Feast or famine

Notes on grandma's poem:
- 'Holding wine talk heart' represents sitting with friends having a heart to heart talk
- Another Village is probably the name of a restaurant (personal note is I recently ate lunch at a great little restaurant called Green Village)

Poem on Another Village

Fancy abundant table fit for emperial royalty
Carefully meticulously prepared every lovely plated dish
Stay foreign place often as restaurant guest
Holding wine talk hearts content another village

Notes on grandpa's poem:
- On my grandma's poem about Xihu (West Lake) I had the same note: there is a Chinese saying: "Upwards has heaven, downwards has Su Hang" referring to Suzhou and Hangzhou which are two places famous for scenery and natural beauty.
- The word used for medicine can also mean copy book papers for learning to write
- Dragon Well tea is famous for its taste
- a note on wind imagery: Chinese often use wind description to connote attitudes like bravado and tranquility. Every ordinal has a feel: eastern is happy, northern is cold and cruel, southern is warm and kind. Chinese people say they 'drink northwesterly wind' when they've lost their jobs and can't provide for their families, or do work with little reward. There is an expression about spring wind that means everything is going your way. and you are pleased with yourself.
- Similar to western thought, sunset represents sadness, closure, ending; and sunrise as hopeful and glorious beginning.

The Scene at Suzhou Train Station

Suzhou city old post noisy crowded hubbub
Short houses desolated depressed four five homes
Thin bones struggle clothes hanging shoes ragged
Ambition and dreams disappear temple hair white
Blanket bit vendors sell Mount Han medicine
Broken stove crudely boils Dragon Well tea
Gusting cold harsh wind doors half closed
Shop doors dark shadowy sun sets west