Week 6

Day 7

The day of liftoff...

A sad day and a happy day too for many.For those that missed home they were really happy to finally be back in their own comfort zone, for those who did not like the feeling of going back were sad and unrelectant, but i guess the majority was of mixed feelings. They had finally gotten use to the lifestyle here in China and they were also missing home at the same time.

We got up early to get our things packed up and waited for the weighing of our luggages to begin. When my luggage was weighed, it read 29.5 kg!1.5kg more than when I arrived here.

During this time, Tom cme over and gave me a pendant with a real wolf tooth on it. It is a buddhist necklace of blessing that could protect the wearer as well as the people around it. We also gave Tom the pictures we took with his family and we wished him luck and vice versa.

We dragged all our oversized and overweight luggages to the awaiting bus where we gave out hugs and last wishes before leaving. The girls cried and we were sad. But this is the way of life, all good things will have to come to an end some day.

We slept through the bus ride and arrived at the airport 2 hours later. We waited approximately an hour before boarding the plane to Guang Zhou. There we quickly got our bags checked it.You know sometimes fate just love to drop by, and thats where we had a miscommunication with our teacher and alomost missed our flight. We mixed up the gates with the 1 outside and there we rushed nby the airport staff to the plane. We were told to pay 10 yuan each to take the car there, but we already apent all of it so we had to give 10 singapore dollars instead.

Thankfully we made it there on time and other than the stares we got, we had a safe flight back to Singapore where it was to many...HOME SWEET HOME!

This ended our misadventures, trip, journey whatever we call it.A meaningful trip I would say, but a misadventure likely I would conclude.

Goodbye China,at least for now...=D

Week 6

Day 6

The 2nd last day of our 42days here in Wuhan. We woke up later than usual this morning and left for our most expensive lunch of all...the buffet luch we talked about right at the start of our stay here in Wuhan!

The buffet was not much of a spread and having limitations like no beef and pork, there was so few choices and all of them had really small appetites, so I was left to finish many things. They had no Chicken too, so being a meat lover or carnivore as Hwee Ping would call me, I ordered loads of mutton and fish till the fish ran out.

We had our last minute shopping there at Luxiang before taking a taxi back to school fearing that we were gonna be late. We took 2 taxis, having 5 of us here. The really contradicting part of the people here in China is that almost every single rule here in China is broken, and here they are not breaking the rule that only 4 adults can sit in the taxi. after we boarded the taxi then we found out why. It seemed that there was a camera in all taxis viewing everything that happens in the taxi so I think thats the reason why they dared not break te rules.

We enjoyed a photo shoot with the whole group that left for Wuhan before laving for a reception at th language school. There 10 minutes before the event started, I was told I was going to be the MC along with Hwee Ping. I quickly drafted a little speech along with Hwee Ping and the reception soon got under way. We ahd a little speech by both the Dean and Mr Ma before a games session and interaction session. After which we enjoyed fireworks and sparklers next to the school. This caught the attention of the uninformed security guard and we had to wait for quite some time before we were allowed to play it.

We left for KFC after that and that ended our day.

I really hope I can 1 day be back here along with a really warm group of friends or even better family.The experience here has taught me much about friendship as well as kinship. The bonds forged between them is really so strong that I really get jealous sometimes thinking about my own family. I really hope I can foster this kind of bonds between my own family and live as happily as they do here.

Week 6

Day 5

Our last day in Tom's hometown.

Woke up early to have breakfast, our last country side breakfast with his family. After that, we gave them a little souvenir, our own currency while they bought for us bread, some local deicacies to bring back to Singapore.

We took the same route back to the bus station where we had to wait fo an hour for our bus back to Wuhan. During that time, we were constanly showered with stares, questions, beggars,etc.The toliet there was the worst I have ever seen. there was a long drain where u did your buisiness and after which it would be flushed by a powerful stream of water and there were also buckets not urinals for us to pee in. Fortunately we got on the bus soon enough and made our way back to Wuhan.

The guys were surprised by everyone's haircut except mine and we left forthe night market to get whatever things we still need to buy back home.

Time reall flies too fast,sometimes too fast indeed, the feeling of not wanting to go home became the strongest feeling of all, especially with the warm feeling of home from Tom's family.

Week 6

Day 4

2nd day in An qing.

We had a typical chinese breakfast in his house after our bathes in Tom aunt's home which supplied hot water for both drinking as well as bathing and it really tasted like home. I really hope to be able to have this feeling for a long time.

The breakfast consisted for many things like eggs, salted eggs, vegetables, peanuts. It looked almost the same as those in Wuhan, so i guess these must be the staple breakfast for people in China.

We headed for the Famous Buddhist Temple, Zhen Feng Da(Tower), Yingjiang Temple in Anhui Province right after breakfast in a van hired by his dad. The Tower which was created during the Ming Dynasty. It was once used to trap enemies as well, in times of war. This idea was thought of by Zhuge Liang. We also walked around the temple paying our respects to the deities as well as had our fortunes told.

After visitng the temple, we went to the shopping area in Anqing and shoppd around especially for the local specialties and sauce. after shoppinge went to Tom's aunt's hous to leave ou hoppin stuff there before leaving for the local zoo.

The animals were caged in a very inhumae way. In fact very badly housed. other than a roof over their heads and a little rocks here and there, most of the cages were just bare concrete for the animals to live in. Th sadness in their eyes could easily be seen. Really pitied them and wished I could free them. We also saw how bdly the zookeeper treated the horse, so we did not see why he not treat the other animals the same way.

We left soon after and went to see the laser show on the lake. we initially did not want to go to the area and to stay from the other bank to catch it, but we decided to go there in the end.

We took a taxi there and just as we settled down, the show ended, so we made our way back again and went back to Tom's house after collecting our stuff.

We had a wonderful dinner with his family where they whip up enough dishs to be served in a wedding!9 courses of good dishes!

After that we went next door to get our hair cut. the girls had perm and a reborn while Satish for a dye and a cut and myself a cut with a shanghai look to it. We went to sleep in Tom's house after that and here ends our day.

I really hope the animals can live in a better environment.the same animals the same objective, but a different environment.

Week 6

Day 3

The day for the trip to Tom's hometown.

We had breakfast with the whole group before leaving to take a bus to the bus station for the long trip bus to his hometown.

The stars seem to be smiling as us as throughout the whole journey to his hometown, we mange to get onto the buis without much waiting and everything was going on fine.

The bus trip to his hometown was 5 hours long where we had a little discomfort and the worst was just someone smoking in the bus.

Upon arrival, we took a taxi to the ferry terminal to cross the YangTze river to the other bank where we would continue of journey on bus to his house. The ferry was also used for transporting small vehicles like motorcycles. We learnt that there was another type of ferry that crosses the river and it transports mainly buses and cars.

The later on bus journey was filled with stares of the local people as they had even less foreign visitors as compared with Wuhan. His house was near the bus stop and we were welcomed warmly by Tom's mother who kept offering us tea and to be seated down. A warm welcome indeed. After settling down, we were brought on a tour around his house and we learnt and saw many things which cannot be found in Singapore anymore.

The house was really old and even around the area this was 1 of the oldest. They had a well which was very deep and the water was used as drinking water last time but now just for washing clothes and dishes. It was really clear and if I had the chance, would try it. They reared chickens, both the chicks and the grown up ones. Everyday they would collect the eggs from the chickens and they would feed them with the left overs of their meals mixed with chicken food. their house was 2 storeys high with roof excess so that makes 3. They had 2 rooms to themselves and the rest were rented out to a hairdresser and a cook. They had had a solar cells on their roof tops and we were told only well of families could afford it. Next we went to have a tour around their cotton factory which was just round the corner. It was quite big and since the season was over empty as well. They still had a few packages of the processed cotton left and it was really soft. We left for the viewing of their cotton fields was was now planted with other kinds of plants. Tom told us it was small, but when we got there...WOAH it was very wide with the size of many football fields on end!We left foe the last visit and that was the primary school that Tom and his dad hd attended when they were both young...imagine how old the school is! We took pictures of the classroon with the students in them and the condition that the tables and chair was in really looked like how it was back in Singapore when we were in primary school.

After all our visits, we went the best motel around the area which was also round the corner to have dinner there. this was wear we felt the hospitality of Chinese families. we were treated to nic spread of dishes where we also learnt the manners of the chinese. they loved toasting to each other not to mention their passion to drink! last but not least, the chefs came out to have a picture with us, saying that it was their honour to be able to cook for us. we were really treated liek kings and queens there.

We left for bathe and the girls stayed at Tom's parent's room while the boys stayed at the motel that we dined.

The chinese hospitality is something which cannot be matched with hotel services. it is really filled with warmth and they really gived their best to us...For the first time, i'm actaully pleased with the people in China.

Week 6

Day 2

The day of submission for our APPG miniproject.

I stayed up the whole night to complete this assignement adding features here and there. people ask me "why bother to do so much for a thing that only gives you just 10% of your grades of APPG?"

Well, this has been the mindset of many, and sad to say even myself as well for a few occasions. having been through so much from primary school to now, polytechnic, I have seen all the ups and downs of either my peers or myself. This has really made me want to be able to do the best that I can. Especially with my recent deproving of last semester's results, I have decided that doing my best in everything is the only option that I can have.

Interview went smooth and we all were glad that we had a big burden removed finally. We went to get a cake for Sasi's sister and we singed her a birthday song through the webcam as we not able to be there to celebrate her birthday with her. Sasi cried instead of her sister but her sister still cried later on an hour later. This really proved to me how kinship really mattered to anyone despite being so far from home. Treasure this family as much as you can for one does not know how long can one still treasure it.

We left for the shopping area half an hour away form school to purchase uor door gifts for Tom's family as we were leaving for his house the following morning. We ended up geting tea leaves and honey for him.

At night, we received a call from Tom saying that the trip to his hometown might have to be cancelled due to the Dean's concern for our safty as we were leaving the province. We did not mind having to waste money, just the experience of being to a country side was now so far away.

Week 6

Day 1

A free an easy day or maybe not so free. we had to finish up all our assignments on this day and be ready to hand up our assignments inn the next few days. the assignments were few but thorough so we had to really put in our efforts and get it properly done before we could really enjoy ourselves.

the day started out slow and we continued our assignments. lunch passed and we were still at it. at night we had dinner at the little food house near the school. Wuchang fish, vegetables,etc. this would be 1 of the last few times that we could savour the food from China so we put aside of our thoughts and enjoyed our meal.

We had briefing after our dinner where we had to return our meal cards. This in turn really gave us the feeling that we would be flying off real soon and the 42 days in Wuhan would be over.

Time really flies when you start to enjoy and have fun. I still can remember the first few days here in Wuhan where everyone wanted to go home because of the infamiliar and bad conditions that we were facing, and now...we all dont really want to go home as yet.

Week 5
Day 7
We had our military training at the place where we had our barbeque. The training started early and many people were late as a result. I noticed that ever since we came to China, the people here in China has a habit of coming early, but the people of Singapore have a habit of always coming late except for the minority that is. Is really depicts a bad image of us Singaporeans to be a not punctual people and something needs to be done about it.
We started with a little ice breakers before breaking into teams to do up our group name and flag. Activities were next and 1 of the nicest to play was the tank caterpillar track where we had to use newspapers as our caterpillar track and we are the wheels. The activity was fun with a lot of things to learn. In fact this is the first time I have seen this activity and I’m hoping to implement this activity to my juniors as well. It really trains up IQ and gets us thinking, it also helps to improve communication between the group members as everyone is needed to make this activity a success. Following that we did trust fall, a little high element and rock climbing. Although all these activities have been done in Singapore many times over, but doing it as 1 big group and as a mature adult is what makes it more worthwhile.

Week 5
Day 6

Monday! I’m into the 8th day before I return back to Singapore. I have a kind of “don’t want to leave kind of feeling”. O well, certain must end.

We woke at 10 today! The latest ever in the history of us being here in Wuhan. We did our stuff again till it was time to meet the girls. However, an hour before our meeting time, Hwee ping came down saying Sasi would not be joining us for lunch for certain reasons unknown to us.
We attended lessons after lunch where we went through the papers and did a small revision on the recent chapters. This was the time where was caught sleeping in class again! Really it was not on purpose. I have been sleeping really late, much later than 3a.m recently for 2 weeks already.

Went for dinner before heading back to the service apartment to carry on with our stuff before bed. An original day again but filled with a little different feeling.

Cherish the times we have with either our family or friends. Time is precious and passes really quickly. There are times where we have to be separated from our loved ones or comfort zones, so we must always cherish the times we have together.

Week 5
Day 5

Sunday…9 more days till we go back to Singapore. Time really flies when you are doing something else that you prefer doing. It has been 30+ days ever since we touched down at the Wuhan Tianhe airport. It really feels kind of different when you are out there by yourself with no one to take care of you.

We woke up late this morning and did out stuff before meeting the girls for lunch. We had maggi noodles for lunch and it tasted quite bland but still all right.

We left for lu xinag guan chang to see if we could find a bank to get our money changed. We went to many banks but they all did not offer this service on weekends or that such a small amount of request for changes of money caused them not to have such services for Singapore currency. We were informed that the biggest china back had our currency but we had to wait till Tuesday before we could change money. We had the much missed mutton sticks which could not beat the taste of that of the man who made it outside the school.

We went back to school to do our stuff again before going for dinner and that ends our day.

Week 5
Day 4

Finally a Saturday that we are not going out of school for a trip! However it comes with a price and that is we have got to study and settle all our projects within this few days!

We woke up at around 9 plus this morning and began doing our work till about lunch time where we met up with Tom to go book the train tickets for the trip to his hometown. When we got there, we were told that the trains were cancelled ever since March; it looks like the trains to his hometown have been cancelled for quite some time already with no news of it. We decided to take bus there instead. It takes the same amount of time which is 5 hours.

We had lunch at the fake KFC. The food there was tasted quite alright and in fact it looked really identical to the ones in KFC! Even the packaging of the food looked alike. I found out that the chicken supplier of KFC and the fake KFC is the same, only the taste tasted a little different.
We left to buy Sasi’s umbrella and our breakfast for tomorrow. We went back with Tom following us there. He played C.S with us throughout the time after checking the games that we had. We had dinner at canteen 2 after that.

Different countries have different methods of working. In Singapore every single actions or happenings will be reported and most people will know about it, but in China, not everything will be reported, if not just a small portion of information will be revealed.

Week 5
Day 3

It’s Friday, which means the weekends! It was supposed to mean free time or excursion time, but due to the fact that next week is the week where all our assignments are due and the last test is on, this weekend would not a wonderful one.

Started out with revision of the APPG papers today. We also got back our results for the first theory test. I got 81! Actually its 82 but teacher counted wrongly. Guess what? There were around 5 to people who got the same results.

There were quite a number of people that were not happy with their results due to their carelessness. Bless them that they may be more careful next time and get better grades.
We did our I.S assignment till 6 p.m where we made our way in the drizzle to the fish ball restaurant where we will be meeting Tom for dinner.

Initially we thought he was late as we waited close to half an hour, but it turned out that he arrived and when he reached, he could not find us and went to our service apartment instead and then he went back again. We had a good laugh about it before sitting to order our food. Our dinner consisted of wenchang fish, fishballs and egg, a simple but filling meal.

After dinner it was raining even more heavily and we went back to the motel beside the school to meet Mr. Chua to discuss about the 3D2N trip to Tom’s hometown in Anhui. He agreed soon and we thanked both of them as this was a rare chance for us to explore the lives of China people.

We will b e going on the Friday after this week and this would be a really valuable trip for us as we are going to learn the difference between the lives of Singaporeans and people in china. This would allow us to understand the sufferings or advantages that the people in china have.

INTERCULTURAL READINESS SELF ASSESSMENT

Open-mindedness

Current self estimate:90
Target after the trip: 95
Comment/ strategy: I have always been open-minded but not the fullest extent. Mixing with the people in China has made been more open-minded.

Respect for other beliefs

Current self estimate:95
Target after the trip: 95
Comment/ strategy: My respect for other beliefs has always been there a I believe every individual has their own ideas and beliefs. We should respect them as we don't want others to question of beliefs too.

Trust in other people

Current self estimate:85
Target after the trip: 90
Comment/ strategy: Trust in other people back in Singapore has always been there and after hearing about the people in China. how dishonest some of the people are, i increased my guard and lowered my trust in people, but i trusted the peopl here

Tolerance for discomfort

Current self estimate:90
Target after the trip: 95
Comment/ strategy: Discomfort can be overcomed by facing more of it. Only by facing it can we overcome it.

Tolerance fo ambiguity

Current self estimate:70
Target after the trip: 85
Comment/ strategy: There were any doubts, doubts for the people, food, etc, but it all can be settled by experiencing

Patience

Current self estimate:85
Target after the trip: 85
Comment/ strategy: Patience remains the same as things like he transportation is really fast but the wait for food is slow so its equal.

Sense of personal control

Current self estimate:75
Target after the trip: 80
Comment/ strategy: Being alone without family or guardians to help you with things creates an envirobment where we have to be independant and have self-control.

Interpersonal skills

Current self estimate:80
Target after the trip: 90
Comment/ strategy: Communication between people is very important, it helps to link people together and get things done. Try to listen more and do more actions rather than talk more.

Willingness to take initiative

Current self estimate:75
Target after the trip: 80
Comment/ strategy: In a foreign place, independence is needed and that is where we also have not much of a choice but to take initiative, but willing to take it is also important, as it helps in the working life.

Willingness to take risks

Current self estimate:90
Target after the trip: 95
Comment/ strategy: Risks are everywhere, it happens every second. It is unavoidable and that leaves us to take what kind of risks, when and where to take it. Coming to China is a a greater risks tahn being in Singapore. Eating and drinking in China is also a risk.

Sense of humour

Current self estimate:90
Target after the trip: 90

Curiousity about other cultures

Current self estimate:80
Target after the trip: 85
Comment/ strategy: I am a chinese but the cultures of chinese in Singapore and the chinese in China is quite different. I like to know the history and the culture of my background.

Comfort level with strangers

Current self estimate:90
Target after the trip: 95
Comment/ strategy: Being in a foreign country with less than 10 familiar faces makes interaction with strangers very common, and because of that,I'm comfortable with them now.

Week 5
Day 2

The weather is as it always is, unpredictable. The temperature dropped down to 9 degrees again! Whenever the temperature starts to rises, the temperature would drop again.
We had I.S in the morning where the director taught us Taoism and Buddhism. As I am a Taoist, I was very interested to learn more about my religion. It seemed that my religion ran away from problems instead of solving them, it had a very different method to achieve the goal.
After lunch the venue of the lesson was changed to a special classroom with headphones and a little control panel. This was the venue for the I.S lesson on Feng Shui and traditional and modern weddings. I fell asleep in class for the first 10 minutes along with many others. It was unintentional but I had already tried my best to keep awake. The topic slowly turned away to the videos on traditional, modern weddings as well as Feng Shui. The main attraction was not all these information, but the way we learnt this. We were listening through the headsets on what the lecturer said as well as what the program was saying. It also allowed the individual to ask the lecturer a question like calling them. I find really well for learning.

After lesson, we discussed with Mr. Chua and came up with the conclusion that the excursion to beauty valley so that we may use this time to study for the theory test. The day camp may be postponed to Monday leaving Tuesday for revising for the test.

We went for dinner after lessons, and I got a packed sausage from the grocery shop next to the canteen and found it to really taste bad. I wonder how the people of China eat it.
Time is really precious, and every single second is equally important. The amount of time spent here in Wuhan is really short and all our assignments are squeezed together. We really need to learn how to control and plan our time well so that we can cope.

Week 5
Day 1

I.S day for us, so we woke up at around 6.30 and got ready for the lesson. Met the girls slightly later, so we walked faster for class, after all we are having a guest lecturer today.

The director of the foreign language school was our guest lecturer today. He even sent us a message to remind us the lesson today at 8am, early in the morning. That was nice of him to remind us of our lesson. We touched on much of the culture and history of China. It was a really enriching experience as China’s history was really vast and interesting as well. The cultural knowledge that the guest lecturer imparted was really inspiring as it brought back all the past teachings that got and made me realise how off the path of the teachings in the cultural ways I was in, really can’t wait for the continuous of the slides.

We went for lunch after lessons and then back to lessons again to complete our assignments. Satish was stuck with his lab 7, it seemed like a very small but hard to spot mistake because it took him so long just to spot the error, around 1 hour?

Inner was supposedly at the restaurant that sells almost identical food as the KFC. We tried looking for it but with no avail. We decided to dine in KFC where we tried the ice-cream there. It tasted like the white rabbit sweet! Despite the taste, it was still quite all right.

We headed back after dinner and guess what? We found the palace we were looking for! It just a stone’s throw from KFC! We really regretted not looking carefully and decided to come here after some time.

The culture lessons that we went today really very good and enriching. The antics taught by Confucius and Mencius really inspired me to become a better person.

Week 4
Day 7
1 day before week 5! We woke up early and showered before meeting the girls to attend class. We had breakfast along the way where the chocolate cake who dropped what is left of it on the floor while feeding Satish. Chapter 7, the last chapter for APPG was covered today, and for the rest of the labs on chapter 7, we were more or less left along to study and check the work.
Lunch was next where we were released early due to the early lunch date that the teachers’ had with the china teachers. We had our own early lunch and went back to the service apartments to settle our assignments.
Lessons was really long and tiring as this was the last chapter and it was an important chapter to take note of. There was a common error that many people got and that was the “Nan” error, but we still got it solved in the end.
We left for dinner right after lessons and went to the bookshop inside the supermarket to get 1 of the DvDs that I purchased there 3 days ago. Got something else and thankfully it worked. Went to get our breakfast for tomorrow and some groceries for ourselves.
























Week 4
Day 7
1 day before week 5! We woke up early and showered before meeting the girls to attend class. We had breakfast along the way where the chocolate cake who dropped what is left of it on the floor while feeding Satish. Chapter 7, the last chapter for APPG was covered today, and for the rest of the labs on chapter 7, we were more or less left along to study and check the work.
Lunch was next where we were released early due to the early lunch date that the teachers’ had with the china teachers. We had our own early lunch and went back to the service apartments to settle our assignments.
Lessons was really long and tiring as this was the last chapter and it was an important chapter to take note of. There was a common error that many people got and that was the “Nan” error, but we still got it solved in the end.
We left for dinner right after lessons and went to the bookshop inside the supermarket to get 1 of the DvDs that I purchased there 3 days ago. Got something else and thankfully it worked. Went to get our breakfast for tomorrow and some groceries for ourselves.








Week 4
Day 7

1 day before week 5! We woke up early and showered before meeting the girls to attend class. We had breakfast along the way where the chocolate cake who dropped what is left of it on the floor while feeding Satish. Chapter 7, the last chapter for APPG was covered today, and for the rest of the labs on chapter 7, we were more or less left along to study and check the work.
Lunch was next where we were released early due to the early lunch date that the teachers’ had with the china teachers. We had our own early lunch and went back to the service apartments to settle our assignments.

Lessons was really long and tiring as this was the last chapter and it was an important chapter to take note of. There was a common error that many people got and that was the “Nan” error, but we still got it solved in the end.

We left for dinner right after lessons and went to the bookshop inside the supermarket to get 1 of the DvDs that I purchased there 3 days ago. Got something else and thankfully it worked. Went to get our breakfast for tomorrow and some groceries for ourselves.

15 more days to go! Sasi is the happiest of all! Routines were the same again, with chapter 6
being taught today. Lunch was quite an adventure for the girls when they went back to their dormitories. They taught that they left their keys in the dormitory, so they attempted to climb in from the toilet window to the balcony which was attached to their room. Hwee ping was the first to climb and Sasi called her back as she was fearful for her. She loosens the water pipe from the wall by coming down the window. Sasi was next and guess what she did, she broke the water tap handle or something like that! Silly girls.

We went back to class to complete the lecture. The lab that we have to complete is’nt easy to do! Really difficult. Table-tennis was up next after dinner where Zhi Hui was learning how to spin the ball. He tried and tried again and was successful soon after.

We went to the night market near the school to get our daily breakfast for tomorrow and bought some fish cakes to eat. On our way back to the dormitories we spotted Dave along with Mr. Chua and a few people going to the clinic beside the school. Hope he will get well soon.

The game of improvement through practice is an important game to play. Just like the table tennis game we played, the spins were hard to execute so practice is really important.

PHOTO ESSAY

Scenery

Beautiful spring

The cloudy sunset

A little bridge on top of little hills

Gorges

A simple design of a bridge matched perfectly with the surroundings

Picture of leaves against the sun

Inhabited valley

Country side

An indian look to a Chinese community

Looks like the golden gate bridge of San francisco?

Fields

The bridge with 2 types of traffic

The pefect blend of nature

Really nice view of buildings with nature

Nature with man-made buildings

Week 4
Day 5

Free and easy day! I woke up at around 8 this morning. Took a bath and headed for the girl’s dormitory to complete our work.

We had cup noodles for lunch; it concluded our cup noodles stock. Time flew very fast and it was time to leave for the BBQ at 5. There was a funny happening here in the service apartment. Satish was looking at Hwee Ping’s program when he squashed Sasi’s luggage! Sasi quickly screamed Satish’s name and went to check out the condition of the Spongebob squarepants instead of her luggage! That really is the end of whatever happened in theafternoon.
I helped out by carrying the big pail of water from school to the BBQ pit which was just 2 blocks away. We went into this place that seemed to be an adventure learning centre. There were 4 dogs guarding this place; 3 big dogs with 1 small dog. The small dog was very cute but at the same time very protective of the guard house he was guarding. Guess who was the in-charge? The tiny puppy! There is a story behind it. 1 year ago, when the first batch of Ngee Ann students came in for this trip, they bought this little puppy as it was really cheap, but misfortune fell upon them as they could not bring it back to Singapore so they gave it to the caretaker of this adventure learning centre.

We went to a little park with cut down trees stumps design to set up our BBQ. They were really ill prepared as they did not have any fire-starters or anything that could start up a fire, so we had to use dried grass from the area as fuel to light it up. The start was really bad but the first fire sprang up after 45 minutes and soon the rest came alight too. It got really dark and the food that we had was just like satay and they had something that looked like mashmallows but it was actually man tou! As the food was mainly pork, we made our way to KFC to fill up our bellies. The restaurant really had its own style, whenever its near closing time even an hour before we cannot order what we wanted, but what is there left.

Getting well prepared is very important for everything that we do.

Week 4
Day 4

The last outing with the tour guides. It was nice being led by them as they were fun to be with and they were really friendly. They brought us to the longest shopping street in the world which is called Yan Jiang Da Dao. It is 7 kilometres long and is filled with many world-wide brands shops.

It was raining quite heavily when we reached there and the weather, really cold, around 12 degrees or less. We had 2 umbrellas for our 4 people group, so our movement under the rain was really slow. We visited the many shops that were selling sports items. We visited a few shops like Adidas, Nike, the shop that sells American leather wallets and belts, and many other interesting shops. Sasi went on a shopping frantic and bought many things! They are a blouse, jacket, wallet, etc. Hwee ping and I got a shirt each. My first time getting a pink shirt! Satish got 2 shirts, wallet and belt. He made me the model to gauge the size of the shirt he should get by making me try out the shirts. Along the way, Sasi’s umbrella went missing as whenever we enter a shop, we had to put our umbrellas outside. Luckily mine was still there, so I could still shelter them. Long the whole 7 kilometers path, there were quite a number of people that were holding a brochure or just loitering about. They are the people that the tour guides warned us about. They ask people to follow them to the alleys where they sold fake shoes and watches. We did not follow them, but we were constantly pestered by them. We took lunch at Macdonald, and then carried on with our shopping trip.

It was around 3 when we got back to the meeting point. We went to the nearby toilet and guess what we saw? The toilet’s windows were open and the guys standing cubicle could easily be seen. The doors of the toilets could not be locked, even the girl’s toilet, heard from them that they saw 2 ladies in the toilet without the door closed. The toilet conditions here in china still has not improved much over the years. We went back to school afterwards where along the way, more than 3 quarter of the whole group left to shop at the area at Yellow Crane Tower.

I washed the clothes and met the rest of the group for dinner afterwards, where our same routine was carried out. The only difference is that we went to the bookstore in the supermarket beside the KFC and got a Chinese to English dictionary for our China friend, Tom. We went back to the service apartment to complete our assignments and journal.

The people of China are very innovative, but to my inference, is because of survival instincts. The people who carried brochures and tried to get ask to buy their fake goods created this method of doing business. It really a sight that I have never seen before and there are many more of these kinds of methods, highly unusual, but very creative.

Week 4
Day 3

Day of the theory test today. We could wake up late as there were no lessons in the morning. We set for the fiber optics and cable factory near to the shopping area that we went on the first few days of our stay here.

The factory only allowed pictures to be taken outside of the factory and in the main hall. Other than that, no pictures were allowed. The company that we went to is the world’s second largest, and it is biggest in the whole of China. They are very protective of their company’s secret for the manufacturing of the fiber optics. This can be seen from the videos that we were allowed to see a very short video, and we are not allowed to stay for very long. We got over the tour of the factory within the hour and took some pictures with the company’s logo before leaving for school.

Lunch was right up on our schedule once we arrived back to school. Lunch was simple with the exception that we had vegetarian noodles today. Reason being Sasi and Satish was being vegetarian today where Hwee Ping and I decided o accompany them. It tasted quite all right other than the fact that the soup went into my eye! Other than that, I tried opening the glass bottle again and it took me less than 10 seconds before I got it open. Looks like I will be trying some other methods of opening the bottle soon. Off to the service apartment to revise on the APPG test which was up in 2 hours. We went there once it was time and started doing it. An hour and 10 mins passed and we had to submit the paper. The paper was quite all right other than the fact that many people including me did not take the “for” loop and the “try” and “catch” method into consideration when studying for our test, and as a result, did not manage to really do it.

We visited Tom at his dormitory to take photographs of the living conditions of China students’ quality of living. It was quite small with 4 people staying under 1 roof. Their beds were elevated and their study area; directly underneath their beds. We moved on to have dinner outside. We bought fried rice form the nearby supermarket and ate it at KFC.

The weather today was really unpredictable. It kept raining and sometimes stops raining at the same time. Like with what will happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere, we need to be prepared for anything that is to come. Just like our test, we were not prepared for those small but considerably important methods to be learnt.

Day 2
Week 4

The morning started put with my roommate and I oversleeping, but the girls were even later! They told us that they did wake up early, but they went back to sleep knowing that Kun Feng was in the toilet. They woke up 5 minutes before our meeting time and they shouted at the same time “Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! “ I think I might have heard it 4 floors down.

We attended APPG lessons, but due to the fact that Mr. Ma’s ankle was injured, he was unable to teach us, so we spent the morning doing up our blogs. Lunch was next with another fish in our menus; the fish in china are really boney!

Lessons resumed in the afternoon, with us doing the tutorial. We went for an early dinner where we had fried rice and that was also the time where I did something funny. I bought a drink without having the metal cap removed. Extra right? I was just testing out the method which I had seen from the net. I tried using many methods, but I ended up borrowing Satish’s spoon to open the lid. I tried for very long but could not succeed. Only when the group was about to leave when I succeeded in the opening of the bottle! I had finally found the method of doing it! I’m going to try it tomorrow too!

We proceeded to buy our breakfast for tomorrow and we got the fish pancake! This time they had another flavor and is the orange and the pork floss flavor. They gave all another 2 for free again, just like yesterday.

We will be visiting Tom’s (a china student here) house tomorrow. I hope we can learn more about how different a student’s life in china can be from Singapore’s student.

Week 4
Day 1

Another day where APPG seems never ending. Programming again, with less time to study and tests and syllabus being pushed forward, I.S report needing to be completed, journals every single day, labs to be completed too.

Less than 3 weeks left in Wuhan. Somehow I just don’t feel like leaving, not even for the comfy bed, proper toilet and food, technology, facilities, family and friends. The feeling of being independent is very different, contradicting; I’ve been left to be independent most of the times when I’m at home, but here in Wuhan, it’s actually really independence.

Programming was quite all right with a few common problems here and there. Satish as of today, is officially known as Squid-Wurt the froggy, and for me, Spongebob just because our characters matches those of them.

I’ve learnt that behind every smiling face is a sad tale, and vice versa for a sad face. Things do not appear the way they will always be. We have to learnt to adapt and spot these differences.

Week 3
Day 7

The end of the 3rd week; this would mean that there are 3 more weeks left before we return home. It also means all the date dues for all the assignments are coming.
We had the actual test this morning and it was quite okay, not really very difficult. We had the test in the morning, so we had an early lunch before carrying on with our IS Stuff. After lunch we carried on with chapter 5.

We had a game of table tennis with Mr. Ma and Mr. Chua. Initially, Mr. Chua seemed like he was not very good in table tennis, but his later on performance took me by surprise and the phrase “never judge a book by its cover” came to me. Mr. Chua taught me a little trick with handling the table tennis ball how to control and it soon seemed like it was table tennis practice instead of a game.

Dinner was right after that where we went to canteen 2 to eat. I had 2 eggs for dinner on top of my fried rice that is. The Chinese people put oil and salt on every single thing, even egg!
After the unhealthy, salt-filled dinner, it was time to follow our daily routine where we go out to buy from the imperial bakery our breakfast for the next day.

There was a new roadside stall that caught our eyes. It had capsules all over. It was fish shaped cake with strawberry jam filling. On seeing us, the boss gave Sasi 2 free fish. We tried it out and it was really nice. I guess we will be going back there soon enough.

Another plus point to the people in China, it appears that the people here are not as notorious, bad character as people said them to be. I will constantly look out and observe the people more.

Week 3
Day 6

A really normal day today. Started out with a brief go-through of chapters 5, 6 and 7 before lunch. We quickly had lunch and prepared for the trial test.
The test turned out to be really difficult, having many steps to complete. I managed to complete only after lessons ended, really need more practice.

We had dinner which consisted of rice with a single dish on top. The shop’s name is Singapore’s gai fan which was rice with a dish. Added an extra egg to give the dish an extra taste to it. We went out to get our breakfast for tomorrow. After getting bread, we decided to try out the ice-cream in Wuhan on a cold weather! It was not bad, but it was really very cold. Our hands were really numb but we finished it anyway. Everyone in the roads was staring at us like we were doing something wrong, but it’s really weird, who would be having ice-cream on such a cold weather?

hope to learn more about the culture of China and their people, starting to get real interested in it.

Week 3
Day 5

It was 5.30 in the morning when we woke up and got prepared to go up Wudang Mountain again. We had breakfast at the same hotel again. I find that the breakfast here in Wuhan is all the same, despite which county you may be in. they contain noodles, egg, man tou, etc.
We boarded the tour bus and went on the winding path of 108 turns on Wudang Mountain. Dave was as usual sick from the turns, but he managed to hold out till we reached the top.s
We walked distance to the cable car station which was called the Jade Terrace Temple Cable car Station. There was a very long and trust me its long! Many people, mostly people from China were queuing up to take the cable car up. An hour passed and we were only moved a little. During this time, there were 1 or 2 people that actually climbed over the railing to cut the queue. There were some mumblings of unhappiness, but since it was just 1 or 2 people, it quickly died down. Another hour into the queue, a whole group of people was on the side of the railings beside us wanting to cut into the queue; this created an uproar among the people in the queue. Arguments arose and the guard who looked like 18 year old came over to solve the problem. The argument carried on for around 15 minutes with the old folks who were trying to cut queue saying that they have special priveleges, but they soon lost oout and went behind to queue up half an hour after, it was our turn to board the cable car. I boarded the cable car with Hwee Ping while Satish boarded with Sasi. It took around 25 minutes for the cable car to make a steep inclined ascend to the golden peak, which was the highest peak of Wudang Mountain. The scenery was beautiful with really natural rock formations with minimal manhandled formations. The cable car was a little creaky but safe to be on. The top was surprisingly packed full of people with lots of buildings. The buildings were quite old and the toilet, I think theres only 1 on top of the mountain was flooded with many people and really dirty!

We had a 15 minutes climb up the mountain to the golden peak. The stairs were really steep and when we reached the top, there were so many people that everyone was jostling around. We prayed a little but was quickly pushed till we were at the back of the temple, so we gave up trying to explore the place and bought some souvenirs before proceeding down the mountain. We bought an egg each and ate it on the cable car down. Before that, Satish attempted to take a picture of a cute small little girl, she cried immediately and everyone was staring at him. We took the bus back down the mountain. The bus went really fast and many people including Satish went sick. That’s where my first aid kit came into hand and luckily nothing other than the driver’s spit landing on Satish face happened.

We had a 6 hour drive after where the driver went against the traffic, made an illegal and dangerous turn. But we were unscathed and we thanked the driver despite putting all our lives in danger.

Seeing all the people of China’s behavior for so many days, it has been an eye opener for me to see people abusing their rights, for even old folks should respect the rules and not do things like cutting queue. The etiquette is really different and we have to adapt to this, yet retain our own etiquette.

Week 3
Day 4

The trip to WuDang Mountain at last! Satish and I woke up just 15 minutes before our meeting time with the group, so we quickly washed up and packed our stuff and went down to the meeting point to meet the rest of the group before setting off on the 6 hour trip to our destination.
During the trip, Sasi kept falling asleep while studying her APPG. Well, not only her myself too! We watched the movie Bolt on our mp4s while travelling. I just cannot imagine that the movie actually took 2 bars of our 4 bars battery! It was suppose to just take 1 out! Sasi was on the 1st page for 2 hours and we had a good laugh about it.

We reached the foot of the mountain within 6 hours, and had lunch at Tai He Xuan Wu Da Jiu Dian. The food there was quite alright, and we proceeded to the starting point of the mountain. It was drizzling slightly when we got there so many people purchased the disposable raincoats which cost about 1 yuan each. We boarded the tour bus that brought us to the 1st stop on the mountain. It took us around 25 minutes to reach the 1st stop which was called the Tai Zi Po. This is the temple to pray at if you want good results for your examinations. We visited the halls where the gods’ statues were situated at, where the crown prince studied. There was a story about the prince was out playing when he met an old lady who was taking a metal rod and sharpening it till it became a needle, this made the price not playful anymore as he understood what the old lady’s meaning was; with determination, even a metal rod can become a needle. The lady was actually the Goddess of Mercy in disguise.

We took the other bus to the second stop which was the Zi Xiao Gong. It is the most well preserved temple in Wudang. When we first entered the temple, we were greeted by a sight of Taoist disciples training on their martial arts. There was a senior that was coaching them. He was really fierce and rough, as he punched a junior when the junior did a wrong step, also, he pinched a tiny girl disciple when she forgot the steps. Today was also a special day so there were many other people that came to pray or attend the service.

We proceeded to the last station of the day. We had to follow the guide really closely as there were many junctions and winding paths. In the end we reached the last place where we threw coins to hit the bell which was blocked by an old Chinese coin. We also saw a narrow little path that led to a place to put joss sticks. This place led out into the open air. We were told many people died while trying to offer incense. We made our little rice pendants and rushed down to get on the last bus of the day.

Dinner was at the same place and we made our way to our place to stay soon after. It was a 2-star hotel with amazingly, a good condition toilet! There we stayed for the rest of the night before our next ascend to Wudang Mountain.

With determination comes success, an old Chinese saying emphasizes what I have learnt today.

Week 3
Day 3

Early in the morning today, I heard excited talking from my dormitory mates. I woke up to investigate and found that the results have been released ahead of time. I already knew how I fared in my results, so I slowly turned on lap-top, connected to the internet and looked up my results. My results were expected and I moved on to wash up after turning my lap-top off.
We covered chapter 4 during programming lessons which was really tedious and long due to the many functions. It took me quite some time before I got the program done and we were off for lunch and then dinner.

Tom joined us soon after and we had a game of table tennis. At the start it was clear that Tom was really good, but we quickly caught up and were having fun playing around. We were finally perspiring a little by the end of the game. Fun indeed!

We went to a small restaurant that Tom recommended. Sasi and Satish tried writing Chinese characters on the paper that was given to us to write the dishes that we wanted. Some characters looked alike, but the others, nothing to say… we had the much wanted Wu Chang fish, some vegetables, chicken, but the real nice dish was the fish. I’m going to have it again before going back home.

We bought the snacks that would last us the whole of the trip to Wudang Mountain and went back to pack for the trip tomorrow.

The people in China live a really simple life with little money, not really good food, but yet, they still lead quite a good life, and they are easily contented, the newer generations that is. Really wish Singaporeans could learn to be easily contented as well.

Week 3
Day 2

2nd day of the 3rd week already! You know the feeling whenever you have finally started to settle down on a place and you found out you will be leaving again? I’m having that feeling now. Had the same lessons again, programming. We finished chapter 4 within a day! 4 chapters in a short few days, really fast right?

Lunch was next and we had the meal that 4 people could easily share. We had many eyes on us again, but I think they are actually looking at Satish. After the interaction that we had yesterday, he seemed to have attracted a lot of girls.

We tried out the yoghurt after lunch and left for class soon after. We covered the whole of chapter 4 within 1 and a half hour and moved on to complete the tutorial 4. Time really seems to move really quickly, too fast indeed. We got 2 tests next week! After the lesson ended, we made our way to canteen 2 to have dinner. We had dinner while waiting for Tom to arrive. He is the friendly person from China whom we had met not long ago. He volunteered to bring us outside of the school to check to food and stalls out. He even brought us to the internet café there to check it out. He told us that there was many of such internet cafes around as many people could not afford to buy a computer. Soon after, we went to get some groceries as well as some bread for our breakfast tomorrow. Tom joined us in the girl’s bunk where we had a very long chat with him. He told us more about his family and his background. We also found out that the hostels the students are living in do not have television!

He left about 2 hours later and we did our journals and rested for the day. I’ve learnt that we should not take advantage of the things we already have as many people cannot afford to own some things.

Week 3
Day 1

8.am lessons! We had another guest lecturer teaching us today. He was touching on the business stuff which was not very interesting to many. He’s tone was monotonous, but nevertheless, he was filled with experience and told us quite a number of life examples.
After which, we went for lunch at canteen 3 where we tried out the rice with food. We proceeded straight to class and had did the summary of our IS before being released at 3 to go to the IT mall.
We took bus 901 to the IT mall and then changed 709 to the service centre for my camera. We went up and checked with the man and he told us that the warranty card and receipt must be present before it can be used , if not 400 RMB must be paid and a waiting period of 2 weeks, so I decided to get my camera fixed in Singapore. We proceeded to take the bus 709 back to the IT mall where we had to check it out.

When we went inside the mall, it looked just like Sim Lim Square in Singapore! So we went about checking the prices of some electronic things. We ended up at a shop and we were looking at 2 mp4 and an mp5. The mp5 had a camera, and the other 2 mp4 that looked really nice. We decided that if the lady could give us a discounted price the whole group would get it. So from 390 we negotiated to 350 RMB! The mp4 was a limited edition kind with the whole Jay Chou album inside it and was really quite good quality. If fact, we found out later that the brand that we got was actually quite good, so not bad a catch. The lady that sold us the mp4 was really excited when she knew we were from Singapore and was even more excited when she saw that we had Singapore notes which she decided to change with us.

We took a bus back to school. This was where I saw for the first time in my life, the handle bar being pulled out because the bus had braked too abruptly and the guy just pulled it right out! Apparently there were many empty holes in the bars so I guess that was what happened to the rest of the handle bars.

Had a meeting with Tom without having our dinner. He was the person that we got to know during the party we had yesterday. He brought us to the English corner of the language school where we interacted with the other students there. We exchanged much information with them and then left for the briefing.

I feel that Singapore should have something like this English corner where everyone in that corner had to practice their English, this could allow the students to practice their language as well as for them to open up more and talk. The Singaporeans in my opinion are very quiet and hardly interact much other each other so I feel that it would be a really good idea to have a corner such as this back in Singapore.

Week 2
Day 7

Steel factory visit today! I was looking forward to this trip as I was always interested in technology kind of things. We took a 2 hour trip to the factory where the air was filled with metal smells. Pictures were not allowed to be taken in the factory so I will have to explain the process. The steel started out from the furnace freshly forged and still bright orange. The steel block exits from the furnace onto a conveyor belt where it was then transported to a compressor like machine where the steel bar was pressed till it became long. The stretched bar next went over to the water spraying machine. The water spraying machine was not that accurate the stretched steel bar went through it and got cooled by the water, only the front of the bar was not cooled. The steel bar then proceeded with thunderous sound; we had to close your ears; and then went into a roller like structure where the cooled steel bars were rolled into rolls that looked like Swiss rolls! Guess how much time did we spent in the factory? Just half an hour! Then we took a disastrous 2 hour trip back again. The driver attempted to take a short-cut, but he was stalled when there was construction being done so he went back from the way he came from and was then trapped in a traffic jam. Most of slept or talked on the way to the shopping district where the longest pedestrian shopping street in China or the world!

When we reach the shopping mall, we went about looking for a place to eat and we ended up eating at Macdonald, where I had 2 burgers and 10 nuggets, well I was hungry! We then shopped around looking for cameras and then we went back to school to continue the lessons.
I hope that we can get more of this kind of educational trip then will enhance our interest in technology.

Week 2
Day 6

Another original day from the start of the day, had APPG in the morning. Had lunch right after that, we tried something different today. I had the mushroom with shredded chicken dish with a gigantic bowl of rice! The lady told me that the rice was free and I could keep refilling the rice if I wanted to. The rest of the group had a change of dish too; they had soup for their meal.
We were back for APPG after lunch. We were released early so that we may prepare for the get together later on in the day. We were busy settling our programming that we only left at around 5, where we went back to prepare. We kept coming up with ideas for the performance, but only reach a decision 15 minutes before the meeting time, and we practiced the dance steps within these 15 minutes and went to the dance and singing hall on the 3rd floor of the recreational building.

The MC was the DJ of the school’s radio station. We started off choosing a card from a stack of them, which became our group’s number. After getting into our groups, we introduced each other and started talking about everything about Singapore and from them, China. The performance started soon and our group was the 1st one to perform our item. We started the dance quite all right and a few mess ups here and there, but over all we enjoyed ourselves, which was the most important part of it all.

The night continued with fun activities and much talented performances with dancing, singing, and a little performance. It was really fun and I would not mind going for another one if I could.
Learning how to interact with people of a different culture is not as easy as it seems. Although they are Chinese, but their culture here in China is so much different than in Singapore. Even the language that they use, the same word they will use a different way or method to say it, so learning to adapt is very important especially if one is staying in a different country for a set amount of time.

Week 2
Day 5

Guess how our day started out again? With the Chinese music again! We were woken up at 6.10a.m, and the sky was already so bright, just like 8a.m in the morning back in Singapore. We got ready and left the ship. We proceeded to take the 6 hour trip back to WUST. Along the way, we stopped at a supermarket at Yichang to get sau su which is a specialty from Yichang. After which we continued the journey back to the school.

After reaching the school, we unpacked and took another journey to the service center for cameras. I was really grateful when our group went together with me to get my camera fixed. Unfortunately, the centre only opened from Monday to Saturday, so we decided to go down to the computer “city” where many places sold computer related things to look for the external hard-drives for Satish. We eventually found it but it was so expensive that he had to consider first. He soon settled to buy it, but the store of the shop was closed already so they could not purchase it. We went walking around after that. First stop was the converse shop where Sasi, Hwee Ping and I bought the same bag which had a 40% discount. Satish also bought a bag, but with a different discount. Sasi proceeded to buy a spongebob cushion which she intent to give to her good friend. After shopping and having dinner at the KFC, we took the special cab that we hired. What’s so special about it? Well it was company that actually rented out it vehicle with a driver to drive you to you intended destination. We took that cab back and bought bread back to school.

We learnt to trust and take risk today. The things that we bought today, though is a small price to pay when converted to Sin dollars but the things that we bought were really original looking or it already is, so we had to make a decision and to buy it.

Week 2
Day 4

“La la la la” I don’t know how to hum the song that was played by the P.A system in the morning. We were woken up by it to have our breakfast. Breakfast on the ship was a little better than their lunch. We had hard boiled eggs, noodles, porridge, a little peanut, and other small dishes.

We did our journals while waiting for the ship to reach our destination which was the Shennong River. The girls in our group have been sick for a few days already, so Satish and I were taking care of them, administering medication and stuff…

We reached the river after passing quite a number of beautiful landscapes. The river was a place where 20 years ago, would have no tourist and was a place of mainly men, as the rowers of the wooden sampan were always naked. But now they are clothed and tourists are flooding the area.
We had to go on a small sampan which rowed out into the river. The river came into a point where the water was shallow so the rowers came out to pull the boat. As the river was just too shallow, we had to turn the boat around and head back to shore. We took the ferry to our next destination. Before that, my camera actually spoiled before we went out on the ferry, was really saddened by it.

We reached the Baidi City in the evening, and we had to rush to finish it as it was close to nightfall. The city was on an island that is only linked by a bridge. It was located on a hill and lit with green lights. Eerie right? The only way to access it is through a long flight of stairs which we climbed till we also dropped! There were many ancient carrier seats that could be rented for us to sit to the top, but we followed the guide to the top. There was a joke that they made regarding every time the guide led a group, he or she had to climb so many flight of stairs, imagine the guide at the great wall? They would be so fit by the end of the year!

Inside the small place were many tablets and statues of the ancients heroes, they were remade for tourist to see, but many remnants were not there. We notices there were many tablets of ancient writings, and the statues looked really scary! There was an ancient statue and interest many. It was a statue and if u touched her hand it would mean all is well for you, and if you touch the hips, it would bring you good health, etc. Of course many people touch it all over for everything good. We left the city soon enough after purchasing what we presumed to be authentic specially crafted combs which wood has medicinal values.
We had dinner on the ferry before proceeding to sleep while the ferry brought us back to the dock.

Ancient history is all around us. It is up to us to see and learn about it. I’m a Chinese and I should know more about Chinese history. I feel ashamed that many things that I have heard about the sites that we visited I do not know about. Although I was born in Singapore, but I must not forget or not learn the history about my race. So I plan to read back all the history once I’m back in Singapore.

Week 2
Day 3

As I’m writing this, the ship is moving out at a snail’s pace towards the “escalator of the 3 Gorges Dam”.

We woke up really late this morning. My roommate, Satish and I could not remember hitting the alarm clock button off of both alarms. Despite waking up late, we quickly packed our bags and set off on time for our 3 days and 2 nights in the 3 Gorges.

We took a 5-hour bus journey to the 3 Gorges Dam. In the middle of this journey, we stopped at a half-way station to wait for the other group of students from Ngee Ann polytechnic to join us while we freshen up and relieve ourselves. They soon joined us and we proceeded with the journey. After reaching Yi Chang which is a part of Wubei, we had lunch at the Yan shi Hotel. The food there was quite alrite, but the service, very poor. At the start, the tour guides were arguing with the floor managers there regarding the lack of seats. Everything was soon settled and the food was served. During the servicing of the food, the service staff for our table was very impatient about arranging the plates on the table so that there is more space, spilled a cup of tea on 1 the group members. Luckily there was a jacket that belonged to a guy, to block the spillage and the group member was not scalded.

After lunch, we set off for the 3 Gorges Dam. We had to go through winding roads of beautiful sceneries and a series of short to long tunnels through the hills. Arriving at the Dam, we were greeted by a sight of the “escalator” which was where the ships were brought up or down. We went for the first station which was where the exhibition of the model of the dam was as well as the souvenir shops. It was also the highest view of the area where we could go. It had a nice view of the dam as well as the area around it. The next station was the 185 station which was the height of the dam. It had the clearer view of the dam, and this was where the guide explained how it was built. The last area was the memorial park which was built for the 3 gorges dam. There was another good view of the dam in the park.

We bought a box of keychains that cost 40 yuan. We found out later at the end of the trip that the other people sold it at 20 yuan. So we were indirectly cheated for 20 yuan! O well, a lesson learnt for us, never be inpatient regarding the buying of things, always consider the price as well as the the risk that’s involved. Whether we can get it at a cheaper price at the end of the trip or at the start, it’s all a risk that we have to take. After the picture taking session, we took the bus to the same hotel for dinner, this was where we were told that we were behind time and was suppose to board the ship at 6p.m, but it was at 6p.m that we arrived at the hotel for dinner, so we quickly ate and rushed to the dock. It was at 7.30 that we arrived so we were 1 and a half hours late! Some of the other passengers were not happy with us too.

A few hours into the ride, we had to stop as the “escalator of the Ba Dong Dam “was closed, indicating that there were ships inside. While waiting, 2 ships arrived behind us. An hour later, the “escalator’s “doors opened and we were ready to take pictures of the ship moving in, but our hopes were dashed when our ship did not bulge even a bit, while the other 2 ships that arrived after us actually moved forward and went in to the “escalator”. We felt confused and watched the stars and talked while waiting for our turn. After around 45 mins, our wait was gone and our ship moved in. the escalator was huge and the water that was needed to raise the ship to a high height quickly filled the area that we were in, this amazed us as we thought the reason why the proceedings was so slow was due to the slow pumping of the water. Our ship was raised quickly and we soon left the Ba Dong Dam which was downstream of the 3 Gorges Dam.

We did our journals while waiting for the ship to arrive there and we fell asleep before we arrived there, and it would seem that the ship arrived at those might doors of the “escalator of the 3 Gorges Dam” and we only left there at around 6 in the morning.

Week 2
Day 2

The weather is back to rainy and cold again! It was drizzling a little in the morning and the wind was blowing real hard till the umbrella that I was holding actually bended to the sheer force of the wind. We went for lessons in the morning. It was programming today, and we were touching on chapter 2 today, which Mr Chua was hoping to cover it all today.

After lessons, we went for lunch in canteen 1 which was right opposite the library, and it was in this canteen that I had a real eye opener. The canteen was packed and every single one, including the ladies was jostling around pushing and squeezing to get through the crowd. I have heard of people in China pushing around and cutting queues, but I have not encountered this kind of situation first hand. After much waiting and slowly maneuvering through the crowd I finally sat down with the group to have lunch.

We continued lessons for an hour or so after lunch. We were let off early so that we may prepare for the trip tomorrow. We took this opportunity to check out the supermarket that our teachers introduced to us. We followed their directions and found that there was no such place at the place where the teachers told us. Instead, it was way off the place that the teachers told us its location was.

The supermarket was quite big for one, and the pricing of the stuff there were quite normal, with the winter clothing selling at a rather cheap price. I guess it was due to the end of the winter season, and the weather here in Wuhan is approaching hotter times.

After shopping around for a little tidbits and mineral water for the trip, we got back to school to be on time for the basketball match between Ngee Ann Polytechnic students the students of Wuhan University of science and technology. It was a rather interesting match as well as tension filled, as the players from both teams were really good. Honestly this is 1 the best matches of basketball I have ever seen, other than those in NBA that is. Our school won in the end, but it was the experience that mattered not who won so good job guys!

Our group left the school to the roadside stalls for dinner. I got 30 sticks of mutton on a stick which tasted really really nice! Tastier than any mutton I have ever tried in Singapore! Wish you be here to try out the mutton Gabriel, sorry man. We also got a popiah looking dish which tasted not bad and dumplings coupled with drinks from a nearby shop. A really tasty but unhealthy meal, the taste was worth the sacrifice, not everyday though.

Learnt a little something today. You know about the times when the first thing that came into your mind about some things is that things are suppose to be the way it was supposed to be? Complicated? An example would be like people who are older should naturally have more experience, but sometimes situations turn the tables around. Today, I was thinking our team might not be able to win the match against the university students, but I was proven wrong, in fact we did very well against them. Things might look like this from an angle, but from another angle, it might seem another way. So guys, always look at things from every angle before passing judgement.

Week 2
Day 1

Start of the second week, was really hoping that it would be bring some luck for me. I have not been having the bests of luck this week. Breakfast was the same as usual with a tiny exception that we ate while walking to where we had our lessons. The morning was really chilly; I guess the cold weather was not gone after all, just temporarily gone. Lessons began with the remaining groups that have not presented yet to present. Most of the groups presentations that the teacher highlighted were read-offs which meant that the students read off from the slides, so it was not very well done, and for this, Mr Chua insisted that the groups had to present for the lesson in the afternoon.

After lunch break, we decided to take a shortcut to the building where we had our lessons, and found it to be much shorter and convenient for us to travel there. A new discovery everyday! Lessons continued with the presentations on again where even the teachers were bored of it as the students were still reading off the slides instead of their own words. I guess the teacher could not take it anymore, so he let off 1 hour earlier to have a longer break.

We took this extra time to have a game of table tennis. Satish and Sasi will be playing this game for the first time, so Hwee Ping and I taught them how to play it. It was really hilarious seeing them miss the ping pong ball or hitting them like they are playing badminton or tennis, especially Satish. During the whole time that we were playing them he kept hitting the ball to hard till it was flying all around the table tennis room! We had a good laugh as well as a good exercise running about getting the ball. Sasi and Satish made great improvements while playing the game and I hope that they enjoyed themselves!

We went for dinner right after the game at canteen 2, 1st floor where we had the rice with dishes. Got out of school to purchase tomorrow’s breakfast as well as to change the CDs that I had purchased yesterday night. Tried the mutton on a stick outside of our school and found it to be surprisingly tasty although it was dripping with oil.

Think that’s the end of all the action? Wrong! We went back to our dormitory and was about to cut the watermelon that we bought a few days ago when we saw the bacteria growth on the watermelon as well as a yellowish liquid that was at the bottom of the plastic bag. I threw it immediately of course. Guess what the guys did? They laughed so loudly! Especially the famous Satish! Who always laughed at people when things go wrong for them.

Remember the CDs that I exchanged due to the faultiness? I found 1 of the CDs to be faulty again, looks like I will have to change it again.

I learnt that something that the Chinese have a saying for it. In direct translation “ as long as u have a never-say-die kind of attitude and do not give up, even a metal rod can be rubbed or filed to a little needle”. For the guys that first learnt how to play table tennis today, they practiced and practiced, although not very good, but good enough for playing a small game and having fun. This is what I call the never-say-die kind of spirit.

Bad projection
the canteen where we got cheated!

Spiky!

Week 1
Day 7

1 week has passed since we arrived in Wuhan! Fast and not fast at the same time. Breakfast in the morning was the same again. Finally a day where everything was on time, we were not late for lessons.

APPG in the morning where we finally covered what we came here for, did a little of the exercises from the notes. It was not bad for a start, but we soon encountered a problem, and that is over version of the program was not updated to the latest! We had to spend around an hour trying to install the update and yet it could not work. It soon got to lunch time, without completing the exercises, we went for lunch. Guess what we had? Cup noodles! Super cup noodles tom yam flavor is quite bland, do not try it!

We went back for lessons after lunch where the teacher spent around an hour or so trying to find a way for the update to work. While waiting, we did the other exercises. After a long wait the update was finally ready and we got down to business finishing it up. There was an interesting program that required us to be in words that will be translated into words being spoken out, so we were trying all kinds of words out, having fun while learning!

Once lessons were over we dropped by the service apartment and left our stuffs behind before leaving for dinner at the first canteen of the school. I think I may not go there anymore, that’s because we got cheated our money! We only ordered 3 dishes and it cost us 10 + ren ming bi! The girls ordered 2 dishes and they were charged 3 + ren ming bi! O well, but we did not bother to go get our money back, so just count our luck.

We went to purchase some necessities and our breakfast for tomorrow. That’s the end of our day. There is 1 really important thing that I learnt today and that is to always persevere during hardships and we will get our results soon enough.

bad lighting

whats inside the vase

Week 1
Day 6

1 more day to a full week in Wuhan. A normal day today except that we had to attend lessons at 8a.m! woke up at 6,30 and had breakfast before we leave for lessons.

We had a guest lecturer who gave us a introduction to Wuhan. The lecturer had quite a good command of English, I believe that she had had education in the united kingdom’s before as I recognised the accent. We had 4 hours of lessons before lunch break. We later had lunch in the canteen where the usual food greeted us again...o well...no choice.

After lunch, we got back to lessons where we summarised what the guest lecturer taught us today and submitted to teacher. Basically nothing much happened...till after lessons where we went to the nearby row of fish ball kings to have dinner! We were greeted by the stall owners who tried to get us to eat at their place, but we went over to the restaurant with the most number of cars parked outside to have our dinner. This was the correct decision that we made because the food was delicious!

We ordered a big bowl of fish balls, mutton ribs, doufu, pigeon meat, local vegetables, local fish. All of which were somewhat delicious. The mutton was spicy but filled with little meat, doufu was the best of all, pigeon was quite alrite, the fish balls! The most unique of all! The fish ball literally melted in your mouth when placed inside! I wonder how they did that! The amount of food was just nice and we went back to school for a tour in the recreational centre right beside our service apartment, that ended my day.

I learnt a little trick today. How to know which stall sells the best food among the stalls that sells the same type of food? See the number of vehicles that are parked outside the restaurant!