When we went to our beds on Thursday night it’s fair to say we weren’t prepared for the busy day ahead of us. We first started with Mandarin classes with our teachers (laoshì), where we began preparing for our final test on Saturday morning. In the early afternoon we departed the hotel, arriving at the Cantonese guild hall where we witnessed quite the spectacle. First we heard a Beijing opera performer, whose performance included waving a paper fan around vigorously while singing in a voice only few dogs could hear. Nevertheless, the performance was good and we were all happy, until we found out that we would have to perform a little routine in our schools in front of everyone! Luckily we were in good hands with fellow Chinese opera performers there to guide us.

Following on from the success of the latter, we then headed off to the ‘Ancient Cultural Street’ where we all indulged in a spot of shopping, while bartering and admiring this cultural hot spot. I think we can all admit that by the end of the day we were shattered.

On Saturday the big day arrived. The final test, which would hopefully provide confirmation of our Mandarin language skills, was done just after lunch and wasn’t as awful as first thought. The test went smoothly and we all passed! Needless to say, hopefully this isn’t the end of our Mandarin language learning and we continue to study this interesting and complex language in the future.

It is difficult to upload media because wifi is so hard to get sometimes but photos and videos will follow.

-Erin Gallacher