No Way to Update about Golden Week

I actually have some time to study, but I have a good internet connection so I'll update first. With my parents visiting, midterms coming up, followed by a 10 day trip to Chengdu in Sichuan, there is no way to go through every day of my trip during Golden Week. That said, I'll put up the best of my photos and outline what I did real quick.


Xian:
-Went to this awesome tomb where they have glass floors installed over the excavated trenches
-Went to the Great Mosque (largest mosque complex in China), and haggled for a small Mao Zedong messenger bag ($9) and a counterfeit NorthFace ($20) in the bazaar outside.
-Looked at and "mounted" the 9-story Big Goose Pagoda




The Bazaar outside the Great Mosque











Beijing:
-Went to Tiananmen and the Forbidden city, took like all the first day.
-First night, saw my friend Jon Kent and went to a Talib Kweli and Ozamatli (sp?) concert, which was amazing, but ridiculously tiring after walking all over.
-Second day, slept late, went to the Temple of Heaven, and found a marginally dirty hostel to replace my really dirty (cockroaches) hostel.
-Third day, Great Wall at Mutianyu, awesome as expected. Long distance bus to Huairou, no clear way from there, so got ripped off slightly by a guy with some car. He gave me a ride for 40 kuai, and I said I'd give him the same to pick me up. Didn't come, so I talked to a cop (in chinese) and he crammed me into a cheaper 10 kuai van with like 7 other people.
-Fourth day, went to Dongyue Temple. it's Taoist and dedicated to hell. There are shrines to all 8o some departments of hell. I love stuff like that, so it was great.
-Caught the 4 p.m. train back to Nanjing. Everything but the hard seats was sold out. I think I already said how uncomfortable that was.




Great Wall