Alllllllllll aboard to Nanjing.

China's rail system is great. For major cities, it's as fast or faster than flying, since you can show up like 20 minutes before departure, and the stations are close to town. And to top it off, it's often cheaper. I know how the US is often too spread out to make rail competitive, but man, that's a big reason why I don't want to live there.

So we took the high speed train in the morning from Beijing to Nanjing. It actually wasn't the super high speed train, in that it took 4 hours as opposed to 3. Anyway, the next night was Chinese New Year Eve, which actually left us with only this day and very little time to get to the main attraction of Nanjing, the Japanese Massacre Memorial - basically, the Rape of Nanjing Museum.

Quick pause before I jump into that. I was having a conversation with Ella that my year spent in Taiwan was basically the year I discovered myself, and became who I am. The previous year, when I was living in Hangzhou, I was still sort of trying to figure myself out and survive in Asia. Combined with being new at blogging, that year was sort a blur. However, there is one moment from that year I will never forget, and this place is it. It's the number one most memorable thing about China to me. And although I haven't been to a Concentration Camp to compare, I have to imagine this place hits you in the same way. This is just a sad, sad place. I agree with pretty much everything I said last time I visited. But this time, I don't know if it's just on a second visit, or a (slightly) increased level of maturity, but it hit even harder. I really hope people who visit here don't come away with the feeling of Japanese people are terrible, as the atrocities they committed are completely divorced from the country that is there today. But I am glad this place exists, because coming to places like this puts things in a different perspective. Maybe a bit reductionist, but being in a foul mood because of something minor like a bad day at work sounds so insignificant when you compare it to what the people of Nanjing went through 80 some years ago.

Anyway, in a weird twist, we went to a German restaurant that night - the same restaurant when I visited Nanjing last time. It was good, but not as good as I remember. This would be the first of many German restaurants we would come across in Nanjing and Shanghai. Apparently German food has really gotten popular in that part of the country, for some reason. You'd think it would have taken off in Qingdao, but hey, here we are.

Kicking off our one full day in Nanjing, we began at John Rabe's house. This is a guy you probably don't know about, but also probably should. He was a sort of Oscar Schindler of China, a German businessman that kept 600 Chinese in his house (which was not that big), and helped establish the Nanjing Safety Zone around it, saving hundreds of thousands of people from being killed. He kept a diary about what happened during that time, and is a big reason why we know what we know about the Rape of Nanjing today. After the war he went back to Europe, but his history of being affiliated with the Nazis left him unable to keep a job. He was practically homeless until the people of Nanjing found out. From then on, the city sent him regular donations and care packages until nearly the day he died.

Shut up, I'm not crying, you're crying.

The museum was actually closed that day, because of the New Year. But a super nice lady who takes care of the house let us in, and refused money when we tried to give it to her. So, thank you, lady who takes care of the John Rabe house in Nanjing. If you ever go, please be extra nice to her.

After that, we took a walk to Gujiming Temple. Not much to say about it, it's a pretty temple. Being Chinese New Year, it was packed, but still, worth a look. For the rest of the day, we hung out in the center of the city around the Confucian Temple. The largest Confucian Temple in the world, it's surrounded by a traditional style street selling all sorts of snacks and souvenirs. We walked around, stopping in tiny little shops and one room museums, until we sort of got tired of it - not to mention, many were closed because of the New Year. Anyway, we had to get up early the next day to make the rest of the journey to Shanghai. And although this is a short entry, I'm going to stop here - there's just way too much to talk about in Shanghai, so we'll leave it for next time.