Confucian Temple
- Riley Smith
- Sep 29, 2019
- 10 min read
More than anything, I just wanted food. But I was scared of accidentally getting cold meats or cuddles fish, kfc seemed like a stupid buy, and I could find nothing online telling me what to eat. There were lots of stores advertising crab from packets, which seemed gross, and I didn't want to sit down and order rice or dumplings because I wanted to eat while I walked around. I ended up going to a place that specialized in Chinese pizza, which was basically onion bread. It was okay and got the job done, but I feel like I'm handling eating in China incorrectly.
I see a sign saying this way to Cyber Street and I follow it. Cyber street sounds cool! It's basically the same as the rest of Confucian Temple, but they string Christmas lights on this block. I take a picture of it anyway.
I saw a large group taking photos and congregated around one store so i decided to check it out. If a lot of people are interested in something, that's usually a good sign. At first, I thought I was looking at a florist shop. There was a fountain that had a dragon spitting water into a bucket. But then I noticed there were baubles hanging from the ceiling, and most of them had notes attached. I then thought this was some sort of Instagram pop up store (even though there is no Instagram in China.) Then I heard techno music blasting from around the corner, so I ventured further inside.
It's just a regular gift shop. The have the notes and dragon and techno music all as a ploy to get you into a store that sells crazy crap. And they sell some crazy crap. Basketball bobble heads, bracelets, purses, fans, lego knockoffs of famous cartoon characters, knives, fake guns, you name it they had it. They even had a giant fake gold throne for another photo opp. I bought nothing.
This place is mostly weird shops designed for tourist. There was a shoe store called The Mexican, something you could not get away with in America (anymore.) There was lots of silver stores, and you could hear pounding whenever you walked near any of them because they would have workers pound silver with hammers out front to entice you into the store.
I wandered into a place called the World of Wonders Art museum, but it turned out it was a vr museum that cost money so I bailed. VR is always a scam. (Oh fuck, I think I forgot to mention there were VR gun games at Xuanwu lake. I didn't do those either. But violent VR at a park seems very counter intuitive to me.)
More than anything, I just wanted food. But I was scared of accidentally getting cold meats or cuddles fish, kfc seemed like a stupid buy, and I could find nothing online telling me what to eat. There were lots of stores advertising crab from packets, which seemed gross, and I didn't want to sit down and order rice or dumplings because I wanted to eat while I walked around. I ended up going to a place that specialized in Chinese pizza, which was basically onion bread. It was okay and got the job done, but I feel like I'm handling eating in China incorrectly.
While scarfing down my food, I somehow wandered outside of the Confucian temple area and on to a side street with a bunch of motels. After walking for 15 minutes, desperately trying to find my way back in, I came in right in front of a large 3 story clothing store, where I could finally but my swimsuit for Bali. They didn't sell swimsuits here either. No one swims in China.
I have noticed many more wall-eyed people in China than in America. Being wall-eyed doesn't seem that uncommon. I don't know if there is a more politically correct way of saying wall-eyed. I also don't know if it has to do with the Chinese optometry industry or if its a genetic thing or if American wall-eyed people just stay in doors because we have worse bullies.
I was here as a tourist, so I started doing up the tourist shit. I started with the Museum of the Nanjing Imperial Test. For hundreds of years, to be considered a great scholar in China you would have to be discovered by a member of this elitist group and then invited to Nanjing to take the imperial test. If you passed, you could train with the other scholars who had passed.
As soon as you enter, there is a giant grid of little tv screens and on each tv screen is a different actor dressed as a Chinese scholar pretending to take a test, They did there pens in ink, write, stroke their beards, etc. Quite a bizarre introduction to a museum. You are then lead to a long winding staircase. On the left, the wall is designed to look like fish scales because that represents something or other. On the right, there is a giant tower made out of scrolls similar to the ones the imperial test were taken on.
The bottom floor of the museum was half mannequins acting out scenes, and half old pieces of paper I can't read/old weapons/a few fans/ a couple bonsai rocks. Because I was in a museum, I walked straight into the first bathroom I could find, pretended to pee while a guy washed his hands, then went to the toilet paper dispenser so I could wipe. It was empty, so I had to keep holding it in.
At the end of the first floor, there was an escalator leading to the second floor. The escalators would speed up as you got closer to them (something I would continue to notice on other escalators throughout my Nanjing trip. I don't know how much energy it actually saves but it is kind of cool.) This floor was filled with statues of some of the programs great scholars and there pieces of their writings. As there was no English translation, I did not really know what was going on. There was also an area that was modeled to look like an old Chinese street, but was actually a gift shop where you could buy fans or beads or quills. There was a long line to buy beads. When walking to and from the old street gift shop area, you walk through these glass staircases that show the museum is actually inside of the tower made of scrolls we walked around when we came downstairs.
The third floor explains how the imperial test was taken away when Imperial China became the People's Republic of China, but that they have a new, less intense test that filled it's place. It showed what great modern Chinese classrooms look like and had mannequins of some of China's great modern leaders. It also had a bathroom with toilet paper that was the best bathroom I've seen on this trip so far. Their was also another gift shop.
After going up another escalator and walking through a third cafe/gift shop, you actually come to the imperialism testing grounds, which looks super awesome from main street Confucian temple. There is an infinity pool between the temple and the street that makes you think this must be the coolest museum ever.
I was expecting some sort of magnificent palace, but the testing ground were basically small outdoor cubicles that seemed borderline torturous. It's crazy to think thousands of brilliant Chinese students studied for years and spent hours in these little hell holes, only to be denied entrance. It makes the SAT look good.
To exit the imperial museum, we had to walk through a gift shop that seemed to go on and on forever, and then went up an escalator into an actual gift shop unrelated to the museum that went back out to the main street. Josie once mentioned to me that Chinese people love to buy things in gift shops in Japan so the Japanese love Chinese tourists. I guess Chinese people love to buy thing in gift shops in China too.
My next stop was the actual Confucian Temple, which is basically another giant tourist trap museum made to honor Confucius himself. Out front, there were some Chinese girls dressed in classic Chinese garb taking photos with tourists. I felt bad for these girls, having to take pictures with every creepy guy who wanted to take a photo with them. But I also got in line and got a selfie.
The temple was basically three beautiful pagodas light up in lights. There was also a big Confucius statue out front, and lots of paintings of Confucius and papers and things in Chinese which I couldn't read.
There was one parable about Confucius that I read that I really took to heart. A friend of Confucius had died, and Confucius had traveled for weeks to attend his funeral. On the night before the funeral, there was a big storm in the town Confucius was staying in that destroyed the dock and made it impossible for him to get to the funeral in time. Confucius didn't get upset or throw chairs against his wall, he said it is my destiny to be in this town. He met with the towns people and this is where he learned to fish. I know we don't think of Confucius as a great fisherman, but it's a tale as old as time. Confucius got some lemons and he said it's my destiny to make lemonade. I would like to get better at making lemonade.
At the end of the museum, there is an exit, and then another part of the museum where you have to pay again. I wasn't going to do that, so I walked back through the alleys to Confucian main street. The alleys were filled with, you guessed it, little gift shops.
A lot of stores in China only play one song on repeat over and over again, like it's part of the stores theme song. I find it annoying just passing through one of these stores, but I can't imagine working at a place like this.
To end my night at the Confucian temple, I decided to take a 40 minute river boat cruise. When I got to the front of the line to get on a boat, the ticket taker began to angrily wave his hand in my face, let two pretty girls past me, and then made me wait for the next boat. I didn't get it, this isn't a club. That guy isn't going to be sitting in a boat with these girls. Why's he gotta let them in firs? And why wave in my face? People here can be pretty rude.
I grabbed a window seat in the back of the boat I got on, but I picked the left side and everything on the tour was on the right side. Nothing ever seems to go quite right for me. This cruise was basically the Disneyland jungle cruise, but with real performers being paid to stand on the sides and wave at us or play saxophone or dance instead of mannequins. I was pretty happy just to sit for a bit though. My dogs were barking.
The b.o. on the cruise was quite noticeable as well. And the guy next to me was insane. When we went past two women twirling, he went "AHHHHHH" I have expected him to pull it out and start yanking it right there. Then his phone rang and he answered it and just kept yelling "Uh-huh" and laughing into the phone. I wasn't the only one who thought this was weird, the entire boat was staring at him.
One gem from the trip was when we passed the boat gas station and you could see all the broken boats and the boats that needed to refuel. They hide that from you on the jungle cruise but not in China.
I pretty soon began to daydream. And I wish I could say I daydreamed about the rest of my trip in China, about possible great adventures in my future, or about some great story I can write. But I mostly daydreamed about Mitchell. If there was anything I could have done differently during the break up, if there was someone else, about the last time we had sex. All of it. No new thoughts really, just the greatest hits of why didn't it work. I thought I had been getting better and was moving on, but I'm just so lonely in general, it's maybe easy to go back to her. It was really great while it lasted. I still miss her a lot. But there is nothing I can do but breathe and move on.
As the boat pulled back into dock, it crashed into the boats on either side. The boats are designed like bumper boats so I guess that's how they always park.
Before grabbing a hotel, I wanted to make one last stop at the Nanjing Fashion Lady. Described as being "inside of a video game" Nanjing Fashion Lady is a bright, shiny, modern shopping center hidden underground in the Fujii shopping center, which is described as Nanjing's Times Square. Despite my barking dogs, I took a 15 minute subway to get there and check one last cool thing of my Nanjing bucket list.
The Fashion Center was closed. My phone was also dying. I ran into a KFC to try to charge my phone, but the wall plug didn't work. I tried to look up hotels online (Peter told me hotels would be the same price if I just showed up and got them day of or if I reserved a head of time. Peter was either lying or just very wrong) but they all seemed very expensive so I ended up booking a room at a local hostel (Peter said I couldn't get a room at a hostel with a passport, and that I would need a Chinese Government ID. Peter was wrong about that too.)
The hostel was write next to the Confucian Temple, so I got back on the subway and went right back to where I just was. I ran to the hostel which I had to use my phone maps to find and paid for it with WeChat (also on my phone) and barely made it to my room with 1% left. I was planning on catching up on my blog that night so I could stay in real time (I'm so behind now), but the hostel had no wi-fi so I couldn't use my laptop.
Inside the room, six Chinese men were smoking cigarettes and talking loudly in Chinese. I tried to read for a bit, but was to exhausted to keep my eyes open. But the room was also to loud and bright for me to fall asleep and my bunk was directly under the air conditioner so I was cold. Not knowing what else to do, I curled up in a ball and closed my eyes, begging for sleep to come.
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