Advertisement
I've been living and studying in Shanghai for a year now. I've decided to record some of my experiences studying in Shanghai, travelling around China.
I've had some really difficult situations in China, from signing confessions to crimes (not registering at the local police station - got a fine and had to sign a confession!!) to falling off a balcony whilst drinking tequila and requiring stitches in my arm.
Having said that it is a wonderful place that surprises me everyday with its fabulous mix of the weird, the wonderful and the bizarre.
The first thing that I found difficult was communication. Even Shanghai or Beijing are difficult places for foreginers who don't speak or read Chinese. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. The food is fabulous, but not at all what I expected. I was expecting prawn crackers, chicken with black bean sauce and fried rice. The food is so diverse here, with a fabulous range of flavours, prices and different beasts to be consumed. I've eaten snakes, sharks fins, stinky tofu, scorpions, grotesque sea-slugs and some stuff I didn't even ask about. I'll write a bit more about food in the next entry.
Even stuff like crossing the road was, at first, very difficlt. Brits drive on the left side of the road, so I had to deal with the switch, but the traffic system, particularly in smaller towns and cities, seems to operate ona system of anticipating other people. Stop, speed up unexpectedly or change direction and you'll get hit by a car or cyclist, as I have been on several occasions. I started emplying a method of crossing the road soon after arrivng. I have named this method of traversing la rue as the "Human Shield Method" Better someone else getting hit than me.
I'll be writing about various places, cultural observations and customs and adding photos about some of the places I've been. Please email or comment if there's anyhting you want me to write about or ask me.
Mike
Advertisement
Tot: 0.068s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 6; qc: 44; dbt: 0.04s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
anonymous
non-member comment
Human Shield?!?
Hi Mike (I'm assuming you're the Mike I know from NTU - there can't be that many Gows can there?)- thanx for the warning, I'll know not to cross a road with you in Beijing. I can't believe it's taken you this long to start writing a travel blog, I'd have thought you would have started one when you first arrived in China. Anyway, I look forward to meeting up with you at Tsinghua Uni. Sarah. :) - Sarah