On June 4th, 39 members of the Lausanne community flew to China for a 10-day cultural trip.
Organized by Yanhua (Jessie) Vann and Nancy Graham, the group consisted of Upper and Middle School students, teachers and parents.
The trip began with a long travel day. Nearly 24 hours of travel, to be exact. The group was rewarded upon arrival with the authentic Chinese food, dumplings, for dinner.
On the trip, the group visited a language-focused high school located a short distance from Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace before enjoying another traditional dinner.
Driving north into the mountains, they paid a visit to the famous Great Wall before returning to Beijing for a tea ceremony where they sampled and learned about the five types of traditional tea. After that, a rickshaw ride awaited as well as dinner with a family in the Hutong, the oldest neighborhood in Beijing. The evening ended with the group enjoying a Kung Fu and martial arts demonstration.
Visiting the Temple of Heaven and enjoying park activities such as singing, exercising, hacky-sack, dancing and more was a nice segue to their next stop, Xi'an where a visit to the archeological site of the Terra Cotta Army of the Qi Dynasty awaited.
The group also was able to learn a little history along the way, as the tour guide gave the group history assignments.
Taking a ride atop the city wall in Xi'an was another highlight of the trip, as well as a visit to the Muslim Market.
"It was a colorful, crowded, and fascinating section of the city," Lausanne faculty member Nancy Graham said. "We loved sampling the unusual foods and other goods. Evening found us in a dinner theater for a beautiful presentation of the Empress of the Grand Tang Dynasty. The meal, music and artistry were exquisite."
As the trip began to draw to a close, the group took a visit to Shanghai where they visited the Temple of the Jade Buddha, took part in a tai chi workout, visited an art museum where they took calligraphy lesson and visited Chinatown.
As they wrapped up their journey, a river cruise on the Huangpu River with its magnificent views of the Bund gave the group a chance to reflect on the new memories of the elaborate mosaic of China that they had experienced.