Berichte von 05/2013

30Mai
2013

Beijing, a Chinese wedding and the last few days

Dear everyone,

it´s almost time to pack my bags and return back home, but before that I still have some new stories and impresisons for you.

I really enjoyed the rest of my weekend in Beijing. On Sunday, I went to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square and also visited Pangjiayuan Flea Market. The Forbidden City was just beautiful! The entrance was very impressive, but also very crowded. Once again it came in handy that I am about a head taller than everyone else here, because otherwise it would have been more than difficult to see something. While waiting in line to purchase a ticket (which by the way was only about 2 € due to my student ID), I got to know a very nice Canadian who was traveling alone as well and we decided to spend the day together. She just returned from a 2 week teacher exchange in a closeby city and enjoyed her last few days in Beijing before returning to Canada, so we spent the day exchanging our China experiences and talking about how much we were looking forward to going home. Back to the Forbidden City: It is a maze of buildings and temples and was more than impressive. The Chinese emperors used to live there, and every building had its own function, like for example the "Hall of Earthly Tranquility", which turned out to simply be a very fancy name for the emperor´s bedroom. There were also some buildings that belonged to the emperor´s concubines and the electronic guide told their often moving and dramatic stories.

the entrance to the Forbidden City inside the Forbidden City the electronic guide Forbidden City one of the bedrooms in the Forbidden City

After visiting Tiananmen Square at noon, we continued to Pangjiayuan Flea Market, where you could buy lots of paintings, jewellery, clothes and other small things. I had found out about this Flea Market from a website with "secret" Beijing highlights and I can really recommend the Flea Market to anyone visiting Beijing! It was a lot of fun and offered a variety of Chinese knickknacks that are nice as souvenirs or gifts.

Pangjiayuan Flea Market Pangjiayuan Flea Market

The Monday after, I visited the Summer Palace, where I met two friends that are currently au - pairs in Beijing. It was a wonderful day, also concerning the weather and the pollution and I really enjoyed walking around the Palace gardens and the lake in front of it. Summer Palace is built on a hill and surrounded by woods, where you can stroll along small paths and discover little bridges and temples. At the foot of the hill is a lake where you can go on dragon boat rides or just walk along the promenade.

Summer Palace Summer Palace Summer Palace Summer Palace Summer Palace Summer Palace

Later that day I took the high speed train home to Shanghai and arrived there at about 9 pm. I really loved Beijing and I think I would choose it over Shanghai anytime.

Later that week I went to a KTV (karaoke place) with my whole Chinese class. I knew that Chinese are crazy about their karaoke, but what I found there exceeded my expectations. The place had small rooms that were equipped with couches, chairs and a bar and each room had its own light show system so that the visitors could pick the lighting they wanted to accompany their singing. Each room also had 3 or 4 microphones, so people could sing together and food and beverages could be ordered to the rooms. It was a really fun experience, especially since my teacher had given me a Chinese song to prepare, which I sang lateron. I still don´t know what I was singing about, but it was a nice song and I really liked it.

Last Sunday, I had another very interesting encounter with Chinese culture: a Chinese wedding. My former Chinese teacher, which I had had the first 5 weeks of my stay, got married and invited the 3 guys in my class and me to the festivities. We were seated at the bride´s and groom´s table right in front of the stage and had a great view on everything that was going on. And there were plenty of things going on...Where should I start? Maybe the ceremony. There were two ceremonies: First, a Western ceremony and then a Chinese one. During the Western ceremony, the bride wore a beautiful white wedding dress, rings were exchanged and they said vows to each other (at least that´s what I think it was, since everything was in Chinese and I didn´t understand a word).

the happy couple :)

After this, the bride changed her gown to a traditional Chinese qipao and there were some more vows. Then, the groom´s parents entered the stage and the couple thanked them for their support.

the traditional wedding outfit don´t get too excited! This wedding cake is indeed fake and was only used for taking pictures

The food served at the wedding was very interesting. There was for example cow tongue and turtle soup, but nevertheless we stuck to the things we knew and had lobster, fish and vegetables.

lobster turtle soup everyone received a little box with chocolates

During the dinner, the couple toasted to each table and we discovered another interesting Chinese habit: emptying glasses. After every toast, the Chinese guests would empty their glasses, no matter how full they were. Half glass of red wine? Gone within seconds. It was interesting. Overall, the whole event took about 2 hours, which is very different to a German wedding, that usually goes on until early in the morning. Nevertheless, it was a very interesting experience and another thing to cross off my bucket list ;)

Meanwhile, the period of "last times" has arrived. Today is my last day at work and next week, I will have all my classes for the last time and turn in the last essays and finals. I am slowly preparing for leaving, getting my stuff together and doing things that I haven´t crossed off my list yet. Next Thursday will be a farewell lunch, for which I was appointed as one of the hosts and then, it will be time to say goodbye.

I will give you one last update next week,

Until then,

Marie

18Mai
2013

busy, busy

My dear friends,

I know I left you high and dry for the past few weeks, but I´ll try to make up for it with this report. I don´t even really know where to start. Since it´s almost the end of the semester I´ve had to do a lot of work for my classes at Fudan University: writing papers, doing case studies, preparing presentations, and next week we will even shoot a movie in Chinese class, for which we had to make up a story, write the dialogues and think of costumes etc...This plus working 2,5 days a week and traveling has kept me so busy, that I couldn´t find time to let you know what I´ve been up to lately, so here´s my chance.

One night we had a traditional Chinese dinner with our course coordinator and language buddies: Hot Pot. It is like a kind of Chinese fondue, except really, really (and by that I mean REALLY) spicy. For me it was difficult to eat even one bite without breaking out in sweat. Luckily, there was also a non - spicy version, which was mostly eaten by us Westerners. Here´s how it works: you have a bunch of different meats, vegetables, tofu, fish, dumplings etc. and just throw them into the cooking liquid. Once you think it´s done, you fish it back out and voilà, there´s your first bite :) Getting the food out with chopsticks actually is quite hard, so we were provided with soup ladles to make it a little easier for us.

hot pot

One of my tours lately lead me to Shanghai Zoo. It really is bautiful, has an amazing park - like outlay and makes you forget that there are 23 million people around you. It´s an oasis of peace and quiet and: it has pandas!! I´ve always wanted to see one and since they are not allowed in German zoos, I took my chance and saw one in Shanghai.

panda :)

The conditions the animals are living under actually aren´t that bad, probably comparable to German zoos. I heard that´s not normal for Chinese zoos though. Beijing zoo for example is said to be close to animal torture.

Another day, I went downtown to Pudong, to discover the World Financial Tower. It has the highest viewing platform in the world (100th floor) and is partly floored with glass. You have a beautiful view over the city, if the air quality allows it of course. But see for yourselves:

pretty high, huh? seeing the Bund from the other side here´s the proof: I was up there! the World Financial Tower looks like a bottle opener, that´s also its nickname

The following weekend I was invited to a wonderful 2-day trip to closeby Nanjing. We took the high speed train (over 300 km/h --> about 200 miles/h) and so the ride took us only about an hour. Since it was my first time on a Chinese train, I didn´t really think about what the train station would look like and I was really surprised to find myself in an airport - like situation. Before entering the building, everyone has to put their luggage and himself through security (metal detectors, scanners, the whole program). Next you end up in a big hall, similar to the waiting areas in an airport and when wanting to board your train you have to show your ticket in order to get to the platform. Everyone on the train has an assigned seat, so if a train is full, you have to wait for the next one. Quite different to Germany, isn´t it? Also, the trains are pretty comfortable and offer a lot of leg space. And all of that for a very reasonable price! Train schedules are the same, no matter if a weekday or the weekend, a holiday or a normal day, and a 5 minute delay would cause an uproar without compare. It´s your turn, Deutsche Bahn!

Chinese train station the high speed train

Nanjing itself is a very nice city with lots and lots to see, since it was the capital of China for a few dynasties. The most popular tourist spot are probably the mausoleums that are built in the hilly area surrounding Nanjing. Visiting them involves a lot of walking, but it´s definitely worth the effort!

Nanjing view from the mausoleum local sweet dumplings

Last weekend, we joined some sociology majors of Fudan University for a field trip to Wujiang, a small village about 2,5 hours outside of Shanghai. The students were doing a field research there, interviewing locals about their daily life, and asked us to come along. The trip turned out to be really interesting, because we were able to get to know Chinese life in the rural areas and were invited for lunch. Most of the people in the village are growing their own food, so we were able to try a real, Chinese homestyle meal. Take a guess, which part I passed on ;)

lunch I admit, I didn´t try these little buddies

During the interview, we were given tea with sesame seeds, leaves and carrot, a tea that is only offered to special, honorable guests and we felt very flattered. Also, the tea was delicious and although it was a hot day, it was perfect. We were also provided with a snack (self-grown, dried, salted beans), and the interviewed family even gave us a bag of them to take home, because they saw we really liked them.

tea dried beans

We also visited a silk factory that day. So if you´ve ever been wondering where those nice silk shirt come from and how they are produced, here´s the answer!

silk factory silk factory

While I am writing this, I am sitting in a hotel room in Beijing, where I am spending a 4-day trip. It will be my last trip in China, since I´m leaving in 3 weeks. Although Beijing is one of the dirtiest places I´ve ever been to (not only the air, everything seems to be covered in dirt...) I like it a lot more than Shanghai. The people here are a lot friendlier, patient and in general just a lot less ignorant than the people in Shanghai. I realized this right on my first metro ride: Unlike Shanghainese, people in Beijing are actually able to wait until everyone gets off the train at a stop and then enter the train in a line, like they´re supposed to. I love it here.

Yesterday, I visited Lama Temple, right outside of my hotel. Today, I got up at 5:30 am to catch an early train to Badaling, a popular entry spot to the Great Wall. Back in Beijing, I visited the Olympic Stadium in the afternoon and had the obligatory Beijing duck for dinner. It was a wonderful day.

Lama Temple Lama Temple the Great Wall the Great Wall the Great Wall Olympic Stadium Olympic Stadium

So far for today,

I have a busy visiting schedule tomorrow. I will keep you updated and see all of you soon,

Marie