In
August of 2000, 45 students from mostly Brigham Young University or Utah
Valley
State College left on a plane to live and teach English for one semester
in a small city called Wuxi. Personally for me it had been the first
time I had ever left the United States and I was extremely excited and
nervous at the same time. We left the Salt Lake International Airport
around 7 or 8 in the morning of August 19, 2000 and flew for about 13 hours
to the other side of the world, China. We arrived in Shanghai sometime
around 8:30 to 9:00 p.m. Finally we got all of our stuff and got
on a bus that took around three hours to get to Wuxi. We were staying
at the school, Wuxi Guanghua, in a building dedicated to us foreign teachers.
They were a series of apartments with two to six persons in each one.
We got to the school around midnight and starting getting situated into
rooms. For the next week the school was so kind and took us around
to different cities located near us. This first week was a little
hard to get use to the food, the smells, the people, and not too mention
the major jet lag. After that week of traveling we started teaching.
I taught 3-6 year old children who came from wealthier families and lived
at the school seeing there parents only every other week for a few days.
We taught from 7 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. and when we finished we would go explore
Wuxi. |
 It
took us about fifteen minutes to walk to the bus stop and then about another
thirty minutes to drive to the city. Drivers in Wuxi are pretty crazy,
weaving in and out of traffic, stopping rarely for pedestrians, and its
not only bus drivers it is everyone, including the taxi driver. If
you get into a taxi you better know how to say the destination right or
a lot of the times we would have someone write it in Chinese on a piece
of paper for us. Wuxi is a very small city in China and the people
there do not see a lot of Americans and it was kind of overwhelming at
first when walking down the street and people would stop whatever they
were doing and stare at you, sometimes point, a lot of people want to take
pictures with you (especially if you are blond,) we even had some kids
ask us to sign our names in a book. |
On our way to the bus stop every day we would pass this property where
this couple was always taking care of their crops. |
| While
trying to get use the smells you also have to get use to the food, this
was a major issue for me. In Wuxi they eat a lot of seafood especially
because Taihu lake is the major lake there. The lake is filled with
fisher men and tons of fishing nets all over, the school we lived at was
around ten to fifteen minutes away from us if walking. We had a cook
at the school who had probably one of the hardest jobs, serving us picky
Americans food! He tried to make the food somewhat western but it
never really turned out that way. We ate rice with every meal, and
for breakfast it usually was either rice mixed with water, instant nutritious
which is a really sugary warm serial, steamed rolls, and some kind of fruit.
After a little while of being there they gave us milk but they rarely drink
milk so we didn't get it too often, and some of us definitely suffered
from it. For lunch and dinner we ate rice, maybe fried chicken, eel,
some sort of fish, bird, and vegetables soaked in grease, once in awhile
noodles, and maybe some tofu. The meals usually seem the same, but
we tended to eat out a lot. There are a ton of KFC's all over and
there is one McDonalds that I am aware of, they also had just built a Pizza
Hut when we were there. The food tastes just a little different but
is cheaper then in the U.S. Beware, if you are staying in China for
more than a few weeks you will gain weight. They use a lot of oil
there and I personally gained weight, but came home and lost it pretty
fast, so its nothing to really worry about, but just know that it happens.
Buying food on the streets is not always a good idea but it never hurt
us, just be careful of what you are buying. |
| Never
drink the water!!! That's pretty common sense but the water there
is not clean and can make you extremely sick so I personally would stay
away from it. Also when you buy bottled water on the streets be careful
that the bottle is sealed, sometimes people collect old bottles and fill
it up with the tap water. The safest thing to drink is soda. |
| Wuxi
is a beautiful city, there are so many things to see. Turtle Head
Island is one of the most incredible things I saw. We took a boat
over to the island and it is so green and so much history there.
There are temples to see, markets to visit, and also the "Big Buddha".
Big Buddha is this huge statue of Buddha in the mountains, there are shops
all around. This is a really famous site there and it is incredible.
There are also many parks to visit and there is a river that goes through
the city. Around October there was the lantern festival and they
had a carnival going on for a few weeks. It was beautiful with all
the lights, the rides were fun but not really too impressive, it was just
a small thing. There is also a place where they make movies that
we were able to go visit. It is this huge set of statues and hills
where some famous movies were made. They also have a place there
where you can get dressed up in these beautiful dresses or warrior suits. |
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 Wuxi
is a beautiful city, there are so many things to see. Turtle Head
Island is one of the most incredible things I saw. We took a boat
over to the island and it is so green and so much history there.
There are temples to see, markets to visit, and also the "Big Buddha".
Big Buddha is this huge statue of Buddha in the mountains, there are shops
all around. This is a really famous site there and it is incredible.
There are also many parks to visit and there is a river that goes through
the city. Around October there was the lantern festival and they
had a carnival going on for a few weeks. It was beautiful with all
the lights, the rides were fun but not really too impressive, it was just
a small thing. There is also a place where they make movies that
we were able to go visit. It is this huge set of statues and hills
where some famous movies were made. They also have a place there
where you can get dressed up in these beautiful dresses or warrior suits. |
