Flashback Friday: One Month Chinaversary | Xiaoshan, China (2017)

Happy Friday, friend! ☺️

Now that I have my sacred space to house all of my adventures, every Friday for the next few weeks, I'll be sharing my pre-travel blog content! I'm calling it, "Flashback Friday."

Flashback Friday: One Month Chinaversary!

sings "DOOOO YOU KNOOOOOW WHAT TUH-DAAAAY ISSSS?!?"

IT'S MY ONE-MONTH CHINAVERSARY, FRIEND!

YEP.

You read it right - #Chinaversary (Anniversary in China).

A Month in China So Far

It's been exactly one month since I've stepped foot on Chinese soil and began a new journey in life. If you read my other article about how the next year of my life will be spent, good! You're all caught up. If not, don't worry; you can read it here.

August 16th was a day that I'll never forget. From the moment I arrived at the Shanghai International Airport at 4:23a til the time I arrived in Hangzhou at 12:05p, I had experienced more awkward moments than I had in 2016 and 2017 combined.  

However, since then, I've made a few interesting observations about the culture but will not list them all here.  I will write separate articles about that and post them.

Fun Facts About China

• There are 56 nationalities of Chinese people. They all have different dialects, styles, sizes and facial features. ?
• Although the city I live in (Hangzhou) is considered to be advanced and developed, some of the citizens have an antiquated mentality and lifestyle. ?
• China gets hell-hot in the summer. ?
• The stares are utterly annoying. ?I honestly tried to be as positive as positively possible about those since my arrival but they are just doing the most. ?
• Xiaoshan's cost of living is crazy inexpensive compared to most cities in the States. ?

In addition to these discoveries, I have found some positive things as well.  For example, in my condominium, there is a shopping mall and there must be over 150 restaurants and department stores here!

Food

The first 3 weeks here, I had a craving for some really good fried rice that didn't involve pork. Well, I found a small restaurant and when I did, I may or may not have cried tears of joy. ???

This little restaurant has shrimp fried rice and I am not even a little bit ashamed to say that upon discovery, I returned almost every day for lunch that week.  Not only is the rice super affordable but it is utterly delicious!

I'm pretty excited about that.

My Job

My experiences as a teacher here have been extremely gratifying and I have yet to start my Full-Time position because the Federal Bureau of Investigation back in the states have been taking forever to send over a very important document.

That's another story for another day. ?

I had no idea that my students - business professionals, younger aged adults, and corporate employees - would gravitate to me in the way that they have.

My first class began with 7 students. The next day, the same class had 13. The next day, even more.

Apparently, I'm popular. ?

I was told that the students here love coming to my classes and they are very impressed with my English pronunciation.  I thought this to be strange because my pronunciation doesn't really stand out to me. I mean, I'm an American.  I figured my pronunciation of the English language was standard but since the majority of the teachers that come to China are non-native speakers, they appreciate hearing a native speaker's dialect.

And then I thought about something else.

There are plenty of Americans whose (depending on their region of the United States) pronunciation, dialect and accents differ greatly.  Other factors to consider include a person's background and environment.  

Anyways, let's get back to the school.

The Training Center

I really love the location of the school because it, too, is in the same vicinity of another shopping mall and across the street from a mega movie cinema which, I just found out, is a part of another shopping mall. ???

I have decided that since I will be here for some time, I must make the best out of this experience.  Doing this requires me to be a little more optimistic than usual, than usual, more open-minded and loving.

The reason I say loving is because I have become annoyed with the stares of people more times than I can count. ? Then I realized that some of the citizens here have never even heard of an American nor ever traveled outside of China.  Some have never seen anyone outside of their cities, let alone the country.  

With this in mind, I have to remember to be loving and show the type of responses that Christ would show - not my annoyance and impatience.

My Development

Oh! Did I mention that there is a Starbucks in my development?  *shrieks*  ? I am so excited because I have dedicated a few mornings out of the week to going and working for about 3 to 4 hours on my blog, university duties, and also working on articles and books.

I'm still trying to find my rhythm here but I have no doubt that China will soon become a territory that I will master in a graceful manner. ☺️

Conclusion

If you have not already started following me on social media, I encourage you to do so because you are missing out on real-time updates - especially on Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter.  

I do, however, ask that you be patient with me in this transition. There's so much that I want to share with you, friend. I'm trying to find my balance so that I can consistently share my adventures with you. ❤️

Thank you so much for subbing to my blog and becoming a member of my social fam my travel bestie.  This is an amazing and new journey for me and I'm glad to have you with me.

Signing off for the day,