Golden Season 金色季节

[In this blog, I have included a link to the glossary at the end so you can learn and check the pronunciations of some of the new words I have learned this month]

It is finally Autumn! Although back home Autumn starts around September, we only just started feeling the cold this month. We have literally changed our wardrobes overnight due to the sudden temperature drop! It was nice to observe the leaves finally turn golden and feel the autumnal atmosphere.

Pretty views while cycling

Golden Week Holiday aka National Day 国庆节

Our second month in 中国 started with the celebrations of the Golden Week, which is China’s National Day. This year’s festivities were even more special, as it was the 70th anniversary of the founding of The People’s Republic of China. For this occasion, we were on holiday for the first week of the month. Many have chosen to use this opportunity to travel around China to places such as Zhangjiajie 涨家界 or Qufu 曲阜 (very jealous!), however, I have chosen to stay in Tianjin and enjoy the holiday.

Beijing 北京

On the 3rd Jody, Rhona, two of our Polish friends and I went for a day trip to Beijing. Luckily Tianjin 天津 very near to the capital and the high-speed trains 高铁 only take 30 min to get there. The whole train system is completely different than the one back in Scotland 苏格兰. Here, we had to pick up our tickets a day in advance to avoid delays and present our passport to collect them. On the day, we had to go through multiple security and wait at the assigned gate for our train- just like at an airport! Our train was longer than the usual 高铁, however this gave us time to observe the behaviour of Chinese passengers. Some of them have evidently been on the train for much longer than us, as they had stacks of Instant noodles 方便面, massive blankets and various things to entertain themselves.

Our first train ticket

As if we thought 天津, was busy, arriving in 北京 proved us very wrong. The train station 火车站 was so busy, it took us 20 minutes to get to the entrance alone. It was incredible to see and experience the rush hour, especially in the capital. Nevertheless, we managed to get to the subway station and arrive to the first stop of our trip- the Pearl Market.

The Pearl Market 红桥市场 is a “shopping centre” - perfect to practice one’s haggling skills. As soon as we stepped through the doors, vendors from various stalls were trying to persuade us to buy something. We were targeted more as we were foreigners with phrases like “Do you need a watch?” or “Do you like Supreme?” which sounded to us quite funny. The more floors we ascended, the vibe changed, and the sellers became less persistent as they sold more expensive things such as jewellery or jade ornaments. I will definitely go back when I’m more confident in haggling!

Pearl Market 红桥市场 from outside

4th floor of 红桥市场

Our next stop was the Temple of Heaven 天坛 which was only across the road from 红桥市场. We entered through the East Gate 东门 just to be welcomed by an enormous park full of people having picnics, sightseeing or simply resting. We even met a senior tourist group from Poland which was very heart-warming!

As we made our way through the park, we could get a taste of the Traditional Chinese Architecture and see the different pavilions and passages. Although the park itself was extremely beautiful, I was completely taken aback when we finally reached 天坛. The colours of the Temple are unbelievably vibrant, and they accentuated the traditional patterns sculpted on the walls of it. We tried to see the inside of the Hall of Prayer, which is the main structure, however we were pushed off the stairs by other tourists giving us no chance to take good photos of the inside (but believe me, its mesmerising!) 

We hopped on the subway to our next destination which was Tiananmen Square 天安门. Again, we experience such a massive volume of people, that the subway station to 天安门广场closed. The police officers had to use metal gates to let people cross the street at designated times. At one point they made a one-way system between the two sides of the road, which led us to split for a fair bit of the walk! However, when we finally arrived after 2 hours we were again astonished by the Chinese architecture. From the 天安门 gate tower we could see a military parade on the main square, which was in
occasion of the 国庆节.

View onto Tiananmen Square 天安门广场

We accidentally entered the Forbidden City Park (thank you, nice guard!), which was definitely my highlight of the trip. Apart from feeling like celebrities because many Chinese people 中国人 wanted to take pictures with us 外国人, we have seen some amazing landscapes and even woman dressed in traditional chest skirts, called Hanfu 汉服. The pictures speak by themselves!

Before heading home, we decided to also visit the Jingshan Park 景山公园, which is located just north from the Forbidden City. The park has five peaks in total, on which each lies a pavilion. After climbing a fair number of stairs, we managed to catch the panorama of Beijing just before the sunset.

Panorama of Beijing 北京

During our whole trip we felt like true celebrities. In all honesty, I believe that 中国人have taken more pictures of us than we have of Beijing! All we heard was “外国人” and “漂亮”, which mean foreigner and beautiful. Sometimes it was almost an honour to take pictures with them, but some 中国人 just took pictures without even asking!

Our lovely trip in Beijing finished with our midnight train home. With our legs aching and eyes closing, we arrived to 天津站.

Our stunning window view

School

This month we have started to challenge ourselves with harder material in class and extracurricular activities. One of them is calligraphy 书法, which we attend every Tuesday. As I normally really enjoy Hanzi class 汉字课, I was especially excited for 书法. However, it turned out to be harder than expected! There is a specific was of holding the brush and even of writing the strokes. I don’t think we will match the skills of our 老师 anytime soon, it is still fun to try to write as neatly as possible!

Francesca trying calligraphy

Mine and Francesca's names written by 老师

Culture

The end of the month was wrapped up by our Halloween celebrations 万盛节前夕. In 中国, Halloween is not a popular holiday and most 中国人 don’t celebrate it at all. But, the supermarket near us had some decorations to offer and we managed to turn our floor a mini-Halloween party.

We have invited many of our international friends and even our Comprehension teacher and her son, 付老师和她的儿子.Most of us dressed up and we played dunking for apple and wrap the mummy, had lots of snacks and even a little henna session provided by our Indian friend. We also taught everyone how to carve pumpkins, which we had on display for the next few days. Everyone had loads of fun and it was really touching to share our traditions with our international friends, as many of them also don’t celebrate Halloween 万盛节前夕.

Suha and I (badly) carving a pumpking

Suha and her first ever pumpkin!

DIY Kung Fu Panda costumes

Next month 下月, we will sit our mid-term exams, which count towards our final score. If there is anything you want me to write about, please let me know and I will try to write an interesting blog, so look forwards to it!

Glossary: https://pdfhost.io/v/wuOJxMrO_2_Glossarypdf.pdf

再见，孔爽途