Shanghai, Nanjing, Anhui

After we finished the 6 week course in China and said goodbye to everyone, I still had a week in China before I had to fly down to. So a bunch of us being Monica, Max, Jeike, Matty and Sam headed to the moutain region of Anhui. I have never in my life been so cold, it was beyond a joke. Never going back to China in the winter. I always thought I was a winter person but clearly I was not. The hostel we stayed in was the 'Youth hostel' and it was really nice, empty but good. We walked around the old town, tired and in a daze after a sleepless train ride. After a good night sleep we decided to climb the famous Huangshan mountain. We climbed a fair bit and then got to the area where you needed to get the lifts up to the peak and then realised if we went up there we would not see anything but clouds. So cold adn exhuasted we headed back down and went back to the hostel. The bushwalking club enthuasit Maxine wasn't the best of walkers it is clear to say. It was a really nice region though. We also visited the Xidi and Hongcun ancient villages, they are beautiful as Chinese pictures.
It was a chilled atmosphere. There were things to see in Anhui but we pretty much saw them within the first few days. So we decided to head back a day early to Nanjing. We got to Nanjing really early in the morning and decided to sleep off any tiredness. In the afternoon we just casually walked around the town to get our bearings. Me Maxine and Sam went to the Nanjing war museum which was actually really sad. It had a lot of history, very anti Japanese that was for sure. It was also very modern and state of the age. We also headed to see the bell tower of Nanjing, which is not a real good highlight it is safe to say. Nanjing was a cool little city. It wasn't as good as Shanghai but it was still nice to see. We ended up running in Aimee and Sharon and there we went to a Mongolian hut for dinner which was actually really awesome and delicious. Loved the food. It was nice to see. The best moment was at the train station getting tickets back to Shanghai. The line was no joke MASSIVE and there was no way of getting to the front and skipping, or at least we thought. We sort of played on our white appearance and ignorance, despite we spoke chinese, and walked to the front of the que and bought tickets, so we were in and out of there in 5 mins. No one said anything to us, just muttered bad comments and gave us an evil stare. It was an experience. Probably not very ethical but oh well. So the next day I went to Shanghai whilst the others went to Beijing. They were all off to more extreme colder places whilst I was headed towards the sun and heat of Thailand. Let me tell you I was so happy to head to the heat. I ended up having one night in Shanghai, where I met up with Owen who I used to live with in Souther China. He had not changed one bit that was sure to say, still typically English. Took two connecting flights through Shenzhen to Bangkok, so it was a bit of a long day in transit.