垂柳

The title of this post is Chui Liu, or "drooping branches willow" which is the Chinese translation for the 柳树 (willow tree) we know as the weeping willow. My translation as the 哭树 or "crying tree" was pretty far off the mark in this case. Oh well. I have been getting pretty lazy with the Chinese since everyone around here speaks such good English so I'm trying to devote a little more energy to language study.

In the meantime, I have been visiting parks with my new blog muse, Angela. Unfortunately, she won't let me take her picture very often (I have no idea why because she's totally hot), but I managed to get this one off after a good amount of coaxing.


The viewscape of this park is dominated by the CCTV tower, which I found quite fun to photograph for some reason. It looked really amazing at night, the lights reflecting in the "deep pool" of the lake for which this park is named. Here are some other night sights from YuYuanTan park:




Another interesting feature was the small Metasequoia plantation I found near the main gate of the park.


Here are some photos from the Yuan Dynasty Wall Relics park. Apparently, they incorporated a river into the design of the city in order to more easily keep the barbarians out. It's now little more than a cement channel, but there is a nice park along side it and it is beautiful in the evening.


While there, I learned a beautiful saying:

黑夜给了我黑色的眼睛。

"The dark night darkens my eyes." With dark eyes, I had a truly beautiful evening there I will never forget.


Lastly, my friend Jun Yang (of Joe McBride lab fame) took me out the other night for a guys only style session: meat and beer! We had a draft beer drinking contest while brainstorming ways to get rich and eating spicy bar-b-que lamb on sticks. Good Times!