China: Massacres, Memorials and Mountains of Purple

Right here it goes- China updates are coming thick and fast now! (I hope)

From Qingdao, we took a Soft Seat train to Nanjing. 8 hours of serious "arse on cushion" comfort. The pollution between the two cities was ridiculous. The view consisted of the following pattern- power station, smog, polluted fog, power station, power station, power station, smog, smog, smog, another power station, oh yes some more smog, and then what's that? oh its a power station. It clearly seems that China's attempts to develop into a super power is more like an attempt to develop into a "super power station".

Anyway, we arrived in Nanjing at night and it was a pleasant city with leafy boulevards across the place. The Sunflower Hostel was a little bit grubby but not too shabby by all accounts. We met a young, American roister-doister called Fletch in our room, so we decided to go grab a few beers with him. As we were heading out we also met a few more people: a young german couple called Gerhardt and Gertrude (I can't remember her actual name) and then Stevesie (guy who was into map reading and camping. He looked kinda like a skinny version of Bill Murray in The Life Aquatic - hence the nickname). We went to a few places and had a few beers, before Stevesie, Fletch and the slightly dull German couple left us to our own devices in The Castle bar. However, soon after their departure we were joined by an incredibly hammered/enthusiastic Tibetan chap. He asked us to join him and his friends. All of them were from Lhasa in Tibet, and all of them were inebriated. Conversation tended to include the following subjects- 1) Welcoming us to the Tibet in their hearts. 2) The freedom of Tibet. 3) They would mention an English football team/football player/film star and then they would smile, stick their thumb up and exclaim "Very good!" It was quite charming. "Clive Owen. Very good!" was a particular highlight. Then they all sang to us, in unison, a Tibetan song about their hometown. Subsequently, we were asked to sing "Yellow Submarine" by The Beatles. We obliged. As we were leaving, the ringleader of the Tibetan group pointed at his T-shirt which had Heath Ledger's face emblazoned across it, and exclaimed "Orlando Bloom. Very good!" Good times.

The next day we visited the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall, which was in dedication to the 300, 000 Chinese people killed in Nanjing by Japanese soldiers in 1937. It was understandably pretty grim, hard-hitting stuff. It was a fascinating museum, but it really did not pull any punches at all. The museum housed graphic photos, video footage of dead bodies and women who had been raped (sometimes 40 times in one day - apparently if they were particularly attractive) and of people with chunks taken out of their neck from unsuccessful beheading attempts. We also saw three different actual mass graves, filled with skeletons of the victims. It was a fantastic museum and I would certainly recommend it, but don't expect to be feeling too great afterwards. The Chinese people however, seemed to appreciate the place in a slightly different and bizzarre way. It was not uncommon to see young people, both strangely and distastefully, posing for smiley photos alongside statues of people on fire or holding their dead babies.

That evening we just hung out with a few 35p beers. The next day we headed to the Purple Mountain on the fringes of Nanjing. We caught the cable car up to the top and explored the gardens, and walked back down to the city. Excellent views were enjoyed. That's about that. That night we got the train to Suzhou. Canal towns ahoy!