19 Nov 2010It was a pleasant experience flying to Hangzhou with Airasia. At least, the food was better than MAS. It took about 5 hours from KL to Hangzhou. I never imagine myself stepping my feet on China land. The country itself was fine, but I wasn't really fond of China fella. However, I go to Shanghai for one ultimate mission: Faye Wong! I had a bizzare feeling when the plane finally landed, as I still couldn't believe and convince myself that, what on earth am I doing in China...
BBQ Chicken, told u it is yummy
Hot & blue
Foggy Xiao-Shan Airport at Hangzhou
I spent some time at the airport, looking for map and phone card. The best and "safest" way of getting to the hotel is using taxi, as there is no metro in Hangzhou, unless u wana squeeze inside the public bus, which is totally out of my list. The taxi was reasonable, about RMB80, 40 minutes ride. After checking in at
SSAW-Hubin hotel, we waited for the logistic guy to send us the ticket of 印象西湖 (The Impression of West Lake) which we had reserved, a must-watch show directed by Zhang YiMou.
It was about 4pm then, so we went for a quick tea before exploring West Lake. Since it was winter, so the sky turned dark real fast.
Jie-Fang Road
Food!
Hungry-no-more, and it's time to explore the well-known
West Lake. However, the procedure wasn't really smooth, as it was kind of dark when we were there. It wasn't fun to walk around the unfamiliar lake in such a dark and cold weather. Our initial plan was to walk to The Impression of West Lake venue. According to the map, it was reachable. However, the longer we walked, the more we felt like we were lost, very lost indeed. The show actually started at 7.30pm, and we had to reach there earlier in order to redeem the ticket. Now, we started to get panic. We asked several people, including the security guard, and yet they all gave us different answers and directions on getting to the venue (I started to hate this place).
We decided to use taxi, and another problem arises. We couldn't get one as all the taxis had passengers with them. I was standing at the busy road side, while HY continued to ask around. At that time, one
illegal taxi stopped and asked me where I was heading to. Illegal taxi looks exactly like normal car, but it was without license. Who dare to get into it, who knows where will he drive us to?!?! Perhaps we will be robbed and murdered... (Now, I hate this place even more.)
Finally, we spotted a LEGAL taxi approaching the road side, not far from us, to drop down the passengers, and we both really ran like mad towards it, and even shouted so that the taxi won't drive off. Somehow, they seemed to have some problems on the taxi fare, and the driver was arguing with the previous passengers at the road side. We both just couldn't bother anymore, and straight away got into the car. Luckily, the taxi driver didn't chase us down, and yet he sent us to the venue after solving his problem. It wasn't really far, just that it was dark, and we were unclear with the direction. I will write more about West Lake in the next post.
印象西湖 (The Impression of West Lake)This is a live performance on water, about a romantic and tragic ancient love story. The natural scenery is the source of the creativity. West Lake appeared to be so beautiful under the colourful spot-light. The story was divided into 5 parts: meet, love, apart, flash back, memory. The Director of this show is Zhang YiMou, and the music was composed by Kitaro. We purchased the VIP seats at RMB250 per ticket, which was really a good seat as it was very close to the lake, with crystal clear view of the entire show. The VIP seats were very limited, less than 50 I think, so reservation is definitely required.
It was a very very cold night. I almost dropped my tears during the end of the show, as it was too touching. I felt like I was in heaven, as West Lake was too beautiful. The songs, rhythms and plots simply took my soul away.
We both almost froze to death during the one-hour show, it wasn't windy, just that the cold lake cooled us into the bone. We straight away rushed into KFC to keep ourself warm, right after the show ended.
Hot Soya Bean Milk & Mashed Potato
