Changsha #2: Hunan Provincial Museum and Orange Island

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I woke up having not had the best night's sleep. Changsha is a pretty noisy city, that never stops, and the windows in my room seemed to lack adequate soundproofing. First stop of the day was coffee. I had spotted a Starbucks on the main street the previous day so headed there. As I was walking along the street, I passed a few live streamers and wondered what they were streaming about as they were in front of the now shut bars and clubs. I made my way to Starbucks and saw that it was a fancy Starbucks Reserve type of store, I had never seen or been to one of these before. It had a fancy coffee bar in the middle to order your coffee at. I ordered my usual a basic americano and nearly died when the barista told me the price. It was 44 RMB, normally it is only 27 RMB. Lesson learnt, only go to Starbucks Reserve after winning the lottery. It definitely wasn't a grab and go as I had to get my money's worth, so I headed to a comfy chair in the window and alternated between people watching and reading my book. It was rather nice watching people doing their daily commute knowing I was free from that for an extra day or two.

I headed up to the subway station and took the train to the Hunan Provincial Musuem. It was a short walk from the subway to the museum and it was already packed by the time I got there. I thought being a week day it wouldn't be that busy, but I was very wrong. I spent ages queuing to get in. You have to have your ID scanned and there are loads of smart gates for locals to scan their IDs, but no, most of them wanted to wait in the manual queue tht I have to join. This took ages and I was annoyed that thry needed to check IDs to enter the museum, what's wrong with just using the QR code ticket you get when booking. Once through the gates, it was down to the bowels of the museum to go through another security check. I think I was over the museum before I even entered it. I made my way around the various exhibits on the different floors of the museum but it was just too crowded, so I didn't feel like I got a good look at anything. I did learn a little, so it wasn't a total waste of a visit. Settlers first arrived in the area a long long time ago and cultivating rice has always been the central theme in the area. Also many people migrated from neighbouring Jiangxi province especially during the Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties and it is said that around 8 or 9 out of ten people can trace their ancestry back to Jiangxi Province. Hunan is known as the 'granary of China' due to its fertile growing conditions and production. The exhibition that impressed me the most was about the Mawangdui Han Dynasty Tombs. The tombs are located in Changsha and consist of a fully preserved tomb structure and a wealth of funerary items, which give insights into everyday life and funeral concepts during the Han Dynasty. I would have liked to have visited the actual tomb site but I don't think that there is much there and the best things are in the museum now. I loved the small sculptures of people. I think that they were servants to help the tombs' inhabitants and also guards to protect them. The tomb belonged to Xin Zhui, who was a noblewoman, also known as Lady Dai and was the wife of Li Cang, who was the Marquis of Dai and the Chancellor of Changsha during the Western Han Dynasty. For me, this was the best part of the museum and it was really well done. After looking through the artefacts that had been excavated from the tomb site, you entered a room/corridor where you could look down and see the tomb beneath you. It was darkly lit and felt quite atmospheric. I followed the slope down to the ground floor and saw the coffin of Xin Zhui, which was beautifully ornate. Her mummified corpse was also on display. There were signs warning people and also to be respectful. I did see one university aged young woman trying to take a photo, who was quickly admonished by her friends.

I was starving by the time I left the museum and it was now lunchtime. The place I was to going for lunch was quite far away so to tide myself over I ended up buying a milk tea from the convenience store and a small bread roll from the bakery next to it. I hopped on the subway and it took me about 40 minutes to get to my lunch spot. Living out in the sticks, there is a definite lack of international cuisine, so when researching my trip to Changsha, I was looking for some international food options and since I adore Indian cuisine, I knew I would have to have a curry while I was here. I had found a place online called Masala Curry that looked pretty good. It was quite far out of the city centre, in a random mall, on the subway line that was heading out to the southern railway station, but since I was in relatively close location I couldn't miss out on the opportunity. The mall the restaurant was located in was a complete contrast to the museum I had just visited. It was pretty much devoid of life, with their being less and less people the higher I got in the mall. It was slightly later in the day or lunch, but I was still shocked that there were barely any people in any of the restaurants on the top floor. I did think I was the only person in the restaurant, but there were another couple of people tucked away. I was really boring and ordered my usual; palak paneer, garlic naan, samosas and a mango lassi. The food was a little slow to come and the samosas sat on the pass for ages as I think the waiter was a bit out of it, but it was worth the wait. I quickly devoured my mango lassi, and tucked into my food. The curry was delicious, a bit too salty, but still enjoyable and the garlic naan was slightly unusual as it had either carrot or pumpkin on it. I wasn't sure at first, but I think it was pumpkin as it didn't taste sweet enough to be carrot. An unusual addition, which to be honest didn't really add anything to the dish. The samosas were good, but it was just too much food and I ended up having to leave some. I was utterly stuffed by the time I left the restaurant and instead of heading to Orange Island like I had planned, I ended up back at my accommodation for an afternoon nap.

After my nap, I headed out to Orange Island. It was quite near where I was staying and I headed up through Taiping Old Street. It didn't look as good in the daylight. For me it is definitely a place to visit at night with all the lights on. I got a bit lost on my way to the bridge as the route to get there is rather circuitous and I ended up at the subway station rather the slip road where the path meets the bridge. I also came across what appeared to be a bit of a homeless encampment under one of the roads leading to the bridge. A few people were just chilling, while some had chairs set up offering hair cutting services. There was no bad atmosphere in the area, but I am still glad that was walking through there in daylight. I don't think I have ever come across a place like this in China before. I made my way onto the bridge and got some nice views of Orange Island, it's a shame that it was so overcast as it did make the view a bit meh. After a while I came to the stairs that led down to Orange Island. Orange Island is infamous in China as it had a statue of a young Chairman Mao's head and is a must see for locals. Mao was born in Shaoshan a small village not too far away. It often surprises Chinese people when talking about places I've visited in China that I had been to Shaoshan but not Changsha. The Chairman Mao statue was quite a walk away, about 3 kilometres, but I had plenty of time. I started walking and came to some entrance gates. I scanned the QR code and started filling in the form, but then couldn't do it as it was only possible for those with Mainland ID numbers. I went over to try and explain to the security guard and she told me to wait as she was helping some older women. I really don't get how old people struggle with this as it is all in Chinese and they have to fill in forms like this to do pretty much everything. If I can cobble it together in a foreign language they have no excuses. After she helped one woman fill in the form, the security guard beckon me over so that I could run through when the gate opened for the old woman. Method in the madness!

There were some shops, snack stalls and places to eat when firs through the gates. I wasn't interested so kept walking. I came to another building that could have been some kind of museum, but there was no information in English, so I kept walking. I came to a nice open field where some people were relaxing, I could imagine it being a sea of bodies in warmer, brighter months. The sun had also pretty much set by now and the sky had a pinky purple hue to it. It was nice to be in an area of greenery surrounded by grass and trees, but able to see the skyscrapers of the city just behind it. I love the combination of the two. After this my walk was pretty boring as it was dark and there was nothing to see on the path I was taking. There wasn't many other people walking along this path either. I think a lot were taking the little shuttle instead. I alternated between the road and the tree lined path. Checking my map app, I could see that I was approaching the statue so cut inland a bit to reach it. Well, talk about anti-climatic! When I got the statue I discovered that it was covered as it was undergoing some kind of maintenance/renovation work. I'd bloody walked all that way (and would still have to do the return journey) for nothing. I did have to laugh to myself. There were still quite a few people about and since they were taking photos of the covered Chairman Mao I did too. When I showed a friend the pics later, she did get a good laugh out of it. From the statue I walked back along the other side of the island and this made up for the disappointment I had felt so far. The views across the river to the CBD area was really good. The buildings were all lit up and the scenes were constantly changing. It made the walk back so much more enjoyable albeit longer as I had to stop about a million times to photograph the light show. Once back in the city proper, I headed back through Taiping Old Street as there was a snack I wanted to try. It was from the same place as the smelly black tofu and I thought it might be fish balls, judging by what it looked like and not bothering to read and decipher the description. I got a bit o a shock when I bit into one to find that they were sweet, deep fried glutinous rice balls. They were tasty and I did enjoy them, but nothing amazing. I have since found out that they are called 糖油粑粑 (tang you ba ba), which translates to sugar oil cake or more literally when you put the characters into translate sugar oil poop. Thank goodness it doesn't actually look like poop.

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Photos

Chairman Mao Statue
Orange Island