written by Dmitry Manakhov

Good Morning Everyone!

It’s nice to be back home in North Carolina. It looks like it will be just another hot and humid summer day, and I’m going to spend it tasting all different Chinese teas that I brought with me, and browsing pictures and videos that I took during our trip. I’m absolutely positively definitely going to miss China and the time I spend with students.

Yesterday we’ve had mildy stressful day of traveling back home. First, our Beijing flight was delayed, and students spent free time in the kids playground inside the terminal. (playground was designed for children under age of 5, but we are all that age at heart). Then one of us misplaced a boarding pass, and it took a bit of time to track it down.

The 12 hour flight  to Toronto was actually nice and uneventful and it wasn’t that bad. However, due to the delay we arrived more than an hour late and we only had 2 something hours for the connecting flight to RDU.

We were surprised to see that US government established a firm footprint on Canadian soil and all immigration and custom procedures happened in Toronto airport. That was a bit stressful to say the least since we thought our flight home was about to start boarding and we got stuck in enclosed area with automated passport scanners where we had to wait for our names to appear on the large display screen before we would be allowed to see customs officers.

It was actually nice that my name showed up very last on the display and i told every student to rush to the gate leaving me behind if needed. Well, once i got my passport stamped i was surprised to see a large group of students waiting in another line in front of metal detector and body scanner…

Once we finally passed immigration formalities we raced as fast as we could through Toronto terminal to our gate. Yup… we ran as fast as we could only to learn that our flight to RDU was delayed as well.

The only other event that raised a lot of concerns was the fact that right before we landed in RDU our small plane started to ‘leak’ and cabin floor filled with rather thick fog or cloud. Griffin and Rosie weren’t amused, but at that point the plane touched down on the runway.

Few minutes later students and parents finally met each other after a long 3 week trip.

As promised, you can find the links below to the picture albums of every day that we spent together. I still haven’t had a chance to edit any of the pics or videos, everything is ‘as is’ for you to see.

Day 1 05-24 – Flight and Arrival to Shanghai – http://1drv.ms/1KKtQAw

Day 2 05-25 – Shanghai http://1drv.ms/1KKu2jd

Day 3 -5-26 – Arrival to Xi’An http://1drv.ms/1KKubTI

Day 4 5-27 – Xi’An. http://1drv.ms/1KKui1J

Day 5 5-28 – Arrival to Zheng-Zhou  http://1drv.ms/1KKuBJQ

Days 6-10 5-28 through 6-02 Students spent with families and we were separated.

Day 11 06-03 ZhengZhou-Taiyuan-Pingyao http://1drv.ms/1G9hYWN

Day 12 06-04 Pingyao-Wang Castle-Taiyuan http://1drv.ms/1KKviD7

Day 13 06-05 Datong – Yungang Grottoes http://1drv.ms/1KKvnGM

Day 14 – Datong-Hanging Temple-Wutai Mountains http://1drv.ms/1Gyz54z

Day 15 – Wutai Mountain http://1drv.ms/1KKvwKp

Day 16 – Arriving to Beijing http://1drv.ms/1HzcxkQ

Day 17 – Beijing  Tianmen Square-Forbidden City http://1drv.ms/1HzbOQT

Day 18 – Beijing Great Wall http://1drv.ms/1QS1O5C

Day 19 – Beijing, we are going home http://1drv.ms/1QS1Tqb

 

 

Mr. Manakhov

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

written by Aryan Ansari.

What’s good FAM?

Today we woke up around 7:30 then went down to breakfast. We then went to the lobby to go meetup with Katherine. After the group was downstairs, we sat in the bus and drove over to the great wall.

On the bus ride Kim, Andrew, Tyler, and Rosie went up to the front of the bus and talked about China in Chinese.

When we arrived at the Great Wall, we had to take a separate bus to the cable car. Spencer, Tyler and I took one cable car to the Great Wall. At the top it was raining, and the bricks were very slippery. When Mr. Manakhov met us at the Great Wall he and a lot of the other kids raced to some spot on the great wall.

I explored with JJ, Emma, Caroline (, and this random girl named Dora who had a monkey named Boots or something. Idk. She was weird.) and we walked at a slower pace than others. There was this one steep part of the Great Wall which took the most work for the people I was walking with. We walked back down from the high part and met up with others.

On the way back to the cable cars, Charlotte helped out an Italian family talk to a Chinese man (she thought it was pretty cool). After coming back down from the Great Wall, many people bought souvenirs from shops around the entrance.

Spencer and I bought fries from Burger King which was the smartest thing we bought. We then went to lunch it wasn’t the best. After lunch we drove to the Bird’s Nest and the Water Cube. We didn’t have enough time, so we just drove around the two building (sorry for the bad pictures we were in the car).

From the Olympic Stadiums we drove to the acrobatic show. We had to wait outside for a good 15 minutes before we were allowed to go inside and sit down. The show consisted of, dancing, jumping through hoops, women spinning umbrellas on feet, guys juggling hats, flexible female acrobats, spinning rings, bicycle tricks, and motorcycle riding in a metal sphere. The motorcycles were the highlight because 9 people on motorcycles spun in a metal sphere. Everyone had mini heart attacks.

After this we ate dinner at the Pecking duck restaurant. Many people liked the restaurant because it was something new. It’s been real in China, and I have mixed emotions about going back.

 

written by Jack Pullen

Hello from Beijing! We got to sleep in a bit today, which felt great, especially after yesterday’s early rise. Breakfast was pretty good, I had cereal (which was something I hadn’t tasted in two weeks) and cold milk instead of the normal room-temperature stuff. At about 9:05, we rolled out from the hotel and headed for Tiananmen Square.

We got to Tiananmen Square around 9:25. Once there, we dropped our bags off with the tour guide and got in line to visit Chairman Mao’s mausoleum. The line moved surprisingly fast, and after passing through security (and being told to leave our cameras and phones off), we were inside. The first room was dominated by a white larger-than-life white statue of Mao sitting and thinking in a chair. The statue was surrounded by bushes and ferns in pots. Just in front of this assembly was a wooden pedestal covered in yellow flowers that the Chinese people were bringing in and laying down for Chairman Mao. Proceeding into the next room, we saw Chairman Mao’s actual body in an open (albeit glass-encased) casket, surrounded by red carpet and rope. His face and body seemed completely intact, almost wax-like. His face was glowing eerily, with an orange light. After we exited, we went back to the main square to pick up our bags and continue to the Forbidden City.

We arrived at the Forbidden City’s gates at about 10:30. While the tour guide went to get tickets, we looked around in the courtyard and took pictures. When the tour guide came back, we proceeded through some more security and another gate. At about 10:50, we finally got inside. At this point, we hadn’t had a chance to go to the bathroom. We were led to a fancy-schmancy ‘four star’ restroom, as rated by the Beijing Tourism Administration. After that exciting excursion, we continued our tour of the Forbidden City. We saw three main buildings, used by the Emperor in ancient times as meeting places and courts. The whole city was actually very big and very impressive. It took us just over an hour to complete our tour, leaving the city at just before noon.

Next up was lunch. We walked into a fancy hotel lobby at 12:15 and proceeded into their dining area. It was a pretty normal lunch (at least by Chinese standards), with the only real difference is it seemed that they forgot to bring us rice, and Miss Yu had to ask the waitress after nearly all of our other food had been brought out. We left lunch at 1:00 and headed back to the bus.

We stopped at 1:15 and started a rickshaw tour of some of Beijing’s back alleys. There were three people per rickshaw – two passengers and one driver. I sat with Aron Rash, and we both thought our driver was an interesting guy. He was pretty talkative at the beginning and the end, and seemed very friendly with his broken English. It was kind of neat getting to see how some of the actual civilians lived instead of only being shown the tourist fronts of the city. We passed a few shops and a few small dwellings, and before we knew it the tour was over. We got back on the bus at 1:35 and headed to the Temple of Heaven for a special tea ceremony.

After sitting in traffic for what seemed like forever, we got to the Temple at 2:30. We went into a back room and sat at a long table with cups of peanuts and small tea sets for each of us. A Chinese woman came in and made some tea for us, explaining what each one was and how they were made, and we all had small cups of each. The four teas we tried were Wulong, Jinseng, Lychee, and Jasmine. They all tasted and smelled quite different. After a short opportunity to browse and purchase some tea house wares, we departed for the Pearl Market at about 3:15.

The Pearl Market was fun. I’d say what we bought, but that might ruin the surprise for people back home. We arrived at about 3:30 and began our shopping spree. There were four floors: first was mostly technology (i.e. fake beats and watches), second was mainly clothing, third was miscellaneous stuff but mainly pearl jewelry, and the fourth was almost exclusively jewelry. Our bartering skills were truly put to the test, and by the end, peoples’ hands were full of sagging shopping bags, and the few of us that had brought backpacks were bent double from the sheer amount of loot.

After an exciting two hours, we departed for dinner at 5:30. Dinner was nothing spectacular, although we did have more dumplings than normal, which was nice. We left dinner at 7:05 and headed for the hotel. It looked like an early night.

– Jack

P.S. Hello from Mr. Manakhov. Today’s pictures will be available here in few hours once the sync is completed. I’ve recorded the entire above mentioned tea ceremony, but that video isn’t likely to appear until after we return due to its size.

written by JJ Lee

My fellow Earthlings,

As we near the end of our quest, one of which was an effort to obliterate barriers and complete trials and indulge on delights of ice and cream, I will write as much as I can to withhold this machine from Mr. Manakhov who took pictures of me napping.

After enjoying a great period of sleeping in with our usual 7:45 wake up call, the itinerary displayed a lack of mercy as the 8:20 AM train to Beijing from our current location of Tiayuan forced us to overcome the barrier of sleep, but the Circle of Life makes for a rather blasting 5:30 alarm. After my roommate, Nate Jones, gave me permission to clean myself, I did my usual routine of showering with extreme water temperatures, applying lotion, and packing my dearest suitcase, Lucas, without whom I would be at a complete disarray. To prepare for immediate departure after breakfast, I had to say goodbye to Lucas early at the bus.

I would like to take this time to personally like to thank my dear friend for being there when no one else was to hold my dirty socks. Lucas is the strongest friend I could have, having to constantly hold a 50 pound load, even on the occasional blistering gravel. I am sorry for having to separate ourselves by putting you in lower compartments on the bus this morning. It was never my choice.

After that emotional goodbye, I made my way to breakfast, which only consisted of watermelon for me, but some other delights for others. Nate for instance, had a great serving of noodles. After breakfast, we made our way back to the bus, which transported us to the train station. The 3 hour train ride was quite satisfying by giving us time to rejuvenate ourselves. After we arrived in Beijing, we were greeted by our gracious tour guide Katherine, and immediately headed to lunch.

Lunch was actually decent, especially for a hotel restaurant. Fried fish was provided, with the bones of course, as well as the addicting eggplants in addition to the usual pork, beef, and chicken with exotic tasting sauces. With a slight modification in our schedule, we made our way to the summer palace due to the notorious Beijing traffic.

After 3 whole boat rides, we finally made it to the Summer Palace guided by our generous Katherine. The emperors and empress really had it all from majestic views to a Buddhist temple to a foot massaging pathway that resembles a fancy acupuncture mat. I still don’t understand the need to undergo such torture when the longest corridor in the world is right next to it, providing shade and protection from the sun. Also, the paintings on it were pretty impressive, but I have to admit: ice cream was just as pretty of a sight in Beijing’s toasty weather as a few of us strayed away from the group to grab hold of these cold treats. Also, our status as celebrities disappeared as no one wanted to take photos with us anymore. As we made our way out, the excitement to see some cuddly creatures was in the air.

Our next destination, the Beijing Zoo, had an impressive facility containing various animals including the Panda. We were all excited to see these cute guys, but I have to admit, Pandas are just like us: lackadaisical and hungry. Out of the three pandas that we saw, one of asleep, one was eagerly waiting for his meal, and one was indulging on his meal with his colossal, soft back facing us. Nonetheless, the pandas were still cute. With some free times on our hands, I myself got to see some otters and penguins. The monkeys were especially fearless by having the courage to pee in the presence of the dominating Mr. Manakhov. The zoo was pleasant overall; however, ominous clouds drove us to retreat to our bus.

With some time remaining before dinner, we decided to stop by the silk shop, which truly had an impressive array of silk items and an even more impressive price tag. I now believe that silk to the solution to all clothing complications as one silk scarf had the versatility to provide outfits from the classic caveman to our dearest Little Red Riding Hood. Such power is best kept away from teenagers. Mom, you should’ve given me more money; I wanted that silk sheet.

Dinner followed, but not before the traffic. However, the hotpot was tasty. Various types of meat were introduced as well as some veggies, ready to be cooked in individual pots of boiling oil. However, the biggest filler was the fried rice, dominating nearly everyone’s plates. This was actually one of the more dangerous dinners with open flames cooking our meals, food poisoning being imminent, and arms barely missing the hot pots, which were indeed very hot.

After dinner, I started to write this blog post, which took up a whole bus ride and an hour in the hotel room. I know I couldn’t give every detail and I probably left some essentials out, but it’s been a very long day, and I’m tired. Also, Mr. Manahkov is about to hit the shower and he wants his tablet back. Goodbye, and see you in 3 days.

-JJ Lee

P.S. I am pleased to announce that Lucas is now best friends with Izhan’s Delsey. Truly a great friendship.

P.P.S. Such a white lie.. I was perfectly okay to give JJ as much time as he needed, but he was tired indeed… it was a long day. Mr. Manakhov. Oh, and here’s the latest batch of pictures from my personal photo album: Day 16 (June 8, 2015) . Pictures are downloading as I type this, and it may take few more hours for everything to sync.

written by Gabby Cooper.

This morning our wake up call came at 7:00, and we all headed downstairs for breakfast together. Afterwards, we loaded our bags on the bus and set out to visit the four famous temples in the Wutai mountain which was the highlight of the day.

The Wutai mountain is one of the four Great Buddhist Mountains and is considered the most holy land of Chinese Buddhism. What makes the temples so special is that in all of China this is the only place where you can find both Tibetan Buddhism and Han Buddhism temples.

We started at the temple at the highest point and then worked our way down the mountain one by one. Unfortunately, the temperature was fairly low and it rained for most of the day, so we all bundled up in our rain gear before heading out. Some of the buildings had gold tiled ceilings which is rare and considered very special.

Along the way we saw many monks who live in the temples. Mr. Manakhov even made friends with some who gave him a melon as a gift.  There were also many rooms with Buddha statues inside where visitors would burn incense and pray.  After visiting the four temples, we had finally reached near the bottom of the mountain.

The group walked to lunch at a restaurant close by. The meal was all vegetarian which is popular in the mountain town we were in. Not only were there lots of vegetables but also many different kinds of tofu.

Afterwards, we all climbed back on the bus and set out for Taiyuan. It was a long bus ride, almost four hours, but luckily we were all tired and ready to get out of the rain. Most of us took a nice long nap on the bus before reaching Taiyuan.

As soon as we arrived in the city we drove to the hotel and and all settled in our rooms. The hotel was the same one we had stayed in two nights earlier which had great wifi and normal showers, so I think we were all very happy to come back.

We were given some free time before we all walked to dinner together. During our free time before and after dinner, many of us walked the streets near the hotel and visited some local stores. This is our last night staying in the Shanxi Province, so I think we are all excited to finally reach Beijing, the home stretch of our trip.

Gabby Cooper

P.S. Mr. Manakhov with his  batch of pictures. Day 14 (June 6th) and Day 15 (June 7th).

Also check the previous days galleries. Small video clips will appear there as they sync. Most are lousy but they should give you a glimpse of what our students experience in China.

Previous days Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 11, Day 12 (June 4th) , Day 13 (June 5th) 

written by Izhan Ansari.

Greetings to all fellow readers!

This day was quite eventful, and I have the wonderful opportunity to convey our journeys to all of you.

After leaving the hotel, we got in the bus and travelled to the Big Wooden Pagoda. Surprisingly, the pagoda was quite big and it was also made of wood! Inside the pagoda, there was a LARGE Buddha statue where many people were praying and burning incense.

Then we went to a restaurant which had lots of food which consisted of pork (unfortunately for those with dietary restrictions). After lunch, we got back in the bus and drove to the Hengshan Mountain and saw the Hanging Temple which, as the name indicates, was hanging off the mountain. We had the opportunity to walk through this beautiful structure. From this structure, we could see a beautiful view which I will share with you in the form of digital photography below.

After exploring the temple, we found this tunnel which was a little off the path which was pretty cool. A few of us enjoyed screaming into the temple and hearing our echoes.

After the tiresome exploring, we had our bi-hourly ice cream break. Shout out to my boy Nate T. Jones who has probably consumed the most amount of ice cream out of anyone on this trip.

Next, we went to our lovely bus where we made our way on over to the largest mountains in China known as the Wu Tai Mountains. During the travel, our very own Griffin “Beyon-Cece” entertained us with our daily Beyoncé Bus Concert.

Also, shout out to the rainbow which we saw on the way. Reminded me of the taste of American Skittles (#TasteTheRainbow). We drove through the Wu Tai Mountains and it was BEAUTIFUL! However, we had to hop off the bus for a minute for some reason and so we had a huge cuddle session since it was raining and it was super cold! Lol… I tickled Nate and Charlotte in the ear but they didn’t know since there were so many people in the cuddle huddle.

Then we got to the hotel where we had dinner where we had a beautifully prepared dish with a chicken head in it. The chicken head is below. Shout out the wonderful lamb dish that they had on the table (okay, I’ll stop with the shout outs now).

After our dinner, we had quite a bit of time to kill. A few of us decided to go explore the nature-filled mountains nearby. We ended up getting really high up and the view is below. Then we went back to the hotel where we then slept. Hope you enjoyed reading.

Enjoy life and be safe kids. Izhan Ansari VIEW FROM HANGING TEMPLE

 

written by Caroline Todd

Happy Friday! I hope everyone’s daily flossing is going well!

Today, we were given a much needed gift: 45 minutes of extra sleep before the wake up call. Breakfast followed with the popular option of bread, strawberry jam, and Aryan’s crunchy peanut butter. Another popular option was the steamed red bean filled buns, in which plenty were consumed by each student.

After breakfast, we took a three and a half hour bus ride from Taiyuan to Datong. The bus ride was slow at first, ranging from intermittent naps to a lecture about traditional Chinese weddings, then sped up to a debate about Griffin’s Paper Theory and a Chinese children’s movie about a monkey and a dog traveling the world.

Arriving in Datong around 2 pm, we went straight to lunch specializing in noodles and vinegar, specific to China’s Shanxi Province. At lunch, our tour guide explained to us how the city of Datong is shaped like a Phoenix, similar to how Pingyao is shaped like a turtle.

Around 3 pm, we arrived at the Yungang Grottoes. For about two hours, we were amazing by the hundreds of Buddha, big and small, carved into the sides of the caves. For me, one of the most interesting things was walking from a hot humid day into the cool breezy caves. The temperature difference was roughly ten degrees. Some, including myself, also noticed how the lighting into the caves provided the “perfect selfie lighting,” and proceeded to make good use of the 20¥ they spent on selfie sticks. After touring, we all bought an ice cream. I tried my first corn ice cream pop. Surprisingly, it was really good. It had a mostly vanilla taste with a slight hint of corn. Exiting the tourist area, we were allowed some time for shopping. Ellie and I both bought this homemade nut bar that they made to sample on spot. It was very fresh and tasty, especially because China doesn’t have a ton of simple nut flavored creations.

Around 5:30 pm, we left the Yungang Grottoes and took a short bus ride to the Nine Dragons Wall of Datong. The wall was a quick stop because we had already spent so much time at the caverns. A couple pictures were taken, and then we were off to dinner. On the 40ish minute drive to dinner, the entire bus had a jam out to Beyonce’s latest album, including Flawless and Partition.

At dinner, none of us were super hungry, but the dumplings were stellar. After dinner, we checked into the hotel. Since we had time before curfew, we decided to head out as a group and walk around. We ended up going straight into the closest KTV and sang karaoke for about an hour. That concluded our day pretty well because we were all able to let loose and be free.

Overall, today was a really fun day, including both touring and leisurely activities. I think everyone enjoyed their time and look forward to a good nights rest.

Much love and keep flossing!

Caroline

hi mom 🙂

 

P.S. And it’s Mr. Manakhov again with a fresh batch of pictures he took on his own camera. Day 12 (June 4th) and Day 13 (June 5th) . The Internet connectivity isn’t the best. Please allow several hours for pictures to fully sync from both my PC and phone. It could take couple of days for the videos to sync. Meanwhile, check the previous days links below, and you might find new video clips in some of them.

Previous days Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 11

 

written by Charlotte Waechter

First, I’d like to give Mr. Manakhov a birthday shoutout. Mr. Manakhov, we’re all so thankful that you’re one of our two chaperones, and that you chose to spend your birthday with us in China.

Mr. Manakhov’s birthday was incredibly well timed. Pingyao is, without a doubt, the prettiest city that we’ve visited thus far. We woke up at 7:00 am promptly. After getting dressed and packing, we dragged our stuff out to the lobby. We then proceeded to have breakfast. Some of my classmates were fixated by the greasy bacon and cake. Unlike others, my eyes were set on one thing alone: a peanut butter sandwich.

After breakfast, we took the city bus to Pingyao’s city wall. Here, we walked around and took #selfies with pagodas. Some people even dared to stand off of a small ledge connected to the wall. Those of us who didn’t have the guts to take such risks huddled together under a few umbrellas, because while we were all grateful for the cooler weather, only one person was prepared with pants (congrats, Griffin). Our last adventure in Pingyao was touring the Draft Bank in China, which was essentially the first investment bank.

When we walked out, we were all incredibly excited to see a clear, blue sky. We spent the next twenty minutes walking the side-streets of Pingyao, buying items like soap, hats, and ice cream. A few of us also stopped when we saw a lady giving Henna tattoos on the road. There were a plethora of intricate designs to chose from, all for less than 30 yuan apiece. Emma, Kimmy, Caroline, and I were so intrigued by the Henna that we actually missed half of lunch. When we arrived, we especially enjoyed the westernized sesame chicken. The highlight of lunch, though, was definitely singing happy birthday to Mr. Manakhov. The cake was great, too. I’ve noticed that Chinese people rarely eat sweets like we do in America. Even their birthday cake was filled with fruits like kiwi, strawberries, and dragon fruit.

The conclusion of lunch, however, also sadly marked the end of our time in Pingyao. I know that we were all bummed to leave the authentic, clean, and unique environment that Pingyao provided. In addition, Pingyao had incredibly fast wifi, and many of us FaceTimed with our parents or friends for the first time in a while.

Our next stop was Wang’s Compound. We were all astounded by the size of if. Being one of the richest families in China, Wang’s family compound was huge. There were more houses and buildings than imaginable. The architecture was also very authentic and beautiful. We walked around for almost two hours, exploring the many different structures. After finishing, we were all tired and chose to rest with some ice cream. While the coffee ice cream was everyone’s favorite, the corn ice cream was definitely the most interesting (and was surprisingly good).

After all the walking, resting our legs was just what we needed, and we had time to do this on the bus. Initially, we took turns singing and telling stories on the microphone; however, eventually we settled down. People slept, read, and watched movies. We arrived in Taiyuan just three hours later. We ate dinner first, with the two highlights being the cous-cous dish and the duck. We then toured the noodle museum, where we saw the different ways to make noodles. We were also given some samples of vinegar favored frozen yogurt. To be honest, the fro-yo produced various reactions. While some enjoyed the ice-cream, others disliked the aftertaste that it provided.

The tour of the noodle factory was short, and at 7:30, we sat back down at our tables for a performance. We were all very surprised. Some of the acts included: girls dancing with long feathers on their heads, flame throwers, singing, noodle-making, and a fake wedding with a guest from another table. It was definitely a fun experience that we wouldn’t have wanted to miss, as it was unlike anything we had seen before.

Tomorrow, we are looking forward to visiting the Yungang Grottoes in Datong.

With love from Taiyuan,

Charlotte

P.S. Hello everyone. This is Mr. Manakhov. I’d like to add to this post that students and Mr. Yu made my birthday truly special. They sang a b-day song in Chinese and we had a yummy lunch and a delicious cake.

Also, now that we are all back together, I will continue sharing the pictures that I’ve been taking with all of you. You can find a new batch of yesterdays pictures under the link below.

Dmitry Manakhov’s Pictures

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to sync today’s pictures. All of the sudden Onedrive stopped working on both my phone and PC and Google is blocked all together. Hopefully this is something temporary.

 

written by Spencer Reed.

Hey everyone!

Today was a very jam-packed and emotional day.  It started out in the morning with a farewell to our exchange families.  They have been so great to all of us and it was quite difficult to say good bye and properly thank these wonderful people that opened up not only their homes but also their minds to us foreign exchange students.  After saying goodbye to the families, we attended a couple morning classes like we had the days before.  We then went to pick up our suitcases and bring them to the schoolyard where we took pictures with the students before we left.  It was a really fun time and we were all able to share a last laugh with our Chinese friends before leaving.  However, when they walked us to the bus before we left it was quite hard to say bye.  To be completely honest, when we first got to Zhengzhou, I was counting down the days before we left because I was a little worried about how the stay would go, but as we were boarding the bus I realized that I had grown quite close to a lot of the students and wished there were more days to count down.

After leaving the school and our students, we then went to wait at the train station.  We had a two hour wait there where we all caught up on some much needed sleep.  At about one, we got on the train to Taiyun.  It was a four hour ride where I again got to slide some sleep in.  I love the train rides because I think the countryside of China is beautiful and it amazes me just how much farmland there is here.

Sadly, when we got off the long train ride, we then had to take an hour and a half bus ride to Pingyao.  The ride wasn’t that bad and was headlined by our new tour girl Maggie singing for us.  Following the bus ride to Pingyao, we couldn’t actually take the bus into the city, so we then funneled into small cars and rode into this cool little ancient city.  This city is definitely the farthest from Western civilization we have been so far.  We then arrived at our hotel where we were led to our rooms.  The place we are staying is incredible. We are all in this courtyard type place together where we are the only ones.  It is decorated very traditionally and gives the impression of what life here would be like long ago.  Although we are only here a short time, I think will definitely be a fantastic part of our trip.

From,

Spencer and the Chinese squad

PS- I love and miss you fam, looking forward to comoing back home soon.

I promised to post the video of CA Students taking over the stage in the Shanghai Restaurant. I was finally able to put it together and publish online.

Enjoy!

CA Students rocking in Shanghai

 

written by Rosie Hoile.

It’s day 11 in China now as I begin to write this.

Or is it 12?

I don’t know.

One thing I know, however–I have never not seen so many white people. It’s cool.

I’m driving to school now with Ashley (given name: LiLuo) and the person she calls her “driver”, but he seems to live with them as well. He is either her father, uncle, or a live-in maid that’s terrible at his job, as her mother does most of the cleaning.

But I’m in too deep to clear up any confusion; seeing as I leave tomorrow, I cannot clarify about basic family dynamics after four days of no questions.

Even though it’s long, I’ve begun to enjoy the ride to the school from her apartment. China, especially the cities, looks like one big paradox.

I literally just saw someone throwing huge fish into a pool into the back of their old and dirty van parked next to a shiny sky-rise bank, for example.

The neon lights and business hubbub of Shanghai never really shine on the people sleeping on the street or the beggars following you as you walk, and I’ve found the same sort of thing applies to Zhengzhou.

Although Zhengzhou was never advertised to be up to the glory or standard of Shanghai or Beijing, it still attempts to dazzle first and conceal its poverty second by building banks and sky-rise apartment buildings next to vendors and in poor neighborhoods, creating a very cosmopolitan (forgive the liberal usage) mixing of the classes, and that mix of people is what has surprised me most about this city. People with Chanel bags and Gucci sunglasses cross the street with the people who only own the pair of shoes on their feet, or have to sell knockoff Chanel and Gucci to provide for their family.

We’re at the school now, and I’m told the first class today is a free study time, which usually means I sit in the back and read with Kimmy and Jack, but today is different.

Ashley tells me she has a drama presentation today and is going to try and take her study periods to practice, since their planned practice after school yesterday did not go like they’d hoped.

To get to this classroom, however, you have to climb five flights of stairs.

It’s the worst thing about China so far, on par with the squatty potties. I’m already too tired at floor 3, and definitely out of breath at floor five.

I mean, everyone else is at least mildly winded as well, but I’m just a sad example.

Their school was built in 1959, I think, and I’m sorry to say I definitely believe them. The ability to touch or wall or use a bathroom and not feel like you’ll end up in the hospital later is an ability I miss about our own school.

But I’m here now, and here begins the last day in ZhengZhou:

7:13 am

Ashely just left the classroom with another girl and a lot of purple construction paper. Not sure why. I think it had to do with drama and a boat, but I have been given no instructions.

That’s cool. “It’s whatever”, as Kimmy would say, if she was here, but she and Lilian decided to sleep in.

Traitors.

7:21 am

Kimmy and Lilian have arrived now, but I’m still the only white one here.

It’s cool, though, switching from such a majority to such a minority so quickly. The stares, the comments and the really honest questions from children (and adults, sometimes) are things I’ve never even begun to experience because of my race or nationality. It was funny at first, but now it’s just annoying.

7:51 am

I was shown a movie made for their English class based off of Kung-fu Panda. It was actually pretty impressive, but had an inordinate amount of cuss words for class…

Also, Jack arrived. He had to run to school. Haaaa.

7:55 am

Ashley is here now, and I think math started, which is gross. But I’m biased.

The teacher, Canadian, explaining a “secret project” for foreign teachers leaving, and identifying them as first their names, and then as, like, “the little woman from India” for recognition amongst the students. It’s funny.

8:14 am

THEY GET A FORMULA BOOKLET FOR THEIR STANDARDIZED MATH FINAL

COME ON CHINA

8:16 am

It just occurred to me that I miss pancakes suddenly and severely.

8:17 am

There are Christmas trees hanging from the ceiling. It is June.

8:37 am

I am learning how to play UNO using a Japanese anime deck in China. Where am I.

9:34 am

We’re walking to drama now, I think? Plans are not easily communicated (or coordinated), but it’s cool.

9:39 am

We just arrived at a museum and I realized we’re not going to their drama class.

10:01 am

The most amazing thing about the things in this museum were the preservation of pieces of artwork or tools, hundreds of years old and still looking brand new. China has some of the most beautiful works in history in regards to their intricacy and delicacy, while still managing to be imposing, bold, and obviously impressive.

10:07 am

I FOUND A 3D MODEL OF THE FAMOUS PAINTING WE STUDIED FOR LIKE THREE MONTHS IN EIGTH  GRADE UGHHHH.

A girl also walked up next to us with a shirt that said “We make noise, not clothes”. We’ve seen so many bad/random English shirts in the trip (BUTTER, I’m Kind of a Big Cheese), but this wasn’t one of them. It’s interesting because from what I’ve understood, the details about the factories in China are kept secretive to their own population, but maybe I’m wrong. Anyway, it was a cool shirt.

10:31 am

Kimmy and Aron couldn’t figure out the Chinese vending machine and I sat on the floor.

12:25 pm

FINALLY EATING. Well, almost.

We’re (Kimmy, Ashley, Lillian and I) at a fish restaurant and apparently the concept is very complicated, but we finally got our order placed.

I mean, I really don’t even like fish, but you can’t have that sort of mentality in China. You eat what you’re given unless you’re allergic and move on (thus my pretend egg allergy everyone thinks I have).

1:35 pm

We’re at a coffee shop everyone seems to like and it’s very Indie-American, but the menu is in Chinese. I used the magic translation app and entered in the usual coffee flavors to try and match them up, which actually worked pretty well and got me a caramel mocha.

2:30 pm

We’re in ping pong class–and they have an exam.

Like, an actual exam. In ping pong.

4:16 pm

Their next class is a class meeting and I’m told we have to share something unique about our American life. I’m kind of struggling to point out differences that aren’t going to offend anyone. Jack suggested I explain the concept of “suburbia”, and I think that’s a safe bet.

5:00 pm

It was really fun explaining parts of our lives and school to a Chinese class–they were both surprised at our work load and our freedom with our free time and classes. They were astounded at our tuition–ahem–but seemed interested and impressed nonetheless.

We demonstrated our knowledge of Chinese culture (Kim and I danced 小苹果) and played Taboo (they’re much better than we are) before leaving for dinner.

6:09 pm

We’re ordering at an American restaurant and they’re out of everything that we want…cool

But we did get free bread from a very aggressive waitress, so score

6:36 pm

Found someone wearing a Harry Potter shirt!!!!

A friend at last

6:51 pm

We’re at KTV now, where we’ll be until 10 pm. If you’re unfamiliar, it’s basically really super fancy and hyped up karaoke. I walk in and everyone is yelling Taylor Swift, which is a pretty good indicator of the night.

Due to the time limit of these blog submissions, I’ll stop here 🙂

Good night (or morning) to all!

-Rosie

 

written by Cameron ‘Clatts’ Latta.

A big hello to all the parents of the current Chinese exchange students!

My name is Cameron to give you the identity of this (maybe) mysterious writer for today.

The day started off great, as Tom (my exchange student) and I woke up, ate a wonderful Chinese breakfast, and went to school.

Excited to be at school for the first to periods, which looked like it’d be from 8 to 11:30, I was ready.

The first class for my group, consisting of Emma, Nate, Tyler, Izzhan and I, was English, where they were writing a math journal, which was pretty cool at the time (for me at least, but I’m easily excited :).

However, we were told two things at the beginning: 1) no phones, 2) we had to sit in the back and there was nothing planned for us. Having decided not to take my backpack, which contained all my books and other day stuff, because it was too heavy at the time from other stuff I had bought and not unloaded, I was suitably miserable for around twenty five minutes, where I then proceeded to sit by Tom because my group was too boring (aka, they weren’t talking to me or engaging my attention).

Five minutes later, we (my group) were out the door so we could head to an activity that had been planned for us, thus eliminating my boredom for the moment. It turned out to be a graduation of students participating in Sino-Japanese program. For those of you who don’t know my family, I was dreading this because in the last three to four weeks, I have gone to three or four separate graduations, this being the most recent.

However, back to the ceremony. As I mentioned, it as both Chinese and Japanese, so the understanding was not the best amongst our group. There was really dramatic or classical music going along with the speeches, which actually complemented some of the speakers quite well. It was also a small class of maybe fifty graduating, so it was interesting to say the least. The first speaker, the head of the school I do believe, spoke for a very long time before starting to hand out the certificates, of which I have photos of this part. It also seemed that the male graduates had a female speaker, while the females had a male representative, but I don’t know if that was just coincidence… Another coincidence, the male seemed to speak in Japanese mainly and the girl in Chinese, but I may not have been listening to the correct portions of their speech…

Regardless, the ceremony was the same for both, and the second speaker came to the stand. In the middle of his, thankfully shorter, speech, the microphone actually messed up and his voice became much quieter, must to my hidden amusement. This man seemed to be giving out special awards and, soon, we were on to our third speaker.

Then a presentation began, showing the graduates journey from middle to high school (again, can there be a little more originality? What if we reversed the order, and put it from high school to middle school?). After this presentation, a group of six or seven (there’s a picture with them…) students stood and began thanking their teachers (I think…), while the presentation showed their photos and some text.

Remember earlier when I said the music complemented some speakers really well? Well the second person from the right was really passionate, and it went very well with the music. After the thank you’d were said, then there was a part where all the graduates stood up and went to the stage, and three sung to be crowd. It was very emotional I’m sure, but nothing I hadn’t really seen before. And then we were done! No more graduations for me!!! Haha!
After this (it ended at roughly 10:50) and some four square, we headed back to the classrooms where I believe English was still in session, but I was not totally sure… Anyway, my group (still consisting of the same people as earlier that morning) just sat around as they studied, and eventually we went out for lunch at Tiger Pizza. I don’t know about you, but this was the first bit of American food we had had since the beginning of the trip, and I are like a ravenous dog, downing as much of the free soda as possible (which usually costs extra for refills, but didn’t here) and sticking as much of the gory, greasy, and utterly delicious pizza in my mouth before I couldn’t fit anymore in. Suffice to say, I got three slices of pepperoni pizza and two glasses of coke. Very fulfilling.

Afterwards, the group and I returned to the school, where Tom and the other Chinese students entered their classroom and we went to play soccer. After joining the team of six American exchange students versus the six Chinese students on the field, we were able to play a fun game. With people from other groups having joined us, we had a good team and managed to win 5-2, much to my excitement, not to mention I actually helped our team as a defensive player.

Afterwards, my group returned to our classroom at the end of geography class, where they were having presentations to learn that Chinese math was next. Naturally, being the only lover of math in my group, I stayed as the others left, exclaiming that I wouldn’t understand it. With honors precalc behind me and knowledge of both Mayan and binary math, I was confident I could do it. Safe to say, I utterly dominated the classroom. Finishing the two problems on the board and the first three problems from the sheet given to me in my mind alone (the fourth requiring a calculator for sin/cos/tan), I showed just how much mental math prowess I had while quietly keeping my pride to myself. I was the man.

At the end of class, I was exuberant and able enough to teach the class sigma, and I walked out like a pro (after being give a rather difficult problem by the rest of the class and being able to do it, albeit with difficulty), and headed down to the rest of my classmates to show just how “awesome” I was.
Sadly, my peers didn’t see the “amazingness” that I had some and for the large part responded with “you stayed in there?” Followed by “don’t ever say that in my presence again” when I stated that I loved math, and so stayed there for it.

After that, the school day was done, and we went to the basketball court, where I watched as they played and we eventually went to the park. There, we placed tags on us and played runningman, where we had to pull off the tags of the other team without getting ours pulled off. Despite brilliant strategy on my part, our team still posed both games before people started to leave.

When we were the last people in the park, Tom and I went home with his dad and had dinner, where I then retired to my wonderful room, where I proceeded to write down my day for this blog. Now, I’m sipping tea as I finish the blog.

Happy days, and see you all when we come back!

Cameron ‘Clatts’ Latta

P.S. I hope you all enjoyed my post, and can read it with a smile!
P.P.S. Sorry if there are typos. I wrote this on my phone since i don’t have my computer…

written by Nate Jones.

Hey there!

Today marked a week from when we first arrived in Shanghai. I know that’s hard to believe for me, as it seems like we’ve been in China for much, much longer. A couple of notes before I talk about what I’ve been doing.

First, before Charlotte’s parents get worried that I am completing this blog post rather than her, it is just because of the vagaries of local internet access.

Second, Mr. Manakhov told me I can talk about both yesterday and today because people have been doing so many different things, so you are about to get twice the days in just one blog post!

Yesterday was the first day of the weekend, and we took advantage of our free time. In the morning, I ate a filling Chinese breakfast before heading out with Leonard. We met up with Tyler, Cameron, Izhan and their exchange students to go to a computer gaming center. It contained rows upon rows of computer screens and headsets, along with a pretty healthy population of gamers for 10 on Saturday morning. The exchange students took us to a private room where they played League of Legends and we tried to figure out to play games in Chinese. At 11, we went next door to a much sketchier establishment and played some XBox and PlayStation. After grabbing a quick bite to eat, we met up with Spencer to head to Shaolin temple.

Our students had helpfully arranged a bus to Shaolin Temple and a tour guide. Most of us dozed off during the hour and a half bus ride. Upon arrival, we walked out of the bus to see an ineffably beautiful mountain landscape. The bus ride had gotten us out of the smoggy city to a rural and picturesque mountain region. We went into the temple grounds and watched an astounding kungfu performance. Afterwards, our tour guide showed us around the temple grounds and taught us about Buddhism and it’s history. We then rode a shuttle down the mountain before heading to a vegetarian dinner.

After our dinner we took some winding roads to the location of the other part of the Temple. It would be a while before the show, but we settled into our seats. The show was nestled between three peaks, and was incredible. A stirring combination of auditory and visual stimulation, it showcased kungfu and traditional performance art forms alongside an extraordinary light show. Afterwards, most of us could just sputter superlatives about the incredible show we had just seen. The pictures below don’t exactly do it justice, because much of the majesty of the performance was in the synchronization of it’s hundreds of performers and their dynamic movement. It was definitely one of the highlights of the trip so far.

The unfortunate issue with the trip was that the long trek out to Shaolin had to be repeated again to get home. I got home around midnight and fell asleep immediately.

I woke up in the morning to small children running around Leonard’s apartment. Leonard’s little brother was being picked up to go the family barbecue we would be going to later, and his little cousins were very, very excited about it. His parents told me I could sleep in for a little while before we went to the barbecue. I ate a breakfast consisting of fruit, vegetables, and rice with some sort of broth before I left with Leonard’s family to go to the barbecue.

We turned off a major highway into a surprisingly tranquil park. After a winding series of turns on dusty roads, we were plunged into a crowd of people. It turns out the park was Zhengzhou’s prime spot for picnics and barbecue. The meal was delicious-an assortment of grilled meats and vegetables, along with pear juice.

Leonard and I then met up with the same group of friends from Shaolin along with JJ and his exchange student. We waited around in the mall for a while to play a game called “the room”. We were all placed in a room with 7 doors and tasked with getting out. Sadly, we failed the task as our hour ran out after we got out of the room but before we got out of the entire maze. Still, good times were had by all.

We all crossed the street and headed to the mall, where some ice skated in the indoor rink while the rest watched. Some of the kids skating found the Americans to be more interesting than the skating and came up and chatted. Soon the skaters were tired and we headed to eat a family-style dinner in the mall. Afterwards, most of us wanted a taste of home. We capped the day off with Dairy Queen blizzards. Everyone headed home early to rest for our first school day tomorrow.

From Zhengzhou,

Nate

Written by Zoe Sheitman.

Today a group of students decided to go visit a famous landmark in China called the Shaolin temple. After a two hour drive from Zheng Zhou, we finally made it to Shaolin.

This temple is the starting place of Kung Fu and is highly respected throughout all of China. Shaolin temple is composed of many different religious buildings, some even have statues and Buddhas. Our tour guide explained to us how each building has its own story which was quite intriguing. The scenic views of mountains and beautifully painted buildings were quite impressive.

Once we looked at all of the buildings in Shaolin, we decided to drive back to Zheng Zhou and get some lunch. The exchange students decided to give us a break from Chinese food and let us enjoy an American favorite: McDonalds. All of us really enjoyed eating this classic food; it tasted exactly like it does back home!

Once we finished eating, the students took us to an ice skating rink. This rink was located in a local mall. The cool temperatures were a nice break from the heat of Zheng Zhou. We skated around the rink and made some friends with the Chinese kids skating! Most of us were skilled at skating, while others fell a few times. Despite this minor setback, we had a really nice time at the ice skating rink.

The exchange students then took us to a market place for dinner. Here there were an array of different foods to choose from. Some of us choose to eat crayfish, bao zi (a type of food similar to a dumpling), pineapple fried rice, noodles and much more. Although at first we had doubts whether the food would taste good since it was in a market that looked rather shabby, we were pleasantly surprised when we tried the food and found out it was excellent.

Everyone was sharing with one another since we had so much food and we all had a great time. After dinner, some of us went shopping at the stores close to the market while some went to get more food.

Then we all parted ways and we are super excited for what exciting adventures tomorrow holds.

 

written by Aron Rash.

Day six began with a visit to the Henan Experimental School’s history museum. The two story building contained seven rooms, each exhibiting walls plaques which contained information regarding the foundation of the school, as well as many of its wonderful attributes. A guided tour of the museum lasted for two hours and brought us to a seventh, final room where our class took pictures using a kiosk and signed them digitally on the kiosk touch screen. It is reasonable to assume that the photos we took will be made available for the viewing of future visitors to the school’s museum.

Once we’d finished touring the museum, our class was formally introduced to and greeted by the school’s administrators. Soon after our introduction, we met with our exchange students who’d just finished the first two of their four exams that were scheduled for the day.

Collectively, we agreed that we needed something more engaging/fun to do. Both classes walked to the school’s outdoor basketball courts where we organized a pickup game between the Chinese and the Americans.

For about an hour, every student was lost in his chosen activity. The group was split three ways. Some played basketball. Some played soccer. Those who chose neither simply watched. No matter his choice, everyone seemed to be having a good time.

When the time came to throw in our towels and grab a bite to eat, we broke off into groups once again. Most of us ended up at a local cafe where we were ordered from an assortment of traditional Chinese dishes. Some of the ones I sampled and enjoyed include: sesame pork with steamed buns, pumpkin soup, Chinese chicken quesadillas, and sautéed pork confit. The general consensus was that the cafe food was some of the best we’d tried thus far.

After paying our dues in more Chinese yuan, we walked for less than a block to reach quaint, second-floor coffee shop. Most of us either ordered coffee or ice-cream with fruit. I can vouch for the deliciousness of both. We spent the next few hours of the day sipping coffee and chillaxing in the shop -which appeared strikingly similar to a traditional American Star Bucks.

Once a few hours of chitchat had spilled away with the coffee (and our centerpiece), we returned to school so that the Chinese students could finish up their remaining two exams.

While they were busy slaving over scorecards, us Americans had fun attending three of the more interesting classes offered at Henan Experimental School. First, we mastered the art of traditional Chinese ink painting… maybe.

The teacher, with the help of his assistant and translator, guided us inexperienced American folk in illustrating a single cherry blossom branch. It was hard. Most of us agreed that our paintings “looked pretty dank” when finished. Next, we met a Kung Fu master on the school’s soccer field for a lesson in what Kyrie later told me was Tai Chi, not Kung Fu. Following our Kung Fu lesson, we participated in a non-typical Chinese geography class. The most interesting ornament in the room was what seemed to be a spherical projector. They told us it was supposed to project images of earth, the sky and outer space onto a dome-shaped in-cropping in the ceiling above it; nevertheless, it was too warm to have functioned properly at the time. When our classes were over, we received –or should I say participated in a simulated final surprise.

We walked into a room full of manual driving simulators. Some of us were ecstatic, and others were skeptical. It took many of us a while to learn the ropes of driving a stick for the very first time; it even became frustrating at times. Although, when I finally got the hang of it, I found it to be the most clutching part of my day. But, wait, there’s more! Right when we were starting to get comfortable in our new whips, our Chinese friends concluded their final exams and came to relive us of our many duties as simulated drivers.

Our final stop of the day was the local Hot Pot restaurant. Hop Pot was crazy. I’d like to think of it as a Kanki on steroids that, instead, serves traditional Chinese food. I’ll try and paint a picture of the experience with words, but only my photos and accompanying memories will truly do it justice. In the center of each round table sit two vats of boiling liquid. One is spicy and the other is not. Visit by visit, a member of the serving staff drops a different ingredient in both vats, consequentially adding flavor to the broths. Once you are sure that an ingredient has been cooked thoroughly, you can hit the sauce bar to concoct a dipping sauce unique to your pallet. It will serve to enhance the flavors of certain ingredients. Some of the ingredients that ended up in our broths or on our tables include: longan berries, dragon fruit, lotus root, cow stomach, duck stomach, and cow throat. Yeah…

On top of trying all the new foods that were presented to us, we were sufficiently entertained by the performers. First up was a man dressed in a samurai uniform; he was able to instantaneously switch masks with a flick of his fan. Then, it was the man who stretched noodles like a ribbon twirler; he was equally impressive. And, it would be totally uncool to go on without acknowledging the incredibly hospitable serving staff. Of course, we finished day six with a bang when our class whole started flash mob dancing to Xiao Ping Guo in front of the entire restaurant. It was pretty dank.

 

Written by Griffin Cece

We woke up.

Well Technically Cameron woke me up. It was a slightly rough start to an exciting day. The feeling of impending doom surrounded us like smog around the city. Today was the day that we would meet our exchange students. Ai yo! The taste of chicken nuggets, pumpkin dumplings, and toast with strawberry marmalade put most of our fears to rest for the time being.

As we descended into the lobby, more stress emerged. Cameron, Aryan, and I lost our second room key. In China, this was a major faux pas. We handed them our one and only room key and nothing happened so we just ran with it. We then traveled to the train station with a slight disadvantage given the late start (thanks Rosie).

After a relatively short bus ride we arrived at the train station. With a couple of heart attacks due to the misconception that we had lost our phones or passports and slightly intrusive security checks we all gallantly strode towards the train. Since our bags were too large we got the VIP treatment and emerged into the train early. Everyone got comfortable in the train as we waited for it to start. To be honest, I can’t give you the greatest summary of the train ride because I was asleep for most of it.

After we got off the train we took another short bus ride and arrived at Henan Experimental Day School. Our exchange students met us there as we all tried to diminish our fears. Once everyone was with their students, everyone had their own unique experience.

I, Griffin Cece, went with Kim and Rosie to have a sort of hibachi lunch. It was great. Then most of the group went to KTV. KTV is the name for these crazy over the top karaoke bar places. I’m sure you can only imagine how that went. After that it was dinner with the family and, personally speaking, I went to bed after a long exciting day in Zheng Zhou.

I’d like to apologize for the delay in the blog.

I’ve really noticed how many people there are in China nowadays. Today alone I have seen 50 kids and about 30 babies, not to mention all the people that surround you in a regular basis.

It’s also kind of weird that at breakfast in the hotel, random Chinese people will just sit down next to you and there usually isn’t an open table to eat at. Today’s breakfast was good and everyone managed to find a seat relatively close together.

After breakfast we went to exchange some money at a bank across the street, but we soon realized that it’s a long and complicated process that took around 30 min. This made our tour guide, Julie, a little worried about our schedule but we managed to get to the terra-cotta warrior and horse museum on time. It was really cool to walk around and to see all the warriors and chariots.

Afterwards, we hung out in a coffee shop eating ice cream and bonding. We then went to lunch at the museum where there was a buffet with a lot of great food, and you could watch the noodles being made.

After lunch we went into the gift store to buy some things and I accidentally told a shopkeeper that Andrew was going to buy something that he didn’t want (sorry Andrew).

We then went to the Small Wild Goose Pagoda where we wandered around for a bit and got to ring a bell three times for 5 RMB. Dinner was another buffet that was really great and had fries with tomato juice, aka ketchup. After dinner we came back to the hotel and we went to go find a place to play soccer and a place to pump up the ball. As I’m writing this now, we’re waiting for griffin and Izhan to return with their new haircuts, and for Charlotte to come back with the soccer ball so we can play a game.

Lots of love from China with Kim and the rest of the exchange group

 

Written by: Emma Briggs and Andrew Lee

Today started off with a 5 o’clock wakeup (which was gross), so we could catch our flight to Xi An. Breakfast included 5 red bean buns and a banana. After a two hour wait we finally boarded a bus to get on our plane. The airport was insanely crowded, but I found lemonade so all was good.

Apparently on Chinese airplanes you can’t have cellphones on. At least they brought us a nice second breakfast of rice pudding, watermelon, and bread.

We finally landed in Xi An which is a western city. It’s a lot smaller than Shang Hai. We met our tour guide- sadly she did not live up to Wu Ge’s fabulous legacy. Then we ate airport buffet western food which was interesting to say the least.

Xi An was much smoggier than Shang Hai and the weather was easily 90 degrees.

Afterwards we got on the bus and rode to the city wall. At the city wall I (Andrew) tried to see how fast we could go around the city wall with Charlotte, Caroline, Griffin, and Nate. I (Emma) had a leisurely stroll with Kim and Rosie because we are not crazy.

After the biking we went jumped on the bus to go to a mosque. This mosque had a lot of history behind it and the Hui Muslim people practice (shout out to Dr. Sencer). The highlight according to Rosie was the multitude of cats roaming around the property. Don’t worry none of us got rabies.

After looking through the mosque we all we shopping in the Hui marketplace. It was very cool and we all bought lots of stuff. I (Emma) bought a gorgeous ceramic plate and a huge cow poster for a friend’s birthday. I (Andrew) bought fake Raybans, a fake Rolex, and squid.

After that we had dinner at a famous Chinese dumpling restaurant with 15 different types of dumplings. Dinner had mixed reviews. We walked back after fighting off street venders/beggars to our bus and drove to our hotel. Our hotel tonight is nicest one yet and we (Emma, Rosie, and Kim) have the best room.

With love from Xi An Emma and Andrew

 

First (full) day in China!!! Sleeping in a bed was so much nicer than sleeping on airplane seats, and the 7:30am wakeup was a lot friendlier than the previous 3:00am wakeup. Breakfast was very good: noodles, fried rice, bok choy, pale sausage (which tasted a lot better than it looked), and the favorite: buns with red bean paste inside!

On the bus ride to the Shanghai museum, Wu Ge (remember that he is our guide for Shanghai) told us all about the history of Shanghai and the dynasties. Mostly, a lot of random facts about trading with other nations, “strange blue eyed and brown haired people” (quote Wu Ge) and facts about the government in China. I also noted that there is a lot more greenery around Shanghai than I thought, especially in the British concession (which is apparently shaped like a race course for horses according to Wu Ge).

The museum was full of ancient Chinese artifacts, from old coins to amazing calligraphy! Griffin, Anna, and I tried rose ice cream which was very good! It was nice touring the museum since there were English captions under every Chinese caption. The guards also watched our every move, a bit daunting but they seemed friendly enough.

Then we visited the expensive shopping district for about 20 mins, in which we saw a lot of interesting t-shirts. After looking around elite tea shops and expensive clothing stores, we ate lunch. During lunch, a group of dancing Chinese ladies took the stage in green sequined outfits and proceeded to dance to interesting Chinese music. We started clapping after they finished, but we learned that Chinese people do not clap… A belly dancing man came on next, there was a lot of hip thrusting.  We decided to add to that performance with our own dance to “xiao pinguo”. We went up on stage and danced in front of the waitstaff and some random customers.

After lunch, we took the bus to the Shanghai World Expo location. We went through the East section of Shanghai, which used to be looked down upon because it was farmland, or so we were told by Wu Ge. We saw the China Art Museum and were harassed by what Kim calls, “Stuff People”. We then went to the Chinese Yu Garden. Good thing we didn’t have to find our own way back through the garden- we were thoroughly lost without Wu Ge. We then had about 2 hours to walk around a shopping area. There were tea shops and steam bun shops, pearl shops and hat shops; it was very cool! We were, at one point, invited to follow a man to his “calligraphy studio”, but don’t worry we don’t talk to strangers! Then, the majority of our group was photoed by a bunch of Chinese people just milling around. Andrew bought some squid on a stick and almost all of us had a bite: it didn’t taste too bad!

We had dinner in an upstairs restaurant overlooking one of the shopping streets. There were a lot of new foods this time, I tried peppery fungi! Tonight we had some free time at the hotel, and then we’re off bright and early for a flight to Xi’an! We’ll be leaving Shanghai at 5:00-5:15am tomorrow!

Love,

Ellie and the CA Chinese Exchange Students

 

We’re in China now! The flight to Canada was pretty easy, and the Toronto airport is super nice! There were iPads at pretty much every table, and the food was pretty good too. A couple of us had hamburgers and fries for our “last supper”.

After the incredibly arduous 14+ hour flight, we were finally in China. After going through customs (where, as obnoxious American tourists, we cut in line), we were greeted by a nice little Chinese man called Wu Ge (Brother Wu). You can see him showing us a map of Shanghai, and his little red flag at the bottom of the escalator. He escorted us to our bus where we loaded our checked baggage underneath it. He then took us to the MagLev train; what’s special about the MagLev is that it’s suspended on a magnetic field, so there’s virtually no friction. This allows it to reach speeds up to 300+ km/hr (roughly 186 mi/hr). We covered the ~30 km trip to the city Shanghai in ~8 minutes. In the words of Griffin, “it was quiche though.”

After getting to Shanghai, we got to explore the Bund. The Bund is a riverside area where one side has European looking architecture left over from the French occupation. We got to walk around a bit, which was especially nice after sitting on a plane for so long. We also got dinner at a restaurant in the Bund – it was delicious! The chief conversation topic at my table was bathroom facilities. Yum. I don’t have any pictures of said facilities, but the term “squatty potty” should be sufficiently self explanatory.

Once we finished dinner, we went on a river cruise of the Bund. However, before we had a chance to actually board the boat, we were swarmed by people trying to sell us things. Some people ended up getting selfie sticks, and someone got a really powerful laser (that is apparently illegal in America?). While on the boat, we got to see Shanghai’s skyscrapers lit up with various colors, patterns, and messages. Towards the end of the cruise, we started dropping like flies as the exhaustion really hit. By 8:00, I felt like (and probably looked) like death warmed over. We drove back to the hotel, which was actually a somewhat harrowing experience given how people drive in Shanghai, took showers, and went to bed. Now I’m going to stop writing this blog post and go to bed myself!

Sending our love from Shanghai,

Anna and the rest of the CA Chinese class

This is just a quick post to let everyone know that we’ve arrived to Shanghai. We are safe and excited, but very very tired.

It’s 8:40 PM here and we are getting ready to sleep. We will post more soon. (with pictures, of course)