Final weeks

As each day passes I become closer to my departure for China. I've been recently attempting to prepare for this journey by talking to friends who have studied abroad before in China and elsewhere. The questions usually revolve around how did the trip go, would you go again, what did you like the most, what took the most getting used to, what is a MUST see. It came as not much surprise that the answers were fairly common and expected. The must see item is China is the great wall. One person, who has been to China, said that the Great Wall is amazing and Chinese architecture while is great -- tends to look very similar after awhile.  While that doesn't distinguish my ambitions for traveling around China when the opportunity arises, it may change some of the destinations.

Everything in China has a lot of history associated with it.  I hope it doesn't feel like everywhere is a museum and places are only to be seen.  The last person I know who went to China for an extended time said the people were the most enjoyable part of the trip.  Making friends, talking to the people, and learning about the country through the people was the experience that is most memorable.

The semester at Purdue has finally come to a close.  I have continued to power through the semester and the results are successful.  There is room to improve and the classes were difficult.  I look forward to learning all that I can while I'm in China.  I will be studying Mechanical Engineering while I'm there, but I'm most looking forward to studying the culture and growing in a worldly sense.

I started learning Chinese over the weekend.  I have been studying with Rosetta Stone.  It is possible that I'm not far enough into it yet to really have a firm grasp of how the program is suppose to teach.  That being said, after 6 hours of using the program, I feel like it can be miss leading at times.  The premise of each activity is be show a scene, and infer what it means while being told what it is in Chinese.  I have spoken with some folks who know Chinese and I haven't always been inferring the correct things with the pictures.  Though it is building a basic vocabulary of activities, colors, etc.  I plan on sticking with this through the rest of break for a least two hours a day.

Please share your thoughts.  I'll be gone in just about two more weeks.  Let me know if there is something in China that you would see if you would be going over there.  Also clue me into any good deals you know of, like - it sounds like silk items are very cheap in Beijing.  Another person said pearls are very cheap in a small city on the eastern coast.

Thanks
Jbiber

PS- I've added a Mailing List gadget on the right side of the page - near the bottom.  Please sign up if you're interested in being contacted while I'm in China.  I'll likely have some periodical to publish.

Test Slideshow

This is a test slide show. Enjoy!

Paul Merton in China

I've found some what of a good introduction for the Paul Merton video I talked about in November. The video from Discovery talks about Shanghai and China in general.  If you're on campus, you can find it through the normal distribution channels.  If you're not on campus, there are multiple links in the referenced above article.

Episode 4 is the only episode I've seen from the series, though it was a very good video and I would highly recommend watching at LEAST that video.

If you don't already have it, you'll need some software to watch this video file (xvid).  One of the best, and free, video players available - in my opinion - is vlc.  Download here.

JBiber

China Prep

China Prep is a video I recently watched on PBS.  It's not so much about someone preparing to go to China, but rather it's about high school students in China getting ready to take the exam of a lifetime.  This is the exam that students in China take to find out whether they will become wildly successful, mildly successful, or ... not so much.  The exam is for seniors in high school.  It should be noted, that to get into high school -- theres another exam students take 4 years earlier -- that one also determines quite a bit about where each student will go in life.

During the senior year of high school, and for some -- the years leading up to it, students are essentially expected to study 16 hrs a day 7 days a week.  There are times laid out for sleeping, eating, learning, and occasionally stretching to compliment the excessive studying.  The success of each student is incredibly important for the parents of each student because of the one child policy and retirement options.  It is very traditional in China for the grandparents to be taken care of by the parents and live in home.  As a child grows up and gets to having a career, they begin to support their parents and grandparents.  One way to look at it would be that the parents really want their child to do well because the child is their retirement plan.  Each set of parents only has one chance at a good retirement because of the one child policy.  It's an interesting system, different than home for sure.  It's not really a bad system, clearly it works well for the Chinese and if thats how they want to do it, then go for it.

Anyways, the video is interesting and really shows some unique hardships for students as they go through their senior year in high school.  Another interesting piece of the video is part 3 of 3 with Venessa Fong.  It really highlights the different policies between the two countries.

Also note the new gadget on the left, google voice.  It works. It really does call me.  You can try it, it asks for your phone number because it will call you, have you answer -- then it will try to ring me.

World Expo News Story 1

The World Expo will be held in Shanghai starting May 1st.  There is already much talk about the different displays that each country will be having.  In this article at Gizmodo, they discuss a Romanian announcement about their exhibit that was found on a few other sites.  Along with the Romanian exhibit, there are links to a few other exhibits that will be on display linked from the article.  Worth a quick glance.

JBiber