Week One Summary

Here is a quick run down of my first week here in China.

Monday-I arrived at 8 pm. I was supposed to get to Shanghai on Sunday afternoon, but due to some sort of mass computer system failure of United, I was unable to make my flight and the next available one was the next day. On the plane ride I sat next to a Chinese woman who had been in the US on a business trip with a group of colleagues. She was friendly and chatty the whole time.

Tuesday- We had a group walking tour through the campus. We also went to the bank and then to a nearby shopping center called Zhongshan Park. We had Pizza Hut for lunch-I order a rice and beef dish. I did a little shopping to pick up a few things I needed. It was fun to practice using Chinese with the store clerks. I also picked up my books this day.

Wednesday-My first day of language class. My class is way to hard. In my classes at Drake, we hardly ever practiced writing so most of my knowledge of Chinese is speaking and listening. And recognizing a few characters. I have been having to work really hard to try and catch up, I’m thinking about switching to an easier class, but I’m not sure I want to-it’s kind of a big debate.

Thursday-After class we had a group outing for the BLC students in the form of a bus tour and walking tour. Some famous sites we saw were-Great World (da shi jie), Shanghai Xin Tian Di, Site of the First National Congress of the Communist Party of China, The Bund, Shanghai People’s Square, Grand Theater, Municipal Government, Urban Planning Exhibition Hall, History Museum, and Nanjing Road. Afterwards we had dinner at a fancy restaurant. Then we saw an acrobatics show.

Friday-Class, laundry, homework, KTV. KTV is Chinese karaoke, I had never done it before. It was a super nice one downtown, so we had a fancy private room.

Saturday-I wanted to do a little exploring, so I picked a place, tried to figure out which busses to take to get there and then went for it. I love that in China strangers are very willing to be helpful and to go out of their way for you if you are lost. I kind of took advantage of this on my explorations, may that be good or bad. And I used a lot of my Chinese skills to get around. I went out for fried dumplings, a Shanghai speciality, for dinner.

Sunday-I wanted to go to church. There weren’t really any close, especially one for Internationals. I rode the bus, but got off at the wrong stop and walked around in a desolate part of town for about 30-40 minutes. I had decided that I would just give up and take a taxi, but there were none in site for a very long time. And I realized that I wouldn’t even know how to get a taxi in America, let alone China. Since I’m from rural Iowa, I don’t have that much experience with taxis. Anyway I finally made it to the church. Afterwards I had lunch at a close by restaurant with a few college aged students who were there. I decided I would try to take the subway on the way home, which took about an hour and 45 minutes. I have no idea what would be the easiest way to get there. For dinner I had hot pot (one of my favorite Chinese meals) with my roommate and her boyfriend. Hot pot is where you have a pot of boiling soup in the middle of the table, then you put meats and vegetables in the pot to cook them. And then you pull them out and eat them.