On Day 2 in Nanjing, the sun was out so the weather went from extremely hot to beyond sweltering. I had enough of walking in the heat, so I took several separate air conditioned taxi rides to see specific sights and returned to the hostel after each stop to cool down and recharge.
First visit was to Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre. China was occupied by Japan during WW2 and in 1937, invading Japanese troops in Nanjing bruatally killed over 300,000 civilians during a period of one month. This museum is built over an excavated burial site from the massacre and records the suffering of the people of Nanjing. It was a horrible event for which Japan has never admitted guilt or apologized. It remains a very sore spot for the Chinese people.
Next place I visited was Nanjing University. Nanjing appears to have more than ten Universities. I was interested to see Nanjing U because Kathy, my former Chinese teacher is a graduate. We have often spoken about Nanjing and she encouraged me to visit. The university was quite charming with lots of activity on the sports fields, the quadrangles, and many people enjoying the shade and greenery of the walking paths.
My third activity of the day was a visit to Xuanwu Lake Park with a chance to see part of the 600 year old Ming City Wall and the Zhonghua Gate. The city wall was quite impressive standing over 40 feet tall.
Instead of walking through the park in the heat, I opted for a ride on one of the park trams and met the two people pictured above. The man on the right is a famous Chinese author with four books published and translated for sale world-wide. His name is Bi Feiyu and his first and most famous book is a collection of short stories called "Moon Opera". The woman on his right was his agent. She spoke perfect English having studied for a year at Oxford. Mr. Bi was an animated and energetic personality. He kept wanting to talk to me about the NBA.
Finally there is a picture of the Nanjing Jasmine Youth Hostel which was quite a nice place to stay. It had a comfortable, well air conditioned common room with lots of young travelers writing in their blogs. I was able to reserve a single room with a private bathroom and A/C for $40 per night. This was inexpensive but not rock-bottom cheap for China. Nonetheless, the place had some real character and was located in an interesting neighborhood nearby another Nanjing university.
I posted a collection of pictures from Nanjing on Snapfish. Please visit and see the rest of the things I saw in this historic Chinese city. Click here to view.
First visit was to Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre. China was occupied by Japan during WW2 and in 1937, invading Japanese troops in Nanjing bruatally killed over 300,000 civilians during a period of one month. This museum is built over an excavated burial site from the massacre and records the suffering of the people of Nanjing. It was a horrible event for which Japan has never admitted guilt or apologized. It remains a very sore spot for the Chinese people.
Next place I visited was Nanjing University. Nanjing appears to have more than ten Universities. I was interested to see Nanjing U because Kathy, my former Chinese teacher is a graduate. We have often spoken about Nanjing and she encouraged me to visit. The university was quite charming with lots of activity on the sports fields, the quadrangles, and many people enjoying the shade and greenery of the walking paths.
My third activity of the day was a visit to Xuanwu Lake Park with a chance to see part of the 600 year old Ming City Wall and the Zhonghua Gate. The city wall was quite impressive standing over 40 feet tall.
Instead of walking through the park in the heat, I opted for a ride on one of the park trams and met the two people pictured above. The man on the right is a famous Chinese author with four books published and translated for sale world-wide. His name is Bi Feiyu and his first and most famous book is a collection of short stories called "Moon Opera". The woman on his right was his agent. She spoke perfect English having studied for a year at Oxford. Mr. Bi was an animated and energetic personality. He kept wanting to talk to me about the NBA.
Finally there is a picture of the Nanjing Jasmine Youth Hostel which was quite a nice place to stay. It had a comfortable, well air conditioned common room with lots of young travelers writing in their blogs. I was able to reserve a single room with a private bathroom and A/C for $40 per night. This was inexpensive but not rock-bottom cheap for China. Nonetheless, the place had some real character and was located in an interesting neighborhood nearby another Nanjing university.
I posted a collection of pictures from Nanjing on Snapfish. Please visit and see the rest of the things I saw in this historic Chinese city. Click here to view.
1 comment:
Looks like Nanjing is a beautiful city! I regret I have never made it there.
Tamara Baird
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