I had heard a lot about Harbin, mostly the ice sculptures. Unfortunately (for me anyway) this is the Summer so there is no trace of ice sculptures. In the wintertime, temperatures can go down to -40 degrees. At the moment , it feels like 25 degrees.
The first thing I normally do when arriving in a new place is search for a restaurant and grab something to eat. I used to think that I would prefer to eat cold food in a hot area but here I tend to look for hot food regardless of the outside temperature. Maybe I am just getting used to drinking lukewarm / hot water and it is changing the taste buds.
The menu does not change too much
egg plant with shredded pork and noodles
茄丝肉丝拌面
I bumped into a cobbled street. I have not seen many cobbled streets around these parts. I guess that is the Russian influence in the area.
Reminds me of Grafton street back in Dublin
Music seems to mean more to people the further north you go.
I did not notice many musical statues down south.
I got sick of walking around pretty quickly so the next step was finding a place. I brought up the meituan app and noticed there was a place closeby so I went to search for it. I walked straight past it but I did see a store 4 doors down with (what looked like) the boss outside it. I asked if they knew about the place I was looking for. They looked at me with a very bewildered look and told me they NEVER heard of the place. I knew I must be closeby so I just retraced my steps.
10 meters away on a basement floor, I found the location. The guys that owned the rooms were standoffish but at the same time nice towards me so I was able to stay there.
The bed (As you can see , it looks like they build the
rooms around the beds here.)
I had to go down the stairs to find the hostel.
I just dropped my gear at the hostel and then started walking to Stalin square (down by the river)
Fishing seems to be the way to go here.
It would be nice to see some ice fishing in the winter.
Symbolism
Stalin park 斯大林公园
Using the river as nature intended.
(To go fast on a jetski)
\Cinderella's castle
I headed back into town and went to Sophia square. This part of the country does look quite different to the south. The influence of Russia is obvious.
Sophia square , 圣索菲亚大教堂
I did like those small corner shops that only open for a few hours. (As far as I could see anyway.)
People should bring these to the south of China
It does what it says on the tin..
There seemed to be quite a few statues in this city. I quite liked to one of the woman peering into the mirror. I wonder how long it took the artist to get the angles right.
The grass growing around the statues adds to the image.
No need for a mirror
I wanted to find out the name of the statue
but I did not want to be too nosey.
Sometimes I use couchsurfing to find someone who could give me a better perspective on the area. So I ended up meeting a guy called Lucas and he showed me around his part of the town. Before I took the metro to find his place though, I wanted to try out a Harbin delicacy .... ice cream.
I wonder what it would be like eating ice cream at -40 degrees Celsius.
There are 2 metro lines here at the moment.
So , it was quite easy to find the area. Once I found the area , I just sat down for a while and noticed a couple of things.
1. The local flies love bothering the cr*p out of me.
2. I guess people like to eat dog here.
萝卜白菜各有所爱 as some people might say
Anyway , I met up with Lucas and he showed me around the place before telling me about unit 731.
Spicy noodles meal
Harbin beer.
Another thing that could be moved down south if possible.
The sausages are definately meatier up here.
Sausages and beer - a good combination.
That was a full size helicopter
I decided to have a look into the Japanese army , 731 unit that was here in the 1930's and what happened at that time. I really did not know much about biological experiments that went on over here many years ago but it was something else. It is better just to look at the pictures. It seemed like there was one main guy in charge of the operation (Shiro Ishii) and they seemed to try out lots of biological tests. It was quite a scary place.
The Japanese soldiers that worked in the prison lived in
these now derelict apartments.
The metro was built in front of these apartments
(Which as far as I can see remain unused)
Entrance to the buildings
Layout
A top down view of the area
Bacteria site
These previous photo is the remains of one part of the site.
There is a new museum where you can read what went on during Shiro Ishii's time in charge.
Here is a timeline of the thought process of the time.
No subtext needed
No subtext needed
Prisoners were brought to the prison using this car.
Different poisons in different areas
The museum (Made in the shape of a black box)
So, you walk inside and discover what was in the black box.
On this sombre note , I moved onto the next area - Qiqihar (齐齐哈尔). There were rumours that some people had picked up the virus and it had spread to Shenyang and Dalian (2 places that I had visited. My health status history (seen through the wechat app.) indicated the places where I had been over the previous 2 weeks. I wondered if I would have a problem going to new places in the north of China based on the places that I had visited. I need not have worried. I was about to find out anyway.
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