As I enter the courtyard, I lock eyes with a boy. No one else has noticed me. After a moment of shared recognition, a scream erupts from his small frame, “WAI GUOOOOO RENNNNNNN.” One thousand heads snap in my direction. The news of the foreigner......Read More
China—the land of monks in yellow robes, spicy hot pot, and shopping plazas with glass elevators. It’d be difficult to find another country with a more extreme contrast between modernity and traditional life. This is especially so here in......Read More
Upon initial arrival in Kunming, I was both thrilled and concerned to find that my homestay family’s piano resides in my bedroom: excited to hear the melodies that I was sure would flow from it, and apprehensive that the placement of the......Read More
Its 6:30 on a chilly autumn evening and I am making my way to the dining hall for dinner. It’s the second week of school and I notice myself still walking with the quick and intentional pace of someone who doesn’t feel at home. However, as soon......Read More
After a small breakfast of meat buns in early October, the seven members of our cohort parted ways and began our missions to reach different landmarks around the city. The blueprint for my day’s itinerary was an index card, and on it was inscribed......Read More
Upon initial arrival in Kunming, I was both thrilled and concerned to find that my homestay family’s piano resides in my bedroom: excited to hear the melodies that I was sure would flow from it, and apprehensive that the placement of the......Read More
3,425 tea leaves. Over the course of five hours, my sling bag has become heavier and heavier on my shoulder as it has fattened up with the day’s harvest. Exhausted, I plop down by a persimmon tree and take a gratifying sip from my water bottle.......Read More
I remember moving in with my host family during my first week in Kunming, nervous and tired from lugging all of my bags into my new room, and being told by my Nai Nai (Host Grandma), “If you live here, I’m going to teach you how to cook.”......Read More
With our destination in mind but our route unplanned, we hopped onto the 133 bus with hesitant optimism. In an attempt to find our way and practice our Chinese, we asked the woman next to us for directions to the “Golden Horse Jade Chicken......Read More
We started our day with a trip to a quaint convenience store nestled between two cinder block apartment buildings. The three of us quenched our thirst with some scrumptious fermented milk. We then crusaded through the city in search of wifi.......Read More
Within the warm hearth of love, curiosity, and welcome that is my host family of three (We’re the Huang’s), every day presents a new culinary adventure. Virtually nothing – animal, plant, fungi or other – found within the......Read More
It’s 7 am on a rainy morning in Bangdong. It starts with a light sprinkle around 7:05, and quickly turns into what sounds like a torrential downpour. By 7:10, the only audible rain drops are those slowly dripping off of the leaves of the small......Read More
For the past two weeks, each member of the Bridge Year China 6.0 Group has been staying with his/her own host family in Bangdong, a hospitable tea-picking village in Southwestern Yunnan Province. Here is what the participants have to say about their......Read More
And more photos of our September travels….....Read More
More photos of our September journey!...Read More
