Hello from Nanjing

Update from our Young Leaders

Hello Australia, it’s Jacob and Ben in China. This week has been packed with activities, all day everyday. Activities such as fan dancing, calligraphy, paper cutting and so much more. These activities have been very enjoyable and educational, some of our favourite activities have been Diablo and lion dancing. The Chinese activities require much skill and concentration, some being physical like lion and fan dances and some more relaxing like paper cutting and painting traditional opera masks. All the activities have been amazing and insightful. They’ve been so educational and different to each other.

Every week day, excluding Wednesday, we have three activities after lunch. In the mornings breakfast is at 7:30 except Mondays when we have to get up half an hour earlier for a morning assembly. Classes are pretty intense, starting at 8 and finishing at 5 past 10 with a short break in between for something called morning exercise which is something they do in all of China between morning classes. Morning exercise consists of the entire school running out to their oval and doing a series of dynamic stretches to a interesting beat. Then a short run is completed before returning to class for the next period. The food here is great with breakfast, lunch and dinner all being catered for buffet style. We get fruit and yoghurt every meal, with a range of meats, rice and dumplings to fill our stomachs.  The high school here also provides snacks in between meals to keep us going.

On the weekends we don’t have school just like in Australia, however the School arranges for us to go out Saturday to see the sights of Nanjing and then go shopping at the local markets. Then Sunday is a real blast with our Chinese language buddies taking us out to see Nanjing in a way no one else can. Our buddies decide what we eat and where we go from 8 till 7 every Sunday. Then when we get back we all tell stories of our day. Some people visit museums and others check out the revolutionary 3D arcades. Some went to barbecues for lunch for a real local cultural experience and others went to the most fancy restaurants in all of Nanjing. Our buddies have a range of English speaking skills, and Ben and I were lucky to both get buddies with excellent English speaking skills. Because although our Chinese is improving at light speed we still need them to help us translate what the super fast speaking grandma is angry about. Our trip to China is going great with only a week and a bit to go. See you soon Australia!

Jacob and Ben 

Year 9 - Victorian Young Leaders to China team