Chinese Garden

Recently we decided to explore further East of where we are living and decided to visit Chinese Garden, also known as Jurong Garden which is a park at Jurong East. It's only a short walk from the Chinese Garden MRT. Whilst walking to the entrance we passed through a large area of grassland and inspite of the heat there were several groups of young men playing cricket. This is the first time we had seen cricket being played here and spent a while watching them and admiring their stamina to play in such heat.

 

 

 

Walking over the pretty bridge over a small river to the entrance almost the first thing we saw was a huge monitor lizard, and then 3 more close by. I love spotting these impressive creatures, they look almost prehistoric and have long blue tongues that flick in and out 'tasting' the air. In amongst the reeds there were lots of tiny fish and on the river bank several small herons waiting for a fish to come close enough to catch.

      

Once you cross the bridge you immediately see a Chinese pagoda set on top of a small hill with steps leading up to it.

Inside we climbed up the spiral staircase and looked out of the heavily screened windows and door ways with big red doors on each level as we got higher and higher.  

 

 

The views from the top were pretty extensive, looking one way over to Jurong lake and the other towards the Jurong River and Pandan reservoir.

                                                                          The pagoda is beautifully painted particularly on the underside of the eaves

 Having come down for the pagoda we explored around the nearby ornamental ponds and were curious to see bright pink 'stuff' on many of the rocks. When we got home we googled 'bright pink stuff on rocks' and found out that it's the eggs of the Golden Apple snail, which is not native to Singapore and infact is being blamed for the decrease in numbers of the native Apple snail.

 

 Further on is a Bonsai Garden which had some very beautiful specimens but also many that looked neglected and a few that were obviously dead sadly. However there were temporary fencing up around one big area and it looked like some renovation might be planned

        A Yellow Oriole

Next we came to an area marked Coomunity Garden and were pleased to see flowers, herbs and vegetables being grown in teapots, old boots, tyres and all sorts of unusual containers. I really liked the shady sitting area with 'walls' made from plastic bottles strung together with small plants inside. I think if the top bottle gets watered the water would gradually trickle down the string into the bottle underneath-ingenious. Good to see some recycling going on in Singapore. 

The Chinese garden links with the Japanese Garden where there is a statue of Confuscious, behind it the Tea House Pavilion and Stone Boat

 and at the furthest point of the garden to where we came in a lovely bridge-the White Rainbow Bridge and the Twin Pagodas. By now it was really hot and we were flagging a bit so choose not to climb up the pagodas.

 Walking back towards the entrance and first pagoda we came to statues of the 8 Heroes. The statues depict famous heroes from Chinese history, they represent various moral values such as filial piety, loyalty, love, benevolence, courtesy, righteousness, honesty and modesty.  This is me standing with another statue of Confuscious, the Chinese phiosopher.

Qu Yuan-he committed suicide to protest against the corruption of the era.

 

Hua Mulan- a woman warrior who disguised herself to join the all male army in place of her father. She was fearless and resourceful and triumphed over her enemies during the 12 years in the military, showing that women are equal to men in intelligence, bravery and capability. (This is the words written on the inscription, not mine but of course I agree.)

                                                                                             Yue Fei- was an eminent general. Born into a poor family he was studious, brave and intelligent. Before departing for war his mother tatooed four characters on his back to exhort him to serve his homeland with loyalty. He won every battle.

Wen Tianxiang- Scholar-general who resisted the invasion of the mongols and refused to yield despite being captured and tortured, today a symbol of patriotism and righteousness

Guan Yu- a general who was instrumental in the collapse of the Han Dynasty and the establishment of the Shu Han of the Three Kingdoms

I seem to have missed taking photos of 2 of the heroes, Zheng He and Lin Zexu, not sure why, maybe the heat had got to me.

The Chinese gardens were unexpectedly interesting and beautifully quiet, I'm going to go back one evening and go up to the top storey of the Pagoda as think it might be a really good spot to see a sunset.