Julia's Blog

Last week it was the national holiday week or also called Golden week. In this week there are two important days celebrated in China: On October 1st there is the National day of China (whose holiday is prolonged until October 3rd) and the Mid-Autumn/Moon festival which is celebrated on October 4th. Therefore we got one whole week off at University.

I spend my National holiday week with Chen Ni and his family. We went to his hometown Nanchang 南昌. Nanchang is the capital of the Jiangxi province and is around 800 kilometer north of Shenzhen. Nanchang has much more history than Shenzhen. Nanchang has existed and evolved over several dynasties, has a number historical monuments and is an important place for the history of rebellious acts.

The holiday started on Saturday with a long car drive. Supposively the drive should take us around 9 hours, however it turned out that we were not the only one wanting to leave for the holiday. Around Shenzhen the traffic was really bad - one and a half hour after we departured we still hadn’t left the city. However it got better after leaving the Guangdong Province, because we took a newly built highway that a lot of people didn’t know about and therefore it was quite empty. Out of the city the landscape was very beautiful and very green. After 14 hours of driving, we arrived in Nanchang when it was already dark.

On Sunday it was the National holiday. This day celebrates the founding of the People’s Republic of China back in 1949. I met Chen Ni’s family and we went for family lunch. The family was warmly welcoming me, they taught me a lot about Chinese culture and I could perfectly practice my Chinese with them. Nanchang is know for it’s rice noodles and we  went to eat the best in town, which were really delicious…

In the afternoon I went with the two girls of the family to the museum - Helen was our local guide and Shirley knows Swiss-german, so she was my translator. After this we went for a walk around the lake, which is in the middle of the city and gives the city a very relaxing touch.

On Monday I mostly explored the city on my own and did some sight-seeing. On the morning I went to visit the Bayi-Square. The name is a reminder of the “First of August” (Ba = eight, Yi = one), which is seen as the founding day of the People’s Liberation Army. The Bayi-Square is a huge square with a fountain, a monument and music.

In the afternoon I went to visit another sight, the Shengjin tower. Around this tower there is a big with local food and snacks and I tried several things which I honestly couldn’t really tell what they were…

On Tuesday I was really surprised when I stepped out of the door, because it got real cold. The day before I was around 33° and on Tuesday it was around 25°… But for me the feeling was great - for the first time in one month I could go outside without immediately being hot! In the morning we visited the Teng Wang Temple, a temple with a garden just by the river. This temple has been destroyed and rebuilt 29 times in history.

In the afternoon we went to the Wanshougong temple outside of the city, which was less a touristic attraction but more of a cultural experience. It is a temple of the Taoism and people come there to pray. People go there to light joss sticks and ask for protection for their beloved ones. We also went to a kind of fortune teller and I got the number 88, which he told me will bring me a lot of luck!

On Wednesday was the day of the Moon festival. This is a festival of lunar appreciation and moon watching which is celebrated of the 15th day of the 8th month of the lunar calendar. It is always the day of the full moon. In China people gather together with their family, thanking for the harvest and union.

In the morning we went to another temple, the Youming temple which is a temple of the Buddhism, located in the city of Nanchang. After this we had a big family lunch with delicious food and of course mooncake. Mooncakes are round pastries with either lotus seed or red bean filling and sometimes they also contain a duck yolk. The mooncake is shared with the family on the Moon festival. Personally not my favorite pastry, but also not as bad as other people described it to me :)

(Since I did not take a picture of my mooncake, I just inserted one from the internet so you can imagine how it looks)

In the afternoon on Wednesday we went to the Museum of the Chinese painter Zhū Dā 朱耷. If you payed close attention you will notice that he has the same surname as me, so basically we’re family. He is a painter and calligrapher of the Qing dynasty.

On Thursday we drove back to Shenzhen (again, 14 hours) but when I stepped out of the car in Shenzhen shortly before midnight and smelled the hot and humid air it really felt like coming home!

In general I had a really amazing holiday in Nanchang. Nanchang is not the typical city to visit as a tourist and that’s what made it very interesting. I learned so much about Chinese life and culture and I had a interesting and pleasant time!