I made it! After a 15 hour flight, 4 hours in the Hong Kong airport and a 70 minute ferry ride, I have arrived in Zhuhai, China. I left Toronto on Friday, May 12, and after almost 24 hours of travelling, I should have been exhausted but it was too exciting! The plane ride was not as tough as I expected and I managed to get a lot of sleep. I was very lucky to be travelling with 6 other students from Saint Mary's, so we were able to navigate the whole trip together.
Once we arrived at the ferry terminal in Zhuhai, we were met by a driver who brought us to BNUZ. At this point it was about 7:00pm local time. Driving through the city was amazing - there are trees lining every road and huge bike lanes and sidewalks. It seems like the city is made for pedestrians and cyclists. When we finally arrived at BNUZ, we were met by our language partners who took us to our rooms. My language partner is named Katherine, and she is in her second year studying international development. She is originally from inner Mongolia, but her native language is Mandarin and she speaks almost perfect English.
After I dumped my luggage in my room, Katherine and I met up with some of the other students and headed to the cafeteria for our first meal in China! I did not know how to order anything or what any of the menus said, so Katherine helped get me some rice and stir-fried vegetables and soy milk. Very yummy! Once I finished eating dinner, Katherine took me on a mini tour of campus, so I could try and situate myself.
She showed me the supermarket, my classrooms and took me to the bank to put money on my student card. All the shops and restaurants on campus have the option to tap your student card and places like the cafeterias will only take the card and not cash, so it's important to make sure there is always money on the card. Then we headed to the supermarket to pick up a towel and some water for my room. Katherine then gave me a new SIM card for my phone. At BNUZ, the wifi zones are restricted to inside the school buildings, so anytime you're outside and need the internet you have to use data. After that it was about 11:30pm, and I decided to go to bed. Katherine said she would meet me at 8:30 on Saturday to take me for breakfast.
The next morning, I was up pretty early so I unpacked all my clothes and laptop so my room felt a little more homey. Katherine took me to the second cafeteria on campus (which is apparently the best out of the 3) and got me some breakfast. I had "Chinese pancakes" and milk tea. After breakfast, we took another tour of the campus, which turned out to be way bigger than I expected. All students at BNUZ are required to live on campus and since the university is fairly far from downtown Zhuhai, the university is basically its own little town. The residence that I am staying in is right on the edge of campus, and Katherine's residence is way on the other end of the campus, about a 35-40 minute walk away. The campus has everything you could need -stores, restaurants, post office, cafeterias, swimming pools, gyms - all on campus. As I walked around, I realized that everything could have been much more contained, but the environment is so gorgeous I imagine they wanted to spread out the buildings so that people could enjoy the scenery. The university is at the bottom of a mountain, and pretty forested, with tons of paths and lakes all around.
After the tour, all of the students in the International Chinese Studies Program were invited to a luncheon to celebrate the beginning of our program. We had another delicious, traditional-style meal and the opportunity to meet the people from Acadia university who are also attending the program here. At the lunch, one of the program organizers, Mr. Bill Bu said something that really struck with me. When he was talking about how excited the BNUZ students were to have us here, he said "don't be a rock thrown into a pond, only getting wet on the outside. Be a sponge thrown into a pond, and absorb as much as you can." It's only been a few days, but I already know that this experience is irreplaceable.
Hope you enjoyed reading! I started my classes today, and will be making a post about that soon. I'll also be posting more photos on the Gallery page of you would like to check them out. Thanks for reading :)
