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	location:Home > Why Westerners Like Suzhou So Much?
	Why Westerners Like Suzhou So Much?
	This is really paradise on Earth. In the classical gardens that were built over 1000 years ago, there is a lot of history. And these gardens are hidden within the city  walls. Why are they hidden? Who are the people that built these gardens, and why in Suzhou? Well, this is an episode of Travelogue you do not want to miss. I am Yin and welcome to our history and culture series. Located in the southeast of Jiangsu Province, on the south near Taihu Lake, in the west, the Yangtze River, in the north, and trespassed by the Grand Canal, the history and culture of Suzhou is tied to the water. Suzhou crisscrossing waterways gave it the name the Venice of the East since ancient times. Today is Suzhou is a city that preserves its awe-inspiring scenery, running streams, small bridges, waterside houses, elegant Kunqu Opera, and the most characteristic of Suzhou, the classical gardens, which are listed in the UNESCO World Heritage List. In fact, the entire city looks like one big garden in itself. The Humble Administrator's Garden, magnificent. But, who owns this place? These gardens come in three types: official, monastic, and private. Like the Humble Administrator¡¯s Garden, the owners were often retired government officials who wanted to get away from the bureaucratic, materialistic, and often corrupt lifestyle. This garden was built in the Ming Dynasty by an imperial inspector, who was tired of official life. He got the name for the garden from an essay called To cultivate my garden and sell my vegetable crop is the policy of humble man. The names of the gardens have strong cultural flavor. Retired officials wanted simple lives, like the official who dreamed of a trouble-free, fisherman lifestyle, unrestrained by the water. Thus, Fisherman's Garden was his paradise after retiring. The gardens became microcosms of a world made up only of the most basic elements of water, stones, and plants. The owners of the gardens were unsatisfied with their positions in society, so they built their own metaphysical world in their backyards. For instance, they planted lotus in their gardens above the mud. The mud symbolized the polluted society, while they, like the flower, managed to keep themselves clean, blossoming purely above the dirt as a true person of virtue among flowers. The names of the halls, the calligraphy, the carvings, and the decorations have deep literary significance.  The With whom can I sit? veranda in the Humble Administrator Garden gets its name from a line in an ancient poem, conveying the inner loneliness felt by the officials. Besides individuals, wealthy couples also built gardens. Couple Retreat Garden, Ou Yuan is the name, means lotus root garden, and a couples love is compared to the lotus root interconnecting threads and inseparability. Ou Yuan (zhu jia ou). What that means is that inside the couples garden there lives a very happy couple. And there are many signs in the garden that tell you that the couple is very happy. The owners divided the garden into two gardens, an east and west section that follows the theme of a couple. Inside, everything also comes in twos, from paths to roof linings, pagodas, to windows and rocks. It is the details here that show the deep artistic connotation and hint at the love between the two owners. You will find something else that comes in two¡­pavilions. There is one for the husband, and one for the wife. This one is called pavilion to my love. It is where the husband would watch his wife perform, in the pavilion over there. Today, the classical gardens have become a tourist location that can be appreciated. Suzhou gardens are easily accessible by air, rail and road. Its location along the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal means the city also enjoys good waterway transportation.
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