Hello Hive
I am writing to share part of my experience from a trip I took to China, visiting notable cities such as Beijing, Xian, and Shanghai.
This is my favorite picture I was able to take in Beijing, where most of my time was spent.
While we went to famous landmarks such as the Great Wall and many others, some of the best parts of the trip were simply immersing ourselves in the local culture. At the time of taking this trip, I was also learning Mandarin, and the trip gave me an opportunity to practice what I had learned in a real setting. We lived in dormitories at a University in Beijing, and did many activities at our pleasure, being able to visit markets, restaurants, and other local businesses on our own time. I think that having an extended period of time to be part of another culture is a better way to be a tourist than just going to visit well-known landmarks.
Our trip required a great deal of travel in China, taking multi-day trips by train to travel between Beijing, Xian, and Shanghai. We spent the smallest amount of time in Xian, mostly having visited to see the Terracotta Army.
My favorite location in China is by far Shanghai.
This has just been a small collection of photos I took on my trip. I am not a great photographer and did not plan to take many pictures on the trip. For someone like me who had never left my native country, what was most notable for me was observing how other people and cultures work in different ways from my own, often in ways that are hard to capture on camera.