Sihai park
Watch out Shenzhen. I am armed with an English-language map now. You can't hide your locals-only attractions from me!
This week we went to Sihai Park, a city park about five bus stops from our neighborhood. This park really isn't anything of great note; it is just a regular Chinese urban park. For us, though, as foreigners, it was something new.
There were paths around and over the four ponds . Si Hai actually means 4 Seas, but they were really ponds.
At least one of the ponds had people fishing in it. Myles and I even watched fish jump.
The ponds themselves were to me images of my China. Beautful waterlillies, surrounded by filth and litter.
In the middle of the park is an enormous bronze sculpture of a bull. How big is it? Can you see Myles standing in front of it? He is wearing a maroon shirt. I don't think I have been this close to a work of public art this big.
My favorite part was a sign we saw. It was one of the few with any English on it, probably intended to be a courtesy. One of the jokes among foreigners here trying to learn Chinese is the difficulty with the near-homonyms of si (four) and shi (ten). Written even in pinyin they look more distinct than their actual spoken forms. Like fourteen and forty, two words that can be confused when you hear them, shi si (14) and si shi (40) can also be confused. I have seen it, when reservations for a birthday party of 14 led the restaurant to clsoe off an entire room expecting more than 40 attendees.
Anyway, it is bad enough when we foreigners have trouble distiguishing si from shi. Worse yet when the Chinese do it, too.
This week we went to Sihai Park, a city park about five bus stops from our neighborhood. This park really isn't anything of great note; it is just a regular Chinese urban park. For us, though, as foreigners, it was something new.
There were paths around and over the four ponds . Si Hai actually means 4 Seas, but they were really ponds.
At least one of the ponds had people fishing in it. Myles and I even watched fish jump.
The ponds themselves were to me images of my China. Beautful waterlillies, surrounded by filth and litter.
In the middle of the park is an enormous bronze sculpture of a bull. How big is it? Can you see Myles standing in front of it? He is wearing a maroon shirt. I don't think I have been this close to a work of public art this big.
My favorite part was a sign we saw. It was one of the few with any English on it, probably intended to be a courtesy. One of the jokes among foreigners here trying to learn Chinese is the difficulty with the near-homonyms of si (four) and shi (ten). Written even in pinyin they look more distinct than their actual spoken forms. Like fourteen and forty, two words that can be confused when you hear them, shi si (14) and si shi (40) can also be confused. I have seen it, when reservations for a birthday party of 14 led the restaurant to clsoe off an entire room expecting more than 40 attendees.
Anyway, it is bad enough when we foreigners have trouble distiguishing si from shi. Worse yet when the Chinese do it, too.
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