I've finished watching ISWAK finally, and watched almost all of 2pm's variety show, and I'm currenty staring at the computer screen wondering what to do next. Since I've nothing better to do, I will blog about the china immersion trip (finally) even though the trip is long over. And I don't want memories of this trip to be forgotten, at least it's saved in this blog! Morever hardly anyone blogged about this trip, or rather very few of the china immersion people have blogs. Haiss..

(Good thing I kept my own personal daily diary in china! At least I won't forget stuffs!)

So here goes:

Day 1 | Tuesday 10 November 2009

Mummy brought me to Changi Airport Terminal 3! First time at Teriminal 3 and IT'S IMPRESSIVE! So huge! Haha! Met the rest and Shumin, Charissa and I started looking at our passports during waiting time. Gosh Charissa has this stamp from Australia that is stamped on a dog-eared of her passport, such that the stamp is cut into 3 parts which are on 3 different sides of a paper. Damn cool lah! It's like some sort of puzzle haha! (Oh and apparently Charissa's younger brother ponned school just to send her off! So sweet lah!)

Boarded SQ830 (SINGAPORE AIRPLINES YOU KNOW ZOMG) at 10am. Flight lasted all the way till 3.15pm. Watched Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, rather enjoyable, but yes I agree with most people - the funeral was disappointing. Had some fish thing for lunch in the plane. Shumin and I shared Charissa's unwanted bread. (Gosh Singapore Airlines bread is damn damn damn nice to eat! Especially with butter! I'm lovin' it~) Got off the plane at Shanghai and collected luggage. Zou Yan almost lost her luggage, quite scary really. Hahaha my luggage was so easy to look for since it's orange and hardly anyone has orange luggage! ^^

Boarded a shuttle bus at 5.15pm to Suzhou, there was traffic jam, and we stayed in the bus for nearly 3 hours. It was here where I entertained Charissa with videos on my phone, and the fateful time where I showed Charissa the hamburger video which led to her craziness about it thoroughout the trip. Reached 星海实验学校 at 8.30pm. Had our first meal in the school, was damn hungry then haha.

Fact #1: The school only provides spoon to eat meals, no forks at all. It felt weird at first, but we got used to it. ^^

Went to our dormitory! The dorm is nice and simple! Spacious too! And so cool lah bunker beds where below is a table and cabinet (where we placed our luggage in). Except the mattress was kinda thin haha. Had debrief in teacher's room and that was when I really needed to do big business. Almost died holding in cause the debrief seemed super long haha. Chionged back to room to 'complete mission'.

Fact #2: As the flushing system was not very strong in the dormitory, we had to throw toilet papers we used in a bin, and NOT in the toilet bowl. Yes sounds gross and pretty inconvenient. My mum was freaked out when she heard about this too. And once I forgot to put the papers in the bin, and flushed the toilet. As expected the paper was stuck in the toilet bowl and I had to use my hands to get it out and throw it in the bin.

Fact #3: Occurence of toilet bowl flooding was common in my dormitory. Especially once when Shumin's poo refused to get in and was floating around in the toilet bowl. Poor Gin saw it...

Fact #4: Since there's always choking of our toilet bowl, our dormitory room had this funny smell. It's a smell you'll smell when you enter the room, but get use to it almost immediately. So to get rid of this weird odour, Shumin ate lots of oranges and collected orange peels to fragrance our room. It kinda worked, to the extend that some of our dormitory room visitors commented that our room was damn nice to smell. Haha.

Day 2 | Wednesday 11 November 2009

Woke up at 7am. We (Sinlie, Shumin, Charissa and I) staggered our waking time so that we won't be waiting for each other to use the toilet. It kinda worked brilliantly!

Fact #5: Charissa's and my bunk beds are linked together, and it was damn shaky (we suspect that a screw might be lose). So shaky that even super skinny Charissa, when she went up the ladder the whole bed will shake terribly. And when I sleep and turn aruond, the bed will shake and squeaky sounds will be produced. Once when Shichen came to our room to help us kill flying insects in our dormitory, she went up my bunk bed and commented that our bed was so shaky that she felt that she was sitting on a '船'.

Had porridge and herbal egg for breakfast.

Fact #6:Their porridge is very very taste-less, and many of us has realised the importance and how great herbal egg is for breakfast. Whenever herbal egg is being served in breakfast we'll all be damn happy! ^^

Had some introductory ceromony at 星海实验学校 with the principal of the school. Proceeded to have lessons witht the students. Was assigned to 八（一）班 with Charissa and Shumin. As their exams were just over, they went through their exam scripts most of the time. Pretty boring haiss..

Fact #7: Their papers are printed in a way that one paper is folded into half with each half printed, so it's like a book. And the paper used is kinda fragile.

Oh and they had this eye exercise break thing where a music track will be played over the PA system and someone counting (it's pre-recorded) the beat for them to do eye exercise. Really cool lah!

Lunch! Oh their canteen is so much different from NYGH! They all eat the same thing and just collect their food, no need to pay! (I think they pay in advance for the whole term/semester/year bah) Haha the tray used is kinda like what army people will use! (And again only one spoon provided haha) The food provided is nice, but very oily, especially the vegetables. Oh they provide soup too! Gosh the lunch is a lot and damn filling, compared to the meagre amounts we get in school haiss. The lunch is like 3 or 4 times the amount you get if you order food from mix veg stall. And there's fruits too!

After that was English lessons. My most anticipated lesson other than Math haha. Cause I was really interested to know how they would teach English. And guess what.. English lessons was conducted 90% in Chinese =.= They went through exam papers too, and there was this grammar question that was very puzzling:

There was little milk in the fridge, was/wasn't it?

The teacher said the answer is was. However most of us thought it was 'wasn't', and we asked ms foo later and even she agreed the answer is 'wasn't'. The china friend who shared with me her exam paper explained that because 'little' milk is negative, so the other half of the sentence will be the opposite-positive. So weird!

Had calligraphy lessons which was fun. LOl fun to screw up words I wrote. And Zou Yan was sitting in front of Shumin and her writing IS DAMN NICE LAH! Like printed gosh!! Super pro! ^^ Then had some Chinese Calligraphy drawing lessons. Learnt to dra bamboo shoots but I was damn fail lol!

Had dinner, gosh equally filling meals as usual. Went back to dormitory and watched TV, and most of us gathered in Shichen's (I think) room to play cards. Super fun lah! SLept at 11pm

Day 3 | Thursday 13 November 2009

Had 5 wontons soup for breakfast (shared with sinlie). Math lessons first! Gosh everything is really taught in Chinese! I copied one of the math questions for fun: (It's related to geometry)

如图，在矩形ABCD中，AB=3, AD=4, P 是 AD 上不与A, D 重合的一动点，PE (perpendicular sign) AC, PF (perpendicular sign) BD, E, F, 为垂足，求PE+PF的值。

Conclusion: I'll get 0 for Math if I ever change my school to a China local school in China.

Oh but I managed to learn a very cool new geometry method in this lesson! It's kinda like a combination of algebra too!

Had Chinese then, studied about 柳宗元's 《小石潭记》. Really interesting lah! Although it was damn cheem but enjoyed it thorouhgly! They do 分析 of it too!

柳宗元：小石潭记

从小丘西行百二十步，隔篁竹，闻水声，如鸣佩环，心乐之。伐竹取道，下见小潭，水尤清洌。全石以为底，近岸，卷石底以出，为坻，为屿，为嵁，为岩。青树翠蔓，蒙络摇缀，参差披拂。

潭中鱼可百许头，皆若空游无所依。日光下彻，影布石上，佁然不动；俶尔远逝，往来翕忽。似与游者相乐。

潭西南而望，斗折蛇行，明灭可见。其岸势犬牙差互，不可知其源。

坐潭上，四面竹树环合，寂寥无人，凄神寒骨，悄怆幽邃。以其境过清，不可久居，乃记之而去。

同游者：吴武陵，龚古，余弟宗玄。隶而从者，崔氏二小生：曰恕己，曰奉壹。

Super cool and cheem lah! And they are even expected to memorise the whole thing PLUS the chinese translation of this piece! Like OMFG lah! Scary. But I can kinda read this out loud and it's damn cool! Maybe I'll memorise this and scare people off by reciting it wahahaha!

Their Chinese textbook is freaking cool lah! Really wanted to buy it haha but couldn't find it lah! SUPER COOL LAH ZOMG! It's like cheem-ness to the max haha! And they study 朱自清《背影》too! Haha the piece I almost wanted to do for my Chinese SIA! FREAKING COOL LAH!

Okay then had Physics lessons which were the ultimate terror for Shumin and I. Totally couldn't understand most of what he said, other than the diagrams the teacher drew on the blackboard. Oh yes the physics teacher draws lines INCREDIBLY STRAIGHT! Damn pro lah!

Had stomachache then. Gah it's those kinda that couldn't be solved by big business. And it wasn't cramp either. I suspect it was indigestion cause of the huge amounts of food I've eaten. Stayed in the dormitory for the rest of the afternoon, slept from 1-4pm while the rest learnt Chinese dance (GAHH! can't believe I missed it but the dance seems okay lah not so terrific haha). Oh yes huge thanks to ms foo who looked after me when I was sleeping. Wow I didn't know she checked on me 2/3 times to feel my forehead if I had a fever. I thought she only came to my room once! Had a very slight fever of 37.3 degrees, fortunately the poh chye medicine helped my stomach and I felt a lot better during dinner, though I didn't have much appetite. Ate only rice and soup for dinner.

Slept very early at 7pm cause I was still feeling a bit weird. While the rest had the first sesson of 空中会议 which I completely missed! D:

Day 4 | Friday 14 November 2009

(I didn't write my diary that day! But wrote some notes fortunately, so there won't be much details for this day)

Had History, English, Chinese and Math lessons. Hmm History was going through their exam papers. And gosh they get super high for marks one lah! The paper is out of 50, and if you get 48 and above it's considered damn good, and if you get 45 and above it's considered average. LIKE WTH LAH! Gosh. And the teacher announces the marks of everyone while giving out the scripts. Kinda scary. And she even asks those who got full marks to go to the front of the class to tell the class how they went about getting so good marks. LIKE OMG!

English.. they went through their textbook which talked about some endangered species thing. And apparently there was this short passage which the teacher expected everyone to read the whole thing under one minute. Damn weird lah! Haha I think the English teacher is the only teacher that acknowledges Shumin, Charissa and my presence. She keeps asking the class to converse with us more in English, but they didn't haha. Shumin and I were like wanting Charissa to read that passage in a debate-y voice to the whole class to show them how fast she is hahahha. But didn't lah in the end.

Math... gosh the first time I really felt damn damn bored in a Math lesson. The teacher spent like 30min explaining what a rhombus is. LIKE WTH LAH! Ms Teng/Mr Tiong could have done it in 30 seconds! And the only thing I learnt from this Math lesson is what a rhombus is called in chinese: 菱形.

Oh yes if i'm not wrong it was this day that we ran 800m with Grade 8 and 9 cohort! Damn hilarious lah! The school requires students to run 2 rounds around the track everyday during winter, except when the track is wet or it's raining. So most of the time the track was wet and we ran with them for only one day. They run as a class, and on the track there are 2 levels at once. And it's damn hilarious to see blocks and blocks of classes running together, looks like some herds of animals or something haha. The running speed was damn slow, like brisk walking haha but the teachers around expects everyone to jog. And we weren't allowed to place our hands in our pockets!

The run was VERY effective in keeping us warm. Had this weird feeling of feeling very warm but cannot sweat at all lol! The coldest part of my body was my hands in the end, practically freezing cause of the cold winter wind blowing against us while we were running. Fun experience though!

Fact #8: The students were allowed to eat in class!! Gosh lucky them!

Fact #9: They are damn damn noisy between lesson periods. Especially the guys. It's not uncommon to see people running about and shouting between lessons. And they really like to shove people gosh. Got shoved lots of time haha.

Went to an exhibition about 新加坡苏州工业园区15周年. Quite interesting!

Then had some Q&A sessions about 世界遗产, and we had this buddy each from 星海实验学校, haha mine was pretty fun to talk to! And she kept telling me how pro singapore students are cause we can speak two languages so well. So not true lor. =.= My chinese is horrible. Gosh.

Fact #10: The students are damn damn enthu in asking questions! Compared to 202 classroom setting! And the teacher will always call out people's name to answer questions almost every 3 minutes!

Day 5 | Saturday 15 November 2009

Ate 油条 and 豆浆 in some shop. SUPER YUMMY OKAY! The 油条 is like freaking huge and cripsy! LOVE IT~ Went to 观前街 for SHOPPING WOOHOO~ It's the best shoppable place out of all the shopping oppotunities we get. Spent lots of time at this huge bookshop!

AND I DIDN'T KNOW THERE WAS A MAGAZING SECTION GAHH! Sonia bought like 2 ENTIRELY Kpop magazines with CD for just 10RMB! That's like 2 dollars GOSHGOSHGOSH!

Shumin got yueling's super girl cd there too! for 45RMB, pretty cheap I guess. Resisted my urge to purchase SNSD's gee mini album.

Got some food too! for parents and friends~

Then went for river cruise (苏州环城古运河). SUPER NICE LAH the scenery! Pictures all on facebook! Though it doesn't look as nice as when you see it yourself! Bought the poker cards souvenir for only RMB7.50! Moreover each poker cards have different pics of 苏州!

Had lunch at a hotel.. didn't have much appetite again. Ate relatively little compared to the rest. Gosh there were MANY dishes.. as you can see in my fb pics!

Went to 寒山寺，虎丘 and 苏州刺绣研究所. 寒山寺 was a temple, where I followed Sinlie, Charissa, Gin and Shumin. They are Buddhists so I just watched them pray most of the time. 虎丘 is supposed to look like some sort of tiger haha, the pagoda is slightly tilted (like leaning tower of pisa), which was quite cool haha.

The best place is the embroidery factory lah! SUPER COOL! There are three kinds of embroider: 1) Both sides of the piece looks exactly the same. 2) Both sides of the piece has the same design but different colour. 3) Both sides of the piece has entirely different designs. The third is obviously the best and most difficult to do, and very few people have the talent to do it. The guide was telling us that embroiders (I created this word, not sure if it's in the dictionary) have to be really good in drawing, cause they actually reproduce small pictures onto a huge cloth.

Really fascinating, saw this embroidery of several empty wine glass, super pro lah! And they were selling the pieces.. with many zeros in them haha. The pictures ranged from Vincent van Gogh's Sunflower, to animals and flower. Damn cool lah! Unfortunatley we weren't allowed to take photos, if not i'll be taking hundreds of photos there LOL! It's just super pro gosh.

Had dinner at another restaurant. Had a better appetite and ate a lot more! ^^

Expenditure for this day (in RMB):
52: 3 Chinese Books
4.5: 1 Notebook
7.50: 1 苏州 Poker Card
20: 2 Boxes of Biscuits
8.20: 1 Packet of Sweets
100: China Phone Card (Purchased earlier during the trip)
Total: 192.20

Day 6 | Sunday 16 November 2009

Breakfast at the same place as the previous day! Except we ordered different things to try out different dishes. Had porridge, 小笼包 and 锅贴. OMG 小笼包 IS THE LOVE <333! Went to a silkworm factory. And saw real silkworms for the first time in my life! IT'S DAMN CUTE LAH HAHA! Bought a 100% pure silk pillow.. quite costly.

Had free time to shop in 山塘街. Really different from 观前街. 山塘街 gives a more olden days feeling. Went for lunch at a restaurant (again).

Visited 拙政园, a world heritage place. Really nice scenery, though it was quite hard to take photos cause there were so many tourists. Packed like mad.

Then had free time to explore 苏州博物馆 by ourselves! Sinlie, Charissa, Shumin and I just browed through artefacts damn quickly. Then we found a spot where hardly anyone goes outdoor and started to take photos using self-timer mode on the camera! (Here was where came out the nobody-inspired picture which many people liked on facebook ^^). Had dinner and headed back to dormitory!

Expenditure:
10: 1 Tube of Potato Chips
47.80: 2 Chinese Books
180: 100% Silk Pillow + Cover
Total: 237.80

Day 7 | Monday 17 November 2009

Had Chinese, English, PE and Math.

PE was cancelled cause the tracks were wet D: And we ended up playing chinese chess with the China students who accompanied us! Super fun lah! Haha! I watched and helped Shumin but was kinda fail in helping haha. Only helped her to eat as many of the opponent's pieces lol!

I got so bored during Math that I started sketching the classroom on my diary lol! And the teacher kept walking up and down to see what we were doing. (Charissa, Shumin and I sat right at the back of the class.) Had lunch in school, and had some 研究会 about world heritage. Pretty cool.

Fact #11: Wow NYGH students are really trained in presentation skills compared to them.

Then had embroidery lessons! Shared a cloth with Charissa! And 曹老师 said I have talent in embroidery woohoo~~ Haha she even said that I was the best out of everyone LOL!! Charissa and I were so passionate about embroidery that we stayed back for 10 more minutes while the rest went to collect presents haha!

Had farewell party which was pretty fun! This guy from 星海实验学校 sang a chinese song and he's damn pro lah! And there was zou yan's caligraphy performance with two twins playing erhu, a funny english skit, our very embarrassing chinese dance performance with a 茉莉花 track that sounded like some funeral song.. Though the You're My Sunshine performance was great!

Haha there's this super super tall British English teacher who is damn friendly haha. He shook hands with Shumin and I, and his hands are damn warmed lah, he was like exclaiming how frozen our hands were haha. The whole bunch of us took photos with him cause he was just so tall! Haha he was super enthusiastic-ly waving his hands while we sang You're My Sunshine hahah! Damn hilarious!


SUPER TALL RIGHT?!?! Haoqing's nickname for him - Mr Tallie

Then the students from our class gave us this super nice suzhou scenery embroidery! LOVE IT! And we took photos with the teachers and the students. Charissa was going all crazy how cute the form teacher is, and she was damn sad for not sitting beside the reacher when we were taking photos lol!


Haha here is that fateful photo! Beside Shumin is the form teacher Charissa went crazy about, and behind the three students, the most left is the monitress, and the two on the right are the students who accompanied us most of the time! They are super nice and funny!

Received some certificate and a 星海实验学校 mascot softoy~ Took lots of people pictures too! ^^

Day 8 | Tuesday 18 November 2009

Took a 3 hours bus ride to Hangzhou, slept lots on the bus! Visited 岳飞庙, 西湖 and 苏东坡博物馆. 岳飞庙 was nice and educational! The tour guide was really good in explaining historical stuffs, and even talked to us about 鸦片战争 on the bus! He even recited chinese poems! 西湖 was kinda boring, Charissa and I were talking about how overrate it is. Haiss.. Couldn't take nice photos there either. It's like this huge lake and we sit on this boat around it. We see practically the same thing during the whole 50min boat trip. And apparently 100 西湖s equal one singapore. And Charissa was having this heated discussion with 曹老师 whether 100 西湖s equal one singapore meant that singapore was huge or tiny. LOL.

Checked into St. Rich, our hotel in Hangzhou. The corridoors of the hotel was damn scary. Every corner you turn you see three four hotel room doors. Ms Foo was telling us that anything can happen, anybody can just open the door and pull us in. And Charissa told her mum on her phone 'I CAN GET RAPED ANYTIME!' =.=

Oh yes I roomed with Charissa! Pretty fun to room with her haha! We talked LOTS! Cause I somehow caused the TV not to switch to a channel, so we just talked haha! Talked till 1am! Oh yes and the door of the toilet is horribly weird, the main door of the toilet is the same door of the shower cubicle. Damn weird lah.

Day 9 | Wednesday 19 November 2009

Woke up super early to go down earlier to use the computer to check our subject combinations, unfortunately it wasn't out yet. Was the first few to go for breakfast and the last few to leave the buffet breakfast haha!

Went to Longjing Tea Factory, where they were promoting this green tea leaves at super high price. Luckily I called my mum to asked if I should buy them, she has been to these kind of thing in hangzhou and said it wasn't worth it. Bought the green tea sweet though cause it's damn damn nice! (Ended up giving one whole packet to the class during BBQ!)

3 hours bus trip to Shanghai, and went to Chenghuangmiao Shopping Area for shopping again! But nothing nice to buy though. Saw several interesting things in shops! Oh there's starbucks there too! But the price is about the same as singapore's. Haoqing and Zou Yan were crazy enough to buy frappe during winter gosh. Ended up buying a pair of sneakers with Sinlie while Shumin bought her winter clothes.

Oh yes and Sinlie wanted to buy this clip for her sister, and I was used as a guinea pig for the saleswoman to show how to use the clip gosh. Haha. We bargained a lot, to the point where the saleswoman got quite irritated heh.

Drove past 上海外滩, couldn't take nice photos cause it was dark and the bus was moving. Though the scenery was damn damn beautiful with all the lightings! (Hahaha when I went home I realised my dad took photos of those when he was in Shanghai earlier heh!)

Checked into Crowne Plaza hotel. Gosh super high class lah! It's the same hotel most of us saw in Changi Airport Terminal 3! Love the hotel! Though I accidentally broke 3glasses and had to pay 60RMB for them.

It was today that many of us found out about the horrible truth about SAP and MSTP. Haiss.. shall accept my fate bah haha. Was kinda sad about it, but i'm okay now! ^^ Talked for super super long with my mum on the phone, cause my dad bought this card where to talk overseas for damn long, and it was free on the hotel phone if it was incoming call yay! Haha Charissa and I took turns to use the phone! Talked to my mum til 1am. Slept at 3am cause I was watching Hell's Kitchen and eating my food haha. Oh yes gave the remainder of Drama Fest Prize (popcorn) to Sinlie and Shumin who's in another room! And gosh the hotel's TV even had a French Channel! Freaking cool lah! First time I get to hear English from a TV after a week haha! (The dormitory TV only has China channels)

Expenditure:
50: 3 Packets of Green Tea Sweets
50: 2 Packets of Mochi
70: 1 Pair of Sneakers

(The Mochis are given to special people cause I don't have enough haha. So if you're one of them who received the mochis be honoured! ^^ Oh it's given with a weird sweet I bought earlier during the trip, however turned out some people like it! xD)

Day 10 | Thursday 20 November 2009

Had buffet breakfast. Gosh absolutely love the buffet! They even had Japanese cuisine in the buffet! And tons of different kinds of fruit juices! Charissa and I were the first to arrive the buffet cause we prepared super fast and woke up damn early. (In both days staying in the hotels, we totally didn't hear the morning call cause we were at breakfast already! Shows how early we are haha!)

Walked into 复旦大学 which was damn near our hotel. Took this damn professional picture by accident. It's one of my favourite pics lah!!



Had a damn rushed lunch in another restaurant cause we were behind time. Thought we were going to be late for the plane back home but fortunately we weren't. Sat with completely different people on the plane back cause everyone's sitting arrangement was all different. Even the two teachers were split! Sat with siyao and haoqing! Though haoqing had really bah motion sickness, first time I've seen someone with motion sickness. Had lunch (AGAIN!) on the plane and they gave us this HUGE icecream! Didn't watch anything and spent most of the time sleeping. Landed at Singapore at about 7 if I'm not wrong, gosh Singapore's night scene from the plane is damn damn nice! Super beautiful lightings!

Home sweet home~


Stuffs I bought throughout the trip!


How our dormitory room at 星海实验学校 looks like! Roomates: Sinlie, Charissa and Shumin!

Living with these people really made me understand their personalities a lot more! Charissa talks a lot, to the extend of talking herself when everyone is trying to sleep lol. Shumin takes a very long time to prepare herself in the morning. Sinlie is very fast in preparing and wakes up punctually! DAMN FUN PEOPLE! :D

Ending this post with the most-liked pictures among all my pictures taken from this trip:


I want nobody nobody but you~

Extra info:
Total no. of words in this post: 5000
Total time taken to do this post: 2 hours 10 minutes