Random photos and Bing Ling Si

I'm sure I haven't put up enough photos yet, so here are a few more from the past couple weeks.

Mainly pedestrian bridge over the Yellow River

Overlooking the Yellow River at night. Next to me is my neighbor Yiyu

The entrance to Zhuan jia lou, the place I'm living.

In my room, hard at work

Yiyu walking in front of one of the first 'restaurants' I went to when I first came, inside the university campus, specializing in beef noodle soup (牛肉面 - you can see it says this in the big lettering above the door, towards the right) as well as fried noodles and fried rice dishes.

Yuri and I

Out to dinner: drinking chrysanthemum tea and waiting for our food.

Mmmm

After dinner posing with the wait staff in their pretty uniforms outside the restaurant

One early morning at the Yellow River

Bing gui and I in front of a well known statue in Lanzhou known as the Yellow River mother, I think supposed to signify the importance of the Yellow River in supporting the Chinese people over the years.I like seeing the different traffic signs in different countries. China is
particularly good for this. The above has the Chinese character for yield on it.

Yuri, Bing gui and I at Bing ling si

Last weekend, Yuri, Bing gui and I took at trip to Bing ling si caves, which is the one place near Lanzhou which my guidebook says is a must-see. Indeed it was lovely - the weather was great and the scenery was impressive. We made it a day trip, leaving very early in the morning (though had to wait until after 9 to depart, it turned out, seeing as we didn't have bus insurance). The travel was fun, first on a bus winding through the mountains, and then on a long speedboat ride across the liu jia xia reservoir, chatting with fellow passengers. I don't think I was able to appreciate the caves and cave art as much as I might have because I didn't really understand the background of how old it was and what purpose it served, but it certainly was interesting, and the scenery seriously great. There were a bunch of foreigners there on a guided tour, and I was excited to join in for the explanations, but it turned out they were all being given in German.

Lanzhou West bus station, point of departure

Yuri on the speedboat crossing the Liujiaxia reservoir

At Bingling si

Me with giant buddha carved into the hillside