Traveling back

The day of the departure was marked by a constant rain. Indeed, the whole train ride from Nanjing to the capital city of Beijing was chased by the rain. It's been a while since the last time I went on an overnight train ride. That was in Finland I think.

I got tickets to a "hardback" bed which means a cubicle of 2x3 beds (three levels on both sides). That's the usual ticket type we bought back in the day, when living in China :) I slept on the lowest one. It was comfortable enough to be able to fall asleep, although I kept waking up once in a few hours. Anyway, back and still alive :)

P.S. the photos are starting to flow into Flickr... I'll keep a constant pace of about 8-10 pictures / day so that if you check back every now and then, there should be some new ones (instead of lashing them all at once).

In NJ

Well, it seems there won't be a road trip with my dad as my aunt was able to get me a train ticket back to Beijing

This morning me and my dad drove from Hangzhou to Nanjing. Well, I did most of the driving, as in back in 2006 :) I guess once you get used to the Chinese traffic "rules" - or lack thereof, everything goes a lot smoother.

I also finally saw my grandma - I mean after she got seriously ill, was hospitalized and subsequently released for home care about a year ago.

I guess I'll be spending the rest of my week here, so there's plenty of time.

Loma!

... that was Finnish and means "Holiday!". Yup, the National Holiday week (around Oct. 1st) has begun. I flew to Hangzhou as soon as I could (last lecture on Thursday morning, flight on the same night), got delayed for an hour and a half by the Shenzhou VII rocket launch and arrived in the early hours of Friday morning.

Hangzhou is a beautiful city in the eastern coast of China, few hours' drive from Shanghai. It was very humid when I got here, and a bit warmer than Beijing. I heard Nanjing is even hotter. That's my next destination. The most well-known place in Hangzhou would be the lake Xihu, or West Lake, a very scenic place right by the city. I went there today, but unfortunately my internet connection at the moment (at my dad's place) is a bit slow so the pics will be coming later.

I also visited Zhejiang University, which is the place my parents worked at during my early childhood here in Hangzhou. My good friend from Finland, Shilei (people tend to call him Chili), is also in there to study Mandarin for a semester, and with a stroke of luck we met each other today.

My tour will continue to Nanjing on Monday, and I'll return to Beijing the next weekend. Details unknown for now, but it looks like I'm going to have to take a very long road trip with my dad on my way back...