei's Cong.
Monday May 14, 2012
Delicious...oh, and you won't see your kids.
Where I grew up in central Illinois (way, WAY outside of Chicago) there was no such thing as "brunch" - late breakfast or early lunch, but no one brunched. Later I moved to San Francisco, where everyone "does" brunch. Brunch in the Bay Area means queuing, Bloody Marys in hand while you wait for your table at the hippest neighborhood pancake joint.
Brunch in Asia is a whole new ballgame. It's big and happening and everyone plans things around Sunday family brunches that are put on lavishly at every hotel from Shanghai to Singapore and back. These fancy hotels try to top each other with ridiculous gimmicks: free-flow Champagne, caviar with every course, table-side cooking, oysters flown in from the farthest reaches of the globe. But I have just experienced a little ecstasy that no other brunch has ever offered me: fabulous food and the disappearance of my children.
Welcome to the Brunch Scene, InterContinental Shanghai Expo. Easily the best choice of hotels for anyone traveling to Shanghai with a family (riverfront, soccer pitch, beautiful garden, playground, fabulous pool), it currently holds the choicest table for anyone who wants to have a leisurely brunch while having their kids totally entertained.
InterContinental Shanghai Expo's Café 1188 has teamed up with Awesome Kids Club to create a fully staffed kids' club that runs the duration of the brunch (Sundays 12:30-3:30pm). Get the kids fed and they'll be off to play sports, games or do artistic activities in the garden area of the hotel while you and friends enjoy the hotel's gorgeous food offerings.
Book now, kids under 11 accompanied by 2 adults eat free this month.
Details: InterContinental Shanghai Expo | 1188 Xueye Road, Pudong, Shanghai | 浦东新区雪野路1188号 | tel +86 21 3858 1188 | Brunch: 348+15% service charge for adults, beverage on consumption. Through May, children aged 4-12 will enjoy 50% discount on the price and children under 4 years old eat free.
Photos: above - the seafood bar at Cafe 1188 (courtesy of IHG group, all rights reserved); below - Coach Michael at the Awesome Kids Club on the InterContinental Shanghai Expo's lawn (© 2012 Sara Naumann, licensed to About.com).
