So far China has been a blast! I have traveled to seven cities including Beijing and Shanghai. Apart from traveling. I have kept busy with school, working and learning to play the guitar :).
Living on campus has been nothing short of interesting. Lets begin with the positives:
Negatives:
September
In September I traveled to Wuzhen. Wuzhen is a historic scenic town which displays its history through its ancient stone bridges, stone pathways and delicate wood carvings. Located inside is a museum of what it was like to live in past times. On the same journey, we stopped over at Hangzhou. Hangzhou definitely had more to offer. We went on a boat cruise to an area which had been written about in numerous famous Chinese poems. Although the weather wasn't very nice, it was a nice to go somewhere with a bit of nature.
October Chinese New Year was celebrated in October. The first city I visited in October was Suzhou. Suzhou is such a beautiful and amazing city, definitely my second favorite city (was my first until I recently visited Guangzhou). Suzhou was beautiful and historic but with a hint of the modern lifestyle. We visited an ancient garden which was said to be one the homes of a former minister of a past dynasty. The shopping in Suzhou was awesome! The shopping in China in general is amazing but Suzhou had a specific indoor market that I quite enjoyed.
In October I also visited Shanghai. In spite of its popularity, I didn't really like Shanghai very much. Obviously we have all heard how crowded China is, but until visiting Shanghai, I hadn't really experienced the intensity of its crowds. In Nanjing there are a lot of people, but the number of people that crowd the streets of Shanghai is absolutely insane. Maybe it's because it was China’s independent week? Our three epic days in Shanghai included a hotel located on the bund looking over the pearl tower, street meat and underground shopping!
November
In November I went to Beijing with a couple of the students from Canada to explore. We stayed in a hostel, arriving in the city with just a backpack each. Our hostel was a bit below average but for 30CNY ($5.00) a night, we couldn't expect much. We did meet some really cool travelers who were backpacking like we were. We started on the first day by going to Temple of Heaven.
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We also visited the Forbidden City, Tia’men square, the Fake Market and last but not least, the Great Wall of China. We visited the part of the wall that has been the most re-constructed, called Badaling. It took us about two hours to get to the top. On our last night we also got to eat the ever-so-famous Beijing duck. (Yum!)
I also traveled to China’s biggest shopping city, Guangzhou. I actually have some extended extended family there, so I spent most of the time catching up with them. Guangzhou has been my favorite city so far and I have a plane ticket to go back in February. Being around familiar faces definitely cured any homesickness I had.
December In December, I stayed in Nanjing and didn't travel at all. I did explore the night life a bit more though. The exchange students and I discovered numerous foreign restaurants and hangout spots. Since the foreign population is gradually growing in Nanjing, numerous businesses are opening up to cater to them. I'll be doing quite a bit of traveling in the next few month but I'll write again soon!
Happy New Year to all!