A Story of a Boy

2010-04-05T11:19:00.004+08:00

Day 34, today is the 4^th April 2010, today’s post shall be the last post for the whole trip. We went out early in the morning with some of our other friends to 四门口街 to shop for more things. We couldn’t get the 面包车 at first, after walking for few meters then we found one. The place was very crowded as today is Sunday! We took neoprints at one of the shops there, their price is very cheap compared to the neoprints in Singapore. I think we have went to the wrong place, there is not much things to shop for at the place, the things is expensive and not worth, not much of shoes and clothes. I think I have made a wasted trip today. At night, we are lost as we couldn’t find any 面包车, and the whole place looks the same to us, in the end we got on taxi and luckily the taxi driver knows how to get back to our school. Throughout the whole journey, the driver told us a lot of things, like how he wish to migrate to Singapore if he is given the chance and talk about how well is the safety in Singapore compared to China. After the conversation, I realized that the police here have working hours, meaning after their working hours, they will go back to the station and knock off, thus there is no police at night. This makes the whole area very dangerous. Now then I realized how fortunate I am to be in such a well developed country with such good government.

2010-04-05T11:19:00.003+08:00

Day 33, today is the 3^rd of April, journal is going to end, I think I will miss writing journal when this trip is over. My roommates and I have decided not to go to for today and tomorrow’s outing as we were too tired. We have decided to start early on our presentation so that we will have more time in editing the slides and making it look better. I started on doing the individual report first before starting our presentation, I spent the whole day doing the report as I have quite a number of difficulties in doing the report. We spent the whole day in our room other than going out to get lunch and dinner, suddenly felt that the whole corridor was very quiet, as most people went for the trip. I felt that time here flies very fast, we are left with almost 1 week back to Singapore. I think I will be missing the weather here, so cooling and windy.

2010-04-05T11:19:00.001+08:00

Day 32, today is the 2^nd April 2010. We went out early in the morning for shopping at 光谷步行街 again! Instead of taking bus there, we took a type vehicle called the 面包车. It is like a small van, capable of sitting about 7 or more passengers if we squeeze, it is like a taxi, but able to sit more people. It cost about 35 RMB there. We split the price among ourselves. We went shopping for clothes, souvenirs and other stuffs too. I realized that we are becoming more to girls, spent more time on shopping and we are better in shopping too. After shopping for like 3 hours in 光谷, we went to the mall beside for IT gadgets, I bought 4 speakers for myself and 3 other friends. I did quite a number of shopping today, I still have things to buy for myself and my friends, perhaps some for my family members. I love Wuhan! It is a shopping paradise!

2010-04-05T11:18:00.002+08:00

Day 31, today is the starting of the new month April, and today is the day where most people will play one thing, that is April fool’s Day! Like many others out there, I got tricked by few of my friends too, that was kind of funny. In the morning we finished up on our virtual lab 3, finally everything is over. I felt kind of relief when everything ends, now I am only left with the IS final report and the presentation. In the afternoon we went to explore the road behind our school and we found a few shop houses thus we played few hours of pool with some students from other courses as well as few of my friends, some of them went to play roller skating. Some of the China local students went with us too, we had interaction with them and we learnt from each other.

In the evening, we went for steamboat with the local students at the nearby shop houses. I realized one thing, people in Wuhan like to take spicy food, perhaps that is one of the reasons to keep themselves warm during winter or cold season. We had 麻辣 steamboat with them, it was very spicy and at the same time, it keeps us warm in our body. We ate dinner and talk at the same time, thus our table was very lively at that time. The local students taught us how to bargain for better price when we go shopping. After dinner, we took a photo with them at the steamboat entrance, they are very cute and friendly people, I think I will be missing them when I am back in Singapore. Now then I know that we are very fortunate, we are staying in the best hostel compared to the other local students. There is no limit to our electricity supply where the others are only limited to only 300 Watts of electricity supply, thus they have to sleep without heater or air-con at night. I am so fortunate!

2010-04-05T11:18:00.001+08:00

Day 30, today is the last day for the month March 2010. We had IS in the morning and today’s lesson is on the places of interest and historical site of Wuhan, Hubei and parts of China. She went through the history of Yellow Crane tower and also the Wudang mountains as well as other places of interest. She went through with us the local delicacy, some of them I have personally tasted before but some of them, not yet. I think if I have the free time, I must try every single dish out, so that when I leave Wuhan, I will not have any regrets. I find today’s lesson quite interesting and our lecturer is a lady, I can tell that most of the guys are focusing better on today’s lesson.

In the afternoon, we stayed in our room and did tutorial 6, finally we have completed it! Now we are left with only virtual lab, I can understand why Dr Tan gave us so much work to do, he is trying to give us more practice for our final examination. We spent the whole afternoon in our room doing our work and did some skipping at the corridor. These few days I didn’t really went out, only stayed in room, feels like time in my room is faster than outside. Today shall be the start of a new month, I am here for you April!

2010-04-05T11:17:00.000+08:00

Day 29, today is the 30^th of March, we have come to the end of March 2010, time flies when I am in Wuhan. I am starting to count down to the time I am going back to Singapore. Today we are supposed to have BBQ with the local students as well as interaction. But due to the bad weather, all these events are cancelled. What a waste, but it’s alright, some of our students will be making some of our local food, Laksa and Rojak for our mini party. They started preparing around in the afternoon, cutting the carrots, peeling the prawn shells, boiling the eggs and other ingredients too.

Around 7pm, we had our dinner at room 304, the place where Laksa is made! Everyone took a bowl of Laksa and a bowl of Rojak, most of the people said that both the food tasted great, I didn’t taste the food as I was feeling not well, but I couldn’t stop the aroma from flowing into my room. They have spent so much time and effort on the food, thank you guys!

Tomorrow we are going to have our last IS lecture. Today we have finished chapter 6, finally, everything is over. We have got homework to do, tutorial 6, luckily we have plenty of time to do, and we have to submit the tutorial together with virtual lab 3. This weekend we are going to have outing again! I feel kind of excited again but not sure if I will be going as we have got presentation to do on Wednesday. I feel that I will miss Wuhan when I leave here, I will miss the people here, the people I have made friends with, the places for shopping and also the local delicacy. I love Singapore and I miss Wuhan!

2010-04-05T11:16:00.000+08:00

Day 28, today happens to be on the 29^th March 2010. We had IS today, the lesson for today was on wedding culture and traditions, like what do people give as gifts to the other party and we watched some videos, short clips on how people go along with their weddings, the process, the different challenges and how they go about overcoming the challenges given. I think this is rather interesting so that they can prove that how much that guy loves the girl. I feel that the new generations of people are neglecting the tradition for marriage. I hope that the generation will be there forever and will not be forgotten.

Before the IS class, we went to a local student’s class, she was the MC for the first performance night we had, her name is Icy Zhang. We went to her class to experience the way of teaching they practiced, at that time, their lesson was on English language. Similarly to us, they have a textbook each and I managed to flip through one of the student’s book and found out that what they are studying is actually more similar to what we used to studying in Secondary school, like comprehension. I went through a 45 minutes lesson with the locals and found out that they are very hardworking, everyone was concentrating, all willing to learn, the whole lesson was very quiet. Unlike what we normally have back in Singapore, our students are sure to make noise, talk among themselves and teachers will have problem continuing with the classes. One thing I realized good about their teacher is that she speaks good English, I can understand it clearly without having any difficulties. After taking a photo with their teacher, we left the class room and proceed to our IS class.

We had Strength of Materials lesson in the afternoon, we started on chapter 6, more Mohr’s circle and more stresses! Basically it is almost the same for both chapter 5 and chapter 6, Chapter 6 is a very short chapter compared to other chapters. We only managed to cover half of the chapter and we will continue tomorrow I think. I just feel that the time in Wuhan is really fast, in a blink of an eye, we are just like 2 weeks away from going back, and we are finishing this module soon.

2010-03-29T17:56:00.002+08:00

Day 27, today is the 28^th March 2010. Rise and shine at 8am, when I woke up, the first thing I thought of is shopping! After meeting our teachers and friends, we set off to 汉口, our destination for the day! Upon reaching there, I can feel the livelihood of the place, lots of people and cars, we were told that we will have our free and easy time until 3.30pm if we want to take the excursion bus back, but we shopped till evening and took our own public transport, though the traffic is always a bit dangerous, but still buses are quite convenient, that’s one thing I like about China.

We went to a lot of places to shop today, and today is a very happy day though it was tiring. Everybody bought something either for themselves or for their loved ones. When I first stepped in to the shopping centre, I was like “wow”, it’s huge, lots of shops on the outside and even more inside! It’s like a shopping paradise, I must say that we cannot finish shopping all the shopping malls and streets in just one day.

My friends and I did a lot of shopping today, one incident that I remembered clearly is that there was this man standing in the streets selling wallets, at first no one bothers to stop and take a look, but then when Dr Tan stopped and take a look, we followed him and went to take a look too. The person showed us that he is selling real leather, he burned the leather to show us, we were shocked, thus everyone of us decided to bargain and buy more from him, as a result, more people came to crowd around the stall, it’s like from 0 people to like 10 over people.

We bargained for a good price and we got what we want, thanks Madam Tan for helping us to pay first, I was wondering how these people managed to get these stuffs. We went to a shopping centre and we split our paths, meeting back at around 2.30pm. When everyone was back, everybody bought something, and I love one thing about the shopping in Wuhan, the bargaining! I can get items much cheaper than before. Thus I can save more and buy more items.

Before going back, I got a shirt and most of the guys got one too, and I heard something in the shop, Madam Tan racist! She didn’t mean it, I can tell, she was helping us to get items for a cheaper price. Thank you Madam Tan, today we enjoyed ourselves to the fullest and hoped that everyday can be like this, no studying!

From tomorrow onwards, Dr Tan will be starting on chapter 6, lectures will end next Wednesday! We are going back to Singapore soon! I am coming back for you. I have learnt a lot of things in Wuhan, if I have never come, I would not have experience what I am experiencing now.

Looks like I have made the right choice, thank you Ngee Ann polytechnic for giving me this chance.

2010-03-29T17:46:00.001+08:00

Day 26, today is the 27^th March 2010. Count down 16 days to Singapore, I miss everything in Singapore! The food, the people, the places, and other than my parents and friends, the next important thing is driving! I can’t wait to pass my practical test, hope that I can pass on my first attempt. Today we went to yellow crane tower and a lot of beautiful places. How I wish Singapore can be like this, then every day I can go for sightseeing.

We took a lot of pictures and the place was full of people, all the tourists were there at the same time with us. We took quite some time to go up the tower and it felt like I am on the top of Wuhan! There were many different things to see in the tower as well as outside the tower. In Wuhan, I still see beggars everywhere. I can’t believe there are still beggars. The rich are getting richer and the poor is getting poorer. I donated some of my spare cash to them, hoping that this little money to me will be a great contribution to them.

Out of a sudden, I realized that how fortunate I am to be born in Singapore, to have such great parents to provide me schooling and to become what I am today. Thank you Dad and thank you Mom. We went to have lunch at a nearby eatery place, that place is crowded and full of small snacks, ranging from rice to dumplings and many more, mainly are food that people in China love to eat. I tried a couple of food and I would say that they taste not bad, it’s quite nice.

After our lunch, we went to the museum to visit about the historical events and things, and also the engineers who built the 3 gorges. Some of them are not in this world but some of them are still alive, thanks to them, we will be able to see these 3 beautiful gorges. Due to the shortage of time, I can only browse through the 3 levels of museum in a short time and took all the photos that I could within the short time limit. I have a little bit of regret for not being able to visit all the 3 levels of museum to read about all the information. They have the ancient bowls, plates and cups and the ancient weaponry. It is very fascinating.

After the museum trip, we made our way to the Eastern Lake (东湖), we paid 20 RMB for a tram to bring us around the whole place, it is very big, people can rent bicycle and there is a small amusement park in it, go-kart, roller coaster and others, it is very hard to find amusement park in such a park. I don’t even see them anywhere in Singapore. There were people shooting wedding photos, so sweet of them to take in such a place, we even cheered for them! It was very funny at that time, some of the locals are friendly while some are not.

Today is a very tiring day for me and I think for everyone as well. Tomorrow we are going to do some shopping! I feel that I have adapted to the environment here, the food and also with the people here. That’s something good! I think I will be buying a lot of things tomorrow.

2010-03-29T17:44:00.001+08:00

Day 25, today is the 26^th of March 2010. We completed chapter 5 today, it’s far too hard! I think I need some time to revise and read through what Dr Tan has taught us if not I will be lacking far behind. We finish chapter 5 in few hours, our lesson was postponed to afternoon class, and some of us need to go to the rehearsal for tonight’s performance, thus lesson ended an hour before the expected time.

We went back to our rooms and got ready for the rehearsal. We went to the performance hall an hour earlier than the others and practiced quite a bit and went for dinner, the good thing is that dinner was provided for us! We gobbled our food down and but the time we finished our dinner, the crowds started to come in, same for our teachers and our fellow students. We got a bit nervous before the performance starts but we gave ourselves encouragement and during the performance, we could see everyone from the stage, it felt so scary. We held each other’s waist to encourage each other and this is something that we didn’t experience before in Singapore. The performance was very smooth, we can see that everyone below the stage was enjoying the performance from their expressions.

Everything went smoothly and I realized that I have gained something, team spirit or team work, never felt anything like this before. I must say that everyone has worked their best and everyone enjoyed this performance. Especially Dr Tan, I noticed him laughing and smiling all the way from the start of our performance, way to go Dr Tan!

I must say that today I have learnt a lot of things, more than what we can learn from our lectures and tutorials. This is something that cannot be purchased by money. I want more of such events!

2010-03-29T17:42:00.001+08:00

Day 24, today is the 25^th of March 2010. We started chapter 5 today! New chapter, more stress coming to my head, have to manage stress soon. Dr Tan went through part of chapter 5, which covers a bit of combined stress and also we have to bring compass and protractor for drawing of diagrams, luckily it is only 2D.

In the afternoon, we went to BlueStar company which is a IT company selling IT gadgets which can be installed on moving vehicles, something like GPS and also touch-screen computer and also television on the front or back of the car.

We went for a short briefing followed by a short visit to the gallery showing what are the products that they have designed and then we went back, it’s a rather short visit and I felt a bit disappointed, I thought we will be going more into the company like where are the different areas for manufacturing different products and other things. But still, it’s a rather nice industrial visit. Thank you teachers for organizing this trip.

After the trip, we went back to school to play basketball! One of my favorite sports, managed to borrow a ball and we headed straight to the basketball court to play, had a splendid time with friends but I didn’t sweat, only felt that my body is warmer but didn’t managed to sweat, I think the weather is still too cold. I feel that people in Wuhan are very healthy people, every time when they have their own free time, they will be at the basketball court playing basketball, if not they will be doing sports, in such a cold weather.

Tomorrow we are going through chapter 5 and I think we will be finishing it. There will be a performance tomorrow by our school and also the local students, I hope there will be lots of fun.

2010-03-29T17:34:00.001+08:00

Day 23, which is the 24^th of March 2010. Today we completed chapter 4 and we have to do some tutorial questions as homework. I love the way Dr Tan teaches his lecture, full of animations for his PowerPoint slides unlike other lecturers, there is no animation in the slides to attract our attention. Thank you Dr Tan! I feel so honored to be in his class. I hope when I am taking Oil and Gas module in year 3, Dr Tan will be teaching me on that module again.

We were briefed on virtual lab 2, what we need to do and other stuffs, then we were told to go back to our rooms and start doing our virtual lab, thus afternoon classes were cancelled for virtual lab. I feel that this virtual lab is better than the real lab practice as we can just read the information and the different readings, from the virtual lab itself and not go personally to the lab to do our experiment.

After finishing my virtual lab, we headed to the nearest biggest supermarket for shopping again, bought detergent and other snacks which will be able to last us till we are back to Singapore, I realize one thing about the supermarket, if you want plastic bags, you have to pay for it, unlike in Singapore where you just have to buy something and they will even give you a small plastic bag. I think that both countries have their pros and cons, in Wuhan, people will then use their own plastic bag or recycle bag if they don’t want to spend the unnecessary money on the bags, and thus people will not throw plastic bags everywhere they like to do.

After which we went for dinner, these few days the temperature at night is dropping, it’s getting colder and colder! That’s what I feel in Wuhan compared to Singapore.

2010-03-29T17:31:00.002+08:00

Day 22, 23^rd March 2010. Finally, we had IS again! Today we went continued on our Chinese culture. I must say that today’s lesson is much more interesting than last 2 week’s lesson. I learnt about Buddhism and the good thing is that I am a Buddhist. I learnt about the 4 noble truths and sufferings.

In the afternoon we had Strength of Materials, I got back my common test result, not too bad, but can be better. We were taught chapter 4, not everything but part of it. I need time to absorb all these theory and formulas, how to apply them and many more. I heard that tomorrow we have to do virtual lab 2, I guess this week is going to be a stressful one, really stressful one.

After this week, I think everything will be over in few weeks time. I can overcome this obstacle. Nothing is impossible I guess. Tomorrow we will be continuing our chapter 4 and a bit of briefing on virtual lab 2. Suddenly, I feel a bit stress but I think this is normal to most of us.

2010-03-29T17:25:00.002+08:00

Day 21, 22^nd March 2010. Today, Dr Tan decided to give us a break after the tiring Wudang mountain trip. We have to do virtual lab 1 and submit to Dr Tan by Tuesday. When I woke up, my legs were aching and I almost couldn’t come out from my bed.

After finishing virtual lab 1, my friends and I went for shopping! We went to 汉口街 for shopping, long bus journey but the thoughts of reaching the place never fail to excite me. It was drizzling over there but it didn’t stop us from shopping at that place, there is only one word to describe the place, fabulous! The place is something like our Bugis Street in Singapore, lots and lots of cheap goods ranging from shoes, bags, clothes and many more, there isn’t much time when we were shopping, thus we only managed to cover a small part of the street, I guess we will be back to that place around week 6. I managed to get myself a pair of shoes, bargained for a good price, one thing good about the shopping there, the bargaining! People always love bargaining, they can get more items for a cheaper price, who doesn’t fancy?

People in that area are all very friendly, they approached to talk to us and told us that they love Singapore drama shows. I didn’t realize that Singapore’s drama show is available here in Wuhan. We had a very fun time together, looking out for each other, lots of laughter.

How I wish that every day is like this. Tomorrow we will be starting on chapter 4 of our Strength of Materials. I want to finish the whole book as soon as possible!