My Summer Story

We took a family trip to another country, China.  I was 8 years old, in the first grade of elementary school. Other people on the trip were my aunt and 3 cousins. We went by airplane, and it was my first time flying. It was about a 2 hour flight. The signs in China were interesting because they had many languages: Mandarin Chinese, English, Korean, and Japanese. There are many Korean people in China. They are students, travellers, or workers. Actually, many Chinese people were speaking Korean.

We stayed for one week in Shanghai and Beijing. The first city we visited was Shanghai. Shanghai is cleaner than Beijing and has a big, long river. There were people fishing in the river in the city.

We took the airplane from Shanghai to Beijing. In Beijing, we saw the Great Wall. We walked around, took pictures, and had a picnic there. We rented a car to drive around the city, but there was a lot of traffic. We also travelled by bus in China. There were a lot of people in the city. It was crowded. There were also a lot of Buddhist temples. The temples were very nice. I bought a Chinese traditional doll in China.

The food was a little bit disgusting. In China they eat many different animals, but some things were yummy. Beijing chicken was good. But I think Korean food is better. They had kimchi in China, but it was too different, so I didn't eat it. Sometimes people in China eat monkey's brains and other parts. They had scorpions to eat in both cities in China. You might be surprised, but it was delicious! The Chinese noodles were also delicious.

We went on January 1, New Year's Day. There was a festival. There were fireworks, and it was a good show. Also, there was a parade with Chinese traditional instruments, which are different from Korean traditional instruments.

We looked at the Forbidden City for only ten minutes and took a picture. The king and his family used to live there. Also Tiananmen Square was interesting to visit because of famous picture of the protest in 1989.

In China, there were huge buildings: shopping malls, apartment buildings. Kids were practicing Kung-Fu in an academy. Kung-fu is like Taekwando in Korea. The weather in China was different from Korea. It was hotter. The cars are dangerous in China because they don't follow the traffic lights or the rules.

I enjoyed a lot of China's culture, and I want to visit China one more time. I would go to a different place next time, Guangzhou. Guangzhou is another big city in China, and they have a football team which I know.