Sun Island and the Chrysanthemum Exhibition

I have just completed my third week at CET, but it hardly seems like I’ve been here long enough for that to be true. Then again, I look back and realize that I have a general idea of where things are on campus, know some good restaurants, and have even been out exploring once or twice. A perfect time to change locations, right?? Actually, I’m very excited for this upcoming relocation. CET is taking us on a long-weekend trip to Dandong, a short 12 hour train ride away, for a short vacation. Dandong is located on the border between China and North Korea, so it should be a very interesting city. Even though we’ve only had class for three weeks, the break is very welcome. If you’re not on top of things, it’s very easy to let the homework here overwhelm you. On the plus side, I am starting to see some improvements in my Chinese, and have been getting comments like, “you’re doing pretty ok,” from teachers, which actually translates to something like, “wow, nice job!” when you consider the fact that they rarely praise students. I think my biggest accomplishment so far is the essay I wrote this week briefly explaining the Electoral College (I will send it to any interested parties).

As for more fun things, last weekend, CET took us to Sun Island for a picnic and some sunshine. The weather has actually been beautiful all this week!

Me in front of an "ice sculpture"

As with all beautiful places in China, we witnessed about 10 or so couples taking wedding photos that afternoon.

A frog!

Sun Island has it's own waterfall. Doesn't it look real????? >.>;;

They built *coughcough* discovered a walkway behind the waterfall, complete with stalactites and conveniently places openings to view the falling water.

I'll admit, it was pretty.

This sign scares me...

Part of Sun Island included "Squirrel Island" where you could see and feed real squirrels and chipmunks.

They were adorable, and looked a lot different from US squirrels.

 

The next day I took my teacher’s recommendation and visited a park that was hosting Harbin’s annual chrysanthemum exposition. All the flowers were beautiful (the internet is being slow, or I would post more pictures), even if it was a bit crowded. It was the first time in Harbin that people had asked to take pictures with me (a common occurrence for foreigners in China); I was almost surprised it took this long.

 

After my friend and I had been there about an hour, we ran into a group of people dancing in the park. I ended up dancing with one of the men there and when we had finished and started talking, random Chinese people gradually floated over to investigate. As normally happens when people gather together for no apparent reason, more and more people came over to see what all the fuss was about, and soon my friend and I were surrounded by curious Chinese people hoping to engage us in conversation or just to get a closer look at us. At one point I’m positive there were at least 30 pairs of eyes on me. Needless to say we didn’t stay and chat for too long before we continued to explore the park and eventually head back to campus.

I snapped this picture while KL was in the middle of a conversation about which region in China has the most "standard" accent.

Lastly, for anyone who has been following the China-Japan situation in the South China Sea, I will tell you that there is currently a potable anti-Japan atmosphere here in Harbin. Even for someone who doesn’t follow the news like me, I have noticed the tension. Our teachers have advised us not to talk about the issue in public and to stay away from random mass gatherings (though these are more of a problem in larger cities like Beijing and Shanghai). YM informs me of many cities that have held protests and I myself have seen anti-Japanese messages on the major streets. All that being said, it looks like the issue is becoming less heated and will not lead to militaristic action.

Approximate translation: The fishing islands belong to China! Little Japan, get the f*** out!

I hope everyone is doing well at home! I’ll be back in Harbin in a few days!

A week of birthdays OR scavenger hunt adventures

My first week in Harbin has officially come to a close, and because I have delayed posting for so long, we are well into the second week of classes.  Since, “I was busy” is not an acceptable excuse, I will not attempt to provide one. Let’s just say that CET Harbin prides itself on its homework load. For those of you who are not too familiar with Chinese geography, here’s our lovely map!

We took our language pledge the Sunday before classes and later found out that they had published an article about it in the college’s newspaper/ on their website. Interested parties can check it out here:

http://today.hit.edu.cn/news/2012/09-05/3883159090RL0.htm

For people who can’t read Chinese, it’s still cool to look at the pictures they took (you can see part of my head!) and they explicitly mentioned Grinnell College along with Yale as institutions that had students in the CET program.

The CET program is pretty cool and all students end up learning about a variety of different subjects no matter what your language level is.  Everyone is in a one on two drill class where we work on pronunciation with a teacher and one other student, and there is also a mandatory one on one class in which you research and learn about a specific topic that you have expressed interest in. Mine is about middle school students’ mental health, which will tie in nicely when I start Fulbright research in January. Aside from these two classes you also take two electives. I am taking Chinese modern literature and a newspaper reading class. The newspaper class is definitely harder.

Classes aside, everyone also spent this first week attempting to get to know each other with varying language abilities. The fact that three students had birthdays (and small parities to boot) in that time helped quite a bit, and I now recognize pretty much all of the American students, if not their Chinese roommates. To help us acclimate to the surrounding area, CET arranged a scavenger hunt for our first weekend activity. It was a BLAST! The questions ranged from “Who’s calligraphy was used as a model for the school’s name on the front gate?” to “purchase and bring back a pair of fake eyelashes.” Some other interesting questions included: Where can you purchase a leather Russian style winter hat? How do you ask a cab driver to use the meter? and Find a chicken foot and bring it back; 5 extra points for every member of your team that takes a bite.

We had to find someone who was not from the local province: Heilongjiang

One of the questions asked us to eat lamb kabobs in tango pose.

We had to get a photo of a team member feeding an animal. We managed to find a donkey!

Streets of Harbin, searching for the Sophia Chapel.

Found it!

Group photo.

A bar we had to find.

We had to take a picture with a Wal Mart employee, but when we asked, they said it was against company policy for employees to be photographed....

But not everyone has been coping as well. I think the language pledge has hit my roommate especially hard; she’s often homesick. To brighten her spirits, I gave her a cute little present with an encouraging note and received this in return. It made me really happy.

 

Random picture time!

Grape and peach flavored Oreos. They don't taste very good.

Our walls are covered with these interesting stickers. I decided to pose like them.

There's clearly a likeness

Some delicious dried lemon slices with honey that I use with hot water.  They smell amazing, and I know Michelle would really love them.