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I do not own the music in this video, copyrighted by the rightful owners. This qigong video was filmed in the Chinese Garden “Kingdom of Ming“ of the Hortus Botanicus of Haren, Groningen (the Netherlands). I feel honoured and grateful that I was granted special permission to film in this beautiful garden. See below for background information on this garden. Qigong playlist: Websites: CHINESE GARDEN - THE KINGDOM OF MING An old Chinese saying goes: 'In heaven there is paradise, on earth there are Hangzhou and Suzhou'. The ancient gardens of Suzhou, considered the most beautiful in China, served as a model for the Chinese garden at the Hortus Botanicus in Haren, Groningen (the Netherlands). During the Ming Dynasty, rich merchants and officials had large private gardens laid out. Here they retreated to devote themselves to nature, painting and poetry. The Chinese garden in Haren is another of those gardens where you can dream away. The garden is designed so that there is something blooming in every season, and even in winter the garden has a beautiful look. This film was shot in early March 2024 (the year of the Wooden Dragon). In a western garden, you often have an immediate overview of the entire garden, but in a Chinese garden, this is precisely not the case. Walking through the Chinese garden is like wandering through a Chinese painting. The galleries with surprising vistas, pavilions, winding paths with changing viewpoints, a pond, an island and a waterfall are meant to make the visitor dream. Thoughts are carried away by the imagination. A Chinese garden is full of symbolism. Apart from plants, water, stones and architecture, written texts play an important role in the experience of the garden. Naming is also important and the pavilions and parts of the garden have been given wonderful names like The Garden of Tea Making, the Thousand Things Pavilion, the Moaning of the Dragon Tea House, the Path through the Forest of eternal Bamboo and the Lake of Red Carp with the Island of the Beloved. The Chinese Garden was named The Hidden Realm when it was opened in 1995 by H.M. Queen Beatrix. THE ORIGINS OF THE CHINESE GARDEN In 1986, a Groningen trade mission visited several cities in China. During a visit to a restaurant near the Long Hua temple in Shanghai, one of the members of the mission said that they 'should have something like this in Groningen too'. And so it happened. Master Le Wei Zong, Shanghai's famous city garden architect, made the first designs during a visit to the Hortus. Shanghai made building materials available and the Netherlands provided the necessary funds. Almost all the material used to build the Chinese garden was shipped from China to the Netherlands, from the stones in the garden and the wood of the pavilions to the furniture of the Moaning of the Dragon Tea House. For seven months, dozens of Chinese workmen laid out the park largely by hand, because 'What you make by hand, you can put your soul into'.
