The Middle Kingdom Part I

Since chronology is already majorly messed up post-wise, I figured I'd embrace the chaos rather than trying (in vain) to fix everything.

I spent part of my Taiwan trip in China with my mom, aunt, and uncle in one of those bus tours. While originally, everyone wanted to go to the World Expo in Shanghai, the purported 5-6 hour line-up per exhibition site had us going to Zhangjiajie (in Hunan "Lake-South" province) instead. We actually started in Hubei "Lake-North" province (in the red), in the capital city of Wuhan.

 Yellow Crane Tower

One of the four great towers of China (alongside Yueyang tower, Tengwang tower, and Yuejiang Tower). It was where poets gathered to drink and make poems (what else?) Legend has it that it's where a famous person became enlightened and rode to the heavens on a yellow crane, hence the tower's name. In the lobby, there is a large mosaic depicting this scene. 

Due to fires and civil unrests, the tower was destroyed and rebuilt many times (a common theme in all the "historic" sites), each time reflecting the architectural styling of the period . The current one was built in the 80's.

The tower actually dedicated an entire floor to models of the tower's previous incarnations. Since I love scale miniatures (who doesn't?), of course I had to take pictures. Aren't they cool? If I could run away with them, I would have. The one on the left depicts the tower from Qing dynasty while the one of the right is of the Tang dynasty.

Neat fact: because the tower is so prone to fires, when they designed the current building, they added a special motif to the roofs (left). The "fish tail" depicts one of the sons of the sea dragon king. Since dragons controls and is of water (sea, lakes, rain, etc...), the addition is believed have the ability to prevent fires. *Fingers crossed*
So far, so good.

It's the little details that makes historical buildings such as this one so amazing to visit in person. Although personally, I think the "christmas lights" really cheapens the vibe of the whole place. Gah! It's like putting Starbucks in the Forbidden City (Oh wait, they already did that...)


Mural depicting all the famous people associated with the tower (mostly poets whose names I have no idea. I really need to brush up on my chinese history/geography).

View from the top of the tower (right). See the bell? Ringing it supposedly gives you good fortune. I didn't do it mostly because our guide was herding us to the next destination and also that it was pretty pricey for knocking metal with a piece of wood (they charge per knock).




Things I've Learned - Important Things to Know When Going to China:

1. At all times (and I mean ALL TIMES), have tissue paper/toilet paper on your person. Because it is never safe to assume that the places you'd think would have a steady supply [i.e. public washrooms] would have any. Also, hoard any and all of antiseptic wipes you come across. Those things are equivalent to gold! You'll thank me later.
2. Chinese people are pushy (both verbally and physically). They are verbally blunt to the point of tactless-ness. Even people in the service industry can seem extremely rude/lacking in common courtesy. Case in point: at one of the hotels, a housekeeper came in our room to lock up all the cash bar stuff (which in itself was already kind of a rude thing to do right in front of customers) and then proceeded to argue with a co-worker through her walkie-talkie right in front of us. After which, she slammed the walkie-talkie on the table before leaving for the next room. I was flabbergasted at her behaviour but what I got from the whole incident is that generally speaking, they feel that being extremely blunt/straight-forward is a positive trait and that people who are polite/courteous as really fake because they don't speak their minds. I also realized that they don't think of themselves as representatives of the restaurant/hotel/service they are working for. "As long as the work gets done, who cares what my attitude is." It's definitely something to get used to and not be offended at. Someone on the tour said something that I felt was really apt and summed up on China really well. "The infrastructure/hardware is all there, now the software needs to catch up." In the cities we visited, all the hardware (roads, buildings, technology, etc...) were great and modern, but the software (people) needs some updating, especially in the common courtesy department, which I'm sure will happen as they interact more and more with "foreigners" from outside. Whoa, didn't meant for this to be an op. piece, but I guess somethings just needed to be said.