There are four days of orientation.  Saturday, August 27, was our first day.

That day started way too early for me.  My roommate, Linda (also Vietnamese), woke up at 5:30 am even though our orientation did not even start until 9.  She said since there’s only one shower room and only five shower booths, she wanted to get a head start.  I tried many attempts to go back to sleep but was not able to because most of the ladies on the floor felt the same way as Linda and they were pretty noisy.  At about 7:00, I gave up and join the crowd but they already left for breakfast.  The shower room and bathroom were empty!  I was so happy to have them to myself (Linda should have slept in =P).  After the shower, I met up with RA Signe, nice, big, blond young lady, who cheerfully show me a breakfast place.  She lend me 5 Yuan to buy a breakfast wrap, freshly cooked fried, flatten dough with fried egg. (The exchange rate is 6.41 Yuan to 1 U.S. dollar.)  Then about nine, all of the students gaggled in front of the building so we can divide into groups for orientation.  Each group was lead by two RAs to the market place, about 10 minutes walk across campus.  Everyone bought necessities like shampoo, shower caddies, shower shoes, bath towels, toilet paper and shoes.  (We ran to the ATM nearby to get some RMB).

Then we had a meet and greet with the staff and faculty back on campus.  They all seemed nice and cool.  The Calligraphy instructor only spoke Chinese, but his class will have a translator.  There are about 68 students total and all them with different level of Chinese.  Some only know “Ni hao.” 

At about noon, the staff took us to fancy restaurants and we ate really delicious food. We were split into two different groups to two different restaurants.  The restaurant I went to have a big dinning room with a couple of big fish tanks in front. We went to the private dinner party rooms with big round table that can seat ten people.  There were food already on the lazy susan on the table.  Each person’s table setting has a small bowl and plate (dessert size) wrapped in plastic.  Beside them set a pair of chopsticks, also in plastic wrapping.   Each table also has a bottle of Coke and a bottle of Sprite.  We tore off the wrappings and ate our heart out.  I liked the eggplant stir-fry the best.  All of us at my table take turns introducing ourselves and we had fun talking.  We talked about trying new drinks like Qing Dao beer and bai jiu (Chinese rice wine) ( a few of them are about to turn 21).  We also talked about the best way to learn Chinese.  They all agreed that having a Chinese boyfriend/girlfriend would be the best way to learn Chinese. 

After lunch we had class selection and the speaking test (part of our language placement exam).  The faculty decides which Chinese class best suit us base our Chinese level/on our test.  We will not know the results until tomorrow.  Then those students like me who select living with a host family (the Home Stay option), had to fill out a personality survey and choose what they desired in the host family.  We will be moving to our home stay on Tuesday.  That did not took long at all, so we had about two hours to do whatever we want. 

A group of us decided to take an excursion of the campus.  We went back to the market place and explored some more.  I saw farmers market place where they sold fresh giant fruits (apples the size of two palms), green eggs, fresh pork, and lots of melons.  There was a place that sells bicycles. There is a western dessert shop too–it has plenty of cheese cakes, trifles, moon cakes–all of them looked deliciously sweet, but they are very pricy. (All western food/restaurants are very expensive.)  We ended the day about 9:30 pm.  (There was a planned movie that night but there was some technical difficulty, so we played the “get to know each other” games instead.  By the time they figure out the problem, most of us were ready for bed.  I went to sleep about ten.  Jet lag seemed to get everybody….well, some went to KTV, a local Karaoke bar and had some fun.)

Interesting Notes of the Day:

-From the key note talk about Beijing:  

a-China buys our used and discarded electronic parts and take them aparts and use them for building new electronics that we use today–like cell phones and laptops.  There are small towns in China specialize in this profession because it pays better than farming.

b-Mao called for the extermination of the four pests: mice, pidgeons, sparrows and misquitos.  The Chinese tried many failed attempts to kill the sparrows and finally came up with a great solution.  They took out pots and pans and bang them together to chase the birds away.  They would do this in masses and in shifts so that the birds would continuously be in flight.  They end up killing many birds, not just sparrows.

 -walking on the streets of Beijing can be scary.  There are many cars, bicycles, mopeds and electric bicycles.  All of them are focused to get to their destination and they are everywhere. The good thing is that they tend look out for walkers.They will honked at you to move out of the way. 

 -there is a calligraphy club in September so I don’t have to take the Calligraphy class in order to enjoy/learn it. 

Location: IES building, Beijing, China