Solo flying up in Nanjing - Day 1

This time I decide to go it alone and have a bit of an adventure in Nanjing. I packed up my stylish (and heavily EF branded) bag and headed to the train station. When I got to Nanjing I headed to the metro station and proceeded to mash the keypad of the ticket machine in a confused way. After trying to put my money into the machine for a few minutes a kind-hearted local pointed out that my note was too large and I had to go to the counter to get some change.

Metro mistakes in the past, I made it to the art district that my hostel was in just in time to get completely lost in the mini-forest it was in. Eventually I stumbled into the back of the hostel and found my way through the restaurant and into reception.

Once I got settled into my room I decided to get some help from the ladies on reception. Cue lots of confusion in a foreign language! We spread my tourist map out on the desk and got down to some serious pointing and nodding with occasional bits of 'I want to go to...' in Chinese. One great thing about being in China is that producing even basic Chinese will result in people saying that your Chinese is fantastic. Positive reinforcement agogo!

The upshot of my little reception romp was that I roughly knew where I was heading. That being said, I did then leave the hostel and get immediately lost...on the plus side I got lost in an amazing little street with old style building and the best starbucks I've ever seen! Not that it was enough to spend that much on coffee!

You'd never even know it was Starbucks!

I didn't understand the name of the street but I'd guess it was 'Awesome Street'!

Wouldn't be China if there wasn't some kind of construction...

From there I continued my wander around the city and headed over to Shizishan (Lion Mountain) to have a look at the towery templey thing. Still not 100 percent on which it was...either way it was an amazing place with carved steps up to the main buildings lined with little stone lions, all with different facial expressions, some smiling, some growling and a couple having a chat. The main building was a masterpiece of lacquered wood housing some incredible pieces of art and historical notes about all of the emperors. I have to admit that I didn't read every single word about them but I did look at all the artifacts that were housed in the lower levels and checked the hell out of the badass throne that was on the ground floor (or as the Chinese more sensibly call it - the first floor!).

Gateway to another world

HIYA!!!

From Shizishan I headed back towards the hostel, getting slightly less lost on the way this time, and made my way to Fuzimiao, the area around the Confucius temple. It was dark by this point but, in China, that generally means an buttload of lanterns and lights - which was also the case here and by no means a bad thing. I wandered around looking at the wide old streets filled with tiny modern shops and dodged the occasional guy in bright yellow dragging a tourist behind him in a little buggy. I decided to duck into a little food court that I found and had some very cuminy and very expensive chicken wings. When I walked in there were immediate cries of 'Hello!' from various members of staff, accompanied by huge grins, which roughly translated as "Eh, you're English. I said an English thing! Right!?" The number of strangers who will say hello does make you feel a bit like you're in the Truman show - do they all know who I am or something!?

Anyway, I headed over to one of the windows to get my chicken and one of the younger chefs decided to try and get my number on behalf of his female colleague, who turned bright red and looked at me in a mortified way. Hilarity ensued, coupled with generous 'Tingbudong's (meaning 'I don't understand) on my part. I actually understood more than I let on, but when in doubt, claim ignorance!

Return to Lingyin

The new leader of the pack...

Okay, so my VPN is working again so I can finally get back to some blogging. In all fairness it's not just the VPN that's been holding me back, I've just been rubbish at keeping this updated. We're jumping back a bit here to my trip to Hangzhou and the visit to Lingyin temple, aparently one of the largest active temples in China!

The day started with some early morning dabing, kind of like an oniony savoury crepe, and a quick ride on Sydney's electric scooter. It was the first time id ridden one and the locals did not look convinced. After the morning's entertainment we jumped on the bus and made our way out to Lingyin temple. The scenic area around the temple, which we walked through to get to it, was absolutely stunning. We went through a big traditional gate and came across Qinglin cave, an amazing rock formation with statues carved into it, representing Buddha and his various cronies.

 We carried out and came out the other end of the cave and into a forest comprised of some seriously weird trees. I can only assume they were a bit drunk as they seemed to have forgotten which way up was and just guessed at a direction then grown that way. It was all a bit swamp meets Alice in wonderland in China. As ever on these trips I busted out the dizi and sat on a rock to entertain/infuriate the local fauna for a bit.

Is that a flute in your forest or are you just pleased to see me?

We left crossed a little river and came upon the temple itself, passing through the huge doors and into a courtyard full of trees with people milling around like interested goats. While we were walking towards the main temple building I caught sight of my first wild preying mantis! It was an amazing looking little guy, having a wobble around on one of the little stone walls around the trees - not so graceful with the walking the preying mantis.

The temple itself was incredible and housed a gigantic golden statue of Buddha in the centre. Not long after we got there a lot of the other tourist started excitedly heading towards the main temple building following a steady stream of Buddhist monks in their brown and mustard coloured robes. It turned out that a prayer ceremony was to take place so we perched inside the temple to watch. I don't have any pictures of the ceremony unfortunately as it didn't feel like a very 'please take pictures of me' kind of event but they wouldn't have done it justice anyway. The monks entered the hall and arranged themselves in rows in the central area around the statue of Buddha with a few in the centre presiding over the ceremony. There was one man rhythmically beating on a huge carven wooden frog drum (literally a massive drum shaped like a frog) pounding out like the heartbeat of a whale. This was joined by the chanting voices of the monks and created an atmosphere that just can't be described properly. Members of the public went in to pray in front of the Buddha and make offerings while the chant continued and onlookers gaped.

Pre-ceremony Buddha

From the main temple we carried on up the hill and further into the immense grounds of the temple grounds. We climbed up hundreds of steps, going past halls containing various relics and statues and some amazing carvings, finally reaching the highest hall in the temple where 3 Buddhas sat looking out over the hills. We weren't the only one to have made it up this far either, there were a few local tourists up there too and, hilariously enough, even with the incredible scenery and ornate statues all around them they seemed far more interested in grabbing some selfies with the foreigners they'd just found...us! Even having been here for 5 months, I'm still surprised by some locals' reactions when they see me and other foreigners. Lord knows what they do with the photos but if me smiling big means they do the same then where's the harm?

Another world entirely

Buddha's Eye View

The Buddha's of the top temple

Flute, fatigue and physiotherapy - Huangshan Revisited

As I said the casual stroll up the mountain became a tad more strenuous as the stone steps rolled away beneath our feet. It turns out that climbing a mountain whose summit is over a mile above sea level is pretty tough going, even if there are steps all the way up. This was more than made up for by the exquisite views of mountain peaks towering above us, tree covered valleys stretching out as far as the eye could see and, just for a bit of a change, the occasional group of guys in dress shoes and trendy blazers puffing and panting their way up the mountain with cries of 'Jiayou!' which roughly translates as "Pour some oil on it!'

While we were taking a break part way up the mountain one of the groups of dressed up dudes stopped for a break near us and one particularly snazzily dressed guy saw us and exclaimed to his friends 'Oh! Waiguoren!' in other words 'Oh! Foreigners!' He clearly wasn't expecting us to understand because when we replied 'Yup' they all looked at their friend and then fell about laughing. We carried on up the mountain with them, receiving our very own cries of 'Jiayou!' for a little while until the mountain proved too much for them (or more accurately their wardrobe) and they stopped for another break.

We carried on up the mountain with occasional stops for food, flute playing and being awestruck by how absurdly beautiful the views were. As we were resuming our climb, a man ran (yes I said ran!) past us and on up the steps. We looked at each other in shock as the man belted it off up the mountain. He was soon followed by other mountain running nutters, who all seemed to be wearing similar stuff. It turned out that we were going up the mountain on the same day as hordes of people who had come for the Summit Climb and some of them were just sprinting up there! At one point a young lad came puffing along behind us and then fell to floor grabbing his calf and groaning. It looked like he had cramp so I asked him if he wanted me to help, which received some very enthusiastic nodding and grimacing.  Tip for travellers, if you're camera-shy, don't help a Chinese guy stretch off half way up a mountain, it's cat nip for camera toting Chinese tourists!

We got to the top of the mountain after about 4 hours of walking and I celebrated by busting out the flute again!