China has been on my mind since I was in 9th grade.

I was 15 years old when my 9th grade history teacher proposed a question to our class. She asked if anyone would be interested in having a penpal from China. Being the social butterfly that I am, I decided that it would be awesome to have a Chinese penpal. Over the summer, my teacher coordinated details with a teacher in China and her students. When I came back to school as a 10th grader my penpal’s email address awaited me. Unfortunately, she was soon too busy with school work to keep in contact, but I still got to exchange emails with her for a few months. This was the first, but not last, of many exchanges I would have with people from China, and the more I heard about their culture, the more interested I became. And although I did not know this was part of the penpal deal when telling my teacher I was interested the previous school year, I somehow ended up being taught Chinese by a Penn State Graduate Student.

At first I considered stopping the whole penpal and learning Chinese thing because learning a completely new language was a little daunting. I was already learning German and was really interested in the language, but somehow Chinese stole my heart. This was one of the first times I remember being met with something so new and off my radar. I had to make this decision on my own and I am so glad I decided to stick with it. Learning Chinese helped me realize that trying something new and going outside of my comfort zone would help me grow and learn. I was taught Chinese by roughly six different teachers by the time I graduated from high school. It was a fun journey, but I knew I wasn’t done. I still wanted to travel to China at some point. I liked Chinese so much that I decided to take classes at Penn State in what seemed like yet again, another spur of the moment decision. I submitted my application last minute, and ended up taking Chinese during the summer for the next two years.

When I attended WEPO, an orientation program for freshman women engineering students, I learned of the opportunity to travel to China with Xinli through the ENGR 118 course. After being exposed to so many different learning environments, I had been taught about Chinese culture, I had participated in Chinese New Year activities, done paper cutting, and done calligraphy, but I wanted to see all of this first-hand. I was hooked the moment I found out it was possible to go to China and called my parents as quickly as I could to ask them what they thought. Luckily, they have been supportive of me and have encouraged me to find my way to China. I obviously won’t be experiencing Chinese New Year while in China, but I will probably be able to find paper cutting and calligraphy along the way.

I am all packed and ready to leave. I “packed,”

unpacked,

Unpacking before even leaving home

and re-packed

Packing is finished! Ready to take off.

and am still not confident that I did not leave something behind. Every time I leave my house, I end up running back inside 30 seconds later because I forgot something. So…we will see how this turns out.

I just drove to Pittsburgh and am catching a flight from Pittsburgh to Dallas on Sunday morning. From there I will be flying to Beijing, arriving Monday afternoon.

So yeah, you could say I have been unknowingly awaiting this trip my entire life. Fate or just a string of very well put together events?

Either way, I am going to China!!!!

Location: Pittsburgh, PA 15212