Pre-Trip Class 3 Reflection

Not much work was done over the weekend for me, but I did look forward to our class this week since we would be getting a basic itinerary. Our class started off by giving out the details for our volunteer groups. I was put into the local attractions group (perfect). Jake and Krupa are in that group with me. Once we were all in our groups and done with the initial activity, we were introduced to Ulyssia Dennis, our chaperone for the trip. She’s been to China and helped settle my nerves a little more about being “in the dark” in a foreign country. After her introduction, we got to see the itinerary (yay!). It was pretty basic, but gave us an idea of how much time we’d spend in each city (info my group would need for our presentation). I did some research in class on each city and there’s a lot to look in to. Towards the end of the class, Jonathan gave a presentation on currency in china which helped a lot with monetary preparation and gave me an idea of what to expect for prices while I’m there. The last part of the class was reserved for volunteer group work, where we got most of our presentation done.                For the rest of the week, I found some chunks of time to do research on Beijing and Zhangjiakou/Zhangbei (my part of the project). There’s a lot of things to do on the outskirts of the city center and even more to do as you move downtown. Luckily for us, we are staying pretty close to the city center. There are parks, temples, museums, cooking classes, showcases/attractions, and bars/clubs galore to see and explore in Beijing. I can’t wait to be there, but there is almost too much to do in so little time. We mat have 4 days, but we only have about a day’s worth of free time and of course we have each night. As a polar opposite to Beijing, Zhangbei is relatively barren with the exception of a fairgrounds for showcasing Mongolian culture, which I bet we’ll be spending our day at. I think Beijing will be insanely fun, but I am really looking forward to the more natural beauty of Zhangbei and the Mongolian culture.