After having a throughly well-deserved sleep, we awoke on Monday excited for the day ahead. It started with us meeting our two new Mandarin teachers (or 老师, should I say), who wasted no time getting straight into the language (in pinyin mainly), which is full on.

After finishing, we then moved on to the day’s culture sessions: calligraphy and tea-appreciation. The former may have been quite difficult for the non-arty, but enjoyable nonetheless, and allowed us to practise our language in a different way. I think we all did a pretty good job with the tea. Some of us played chess.

Another sleep brought us to Tuesday. This day started started much the same, in the classroom, but after lunch we travelled to the Mahua food factory. Not only are lots of different types of regional pastries prepared here (a process which we saw first-hand), and the local favourite, sesame twists, but the building also acts as a mini-museum – demonstrating the fascinating history of food in Tianjin.

We then arrived back at the campus to play Go – a traditional Chinese board game. The game’s easy to play, but very tricky to master, and there were a few very skilled Chinese players helping us. Mr. Allan thought he’d take one on and seemed to be doing quite well but the opponent was going easy.

The final activity of the busy day was a boat ride on the Hai river, the most important river in the area. Tianjin is a stunning city, and even more so at night with its glowing buildings and amazing architecture. This trip even allowed us to get a sense of the city’s vibrant night-life, as we saw street-singers and public Tai-Chi – there were even swimmers.

Overall, the day was amazing but tiring, and so I think we’re all looking forward to our beds tonight.

Lewis Forbes