The first few days

Sorry for being behind the blogs--been busy lately..Will get back on track in a week or two...I'll try to write every other night or so.

June 1st

Tuesday was children’s day… Yes, they do actually celebrate it here while we in the states have no clue. So apparently there’s a discount for people who are university students (score) so Nia and I hit up the Brazilian BBQ and got the student discount. After classes (boring because we were just observing) we went home, showered then hopped in a cab and arrived at the BBQ. Once there, a big party table was there but it was a nice place to eat.

I’ve only eaten at a Brazilian BBQ once before this time and it was in LA with Alex and her family. It was awesome! Unlimited salad bar and then all the meat you want---all so juicy and delicious! The food there was fresh and I had so much but it was so good! We also ordered some drinks to pass the time. There were children running around, but it was a good atmosphere.

After dinner we decided to walk off all the meat we’ve just consumed. We were close to Tian Yi Sq. (the main square in the city where all the name-brands are) and we decided to just walk around. It’s really pretty at night.

Coming back to the campus was interesting. We took a cab from Tian Yi and the driver was 2F2F(2 Fast 2 Furious) status. He was zooming left and right and I don’t even think he used the brake once unless it was for a traffic light (but it felt like we didn’t even stop for any lights! Traffic lights are truly a suggestion in China!) and then within about 10mins or less we’ve arrived at our school! Also during the ride he was like you girls scared? Don’t be, don’t worry you’re fine!

I think we’ve settled in okay but waiting for the actual time we get to teach. We’ve been approached by students asking many questions and many stares (but mostly for Nia…)

June 2nd:

Today we had to sit in our class that we’d be teaching and it was sooo BORING! The teacher was teaching US history from colonization to the Great Depression. We legit fell asleep in that class. So we decided to just come back to our apartment and slept until we had to go back to school that night.

At 6:30pm they had a concert celebrating May 4th and we were invited to attend. It was a great performance with dancing and singing and what-nots. It was a long day but at least we were well rested.

3 day in 1

Recap of Flight to Ningbo:

Arrived at JFK at 8am. Checked in and then went through security but was called aside because apparently a snow globe can not be carried on the plane. The snow globe was a gift for someone—and the guard told me I had two options—> throw it away or check in my carry on bag! So I had to sadly leave it back in NYC and find a way to ship it somehow when I get back.

Before getting on the plane I already puked because I was nervous and anxious—so I knew I wasn’t going to like the plane ride. The plane ride was about 15 hours so I basically didn’t sleep the whole way there and my left eye got irritated with me and decided to revolt and become bloodshot, while apparently my right eye didn’t get the memo and stayed normal.

I re-watched movies I’ve already seen just to pass the time. They had a good Korean Pop playlist so I was really happy about that. After we landed in HK, I had to run through the airport because our gate was at 503 while we landed in 33.We took a shuttle and ran to our gate which we made in time.

On the connecting flight from HK to Shanghai they had the option of western food or DIM SUM! I of course took the dim sum tray duhhh! Inside there was a zhong zi (sticky rice), jiaozi (dumpling), shui mai and xiao long bao! The zhong zi was really good. They even served ice cream—I got the cookie and cream flavor. For someone who gets plane sickness I was okay (thank god).

We landed around 6pm going through the security check. People from Ningbo University of Technology were there to greet us. We got our dinner at the airport then started on our journey to Ningbo. We got to Ningbo at around 10pm or so. We settled in our apartment and the first thing we did was get our internet worked out. We don’t have to pay for our internet so YAY! We just need to use the Ethernet cord which I’m down with.

May 30^th:

On Sunday I woke up early at around 7:30am so Nia and I decided to go shopping for some food to stock up our fridge. We had KFC for breakfast. Our apartment layout is pretty nice. We have our own bathroom, kitchen stocked with a fridge/microwave/stove and even a washer. Then the ‘living room’ was converted into Nia’s bedroom. Then I got the actual room. This apartment was meant for a single person but it’s not bad. We are in a good location because we are near food.

After shopping for food and have stocked our fridge with beer and water, we headed out to a village in Ningbo. This village has lots of farming area—apparently city people pay these farmers to grow crops for them. So we went with one of the teachers and her friend who had property there. The weather was gorgeous! It was sunny and breezy. We were surrounded by mountains and trees. Once we reached the property they started digging and they had crops like corn, potatoes, lettuce, cabbage and peppers. After they’ve collected their crops, we went to a restaurant in the village where they prepared the potato, cabbage and lettuce that were just dug up.

I was very full by the end of that lunch. We then toured a bit more by car going through the mountains. It was very scenic.

By the time we made it back to the dorm, I had to get my SIM card for my phone so I had a working phone in China. We then had Sichuan food for dinner. Thank god we ordered beer lol we had to go to bed early because the next day we had to wake up early (7am) to go to check out the school.

May 31^th

One of the teachers drove us to the new school which is about 15-20 mins away. Let me just say their campus is GINORMOUS! The teacher the campus was small in China standard. The campus is still being renovated with buildings being built left and right so it’s not completed yet. But with what they have now, it’s really huge already.

After we arrived we got to meet some of the other foreign teachers. One teacher is from Japan (Akira), Australia (Jeanette), Germany, and two from the States (Bruce and Daniel). Daniel was nice to take us out to get some breakfast on campus. There is this little alley way that has lots of different food and stalls so I bought some pork buns…I bought 3 pork buns and a soybean milk. I miss the pork buns in China, they are so juicy!

When we finished our breakfast we sat in on 3 Interpretation Classes. It was interesting that the classroom was set up like the UN. The tables, podium and then the booth in the back where translators usually sit—it was like mini UN. It was really cool. At first it was cool but then the classes got boring because the questions seem to be dragged out. I had to translate from English to Chinese 2 paragraphs… (I really don’t know enough Chinese to translate things about inner city illiteracy…or how to say federal tax forms…) But I gave it my best shot. Damn me for being able to speak somewhat decent Chinese.

After sitting on the classes, we toured the campus a bit. There are 4 bridges right now that connect the academic buildings to the dorms, but by the end of the construction there will be apparently 11-12 bridges in total! (Don’t know why they want that many bridges!)