Hangzhou - NSC Trip

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Hangzhou, a sub-provincial city southwest of Shanghai, is most famous for its historic and scenic places like the West Lake and Ling Yin Temple. It's a beautiful city - more trees, less pollution than Shanghai...and of course, lakes.

Friday night, I had the opportunity to go out to a pub and hang with fellow interns, however, being that I'd have to be awake and coherent at 6a.m. Saturday morning, I chose not too go out. Lame? Maybe, but when my Peruvian friend, Bosco, practically crawled through the metro to meet up with the other interns at in the Shanghai South Railway Station, I felt a lot better about my decision.

We took a bus from Shanghai to Hangzhou at 9:10a.m. and it was about a two-hour-death-defying extravaganza in the bus. It really should be a requirement for tourists to travel around China in bus - the traffic jams, bus drivers and everything else just adds so much to the experience.

On the bus, all the interns (minus Bosco who tried very hard not to throw-up due to his hangover) talked about China and their experiences thus far - taxi rides, food, NSC, etc.
I was slightly distracted becuase the Red Wings Stanley Cup Final was on back in the states. Matt, from Indiana, got several updates from his family back home and I practically died when i read the text that said: "Penguins win stanley cup. 2-1 win over the Wings." I proceeded to be utterly depressed for the next hour and refused to discuss the loss - other than to say how completely sad I was...and still am. Those cheeky Penguins!!

After having arrived in Hangzhou, priority numero uno was to get a bus. We had a few options: take a big tour bus with loads of people or a smaller one, just big enough to hold nine of us. Obviously, for the sake of deciding what we wanted to do and when we wanted to do it, we chose the smaller bus. And this is where gets interesting...

Have you ever watched those extreme-traveler shows? You know, the shows that provide viewers with stories of travelers who walk through creepy alleys just to get to a van that will drive them to some tourist attraction, but really, the driver of the van kidnaps the travelers instead. Well, it's clear to me now that sketchy vehicles and creepy alleys in U.S. are equivelant to those stories. Nobody in the U.S. hops in a creepy van - ever heard of death on wheels?! Absolutely not a good idea. In China, however, - or in Thailand or Africa - it's a completely different story.

So, we got in the van, made a quick pitstop at the railway station to pick up our return-trip tickets and then headed to Ling Yin Temple. Ling Yin Temple was beautiful. I've never seen so many Buddas in my life - big, small, thin, fat, happy and sad Buddas. We went into caves and climbed very slippery, steep steps to see many of the buddas.

Other things we did:

We had lunch...always a good thing, right? I ate some shrimp, veggies, spicy beef, pumpkin paties (dessert) and they were so good. We also had flowered tea, some mystery meat, and two buckets of rice. Logan, intern, and I tried to order snakehead, but the restaurant was all out of it. Such a bummer.

After lunch, we walked around West Lake a bit and then we walked on a famous bride where lovers go. Oh la la.

All in all, it was a nice trip: got out of the city a bit, saw some buddas, ate good food, etc.

I had hoped to shower and freshen up before going out to Hot Pot (restuarant) to celebratre Riina departure, but I was running late as it was so I skipped the shower and hurried my little tush to meet up with the gang. I got to Hot Pot, just in time because they were finishing up. After dinner, we went to Bulldog - classic Irish bar the ladies love to go to. Riina and I left Bulldog at about 12:30ish in the morning. Both of us wanted to stay longer, but she had to be up at 5:45a.m. to go to the airport and I was her second alarm. Sooooo early.

Fortunately for me, I was able to squeeze in a few extra hours of rest before my Mandarin lesson at 10:30a.m.

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Comments

[Vernia McCullough]

Mandarin lessons
This is the first mention of your mandarin lessons and I so enjoyed the card with the caption in Chinese! The lessons are really helping-Love Mom