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Our language professor was kind enough to bring us some Zong Zi, sticky rice eaten in celebration of Dragon Boat Festival, to try! The bamboo leaf the rice was wrapped in gave a very distinct smell and the rice was kind of bland but it actually wasn't too bad. When dipped in sauces and heated up we are told it is even better. It was very satisfying to my growling stomach. 

While traveling on the street, and in and out of buildings, I have found many errors in the English words. It it surprising to me to see errors in public places and well kept buildings. I have seen letters transformed in elevators, very literal public signs, and the funniest place to see these mistakes is on clothing! Today I saw a shirt that said "You will fid someone." Another day we saw one that said, "thanks for eing you." Most things aren't bad like these examples but you will find some that don't even make sense. It's fun to search for these things!

Our afternoon seminar covered Chinese economy. There have been a lot of ups and downs in China's vast history. One thing I found to be intriguing was China's use of what they called coupons. For a long period of time China was on a shortage of many supplies especially food so they were given coupons to turn in for those items. The family was only given a select amount and food was very scarce, especially pork and grain. There were even coupons for random items like shoes and bicycles. Another thing I took from this seminar and our previous seminars on Chinese history is that China's development is very young even though they have over 2000 years of civilization. They are about 10-15 years behind America and are slowly progressing to better their lives. 

For dinner, Mrs. Reitman,  Jessica, and I took initiative and went to dinner on our own. We went into a restaurant with absolutely no English and ordered! We were about 75% successful but it was great practice. I had to write down our order in Chinese characters after Jessica translated with her phone. We ended up with egg fried rice and pork. Which is what we ordered except we wanted sweet and sour pork and not pork on a bone! We were lucky and the food was all very good. I definitely got my fill on rice! I was happy with myself for being able to ask for boxes and for the bill in Chinese. I enjoy practicing out on the street and we had fun going out on a limb and trying something new! 

The three of us then presented to a large group of education students. Mrs. Reitman had a wonderful presentation on the ins and outs of the education program at USI. The students in attendance were taking lots of notes and had plenty of questions at the end! I have to say after this trip I'll have a lot of experience presenting in front of an audience. 




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