I am currently riding the bullet train on the way back from our long weekend trip in Qingdao! Half way through the program, we get a long weekend where many students choose to travel to cities outside of Beijing. Me and 5 other people decided it would be fun to travel to Qingdao! Qingdao is a coastal city south of Beijing. It takes about 5 hours to get there on the bullet train. We left Beijing on Thursday, July 13th, just 2 hours after finishing our last Chinese final. The train station was extremely crowded and people were certainly not afraid to push and shove to get ahead in line, but we ended up on the train and had a relaxing ride to Qingdao. On the way, I made friends with some elementary school children who were curious about foreigners. I tried to speak to them in Chinese and they tried to respond in English. One kid even pulled out a Chinese Harry Potter novel and started showing it to me. It was quite the bonding experience.
Once we arrived in Qingdao, we immediately noticed a change in the weather. Qingdao was much cooler, less crowded and had better air quality than Beijing, which was refreshing. We got a cab and headed to Holiday Inn. One of the girls I came with had some family friends in Qingdao, so they came to get us from the train station and treated us to dinner, which was nice. One of the family friends was named Daisy and attended college in the US as an international student. She was super nice and willing to show us around Qingdao.
On Friday, we went with Daisy to a park by the ocean called the May Fourth Square (the name is completely unrelated to Star Wars). After that we explored the coastal shops and drove around in a four-person bicycle while yelling “ni hao!” to random people strolling along the coast. We saw so many cute dogs along the way as well. That night we went to the Olympic Sailing center and explored the pier. We even drove bumper cars, which was so much fun.
On Saturday, Daisy took us to a cool German town area of Qingdao. We went to the beach again and took some pictures by a beautiful castle. Then we went to a Beer Museum, which was actually a very interesting experience. Qingdao used to be occupied by the Germans and is known for its beer, particularly “Tsingtao”.
The third day we relaxed a bit at the hotel and went to explore the mall. At night, we went back to the pier, bought some souvenirs, and went on the bumper cars one last time.
Finally, on Monday it was time to leave Qingdao and head back to Beijing. This long weekend trip has been so much fun! It was nice to explore a new city, enjoy the beaches and nice weather and also get a chance to relax before returning to the busy life in Beijing. I would definitely recommend traveling to Qingdao for anyone looking for a place to visit during the long weekend trip!
