Families in the Lanes
As alleys in Beijing and lanes in Shanghai, the life of Suzhou people is concentrated in lanes with pink walls and black tiles.
In Suzhou, a river city, lanes are always connected with rivers. The often seen lanes on the water, washing on river pier, together with flowers, grass, birds and worms in small yard and soft Wu dialect make up a living picture of the life of ordinary people in Suzhou.
In lanes between houses, water maintains the life of Suzhou in another way, that is wells. Up till the 70s, there were still 15,000 wells inside the urban Suzhou. Well platforms are the most basic, the smallest, but, at the same time, the most evenly spreading, the most extensive places for social activities of citizens in Suzhou, where the pattern is most free and communication is the most speedy and convenient.
The Apparel in the Region of Waters and Lakes
The Apparel in the Region of Waters and Lakes is popular in villages in eastern Suzhou, such as Luzhi, Shengpu, Chefang, Xietang and Weiting, etc. The style popular in Luzhi is the most typical.
After thousands of years of constant evolution and reformation, The Apparel in the Region of Waters and Lakes has become more and more perfect day by day, and has formed a complete set (8 articles) of make-up clothing ornaments: Triangle Head-wrapping, Dajin Pin Jie Coat, Flower-cloth Xiongdou, 100-pleat Skirt, Waist Binding, Chadang Flower Trousers, Shank Curling, 100-Na Embroidered Shoes.
The Apparel in the Region of Waters and Lakes is adapted to the needs of labor requirements and living habits in its structure, and is ham onions with natural environment in its color. It is a set of clothing ornaments created purely by folks, combining natural, unsophisticated, elegant, easy and practical characteristics into one. It is a rare flower in China clothing ornaments culture, containing strong river village sentimentalism, demonstrating deep-level regional aesthetic standards, and arousing great interests of tourists throughout the world.
The Bumper Harvest in the Autumn
Each time when there appears a vast scene of colorfulness and tinted forests in Dongshan, Xishan, Yaoshang Villages in Western Outskirts of Suzhou, and fruit forests send out information of harvest to people, the autumn wind and slight rain will urge people to hurry harvesting their labor fruits. Oranges become red, Chinese chestnuts become ripe, Baiguo falls down, and it is busy in forests. Fruit farmers are busy in loading and carrying and the happiness of harvest appears on faces.
The scene of Western Outskirts in Suzhou in autumn is really fascinating and attracts tourists from everywhere to come every year. There are beautiful mountains, pretty rivers and kind people here. During traveling here, tourists can't help joining the team of harvesting. It becomes a fashion for city residents to experience the way of living in the countryside, with villagers and sharing the happiness of harvesting. Carrying small fruit basket on your shoulder and walking on ginkgo leaves covered path in the forest, you can feel as if you were walking on golden down carpet, natural and easy.
Beautiful mountains and rivers, fertile soils and hard-working people are expecting the scene of "The Bumper Harvest in the Autumn".
Folk Dragon-dance Performance
In the homeland of dragon, dragon-dance is a tradition. It is dragon-dance that is the way to express happiness and celebration in festivals. Although it is said that there is dragon-dance throughout the country, it is the same as in music and architecture, the difference between the north and the south is obvious, with the north being strong and the south being soft. Anything extremely trong will becomes soft and delicate while it comes to Jiangnan River Village. Under the hands of women in the river village, the agile and brave dragon and its domineering movements will change into light and beautiful spiraling and swaying Not to say you have seen dragon-dance for innumerable times, the dragon-dance performed by women in the river village is very unique.