We woke up on the train this morning, groggy and confused about when our stop would come. Unable to find anyone who could clear up our confusion in English, and no less puzzled by the train conductors hand gestures in response to our questions, we decided to wait it out. Ryan suddenly realized; however, that the captain was using Chinese finger counting, and the sign he made with his pinky and thumb meant we would arrive at 6:00 AM.
After finally making it off the train all together and with all of our things, we were greeted by our new guide, who talkatively led us to a large golf cart. We loaded our luggage and piled in, cold and tired. We checked into our very authentic hotel, complete with rock-hard beds, no heat, and a shower head in the middle of the bathroom. Though it is very cold here, people make no effort to avoid it or use heat. In everything from houses to restaurants to hotel rooms, it is very difficult to escape the cold. Doors are often left wide open, only sometimes shielded by a thick quilt hanging from the threshold ...
After cramming in one last hour of sleep in the morning, we met for a “western” breakfast in the hotel, and reluctantly went out in the bitter cold. Our guide led us to the city wall, which he explained resembled a turtle with each of the two main gates representing the head and tail. He also informed us of Pingyao’s history as a banking center of China. There are twenty-two ancient banks in the city, and in its heyday they had outposts and connections throughout China.
We also visited a Confucian temple, where a group of costumed teenagers were beginning the day with a dance and musical performance in front of the temple. After enjoying the show, Ryan, Colin and I were forced into getting our fortunes told, all of which didn’t exactly make sense, though they were quite specific. Incense was lit, and we left the temple.
Due to the raw temperature and even snow flurries, we soon had to ask our guide if we could take a break in a warm coffee shop, where the unexpected warmth was much appreciated. We were then led straight to lunch, where we lingered in the warmth of the food again. We made the mistake of sitting in front of the window where the overly curious townspeople had a perfect and up-close view of us. Few hesitated to come straight up to the window and peer in at us for a good minute. One group even entered the restaurant and requested that we come outside to take a picture with them, to which we agreed, despite our guide asking the friendly Chinese to leave. Many of the people living in Pingyao are not afraid to snap pictures of us as we walk by or ask that we pose in one with them. One family even asked me to hold their baby. These sorts of things make the cultural differences between China and the US very apparent.
After taking a rest we met back up for a tour of the banks, which were interesting. What was more interesting; however, was that given Pingyao’s ancient background with banks, we had to leave the city to find a modern one.
While Ryan slept in the hotel to recover from a cold, Chris, Colin and I decided to check out the light show our guide mentioned to us that was outside the city walls. We were told that we had to be out of the main gate by a certain time when it closes every night. We rushed to finish up our second cup of tea in the warm coffee shop we had gone back to, and were driven to the gate. As we left through the city gate we realized that there were very few other people in the deserted outer courtyard, but thought little of it. Our guide led us to what looked like a circus tent from the outside. We bought tickets and entered what turned out to be a sort of maze made of bamboo and strings of flags. As we started following the various chutes, we quickly realized that there were no alternate routes to follow; what we thought was a maze was more of an elaborate queue directory, in which we were the only ones waiting. Already confused at the purpose of this, we were then informed by our guide that the show tonight was for government officials only, and that we would just have to wait in the “maze” for an hour and a half to see the show. While Colin followed the identical path a second time, Chris and I decided that our time could be better spent. We kindly told our guide that rather than sitting in a string-crisscrossed arena, we would like to walk back to our hotel. We made it back in the gate within a minute of it closing for the night.
On the way back we enjoyed experiencing a little of the town’s culture. We took a look at some of the popular street food, stepped into a tea shop, and looked over some vendor’s wares. We were all pretty tired, having slept little the night before, and were happy to enjoy dinner and relax. After dinner we turned on the Chinese TV in Chris’ room while Colin dubbed the character’s voices with his own impersonations.
We all got about three-hours of sleep before we had to wake up again to catch our next train to Luoyang. Though traveling has certainly been exciting and very interesting, I think we are all ready to reach our last destination.
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