Into the Ice Festival

Well I finally made it up into Zhao Lin park to check out the world-famous Ice Festival. It's a good half hour walk from where I am with the park up against the northern edge of the district bounded by the Song Hua River.

On the way, I suddenly came across this Church. I'm not sure of its name but there are a couple of signs around saying 索菲亚 (suo fei ya) so I gather it's Saint Sofia or something like that. It's surrounded on literally all sides by ugly department stores but it looked just stunning with the snow and the clear skies.

I got some other tourists to take a photo of me, then had a walk around. A cheesy muzak version of Beethoven's Fifth was emanating from somewhere and reverberating around the square, and the whole scene was just so beautiful but incongruous I ran around that square for about 15 minutes just giddy.

Strange I know but I think I'm suffering from spending too much time alone. When I saw Xiong on the China leg of his pan-Asian travels, he'd been travelling on his lonesome for so long that he continued to talk to himself as we walked around (a running commentary in case you were interested). I know how he felt now, and I'm almost constantly talking to myself now, often aloud before I check myself.
Anyway, I also snapped a photo of this brave girl, nekked by the standards of the season, on the church steps. It was -8C! The groom was nowhere to be seen - I suspect he was probably inside warming his hands on a hot cup of cocoa.