Advertisement
Published: March 20th 2009
Tonight, I had one of the most spectacular nights in China. Life is full of surprises and today was definitely one of the most fun nights I have had in China. After class the other day, I heard some guys speaking a language that was strangely familiar. The more I listened the more I was certain that it was spoken Vietnamese. Since they were both northern Vietnamese speakers, I was a bit hesitant to believe that what I was hearing was correct, but I knew I could not give up the chance to introduce myself. As it turns out, going out of my comfort zone and making the introduction was probably one of the best decisions I have made so far....
A few days after meeting my new friends, I received a text message from a random stranger about a Vietnamese gathering/party that was going to happen later in the week. I had in my mind that I would be going to dinner with the two friends I had met earlier and this random person I had yet to meet. Little did I know what was in store!
Upon meeting my new Vietnamese friend (Viet) in the lobby of
my dorm building, he informed me that the rest of the crew was upstairs having some sort of a meeting. He wanted to introduce me to everyone so we went upstairs......and as we entered the common area of the fourth floor about 30 Vietnamese students studying at Tsinghua greeted me! It was the most overwhelming and exciting feeling ever to see so many Vietnamese students gathered together. I would guess that about 99% of the students are from Hanoi, northern Vietnam so I had a really hard time understanding most of them. Luckily, Viet is from Saigon and could speak a bit of English so he could translate. 😊
During the meeting, everyone introduced themselves and then the fun part began.....The gathering was in part to celebrate International Women's Day which is also regarded as an official holiday in Vietnam. Out of the 30 people present, six women were women. So all the guys gave the gals a red rose and a little gift bag. The guys would "nominate" someone to give the gift to the lady. It was super cute and there was lots of laughter that ensued. I love absolutely love Vietnamese humor and the way of
joking around. It's hard to explain, but if someone were to translate our conversations it would not make any total sense. Since being in China I don't think I have laughed so hard and so much with a great group of people. Now I definitely think the U.S. should recognize and celebrate International Women's Day.
After the little ceremony, we all went out to eat at this placed called "Big Pizza." The restaurant was pretty close so some people biked and others went by taxi. I really enjoyed dinner with all the Vietnamese Tsinghua students. Sitting in a American style food restaurant with a bunch of Vietnamese students in Beijing was just a memorable experience. I would have never thought that I would find and a be a part of the Vietnamese student community at Tsinghua. Just awesome!
Once dinner was over almost all 25 people went to sing karaoke---only in Asia is karaoke such a great pastime. Going out to sing karaoke is usually called "going to KTV," where KTV stands for karaoke music video. Going to sing karaoke is definitely not the same as in the states. From what I have seen the karaoke rooms in
China are very fancy and spacious. I had a really time just singing along with everyone---both Chinese, Vietnamese and English songs. I was amazed by how good the language skills of my new Vietnamese friends. We mostly sang Chinese songs and it was cool to be able to sing along with some of the songs. I guess listening to all those Chinese songs and learning those songs in my Mac Chinese classes actually worked. 😊 What I liked most about the entire evening was that there was absolutely no alcohol and cigarette smelling smoke involved as sometimes tend to be the case with some of the international crowd here. It was absolutely relaxing to just go out and have just plain fun filled with lots of laughter. It was a good way to celebrate International Women's Day!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.081s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 6; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0432s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
anne johnson
non-member comment
this sounds so great! sweet ;-)