Hello my name is Zach Winston. I am a senior (really super-senior) at PSU and I major in economics.
This is my second time abroad (I also did the University of Westminster CIEE Program in London), but Shanghai is on another level.
I arrived last Friday the 17th of June, two days prior to the beginning of my program. For anyone studying abroad in Shanghai who does not speak Chinese I would not recommend this at all. I flew from Philadelphia to Pudong Airport in Shanghai via Toronto and my flights were fine. However, upon arrival, after travelling for nearly 20 hours, I was approached by a Chinese man in a suit who asked me where I was going and offered for me to get a cab back to my dormitory, but conveniently neglected to mention the price. To my dismay, I saw that I was charged more than double what it said a cab ride would cost or 500 Yuan ($77) instead of 150-200 Yuan ($23-$31) and negotiated the price down to 420 Yuan ($65) so not a crisis, but I still paid over the odds.
More important though was arrival in the dorms jet-lagged, hungry, and alone. This led for me to experience tremendous culture shock as the food is much greasier than what I am used upsetting my stomach and since I don’t know the language unsure of what I am eating. Given this, I became depressed, had a mild breakdown, which for me has never happened in my life, and wished I had never come to Shanghai.
Things got better.
The next day I was in the lobby of the international student dorms and met a guy named Kyle with a Hampden University shirt and said to him, “thank god you speak english”. I then proceeded to have a great day, despite pouring rain, touring the French Concession in downtown Shanghai with his group. Despite still feeling sick my experience in Shanghai had begun
I am now nearing my first full week here and in this time I have met a bunch of great guys in my program, have a cell phone, a gym membership, and a settled stomache…Shanghai is awesome and I look forward to posting more about it.
Location: Pudong International Airport, East China Normal University (both in Shanghai)
