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It's not often a Chinese student gets a chance to go on a field trip. In fact, I don't think it ever happens; they are too busy studying!
Our center is different though! We teach an international program for students that want to study abroad at university. This is my first field trip I have been on for the 4 years that I have been teaching at this school. I was definitely excited to participate and so were all the students!
The boss booked a coach bus to take us to a rural county of our city called Qinglong (Green Dragon). We took this trip because all the pear tree flowers were blooming and the boss figured it would be a nice trip to come here and take pretty pictures of all the flowers in this vast region.
Since my new found interest in filming and photography, I try to bring my camera everywhere I go so I can practice this art. I was enthralled to see all of my students do the same and we each got to see what camera they were wielding for today's adventure!
Food
When we got off the bus, we were standing in front of a peasant restaurant. A peasant restaurant is basically a restaurant that specializes in cooking food that farmers have been eating. They cook in a traditional way and the ingredients are simple. We ate food from here for lunch. You'll see pictures of it later on in the blog post!
The students were all huddled because they saw these big fish in a bowl and were just intrigued for some reason hahaha. Almost like they have never seen a fish before!
After hanging around this restaurant for a bit, the boss decided that it is finally time to start the trek!
Scenery & Flowers
I was impressed with the overall scenery of this place. The air was clean and you could smell the scents of different flowers lingering in the air.
I apologize in advance, but I really don't know much about flowers. What I do know is that most of these are pear blossoms! It was the exact time that they started blooming and in fact, many people travel to places like this in order to see them! The thing with pear and cherry blossoms is that they only bloom for a couple weeks and then they are gone! That is why it is crucial to know when they are coming out so that you can appreciate them for the time they are there in action.
The students broke up into smaller groups. It was obvious that we couldn't all go together because different students took pictures of different flowers and we couldn't all wait for each person. The good thing about this is that I was able to take my time with videos and photos, and every time I happened to meet up with other students, it felt like we were meeting them all over again hahaha!
This area was very mountainous. It made the flowers look even better because we could see them at different elevations. I saw this old house and felt a little jealous that whoever lives here has such an awesome view they can wake up to everyday!
Some students were getting tired of the hike, it was pretty long. We kept walking on the paths looking for anything interesting to film or take photos of. Eventually, we ended up in the middle of a market where you could see several vendors selling food and different items. This place was so loud! It was strange because prior to arriving here and even after, the place was pretty silent. It was kind of bizarre to be around one pocket of the hike that was so noisy and then suddenly become silent again.
Continue walking...
Finally got to try the water reflection photo technique!
We were almost at the time by this time. I saw some of my students approaching me and couldn't help but notice how massive this mountain looked compared to them!
As I kept walking, I saw these Chinese characters on the side of the mountain. They read "状元 （Zhuang Yuan)" and "福寿 (Fu Shou)". Zhuang Yuan is a title attributed to the Number One Scholar. Students that performed the best on a test would be called Zhuang Yuan. Fu Shou means good fortune and long life.
We finally arrived at a major rest point of the hike. There was a big pear tree in the middle and you could see countless people trying to capture their own selfies with the tree.
There was this rickety ladder that was leaning against one of the branches. People could use it to climb up and sit on the branches of the tree. I guess I was the only one brave enough to use this ladder because it was just made out of wood and was basically a stick with holes in them so that horizontal pieces of wood could be inserted through them. Everyone braced the ladder to make sure it didn't fall or something lol. Once I got to the top of the ladder and leaned against the bottom branch, my boss and one of the students took pictures of me.
Another awesome thing about this trip is that one of the students brought their guitar with them. I felt sorry for them because they had to carry it all the way up the mountain, but it seems like it was worth it because we all got to sing and play beside the tree. Fortunately for me, I know a few Chinese songs on guitar, so we had a great time singing together some very popular songs in Chinese!
Once we finished playing guitar, we tried to trek up the mountain even more. If you looked to the very top, you could see a section of the Great Wall but there were no paved pathways to walk that far. The boss decided that it wasn't safe enough for us to keep going so we decided that this would be the end up our upward hike. Now it was time to go back down!
After lot's of walking, we finally made it back down to that peasant restaurant I was talking about earlier in my post. After all this time, it was around 12:30pm. Who thought you could do so much in the morning! We had to arrive at school at 5:45am to take the bus here because we knew that if we came here too late, we would be stuck in traffic.
Lunch Time
Usually, different foods are cooked in a big wok and boiled in some kind of sauce. They use different parts of a chicken, vegetables, pork, etc. and cook it in a single dish.
Left to right: Egg "jello", traditional tofu, fish, tomatoes with tofu skin, gelatinized pig fat and boiled chicken in a sauce
I thought the food was good, but I don't think many of my students enjoyed it. Don't forget that China has a middle and upper class, so they aren't used to eating food like this either. The food tastes very natural, which city-slickers might not enjoy.
Final Stretch
So that pretty much was my whole trip with my students and boss. After we had lunch, we had about an hour to just walk around on our own and do whatever we wanted. What did we end up doing? We took a nap! The room we had lunch in was pretty small but there was a section of the room that had something that was similar to a bed. Basically, it was an elevated platform made out of wood that people in rural places sleep on. I wish I had pictures of this part, but most of us tried to find our spot of this bed so that we could take a nap. I was situated in the corner, while other students were on the opposing side. It was funny that I was napping with my students because I think that would be seen as strange back in the West, but here I think it is normal. Some students chose not to nap and instead play games with each other on their cell phones. I think we were all tired of hiking and the hot sun, so not many of us went out to take more photos.
The ride back to school was peaceful and quiet. Everyone was so sleepy from our adventure that everyone was basically passed on in their seats on the coach bus.
Hope you all enjoyed this post. I tried my best to incorporate as many photos as I could from this place. My camera was packed full of footage and photos!
Check out my other posts!
The Difference Between Teachers in China and the West
What Kind of Imported Food Is Available in China?
MOUTHWATERING Food Of China's Ethnic Turkic Minority!
The MASSIVE Construction Boom in China!
Why I Left My Engineering Career To Be a Teacher in China!
Is Chinese Food Low Quality? Organic Farming in China
Why The Heck Did I Move to Communist China?
What's It Like For A Canadian Living in a Small City in China?
Thanks for reading & watching!
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