Day 2 (4-3-2009) - Opening Ceremony and awkward dining

I woke up on day 2 feeling very cold even though I had my windbreaker on. We realized much later on that we left the window open and did not turn the air-con on properly.

We had our opening ceremony at 8.50 am so we did not have time to go anywhere for breakfast, given the time we woke up. Half of the opening ceremony was spoken in Chinese, a language that I am familiar with, but not by any means understand. Luckily, English was used later on and we were briefed roughly on what is going to happen for the next 41 days.

Campus tour was very interesting. I really love this campus as it seems to always be filled with life, even in the earliest of morning and the coldest of nights. I remember last night, when we just arrived in campus that I thought we were still on a normal street in Wuhan. I did not know that the big buildings, roads, road signs and others were all part of the campus. Right now, I still can’t believe that campus feels so unlike a school; much different from Ngee Ann Polytechnic.

We went to see many places during the campus tour, but my favourite was the basketball court, where you could see many students gather to engage in physical activities, most notably Tai Chi.

We then had our lunch in a restaurant, in a hotel, in the campus. Again, I still couldn’t believe that all this was part of the campus. The lunch we had was probably my highlight of the day.

Jonathan, Shakir and I, had unknowingly put ourselves in a difficult situation. We were going to have our lunch at the same table as the 2 guests, the deans of the university. None of the 3 of us was aware of the Chinese customs and proper way of eating dinner. We did not even know what we could and could not eat! So I was very pressured and nervous throughout the dinner, constantly reminding myself not to do anything stupid. One thing I did not understand was how often u had to give a toast with someone.

We later learned that the giving toasts or saying cheers is very common in dinners between business partners, or in our case, between guests and hosts. Luckily, Shakir bravely broke the ice by giving a toast to Mr Liang, one of the deans of the school. I learned a lot from this dinner alone. I also tasted one of the signature dishes of Wuhan, “Toufu pi”, aka toufu skin (I am unsure of the spelling). I feel that Toufu will be very important during my time here as it is a Halal food, and it is quite healthy. The way it is served here in Wuhan is also very delicious.

After that it was pretty much our free time but we decided to go shopping together as a group at the supermarket nearby. There, we bought what we felt we needed. Some people bought hangars and mugs while others were more concerned about detergent and toilet rolls. I bought a fair share of stuff but I felt that nothing was as important prickly heat powder. It keeps you slightly warm, and I can substitute it with bathing if I feel that I’m just too cold to shower.

We did something very important after that, which was to get a local Sim card to call one another, and also to call our family and friends back at home. My mother was delighted to hear from me and for the 100^th time, reminded me to take care of my money and belongings properly all the time.

I had another interesting time when I was eating dinner. We had it at the same place as the previous night, and Shakir, Jonathan, Fareez and I sat at a separated table from the others, as we wanted to eat Halal food. We had much difficulty communicating with the Chinese waitresses and needed urgent help from our Chinese friends. In the end, we ordered rice, with 2 dishes of fish, 1 dish of toufu and 1 dish of corn. Once again, the toufu did not disappoint and so did the fish. Overall we had a great dinner but we were just jokingly annoyed by the fact that the waitresses stared, looked and giggled at us while we were eating. Maybe it was because of how we used our spoons and chopsticks, or maybe it’s because of how hungry we looked while we were eating. Whatever it is, I hope that we did not leave a bad impression.

We then had a brief meeting at the girl’s hostel, which I believe, is far better than ours, because they own their own bathroom, they have a personal desk and drawers, and most importantly they have Internet access. But I am not going to complain so much as my decision to come here was to put myself out of my comfort zone, and live a simple life.

After the meeting we went back to our hostel, played some cards, watched some TV and went to bed late as we knew there was going to be a free day the next day.

this photo was taken after the awkward lunch that I had. nevertheless, it was still a nice and memorable opening ceremony