China, the place I was born and grew up, and always felt attached to, did not disappoint me at all.  The trip has brought me so many pleasure surprises and left me the best travel memory ever.  Not to mention, I have met such a dynamic and energetic group.  I did enjoy talk with them, hang out with them and learn things from the perspective of young Americans.  Most importantly, Dr. Li, our leading professor and organizer, put in the great painstaking effort to make it perfect for everyone. The whole study trip is informative and rewarding!  

For myself, on the other hand, I feel ashamed that still so many things about China I wasn't aware of or did not even know about them.  One reason for my ignorance is that China is really big, vast in territory and abundant in resouces. The other is that in daily life I did not appreciate my culture enough put in time to study it. 

My working goal is to become the conduit building up the bridge between U.S. and China, to facilitate people's interaction and deal with international trade.  China is my root, as much as I work hard and devote myself to U.S, I will love this great land as always!

Meanwhile, the reluctance to assume responsibility has been reinforced by the belief that it is risky for people to stand out... This is maybe the only aspect I have some reservation about Chinese cutlure.  This way to raise children up will put on too many baggages on their shoulders and too many constraints to develop their personalities.  In spite of respect the seniors and hierarchy, people still need to be responsible for their roles in their family and society. 

In Chinese society, it is normal for four generations live under the same roof of the house.  The juniors respect the seniors, the seniors take care of the juniors.  When kids are little, grandparents always feel obligated to babysit and invest all of their love to the next generations.  In U.S, people advocate independence. When they are over 18 years old, they will try to look for a job or move out of the house.  Though they care or love their families, they prefer to live an individual life and have some privacy. 

Guanxi may also be of importance within organization in the sense that good personal relationships can promote a more open and direct communciation among colleagues; Guanxi networking can offer a number of potential benefits; for example, more sources of information, more opportnities, and so on.  The professor told us, in Chinese culture, who you know is more important than what you know.  I think this is somewhat similar as that in U.S.  The network of people is always important, especially for the business major students to explore careers. 

This study trip in China, we got the chance to visit Pudong Devlopment Bank, Tianjin branch, one of the most famous local banks in China.  We were treated very well by the management.  They patiently answer all kinds of questions we brought up and prepared us very nice umbrella as souvenirs. As a matter of fact, it is because the general manager of the bank is Dr. Li's close friend.  Owning to the close guanxi,  we learned the first-hand knowledge and had a great visiting time.

I understand that eveybody needs the sense of belongings.  This is much better explained how come Chinese or other oversea students in U.S. tend to gather together and form their own social group rather than mingle with local students.  One reason is that the communication among insiders is much more personal and open; the other one is because we feel more secure hanging out with the people who share the same cutlure.  

In Chinese culture, great emphasis is placed on reaching a consensus within the work group, and on not causing somebody to "lose face".  For example, in Asian culture, particular Chinese culture, a manager who criticizes a subordinate or colleagues, especially if this is done in the presence of others, can cause this person to lose face.  In other words, the subordinate will feel embassed or even insulted by the boss. Therefore, in Asian corporate envrionment, when people have concern about each other, they usually exchange ideas privately and try to use a subtle way avoiding to hurt people's feelings.

Meanwhile, the communication in Chinese society is indirect and non-confrontational, as individuals try to minimize the loss of face and preserve harmonious relationships.  By constrast, western style tend to be straightfoward and put everything on the table.  When we find out problems, the whole working group work together and try to resolve the issue. It is hard to say which way is better when it comes to problem solving.  But there are 1.5 billion people living in the other side of the world follow the culture inherited from ancesters thousand years ago, it absolutely deserve people's respect and appreciation!

While cheaper restaurants, i.e. road stands, were much cheaper that those in Taibei or Tokyo, upscale places cost a bit more. In general, drinks in Shanghai cost from quarter to a third of what they do in Tokyo.

There were quite a few nice things in Shanghai, besides the prices. One big one was the sidewalks.  Usually, in Taibei, sidewalks are narrow, cluttered with illegally parked scooters, and built at a different height in front of each building.  In Shanghai, they were level, wide, and uncluttered. "Walking was a joy."

The selection of dining, both Chinese and western, in Shanghai was also far better than anything I've seen in other places in Asia. They had authentic foods from every province, great western restaurants, and some a decent Mexican restaurants.

The first few days in China were definitely an eye opener for me. During our first sight-seeing trip we were at Tiananmen Square and everywhere we went people were taking pictures of us. It was so weird to all of us! We felt like celebrities and it was pretty cool. People left and right were grabbing our arms and pulling us toward them to pose for a picture. Even when we would pose for group pictures, people would take a picture of us! We were American and looked very different from all of them so they just loved us. They especially loved the blondes, myself, Curtis, Sarah, and Eric. They were so use to seeing only dark brown or black hair that they starred at the blonde hair. When Sarah and I would walk around, just us two, people would stare at us! Two blonde hair, blue eyed girls walking around was a treat for them. It was fun for the first few days but by the end of the trip I was so sick of people asking for pictures and people starring at me. Starring in the United States is considered very rude so I just wasn't use to it. At the World Expo is where I lost it. Everywhere Sarah and I walked; people would grab us and ask for a picture. I would just continue walking and say, "No." I was very annoyed because the excitement of being famous was getting old. I was ready to go home and be normal again, where I would fit in with everyone else and not stick out like a sore thumb. Truly being famous must get very annoying! I couldn't even imagine having to deal with the paparazzi and photographers everywhere you went!

Before leaving for China I was extremely worried that a month would be way too long for me to spend in a foreign country. Much to my surprise I did better than I had expected. The first time I got homesick was when I got really sick during our two week stay in Tianjin. I was very lucky to have friends to take care of me and for Dr. Li for getting me medicine but I just wanted my mom. I know I'm 22 years old but there's just something about a mother's comfort when you're sick. I called her on Skype and just cried. I felt so awful and just wanted her to take care of me. Luckily I felt much better the next morning and could enjoy my time again in China. By the end of the stay in Tianjin I was ready to move on to the next city. I think I just got bored with staying in the same city for so long. I was ready to travel again and then head back home to the United States. We were traveling so much during the first week of the trip that I got bored while in Tianjin because we were there for two weeks, stationed in the same place. However, it was nice to get so familiar with the city and to be able to do our own thing most of the time.

Our final destination was Shanghai. Although I was very excited to visit Shanghai, because it is such a well known city, I was ready to get back to the United States and return to normal, everyday life. I had an absolutely wonderful time in China and can't believe I've already been home for one month. I enjoy telling everyone my stories of the trip and hope to visit again someday!

Before the China trip I had no idea what the World Expo even was. Everyone kept talking about how exciting it was going to be that we were going to it, so I did some research online. Once I found out what it actually was, I was quite excited myself. We left the hotel at 7:00 AM to make sure we missed all the traffic so we could get there at a decent time. We got there and a ton of people were already waiting to get in. We stood in line for a good hour because the gates didn't actually open until 9:30 AM. Once we all got in we went straight to the USA building. It was really the only building I cared to go in. The line was very, very long, but it was moving quickly. Once we got up front there was an American woman who greeted us. We got inside and she started speaking in Mandarin while a Chinese lady was speaking English. It was quite funny and all the Chinese people would laugh when the American woman would speak. They told us we would be going through four different parts in the building; three of them would be watching movies. The movies were just people talking about America and our plans for the future. Barack Obama gave a little speech as well. The last part of the building was a display of all the large American companies. Wal-Mart was displayed, Dell, and Microsoft among many others. We got out of the building and it was already extremely hot and muggy out. It was going to be a long day at the Expo where 500,000 people visit each day! Sarah and I walked around all day and I took pictures of each building we passed. I couldn't believe how amazing some of the buildings were. So much time and planning must have gone into each one of them. They were absolutely stunning and now I understood why more money was spent on the Expo than on the Olympics. Overall it was a very exciting day, although I anticipated leaving early and to head back to the hotel. When it was time to go I didn't want to leave because there was so much to do and so much to see. I'm very happy I got to see the World Expo as it doesn't happen that often and I'll probably never get the opportunity to go to one ever again.

One of the things I was most excited about during the China trip was going to Shanghai. It is such a well-known city and is featured in a ton of movies so I couldn't wait to see it for myself. When we arrived I first noticed all the smog. In a city with 21 million people there is obviously a lot of pollution and it's too bad they never get to see the sun! I also noticed all the sky scrapers and how tall all of the buildings were compared to the other cities. Since the space was so limited they just kept building up and up. There were sky scrapers for miles and miles. I just can't imagine how much work goes into building one of those humongous buildings, they're absolutely huge! We also went to the World Financial Center building which is the tallest building in Shanghai and has the world's highest observatory. Waiting in line to go up was brutal and once we got to the observatory I started freaking out a bit. The floor had glass pieces in it and I was afraid to walk on them, thinking I would break through the glass and die. The building also had a slight sway to it because we were up in the clouds and this freaked me out as well. Waiting in line to take the elevator to get back down was awful too. I just wanted to get out of there and I felt trapped because we had to wait in line for so long then take several elevators to get back down. I'm glad we did go to the World Financial Center because I've never been in a tall building like that before so it was a first for me. It was also awesome to see the building whenever we were in downtown Shanghai and I could say, "Hey I was all the way up there!"