First Week In China~!
Bon Voyage~!
This week marks my first whole week in china. After finishing up on orientation the 9 of us were finally ready to set off for our Date programme in China. Pictures were taken before we entered through the boarding gates and said our goodbyes to our friends and family.
As we boarded the plane we were excited to finally set off towards china, where many of our friends already were. As you can see from the pictures, We were full of smiles as we set off for our trip. When we finally arrived we were greeted by our friends and we checked in quickly into our rooms so that we could get our first meal in China.
We had heard all about the 外卖 culture ,food delivery,and wanted to get first hand experience on it! Sadly we had not set up our alipay accounts and could not 外卖. However luckily we had friends who were gracious enough to bring us out to get some eats. so we quickly through our stuff into the hostel rooms and rushed down to eat.
Sadly most of the stalls were already closed at that time but we were able to get some noodles and rice.(sorry no pictures of those taken).
We then turned in early for that night as we had an early day the next day.
First Lesson~!
We proceeded to have our first lesson we had our first walk through this path, a journey which we would make many times over the course of the following days, the road from the hostel to yueya building.
A large poster greeted us as we had our first lesson. A sharing session where members of the programme introduced various locations that they had been to during orientation week. It definitely looked amazing. And i couldn’t wait to visit them all!
I was then introduced to my workspace. A place where i guess i would soon have to spend alot of my time at.
We then had our first meal in Zhejiang. A balanced diet and soon it was time for bubble tea after we got our phone numbers which was the first step in getting our alipay accounts to start taobaoing!!!
We proceeded to explore the rest of the school,exploring a park in the school. Man, this campus is so huge. Saw the various lakes in the campus and explored most of it. We further explored the other canteens in school as well as the laundry room,the place where we would be able to do our laundry.
I then proceeded to have my first MALA meal in China with the TFI peeps so that we could discuss our plans for the CIP trip the day ahead. We had ice cream after our mala meal and proceeded to discuss our plans. Overall, it was definitely an eventful day. I then proceeded to have supper with the delayed group at a vegetarian restaurant where we also learn a little about calligraphy and the history of some Chinese words. Overall definitely an interesting experience.
Making our bank cards finally!~
The next day we proceeded to make our bank cards, One step closer to being able to TAOBAO. Sadly I didn’t have immediate clearance to bank in money so i had to wait to be able to bank in my money. Another hurdle to my TAOBAO dreams.
But we explored more of the school and had an awesome dinner with lots of mushrooms and carbs at a hotpot restaurant. Definitely a night to remember, we ate till we were too full to move.
Visit to XiHu~!
On one of the days we visited Xi Hu and was treated to a nice lake and lots of nature. Definitely a place to visit again as we only had time to see a small fraction of the place.We visited Lei Feng pagoda via bus after giving up on walking there. Though the bus driver was initially a little hostile, he was quite helpful after he understood we were Singaporeans. Pro tip: the locals will think that you are locals if you have Alipay and assume that you know how to use all the functions of it. So explain that you are not a local if they seem extremely hostile towards you.
We then proceeded to hubin park to see the sunset and see the water show. The water show was mostly an overhyped tourist attraction so it is okay to miss it if you are thinking of it.
First Origami lesson!~
we then had our first origami lesson as we folded our origamis and tried to make them move using arduino parts. It was definetly an interesting lesson as we folded all types of animals and shapes and tried to imagine their movements and made them move using the various servos and ropes and tape given to us.
CIP trip!~
We then had our first session with huxi school. We baked cookies and folded origami with the kids. As we played with them we were reverted back to our childhood and definitely enjoyed ourselves tremendously. The kids were a joy to work with and well i think i definitely relived some memories of my first time baking as i baked with the kids.
Singing K to the weekends!~
We proceeded to sing Karoke to the weekends as we sang for the whole night till 6am. It was definitely an interesting experience and well something that should not be repeated too often. But it was definitely fun. We cycled to the Karoke place and proceeded to sing our lungs out. Protip: there will not be any DIDIs if it is too late, unlike Singapore, so you would have to cycle to the places you would want to go. But do go as a group for safety.
