ABROAD IN
I've been really busy and haven't had time to post a lot! But, I've had an eventful few days. The first day of school was really hard. Advanced class was challenging for me at first, but I think I'm getting used to not understanding everything that is being said. In the advanced class we have some homework every night which is to pretty much prepare for speeches in class the next day. They aren't very long speeches but it takes me a long time to prepare each one, so I spend a lot of my night doing homework. My host sisters help me with my homework so I'm really thankful for them :). I think we are a perfect fit, my family and I. My mom tells me how I am her third child, and she posts on her wechat memories about me haha. My dad and mom both say how I make the family happy, ahh I got lucky with my host family they are super sweet. That second night with them I had a feast with my family. We went to this really traditional restaurant that served spicy everything. We had 龙虾(lobster) and spicy lamb and spicy clam. I don't understand everything my family says, but they want to help me learn and we laugh together when I really can't understand something. It's funny how we can connect over me struggling to understand Chinese. On Tuesday the 27th, I had class. I normally wake up at about 7 and leave at about 7:30 in the morning to start class at 8. I had an egg and sausage sandwich that morning with yogurt. I've noticed that Chinese people really like to eat yogurt in the mornings. It's also weird, they don't really use the toilet paper like the ones in America. They literally use tissues, like Kleenex. They use it for everything really, clean hands, wipe up messes, etc. Also kind of random but I have gotten so many mosquito bites, I think I'm at around 40-50 now. But there's this really great liquid here it's called 花露水, and it's pretty much anti itch for mosquitos. Anyway, after breakfast we went straight to school. For lunch, I go with the other students to eat lunch at the university Cafeteria. Everything is paid for by NSLI-Y, so we can pretty much order anything we want. Everything is really cheap too, meals are about 8 yuan, which is just over a dollar USD? So, it's really nice, and convenient. After lunch we went to this museum as a group, called 云锦博物馆 I think. I'm not quite sure what the translation was but it was a museum on the history of clothing in China and it was kinda cool to check it out. We had a tour guide but she talked so fast and her Chinese was really complicated so none of us really understood what she was saying. That night, we ate jiaozi (dumplings) at home, and it was SOOO good. Everyone should eat Chinese jiaozi one day. It's so cheap too. On the 28th we had xiaolongbao for breakfast. I think xiaolongbao is my favorite Chinese food. Also on the 28th we did some calligraphy for our cultural part of class. It was really hard but we were able to learn about the different types of calligraphy, so it was kind of interesting. We also toured around Nanjing University, the campus is gorgeous. After school I went running with Alexandra at the community track near 南大 (the university we are studying at). It wasn't actually too bad. It is definitely hotter in China, but I thought it was going to be much harder to run in the pollution. I remember when I first arrived at the house I mentioned maybe once or twice that we ate spaghetti at home and that my American mother's spaghetti is really good and that I liked it a lot. So to my surprise, my mom told me that she was going to take me out to Italian spaghetti tonight! We went out to this really cute café and ordered some "Italian“ noodles. It was more like Chinese-style spaghetti, with stir fry beef and vegetables over spaghetti noodles. Nonetheless, it was delicious. My family thought the noodles were too oily though. That evening, I went walking with my host sisters around our neighborhood. It's so busy and crowded even at night, it's so fun over here. I bought boba for my sisters and I also bought a pencil at a stationary store. Boba here is really cheap (9 yuan = 1ish dollars) but it tastes different than in America? I don't know if it tastes better, even though it's more authentic. On the 29th, during lunch we ate on the 3rd floor at the cafeteria, and the food was so cheap and so good. I had these really good fried noodles. After school we got picked up by my host mom's good friend who drove me and three other NSLI-Y kids to our host siblings middle school. It was funny because my mom's friend who drove us had a toddler boy in the car who had to sit on my lap the whole car ride. He was bawling the whole time, but his faces were really funny. Anyway, there is a middle school that has students who hosted some NSLI-Y students so the middle school has receptions for us often and this was our second time meeting at the middle school. Below is a photo with the students who coordinated the reception/gave us food, etc. Here we pretty much talked to kids about America and American life. They had a lot of stereotypes, like that all Americans take mornings showers, and that we all drink beer. They also think that we eat our food with weapons?? (forks, knifes) Anyway, it was fun to talk to the students because they treat us like celebrities and gave us a lot of food. This weekend they invited us to go sightseeing with them, so I'm excited! After, me and my sisters ate dinner at this curry place because my mom had work. It was pretty good too. All the food here is good. The rest of the night I hung out with my sisters and did some homework. It has been raining pretty hard this week, wayyy harder than Seattle. The rain comes in waves though. It is usually is finished in about 15 minutes. I was debating whether I should get shower shoes for the rain because my Vans got soaked to the point where it was like I was walking in a puddle. Anyway, today for lunch we went to this restaurant as a group instead of the cafeteria. I ordered xiaolongbao and it was definitely one of the best foods I've gotten on this trip. Xiaolongbao are dumplings with soup inside. The soup tastes like beef broth, it's delicious. The restaurant was really busy though so we weren't able to eat as a group. After lunch we went to the stationary store and I bought something for my sister in America (hi sarah). After getting some boba, we walked back at a quarter to 2 because we had to meet back at 2 for community service. It turns out though that class was pushed back until 3:30. So, Alexandra, Josie, Ines, Helena and I decided to go to the gym for an hour ish because it was raining and everyone was kind of staying inside. I was going to go running after school that day with Alexandra but this worked out well too. After gym we did community service with all the Nanjingers. We pretty much were there to speak English with these elementary school students and to sing songs with them. They were all so cute. After I was picked up at 6 and we went straight to dinner where I had wonton soup and some 锅贴 (fried dumplings), 非常好吃!It's so convenient in Nanjing, there are a ton of small shops of food and stationary and clothing right outside of our apartment, and every living area really. My host mom was a little surprised when I told her that in America we have to drive to get our groceries and our food. Anyway, first week is done! Shoot, there's only 5 more left. This weekend, I am planning to go ice skating tomorrow with friends and then shopping with my host sisters。 On Sunday, I am sightseeing with the middle school! I'm excited :)
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6/24/17 I woke up in the hotel room in Nanjing (I roomed with Mae), and even though it was such a sketchy hotel room, we had a pretty good view of Nanjing! One thing that's different in China is that the showers don't have a tub so when you shower it literally is like a flood in the bathroom and the toilet gets drenched with water from the shower. Anyway, I think that night (the night of the flight to Shanghai and our bus ride to Nanjing) was the fastest I've ever fallen asleep, I think I fell asleep in 2 minutes or something. Mae and I woke up at around 6 am naturally (weirdly early) and we got ready for breakfast. Breakfast was actually really good, I had my first 油条 which is pretty much a churro without sugar and cinnamon, but it's better. Breakfast was a lot of Chinese food like fried rice and noodles, etc. One thing that I already miss about America is ice water. In China, all water has to be boiled because water here isn't very clean, so for breakfast lunch and dinner, we are served hot tea or hot water in restaurants. Anyway, after breakfast we had free time so a some of us and I (Jessica, Anushka, Alexander, Ben, Mae, Peter) went out and walked around. Nanjing is so cool, it's bustling and it's just a city that is so fun to walk around in. We tried to go to this boba tea place, but to our dismay, it was closed. I am determined to go there soon though, maybe tomorrow. After walking around and buying some water at the supermarket we had orientation. At orientation, the teachers of our classes introduced themselves and then we got some schedules and a Nanjing University swipe card for free meals. Right after, we were told we were going to have a "test", and were put into groups and our future classes. I was so surprised that I was put into 高级班 (advanced class) , I thought I was going to be in intermediate. The Nanjingers are split into 3 different classes: advanced, intermediate and beginner. I didn't know this, but the Oral Proficiency Interview (OPI) that we took about a month before we left for D.C. determined our class! I talked about President Trump and the Paris Climate Accord for part of the interview and I forgot how to say a lot of it in Chinese so I thought I did terribly, but I guess it turned out well. Our test was pretty much speaking with our teachers and them making sure we were in the right level. After orientation we went out to lunch. I am fuming though because at the Nanjing University cafeteria, Alex, Ben and I got ripped off and prices were raised wayyy too high just for us because we are foreigners. Alex was charged 10 yuan for a bowl of rice, and I was charged around 15 yuan for a bowl of rice and some mediocre sweet and sour pork. The lady scaled our food, and the price on the scale was not the same price that she charged me, but I thought that was normal. It was only after that we realized that we got ripped off. Margie (our Resident Director) went up and had a conversation with them, but I am definitely not going there again. After lunch all of the Nanjingers walked back to the conference room in the main International Studies building in Nanjing University to meet our host families. The room was filled with parents, children and grandparents all sitting in chairs. We all walked in and everyone looked at us. After a little introduction by Margie, we each walked up to the podium and gave a short introduction about ourselves and then went to our host families. After my host family stood up and waved their hands to indicate they were my family, I went over and met YuChen and YuXin, my host 妹妹s (sisters) who are in 8th grade!! They were a little shy at first but once we got in the car, we were all laughing. The mother was also there (the dad was in the car to pick us up) and the first things she said to me was that I was pretty and that she was so happy I was in her family. My family is so sweet. I also met my other host family, with a younger sister who is in 7th grade, and an older sister about 20 years old. The 20 year old is super funny and stylish. She came up to me and said in Chinese "I'm super glad we got you" and she gave me this huge smile. The 7th grader is talkative and started talking to me right away which I thought was super sweet and she seems really nice. After dropping my stuff off at the apartment my host family took me to their middle school where they had a surprise reception/party for the NSLI-Y students who had host siblings at that middle school. There were 4 of us (Josie, Anushka and Ines) and the middle schoolers introduced, in English, their school and walked us around. It was super well planned and organized and we were all super honored to be there. The middle schoolers had scripts in hand and they spent 2 days to work on introducing the school in English. Also, near the end of the reception the students sang songs for us in Chinese then asked us Americans if we wanted to perform a song. We were all a little rusty but we decided on singing Taylor Swift's "You Belong with Me" and it was funny because some of the middle school girls immediately joined in. After it finished, a bunch of the middle school girls came up to us and asked us for photos individually with each of the Americans. I kinda felt like a celebrity haha. After, we went back home and then my family and I went to this really famous Nanjing restaurant. The food was amazing and really authentic. There was his dish that we ordered that my family was trying to explain to me. They were trying to explain the meaning of “鸭血” which means duck blood. I was so confused for about a minute, because I was wondering what血 was. Once I realized, it totally made sense because blood duck soup is really famous in Nanjing, and it's actually tastier than it sounds. We also ate some really good 饺子 (dumplings),豆腐 (tofu) ,and some good dishes. It was kinda funny because whenever I would look up from eating, there was always a new piece of meat or vegetable on my plate. My host mom would just keep saying “再吃” (keep eating). The restaurant itself was beautiful and bustling too. It's hard to describe in words but it had lanterns up everywhere and it was filled with people, 春联 and red/gold decorations. I love Nanjing. We are currently just about to go to bed. Both my host sisters and I are both really tired. Tomorrow, my host mom said she would take me walking, and to buy some clothes that I mentioned "Oh, those are cute" in Chinese. She also said she was going to buy me a wardrobe thing but I said that she really doesn't need to (My host mom is so cute - she also took a selfie with me). Tomorrow also is my first day of class, so I'm super excited :) YuChen and YuXin, 我的妹妹 Streets of Nanjing 6/23/17: This morning I woke up at 3 am and made sure I had packed everything back up. I kinda felt bad for Rachel (my roommate in D.C.) because only the Suzhou and the Nanjing students had to meet in the lobby at 3:40 am, while Xi'an students (like Rachel) had to meet in the lobby at around 8 for breakfast. So, I tried to be really silent while I finished cram packing some of my things this morning. After a few people were late to the lobby from missing their alarms, we headed out to the airport on a charter bus and checked in our bags. It took a long time because we had about 42 people, and each one of us had 2 boarding passes to print out. Also we had to wait for everyone to go through security. So once we reached our gate we only had about 10 minutes to grab breakfast before we had to board at 5:45 am. I was scurrying around the airport with my friend looking for a good place to get some iced coffee and some food, but lines were too long so we decided that we would pick up something in Chicago, where we had a one hour layover. However, after boarding the plane, the pilot informed us that our flight to Chicago was delayed for about 45 minutes. Everyone thought we were going to miss our flight to Shanghai so once we landed, we immediately rushed to the next gate with a little less than 10 minutes until the boarding time period closed (the workers who scanned our passes were annoyed at us). I forgot how nice international flights can be even though the flight was 14 hours long. The movies available are pretty good/new and we also were fed a lot of free food, so even though I skipped breakfast I had enough food. Every person even got a little single-serve bucket of caramel gelato. So overall, the flight to Shanghai was bearable through short naps and movies. It was so surreal arriving in Shanghai, and the fact that I am going to be living without my family in China really hit me then. When looking to the window on the 5 hr charter bus ride to Nanjing, I noticed that the whole scenery is so different and the way people act is so different. The bus ride felt SO LONG but the Nanjingers pretty much cracked jokes the whole time so they made it fun. We finally arrived in Nanjing and it's a little chaotic but lively at night. There are rows and rows of shops and places to buy food on the main street and I am constantly hearing car horns. I can't wait to explore it tomorrow. As we got off the bus, we were told that we are meeting host families and taking our placement tests tomorrow (which determine what class we are placed in for the duration of the program). We just finished this really nice Chinese dinner and the whole time I was so exhausted and kind of in this warm haze. It's even humid in our hotel room, but at night it was only in the 70s. I'm super tired and I have been up since 3 in the morning, so I'm going to head off to bed. Alex and Alex were happy when we arrived in Shanghai! *this is a few days late because i didn't have wifi*
6/22/17: Finally done with PDO!!! It wasn't too bad but I was so exhausted, and it was really hard to stay awake. We pretty much sat in a room from 8 until 5:30 and went through power points and ate food. It's ok though because NSLI-Y staff made it bearable with activities and it made me a little more excited for the trip. In the middle of the power points during our break, we all played some games and did some taiqi on PDO day 2. PDO Day 1 (June 21st - getting off the plane from Seattle): I arrived in D.C. an hour earlier than expected and met some NSLI-Y alum/staff (Isaac and Orion) and ran into some other students at the baggage claim. There, I met another Seattle student that's doing NSLI-Y and it turns out she was on my flight! She's going to Suzhou, and she knows one of my good friends so it was funny that we ran into eachother. We waited for a few minutes for other students to arrive, then we took a shuttle to the hotel where PDO was held. There, we did some icebreakers and I got to meet all of the other Nanjingers in person and the other 40ish students that are going to Suzhou and Xi'an. Everyone seemed to connect rather quickly and easily because everyone is super friendly and funny and really excited about the trip. We ate some good dinner and then pretty much had free time the rest of the night. So, I played some ultimate frisbee outside with some of the Xi'an and SuZhou students, then I met all of the other Nanjingers in the pool where we went swimming. Also, I wasn't expecting D.C. to be really hot/humid, but it was surprisingly in the high 80s and the humidity was pretty bad. I'm not quite sure how I am going to survive in 100+ degree Nanjing weather?? ALSO I met another XC runner who is from Minnesota!! I'm super excited because Alexandra and I both want to summer train and are serious about getting in shape for season, so after going to the pool we went running at the gym with Camilla. We had some time before curfew so we met at our friend's hotel room with around 10 other Nanjingers where we watched Sherlock and crashed on the bed to play some games. Just before 10 we went back to our hotel rooms - I'm currently rooming with a girl named Rachel from Japan! She's going to Xi'an but she's super nice and relatable so it was fun to room with her, and it was a good start to the program. PDO day 2: I woke up at 7 am with Alexandra and Rachel to go on a morning run. I only ran a mile partially because I had no food in me and also because I was super tired and not motivated. After, everyone met back in the conference room for breakfast and the start of PDO at 8. It was pretty much 8-9 hours of powerpoints and eating. I didn't do a lot tonight, just hung out with some Nanjingers in the hotel room after downloading some free VPNs haha Tomorrow morning I have to wake up at 3 am to catch our flight. Suzhou and Nanjing students are flying 2 hours to Chicago, then flying 14 hours to Shanghai where we will then split up and the Nanjing students will take a bus to Nanjing where we will meet our host families. It's still so weird that I'm going to be in China tomorrow. I'm a little nervous to meet my host family because I know there are going to be points where I don't understand what they are saying. Oh well. I should get used to it. But, I'm mostly excited to experience everything in the next 6 weeks and to finally practice my Chinese outside of America. So, before the trip, all the students have to attend Pre-Departure Orientation (PDO) for 3 days where we get more details about our trip, learn about what you shouldn’t do in China, etc. After waking up at 5 am and rushing around cram packing some things, I made it to the airport and said a sad goodbye to my mom. Currently, I am on a plane headed to Washington D.C. where this year’s China trips PDO will be held! After an hour and a half of failed attempts to fall asleep I decided to write a post that I will probably put up later (if you’re reading this, I will be done with PDO by now)
So about 60 kids from NSLI-Y American Councils go to China, and 20 go to a different city/province. I’m going to Nanjing, some students are going to Xi’an, and others are going to a Suzhou. I’ve been to Xi’an and Suzhou before when I went to China when I was 10, so I am really happy that I get to go to Nanjing because I’ve never been. Even though I am literally on the plane going to D.C. it still feels so unreal that I am travelling to a foreign country alone?? But, I have been hoping to study abroad in China as a high schooler for years now, so I am so lucky that I have the opportunity to finally do it. Along from the cheap boba and 饺子 that I am going to buy, I am looking forward to (hopefully) improve my Chinese and to immerse myself in the country of my heritage. Anyway, im going to eat some Vietnamese spring rolls that I bought at the airport now. Hi! I'm Andrea and this Summer I am going to be studying Chinese in Nanjing with about 20 other students through the program NSLI-Y (through American Councils). In 4 days, I am traveling to Washington D.C. where I will have Pre-Departure Orientation (PDO) for a few days then I will be flying off to Nanjing!
Until then, I will be counting down the days until I leave and will be spending my nights researching the best boba tea and 饺子 shops in Nanjing. It still hasn't really sunk in that I'm traveling to a foreign country without my family in 4 days, but I've been hoping to get into this program for a few years, so I am super lucky for this opportunity and soooo excited to study in Nanjing this Summer! |
Andrea 施安雅17-year-old XC runner and boba tea lover living in Seattle but studying abroad in China. Also, I have a cat! Archives
August 2017
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