China was one of the countries I was most excited to visit this semester! I was so ready to see the hustle and bustle of the streets of Shanghai and step foot on the Great Wall for the first time in my life.
China was such a magnificent country. Pulling into the city of Shanghai at sunset left me speechless. The looming towers of this business-booming city were all lit up in multicolored lights and flashing up the river as we sailed into the harbor. Each high-rise was decked out for Christmas, it brought a huge smile to my face as we neared the much anticipated holiday season!
We were nearly a full day late arriving into port due to a crane working in the middle of our passage into the docks. The night before we saw the MV Explorer pulling out of the berth we were supposed to occupy the next morning. The MV Explorer was the previous ship used by Semester at Sea but has now retired to making short trips around Asia. It was super neat to see one of SAS’s previous ships during our voyage. One legacy passing another.
China was full of so many firsts for this trip! I traveled to Beijing from Shanghai on a sleeper train with some friends for the first time. We played Mah Jongg on the train together in the country where Mah Jongg is a nation-wide loved game. Drinking a fresh-squeezed cup of Orange Juice from a vending machine. I saw and climbed the Great Wall for the first time. Traveling through the Forbidden City for the first time, both on foot and by way of Rickshaw rides. I got to take my first bullet train ride from Beijing to Xi’an (pronounced ‘she-on’). While in Xi’an, I got to come face-to-face with the Terra Cotta Warriors for the first time. Trying Nitrogen-dipped Ice Cream for the first time near the Terra Cotta Warriors Museum. And getting my feet nibbled on by the little fish used in fish pedicures in a small water village outside of Shanghai.
China was a great week full of “wonderful” firsts! Especially seeing and climbing the Great Wall of China, one of the World’s 7 Man-made Wonders! Seeing pictures of the wall in textbooks and from social media do not, in any way, provide this ‘GREAT’ architectural advancement any justice. I took the cable car from the base of the wall up the side of the mountain to Tower 14. From there, my friends and I began our breathless (quite literally) climb up the stairs to Tower 20. The hike was breathless in that climbing 6,000 stairs was physically taxing but the view of the mountains from up there was also breathtaking in the early hours of the morning as the sun gracefully rose. I FaceTimed my mom, and a couple of friends, when I got to Tower 20 to show my view and it was so amazing getting to experience it with her and my friends.
Another first I was really excited for was seeing the Terra Cotta Warriors in Xi’an! I remember learning about the Warriors in social studies back in sixth grade and I have always wanted to visit them myself. I heard from a friend that her aunt traveled to China for business in the past year and while she was walking around Xi’an at night, she claimed to have seen a few ghosts of the Terra Cotta Warriors marching through the streets. She said she could only see them from the knees up because they were marching along the old streets of the city that have since then been paved over. I have also read many other accounts of people encountering ghosts of Terra Cotta Warriors over the years. I was hoping to encounter my own ghost sightings but unfortunately I didn’t. I was so surprised to learn that the Terra Cotta Warrior pits are still being excavated and studied, I thought they were just open for viewing now. It was wild to see my middle school history lesson come to life as I walked through the pits full of warriors both in tact and many shattered in pieces.
Upon flying back to Shanghai, my roommate Jessie and I wandered around the city looking for a shuttle bus to Zhujiajiao, a water village on the outskirts of Shanghai. We took a row-boat ride through the village and wandered in and out of the various trinket shops and markets. We also stumbled upon a shop that offered fish pedicures and we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try it out! It was such a peculiar feeling, it tickled so much at first but quickly became relaxing. We spent nearly 30 minutes with our feet in the fish tanks! We also bought a few natural pearl bracelets from a man in the village and some really neat yarn-woven art pieces of the Great Wall from his neighbor. It was great to spend the day in a serene, slow-paced moment, contrary to our semester as a whole.
My last day spent in China was occupied with a field class for my Coastal Environmental Ecology class. We walked around a local fish market where we encountered so many new seafood delicacies keen in China and got to speak with various fishing families from Shanghai. After the fish market, we toured around the Shanghai Aquarium. My favorite exhibits were the jellyfish hall and the tank tube. The jellyfish tanks were so colorful and swimming with sluggish grace. The tank tube was full of different sharks, sting rays, sea turtles and fish. All of which are my favorite sea creatures.
Sailing out of the Shanghai harbor was bitter-sweet. The bright and flashy lights of the skyline at night made for the perfect photo-op as we left China. But I was sad to leave the hustle-and-bustle of the country, definitely planning to visit again sometime!
Next country- 🇯🇵 Japan!
Until my next post, enjoy these pictures from China!
Jaiden Lynn 🙂
Journeys with Jaiden 