Gone&Back

Saturday, September 12, 2009

7th Sept 09

The day our TCM lesson officially started. The class was held in the School of Foreign Language. Interestingly enough, the university still used blackboards for teaching unlike that in SG. I found out that the classes in the school is quite similar to those secondary schools we have in SG. The fans are mounted from the ceiling and make the same creaking sound. However, the differences are greater and more obvious. The lights in the class in China are suspended from the ceiling by two thin metal chains and the tables and chairs are firmly screwed down to the floor. SG's school's lights are in the ceiling itself and the chairs and tables are not fixed to the floor and an individual set is allotted to everyone. The setting in the classroom prevented excessive movement and the act of leaning backwards due to the space constrains.

Dr Tan teaching us about the basis of TCM on the blackboard.

In the afternoon, we went on a tour of 2 schools, Information Engineering School and the School of Sciences.

Anticlockwise: 1. First stop was at the Information Engineering School 2. The different panels of buttons and werid stuff the students made and press for their assignment i guess. 3. The computers in one of their rooms that they use. Another similar point that can be found in SG's secondary or even primary sch. I would have thought that the students would get their own laptop instead of still having to go to the computer room to use the computers for projects. 4. A detailed diagram showing the network of computers. Something that gave me a headache when the student was trying his best to explain. 5. The HPLC found in the labs when we went to the School of Science. Compared to NP, the equipments looked weird and old and in some cases, one of the equipments found in NP is actually 3 equipments in the China school labs. It feels..unsettling. 6. The last photo is the picture of manniquins in bed and I'm thinking its probably used for demostration of the ways to take care of patients. It seemed to be more appropriate for the nursing course and in this way, quite similar to the Nursing course we have in NP.

8th Sept 09

Another day of lessons and today we were taught on the basis of yin and yang and the 5 elements. Nothing new to me because I've read about it before in martial arts novels. We finished the lessons early and went back to the rooms. On the way back to the rooms, we passed by a huge group of soldier like people. At first glance, I thought that it was most probably a CCA group. However, I later found out that they are actually not students from this campus but are only here for military training. Perhaps its due to the huge space found in this campus. After that, Yee Tat, Jehanne and I went to watch the guys play basketball. There were more basketball courts as compared to our NP campus. I've heard that it because there is enough space to construct and another thing is that this is one way they encourage sports in the campus.

9th & 10th Sept 09

Another day of lessons. Nothing much to comment. There were videos about TCM to watch too. However, the projector location is not as well placed as those in SG. The projectors here are placed on the left, making it difficult for the students sitting on the right to have a proper view. SG's school's projector are all suspended in the centre of the room, making it easier for the whole class to see. Our IS lessons are repeatedly being cancelled due to the fact that the lecturer is hospitalised. This brought the rise of worries that we might not be able to complete our IS module fast enough. I really hope that he really gets well soon and hurry return to teach us. If not, we might really have to retake our IS module in the next semester.

11th Sept 09

Finally! Our first IS class! Taught by Anna or 谢老师, she covered on the culture of Hubei and Wuhan. She also spoke a little about the history of the famous places found in Hubei and Wuhan. She described the food and the famous ancient people. All in all, it was a pretty interesting class. Another fact to note is her English. She sounded like she had spent her whole life growing up in the United States. That's nearly how perfect her English is. From my observations, their method of teaching is similar to our teachers in SG. They made use of resources effeciently like videos and maps to explain their lessons. However, I'm still astonished when i see the other teachers explaining in Chinese when they are supposed to be teaching English. I doubt I can get the link here. Oh well, tomorrow's going for weekend trip. Looking forward to it. =)

10:35 AM

Sunday, September 6, 2009

3rd Sept 09

A free day for us to vist the city and go shopping. (urgh, hate shopping but since I'm already here, I might as well make the best out of it.) So we went out nice and early and caught a bus into one of the bigger malls in town. When we reached, we all split up to do our own walking and we breezed through the stores. So it was 2.20 pm when Edah, Hajar and I decided it was high time we headed back to the hostel. The rest wanted to continue to shopping. Edah led the way to the busstop to wait for the bus that will pass by the hostel and we settled down to wait at 2.30pm. We waited like idiots, wait I'll take that back. I waited like an idiot from 2.30pm all the way to 4.24pm. What a fine way to spend the rest of the afternoon. At 4.24pm, the rest of the group that had decided to continue shopping all reached the bus stop. I was wallowing in despair when the bus finally came at 4.30pm. We waiting for 2 whole hours for a bus that only took less than half hour to send us back to the campus. It was really horrible.

This is probably another difference between SG and China. There is no specific timing at which the buses come at. To top it off, when the people are boarding the bus, everyone is rushing in from both doors. Oh, and their system is not like that of SG's. They had a person who collects the fare and issues tickets but the card system similar to that of our EZLink emerging in the newer air-conditioned bus.

4th Sept 09

Nothing much today. We were brought to see our classroom for the time we were going to stay in China. I'll post the photos on the first day I officially start class =)

Following that, it's free time. So some of the class went out to continue shopping while I went back to my laptop. =)

We are going out overnight tomorrow. We are going to stay in a hotel. Not that I'm looking forward to it, I'm just looking forward to a cleaner toilet. =D

5th Sept 09

Woke at early but due to the laziness in my bones, I decided to laze abit more before rousing myself. Everything was prepared and off we went. It was a 3 hours 40 mins ride, full of honking and bumps in the road. I really mean it. Imagine if you can eat the sound of honks from our bus, it would probably feed me for 3 years. Every 5 mins the driver will sound the horn and it's not really the short horning sounds. He will drag the sound in the period of time he tries to overtake the vehicle in front of him. The whole journey was filled with the sounds of horns. Even my dad don't sound the horns that many times in 5 years. SG dun allow this kind of horn blasting, probably taking into account of the proximity of the housing areas. Another difference between SG and China I guess.

After reaching LuLin Resort, we headed off to lunch before going for the river rafting. No electronics allowed, so no pictures. =) I had troubles trying to figure out how to paddle. URGH! Lucky Tony's my other partner. Otherwise I think I'll probably take 10 hours to reach the end point. The river cuts between the various mountains. With the sounds of nature and the flowing of the water, it really felt like I was no longer in China, really calming and relaxing. That's something you cant really find in SG due to the land restrains and terrain.

Following that, we went ahead to the 美人谷 (beauty' valley would be the direct translation). The scenary is, well, see for yourself.

There were water falls and huge expanses of crops on the way to the waterfalls. The views were terrific. The people were living so close to nature and even contributed to nature. After enjoying the scenic views, we headed back for lunch and then to to hotel to sleep.

6th Sept 09

We woke early again and took the bus to the 绿林塞 to see the olden fortress and the defences put in place. There were figurines constructed there to give off a feel of what it might had looked like in the past. There were activities like horse riding and archery, neither of which I participated in.

Overall, I would sum up this trip as a fruitful one. During the trip, we learnt about a small part of China's history and we got to enjoy the beauty of nature and the horse riding, which is something we can't find in SG.

7:12 PM

Thursday, September 3, 2009

1 sept 09:

Left my warm and cozy bed at 3am. Okays, actually I was nearly dragged outof bed because I didn't want to leave my hugg-able bloster behind. on the trip to the airport, I was thinking about what I would miss in Singapore and at the same time, wondering what new things await me in China. Fine. I lied. I was actually trying to catch up on my sleep. But I really thought of all of that before I slept the day before. My family and I reached the airport with half hour to spare and we loitered around, talking to each other and hunting for food. It took AGES before we were able to start our check-in. We waited at the airport for almost 2 hours before we entered the departure area. Since there was only 15 minutes left before we had to board the plane, we rushed to the gate (C16) and took a rest there. Apparently, no one i knew sat beside me so when we boarded the plane, I decided to just try to sleep all the way till Guang Zhou airport. We reached the GuangZhou airport (finally -.-) at around 11am. After all the procedures are done, it was already well into the afternoon (after 12noon).

This is the picture of the immigration inspection. Nearly all the words have an english translation. The whole airport is mostly coated in chinese and occasionally there will be a chunk of english translation for the rules and regulation. It quite different from SG(singapore) in the sense that SG usually have more than 2 different language translation e.g. chinese, english, malay, japanese. Probably because of the races in SG. =)

This is what we had for lunch in the airport, Macs! There were more varieties as compared to SG. Fine~ This isn't really the picture of MY lunch. I stole the picture from Jehanne. ( shhh..don't tell her!) Mine was similar, with the exception of the drink which was peach float and I had a blueberry sundae instead of chicken wings. A burger, float, fries and sundae only cost about 27 yuan (S$6++) which is cheaper as compared to its SG cousins.

We had to wait 5 hours for the connecting flight to Wuhan. It passed really sllloooooowwly and we only landed in Wuhan at 9+pm. The ride to the Wuhan campus took 1 and the half hours during which I took advantage of the time to take a nap. At the campus, they had dinner prepared for us but none of us were really hungry because it was already quite late and everyone was sleepy. However, I can say that the 11 course meal looks pretty nice.

The beauty of the 11 dish meal.

The next morning, we were able to see more of the campus. The library is just simply HUGE! It's almost the size of one of our normal buildings in NP campus. =)

The Picture of the Library near our dorm.

The main admin block

The supermarket opposite the dorm

Basically the second day was spent on shopping at the above supermarket for neccessities for our rooms. There were lots of stuff to buy and prepare. There were many stuff in China that is really different from those we saw and experienced in SG. One example will be the streets. In our clean and green city, we seldom see holes in the roads and cracked pavements. The streetside stores were clean and hygienic and the trash were thrown in the bins provided. Here in China, all of the abovementioned were opposites. You could see the cleaners busy trying to clean the mess and more of the passerbys adding on to the trash. There were minimal bins provided and apparently, the people here could not hold on to their rubbish for a while longer before finding a bin to get rid of their rubbish. I'd admit that I've had a shock when I tried to cross the roads. Perhaps we had all taken advantage of the relatively safe road environment in SG. When I was waiting for the blinking green lights to turn to red and then back to green to indicate safe crossing, there was a group of people crossing the road at that time. The timer had just reached zero and despite the people still trying to cross the zebra crossing, the cars just drove on without caring about the crossing people. This is probably something that I wouldn't be able to get used to.

The students of this campus are having a holiday which will end on fri. So hopefully I can learn more about the student life here which I think might be quite different from those in SG.

12:46 AM