Nanjing

This weekend we took our first weekend trip. Thirteen of us went to Nanjing for a weekend trip. I expected Nanjing to be rather underdeveloped, but as the Southern capital of China, it is much more modern than I thought. We arrived at the train station after our first big Chinese test and took the train to Nanjing. The train ride was a little over 2 hours, and once we arrived we went to our hotel to check in. The hotel was centrally located and our rooms were sizeable and comfortable for the $17 we each paid for two nights. That night we took the subway near our hotel (Nanjing only has one line in the whole city) to a market with restaurants and shops. On our way to the subway, we discovered an underground food market with all types of foods and sweets. Although we were headed to another location, we decided we would explore this market more later on. Once we were downtown, we looked around and ate dinner before heading back to the hotel. At the street market, there were so many lights and interesting buildings, and it reminded me somewhat of Las Vegas, except for the lights turned off promptly at 10pm.


Early the next morning we woke up and caught a taxi on our way to Nanjing’s Purple Mountain. The mountain was absolutely beautiful, and you would never guess that a bustling city resided merely 10 minutes away. We bought a student pass to see all the sights on the mountain including Dr. Sun Yatsen’s mausoleum, the Ming Tombs, and the Ling Gu temple. We conquered many stairs and passes up the mountain, and it truly felt like we were back in nature away from the pollution and dirtiness of China’s urban locale. I could definitely breathe easier, literally, up above the fog layer that surrounded the mountains. I bet on a spring day the view would be amazing, but I was just appreciative that the predicted rainstorm didn’t surface.



After all our hiking, we had worked up quite an appetite, so we headed towards the direction of our next destination: Fuzi Maio (Confucius Temple). The taxi let us out on a main road and we stumbled upon an alley that would satisfy all of our culinary desires. We first found thin pancakes studded with green onion, and then we met one of the nicest ladies who sold us 包子 (pronounced: baozi, buns with meat or vegetables inside) for $.05! If I haven’t impressed it enough, it will be depressingly hard to return to the prices in America. We walked through the alley, which we soon realized was a lilong. Lilongs were popularized in the days of Mao’s Great Leap Forward, when communes were created from rows of tiny huts. This alley was lined with food vendors, who transformed their living rooms into shops to sell their foodstuffs. They had everything from breads, dumplings, handmade noodles, fresh fish, rice, sweets, red bean everything, and fresh meat. When I say fresh meat I mean cages of chickens that they kill on the spot. I realized this while I was trying to take a picture of the hundreds of chickens, and the vendor thought it would be entertaining to show me how he kills the chicken by breaking its neck. Needless to say, I lost my appetite. Two little children took my mind off that scene by following us and calling us (aiyi), a formal name for those much older than you. I’m pretty sure they had never seen foreigners before.



In Nanjing, I saw one other 外国人 (foreigner) the whole time I was there, and it was at a Westernized bar. So many of the locals stared with their mouths gaped open in surprise. I have gotten somewhat used to the stares and comments, however, Chinese people don’t know that I can understand what they are saying about me, which can be very entertaining when I reply to their comments. About 99% of the time they comment about how white my skin is by calling me milky faced, or they point to my blue eyes with surprise, which makes sense, because I don’t recall ever meeting any Asians with blue eyes. A funny side story: I was in Walmart my first week here, and a salesperson gave me a free sample vial of “whitening emulsion.” She told me it would help my face retain its level of paleness, and I’m pretty sure it was some type of bleaching concoction. Obviously, I have no intention to use this product. Once, my friend and I were walking and a Shanghai local pointed to him and remarked to her friend that he had a huge nose. Being one of the more fluent speakers on my program, he turned around and acknowledged her criticism. She quickly walked in the other direction extremely embarrassed, because they are highly unaccustomed to foreigners who speak any Mandarin.



After navigating the lilong, we ventured to meet our other friends at the Confucius Temple. Although it was closed we could see the traditional buildings and walked around the surrounding markets. We headed back to the hotel to take a short nap, because all our adventuring had led to many miles of walking, and we were exhausted. We woke up and went to dinner at a hot pot restaurant nearby. Hot pot is a very social meal, because you share around one pot and it is custom to stay for 2-3 hours eating and drinking. We ending up leaving around 11pm to find a bar or club. Our recommendation led us to a very Americanized bar, and the only people there were foreigners who gave us directions to a better spot they were also headed to. They told us to go to a bar/club district called 1912, which I read about in all my guidebooks that mentioned Nanjing’s nightlife. We went to a club called Mazzo, where there was a good mix of locals and foreigners. We reserved a table with bottle service, which I reserve for special occasions in the states, but here it is extremely reasonable and convenient. The DJ was playing popular American songs, C-Pop, and K-Pop (Asian pop music is characterized by adding the first letter of the country before the word pop, for example C-Pop is Chinese pop, J-Pop Japanese, and K-Pop Korean.) One of the girls on my program has lived in Korea for most of her life, and has introduced us to some amazing Korean pop, which is the most popular of any of the Asian groups. We stayed there quite late dancing, drinking, and comparing our adventures that day. We ended up leaving around 4, and I prepared myself to get little sleep, as I wanted to get up early the next day to see the Nanjing Massacre Museum before we caught our return train.



I woke up and went to the food market to pick up some breakfast before walking to the Presidential Palace near our hotel. It was an amazing and extensive property that had used by previous rulers until it was turned into a museum. It was a walled property that housed beautiful gardens. We sat in the gardens and could see the skyscrapers just outside the palace. The gardens were a peaceful retreat from a busy city, and there weren’t many visitors, because tourists generally visit in the spring. From the palace, we took a taxi to the Nanjing Massacre Museum. Upon entering, I felt similarly to when I visited the Dachau concentration camp in Germany. It was a very austere set up with stone monuments and rock gardens. The memorial was built in 1985 to honor the 300,000 victims of the Rape of Nanjing. This museum was a total downer, but only because it was so informative that you actually felt like you were in the war watching these people experience atrocities. I came out with a new historical understanding of Sino-Japan relations and events leading up to WWII. I'm happy I went, because it really is the most important historical event in Nanjing. Afterward, we went back to the hotel to check out and sat down to have some Japanese noodles before catching the subway to the train station. Once I boarded the train, I fell asleep for the entire duration. When we got back to Shanghai it was raining pretty hard, so we took a taxi back to our apartment, grabbed dinner to go, and stayed in for the night. Luckily I didn't have too much homework to do, so I planned a full week of Shanghai exploration!




Chinese Word of the Day: 外国人 (waiguoren: foreigner)