Arriving in Tianjin
Hello everyone! 大家好！ערב טוב, Bonjour!
My life has been hectic ever since I last saw you guys! For the last month or so I was stepping up my preparation for the flights and arrival in 中国🇨🇳. It was difficult trying to fit everything I love in a suitcase weighing less than 23kg. It was so difficult that, even after moving all my books into hand luggage, the case was 23.6Kg. The suitcase had to contain enough to allow me to establish myself in Tianjin before supplementing my impressive collection of shirts with Taobao purchases and market purchases.
If you were moving away for a year what would be the most important things to bring? I made a little list but (to get us all excited) I wrote it in Chinese:
- 衣服 👚
- 书 📖
- 手机 📱
- 电脑 💻
- 毛绒玩具 🧸
- 相片 🖼️
Can you guess what each item is based on the emojis?
The packing was arduous but I felt so relieved once I was done. Going to the airport was difficult, we had to drop off my puppy at his daycare before we could go and that was also very hard to do. Despite his barking I'm going to miss him loads! When it came time for me to say goodbye to the rest of my family I cried. It was a difficult realisation that I wouldn't be seeing them in person for a while. But once all the other scholars and I got going my tears dried up and I only felt excitement!
There was a short plane journey to London Heathrow airport before we all went to the gate for our plane to Beijing. The flight would take 9 ½ hours. Have you guys ever been on a plane journey that long? Before that one the longest plane journey I'd even been on was 8 hours long.
We were all very tired when we arrived in Tianjin but we got to see our campus and dorm rooms for the first time! I live in the Hexi district of Tianjin - our closest subway station is Wujiayao.
My dorm room seemed Spartan when I first arrived. There wasn't a balcony but it was fully furnished. It just felt bare because it had no personal details. I soon changed that!
We've been out exploring a lot so I've been picking up bits and pieces to decorate my room with. I've also been picking up even more of a preference for Chinese food:
^ I got that massive bowl of noodles in Tianjin's famous shopping centre; Joy city. It has 6 floors, an ice-rink, a movie theatre, a carousel, and a tiny fish pond!
I've also done some proper work already with registering, getting a Chinese phone number, and doing a placement test. The test had two parts, written and spoken. I found the spoken part a lot easier because I made a silly mistake in the written. I mixed up 有(yǒu) with 友(yǒu) so my last paragraph won't have made much sense!
How have you all found the start of the new school year? Is the work easier than you expected or harder?
I'll sign off here and tell you more about Tianjin in my next blog post.
Goodbye, 再见, לְהִתְרָאוֹת, and adieu
Answers and Pinyin:
大家好 （dàjiāhǎo) [Hello Everyone]
中国 (Zhōngguó) [China]
衣服 (yīfu) [Clothes]
书 (shū) [Books]
手机 (shǒujī) [Phone]
电脑 (diànnǎo) [Computer]
毛绒玩具 (máoróngwánjù) [Stuffed toy]
相片 (xiàngpiàn) [photos]
再见 (zàijiàn) [goodbye]