Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Guangsheng Si (广胜寺)


The upper temple consists mostly of Feihong "Flying rainbow" Pagoda (飞虹塔). According to the internet it's the largest and best preserved glazed tiled pagoda in China.


The official plaque declaring the place significant to the country. Guangsheng si written in traditional characters: "廣勝寺"
















I'm pretty sure I saw a skull in one of these tomb things.






That's the pagoda in the distance.




These last few are all from near the lower temple.




too bad, that water is so clear.




That's a real animal by the way.



A biking trip out to Guangsheng Temple (广胜寺). It's about 28 miles (45km) away from Linfen (临汾), in hongtong county (洪洞县), northeast of Hongtong City (洪洞市) itself. I didn't actually go in the lower or upper temple but walked around lots outside. There is a big spring at the bottom that splits the water 70% one way and 30% the other. It's the result of an old story about two groups dividing up the water, but I wasn't able to fully understand. The picture with the lady in pink above shows the structure commemorating the story, maybe you can make out the characters. But I did understand that a big fence had to be built around the spring to keep people from polluting it, however the water is quickly littered with trash on the other side of the fence.

Friday, May 6, 2011

Cornhole in China (玉米窟窿)





I had some cornhole boards built out of some salvaged wood, and sewed together some bags (filled them with soybeans however; they were cheap). The translation we decided upon was "Yumi Kulong" (玉米窟窿). The second image is of the guy building them for me. They're not perfect and a little smaller than the standard but just as fun. Everyone seems to love them; I keep them over at the bike shop, so they get a lot of attention. And I'm sure there can't be too many sets of these floating around China, I'd like to think this is the only one.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Biking XiangFen (襄汾县)


The the Fen River (汾河)…








Fencheng town's (汾城镇) Chenghuang Temple (城隍庙). I've seen Chenghuang translated as "town god". The sign out front says the place was established by the Ming emperor HongWu (明洪武) in 1369.


















"谴责美国" - "Condemn America"
This newspaper from 1973 was stuck to wall inside one of the buildings.









These last two are from Wei Village (尉村). It was super dusty and I wasn't feeling well so I didn't take too many pictures.


This is a statue of Guan Yunchang (关云长) also known as Guan Yu (关羽) or Guan Gong (关公). He was a general and sworn brother to the war lord Liu Bei (刘备) from the Three Kingdoms period of China (三国时代).


A biking trip through Xiangfen County (襄汾县), still part of greater Linfen (临汾).

Monday, May 2, 2011

Morning in Linfen























Woke up at 5:30 one day to walk the streets and see what I could find.