It took about 10 minutes to cross the river to Pukou harbor. Following the crowd, I exited the ferry, clueless as to what we were doing here, because remember, I didn’t do any research for this trip since my mom was changing her mind almost every day in regards to the places we were going to visit.

We exited the ferry terminal and as my mom and her cousins crossed the street, I followed but as I stepped onto the crosswalk, a loud honk startled me into jumping back a step as an electric scooter whizzed past me, missing me by mere inches. Following the scooter, more scooters whizzed by. I had completely forgotten I was still in China, where no car or electric scooters or bicycles will yield to pedestrians. A few minutes later, I made it to the other side unharmed.

On the other side of street was what remained of a train station from the early 20th century. It was now a historical landmark – Pukou Railway Station Cultural Tourism Area.

It was the first time I have ever visited a place like this in China. Other than the Great Wall and the Forbidden Palace, I have never been to a place with such historical value as this in China. However, instead of keeping the place in the original shape, I found it felt commercialized. On either side of the historical street, instead of keeping the buildings as it was, souvenir shops, coffee shops, and even a real estate office occupied the historical buildings.

After walking to the end of the street and back, we boarded the ferry again to cross the river again. When we reached land again, I found myself walking direction-less. “Do you where we’re going?” I asked Cousin M but she just shrugged. We were just following my mom heading toward who-knows-where.

Just then, Cousin T spoke up, “I’m hungry.” Suddenly, we were looking around for a restaurant. Instead, around us were brand-name hotels and no restaurant in sight.

So we ended up walking back toward the ferry terminal building and thankfully,, next to the building was a restaurant that served a regional cuisine but I just didn’t didn’t know it yet. We ordered soup dumplings, and a bowl of vermicelli in duck blood broth. I didn’t like the vermicelli much but the broth was delicious.

After satisfying our stomach, we walked along the Yangtze River, occasionally pausing to take pictures or read historical plaques. I couldn’t read most of it since it was in Chinese but I could interpret the photographs and my mom was there to explain the history to her cousins.

At first, I thought we were only walking to the bridge but it turned out, my mom was searching for another train station – Xiaguan train station, which ceased to exist in late 1910’s. After some misleading by the map and locals, we found the station in a theme park, filled with coffee shops and concession stands.