November Blog
This month we had the opportunity to take part in some exciting events. On Halloween, our floor in the halls where we stay, organised a little Halloween party so we could show all our international friends how we celebrate it. We all got dressed up in costumes that we made with bits and bobs we had lying around. Some of the costumes people had made included DIY characters from Kung Fu Panda, a mummy, some creative use of face paint and myself wearing my suit as a peaky blinder. We played games such as dunking for apples and wrapping the mummy. One of our lecturers came along with her son. It was great fun.
Our University offered us an afternoon trip to the Tianjin Agricultural University. Although we were not too sure what to expect from this, or what it was about, a few of us decided to go. We got to the event and were shown to a lecture hall where we listened to a very long talk on the importance of healthy eating and having a balanced diet. The talk for the most part, was spoken in Chinese, however some parts were translated into English, so I got the jist of it! In the UK when talking about having a balanced diet, we usually will refer to a visual aid in the form of a plate of food to show which food groups are more important than others. We found at the talk that the Chinese equivalent of this is a Health Pagoda (tower). Each level is a different food group starting from the most important at the bottom to the unhealthier groups at the top. Most the food groups are the same except oil which is in the same group as sugar. After the lecture we were given a little tour around some of their facilities and got to see some students working on the design of a food process product line. As well as this we got to have a taste of some beer which some the students had brewed it in their lab which was actually very good.
On one of our free Saturdays a few my friends and I went to Ikea in Tianjin. We took the subway, however when we got off, we had no idea where to go, so we started walking to see if we could find the building. Thankfully the large blue and yellow warehouse came into view and we knew we were in the right place. We spent a good few hours sauntering around the path marked with arrows on the floor looking at all the things we wanted to buy. Everything was same as back home but with the addition of chopsticks. We may have spent a little bit of extra time in the bedroom department which just reminded me of how uncomfortable my bed in the halls is! We ended the day with Ikea’s Swedish meatballs for dinner, which tasted just as amazing as they do back home.
All the current Tianjin Scholars from Scotland were invited to a Scottish Alumni Ceilidh held in the 5-star Peninsula Hotel in Beijing. This was another great opportunity to wear my kilt. We arrived in Beijing and 10 of us settled into our airbnb for the weekend. When we arrived at the hotel we were absolutely blown away by how grand it was, it’s probably one of the fanciest places I’ve been to. There was a buffet of a variety of canapés and drinks. The night opened with a speech from an important government official from the British Embassy. Once he finished, the ceilidh band, who were all the way from Edinburgh, started to play and we all got up to dance. The other people at the event were mostly Chinese Nationals who had previously attended a Scottish University; either Glasgow, Edinburgh or St Andrews. The night finished with Auld Lang Syne. A lovely reminder of home!
If the previous evening wasn’t fancy enough, a few of the scholars and I had bought tickets to the Beijing St Andrews Charity Ball which was on a completely different level. It was at the China Beijing World Hotel and is right next door to the biggest Louis Vuitton store I’ve seen in my life. This event was made up of different government officials, businessmen, sponsors and other expats living in China. This was a good chance to speak to different people about their respective industries. The most memorable was from a Chinese businessman who is involved in real estate in China and the US, we had quite an interesting conversion about the EU and Brexit. He knows Trump! We sat down at our table in the ballroom for the 5 course meal which included a deconstructed fish salad, a perfectly cooked steak, haggis, sorbet served in a cocktail glass and finally a cheese cake. For the table there was a bottle of 10 year old Talisker. It defiantly tasted of home! The rest of the night was spent dancing and chatting away with people. There was a raffle draw and two of my friends were lucky enough to win a bottle of Scottish gin and a week membership in a gym, however I was not so lucky! Although I feel very lucky to be taking part in all these events.
