Studying for my 'final' sort of dominated my life all last week, but as soon as that was out of the way, I got to head out on a weekend trip to the glorious SHANXI PROVINCE
Check out all that...majesty.
SHANXI QUICK FACTZ:
- Name in characters: 山西
- English translation: "west mountains" (and/or "west of the mountains". I should look at a map.)
- Not to be confused with: 陕西
- Famous for: lots of cool ancient things
- Population: I don't know, I can't access Wikipedia
- Awesome?: yes
So yeah, the Shanxi trip was really good, even though I spent a good portion of the time cringing at how touristy we all looked. (I still have trouble sometimes with the fact that I'm such an obvious 白人 -- people tend to assume I'm here for tourism/the Olympics, which can get mildly frustrating.) Still, all the places we went were really interesting, and a lot more /natural/ than many of the places closer to Beijing (which is in the midst of a renovation frenzy).
The first place we went was Yungong Grottoes, which is home to a series of massive cave-shrines, mostly to Buddha, carved into the side of a mountain over the last thousand years or so. Pictures were banned pretty much everywhere, so I wasn't able to snap a picture of the 17-meter tall Buddha surrounded by dozens of other intricate sculptures and inscriptions. I did, however, snag a pic of this city wall pit for size comparison:
See the little people at the top? This pit was 15 meters deep. To repeat myself, the largest Buddha we saw was /17/ meters tall. Kinda big.
Next on the itinerary was:
Yeah, fear of heights would be a problem here.
The Hanging Monastery, which is a pretty accurate name -- it's built on the side of a cliff. I am...curious how exactly the Chinese did this, X00 years ago. I am guessing it involved some accidental death. Nonetheless, climbing up there was really nice (getting exercise in a place without horrible pollution!), and the view was pretty fantastic, even if we had to rush a bit to get back to the bus.
It was worth rushing, though, to get to the Wooden Pagoda:
Can you count all nine floors? It's pretty tricky from the outside.
This was my favorite thing all weekend, even though we spent literally thirty minutes there before leaving. To begin with: it's a 900 year-old pagoda (one of the younger sites we visited actually) that's still standing strong and still looks amazing. Secondly, it's that old and it's entirely made of wood -- no nails, no iron supports, nothing.
"But Ryan," you ask, out loud for some unexplained reason, "then why hasn't it been totally 0wn3d by insects and the like?"
BECAUSE IT'S THE MOST OLD SCHOOL AVIARY EVER.
Unfortunately you can barely see them in my pictures, and you /definitely/ can't see them once the pictures have been shrunk for the web, but the tower is surrounded by thousands of birds, flying and cawing and doing everything else that birds do. People are only allowed on the bottom two floors because the birds own everything else. Birds inhabit the top seven floors -> birds eat all the bugs and then some -> no wood damage. Sweeeet.
My pictures are not going to do it any justice, unfortunately, but it was absolutely breath-taking, gazing up at this towering, ancient thing with several thousand birds swooping around overhead, unwittingly protecting it. It was like something out of a movie with /really/ good artistic direction and a massive budget, except that, um, it exists in real life and it just sort of happened by itself. SO COOL. Unfortunately, the pagoda's started to lean to the side over the past fifty years or so, and the Chinese government is looking into restorations that might include sturdier materials than just wood. (I guess they don't want it cramping the Tower of Pisa's style, or maybe they don't want people to die or something.)
After the Wooden Pagoda, we settled in for the night at a little inn in Pingyao. In the morning we set out for Jin Ci, a famous old garden-type place with some beautiful landscapes, a bunch of ancient sculptures, and oh, you know, 3000 year-old poetry, that kinda stuff.
See if you can find the character for 'person'.
More ancient wooden things! This guy was several hundred years old.
Only complaint for the weekend: soooo much bus-riding. I expected that going in (after all, Shanxi is a province, not a city), but it's one thing to know what you're getting into and another to spend 18 hours on a bus designed for people much shorter than you. Beh. My knees are feeling better now, though.
Other late-breaking news, before I get cracking on tonight's vocab:
- I've been asked to be in a Chinese speech contest? Apparently there's some sort of friendly/rivalrous face-off between all the US-based Chinese programs every year, and 大流老师 thinks I'm the best candidate for the third-years. Fame and fortune await?
- Speaking of third-years, guess who's started reading Harry Potter in Chinese? (Or 哈利・波特, as it's called here -- hooray for transliteration.) While we were traveling this weekend, I spent about three hours with the first book and a dictionary, and managed to fight through most of the first chapter before finally setting it aside. So woo! Looks like I may have an activity for the plane ride home next month.
- I really want a hamburger -- not 麦当劳, the actual thing. I think I might scrounge some people up to go looking for the nearest Grandma's Kitchen this weekend, which would be /wonderful/.
That's it!
1 comment:
Hey Ryan,
Great to read of your travels and adventures and to see some great photos. Linda & Miya say "How about a picture of you, Ryan?" We want to see you in a picture! That would be nice, as we miss you. Congrats on being chosen for the 3rd years and the competition. Great stuff! Good luck with it. We'll miss you tomorrow at the LIG Festival on the Boston Common. Missing you at disc, too. It's hot and humid here (supposed to be for a few days) and Linda was wondering if it is humid there and hot. Good luck with your studying and reading. (I finally read the last Harry Potter book a few weeks ago.)
Warm hugs,
Tom, Linda, and Miya :)
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