Lesson #1

If you want to travel on National Day in China, you need to have a good idea of where you want to go far ahead of time. If you don't, you're going to end up like I did today.

My friend and I just recently decided that we wanted to go to Qingdao for our week long break. We both knew about the train ticket shortage that goes on around huge national holidays, but we thought we'd try anyway. We went today, and the only itinerary that was still available was from September 30 - October 10. That would have meant missing a whole lot of class, which we can't do. The trip was only 391 kuai, but missing that much class would be suicide. We had to turn it down.

I know they must have been selling out like crazy. There were only four seats left on the itinerary we saw. So what I've learned today is to get to that train station really far ahead of time to buy my tickets for the semester break. I really want to get down to some southern provinces.

I was trying to think of other ways we could get to Qingdao, but train was really the best option. Just interested a general idea of prices for rental cars, though, I checked online for quotes. There is nothing available out of Beijing for the holiday. That amazes me.

I think I'm going to wander over to Tiananmen, or some other huge national symbol, for National Day. I want to see what kind of fanfare goes on in the capital.