Blogs from Guangdong, China, Asia - page 21

Hi All, I dusted of the museum walk whilst looking around The Mausoleum of The Nanyue King. First though an exhibition of ceramic pillows, which really look like a form of torture. Different designs were made and some were thought to influence dreams. How anyone got to sleep with their head on one of these I'll never know let alone dream. On to the tomb. A cousin of the Emperor was sent south in around 200BC to quell a rebellion. The cousin liked it so much that he stayed and made his own kingdom and called himself an Emperor. There's a splendid jade funeral suit, one of which I've also seen in Zhengzhou. His concubines were buried as a sacrifice along with some servants too. I'm not sure if these people were just buried alive or ... read more

Hi All, I think I may have walked a little too far yesterday as my legs were aching today. A short ferry ride away, over the Pearl River, from my hostel is Shamian Island. This is a man made island. As with a lot of the older buildings in this part of China they all date from the European colonization of Asia. This part of the city was given as a concession to The British and The French after the 2nd Opium Wars. Britain had long been illegally importing opium into China, as the Emperor made it illegal towards the end of the 18th Century. In the early 19th century the Qing government finally put a stop to the trade by blockading Guangzhou and burning the opium. The British furious at the loss of income sent ... read more

Legend said demon was prevailed in this part of China, The emperor send Guangong over to look after the situation, and the demon was eliminated after 7 days of hard fight. to intimidated and scared the other evils away, so on the 15th of Lunar May, Guangong sharpened his huge long knife on that day with the rain water that was permitted from heaven, coming down to this day, many area in southern China make celebration to praise Guangong on today, especially the small Dongan village in Zhanjiang, "we celebrate Gunangong day for more than 800 years here" an old man told me. I was late for the ceremony as the parade was almost ended when I get to the village, said all the statue of different deities had been collect from the 2 temples in ... read more

So how do I summarize my first week back in China. So much has happened in such a short amount of time, I should really be writing it down everyday but who has the time for that? Today is Sunday night, classes will start up again tomorrow after a weekend of academic trips. Last week of classes was interesting, I am sitting in on both the Atlantic Canadian Studies class and Dr. Perrins class on Chinese history. The Atlantic Canadian studies class in the morning is only for the Chinese students who will be heading to Canada in the fall to take classes as part of a 2+2 program, two years in China and two years abroad, in this case in Canada. During the week the students tend to be pretty tired after classes, especially on ... read more

Well I am back online! The Great Firewall of China has been creating a number of problems for me as far as blogging is concerned, therefore I will be using this blog address for the remainder of my time in China and I will be switching back to my other blog upon my return to Canada. It has been almost 48 hours now since I landed in China and a lot has happened in that short amount of time. The flight was, well, long is the best way to describe it. Amnah and myself were quite lucky to have an empty seat between us for the longest part of the flight from Vancouver to Hong Kong and our transfers went smoothly, unlike the flight that Dr. Perrins and two students from Acadia were on, which was ... read more