This might be a suitable place for a first post.. Hello and Happy New Year~
Not really 'country', but this is my hometown, Tianjin (天津). A port city half-an-hour away from Beijing by bullet train, it was once the capital's line of defense against a sea invasion. Now it's one of the four direct-controlled municipalities in the country and a major seaport.
It's not as famous as Beijing, Shanghai, or Chongqing, but it's a nice place nonetheless.
Panoramic view of Jinwan Plaza (金湾广场). Like most modern cities in China I think it looks its best at night (or when it's half buried in snow...)
View from Haihe River (海河)
The Binhai New Area, sort of a second, newer and more business focused city center
I'm not sure if
Kiev is happy with his new role as a theme park...
This is a traditional delicacy from Tianjin called mahua (十八街麻花), it's a sweet snack made of dough, and either crispy or crunchy
Fancied-up version of a traditional Tianjin breakfast. Goubuli (狗不理) steamed bun, a bowl of Guobacai (锅巴菜), which apparently English speakers describe as chopped pancake served with sauce, spiced corned egg, and Jianbing (煎饼) which I think translates literally to fried pancake...
This one is a source of immense personal pride for me, and indeed, probably the whole city.
Tianjin Nankai High School (天津南开中学), founded in 1904, it was one of the first to embrace western-style curricula and is now one of the most prestigious in the country. I remember when my classmates and I graduated, we all said "We will always be proud of Nankai, but someday, we hope that Nankai can be proud of us. (今天我为南开自豪，明天南开为我而骄傲)" A very tall order, considering this was the school Premiers Zhou Enlai and Wen Jiabao graduated from, along with some of modern China's most famous writers and scientists.
The photo shows the courtyard of the northern half of the school campus. The building on the right is the auditorium from when the school was first founded. Only a handful of the buildings from then exist; the rest were targeted and bombed by the Japanese in 1937. A few survived because they were very too close to a Belgian tram factory to bomb safely.
The gym on the southern half of the campus across the road
Just in case people think all Chinese schools and students are all work and no play, this is what the school did a few days ago ^_^ Our very own film festival awarding ceremony~
