Due to firewall restrictions, many news sources (such as the Wall Street Journal or The Economist) are blocked in China. Additionally, search engines or social media websites such as Google and Twitter that help provide news in the United States are blocked as well. Therefore, the process for finding news updates in China is very … Continue reading Current Events in China →

While I was excused from class on Tuesday, I took more steps to prepare myself personally for this experience. Even though I missed the Class XXIII Student Panel, I talked to a T&M senior who went on the China trip last year about his experience. He first told me how eye-opening the trip was and … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #6 →

Week five was probably the most informative week in terms of preparing for the upcoming trip. Not only did we have multiple groups present on Chinese culture and more to expect, but we also had a University of Illinois safety training presentation. This was the first time I really reflected on the safety aspect of … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #5 →

This week was filled with knowledgable insights to China and the trip presented by my classmates. I really enjoyed researching and learning about international travel stresses, given that I have not done a lot of international travel myself. I thought that our group presenting first was a great way to introduce the fact that in … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #4 →

This week really brought the trip to reality for me. In the first two weeks, it really felt as if we were speaking high level about what to expect going into the trip. We knew we had expectations and fears and that we were going to be going on corporate site visits where we would … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #3 →

Going into week two, I was more excited about our upcoming trip and began to reflect more on what I wanted to learn and accomplish in the upcoming weeks prior to leaving. While last week we focused more on hopes and fears for the trip, this week brought in the professionalism aspect of our business … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #2 →

The first week I was a feeling a mixture of uncertainty and excitement about our upcoming trip to China. I enjoyed how at the start of class I had to brainstorm and jot down my hopes and fears for the trip. It was one thing to personally think about what were my fears of going … Continue reading Pre-trip Blog #1 →

To help supplement the group presentations, I started to watch a lot of content on YouTube about traveling to China. Per John’s recommendation, Professor Wolters had a number of popular videos on YouTube about traveling to China. He made ones about how to avoid offending Chinese people, things you will love/hate about each city, and … Continue reading Pre-Trip Blog #6 →

This week, I started to really think about how significant the flight is going to be to China. It will definitely be the longest flight I have ever taken, but I think my flights to Europe in the past have been a good warm up for this flight. After the group presentations, it is very … Continue reading Pre-Trip Blog #5 →