Suzhou lures foreigners based in Shanghai

Jiangsu province's Suzhou city is working to attract more foreigners living in nearby Shanghai to visit for weekends and short trips.

The canal-laced "Venice of China" offers a break from the fast-paced and relatively Western life of Shanghai, a hypermodern metropolis whose colonial history started when it became one of the country's earliest treaty ports in the 1840s and has wiped out many traditional Chinese elements over time.

Suzhou, in contrast, is celebrated for a slow lifestyle and traditional gardens, architecture and culture.