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| Harbin Ice Festival crew |
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| Ice and Snow World |
I am just going to start off by saying that this weekend was one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had. I know that me trying to describe it is not going to make it sound nearly as fun as it was but I will just have to try my best with some aid from my pictures. So I woke up at 4:30 to just get up and out and was very surprised when I walked out my door to see Adam Skyping. I guess it’s a good time to Skype home, but it didn’t really seem to make much sense. He told us he just couldn’t sleep but we later found out he had just been up all night after going out and decided to Skype his dad and girlfriend without much recollection. After saying hi to his girlfriend, we all headed down stairs to catch our cab that was there promptly at 4:50 as promised. The cab ride was only about 45 minutes to the airport and when we got there we headed in and we eventually found where to check in for our airline. Unfortunately, the airline doesn’t actually open until after 6 which we found crazy for such a huge airport. After waiting in line for about 30 minutes, they opened and we were allowed to use the self-check in machine. I was a little worried about not having the credit card I purchased the ticket with, but all they needed was our passport and confirmation numbers and the boarding pass printed right out. We then made our way to the gate and decided we had enough time to grab some food but once again couldn’t find anything open so we gave up after not too long. We hung around at the gate until they started calling us to board. We actually had to take a shuttle out to our plane, which was the first sign of the “low-quality airline” box that we had to check before buying the tickets. We made it out to the plane and it was a mad rush to get on but we eventually made it to our seats and were all ready to go, or so we thought. We ended up sitting in the terminal for over an hour but ended up only being 30 minutes behind schedule getting into Harbin. We all basically slept the whole time other than a short burst of homework and some gazing out the window of the great view of the mountains. The best part of the flight came at the end when the flight crew actually led stretches that about 70% of the passengers engaged in. It was absolutely hilarious to see all of these people massage their earlobes and attempt to bend down and touch their toes with the negative amount of leg room we had. We then got to get off the plane at an actual gate, which was a nice surprise, and then headed towards the exit.
We decided it would be easier to just get food there than attempt to find a place after checking into the hotel so we ended up just getting some chicken sandwiches and fries. Three of the four sandwiches were definitely undercooked and still pink but luckily mine was the best looking. After we had some food in our bellies, we were ready to start our adventure in Harbin and take our first steps into the below zero weather. John got a video of our first reactions, which was pretty funny, but we made it to a cab for a little warmth without much hassle. After quickly learning the amount of English in Harbin is limited we had to give our hotel’s phone number to the driver so he could figure out where to go and then just like that we were on our way. We ended up paying for a toll we went through but other than that we got to the hotel without much confusion.
Checking in, however, was much more of a process. We walked up and showed them our passports and they looked up our reservation. After that they used their phones to translate to “hand over 1000 yuan deposit.” This was very startling considering the rooms were only 368 yuan and rounding up 1000 was basically all of the money any of us brought for the whole trip. Without much other choice, we handed over the money and got our keys. We threw our stuff up in the room, very careful not to touch a thing, and decided our first plan of action was to throw on all of our layers and then find an ATM ASAP. We severely underestimated how hard it would be to get cash to say the least. After 4 different ATM’s my card finally worked and I took out 2000 yuan to cover everyone until everyone else could get money. John also ended up getting cash but Bryan’s card wouldn’t work so we decided we would just keep a tally until he could pay us back.
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| Zhaolin Park |
With the cash situation mostly resolved we headed to Zhaolin Park, which was only a couple of blocks from the hotel. Admittance was only 80 yuan with a student ID, and we entertained ourselves for at least an hour and a half. There were just ice sculptures upon ice sculptures including towers and gazebos and anything you could imagine made out of ice. After much wandering we found a dark room full of a ton of ice that was lit up. This got us really excited for what was to come that night, but at the time we had no idea what we were in for. We even found an ice slide but apparently it was out of service so we couldn’t go down. After hundreds of pictures and our fair share of awe, we decided to head back to the hotel to put on some more layers before it got dark.
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| Gangnam Style is everywhere! |
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| Crazy ice slide |
With some confidence in numbers we decided to just go for it too, with no idea what we were getting ourselves into. We took the cab to this sketchy little shop where they took us into the back room and got us the tickets. We felt a little better when we got loaded onto a bus and saw Chinese people but were then instantly taken back when we realized all of the Chinese people had different tickets than we did. We decided what was done was done and we were just going to go with it and see what happened. We did make sure to take a picture of the shop in case they did rip us off though, not that we would be able to do anything. We were only on the bus for about 10 minutes when we saw Ice and Snow World. Right then, we knew that this was going to be way more impressive than we thought as it looked like an entire city made out of ice. Only problem was that we had to get in with what were probably bogus tickets. The Wisconsin girls split off from the group and got denied with their tickets so things were not looking so hot. We ended up just sticking with the group as they counted us about 5 times and kept yelling to stay in a straight line. Eventually our group got led through the line to get in and without even asking for our tickets we were in! We are still about 90% sure our tickets were fake but we were so happy that we got it, we instantly did not even care.
I think I can speak for all of us when I say we were absolutely blown away. This was unlike anything I had ever seen before and made Zhaolin Park seem like a complete waste of time. We all had to use the bathroom so we went into a little building and went to the bathroom and grabbed some dumpings for a quick dinner. We bought some foot warmers, and with that had about an hour and a half to make our way around the park before it closed. Our first plan of action was to get a picture of the giant thermometer, which was at -25 celsius. We then ran into this guy offering us to hold this adorable animal that must have been some sort of arctic fox for only 20 yuan. Naturally, we all jumped on the opportunity and made sure to get some good pictures. After that we decided we needed to find a slide to go down. We found one that looked ridiculous but waiting in line would have probably taken the whole time we were there and we hadn’t even seen any of the park yet so we unfortunately had to pass.
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| Ice thermometer showing -25 Celsius |
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| Heavily sedated arctic fox |
However, seeing the rest of the park was well worth it. It isn’t even going to sound cool when I describe it but there was anything and everything made out of ice from slides, to bars, to a giant stage. John and Bryan couldn’t resist getting a Harbin beer that actually had to be brought from another area because keeping it in the bar would have made it freeze. They had to drink them pretty quickly considering they said it went from a chilled beer to the coldest beer they had ever drank in a matter of minutes. We went down a few small slides and got some good pictures but decided we needed one as a group. We tried to ask this guy to take one, but he ended up busting his shit on the ice and hitting his head. Bryan said his mouth might have been bleeding too, but either way we felt horrible. He ended up still taking the picture and recognized my Purdue sweatpants. We had just assumed he was from China because he was Asian so we asked how he knew Purdue. He ended up being from Washington and spoke perfect English so we felt pretty silly. We ended up talking for a little while and then getting a great picture.
Jess and I then decided we could go for a snack and went for these fruit skewers coated in some caramelized sugar. We didn’t really think it through, but they were completely frozen solid and were pretty difficult to eat, but still delicious. After a few hours in the freezing cold it was time for the park to close. It was actually pretty good timing considering all of us had had about enough of the cold. We got a cab back for 100 yuan, even though the meter said 17, and just went with it because that’s what the guy had told us earlier and we had no way out. The driver was also really nice and we tested our Chinese to tell him how much fun we had, which was pretty funny. Even after getting ripped off we were just so happy to get back in our warm hotel room. After warming up for a little bit we decided to hit the town and find some hot chocolate and something to eat. We ended up at McDonald’s but I actually felt pretty sick from all of the changing temperatures so I just stuck with hot chocolate from next door at Costa Coffee. When we were done, we made our way back to the hotel.
Random, but we had some interesting observations of the hotel including that all of the hallways on our floor as well as the elevator were covered in bed sheets but we eventually noticed the others were not. I guess it was just to keep the carpets clean since everyone was always dragging in mud from all of the dirty frozen streets but we still don’t get why it was just our floor. Also, there was a little chihuahua dog in a kimono outfit, which was really funny to see running down the hall. After some cuddling under the covers, we all showered and got some sleep for another big day ahead.
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