7

Day 7-1st September 08

It’s the start of lessons!!!

Today’s lesson time plan is as follows:

8.15-10.00am- History, Geography and Culture (Lecturer Shi Ding Le)
10.20-12.00pm- International Business (Lecturer Frederick Low)

To play on the safe side on not wanting to be late for class, we got ready by 7am! I woke up a little later than them as I have packed my stuffs (laptop, cable, paper…) for class yesterday. As mentioned before, I felt that the road towards school was really tedious yet, as we walked in the cool breeze of the mornings, it was all quite refreshing. On the way to school, there were peddlers by the side selling all sorts of breakfast. Weee!J It’s so different from what we see at Singapore. Perhaps we can only see this in the “Pasar Malams” of Singapore and even so, it is not opened in the mornings at such a time. I enjoy this very much! All the foooood….

I wanted to eat the ‘油条’ but today, that peddler was not there thus I bought soy bean and some buns (包) only. Wanted to have the typical Chinese fare- “Dou jiang you tiao”. I shall have it another day then. Btw, their pao is a little different from Sg’s too. They have less filling, more skin and it is more salty but they are all freshly made!

As we walked nearer to the building, there were ladies who were doing their morning exercise out in the open space. It is still so early in the morning and the entire street was already bustling with students, peddlers, and elderly. I remember this saying “ 早起的鸟儿有虫吃 “- the early bird catches the worm. I wonder do all of them follows this or only in the early generations as in my family, my grandparents still follows this while we, as the later generation bunch, sleeps late and wake up late. HA!

Classes begun with our China lecturer (Shi Ding Le), she gave us some insights which I have never noticed before. Such as the Chinese culture’s core is one of a collective cluster. In efforts to maintain this, group identities are created. It is best to go with the flow. Example in a class, students are encouraged to not raise any questions. ‘个人主义’与‘团体主义 ’(individualism vs collectivism). Collective cluster is labeled as good while individual clusters are labeled as bad. We also learnt about the taboo terms in Wuhan. Such as when quoting prices, ‘二百五’(250) is a taboo no. as it means dumb. By quoting this price, you are directly calling the seller dumb! =X
One really classic area we found was the toilet at the school building!!! WAHHH! There was no flushing system and no doors for each cubicle. It is just a long hole across the 3 cubicles for people to squat and urine/shit. 太经典啦！ It means that when you urine/ shit, it will stay there until u wash with water or remove it manually.=_=. Quite unhygienic eh… Imagine that the toilet is packed and all the shit are piling. Luckily, everywhere else do not have this anymore!!! PHEW! But it is a real eye-opener! Imagine the people of the past, they have to endure this…

Fortunate us.

We went to a soup restaurant for lunch. The herbal soups all have different health benefits. I drank the red date black chicken soup which was good for blood circulation and good for skin! I LOVE IT! I felt my face feeling hot soon after drinking. I believe it works! YAY:)