southern capital

NANJING 南京
famous location of many of china's historical events (qing dynasty southern headquarters during the 19th century, sun yat sen founded the chinese republic and was elected, chiang kai shek and the guomindang's base before fleeing to taiwan, and finally, communist party liberation in 1949). infamous location of the nanjing massacre; 300,000 victims at the hands of japanese attack/occupation in 1937, lives on in memory akin to a "chinese holocaust."

because nanjing has so much history, and it's only 3 hours away by local train (1.5 by high speed train), it was an automatic travel destination for me. although it felt a little chaotic to cram it in the weekend after we went to beijing, time is running short, so i was off! 8 other students from my program joined. on friday afternoon, mid-monsoon, we threw our backpacks in our apartments, grabbed our luggage, and cabbed to the shanghai railway station. thanks to a ladies' night out on thursday, i completely passed out for the train ride, but i am told that at least 5 chinese families and 1 dog circulated through the seat next to me. gotta love the regional train!

we arrived around 5 pm and headed to our hostel (we all bunked in one big dorm room) and then out to the surrounding area, fuzimiao. this is a hoppin' little pedestrian district with nanjing's famous confucian temple and tons of stores and street food. i've noticed this arrangement to be customary in china. an area that used to attract worshippers is built up to also become and modern eating/shopping playground- just like cheng huang miao in shanghai.

on friday night, we went out to a bar-club-thing that becca recommended from her time living in nanjing. it also happened to be written up in lonely planet so of course i was on board. i will not detail the evening but it suffices to say that foreigner do not frequent this bar... we were instantly treated to a table and several bottles by the manager, who throughout the night brought friends and favorite guests over to meet us, along with a ton of other random people. highly amusing! and very different from shanghai, where the clubs are filled with foreigners [only].

on saturday, our only full day, we packed in the history. AM: zijin shan, the woodsy hill outside the city where dr. sun yat sen is entombed in a giant, ming dynasty era mausoleum. sun yat sen is recognized by both the guomindang and the communist party as the founding father of modern china, so his burial place is a big deal. nevertheless, they do not enforce the "silence" and "no pictures" rules. this is china, i don't know how you could get people to follow either of those directions! below: some of the 392 steps up to the mausoleum, the group at the top.

PM: nanjing presidential palace. think of every important chinese leader between 1850-1950... they did business here. lin zexu, sun yat sen, chiang kai shek, etc. you can see one of the palace courtyards and sun yat sen and chiang kai shek's reception room.

on sunday morning, we braced ourselves for the nanjing massacre museum and memorial. this was a much longer visit than expected. the museum is extensive and there are actually several memorials to walk though. here, i decline to write my opinions on chinese-japanese relations, chinese nationalism, or the massacre in relation to the communist party.. but email me if you are curious, i guess? this museum definitely highlighted each of those issues. 

in the afternoon, we retreated to a giant indoor mall for heavy doses of 空调 (kongtiao, aka AIR CONDITIONING) and retail therapy after our heavy museum experience. nanjing is correctly nicknamed one of china's "four furnaces" along with shanghai, beijing, and tianjin. my question is, if these places are the hottest, most humid, and most miserable in this entire country... why does everyone live in them?

ah yes, well anyway the weekend was over way too quickly. at 6 pm we boarded our train back to shanghai (props to nanjing for the coolest view from a train station ever, see below). i slept... duh. and as if the weekend had not been enough, i met up with the fabulous travis holler upon return to shanghai! he is at fudan for a short two weeks with a GW course. imagine that :) so there is nanjing for you! next posts will be WFC and visiting popo. so behind!