Days 131-133: Nanjing

Saturday morning--early--we were off to Nanjing. We got up at about 6:13 am, but apparently this wasn't early enough: we missed our train. I can't really fault the driver--he was pretty fast. It's mostly my fault. I quickly got our tickets at the train station, but noticed that they gave me only mine and not Kerry's after I gave the woman my confirmation number. It was just crowded there, and I was focused on not letting the teen standing to the side cut in front of me (which often happens here). For some reason, at Shanghai Railway Station, we have to go to a completely different building to collect our tickets, about 500 meters away from the actual station. This really delayed us. So we got Kerry's tickets, but it was too late. We missed the train by about 5 minutes. I was so ticked off--I called Carol and asked her what to do. Poor thing--I'm sure I woke her up; it was 8 am on a Saturday. So I bit the bullet and talked to someone at an information desk; fortunately, she spoke perfect English and told us that we could exchange our ticket. Therefore, we returned to the ticket office, got in a line, only to be told we had to go in another line....but finally, we got some tickets for a 10:00 am train.

The train ride was good--I slept a bit. And Mark met us at the station. He kindly bought Coke Zeros for us both. Then we took the subway to the hotel, the Nanjing Grand. But then there was more drama: when I checked in, they told us they didn't have our reservation, and that they didn't work with Booking.com. I even showed them our reservation and the confirmation number and they didn't seem to know what I was talking about. Still, fortunately, they just asked what the cost was (about 2300 RMB) and they gave us a room. Even more fortunately, it was a BEAUTIFUL room, with a soft bed, nice temperature, and even a heated toilet seat and a bathroom mirror with a defogger. Later hat day, we went to a Japanese place called Who's Sashimi for lunch. I had octopus balls, salmon sashimi, and Mark and Kerry split a California roll. Good stuff!  Then we went to go see Mark's apartment and his lab; we also met one of his grad students, who we are having dinner with tomorrow. His apartment is pretty small, but well-kept, and his bedroom is just as large as ours. Next, we went to an international bookstore across from the hotel that used to be a parking garage. Most of their books were in Chinese, but they had a "billingual" section as well. I found some literature both for myself and some friends! A fun time. We had dinner in the hotel that night--the buffet in the hotel--and had a chance to have a nice, long conversation with Mark.

Here are a couple Saturday pictures:

Nice, cushy bed at the hotel.

View from the hotel window. Note the snow on the rooftops!

Mark's campus, Nanjing Normal University.

A snow bunny on Mark's on Mark's campus (or, as Kerry informed me, a Totoro....)

Sunday morning, we had the breakfast buffet at the hotel (with brie cheese, watermelon, and even tasty chicken nuggets! Yay!), and then we went to the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Museum, which served as a memorial to the 300,000 Chinese who were massacred by the Japanese in 1937.. We were there about 3-4 hours. The hardest part to see, for me, were the actual bones of the people who died there, in mass graves, seen for all to view. It's hard to summarize her my feelings about going there.  So many images and even videos of death, dismemberment, rape, and destruction. On the one hand, it's a difficult viewing. On the other hand, it's life-affirming because you are reminded of the importance of not letting history repeat itself. After that, we needed to do something more fun, so we stopped at a placed called "TACOS" at a mall (they had tacos, but also a million other types of American food). Then we went on to a toy store, where I found a cute panda chachki and a stuffed panda as well. Kerry found a black cat puppet. At one point, Kerry disappeared for awhile trying to find a bank, after we were told that they don't take credit cards (of course!).  But eventually he did return, and everything was fine. Kerry wasn't in a good mood after that, but then we met Mark's students at a hot pot restaurant for dinner. I can honestly say this was the best hot pot I've had in China: lots of veggies, some beef and lamb.  There was even a bar where you could make your own spices and grab some mushrooms or even oranges as side items. Afterwards, there was someone in the mall doing a "mask dance," and he threw a luck charm at Kerry, and then gave Mark, me and Kerry some mask charms as well, in addition.  Nice! This made us feel very welcome. One of Mark's graduate students had her daughter with her, and her daughter was a completely hilarious little girl, who kept telling riddles in Chinese, one after the other. It added some levity to the meal and made Kerry much more relaxed. We rode with the grad student and her daughter back to the hotel in a cab and went to bed soon after.

Sunday pics (Note: I am deliberately not going to post photos from inside from the museum...most are just too graphic and I feel it's too disrespectful...):

Statue outside museum.

Japanese propaganda after the massacre.

My note explaining how the museum moved me.

Peace poster in a special exhibition.

A statue of the writer of The Rape of Nanking, Iris Chang.

Peace statue at the end of the exhibit.

Mark and Kerry at the TACO restaurant.

Monday morning, we didn't have time to do much except finish packing. By the time we were ready to go, it was almost 10 am and the hotel wasn't serving breakfast. In China, hotel breakfasts ALWAYS stop at 10 am, unlike in the USA, when they normally stop at 10:30 or 11. So we checked out of the hotel. Ironically, they charged me only 1888 RMB, which was much LOWER than the Booking.com price. Then we went on to a Starbucks for tea and a muffin, and then Mark suggested we go to a Western bar and grill called the Blue Frog, where I had a REALLY good burger and fries (man, I've missed that!).  Mark then followed us to the train station--a selfie, quick hugs, and then we departed. We made the train with about 10 minutes to spare; fortunately, I slept again on the way home. We decided to take the subway home--not a taxi--because Shanghai Railway Station is on Line 3, close to our apartment. So we took Shanghai Railway Station to Jiangwan Town Station and then walked home. The pollution wasn't good Monday: as in Nanjing, we had to wear our masks, and the foul scent of cigarettes and sewer pervaded the air. I'm quite sure I couldn't stand this every day. Once we got home, we ordered sandwiches from McDonald's and I made a salad and some potatoes. We also spent some of the evening unpacking and sorting out gifts we got for people. We also repacked one of our already packed bags for the USA because we decided we went to take the cloth red one home, not one of the more solid grey ones.


Final pics here:

Burger at Blue Frog.

Last-minute selfie: Mark, Kerry, and me. Kerry and I are wearing pollution masks.

One last museum pic: the flame outside the museum. We had just seen the mass grave of 10,000, so it was very sobering to witness this.