Just Zhejiang Things – Week 4: Weird Experiences, Great Memories

Hey wassup guys it is another cool day in Zhejiang and the past week has been craaaaaaazy! Anyway, this week took so much of my firsts :’) Afterall, who would go through their first concert experience, first insect ingestion experience, first guitar experience with another African Exchange student, all in one week?

Mon – Night Market and eating bugs

First day of the week ended off with ma first night market experience in Hangzhou with my friends. Rather than saying that it was a night market, I would say that it’s really a place out of time. The place retained many features of the 80s, which included an old-school movie theatre from the past that was operational till today. The stalls there also gave off a very homely setting, where we enjoyed the stroll past different stalls, ranging from selling 臭豆腐 (Smelly Tofu) to rubic cubes of all sorts of funny shapes and sizes. Definitely a must go if you are in China (If you are not going to Taiwan).

 

Tues – Guitar and African friend coming in

            Ok righttt so they say new place new experience right, so ta-da managed to get a new guitar in! Preparing for a surprise in December but hopefully this works out. Did I mention that this is a very good time without the worries of academics for you to pick up new skills? Anyway, we were practicing in hostel (Gabriel thanks for taking us in HAHA) and another exchange student came knocking wanting to jam as well! That actually felt refreshing and coming from a musical fifth row, it feels good to have strangers brought together and connected by music. Power of exchange programs, I’d say HAHA.

Wed – Exercising and Batman Challenge

So exercise is important, but you don’t know how to start it? Or did the mala you just ate hit you like a train and make you realise you need to exercise? Well that’s what exactly what we felt so we got into the exercising wave. Well to be more precise, I joined them on Day 5. So for those who do not know about the Batman Challenge, it is basically a set of exercises that you do for 30 days straight. Long story short, this is the start of a bonding journey through blood sweat and tears (oh and very long and painful too)

Ps. Credits to trainer Micaela and ociffer Isaac for arranging the training!

Thurs – First Presentation and Data Visualization Analysis

Ok time to launch into work proper! Today we presented in front of our assistant professor and student advisor, about our insights regarding different data visualization done from this collection of data journalism awards. In turn, we received a critical introduction of what we data visualization is and what we should be looking out for in creating a successful data visualization product. One should be able to receive further insights or use the visualization to access important information readily. To find out more, please join the Global Leadership Programme 2020 – SUTD-ZJU exchange programme Data2Video theme (Now I sound just like I’m working for the school HAHA) In any case, this really sounds like an interesting area to head into, and something I would be updating about in the later weeks.

Ps. These two were two of the more interesting ones that I found, but for the full collection, please refer to the third link.

https://projects.propublica.org/asylum/

https://datajournalismawards.org/projects/caixin-vislab-2/

https://datajournalismawards.org/2019-shortlist/

Friyay – Wuzhen 无镇

YAY Time to go out of the school into the nature!… or so we thought, because we reached the train station a tad too late and the next train was 3 hours after ☹. Being people who could not wait to have fun, we decided to go to Longjing Village (龙井村), which turned out to be only….

 

AN AWESOME DECISION! Because we ended up in the village, enjoying the serenity and the fresh air that the city could never offer. I also bought the authentic tea leaves from the village (I don’t drink tea by the way, my parents would probably love them) But anyway pls do give it a shot if you want to know how tasty tea leaves taste like.

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Nah that’s not over, because our hyperactive group, being hyperactive, decided to climb the mountain that was 4000m…. long. Well and that was when walkie talkies came in handy, so really recommend the juniors coming to consider having a set for your group. In any case, it was tough but with blood, sweat and tears, we managed to reach the peak! Well we did not see the sunset because the other peaks were in the way, but we gained something more precious than the sunset – the bonds that could never be bought, even by the scenery we see up at the peak (and the scenery was honestly breathtaking 😊)

Sat – Wuzhen 有镇 😀

Well nothing would stop us from going to Wuzhen so we also went to Wuzhen the next day 😀 A tip for all going for a day trip to Wuzhen – Get the earliest ticket you can, because Wuzhen is a VERY big place to big exploring. It is split into the East and the West side, with the west being a bigger and probably more of a tourist trap scenic place altogether. This would also be a very good experience for those who are fond of the Chinese culture, for there are many iconic Chinese features at the place, including a pagoda, some flower fields and even a 月老庙 (which represents the diety for love and relationships). All in all, it was an expansive but worth trip for those who just want a day out and take things slow, because that’s just what the ancient town can offer you.

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