Day 30, Nanjing - Last Day of Internship

Today was the last day of internships! Class in the morning was the usual: a little bit slow but still educational. After class we all got quick lunches and went our separate ways to internships.

For the past few days I have been working alternately at an environmental advocacy NGO called Greenstone and the Jiangsu Province Solid Waste Management Department. Today I took a bumpy bus ride, walked through a dirty alley, and climbed up several flights of cement stairs to Greenstone’s headquarters. Greenstone has six full-time workers in the office who manage all of its operations. It calls itself a public advocacy NGO, both in the sense that it advocates for the people of China’s right to voice their opinions and in the sense that they advocate for the environment to the people. The six staff members organize everything from lawsuits against the central government to community volunteer projects cleaning trash in the city. They move around the office like a coordinated hurricane, driven by obvious passion for their jobs.

I was assigned to work with an intern there named Zhang researching environmental law in the US and in China. One of China’s biggest environmental challenges right now is perhaps not what first comes to mind. It is not a scientific problem like water pollution or carbon emissions, but rather comes down to one fact: the public is not participating enough in environmental decisions. There is very little public input into actions that impact the environment, whether those actions are policies, housing developments, or new chemical plants. The problem has to do with environmental laws that do not require public participation, companies or government officials who don’t follow laws or provide adequate information even when the public is supposed to be involved, and public apathy because people are unaware of the issues or prioritize something else, like quick economic growth. Zhang’s specialty is environmental law, so my job was to help him compare China’s laws with those of the US and figure out where and how the people could be more involved.

As we worked I was able to ask Zhang more about his thoughts on his job, the environment, and the future of China. He, like many of the other speakers this group has been able to hold dialogues with, believes that lasting change in China will have to come from a change in people’s attitudes. He encourages Greenstone to develop its community projects and engagement programs because he believes that education is the only real way to change people’s perception of the environment. His approach makes a lot of sense and echoes Hu Jie and others we have spoken to in the last few weeks. Recurring themes for this dialogue definitely include the power of ideas and special people to make huge changes, the need to look beyond a shallow number like GDP into the deeper implications of a matter, and a sense of the responsibility of every person to look beyond themselves.

Saying good bye to Zhang and the others in the office was bittersweet. I have learned a lot from the people at Greenstone over the past week. They told me to keep in touch, and I definitely plan to!

- Maddie S.

Day 29, Nanjing

Today was just another ordinary yet exciting day of being a student at NanDa, while also being an intern at an NGO. 

Getting to class thirty minutes before the start of class to review my "Ting Xie" words have turned into a daily routine. Today, however, I had ten minutes left until the start of class when I had finished making sure I knew every word. Trying to be more like the brave Chinese tourists some of my classmates, Ryan and Max, are, I went out and bought a Chinese omelet wrap type thing from the street for breakfast. I don't like pickled vegetables, so I never wanted to try the omelet filled with pickled I-don't-even-know-what-kinds-of-vegetables, but my classmates get one every morning, so I finally decided to man up today. It was way better than I expected, and I was glad I got one, but I still didn't really like the sour, juicy taste of the pickles. After going over chapter 8, taking our Ting Xie, learning our third song we've learned so far called the "Invisible Wings", and taking our graduation photo, class was over for the day. The "Xia Ke, Ming Tian Zian!" we thirst for probably from the third hour on when our concentration abilities have hit the limit, was finally said. For lunch, I got a Taiwanese fried dough hand wrap and Xiao Long Bao from the "Bird Flu Alley" with my friend I made at Nanda and some of my friends from Dong Bei Da Xue, Northeastern. 

I had to rush after lunch, however, to get to my internship site a little earlier than normal because we were taking a visit to a NGO that works with deaf seniors. We ended up getting there even earlier than we had planned, so we got a chance to interview our co-workers for our Internship paper. We found out that only a few people in the social services career actually want to serve the disadvantage, and the others just do it because its their job and the only job they can get since they majored in it. In China, you may not have a choice over your own major. My co-worker's major was chosen for her according to her high school grades. She actually ended up going to graduate school because she fell in love with her major and wanted to continue studying. The NGO we visited after the co-worker interview was very small. It was a two-story building with two parts per floor. The seniors were making Zong Zi for the Dragon Boat Festival. They offered for Wendy and I to try making a Zong Zi, and both of us failed miserably. The founder of the NGO was a sign language instructor who now works two jobs working as a volunteer at the NGO as well as teaching sign language at a different school. She also teaches sign language to the seniors at her NGO as well as coordinating activities for them from Monday through Friday. 

After internship, it was language partner time! I think language partner time might be my favorite time of the day. It's not stressful, but you still feel so productive because you are learning while you hang out with your language partner. The language partner coordinator, Ryan, took us to his favorite restaurant. It was so refreshing because I have never had such a thing before. We got fresh ingredients in a big pot, and then they weigh our ingredients. We paid by the weight, then we waited for them to cook the meat and the vegetables in a big wok. It was spicy but still so good! 

Writing this blog makes me realize how an "ordinary" day here is so full of adventurous and exciting activities. Every hour is spent well and eventfully, and as a result at the end of the day, I've been crashing in my bed sometimes even with my glasses still on. 

- Hailie J.

Day 28, Nanjing - The Routine

We've begun to adapt to a routine during our time in Nanjing, where we start the day with classes, work at our internships in the afternoon, spend our evenings with our language partners, and have the nights free to catch up on schoolwork as well as to explore the city. In Beijing, I felt much more like a tourist getting a glimpse of the city without immersing myself in the life of a local. Here, we have much more autonomy and responsibility. Even though we're only in Nanjing for several weeks, I feel as though we're living a real life here.

Today, we had Chinese class from 8am to 12pm. While it seems like a long block of time, the breaks at the end of each hour where we can grab snacks, water, and breakfast make it much easier. I've gotten in the habit of stopping at the jianbing (an amazing Chinese breakfast food that looks similar to a burrito) cart near our classroom building in between sessions. I'm in a class comprised entirely of students from our dialogue, so we get lots of personal attention from our teachers and a curriculum that fits in perfectly with our Chinese classes at Northeastern. Our teachers, Zhang Laoshi and Bao Laoshi, do a great job keeping the class engaging and fun despite the intensive nature of the program.

After class, I quickly changed into business casual at our hotel and headed to my internship at the Nanjing chapter of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China. I share an internship site with Brendan, another dialogue student, and it's nice to have a friend around the office. We had the opportunity today to eat lunch with the chapter's General Manager, Mirella, and the chapter's other employees. It's a small team, with only four full-time staff members, so we've all gotten to know each other well in the week we've spent at the office so far. The office atmosphere is very professional but also laid-back and intimate. Today I worked on drafting a report that summarizes the Nanjing chapter's membership details and changes in the month of May. We also called some of the chapter's members to invite them to an event the chamber is having next week. I got to use a little bit of Chinese in speaking with the members, which was nerve-wracking but also rewarding. Before we left for the day, we took some pictures with the staff which they might publish in an upcoming newsletter!

After work, I went with some classmates to grab dinner at Bird Flu Alley, a small alleyway just a few minutes from our hotel with some of the tastiest and cheapest food you can find in our immediate area. It's become a popular lunch spot among our dialogue crew. There's an insane amount of variety in the types of food the restaurants offer, and we often see other students there. Tonight, we got a pile of pork, beef, and egg dumplings from a small restaurant for the equivalent of less than two US dollars per person. I'm already anticipating major withdrawal from delicious, inexpensive Chinese food when I return to the States.

It feels surreal that we're leaving Nanjing at the end of this week. I'll definitely miss the routine we've built, and it will be sad saying goodbye to the amazing people we've met here. However, I'm ready to be a tourist again, and I'm excited for the new experiences and adventures we'll have next week in Shanghai.

- Winnie J.

Day 27, Nanjing - Bike Ride

After a busy week of Chinese class, internships and gloomy weather, the sun was finally out in Nanjing today. Some of us took the opportunity to go on a bike ride around the city to explore a couple of historical sites. Ever since arriving in Nanjing, I couldn't help but notice how popular bicycles are as a means of transportation for local people. I think this could be partly due to the expenses related to car ownership, and also just because riding a bike may be more convenient and easier to manage in this busy, crowded city. The streets here are packed not only with cars and bicycles, but many people also choose to drive e-bikes (electronic bicycles) or regular motorized scooters. With this in mind, I was both excited and nervous to finally try it out today and get the full Nanjing experience.

            The route Dong Laoshi planned out for us was about 10 miles long and would take us through the city, all the way to the Purple Mountain, to the Nanjing City Wall and finally back home. She gave us full disclosure before we began, and warned us about all the potential hazards – hilly roads, tiny bike lanes, moving traffic and tons of pedestrians! Nevertheless, once we all got settled down on our bikes, the trip turned out to be pretty successful. At The Purple Mountain, famous for Dr. Sun Yat Sen's Mausoleum (the founding father of the Republic of China), we road around the scenic hilly roads, and made a quick stop at a hostel for an ice cream break. In the Nanjing heat, ice cream has become everybody's favorite snack, and it's always fun trying out some of the interesting flavors that are unique to China. Today we enjoyed scoops of taro ice cream. Taro is a root vegetable native to Southeast Asia and is very popular in Chinese food and desserts. McDonald's even makes a Taro pie similar to the Apple pie that they have in the U.S.

            On the way back to our hotel at Nanjing University, we made another stop at the city wall. We climbed up the rocky, uneven steps and walked along it for a few minutes to take in the view. Standing on top of this ancient structure (built in the Ming Dynasty, around 600 years ago), it seemed like all we could see of Nanjing was its many skyscrapers and construction. This coexistence of history and modern development that we've been seeing throughout our trip never seizes to amaze me, particularly in Nanjing. The city is being prepared for the Asian Games and the Youth Olympics in the next couple of years, and so it still has some room to grow as far as development is concerned. Yet, there are ancient structures scattered throughout the city, preserving some aspects of traditional Chinese architecture – many of these have also been refurbished and are being reused.

After another 20 minutes of biking we made it back to hotel safe and sound. We ended the day with our 4^th group discussion meeting. We discussed some of the challenges that we have been dealing with at our internship sites, and tried to pinpoint some of the challenges of working in a different cultural environment. We also discussed our thoughts on the Nanjing Massacre Museum and our Q&A with Hu Jie. We all had an extremely busy week and so it was nice to take the time to reflect on everything as a group. Tomorrow we begin our final week of Chinese class and our last week in Nanjing.

- Sania M.

Day 26 - Nanjing

Today we enjoyed a rare morning of free time where we explored around the city a little and ate at a restaurant close to our hotel. We all met after lunch to go to the Nanjing Massacre Museum. This museum was designed to commemorate the hundreds of thousands of Chinese who died during Rape of Nanjing (also known as the Nanjing Massacre) in 1937. The Nanjing Massacre was a period of 6 weeks of Japanese occupation of Nanjing where the Japanese army mass murdered and raped Chinese civilians and soldiers alike. I was particularly looking forward to this experience because my grandparents lived through the Rape of Nanjing.

When we got into the museum, it was clear that this was more of a patriotic monument rather than a memorial for the victims. The first thing we saw when we walked into the museum was the number 300,000, representing the 300,000 victims of the Rape of Nanjing. The actual number of victims is somewhat controversial and ranges from as low as 20,000 to 300,000. It is not surprising that most Chinese insist the number of victims is closer to 300,000. The museum itself was very well set up, taking you through the history of the Nanjing Massacre through the war tribunals of the Japanese commanders. The experience was quite a somber one and some of the pictures are so jarring that I will never forget them. One picture that stood out to me the most was a picture of the severed head of a Chinese man with half a cigarette still in his mouth placed on a Japanese roadblock "just for entertainment" as the caption stated.

I found it interesting at the number of young children who were at the museum. It seemed, to me at least, that this is a subject matter for the more mature, but after observing the museum a little bit more it was clear that this was just as much about promoting Chinese patriotism as it was about remembering those killed in the Nanjing Massacre.

After the museum we went to a nearby shopping mall and had a delicious dinner at a dumpling restaurant and made our way to the controversial film director, Hu Jie's house. As many of Mr. Hu's films are about sensitive historical events in China and most of them are banned here, he is monitored by the police so we had to take some precautions when arriving at his house. His walls were covered with his own paintings; the most prominent were of the subject of much of his work, Lin Zhao. His artwork was stunning and contained a lot of symbolism and was really beautifully done. Listening to him speak about both his paintings and his films, his passion for what he does is very apparent. For me, meeting him was very inspirational. Although he grew up in a country with the same censorship and propaganda as everyone else, he thinks differently. He wants China to remember its past and to learn from it. For me, it was incredible to see that in a country where the concept that everyone is the same is heavily promoted, he could still have the courage to go against the grain and, although slowly, believes that what he is doing will slowly bring about change in China.

 -        Milli C.

 

 

Day 25 - Nanjing

We all have finished our first week of afternoon internships today. For all of us, we've been able to expand our understanding China outside the classroom into the workplace. I had the privileged of interning at the Ruyi kindergarten nearby Nanjing University.

Here in China early childhood education has become a very important part of a child's education. There are both private and public schools available here. The difference between private and public is that most private institutions will provide a specialty such as teaching bilingually. Because the government thinks so highly of early education, they will subsidize the cost of tuition if families choses to send their child. The subsidizing can be up to 30%-40% of the tuition. Not only is kindergarten highly valued but so is preschool from ages 3-5 years old.

China's strong emphasis on the importance of early education is clearly seen at the Ruyi Kindergarten. When I spoke to the supervisor of the school, she emphasized several times that this school was a very typical Chinese kindergarten. This took me back by surprised because this school had an abundance of resources. Each of the classrooms was equipped with a projector and screen along with plenty of educational toys and books. To me, this kindergarten seemed well funded. It was hard to believe that this was the average kindergarten school. The amount of resources given to the school shows the value that the Chinese government puts on early education. Not only are the resources provided, the requirements for the schools and teachers are also high. Kindergarten teachers are now required to not only have a college degree but to go through rigorous training and to have a specific skill set to teach preschool and kindergarten.

To my surprise the kindergarten was very similar to American schools in many ways and very different in others. The first thing we did while at the kindergarten as soon as got there was help the kids refresh themselves after their afternoon nap. For the girl students that means getting their hair redone by the teachers. When I asked the teachers why they redid their hair, they explained that they wanted their students to have high standards in all aspects of their life. Having my hair redone by my teachers was something I never experienced in the States. Next, we went out with the kids to have recess. Unlike the typical 30-minute recess I was used to, the kids were out for only ten minutes, which was enough time for them to let out all their energy. The kids were then led back inside for another small lesson before they left for the day.

This week my partner Lily and I had the opportunity lead a small lesson. We taught the kids how to say farm animal names in English. The kids were very enthusiastic about learning English. Not only did we teach them the names of the animals in English but also the sounds they make. In China, the noises that certain animals make are different than in the States. For example, a dog in the English says "Woof! Woof!". In Chinese a dog says "W?ng! W?ng!". The kids were so surprised that Americans make different animal noises and thought they didn't sound right. It was so much fun to watch them attempt to make the different noises. 

          

-- Ashley  G.

Day 24, Nanjing - The Connection

Today was a pretty full packed schedule as usual. We had class from 8am until 12pm, and then afterwards we had our internships from 2pm until 6pm. My internship is at Import/Export Company called Jiangsu Sainty Runlong Trade Company Ltd. This company is an international multimillion-dollar company that is traded publicly on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. With over 450 high-caliber employees, there is a lot to learn from this corporation. I have had the pleasure of working under one of Dong Laoshi's old schoolmates, Zhang Yong, who is currently the general manager assistant of the company. He has placed me in the Machinery I/E section of the company.

 

I started out by helping one of the employees on his 3D printer project. He is trying to sell his 3D printer to consumers in foreign markets such as the United States and Canada. However he keeps receiving feedback from the consumers that they cannot understand the Owner's Manual because of the poor English used to write it. My coworker then thought that me being there was the perfect opportunity to correct this problem, and at the same time make the company seem more legitimate because someone working there was able to write English well. After giving me this task, he said that he was going on a business trip to Beijing, and that I should have this assignment done by the time he gets back next week. I think he over-estimated how long it would take to do the assignment, because I was able to finish my work early the next workday.

 

Since my coworker wasn't around, I went to the floor manager and told him that I was done with my assignment. I then proceeded to ask what else I could do to help out around the office. The floor manager then began to praise me for my diligence, and asked if I would like to help him on his project. Of course I could not turn this opportunity down, and immediately agreed. He then began to tell me that he sold food additives to wholesale buyers around the world, though he could not sell any to the United States or Canada because his English wasn't very good. He asked if I would be willing to be their foreign agent, and contact buyers in the United States and Canada. He was even willing to pay me commission for any contracts I received, and immediately got me a work email at the company.

 

I couldn't be any happier with the events of today, but it kind of made me wonder. Its absolutely ridiculous for an unpaid intern to receive a part time paid job after only two days of working there, no matter how diligent that person may be. Especially since I know absolutely nothing about food additives, or even chemicals in general. He didn't ask for my job experience, work references, or even my resume. I know that the obvious advantage is that I can speak and write English well, but with over 450 well-educated employees, many of which who have studied abroad in the US, why would I be put in charge of this foreign operation? I began to wonder if it was only because I am a white American. Did they think that having a white American working on their team makes them seem to be more of a legitimate company? This experience has finalized my previous thoughts that it is easy for Americans to do well in the Chinese business environment just because of their ethnic background. Chinese businesses see the West as an opportunity for growth and education, and want to make a connection with this newly opened frontier. In this case I just happen to be the connection.

- Ryan L.