Chengdu: giant pandas and teahouse life

The Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding houses dozens of specimens in an environment recreated to resemble their natural habitat as closely as possible, with a nursery center where you can observe cubs born in the current year.

The Wenshu Temple, the best-preserved Buddhist monastery in the city, combines prayer halls with an internal teahouse where the monks themselves serve vegetarian dishes from the local tradition to visitors.

The Kuanzhai Xiangzi district, three parallel lanes dating to the Qing dynasty, preserves traditional architecture in an area now occupied by boutiques, teahouses, and Sichuan opera face-changing performances.

At Renmin Park, the local ritual of sitting down for tea is accompanied by daily scenes of professional ear cleaning, a traveling service passed down through generations in the city.

It's hard to think of another city where watching pandas at a research center and having your ears cleaned in a public park are both normal experiences in the same afternoon.

Kuanzhai Xiangzi, among the three Qing alleys, remains perhaps the place where that coexistence of ancient and everyday is most clearly seen elsewhere in the city.