Courtney in China, Letter 11

Ni Hao! 

This past week has been pretty busy. Today was our Final exam, now school is over!!!It was a hard class and even harder to fit all the information into 3 weeks of learning. Anyway, it's done!

A week ago on Thursday half of us went to the Pearl Tower (see attached photo) in downtown Shanghai. It is like a sightseeing tower I guess, you can go to the top and look out at the city. We decided to go at night so that we could see all the building lit up and it looked super cool! We had to wait about an hour and a half in line in order to go all the way to the top. The very top floor was a space themed floor. All the walls and floors were totally white and lit by blue lights. It might have been cool if there weren't about 2.5 billion people up there trying to look out of the same 3 ft. window you were looking out. The middle pearl of the pearl tower had a glass floor that was pretty cool! 

This past weekend we went to Nanjing. It was soooooooooooo hot and soooooooooooo humid and I was soooooooooooo sweaty! I tried really hard to enjoy the sights, but it was a struggle. To get to Nanjing we took a 3.5 hour bus ride in this light brown volkswagen bus. I somehow got stuck in the seat that was on top of the tire so I had literately no leg room. But the bus was somehow the best part of Nanjing. Somebody thought that we needed to see 3 different sections of the exact same city wall. It all looked EXACTLY the same, but we spent 45 minutes at each spot. Despite my negative attitude I still had a good time, everybody was feeling the same way so we all bonded over our mutual sufferings (suffering?). 

Today we decided to go to the World Financial Center in Shanghai because they have a sky bridge on top of their tower that is supposed to be taller than the pearl tower. It was really cool! The view was so amazing. It was about the same view as the pearl, but in this building the windows were clean so you could see out of it, there were no lines, and the had amazingly fancy toilets. You can't judge a book by its cover, but you can judge a building by its toilets. These bathrooms were so nice and the toilets could be heated and cooled to your temperature preference, and they were bidets as well. Anyway it was a really fun time. We have developed a love for McDonalds icecream, so wherever we go now we have to get ice cream from McDonalds afterwards.

Yesterday I lost my ID card that I use to buy food with and pay for my showers. So I've had to suffer through cold showers. I guess it's not that big of a deal because we leave here on Monday to go to Guilin, but it's a little bit annoying. Tomorrow we are traveling to an ancient village. Nobody knows the name of it, just that it's ancient. Then Saturday we are going to an island somewhere and riding bikes around it, I think... Monday thru Thursday will be spent in Guilin then Thursday we fly to Beijing and we all leaving on Friday for America! It will be really nice to come home, but I'll miss China. I always forget that I'm currently living in China. 

The following link is our theme song for this study abroad. http://youtu.be/wWLhrHVySgA

I love you guys! Can't wait to see you in a week! 

Court

p.s. I ate a squid. It tasted like burnt rubber

p.p.s. This following paragraph is our iternary for Nanjing. This is a good sampling for what english writing is like in China. Half the time we have no idea what they are trying to say. We were really looking out for the "profound" and the "paddling sound" and I'm not sure we found either of those. I thought you might enjoy reading it. 

Travel arrangements:

D1: Start from JiaoTong Unversity, 3.5hours travel, arriving Nanjing about noon. Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Mausoleum - after lunch visit the great revolutionary forerunner Mr. Sun Zhongshan (free, closed on Monday, visit time about 1.5 hours): love Fang, ramps, Mausoleum doors, Beiting, the festival hall, Mausoleum, Mausoleum of the magnificent, profound, known as "the first modern history China Ling"; visit the Ming Dynasty's founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang and empress Ma tomb - Ming Xiaoling Mausoleum (listing price of 70 yuan / person, visit time about 1 hours), has a special status in the history of the development of Chinese mausoleum, it is "the Ming and Qing Dynasties Royal first Ling" reputation, in 2003 July for the world cultural heritage. For dinner; visit the old East Gate (free of charge), Qinhuai scenery - Confucius Temple Commercial Street (free, visit time about 1 hours): South of Nanjing the most prosperous areas in Six Dynasties and Ming and Qing history, folk culture, Jinling Grand View Garden in a body, pavilions, terraces and open halls, paddling sound, Wuyixiang, Wende bridge, lattice the door, Wen Shu Fang, east city, city and other small commodity street, free activities, products Nanjing ten Qinhuai charm, enjoy the Jinling features snacks, enjoy the old Nanjing folk customs.

D2: after breakfast, visit Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge South Fort Park (listing price of 15 yuan / person, visit time about 1 hours), the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge is the first one built by China designed and double type railway, highway bridge, is of great significance in the history of China bridge, in the 1960's to the "railway bridge" the world's longest was included in "Guinness book of World Records"; after the tour poem "is the most callous Taicheng Liu, still smoke cage ten li Di" in the Taicheng scenic area (20 yuan / person, visit time about 1 hours), visit the Zhonghua Gate Castle (listing price of 34 yuan / person, visit time about 1 hours): is the castle gates of Nanjing Ming Dynasty city wall size of 13 gates in the largest, the most well preserved, the most complex structure of the ancient castle in the world today, with the Nanjing Ming Dynasty city wall, was listed as national key cultural relics protection units. After the end of the trip with Chinese food, after the ride back to your warm home.