The Moments of My Life

Sunday, May 25, 2008

My parents´visit

For 20 days I had my parents over here in China. We started our journey in Shanghai where I was waiting for them in the airport. Original plan was to stay in Shanghai to let them a relax a bit after the long flight but at the end it turn out to a very busy sightseeing day…:) and because it was a national holiday the centre was totally CROWDED so they got first culture shocks instead:) Then we moved to peaceful Hangzhou in comparison and we spent there few days, hiking through the Hangzhou mountains, rent a bike around the lake, visited several pagodas and temples. Afterwards we traveled to Tianmu national park, where we were hiking one day and the second day we spend the day close to the beautiful dam. Then we returned back to Hangzhou, spend couple of days sightseeing the city again. When the whether got better(cause it was raining quite heavily those days) we visited Huang shan (yellow mountains) and took the overnight train to Suzhou (Chinese Venetia) the city well known for its canals, silk and beautiful gardens. Our last stop on the way was Beijing where we spend four days visiting Forbidden City, parks, Olympic complex, Lama temple, Great Wall and finally Summer palace. What a trip!!!
I tried to show my parents China as in the most “complex way” as possible…The modern cities and the countryside on a contrary. The Mountains and the blue sky as well as the huge polluted Beijing, comfortable buses as well as the crowded local transportation and inconvenient N trains (which wasn’t really a part of plan but after all definitely an experience :)The gorgeous chinese food and eating with chop stics, point on culture aspects and differences whenever there were coming out of the situations...However the visit of my parents meant to me more then just traveling experience...Apart from the other findings I have concluded that
- you can change a little in the new environment but you can never change for your parents...
- to do a guide and to enjoy the travel in the same time is more difficult and tiring as I expected (for the first time I had to totally rely on guiding skills and my Chinese)
- I love my country and I am so proud to be Slovak as never before, I love my culture, native jokes, sense of humor, mentality of people, music, drinking bear in the pubs, drinking coffee, sausages, having first shot of slivovica in the morning at 9AM..please note that this is purely perceived by slovaks as a medicine to digest well:)
- Hangzhou is the most beautiful city to live in China
- I need to find very diverse job when I am back home to stay happy with it in long term. Ideally something connected with education and culture understanding...
- Got more understanding about China thanks to talking to my parents about the regime and their experience from the past

Moreover…to have your parents over when you are abroad, somehow give you the feeling of a perfect stability. It well reminds you, you have a home out there, people who you know, who know you and who love you…So then what ever happens there is always a place to return…. To have them around, to speak your language, to know somebody knows you well and you don’t even need to try hard to get your point through....Is such a warming feeling. They simply bring you part of your home...Not because of the suitcases full of the things I requested - cause I was missing them so badly:) (like sausages, Fernet, Slivovica, fruit teas, Plzen, chocolate:) But simply because they are your loving parents.