November has been a really good month! Keep reading to see what I got up to this month.
Places I Went
Best on the Blog
A Taste of Shengzhou – this is the blog post I wrote about my trip to Shengzhou with a TV crew. I had a really great time doing lots of cultural activities.
Best on Instagram
I took this picture the other day at West Lake, here in Hangzhou at sunset. The pollution and the latitude make the sun absolutely huge and neon pinkish orange. It was a really cool sight. See it here on Instagram.
Books I Read
I have been in desperate search of English books here. I have looked in Taipei and Hangzhou – no luck. Hopefully I can check in Shanghai soon. I can’t use my Kindle at the moment, so I haven’t had anything to read. I’m really missing reading!
On the bright side, I have surpassed my reading goal for 2016. I think that means next year I need to set an even higher goal!
Inspiration
This month I got to meet professional photographers and people who travel and do media for a living and it was really cool to get an insight into that career path. I also got to go on a trip as a travel blogger, which made me really excited about the opportunities I could have. I would love to find more ways to keep travelling, meeting people, and writing on this blog!
Highlights
The highlight this month was travel. I got to go to lots of places around China, which has made me excited all over again to keep learning Chinese, experiencing the culture, and learn about the history. My favorite travel experience was possibly the Muslim Quarter in Xi’an. I made YouTube video about the food because I was so amazed by it all.
Challenges
My challenge this month was taking midterms. I’ve been a bit disenchanted with the course here, so it’s been difficult to motivate myself to study. Midterms didn’t go very well, which didn’t surprise me. My grades here don’t matter for my degree at Edinburgh, so it’s more about whether I’m learning Chinese. I did get an A in my oral exam, but I think I’ll need to dedicate more time to learning the obscure vocabulary in my textbooks to do well in the course here.
I’m hoping that I can spend time learning my own vocabulary, preparing for HSK 5, teaching myself Classical Chinese, and reading books in Chinese instead. I will still make progress and it will be much more motivating for me to study those things.
