Day Tour to the Grand View Garden

I am the kind of guy who likes peaceful places. I think that explains why I haven’t paid a visit to the Forbidden City in the 4-year stay in Beijing.

When I was about ten years old, I happened to read several pages of A Dream of Red Mansions. I was too young to really understand the story but I have been curious about the complicated relationship among the figures in the novel since then. When I knew that the Grand View Garden was designed according to the novel A Dream of Red Mansions, I planned a tour.

We, as senior students have nothing but free time. On a weekday, we started off.

It was a rainy spring day. The trees looked brightly-green with the rain shower. The red gate gave out an air of nobleness and dignity, as though telling the people its once glorious days.

As is the Alice stepping into the wonderland, I began to search the little knowledge I knew about the novel with excitement full with my heart.

The Lost Stone by the goddess Nvwa(Bu Tian Yi Shi in Chinese)

It was located outside the Grand View Garden with the height of 9m and the weight of 60t. Another name of A Dream of Red Mansions, The Story of the Stone originated from this stone.

The Front Entrance Gate

Winding Path Leading to A Secluded Place

Aromatic Pavilion (Qin Fang Ting in Chinese)

It was built on the axis. The white-stone carved handrail surrounds the pond. The glistening lights of waves and beauties in the novel bring you a false sense of the fairyland.

The Naiad's House (Xiao Xiang Guan in Chinese)

It is the residence of the soul figure, Lin Daiyu. And the death of her player Chen Xiaoxu added sorrow to this place.

Winter Tour in Harbin

Due to the work, I went to Harbin in summer for several times. I appreciate its broad streets, glorious constructions and straightforward residents. The Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival always stirs my heart, so this winter I started off.

I packaged my fur hat, ear pads, scarf, woolen sweater, down coat, down pants, snow jogging shoes and gloves. When I arrived there, I found that the local people, especially the young never look like this. Our dress stood out in the crowd. A man stared at me and say” You are from the South, right?” Fortunately, he didn’t ask whether I was from the Mars.

Walking for several minutes, my breath froze on the scarf. Now you can understand its coldness.

Passing by two streets, I stood before the Saint Sophia Cathedral. In summer, there were new couples taking wedding photos.

The Central Street is Harbin’s most famous street. In the early morning, the sunlight cast shadows on the paved road. It’s the most beautiful time during a day. There are rows of store standing beside the street, selling local products.

Harbin Ice Festival is a great opportunity for those ice sculpture artists to show their amazing talents. During the Harbin Ice Festival, numbers of ice sculpture artists gather here and like the ice magicians make their imagination and brilliance into fantastic ice sculptures. In the day, you can see the ice magicians take the ice away and create their works. In the night, hundreds of thousands of tourists crowd here and enjoy the splendid lights give off from the ice sculptures.

The Harbin Snow World was like a fairytale world. Every ice castle varies with colors. The carriage carried tourists moving through the ice sculptures.

Guide for Chinese Spring Festival

I am Michelle and I am an American. As many other foreigners, I wonder why Chinese call their traditional new year some animals. For example, in Chinese lunar calendar, the 2014 is the year of Horse. I think it’s so cute. Maybe they truly love animals? And I also have other questions about the Chinese Spring Festival. Why they hang red lanterns above the gate? Why there are lion dances in the streets? Why they like firing fireworks during the Spring Festival?

Bearing these questions in my mind, I want to learn more about the Chinese New Year and the Chinese Spring Festival. I found some interesting information summarized as below and hope it will help.

During the Chinese Spring Festival, Chinese around the world will hang red lanterns, burn censers, eat dumplings, and perform lion dances and fire fireworks.

By convention, Chinese will stick on couplets on the doors one day or two before the Spring Festival.

Usually, on the New Year’s Eve, a family would sit together and eat New Year’s Eve dinner while watching the annual Spring Festival Gala. After the dinner, they will make dumplings for the the first day of the Spring Festival. They stay up very late on the Eve. Some even stay up the whole night. At the midnight, the wife of a family will burn the censer in the yard and the husband will fire fireworks to welcome the new year.

On the first day of the Spring Festival, Chinese get up very early. They will wear new clothes and visit relatives and friends.

On the second day of the Spring Festival, they will visit the maternal grandmother and grandfather.

And their relatives-and-friends-visit activities can continue until the Lantern Festival. On the Lantern Festival, they will eat rice glue balls and watch lion dances.

The above is how Chinese spend their Spring Festival and hope it will help.