Shenyang

I arrived in Harbin after my trip to Qiqihar and promptly bought a train ticket to Shenyang. With a little time to kill in Harbin before my train, I visited the Heilongjiang Provincial Museum, which was all done up with New Year's decoration. I mostly enjoyed the museum's collection of old cannons. I also found a cafe downtown in a building which was once a synagogue. Finally, I went to catch my train. Even at 12am, the station was packed with people heading home for Chinese New Year. One man's sole luggage appeared to be a bundle of fire kindling and large bicycle tire. Another looked refined, sitting cross-legged with his reading glasses on and calmly reading what looked like a book on religious subject matter. His sole luggage was a small cardboard box. I saw other people, including families and couples and groups of friends. The sleeper train was an experience as well. My bunk was on top and required a 10-foot ladder climb. However, this left me relatively undisturbed. I slept through the night and woke to the sound of a radio playing "Green Island Serenade".

Once in Shenyang, I caught a bus to the old quarter of the city by the Imperial Palace. The youth hostel mentioned in the guidebook appears to have closed, another place had no rooms available, and another hotel on that street was closed to foreigners. Fortunately, I finally found a small inn at the end of the street. The room was clean, nice, and cheap with a comfy bed and a computer. The owners said I should pretend to be from Xinjiang for the places that didn't accept foreigners. That day, I checked out the Imperial City. Before the Manchus conquered the Ming Empire and established the Qing Dynasty, they had already built a small empire in Manchuria with Shenyang as their capital. The Imperial City was where the emperor lived and is kind of like a miniature version of the Forbidden City in Beijing. I started to come down sick and ended up buying some medicine at a pharmacy.

The next day I slept till the afternoon (almost 15 hours). I took a bus to the 9.18 museum about the Mukden incident, but found it closed for the Chinese New Year season. I took some pictures and headed back to town. I got a little lost and had to take a cab to where I ate dinner, a vegetarian restaurant. I got "Peking duck" and small cakes baked with fillings such as rose petals. The waitresses all wore bunny ears (this is the year of the bunny). That night, I explored downtown Shenyang, which has enough shopping, lights, and advertisements to rival Times Square. I bought street snacks and got some candy for Mr. Xu's family. The next day I caught a bus to Dandong.