Day 23: Finals and Rock Climbing

Thursday, May 29

Photo 1: The rock wall at Nanjing Normal University

Photo 2: Late-night study session

Once again, like the day before, we woke up to China's high humidity and sweltering 35 degrees Celsius heat. Fortunately that was only outside, because inside, Tim and I kept the room at a very comfortable 16 degrees. As usual, Judy and I went to class together in the morning. Given that I'm a heritage speaker (but highly illiterate) and Judy's high level of reading and writing, the two of us were placed in the standard Nanjing University classes, alongside other international students, many of whom have been in the country for nearly a year. Our classmates included predominantly Italians, French, and Koreans. It was very interesting to learn about the culture and social norms of our classmates in addition to the lesson plan. Despite the fact that class had already been in session for a few months, I found joining the regular classes to be very rewarding in the sense that it gave me a first hand perspective of what being an international student in China may be like.

Following morning classes, we took a group portrait with the assistant dean and several faculty members.  Shortly after, well all had lunch at our hotel's restaurant.  There were quite a few dishes including a large plate of shrimp.  Most of the students didn't care for the shrimp. Perhaps it was due to them having the shell on, or most people just don't like shrimp, but whatever the case, I pretty much had the whole plate to my self, which led to eating over 30 shrimp.

After lunch, Judy and I took our final exam administered by Alex. I'm sure Judy did fine on her test, though I can't say the same about myself.  The rest of the students spent the majority of their afternoon preparing for their exams, which are to take place on Friday.  Deciding to take a break, Jimmy and Tim accompanied me to go rock climbing. Unlike in America where rock climbing has seen exponential growth in recent years, China's rock climbing is still in its infant stages.  Recreational fitness (as we know it) is generally still a foreign concept in China. This may be a result of being a developing country, where energy produced by consuming food should be used towards labor and work, instead of needlessly burning calories. Or perhaps as a result of a high vegetable diet and an obesity rate of less than 4%, most people don't find it necessary to exercise. Though if you looked carefully, you would see the occasional lycra-clad bicyclist or jogger.    

Walking back from the rock climbing gym, we noticed Alvin, Molly, Tyler and many others still studying at Skyways, a nearby German bakery.  Having already finished my exams, I decided to take a nap.  I got back up around 11PM and decided to see what everyone else was up to.  Across the hall from hall was Judy and Seong's room, and inside I found Kimberly and Conley sprawled out on the floor with papers and textbooks all around them.  I sure hope everyone does well on tomorrow's exam, especially after all the hard work they've put in.  

- Hochiang

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Day 22: Fashion Lady, Hot Pot, Massage

Wednesday, May 28

Dialog Blog (DiaBlog?)

Photo 1: Fashion Lady

Photo 2: Hot Pot lunch

Photo 3: Worrisome menu

This Wednesday morning commenced what would be another ordinary day in Nanj-… Hold on… If I've learned anything from this dialog so far, it's that there is no such thing as an "ordinary day" in Nanjing, Beijing or any other town, city or village in this country. No matter how routine our class lives try to be, I am constantly amazed by the unpredictable pleasant surprises惊喜that run that are so prevalent in this country. Below is the story of the most "normal" day possible in Nanjing, and, if you ask me, it is not all that ordinary. 

I woke up in my room next to a sleeping Alvin. Occasionally I will hear his unique 特殊 laugh ring out through the night. It's pretty disconcerting. After showering and getting ready for the day, we set out for class. We no longer had dictation quizzes 听写's in class as Tuesday was our last one. This gave everybody in the class a sigh of relief, but, with the final looming overhead, nobody could really relax just yet. 

After class began, our teachers decided to shake up the curriculum. We were learning lesson 5 from the textbook. This didn't really make any sense considering the fact that it wouldn't even be on our final. Nonetheless, we made the most of it. 包老师 (Bao Laoshi) assigned each of us a passage from the textbook to teach the class about. I think she was just tired of teaching herself, so she found a creative way to make us do her job. 很巧妙. I've never been too great at just reading the passages, let alone understanding and then explaining them. So, needless to say, when it was my turn I walked to the front of the room. Turned to the class, and, as the impromptu professor for the short time, made the class read the passage I was assigned. Two can play this game 包老师. After all, I learned from the best (包老师) who always made me read the passages that I didn't know. 不好意思. Class wrapped up in the next couple of hours and we made our way to lunch.

We went to Bird Flu Alley. Sooner or later, I believe that I will find out why they call it "Bird Flu" alley. I can only hope that it doesn't live up to its name… 担心. After a bowl of FDA approved and sanitary beef noodles and a tray of 饺子, we headed back to the hotel. We usually meet with our 辅导's Language partners at this time, but they were all busy with a graduation ceremony. We had time to study! 

To make the most of this rare study opportunity, I went with people to 新街口 XinJieKo. This section of the city is commercialized, has a ton of stores and vaguely reminds me of a Manhattan with an obvious Chinese flare.  After leaving the hotel with Alvin and Johnny we tried to hail a cab. 

Hailing a cab in this country has proven to be the most difficult aspect of this dialog. There seem to be endless cabs up and down every road, but none of them will pick you up. They have this sign on the top that lights up green when there is a passenger inside, orange when they are en route to a passenger (and thus cannot pick up others) and red when they are FREE. Red is supposed to mean that they will pick me up! As green after green after yellow after green cab speeds by, I finally spotted a red cab. As he drew closer, I saw that the cabin was empty! SUCCESS. We made eye contact, he knew I wanted him to stop and then he just sped away. I'm talking direct eye contact and no passengers, but the man just hit the gas and left! Frustrated as ever, we decided take the subway.

After finally arriving in XinJieKou, we ate iced cream at cold stone. 好吃. Then we finally met up with the others at XinJieKou who were all shopping in a very feminine part of the city called "Fashion Lady". Needless to say, I was not a fan although they did have some fabulous sunglasses 极好.

Luther，Johnny, Alvin and I soon left and ate dinner at Shabu Shabu 呷哺呷哺 Hot Pot. 很好吃. Very delicious, but some of the dishes were rather disconcerting and/or worrisome. 

A week and half earlier, Bobo, Mika, Johnny and myself all won Mystery Nanjing. That meant that we were entitled to one free, full body massage by blind masseuses. We cashed in on this today along with Luther, Jimmy and Dong Laoshi! The massage was, for the most part, amazing. At some points it just simply hurt. A lot. But it was, after all, 非常好. 9/10 would do again. 

So this was our normal day in Nanjing. I managed to write a decent amount here. Pretty surprising considering that we all have a final in a couple of days. I guess I see where my priorities are at now. All in all, China is amazing. I'm still discovering this city and I don't want to 舍不得 leave in a week and a half QQ. 

- Tyler

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Day 21: Class, Jiangsu Province Environmental Protection

Tuesday, May 27

Photo 1: Dinner

Photo 2: Free kites for the advanced class

After a long weekend in a somewhat surreal environment, returning to Nanjing was something of a shock, but it didn't take long for everyone to get back in the swing of things. Today was a fairly typical class day consisting of four hours of language classes, two hours with language partners, and an evening guest speaker. The morning started out with an odd experience at Momentum, the only place near our hotel with affordable hot coffee open before 10 am. I had run out of small bills and needed to get change for 100 yuan when I bought my morning coffee, but the cashier couldn't open the cash register. Thankfully, Rebecca, Molly, and Jonny were able to translate enough to let me know they had made me coffee anyway so I didn't have to borrow money. I'll try to pay for it tomorrow even though I know they won't accept because I felt guilty accepting the coffee without paying.

While most of the other students are in classes with other Northeastern students who are all required to participate in the language pledge, I am in an international class with students from many different countries including South Korea, Australia, Germany, and Sweden. While they are not supposed to speak to me in English, they do sometimes translate words I don't know – their class started two months before I joined and made more progress than I had in my previous class at Northeastern – and one student in particular enjoys teasing everyone. And especially me on days when I can't speak English to come up with a good retort. I had to learn some new phrases to be able to reply, so I think he's actually helping me learn.

During the language partner session today, the Intermediate and Advanced groups went to visit Nanda's hospital clinic and to fly kites respectively. As one of the two in the beginner class, I stayed behind to work with my language partner. As part of the lesson, he asked us to explain the worst illness or injury we have ever had, which involved much cell-phone dictionary consulting on our parts and surprise on his part as to why the other student couldn't remember his injury and why I was indoor rock climbing at the age of six. I think he was more shocked that my parents let me rock climb at that age than that I almost broke my back doing so.

While waiting for my dinner at my favorite Bird Flu Alley shop, I actually had a conversation with the owner, who always insists I take a chair, even when I'm only taking food to go. It was a very simple conversation that consisted mainly of her asking me simple questions, but it was the first time I managed to understand someone with a regional accent at all, which hopefully indicates progress in my Chinese. She's a very nice women who, it turns out, has a daughter a few years older than me who is currently studying at Nanda.

Tonight's guest speaker was probably the most interesting for me so far. Ms. Zhu Mei works for one of the government's water quality control offices, which is attempting to clean up Taihu Lake. As someone who has done environmental work before, I was very interested in what she had to say and received answers to several questions that I have been wondering about for some time. Many of the other students were less interested, but environmental protection is an important issue for China and it was important information for the cultural aspect of our Dialogue to learn about how China is attempting to clean up its pollution and make the environment safer for its population.

- Mika Brown

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Day 20: Descending Huang Shan, Leaving Anhui

Monday, May 26

Photo 1: The twisted railing that was unsettlingly close to the edge of the stairs wherever we went

Photo 2: Going to a lookout point via a narrow pathway

Photo 3: Group photo of the morning hikers

Photo 4: Dong Laoshi looking good with her unrivaled stamina

Photo 5: Part of the extremely long descent to the bottom of Huang Shan

Photo 6: A cute baby monkey that distracted visitors as the rest of the monkey family swarmed for food

Bonus Photo: A bunch of us being able to use our legs before we went to Huang Shan

I woke up this morning only to find myself unable to do anything besides blinking. The soreness of yesterday's hikes finally caught up to me as I found myself unable to leave the top bunk until Dong Laoshi, who slept in the bed underneath, rose up. I had to pathetically slither down the bed because my legs refused to move properly. Seeing the weather conditions outside, Dong Laoshi made the morning hike optional. For the person writing the blog though, optional activities are clearly mandatory and the sheer willpower to write a good blog was the only thing that kept me going strong enough to wobble out to the hotel lobby. A tasty and slightly satisfying breakfast of Orion Chocolate pies may have also helped me regain my energy for the long hike ahead.

It was only a small group that set off this morning (Tyler, Tim, Jimmy, Luther, Jon, Alex, and Dong Laoshi) and I'm not surprised that the only girls on this hike happened to be the two girls (Me and Mika) that shared the room with Dong Laoshi. We were headed to Xihai Grand Canyon…which is a really strange name because I don't think it's anything like the Grand Canyon in the States. But eh, what do I know, I'm just a city girl.

Our time in China has taught me to never trust weather reports as we all looked silly with coats and yellow rain ponchos for the first few minutes of the hike before realizing that the rain was simply morning mist. I'm just glad that there is a lot less fog compared to yesterday as we were able to see past five feet of what was ahead of us. I finally got to see peaks and mountain ridges without the annoyance of rain sticking onto my glasses. Honestly, words will not do Huang Shan justice so I'll just let the pictures do the talking. 

Huang Shan may not have been an actual mountain hiking experience but without the aid of bridges and stairs, we would have never been able to take some crazy photos on some pretty crazy rock formations. The fences here seem sturdy enough to hold onto but then again, they were made in China…

Around noon, we came back to the hotel to gather everyone up for the descent. Huang Shan, it was nice sightseeing but it was time to get off this mountain. At first I was really confused when we had to climb up stairs to start descending but we eventually reached the steep set of stairs that would bring us seven kilometers down to the bottom. Normally, going down is way more desirable than climbing up but when you're descending wet, uneven, and small stairs with no railing to save you from slipping, going down becomes a formidable challenge. I had to repeatedly chant "mountain goat" to get into a zone because it was not fun going down sore. We did see some awesome views on the way down, including a scene where a family of monkeys terrorized a Chinese family for their food. Tyler even recorded one stealing cucumbers out of their bags, heh heh.

I'm glad to say that everyone made it down the mountain without copping out for the cable car. We all deserved our group lunch, which happened to be the first time we had actual food since our last meal in the village. The coach bus ride to Nanjing lulled many of us to sleep, while others stayed up writing journals and blogs and whatnot. I think it's safe to assume that many of us were happy to return to civilization. Well, except for the chance of getting hit by a Nanjing cycler the moment I stepped off the bus. I don't think I'm ever going to get used to that!

- Bobo

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Day 19: Hiking

Sunday, May 25

Photo 1: Chickens on a motorcycle

Photo 2: Out of the village, into the hills

Photo 3: Me, Bobo, and our favorite teacher

Photo 4: Hochiang, Jonny, Tyler, and Luther being majestic on Brightness Summit.

Photo 5: What it looked like the next day

For my first blog, I thought I had to be more professional and informative instead of writing whatever I felt like. But now I'm feeling more liberal, so there will be none of that this time.

My alarm went off at 6:30, and I managed to shut it off within a couple seconds, thereby beating Hochiang to it. It made me feel better about having him and Jonny make me look like I have no reflexes to speak of while playing Egyptian Ratscrew. Dong Laoshi said she couldn't get to sleep last night because of our banging on the table. 对不起。

We had no water in the hotel this morning, which I only learned after trying to flush the toilet. Luckily it wasn't a heavy load. Please appreciate my euphemism. I don't know why I'm telling you this.

I met up with Alex and Bobo outside to do our early morning hike, then we set out when Dong Laoshi arrived. We crossed over some farmland and over the 500 year old bridge that we'd already been on several times. This time we bore left off the bridge up a paved road and walked through a village. We saw a couple of chickens on a motorcycle, and passed by the man Dong Laoshi met yesterday, who runs a shop from his bed because he suffered an injury 5 years ago and can't move. It's an unfortunate situation, but I admire how he's still able to make a bit of a living on his own. 

Soon we broke out of the village and into the hills. All of the paths were generally only wide enough for one person, used by farmers to access their crops. And a lot of the time we had to make our own way to get around, which I thoroughly enjoyed. After about an hour we reached our highest point, and could see the outline of even taller hills in the mist and the farm plots below. Alex told us, "When you guys remember China I want you to think of this, not Beijing, Nanjing, or any of the big cities." That quote might not be word for word but it's the best I can remember. I think he said that because this is what China is really like in most places, and the cities are more like hotspots. We could only take pictures with 3 of us in them, and Alex told me to use a picture with my favorite teacher. So here's a picture with Dong Laoshi (and Bobo and me). 

Our journey back down was certainly more entertaining, mostly thanks to Bobo slipping and falling. It's funny because no one got hurt. One of those times, Bobo said both her feet came off the ground and she grabbed on to some bamboo to save herself. Alex saw it, and he was dying. Since I didn't see it, I'm going to imagine that after she slipped she swung full circle around the tree, launched off with a backflip or two, and landed gracefully. And that's what really happened, actually. I also fell a couple times, and Alex nearly fell into the stream. 好玩。I've never done this kind of hiking before, and it was really fun. I wish I could find a more creative way to describe it.

Jumping through the next few hours now, we returned to the hotel, ate breakfast, packed to leave for Huangshan, and took a bus to a place to store unneeded luggage. Tyler bought a walking stick that would turn out to be his best purchase in the 24 hours I'm writing about. I could argue that's it's the best purchase of his entire life, but I shan't.

We took another bus on a winding road up the mountain. Throughout today there was a fairly thick white mist that limited vision in any direction. It made me feel like being on an island in the clouds. After the bus, we took cable cars further up. It was very wet, so many of us donned our freshly purchased ponchos. I ripped mine almost instantly. I feel like 'hiking' doesn't describe this well, since it was all on manmade stairs and paths of stone, and that's not my idea of hiking. But for the rest of this blog, hiking = climbing up and down stairs and falling up and down stairs… So we hiked around for 20-30 minutes to the Beihai hotel. I sat in front of a fan in the lobby to dry off a bit. 

Then we went hiking some more. Dong Laoshi took some people on a short walk around, and Alex led the rest of us on a long route to Brightness Summit, the highest accessible/second highest peak on Huangshan. On the way, we spotted a wild fire hydrant. Tyler boasted that he would touch it, but didn't actually go near it. I was very disappointed. Bobo eventually slipped again, and Alex missed a step. I probably did too but I don't remember. Our coordination is 非常好。

We had an enlightening group discussion during the evening. Details, however, are confidential. But honestly I just want to finish up this blog.

After the discussion, we played mafia. To those reading who don't know what that it: I'm sorry, I can't help you. I think Tyler was the best storyteller. Also, when Kim was god her Texas accent seemed more prominent. It was all very entertaining.

- Jimmy

Day 18: Tofu and Tea

Saturday, May 24

 

Photo 1: Instamodel Molly

Photo 2: Tofu-making

Photo 3: Homemade Tofu

Photo 4: Outside our hotel, Chengkan Village

Photo 5: Going to pick tea

Photo 6: In the pond

Photo 7: Lunch

Photo 8: Picking Tea

 

Today was our first real day of Anhui after arriving really late yesterday evening. The hotel we are staying at is especially beautiful and super cool. But then Steven and Tim discovered spiders, so Conley and I (roommates once again) freaked out. We were so scared we slept in the same bed, and forced Luther to sleep in the other bed. Well actually his bed had bed bugs so he didn’t really have a choice and he probably wouldn’t willingly choose to be around the freaked out Kim and Conley. So today I got the privilege of waking up to Conley’s face and a coffee-mug-sized-demon spider looking at me from the ceiling. It was super fantastic y’all. Even thinking about the spider gives me the pee-pee-shivers. Conley and I probably overreacted but at the same time we don’t plan on changing our sleeping arrangements.

           

We met everyone else at 5:30 (a.m. y’all) and went to go see how tofu was made by scratch (the tofu factory). While walking there I realized the beauty of the area we are in. It was really nice ^.^ I took a bajillion pictures and Molly became my instamodel for approximately a minute before I decided she wasn’t worthy. JK y’all, Molly is fabulous.

 

The man making the tofu makes tofu by hand rather than how most people nowadays who use a machine. The equipment he uses was passed down for generations and generations and it was very interesting to see how he didn’t waste anything in the tofu making process. After that we ate a bunch of tofu (that was very good). Dong Laoshi apparently mentioned tofu can have a laxative effect (as Conley told me) but I didn’t really take it too seriously. Things got crazy later and I can confirm that at least this tofu has some sort of this effect. Conley and I did a survey to confirm it y’all cause we are super scientific. The tofu effect is real.

Next was breakfast (what a happy time) before picking tea leaves. We had to climb up this hill thing that was pretty muddy and our shoes got a little crazy. It was fun to pick the tea leaves but people kept trying to give me bugs as presents. That was no bueno. Also Alvin said he wanted to marry a ladybug. I wasn’t sure how to take that. Afterwards we went back to the house of the lady helping us pick tea and we watched her prepare the tea.

           

After tea picking we went back to eat lunch. It was so delicious. We had a short break (during which I attempted to clean my shoes) before we went to talk to Mr. Luo, a man whose ancestors had lived in Anhui for 33 generations I believe. He talked to us about Anhui I think and his family. It was a bit hard to follow what he was saying although he was a very enthusiastic man.

 

Later that night after dinner, Dong Laoshi and Alex told us to go wait by the bridge for a surprise. It turned out the surprise was fireworks. It was a pretty good ending to a pretty good day.

- Kimberly 

Day 17: To Anhui

Friday, May 23

Photo 1: Cards on the train
Photos 2 & 3: Out the train window

Our week got a lot more interesting this Friday, as we got to break free from our typical routine to venture out into the rural lands of China.

But that would have to wait until the afternoon. So once again, we woke up for our 8:00am classes to continue our studies, anxiously waiting for our adventure. Luckily, my class had a nice surprise; since there was a confusion between teachers, one teacher never came to class and we only had a half day. WHOO! It brought me back to the middle/high school days when we could enjoy a nice afternoon, but for us, it was filled with studying for our quiz in a few hours…

After our class, our student teacher, mid-twenties, took us out to a jiao zi fan guan (dumpling restaurant). While I do love my Muslim noodle place, it was refreshing to try some new dishes and this dumpling haven will definitely become a new favorite among my classmates. It is probably best to go with someone who knows the area because they really know the best food places in the city. She took us down a street to a dumpling store way at the end; I would’ve never even thought to go down this street in the first place! We all agreed that these were the best dumplings we ever had and for about $3.00 per person…there is no beating that.

It was finally time for us to leave our comfortable, Western hotel and journey off to Anhui for our mini-vacation. But first we had to get to the train station… We were carrying our backpacks and other luggage for the weekend in humid, 90 degree weather to first walk to the nearest subway station. Luckily it is under a mile away but still we worked up a good sweat and tried to find any cool air in the subway. Of course though, we were only met with more and more people on the subway and at Nanjing Railway Station, so we continued sweating. We were, though, lucky enough to wait for our train in a special section designated for military members, pregnant women, and families with small kids, but I guess it applies for wai guo ren (foreigners) too.

Our train ride was a lot more comfortable and enjoyable than our one from Beijing to Nanjing. This time we actually got seats! As soon as the train took off, people started playing cards, doing magic tricks, and getting some work down (which all of us probably should’ve done…). Train rides, especially in China, are great because you get to see what life might be like outside of the hustle and bustle of Chinese cities. The sky starts to clear up, the land becomes flatter and more open, and you see beautiful landscape. It is interesting to see how the Chinese use their land; from what I can tell, the land is either a big city or it is being used for farming, and there are infrastructure projects everywhere. The Chinese really utilize all usable land for farming outside of the cities; it is actually really beautiful to see an open landscape with lush green farms. It also weird though to see all of this farming and then industrial parks or high rise construction projects right next door. It really shows that China may still be a heavily agrarian society, but it is on a fast track to development.

Our train was a quick five hours but weren’t done yet. We then had to catch a bus for some amount of time (I fell asleep as soon as I got on) before we could reach our destination. We arrived in a pitch dark area but our “hostel” was much nicer than any of us expected. It had a traditional open court yard and very classic looking architecture. But things can only be so nice; most rooms had some “big friends” (very large spiders) in them so we had to get over our fear of spiders if we wanted to get some rest before our exciting weekend ahead!

-Jon Laks