TravelStream™ news feed for member ilombardo on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/ilombardo en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sun, 27 Sep 2009 00:41:24 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1254019612/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1254019612/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1254019612/tpod.html Sun, 27 Sep 2009 00:41:24 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Macau, China

As of late, I have been on a kick in which I am fascinated by China's colonial history. I've sauntered through the streets of the French Concession in Shanghai, gawked at German architecture and gulped German beer in Qingdao, binged on the British influence in Hong Kong, and that left one more place that I simply HAD to check out as soon as possible on this China trip ... the Portuguese persuasion in Macau.

I didn't have much time. Just an afternoon really. I booked the first flight from Beijing on Saturday morning and my return flight for Sunday afternoon. Some would say that is too far to go for one afternoon. But I had a craving.

I flew into the Hong Kong airport and before going through immigration, hopped on the ferry to Macau. I arrived just after lunch. The first thing you notice as you approach Macau on the ferry are the gleaming new casinos along the waterfront. Macau is a haven for gamblers, because gambling is forbidden in China and heavily controlled in Hong Kong.

But I wasn't there for gambling. I slipped through the bulking buildings, gleaming like gemstones, each one with its own eccentric shape to attract your attention. I headed straight for the old town, and suddenly, I felt like I had stepped out of Asia and into the Mediterranean.

All of a sudden I was walking through narrow, cobblestone streets and winding ways with artful patterns incorporated into the stones. The buildings were low and European-looking, painted in brilliant pastel colors. Decorative white and blue signs were posted on the sides of these buildings with the names of streets (Ruas) in Portuguese and Chinese. Roman Catholic imagery was all around in the form of churches, sculptures, and mosaics.

But yet, it was also Chinese. A European gelateria sandwiched between a Chinese herbalist and an antique furniture store. A Chinese temple built right up against the back of a church. The people, of course, were also overwhelmingly Chinese. Many people stopped me to ask where I was from and to take my picture. Macau, which has a native Chinese population, has also seen an influx of tourists from the Mainland in recent years.

One of the most impressive sights I saw during my afternoon in Macau were the ruins of the Church of St. Paul (Ruinas de Igreja de São Paulo). The church was built by Jesuits in the early 1600s on one of Macau's highest hills; a fire destroyed most of it except for the impressive facade in 1835. It is a haunting sight to see the thin face of the church perched there on the hill; you can almost still see it smoldering. The back of the facade has been equipped with stairs and lookout platforms so you can climb up and peer out of the windows and over the city below.

The food of Macau is also something to behold. I was determined to eat Portuguese food and Portuguese food I ate. For lunch, I dined on fresh bread and homemade vegetable soup in Yes Brazil Restaurant in a tiny alley near the ruins of St. Paul's church. When evening began approaching, I met up with an old friend of mine, Jürg, whom I know from my time in Taiwan, for drinks in the swanky outdoor bar of the Wynn hotel and casino. After sipping Radlers by the pool, we ventured back into the old town and had a lovely Portuguese dinner in Restaurante Platão. We dined on baked eggplant, chicken, and mushrooms, washing it down with a pitcher of sangria and finishing if off with a dish of chocolate mousse. Delicious!

All-in-all, I can say that Macau is a fascinating, vibrant, exciting, and necessary stop on any tour of China. Whether you like to gamble, or just to stroll through historical streets and admire beautiful architecture and stunning contrasts between East and West, you will not be bored in Macau, at least for one afternoon. Two is probably best.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250992263/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250992263/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250992263/tpod.html Sat, 22 Aug 2009 23:33:54 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Sanya, Hainan Province, China

Having quite enjoyed Qingdao, but already half-way through my week off and still craving that beach time, I knew I had to pull some drastic measures. Despite my better (financial) judgment, I hopped a plane to Guangzhou and then to Hainan Island, otherwise known as the "Hawaii of China."

Hainan Island is the southernmost point of China ... south of Hong Kong, Macau, and even south of Hanoi, Vietnam. In keeping with this "southernmost" theme, I chose the town of Sanya, which is the southernmost town on Hainan Island. Sanya provided everything that I had hoped for in a tropical island: clear blue sky, clear blue water, fine white sand, and an abundance of stands selling tropical fruit and local street food. Sanya offers the full gamut of accommodations from five star resorts to penny-pincher youth hostels. I chose the youth hostel option, not so much for the financial savings (though that didn't hurt), but for the promise of company, as I was traveling alone. The Sanya Blue Sky International Youth Hostel, just a five minute walk from Dadonghai Beach, was brimming with like-minded travelers of all ages and professions from all over the world. Jackpot! Immediately upon arrival, I found myself in the company of several students, a teacher, a professor, a doctor, an accountant, and a pilot-in-training, among others, from Sweden, Scotland, England, Canada, Iceland, Brazil, Germany, Austria, Australia, he Netherlands, and China, not in that order.

Besides hanging out with these people, my two and a half days in Sanya consisted of regular intervals along a two-point axis from the hostel to Dadonghai Beach. I deviated twice from this axis, once to hear a live band in a Sanya bar (cheesy Chinese cover band performing your favorite tunes from the Vietnam War years) and once to explore Yalongwan Beach with Patrick and Amanda. Yalongwan Beach was supposedly even more beautiful than Dadonghai Beach, and also supposedly 40 minutes from our hostel by bus, except that it took us a lot longer because the bus got a flat tire and we had to stop while they fixed it. This ended up being a blessing in disguise, because as soon as the bus had stopped, Amanda got hit with a sudden bout of "la duzi" (spicy stomach), and the break provided an opportune time for her to run shrieking from the bus for a bathroom. (Amanda, sorry if you wanted to keep that quiet, but my regular travelpod readers know that I have experienced this very same problem more times than I care to admit while traveling in China. It made me feel warm and fuzzy to see someone else going through the same thing.)

As for Yalongwan Beach, I wouldn't say it was any more beautiful than Dadonghai Beach. It was more tranquil because it didn't have waves, and the water was like crystal. It also had many more Chinese tourists, many of them wearing the same island-themed shirt and pants ensembles. Patrick, Amanda, and I stood out quite drastically as Westerners on Yalongwan Beach, and we attracted an audience as we swam and did gymnastics in the water.

Other than these two excursions, I really just spent my time in Sanya sleeping, eating fruit, applying sunscreen, chatting with people, playing the hostel's guitar that was missing the d-string, swimming, lying on the beach, eating yoghurt, swimming, applying sunscreen, sleeping, swimming, eating street food, sleeping, eating seafood, chatting, lying on the beach, etc. It was exactly the island experience I had been hoping for.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250592720/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250592720/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1250592720/tpod.html Tue, 18 Aug 2009 09:10:45 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Qingdao, Shandong, China

It was bound to happen. I had high hopes for Qingdao. Home of the 2008 Olympic sailing competition. Home of the Tsingtao Beer brewery. Former German colony with the architecture to prove it. I had been looking forward to going to Qingdao for a long time. Now was my chance.

I hopped a high-speed train (200 km/h at its fastest) from Beijing on Monday evening and arrived in Qingdao six hours later. Tuesday morning had me up early walking down Nanjing Lu to the beach. This was the disappointment. Qingdao means "clear island" in Chinese, and so I guess I was expecting it to be natural, clean, and ... well ... clear. It wasn't. I'm sure the waters were clear once, but they were apparently no match for the large metropolis that was pushed right up against them. As it is currently peak season, it was also quite crowded. What was perhaps one hundred years ago an oasis of lush green mountains spilling into a clear blue sea has given way to smog, trash, overpopulation, propoganda posters, pink plastic bathing tubes, and whatever pollutant it is that makes the water murky silver. Even the supposedly lesser-known beach ten minutes outside of the city by taxi was shrouded in a light haze and littering tourists. This beach was less crowded than the city beaches, but a wafting landfill off to the side quenched my hopes of catching R&R on its hard-packed sands.

So the beaches a bust, I did the most logical thing I could think of ... I headed to the Tsingtao Beer brewery. This part of the city did not disappoint. Built by German colonists in 1903 (they lost it to the Japanese in 1914,) the original buildings of this brewery are still in use. If there is one thing Germans can do, it is build things to last. Much of the original equipment used over one hundred years ago still exists and is on display in the museum portion of the brewery. They have an original motor built by Siemens for pumping beer that still runs to this day. It is not in use anymore, but periodically, they turn it on to see if it still works. It does. For RMB 40 (approx. $6) I had a personal, English-speaking tour guide take me through the factory and explain all this to me. Then it was time to drink raw beer, only served at the factory. This is the freshest beer you can get, unfiltered, direct from the fermentation tank. What a taste! The flavor was so fresh and so smooth that it gave me goose bumps. Unfortunately, it only keeps for one day, so you have to drink it right away. The rest gets filtered and bottled for sale outside of Qingdao. If you have a chance in your lifetime, I highly recommend that you make the pilgrimage to Qingdao and drink raw beer from the factory. I can still feel the zing on my tongue.

The rest of my time there I spent wandering around the city admiring the hundreds of German buildings built at the turn of last century that have survived while China has shot up around them. They are in varying states of repair and disrepair, but overall, Qingdao seems very proud of its German heritage and has worked to preserve these buildings, most notably the train station and the Roman Catholic Cathedral in the middle of the city. It was very interesting to be standing in the cobblestone square in front of the large stone church (once a very tranquil place, I am sure) with the sounds and smells of the dried fish market drifting in from the next street over. And the visual effect of hundred-year-old Tudor houses standing among the frail, corregated steel street stalls of China was remarkable to say the least. The contrast between Germany and China could not have been more stark.

So I had expected to go to Qingdao for sun and sand and ended up getting a German history lesson and the freshest beer I have ever tasted. All-in-all I'd say it was definitely worth it. And my next travel destination provided all the sun and sand I could have ever asked for.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237453560/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237453560/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237453560/tpod.html Thu, 19 Mar 2009 05:14:57 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Chengde, China

Work in progress...
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237099140/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237099140/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237099140/tpod.html Thu, 19 Mar 2009 02:39:39 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Chengde, China

Work in progress...
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237080360/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237080360/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237080360/tpod.html Wed, 18 Mar 2009 23:44:46 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Chengde, China

Work in progress...
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237079280/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237079280/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1237079280/tpod.html Sun, 15 Mar 2009 21:25:31 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Beijing, China

Work in progress...
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/hangzhou2006/1154267580/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/hangzhou2006/1154267580/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/hangzhou2006/1154267580/tpod.html Tue, 23 Dec 2008 17:11:31 -0500 Off to China to take a 6-week immersion language course in Mandarin. Wish me luck, I'm not allowed to speak English the whole time!!!

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Nanji Island, China

We arrived on Nanji Island on Saturday just in time for dinner. We students were welcomed in our guesthouse with an elaborate seafood spread, which I thought was because we were special, but it really was because seafood is all they have to offer on Nanji Island. This is fine by me, because I love seafood, however, I must say that eating seafood in China is a lot of work. Fish still have all of their bones and crustaceans still have all of their crusts. We were served a plate of crabs that looked like they had just crawled out of the ocean, full body armor and all. I took one with my chopsticks, put it on my plate, and puzzled for a moment. I said to my teacher, "The waitress forgot to bring us tools."
"What do you mean, tools?" my teacher asked.
"You know...tools...to pick the crab apart...hammer...pliers, etc."
"You use your teeth," she said, and she pulled a claw off of her crab and bit down on it until it broke.

After dinner, a bunch of us students took a walk down to the beach to see what we could see. It was just about dark and the first stars were coming out. We took off our shoes and began splashing around in the waves. Before we knew it had gotten really dark (not many lights to speak of on Nanji Island,) and stars were just popping out until the whole sky was illuminated in a dazzling celestial display. I had never seen so many stars in my life. The Milky Way was sparkling in all its glory. I just stood there, waves lapping at my feet, head tipped back, mouth open, eyes ogling the sky. Then the real treat began. Shooting stars. There was one about every ten minutes. I saw five total. My classmates saw more. In my whole life up until now I have only ever seen two shooting stars. To see five in one night really felt like a special treat.

Because we were getting up early the next day to watch the sunrise, I decided to call it a night early on Saturday (of course, this was after drinking one beer under the stars with my classmates.) I got back to the guesthouse around 9pm, hoping to take a shower before bed. When I got into the shower, I discovered that the hot water had been turned off. I had suspected that this might be the case, because our program director had told us that the hot water would be shut off at 7:30pm, but I just figured he was lying. He wasn't. I took a very quick, cold shower, which I actually didn't mind because we had been asked not to turn on the air conditioning. Then I crawled into board. I mean bed. That's what it was, of course...a board...with a blanket over it. Nanji Island is not world renowned for its luxury accommodations. (It is, however, known for its breathtaking, pristine ocean scenery, that I dare say, was just as pretty, if not prettier, than the southern coast of Taiwan.)

When the alarm went off at 4:15am, I was more than happy to get up and go to watch the sunrise. (I have a theory developing that China's rapid economic development can be attributed to the hardness of their beds. Think about it...who wants to sleep when it's actually more comfortable to get up and go to work?) Those of us that made it out of board were herded onto rickety busses that emitted pungent fumes. I wasn't quite in the mood for the smell of diesel so early in the morning, so I rolled up my window only to discover that the driver was smoking a cigarette. So, I rolled down my window again, preferring the other fumes. When we arrived at the sunrise viewing point 20 minutes later, we had to wait another hour for the sun to make its appearance. There were stubborn clouds blocking our view, but eventually the sun emerged and it was beautiful. Thus, a day of wandering, swimming, frolicking on the beach, and eating, you guessed it, seafood, commenced.

We had lunch on Nanji Island's main (only) street, which is lined with "restaurants" (read: shacks that server food.) Rather then offering menus, the "restaurants" display all of their recently caught seafood (still alive) in large red bins out on the street. You walk by and specifically pick out who you want to eat. While this is the freshest possible way to eat seafood, it can be a little unsettling. My friends and I decided that we wanted to try eel, so we ordered eel, and then I watched the waitress walk over to a tank, dip both of her (bare) hands in, and pull out a two foot long (wriggling) eel. This eel was not so keen on being eaten by us, and he squirmed out of the waitress's grasp, leapt to the floor, and slithered under a table. The waitress chased him down and grabbed him up, only to lose hold of him again. Three times the eel broke free and slithered along the floor until she finally grabbed him good and disappeared into the back. Ten minutes later he was cooked and on our plates. Part of me didn't feel right eating him after that, not just because he had been swimming around on the muddy floor, but mostly because his futile struggle for life had touched me. Then again, I don't think he was having too great a time of it in that little tank, so maybe it's best we put him out of his misery. And into our mouths. Where he tasted goooood.

At five o'clock, our day on the island had come to an end. Despite applying multiple coats of sunscreen, we were all sunburned and ready to wrap up our midterm/resort weekend. After a one-hour boat ride back to Rui An, and a five-hour bus ride back to Hangzhou, we arrived at our dorm at the wee hour of 1am. Our teachers took pity on us and agreed to start class Monday morning at 9 instead of 8am. I guess that's one advantage of hanging out with your teachers 24/7.

With that, another week of intensive Chinese begins. I hope all is well at home.

~Your Yin Yin
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221544380/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221544380/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221544380/tpod.html Wed, 24 Sep 2008 02:55:17 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Beijing, China

I admit it. I was one of those people before the Olympics who said that Beijing would never pull off the Olympics like they had promised. Now, it can be debated whether or not it really was a "Green" Olympics, and it has in fact been hotly debated whether China fulfilled the improved human rights and increased media freedom promises that it made before the Games. However, one thing is for certain, regardless of the means the Chinese government used to make it that way...it was a spectacular Games!

I missed the actual Games, of course. But the minute I arrived in Beijing, it was immediately apparent that much had changed from just a few months ago. Friendly volunteers with Olympic armbands greeted me at the airport. Everywhere hung signs for the Paralympics. The traffic was notably less. The air was notably clearer. Buildings that had still been under construction when I left Beijing in May had been completed. Even more flowers had been planted. The Olympics had already been declared a success. Beijing was glowing.

The day after I arrived was the Opening Ceremonies for the Paralympic Games. It showed on all the same TV stations that the Olympics showed and was just as extravagant. In fact, the flame was never extinguished in between the Olympics and Paralympics. They kept it lit and brought it out again to light the Paralympic torch. As the grand finale of the Paralympic Opening Ceremonies, a man in a wheelchair hoisted himself all the way to the roof of the stadium with ropes to light the torch. It was a marvelous spectacle. Flipping through the channels over the next days, one could see wheelchair basketball, wheelchair tennis wheelchair ping pong., blind swimming and track and field, etc...all of the events from the Olympics and even some new events featuring athletes with all different kinds of disabilities.

When I heard that a business contact of our office might have extra tickets, I called her up immediately. She had two extras for wheelchair rugby. Score!

I went to the match with my Chinese friend, Frank. It was at the gymnasium of the Beijing and Science and Technology University. The tickets were for two matches: Canada vs. Great Britain for the Bronze, and then United States vs. Australia for the Gold (both teams previously undefeated).

Now, wheelchair rugby is a very exciting sport. It is played on a basketball-like court. The players have what look like steel-reinforced wheelchairs. To score a point, you just have to roll across the other team's goal line with the ball. The person that has the ball can hold it for ten seconds, then he has to dribble it or pass it. To stop him, the other team cannot touch any part of the ballholder's body, but they can grab at the ball, physically block his path with their wheelchairs, or...or...or...they can SLAM him as hard as they can to knock him off course. (I know what you are thinking, and yes, it is just like bumper cars.) As you can imagine, it is a very LOUD and fast-paced game. And they get some SPEED going with those wheelchairs. People get knocked over.

Add to that a packed house of rowdy fans screaming their heads off. The athletes said they had never been so well received as in China. Really, for all the Paralympic events, there were record breaking crowds and enthusiastic fans. I have to give hats off to China for this one. People are saying that they elevated the Paralympics to a level never seen before, a level that London is going to try to match in 2012. Bravo, Beijing!

So, at the end of the evening, I got to witness the United States win a Gold medal in China. That meant that the U.S. flag was hoisted in the highest position and the U.S. national anthem played. It was a very moving experience, to say the least.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221397380/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221397380/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/ilombardo/beijing2007/1221397380/tpod.html Sun, 21 Sep 2008 11:31:46 -0400 Here I go again. China! Wee!

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Beidaihe, Hebei, China

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival everyone. This Chinese holiday is celebrated on the evening of the eighth full moon of the year. This has traditionally been harvest time, and the full moon of this month is especially round and especially bright. In order to pay proper homage to the harvest moon, the Chinese have a three day weekend. Because I happen to currently be in China on business, that means that I have a three day weekend too. Woohoo!

What better way to spend a three day weekend than to go to the beach? A three hour train ride from Beijing is the Communist Party's former favorite vacation digs, a seaside resort called Beidaihe. The Party often used to come here to "work," but current Chinese President Hu Jintao decided that holding "meetings" at the beachside resort did not really fit into the proletarian image that the party was trying to project. So, the CPC has shied away from holding big meetings at Beidaihe, which means that there was more room for me during Mid-Autumn Festival. Woohoo!

My friend Jonas and I left Sunday morning from Beijing on the train. The day before, I had bought us two tickets going there, but there were no tickets available for the return trip. We also had no idea where we would stay. We decided to risk it and go anyway. On the way there, Jonas and I happened to be sitting next to a very friendly Chinese couple, whose names were Yao and Liu, who decided to take us under their wing. When we arrived at Beidaihe, they helped us find a hotel, and also arranged for us to get train tickets back. Score! To thank them, Jonas and I treated them to an extravagant seafood dinner Sunday evening. More on the seafood dinner later.

So, Beidaihe is not only a traditional favorite vacation spot for China's leaders (Mao Zedong is reported to have had a vacation house there,) but it also happens to be the closest beach to Russia. Read: lots of Cyrillic writing everywhere and lots of Russians wearing tiny Speedo-style bathing suits.

The beach itself is a respectable beach, with fine white sand. The town is vibrant with seafood restaurants, hotels, and shops selling seashell necklaces and inflatable beach toys. There was also a fair amount of European-style architecture built by the Russians and the European colonial powers that inhabited China at the beginning of the 20th century.

After getting settled in our hotel, which was a bit of an ordeal because the first hotel that Yao and Liu wanted to take us to refused to accept foreigners and the second hotel said no foreigners at first, but then changed their minds when they heard that I could speak Chinese. It also helped that we enthusiastically took pictures in front of the huge Mao bust that they had in the lobby. So that finally settled, Jonas and I hit the beach. The water was a green/gray color and a nice temperature for swimming. I was surprised to see many, many Chinese people in the water, which is not something that you see very much in Taiwan. I can't say that the water felt very clean, and there was the occasional piece of trash floating by, but hey, when you need to swim, you need to swim. Jonas and I both swam, and we haven't developed any serious health problems yet.

After a few hours of swimming and sunbathing, Jonas and I met up with Yao and Liu for dinner. Yao's and Liu's major purpose in going to Beidaihe was to eat seafood. But not just any seafood. They knew of a seafood market where you go and pick out your seafood, which is all still alive in tanks. Then, you carry your seafood squirming and wriggling in plastic bags to a restaurant, where you then haggle over the price for them to cook it. In the end, you end up with a table spilling over with cooked seafood and somehow, you have to eat it all...with chopsticks. We had prawns, seasnails, crabs, cucumbers, and a plate of strange sea creatures that look like a cross between a lobster and a crawfish, called pipixia. We ate our faces off, and also drank our share of Qingdao beer, despite being told by several Chinese people that it was dangerous to drink beer and eat seafood at the same time. We ignored their warning, and enjoyed ourselves immensely at the time, but Jonas and I were both a bit queasy afterwards.

The unexpected treats continued when, after dinner, Yao and Liu wanted to go for a walk on the beach. I was picturing a dark and quiet beach scene with twinkling stars and the soothing sound of waves lapping at the shore. Instead, we were greeted by a raging beach party. We got there around 10pm, and there were stadium lights flooding the beach, people swimming, people riding around in paddle boats, a karaoke bar, fireworks, and the best part...hundreds of people celebrating Mid-Autumn Festival by writing prayers on paper lanterns, lighting them, and sending them flying up into the sky. It was a surreal spectacle.

Jonas had the idea to buy our own lantern and try to light it and fly it by ourselves. Unfortunately, we had technical difficulties and sent our first flaming lantern flying into this poor guy's head. It then fell to the ground and combusted. We bought a second lantern, and this time a group of Chinese people came running to help us (I guess they didn't want us taking anybody else out with another flaming lantern.) Our second lantern, with the help of the experts, flew away beautifully. Then they made us sing karaoke with them.

The next day, Jonas and I hit the beach again, and then we met back up with Yao and Liu for the trainride home. It was packed, with people standing and sitting in the aisles. But thanks to Yao and Liu, Jonas and I both had seats. It was a memorable weekend in China, to say the least.
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