October 25, 2016
This morning, everyone had to wake up at 5:30 AM, which was extremely early for some of
us. The funny thing is, though, that some people didn’t get even a wink of sleep the night before,
and the others slept like babies.
We all got a breakfast from the hotel which was comprised of three little loafs of bread, a
yogurt, and a bin of tomatoes and grapes. I liked everything except for the yogurt because it was
a flavor that I wasn’t a big fan of. After breakfast, we made our way to where the bullet trains
were. We had to wait for an hour for ours to come. Getting on the bullet train was hectic since
there were so many people, and we were a large group ourself. We had to spend around five
hours on it, and I just slept through the most of it (but I did do a little bit of my homework, too!).
Maggie managed to make friends with a random photographer during that time, which I thought
was funny.
When we got off the train, we immediately went to go eat
lunch. The lunch was my favorite meal of the day, probably
because I was starving by the time it was served. After lunch, we
went to Ancient Hongcun, where the film of “Crouching Tigers
and Hidden Dragons” was shot. The scenery was really cool, and
we learned a lot about China’s
culture. Did you know that the
structure of Hongcun was designed to resemble the anatomy
of a water buffalo?
We bought lots of souvenirs from this place, using our
tactical bargaining skills. This is also a part of Chinese
culture! And then we went to Xidi Old Town where we
bought even more things! I thought that it was more challenging to buy stuff here because of the
currency rate difference, and I had to keep on asking Emily questions about how much money I
was spending on an item in terms of American dollars. But it definitely made the experience
more fun, and I can’t wait to buy even more stuff in the future!
After our tours, we went to eat dinner. Le Laoshi kept on telling us to eat more since there
was so much left on the plates. Even our tour guide, William, said that we were wasting a lot of
food! The culture difference is really different here though, and I remember Isabel saying that she
wasn’t going to eat Chinese food for a full three weeks when she gets back because of this trip.
When we got to our hotel, we had the usual study session and a bit of practice for our
performance coming up this Saturday. Good luck, us!
Like William said, we’re so lucky to be able to visit China. I’m really grateful for this
wonderful trip, and it’s only the second day!
I miss my parents, my friends, and everyone in CGS. I’m going to be so torn when coming
back since I know I’ll love China so much, but I also love everyone back in America. I’ll just enjoy
the time that I’m spending here~
— Ashley Hong
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