Photo 1: Sarah and her baby sister Photo 2: Danea’s partner, Danea, Riley’s partner, Riley, Sarah and I Photo 3: Sarah and I
Upon being told about spending the day with a Chinese family, I was instantly nervous. I tend to be reticent around people who are foreign to me. Here I was scheduled to spend a day with actual foreigners and they spoke little English. Around 9 AM that day, I had no clue how this day would go but it turned out amazing. Our day started out with us going to this little mall, where I bought a backpack that I desperately needed. After spending several hours at the mall, we headed to their home to make dumplings. We walked up 6 flights of stairs to get to their home. I only had to do that twice, on a normal day Sarah (my host family partner) said they walk up an down way too much. Once we arrived at their door, I slipped on the slippers and headed to the couch for a rest. When I first entered her sister was scared of me, by the time i left she was begging me to stay. Back to the food. Before we even started making dumplings, they prepared this “pre-dumpling” course for me. I ate little because I was still full from the breakfast at No. 1 Highschool. Once they realized i was getting a little full, they encouraged me to start making the dumplings. Me, Sarah, Sarah’s parents and aunt all sat around on small stools and made at least 200 dumplings while Sarah’s baby sister watched Garfield. As soon we finished preparing a batch, her mom was there to take them to be cooked. Before they were all finished, I was called to the table to eat. They pretty good and I ate as many as I could despite me still being full. After Sarah and i finished eating, the rest of the family ate, and we headed to the living room area to play and watch TV. An hour passed, and I said my final goodbyes to everyone except Sarah and her aunt. We walked back down the 6 flights of steps, and walked a short distance to the nearest bus stop. After about a 40 minute bus ride, we arrived at the movie theatre. We watched a dramatic although I was told it would a romantic one. The story followed four friends who had been best friends from going through obstacles in high school. The English subtitles went extremely fast and so did the movie, but nonetheless it was really cool to experience a Chinese movie theatre. After seeing the movie, we walked a bit to the “Old City”. It was a street of little shops. While walking, I saw others from our group and I was even encouraged to buy a brush and ink set to do calligraphy at home. We walked around for a few hours and then took a rest with a few others. We stopped by this little side restaurant so I decided to try their lamb with Danea. After that the day was pretty history. I tried KFC before we took our almost 2 hour bus ride back to the dorms where I said my final goodbye, gave my hugs, and exchanged contact information. As the day concluded, I was extremely grateful for the opportunity, and it was by far one of the best days of the trip.
