Why is there meat hanging from that tree?

I was waiting for a bus from Tong Li to Suzhou with some friends that I had spent the day with. Across the road I noticed some meat hanging from a tree outside a China mobile shop.

Meat hanging from a tree.. Click on the image to get a better quality photo.

The conversation with my Chinese friends went as follows..

Me: Why is there meat tied to that tree?

Them: What?

Me: Why is there meat tied to that tree?

Them: What? (One of them starts looking up words in the dictionary to figure out what I am asking them.)

Me: Look across the road... See the moped?

Them: Yes

Me: Do you see the tree beside it?

Them: Yes

Me: Is that meat tied to the tree?

Them: Yes its pork.

Me: Why is it tied to the tree?

Them: What? What you mean why?

At this point the girl has figured out what I was asking originally and she starts laughing. Eventually we are all laughing.

Them: They are preparing the meat for the spring festival in a few weeks.

Me: Are people actually going to eat that?

At this point they are laughing so much that people are staring at us as they walk by on the street. Well people are been staring all day but they even more so now.

Them: Of course they are going to, why would they not. You ate it last night at dinner.

Me: What?

Them: Remember the word we translated for you last night

Me: Cured Meat?

Them: Yes. It's cured meat.  I thought you said you had cured meat in Ireland...


Me: Yes we do....


Them: So why do you think it is so strange that it is hanging from a tree. This is normal in China.

Me: Yes we have cured meat in Ireland but we don't hang it from a tree.

Them: How do you make it if you don't hang it from a tree?

Me: I don't know but I'm pretty sure we don't hang it from a tree.....

Related Blog Posts:

• Head up a tree
• The Miracle Safari - Part 1
• The Miracle Safari - Part 2
• The Miracle Safari - Part 3
• The Miracle Safari - Part 4

Next stop Suzhou

After spending 2 days in Jiaxing I took the train to Suzhou. I had to queue for about 40 minutes to buy the train ticket and the only train remaining was a slow train which would took 3 hours. My Chinese friends from Hangzhou met me at the train station in Suzhou and helped me find my hostel. Then we went for dinner and in Chinese tradition they order lots of different dishes that we all shared.

Dinner in Suzhou

They explained that I used chopsticks like a child does i.e. I hold them in the center rather than the top but I still manage to eat with them. Even eating the peanuts you can see above. They were staying in a different hostel so we arranged to meet at 8:30am the next day at the north bus station to go visit Tong Li.

Tong Li

Tong Li is about 40 minutes by bus away from Suzhou and is known for its system of canals similar to Venice.

Canal in Tong Li

Outshirts of Tong Li

We walked around the village for a few hours and visited the various gardens and museums. Most of the time people were staring at me and I only saw one other westerner through the full day. I have come across Chinese opera a few times on this trip, but this was my first time to see a live performance. It was a free outdoor performance so I didn't have to watch for too long...

Chinese Opera

Friends