*MADE IN CHINA*: 2009-05-31

Day 1

This day, we were greeted by the rain which had been continuing since the day before…
This made the cold weather pretty unbearable. Even our beds felt cold even as we were all huddled up under the thick blanket.

Brrrrr….. colddd……

poor kitty in the cold...

My roommate and I tried to make ourselves feel at home as we unpacked our luggage and made full use of the facilities of the place… Muahahas…

After which, we headed down to meet our China counterparts. It felt really awkward due to that I am a pretty shy person myself and that my mandarin is pretty weak… it’s been like years since I last had to do a proper conversation in mandarin. Whoa.. pretty stressed..

But before that, this is my very first meal in Dalian…

After meeting my counterpart, she brought me around the school compound and showed me some of the works of from the school of design and arts of Dalian..

a tribute to the china earthquake

cool isn't this? how one can play with reflections

My counterpart’s name is Liu Shuang- a year 3 Media and arts student from the southern part of China. Currently she’s twenty-two and her home town is actually a 12 hours train ride away from Dalian.

This has made me feel that the size of China is incomprehensible… having stayed in Singapore for my entire life!!!

After the meet up, we had a tour of the school and I have to say… the school is really beautiful and the brickworks are really like WOW… nicee…. It gave us the feeling as though we are in some Caucasian country instead.

Dalian Polytechnic University is also known as 大连工业大学. Its currently only 50 years old (younger then SP) and focuses on the arts and humanities and the light industries.
Here are some images of the School archive…

us braving the rain...

one of the oldest Macs

having fun where ever we are...hahs

As it was still quite early, we decided to explore Dalian ourselves after hearing that there is a Wal-Mart (Cold-storage of China=P) nearby. It was still raining at this hour and the weather is really freezing!!! The bus ride to the mall took almost an hour!!! But nevertheless it was really exciting as we braved the rain and winds and bought our daily necessities…

I guess that’s all pretty much for today… more updates tml!! =D

Day 2

Whoo.. the rain has finally stopped… and the scenery is really great as we could finally admire the place without the rain…lessons were pushed back for more self-exploration time =D (yay!)

feels like we're in Harvard Uni or sth...

the rubbish filled streets

a monument

btw, there are a number of strays roaming around the place

Today, we had our very first GEMS lesson in Dalian, which is a series of talks that introduce to us about the history and the culture of Dalian and China. Even though the talk was conducted in English, we had much difficulty understanding them due to the difference in the English accent.

nice view of the place from the gems block...

We got to know about the different attractions of Dalian and that made us all really excited and are all having thoughts of exploring Dalian. As we were lucky enough to have a pantry of our own, we tried to make ourselves at home with our all familiar food-Maggie mee…. Hahs.. its only been a day and we’re already missing Singapore food… hahs… The food here so far has been pretty acceptable I guess, just that its more oily and salty and they do not have as much varieties as we do in Singapore.. sigh feel lucky to be in Singpore…

potential chefs in China...

Day 3

Gosh… When everyone’s getting into the mood of having a nice holiday as we’re finally starting to get used to the climate and things here, PROJECT starts…

*Thunder*

We had our project brief launched today… there goes the mood… hahs

Nevertheless, we found out that the people in the university do not have the habit of studying in groups and often than not, like in Singapore, design students do not have the habit of studying in the library due to our nature of being in front of the computer.. hahs…

For this project, we are to transform this space into a student’s hub area, where possibly they can have a better studying environment or a space where they can chill out after a long day studying.