Memories from Qinghai

I sincerely apologize for falling behind on this blog, but I have a lot of daily studying and I am truly enjoying life in China!  This post will sum up the remainder of my Qinghai trip, which is in the north-west are of China, and is primarily made up of the Tibetan minority group.

From the capital Xining (西宁 Xīníng), we drove about three hours to see the main attraction of this province: Qinghai Lake (青海湖 Qīnghǎi Hú).  I loved the breathtaking views that surrounded you at every angle.  I had never seen a salt water lake, desert sand dunes, and snow-capped mountains all in the same place before.

In this area of Qinghai, there were many domesticated and wild animals: yaks, sheep, cows, etc.  The yaks do well in high altitudes and cold weather, so yaks are more common than cows in this area of China.  The area where I saw the Qinghai Lake was about 10,500 feet above sea level.  Qinghai Lake is the largest lake in all of China.  Qinghai Lake was the first salt water I have ever seen, but the ground filters out the salt, leaving puddles for the animals to drink from.  Many locals would ride their horses down the beach and into the water.  I waded in the water a bit, but it seemed even more freezing than Lake Michigan!

After seeing  Qinghai Lake, we drove to another area of Qinghai and spent the day at Qinghai National Forest Park (青海国家森林公园 Qīnghǎi guójiā sēnlín gōngyuán).  This park was a massive area of mountains that surrounded the Yellow River (黄河 Huánghé).  It was wonderful to finally feel the presence of fall, most of the trees in Beijing don’t change color or lose their leaves, so it was absolutely wonderful to spend the day amongst a sea of changing leaves.

One of my favorite parts of that day was interacting with the local people.  In this city the majority of the adults still spoke Mandarin, which I was very thankful for.  Throughout the park many people had stalls set up and were selling souvenirs.  I made a little friend at one of the areas.  He was very quiet until I played with him a bit, we just danced around while he ate a piece of fruit.  It was a very humbling experience to see how a child of this area lives day-to-day.  When I held his hands they were freezing cold and he wasn’t very clean, but he was so happy just to simply have my attention and loved being held.  I spent my time at that spot making him laugh and hugging him; there’s not a big difference in little kids between China and America. I loved spending time with this little guy and being able to give him some attention.  Those 10 or 15 minutes I spent playing with him is still one of my favorite memories from my trip.

This is one of my favorite pictures I took that day.  The Qinghai National Forest Park has beautiful views of China’s most famous river, The Yellow River.  The Yellow River is considered to be the ‘mother river’ of China, it’s about 3,400 miles long and it spans from the western side of China all the way to the eastern side, emptying into the Bohai Sea (渤海 Bóhǎi).  In this area of China the Yellow River is a beautiful crystal clear blue color, unlike other parts of the country where it really does look yellow or brown.

After hiking around the park my group and I took a boat ride on the Yellow River.  The water and skies were so clear, it was a great break from the pollution of Beijing.  There was another group of Chinese tourists on our boat.  Other Americans in my group were trying to speak with them, so I went over to try to help.  Before I knew it we had a 30 minute conversation!  Some of the people in the tourist group had heard of Beijing Language and Culture University was, and I loved chatting with them!  It was another great moment I got to practice my Chinese and meet more of the wonderfully kind people of China.

We spent our last few days in Qinghai in a very small Tibetan village.  We had the option to either stay in a hotel or with a host family for a night, being the adventurous person I see myself as, I chose the home stay of course!  We spent the first few hours in the village at a local school, playing games with the children.  In this village no one spoke Mandarin, all the adults and children spoke Tibetan.  Luckily, I knew about 5-10 phrases that I had the chance to practice a lot 🙂  Although I couldn’t communicate with the village locals, it was still an outstanding experience.  I spent the night with three other girls from my group all sharing one huge bed (in an unheated room!).  This family had a donkey and horse, as well as an authentic outhouse bathroom.  I really experienced what it is like to live in a small village!  In the evening I laid on the rooftop of the house and stargazed, it really was a beautiful experience at the home stay.

At about 5:00 am the next morning I saw the sunrise with other members from my group.  We had to navigate through the maze-like village to find the base of the mountain, only getting lost a few times.  We then hiked for about an hour to watch the sunrise the top of a mountain.  I have never experienced anything like this before.

My entire stay in the village I felt extremely close to my faith.  It was a great realization that although I’m on the other side of the world away from so many familiar things, that God is still with me every single step of the way.  My experiences throughout Qinghai helped to reassure my thoughts and beliefs.  This blog isn’t about my spiritual journey, but not going to church in over three months now, I felt like I’ve actually become closer with my faith, through self-study and by having a new experience of the world and culture.

I loved having the opportunity to do a home stay while in Qinghai.  The home cooked food(they even cooked vegetarian for me!) was delicious, and although I couldn’t communicate very well the people were so kind and thoughtful.  I loved playing with the kids that were at my home stay also.  The little boy on the left of the picture really became comfortable with me.  His favorite game was one that we would play with watermelon seeds— I would hold him and we would throw them into the air, which he found hilarious, and then I would pick them up and give the seeds back to him, and we would repeat.  This kept him content for at least an hour 🙂

I loved interacting with all the people of Qinghai, and I’m so thankful I had the opportunity to see another part of this beautiful country!

Thanks for reading! 🙂