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Several girls traveled to Zhouzhuang together. There were southern girls with fair skin and graceful figure, northwest girls from Sari, and strong Beijing girls like me. Whether girls get together to drink tea or coffee, the topic is always inseparable from the "beauty" that everyone cares about. It is always appropriate to have fat swallows and thin swallows. There is never only one kind of beauty. The wider the aesthetics, the more beauty you can perceive, and the more fun you can gain from beauty. The same Zhouzhuang, in the eyes of different people, shows different beautiful scenery. Some people like the vitality of Zhouzhuang in the sun, some like the coolness of Zhouzhuang in the breeze, and others like the colorful scenery of Zhouzhuang in the rainy night.

This only Zhouzhuang also has more than one kind of beauty in my eyes.

[The beauty of legacy independence]

After visiting too many so-called "ancient towns with Internet celebrities", their faces have long been blurred and have lost their unique charm, and become more and more the same. The town with its own characteristics, preserved its original appearance and maintained the atmosphere of the market is originally beautiful. This is how Zhouzhuang maintains its original appearance and is not turned into an "Internet celebrity" by too many noisy bars. There is never a shortage of Internet celebrities, but Zhouzhuang only has one.

Fortunately, Zhouzhuang is still the original Zhouzhuang. The beauty of Zhouzhuang is that it still looks like before. The door panels of the store are still opened one by one every morning, and the grandma wearing a headscarf is still sitting in front of the window, embroidering full moon shoes in a stitch. The squeaking sound of spinning wheels still rings every day. While the boatwoman is still rowing, you can still buy freshly caught fish at the Nanhu Fishing Market.

In Zhouzhuang, people who met people soliciting business were particularly cordial: "Come and have a meal." "Come and have tea." Even when her grandmother sold the water chestnut she cooked, she said,"I have a few more here." It's like they're all your neighbors.

The girls found out that there was a teahouse called "Sanmao" in Zhouzhuang, and they all called me over. They thought that I had written "Moonlight Shines on the Sahara" and must be a fan of Sanmao's. In fact, I only randomly flipped through a copy of her "Srecrow Notes" when I was 14 or 15 years old, and I can't remember the content now. Although I am not a fan of Sanmao, I am still shocked by the old photos and newspaper clippings of Sanmao in the teahouse. Sanmao did not meet Zhang Jihan, the owner of the tea house, in Zhouzhuang, but became a "pen friend" with him with the help of her neighbors. Sanmao likes Zhouzhuang very much and said in her communication with Zhang Jihan that she would definitely come again. Unfortunately, Zhang Jihan didn't wait for Sanmao to come back to Zhouzhuang, but waited for the news of her death.

In the blink of an eye, Mr. Zhang Jihan has been running this Sanmao Tea House for twenty-two years and left about 6 million words of messages from tea guests. He said: "Although these things in the teahouse may not seem valuable, after a certain period of time, it may be one of the cultural contexts here. It will be more than just a story of one letter, two letters." These letters, like his correspondence with Sanmao, are real letters written on paper with pen, not WeChat messages that arrive in half a second. This long-term love is beautiful in the long years, and is even more beautiful in the era of rapid changes and many personnel changes without trace.

The beauty of Zhouzhuang remains independent in this "unchanging".

[Beauty of New Space]

In addition to the beauty of "unchanging", Zhouzhuang also has the beauty of "change". The diversity of space gives Zhouzhuang a unique charm. Strolling among the bluestone and tiled houses in Zhouzhuang, you can not only discover old patterns such as Shenting and Huajiantang, but also find illy and Starbucks, which ensure the same quality no matter where you drink it around the world.

Illie and Starbucks in Zhouzhuang are both very popular. The store has wooden doors, wooden windows, wooden tables and chairs, and latte mocha macchito on the table; the light boat and small bridge outside the window are bluestone boards, and the Italian concentrated frill white inside the window. Starbucks's sign does not have English logos or logos, only the five Chinese words "Starbucks Coffee" on the wooden plaque, and the decoration in the building is also close to Chinese elements.

There are some very interesting new spaces in Zhouzhuang.

The first day I arrived in Zhouzhuang was cloudy, the second day rained, and the third day was windy. On the morning of the fourth day, I drank a pot of tea while boiling leaves, and I felt confident all day. The same chain brand's boiled leaf display is obviously more "Zhouzhuang" than illy and Starbucks, and the scenery outside the window is also better.

Carton King is a shop that makes everything out of cardboard boxes. From the Temple of God and lighting, to superheroes and various animals, almost everything that you can see in the store is made of cardboard boxes. You can also buy kraft paper hats and schoolbags here that you can throw in the washing machine and wash. The restaurant next door and the Latte Playstone Hotel also continued the theme of cartons. All the chairs in the restaurant were made of cartons. The paper train that children like to ride runs happily in the yard.

Yanyu Jiangnan is a cat-hunting resort in Zhouzhuang. Whether you eat or drink, there are always 29 kittens here accompanying you. They are all stray cats taken in by the store owner. In addition to liking cats, the store owner also likes to live broadcast his own harmonica on the Internet. He has loyal fans both online and offline. Every night, the VIP seats by the bar are occupied by cats, each of whom is quiet and attentive.

In addition to Yanyu Jiangnan, there is another place in Zhouzhuang where you can also masturbate cats-the Sky City Bookstore of cats. When you come in to hide from the rain, read a book or have a drink, you can see two cats fighting, asking for a hug, pretending to be a young man and looking out the window at the rain lonely and cold, and playing parkour in the middle of the book. The names of the two meows are very domineering. The colorful cat is called "Knowledge" and the white cat is called "Invincible". When the two names are paired, they are simply a banner in the bookstore-Invincible Knowledge!

These spaces in Zhouzhuang are very capable of retaining people. As long as people can enter, whether it is reading books, drinking tea, chatting and stroking cats, half a day will pass unknowingly.

In addition to the space on the road, Zhouzhuang's water space should never be missed. Take a small boat and watch Zhouzhuang on the water, and listen to the boatman singing a boat song. Shake slowly and slowly, the sky becomes dark; when you are sleepy, the lights turn on; when you are dense and dense, you will be drunk.

[The beauty of Chinese style in the eyes of foreigners]

Because a Frenchman left a message in my circle of friends, it triggered an obsession: "I suggest that foreigners who are interested in China go to Zhouzhuang to improve their Chinese aesthetics."

When I was in Zhouzhuang, I posted a photo taken at the ancient stage on my circle of friends. A Frenchman who had lived in China for nearly 20 years left a message asking what the name of the Beijing opera I saw. I gave him a good lesson and told him that it was called Kunqu Opera, which was different from the Peking Opera you had heard once at the Chang 'an Theater. Before the first note of French opera was written, Kunqu Opera had been sung in Kunshan for three hundred years.

Different Kunqu operas are performed every day on the Zhouzhuang Ancient Theater. I happened to hear excerpts from "Tiger Bag Bombing the Mountain Gate" and "Peony Pavilion". The center of the dome of the ancient stage is formed by 420 wood-carved phoenixes circling. This beautiful "phoenix caisson" is an ancient "sound" built using the principle of resonance. The opera couplets "Ze is called South Lake, which has been famous for two thousand years" and "The opera is called Water Mill, which has been popular in Kunshan for six hundred spring" are particularly domineering. There are also real-time scrolling bilingual Chinese and English subtitles on both sides of the stage, which not only solves the problem of "not understanding Chinese", but also raises the interest of comparing English. This place is simply suitable for giving foreigners a beautiful ancient Chinese lesson.

You can also buy exquisite and creative peripheral products outside the stage. Postcards made of silk, earrings shaped in the shape of paper fans, and bookmarks for Kunqu opera costumes can no longer be held in your wallet.

In Zhouzhuang, I also found an inn with high performance value and extraordinary Buddhist affiliation-Huajiantang. From the moment I entered the lobby, the scenery I saw with every step was beautiful, which was simply beyond belief. Drinking tea, chatting, listening to the rain, bathing, and sleeping here can no longer be comfortable. Huajiantang is affiliated to Huazhu Group and was carefully restored and rebuilt by Dai's old house. Dai Zhai was built in the early years of the Republic of China. It is the home of three brothers Dai Zhijie, Dai Zhihang and Dai Zhizuo, a wealthy businessman in Zhouzhuang. This five-entry deep courtyard is listed as a cultural relic protection building in Kunshan City. The three Dai brothers are outstanding in academic character and have a large collection of books at home. Their descendants even went to France to study and later brought Western culture home, forming a Dai house that combines Chinese and Western culture. Coincidentally, Huajiantang's design company, Dariel Studio, also came from France. It redivided the old house into 20 guest rooms. Huajiantang grasps Chinese elements just right, perhaps because he views "Chinese aesthetics" from an "outsider" perspective with a unique flavor.

[Recommendation: Zhouzhuang is a special space for retaining people] Yueshang, Quangong Building, Xiangcun, Ulu Perch Zhi Si, Yanyu Jiangnan, Sanmao Tea House, Boiling Leaf, Cat's Sky City, Illy, Starbucks, Ancient Stage, Huajiantang.

[Liu Xiaojia]

travel writer

Sponsors of the "World Give Me Courage" charity event

Suffering from ADHD for a long time

It's a bad day from nine to five, so it's good to run east and west

Worked as a reporter, fashion editor, screenwriter...

My most recent job was traveling