Every year, Qingdao University spends the time and money to take the foreign teachers to someplace in China to visit. We get to go for FREE and get to explore an unseen city or re-explore a city we have already been to. We get to learn so much about many different things and get to interact with so many people, make new friends and take pictures with the Chinese people. This year the school took us to Qufu (the home of Confucious) and Taian (Taishan or Mountain Tai is there).
The plan was for the teachers to leave Friday night and take the train to Jinan. There we would spend the night and take a train Saturday morning to Qufu, spend the day in Qufu, and take a bus to Taian. We would spend Saturday night in Taian and then hike up Taishan on Sunday morning, leaving Taian later in the afternoon by train to get back to Qingdao Sunday night. That is what the rest of the teachers did.
Gary and I however were allowed to go a day earlier than the others. Neither Gary and I work on Fridays, so the university made our train tickets to Jinan for Thursday afternoon. This way we got to spend a day by ourselves exploring Jinan. We are so lucky they were willing to do this. Remember the school paid for most of the trip. The only thing we had to pay for was our first night hotel and getting into the sights on Friday along with food on Friday.
Exploring Jinan
We started off by taking bus number 3 (I had done research beforehand to know what buses to take) to Baotu Springs. There are 72 springs in Jinan. Baotuquan is the biggest and most well-known. This park has about 18-20 something springs in it with Baotu being the biggest one.
I thought this rock was cool. From one side it looks like a horse (picture on the left) and from the other side it looks like a dragon (picture on the right).
Wherever Gary and I go, we have people who want to take pictures with us. Most of them have never seen a foreigner and probably never will again. They are so excited about it, but very shy. We can usually tell when they want to, so we ask them. Sometimes they are brave enough to ask us. We are happy to do it. There are many foreigners who are not happy about it and feel it is an invasion of their privacy. I understand that, but if I can make someone smile, I am all for it.
Next we went to the Five Dragons Pool. You can see the dragons behind us. Yes there are 5.
Our last place was Daming Lake. It is a big, beautiful lake in the middle of the city.
These are the cutest twins I have seen in a long time. We met them on the boat over to this little island. When they saw me again the one on the left came up to me and started to speak Chinese. She wanted to shake my hand and then their parents wanted a picture. Absolutely adorable.
Gary and I dressed up as the Emperor and Empress again. It has become a tradition. We will probably have a wall in our home in the future with all of our pictures like these. We also had our portraits done in charcoal, but we want to get frames before we put them up in our apartment.
So at the base of one of the buildings there was this slide. Many people have and were doing it. I love slides, so I did it a couple of times. I got Gary to do it, too! It was actually really fun. I think I want one in my house in the future.
There is a tradition in China that you throw metal discs at a bell. If you hit the bell, you will have good luck. A water fountain would also go off if you hit the bell bringing more luck. Some new friends we made on the boat ride bought Gary some discs. He had a blast doing it and, of course, the Chinese loved it. Everyone got excited when someone hit the bell. We all cheered!
We met this little boy on the boat. After that, wherever we went we saw the family. He did not want to get close enough to take a picture. This is as close as we good get. A funny thing happened as we were going down the bridge. He wanted to run, so he let me hold his hand, so we could run fast.
The lake was beautiful, but now it was time to find food. One of my students, whose home town is Jinan, recommended we go to Furong Pedestrian Street. It is a foodie street. She gave us directions and we walked there from the lake. On the way we found a Buddhist/Monk school/church and a couple of quaint, old-fashioned Chinese streets. Wonderful and peaceful and totally traditional Chinese.
This bird actually had a chain around it's neck to keep it from flying away.
This was our first snack. It is bread that they roll out, spread ground pork on it and then roll it up again. They flatten it a bit and then start to bake it in an old fashion oven. As it cooks they flatten it some more so you get a little pancake-like thing of bread and pork. Delicious!!!
This is Furong Street. There was so much food to try. We could have eaten so much, but we did really well. We ate some pork skewers and some ice cream.
What a wonderful day we had exploring Jinan by ourselves. We are getting more and more comfortable traveling in China even though we only speak a little of the language. We are lucky to work at a university that is willing to take us on free trips to explore China.
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