The cold weather finally caught up with me today as I had developed one nasty cold that had me spluttering, sneezing and hacking up interesting things all morning and afternoon.
After the second long hot shower of the day, and being unable to find a poor taxi driver to understand me, I worked out which bus to take into the city centre (via the ever helpful hotel staff). Pretty standard ride, though I did eventually pull my hood over my face to stop freaking people out when they got on the bus and caught sight of me. The windows of this bus were VERY thickly covered in ice on the inside, so I had no idea where I was, or when to get off, and only managed to get off in a good enough place when I saw the bright glow of the Disney ice sculptures through the front of the bus.
My destination was a park I saw when previously I passed it in a taxi heading back from the Zhaolin Park (where the ice sculptures and disney stuff was). So I knew how to get there from the park, where handily the bus had dropped me off near.
Turns out what I saw was not a park at all, but actually the Flood Control Monument, which you see as the logo on every single official taxi in the city. Oh, and on the some of the banners that are advertising what I think is a subway system that is under construction.
From the plaque 'It was constructed in 1958 in memory of the case that Harbin people defeated super flood and built permanent river bank in 1957. It is an important landmark of Harbin.'
Lonely Planet mentions it is also to honour the people who died in previous floods. But nothing official was on display to this end.
The monument is a large, tall pedestal with carvings depicting various scenes, topped with statues of heroic looking workers. The area at large is ringed with a columned semi circle that had a swishing colour changing light bar going back and forth, with spotlights on top trained at the pedestal.
Off to the side is the increasingly familiar blue 'thing' mascot for the Shanghai 2010 World Expo and behind it was huge ice slides that would go out and end on top of the ice covered river.
Oh yeah! I almost forgot. Okay, all over town I've seen vendors selling this fruit, or berry, on sticks covered in toffee that I have been meaning to try. On the way to the monument, I spotted a vendor with heaps of them and thought to try my luck.
First thing, since they're out in the cold, they're completely frozen solid. There was about six on my stick, and I ate four before I threw the rest away. Terrible! Like not ripe apples and bananas being not ripe and terrible. Or sour, as my chinese friend gave me a better way of describing it. She also informed me the snack is pronounced as Tang Hu Lu. The fruit is Hawkthorn.
But anyways, gotta try out the local flavours, I mean, we foist Vegemite on unsuspecting people.
Okay, back to the monument area. Off to the right there was a ice sculpture of sorts. By the looks there were some small trees in this little patch, and someone has poured a little water over the branches over time. So you have this effect of tree branches, coated in a thick layer of ice, and in the middle where the ice is the most thickest, someone has carved out some chinese styled buildings.
This is all on the river's edge and according the Lonely Planet, this area is known as Stalin Park and extends for quite some distance either way, along the riverbank. It's quite a nice area with a straight path covered over in trees for as far as I could see in either direction.
After exploring the ice slide areas a little, even had a old lady try to get me to ride a horse drawn sled to 'somewhere', I eventually made way for Zhongyang Dajie area, the cobblestone street that is off limits to cars and serves as the main shopping area, as well as having most of the older European style buildings, in the city. It's on the same street as the Flood Control Monument, so looking down from it you can see the crowd, the colours and the flood lights in various places, but you certainly can't see where it ends.
It is absolutely a shopping area, with boutiques, brand name stores and even a
Walmart off to the side. There's colourfully lit ice sculptures all the way through it and the buildings themselves are lit up, whether it be soft lighting or neon signage.
Took me quite some time to work my way through it all, and eventually I came to the end where taxis show up every now and then, so after a little wait I got back to the Hotel.
I don't think I can mention it enough, but Harbin is cold. Like dangerously cold. Only go out at night if you are either well equipped for it, or in my case, have handy shops or shopping centres you can go into to warm up in.
Oh, today was when I found out about pit toilets. They are the pits. Imagine that!
After the second long hot shower of the day, and being unable to find a poor taxi driver to understand me, I worked out which bus to take into the city centre (via the ever helpful hotel staff). Pretty standard ride, though I did eventually pull my hood over my face to stop freaking people out when they got on the bus and caught sight of me. The windows of this bus were VERY thickly covered in ice on the inside, so I had no idea where I was, or when to get off, and only managed to get off in a good enough place when I saw the bright glow of the Disney ice sculptures through the front of the bus.
My destination was a park I saw when previously I passed it in a taxi heading back from the Zhaolin Park (where the ice sculptures and disney stuff was). So I knew how to get there from the park, where handily the bus had dropped me off near.
Turns out what I saw was not a park at all, but actually the Flood Control Monument, which you see as the logo on every single official taxi in the city. Oh, and on the some of the banners that are advertising what I think is a subway system that is under construction.
From the plaque 'It was constructed in 1958 in memory of the case that Harbin people defeated super flood and built permanent river bank in 1957. It is an important landmark of Harbin.'
Lonely Planet mentions it is also to honour the people who died in previous floods. But nothing official was on display to this end.
The monument is a large, tall pedestal with carvings depicting various scenes, topped with statues of heroic looking workers. The area at large is ringed with a columned semi circle that had a swishing colour changing light bar going back and forth, with spotlights on top trained at the pedestal.
Off to the side is the increasingly familiar blue 'thing' mascot for the Shanghai 2010 World Expo and behind it was huge ice slides that would go out and end on top of the ice covered river.
Oh yeah! I almost forgot. Okay, all over town I've seen vendors selling this fruit, or berry, on sticks covered in toffee that I have been meaning to try. On the way to the monument, I spotted a vendor with heaps of them and thought to try my luck.
First thing, since they're out in the cold, they're completely frozen solid. There was about six on my stick, and I ate four before I threw the rest away. Terrible! Like not ripe apples and bananas being not ripe and terrible. Or sour, as my chinese friend gave me a better way of describing it. She also informed me the snack is pronounced as Tang Hu Lu. The fruit is Hawkthorn.
But anyways, gotta try out the local flavours, I mean, we foist Vegemite on unsuspecting people.
Okay, back to the monument area. Off to the right there was a ice sculpture of sorts. By the looks there were some small trees in this little patch, and someone has poured a little water over the branches over time. So you have this effect of tree branches, coated in a thick layer of ice, and in the middle where the ice is the most thickest, someone has carved out some chinese styled buildings.
This is all on the river's edge and according the Lonely Planet, this area is known as Stalin Park and extends for quite some distance either way, along the riverbank. It's quite a nice area with a straight path covered over in trees for as far as I could see in either direction.
After exploring the ice slide areas a little, even had a old lady try to get me to ride a horse drawn sled to 'somewhere', I eventually made way for Zhongyang Dajie area, the cobblestone street that is off limits to cars and serves as the main shopping area, as well as having most of the older European style buildings, in the city. It's on the same street as the Flood Control Monument, so looking down from it you can see the crowd, the colours and the flood lights in various places, but you certainly can't see where it ends.
It is absolutely a shopping area, with boutiques, brand name stores and even a
Walmart off to the side. There's colourfully lit ice sculptures all the way through it and the buildings themselves are lit up, whether it be soft lighting or neon signage.Took me quite some time to work my way through it all, and eventually I came to the end where taxis show up every now and then, so after a little wait I got back to the Hotel.
I don't think I can mention it enough, but Harbin is cold. Like dangerously cold. Only go out at night if you are either well equipped for it, or in my case, have handy shops or shopping centres you can go into to warm up in.
Oh, today was when I found out about pit toilets. They are the pits. Imagine that!
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