So, a few weeks back took a trip to the Green Dragon Temple (青龙寺 – Qin Long Si), in Xi’an. It’s most famous for it’s flowers; a whole load of Japanese cherry blossoms that come into bloom every April. Info on the temple is hard to find in English, but essentially, way back in the day (think ~500A.D.) China and Japan had a bunch of cultural exchange happening. China sent monks and scholars to Japan, and vice versa. This temple is where the Japanese monks were chillin’. Anyway, The original temple got demolished at some point (as happens with everything in Chinese history), then the bad things happened between China and Japan in the 20th century. Well, to come over all of that (or try to) I think the Japanese planted a whole bunch of these trees to say sorry. Enough of the history, let’s look at pretty pictures!


Lots and lots of pink.

B took her camera too, so you get lots of pictures of me! yay!

It’s no secret that I’m not really into flowers, so when B was flower-spotting, I was camera-spotting! This place was a magnet for expensive glass. I’ll try to resist posting too many photos of people taking photos. But there were plenty of old men carrying around two or three grand worth of camera.

This is a Prunus lannesiana…of course!

Me spying…

…on B!

Here’s B lookin’ pretty.

🙂

  

The temple is pretty cool.

Me enjoying my creme egg, as posted before.


Pink everywhere! I look so cool with B’s pink camera…

Almost as cool as she looks with my HUGE camera.

  
Cameras everywhere!

B checking out one of her snaps.

A Canon 5D.II and a 100-400mm. Not a bad way to blow £3,000.

  
I took lots and lots of photos of B.

The view from the 2nd floor of the pagoda / temple.

B enjoying the view.

  
Then B went down and I took photos from above.

  
🙂

Me from below!

B resting.

B with the pagoda behind her.

Me reviewing a photo

Roughly translated: “Love me? Don’t hurt me!”

B taking a photo…

….of me taking a photo of her.

just the two of us.

I can already hear my mum printing one of these and sticking it on the fridge.

B lookin purdy.

You get sucked into the tranquillity of the place, you forget you’re in the middle of the city.

Took me a while to figure out which I thought was worth more; her coat, or his camera.

More pretty B.

  
and mooooore photos of B.

Another man Vs. tree moment.

  
Center: I admired this man’s dedication. Setting his camera up inside the temple, then going outside and around the back to operate his camera. He was taking a group shot of some sort of photo society who were standing inside the temple. Next time; buy a wider lens?

Flowers of some sort.

B resting on some giant stone ball thing.

 
Me, as viewed through the giant stone ball thingy.

At this point, B had my camera. So time for lots and lots of photos of me! (I deleted most 😛 )

Me being an idiot and making a bunch of blossom fall.

Wont…stop…taking…photos…

But, I do kinda like this pic…

…And this one. okay, I’ll stop.

Me educating people on flowers. Honest.

One of the weird photo society groups. These people all had compact camera, but most of them had tripods. A strange combo. Especially considering light wasn’t exactly lacking.

  
So, then we left the temple, and headed to a nearby university to meet some of B’s high school friends who study in Xi’an. We met up then went to a nearby park.

  
Some nice tulips in the park.

We then headed to the university, which was prettttty swanky. It’s called Xi’an Jiao Tong ( 西安交通大学), and it’s a member of the Chinese “C9 league”, a Chinese version of the Ivy League. One of the top 9 universities in the country; not bad for a country with a LOT of universities. Anyway; check out this for a pathway around your campus.

  
L: Never seen anything like it in my life. C: Students going to class. R: Quite a big library.

  
A really cool university campus.

Tired and exhausted, we headed back to Weinan. 🙂

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