Catching Up in China: Nanjing Part 3

We next visited the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Park and Museum.  This was probably the most fascinating, enlightening and disturbing thing we visited.  Neither Ben or I knew anything about this event in history.  When the Japanese were launching their imperial campaign in the 30's, China was one of the first places they invaded.  When they invaded Nanjing, they proceeded to massacre over 300,000 Chinese in about six weeks, not to mention all the other atrocities that tend to accompany such a campaign.  It was hard to see the Japanese presented in such a negative life, because we (especially Ben) have such a love and respect for them.  It made me think about how missionaries to Germany must have felt when concentration camps were discovered.
It also made me realize how little I really do know about world history, no matter how much Ben thinks I do!

Statues leading up to the museum.

There was a series of statues depicting various people trying to flee.

We didn't really take pictures inside the first museum.  It was mostly exposed archeological digs of mass graves.  It seemed to disrespectful.  But the cool thing was that outside the museum was a garden of peace with a beautiful sculpture depicting peace.

As we worked our way to the next museum (which focused on the actual events of the massacre), we were reminded of how famous Ellie was in China.

Entertaining her fans

The guard tried to hold Ellie. She would have none of it.

I was so grateful for this opportunity to to learn more about event in history. While saddening, it was so enlightening. 

Catching Up in China: Nanjing Part 2

Long live the workers of the revolution!

We really enjoyed slowing down a bit while we stayed in Nanjing.  The first site we visited was a very lovely pagoda (the name escapes me now) in the midst of a very large park.  The park also had a monument dedicated to the workers of the Revolution.

"More love, more spring scenery."

Many, many stairs to the pagoda. And many more inside.

With our fabulous tour guide, Crystal!

Cool rooftop architecture

No idea. A big spider on top of a foot.  In jade.

Everything is a slide!

Then we walked around the park and feed peacocks!  It was so cool!

Eleanor thought they were very cool, and liked to dump the food out for them to eat by our feet.

Then we wandered around more of the park, enjoying the scenery. It was cold, but very lovely.

Bamboo Grove

So romantic...

It was too bad we didn't have more time to explore the park because it was huge and pretty.  But also FREEZING! There were quite a few monuments dedicated to communism, and even something akin to a museum as I recall, which would have been fascinating.

Too busy

I still haven't documented all of our trip to China, let alone the fun we had with Crystal and Aaron when they came to visit us in Japan.  I'm terribly behind, which is mostly just sad for me because keeping track of our family's adventures is more for me than anyone else.  At any rate, we've had even more fun I need to add to the list of things to be properly blogged; namely, Eleanor and I went to Disneyland with my family to celebrate my mom's 50th birthday.  It was wonderful.  But if you want details you'll have to wait until someone decided to take a nap.  And Ben flew in from Japan the day we got back from California to visit during his spring break.  We'll head to Texas on Tuesday (after my 29th birthday on Monday!). In the meantime, here's some pictures.

Eleanor with her Brown cousins