written by Tyler Marshall.

Hello everybody!

It’s hard to believe that today is our final day in China. We’ve been enjoying this country for the past few weeks, and it’s very hard to say goodbye. There is no doubt that we have changed a lot over the past 20 days.

We’ve improved our chopstick skills, adjusted to some very interesting toilets, and used the Chinese that we have learned to communicate with people in a foreign country. It’s hard to put this all in perspective as so much has happened during our trip. It all started in Shanghai where we met Brother Wu and got adjusted to China. In Shanghai, we took an amazing riverboat cruise, got introduced to Chinese street vendors who love to try and sell selfie sticks and lasers, and had our first experiences with real Chinese food.

Our journey then took us to Xi’an which didn’t disappoint us either. We saw the incredible terracotta warriors, rode bikes on the city wall, and got our first experience with a street market. We loved Xi’an, but again we eventually had to leave to continue our trip.

After that, we embarked on the most nerve-racking part of our journey (for me at least) as we headed to Zhengzhou to stay with our exchange students. It was hard to know what to expect going in, but Zhengzhou was amazing as well. We got to visit a Chinese school where we were celebrities and everybody loved us, and at the same time we were staying with some really amazing exchange students that were so nice to us. Even though we stayed with them for almost a week, that didn’t feel like enough time and leaving was again very hard. I still remember waving goodbye to the exchange students while we were on the bus knowing that we wouldn’t see most of them ever again.

It was hard, but there was more of China that we needed to see. That brought us to the next part of our trip where we visited five different places in five days. Every day was a new city, and during this time we saw some stunning Buddhist temples, had some amazing views of mountains, and we were able to experience a part of China that the rest of the trip hadn’t provided us with. Once again though, we eventually had to put this behind us and travel to our final destination on the trip.

The past few days in Beijing have been so incredible that it is hard to put into words. It all started with the Summer Palace and Beijing zoo where we saw some pretty awesome pandas. To follow that up, the next day we visited Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City and saw Chairman Mao’s body. The third day in Beijing was amazing too as we experienced the highlight of the trip in climbing the Great Wall. That experience was truly astonishing and is one I will never forget. Later that day, Beijing continued to amaze us with an incredible Acrobatic show and a great dinner of the famous Beijing duck.

The last day in Beijing didn’t disappoint either; this morning we woke up, had breakfast, and were on the bus by 8:30. After a short bus ride, we came to the Temple of Heaven. Here, we saw tons of Chinese people participating in a variety of activities such as dancing, yoga, Tai Chi, and playing badminton. We decided to join in on the fun and participate in a few of these activities with the locals. After walking through that area, we went to the actual temple and explored it for a bit. The temple was pretty cool and there was an exhibition hall beside it that had some cool information and artifacts in it.

After that, we went to a local street market where we tried some interesting foods. There were a variety of interesting foods that were available for purchase including scorpions, squids, snakes, lizards, spiders, seahorses, and centipedes. I personally tried scorpion, squid, lizard, and centipede. All of them were surprisingly good, especially the scorpion!

After exploring the market for about an hour, we left to have our final lunch in China. We walked to the restaurant from the market and for lunch we had a pretty standard meal that consisted of rice, egg, chicken, some type of beef, some type of pork, watermelon, and also some steamed and fried buns. It was a good last meal in China, and upon completion we got on the bus to go to the airport. After driving for about an hour, we arrived at the airport.

We checked our luggage, and after that we had another goodbye. Since Ms. Yu is not coming back with us, we had to say goodbye to her. Once we all said our goodbyes to her, we left her to head off to security. After a long process, we all made it through security and successfully to the gate. As I am writing this, we are in the Beijing airport waiting to say our final goodbye to China. It has been a truly amazing trip, and is one that I will remember for the rest of my life. We have had to say many goodbyes on this trip, and this is our final one. It’s been an awesome trip, but at the same time it is a good feeling to know that we are coming back home.

Lastly, I’d like to thank Ms. Yu and Mr. Manakhov for all that they have done for us on this trip. The trip has been truly incredible and both of them have done so much for all of us.

See you soon America!

Tyler Marshall