Reminiscing about my journey in Suzhou with my new-found friends

Here, our journey begins..

These past 6 weeks were an eye-opening experience for me, not only in terms of knowledge gained from the modules themselves but also in terms of personal growth. I discovered quite a number of things about myself and learned to adapt in new situations and work with everyone. There was a lot of firsts that occured - from missing a train (and a couple of days later - we nearly missed the connecting flight back to Singapore as flight was delayed) to better things like calligraphy to scaling the Great Wall to successfully running with a friend in the evenings and playing frisbee with the group (never actually exercise >_< ).

Immersing in the beauty of Hangzhou's West Lake

Visited quite a number of places both in Suzhou and other parts of China - Hangzhou, Nanjing, Shanghai and of course, Beijing. The Beijing trip was not part of the school visits and yet, it was one of the best experiences that I had with my new-found friends. The view from Beijing's Great Wall was spectacular - awed not only by the sheer size of the walls and towers but by how serene the natural landscape seemed in the midst of all the traffic in China. However, if you ask me which place has the most number of beautiful sites, I would say Suzhou. Gardens, rocks, lakes, water villages - that's what Suzhou is famous for. Suzhou gardens are very beautiful despite the lack of physical space while Beijing and Nanjing gardens are spacious but somehow lack that certain feel of elegance within them. Every place has its own unique features.

A lovely day in Nanjing

enjoying the water musical performance

Made a lot of new friends over here. Everyone was very helpful which I am entirely grateful for and I find each of them wonderful in their own way. Learning to survive together in a foreign land somehow bonded us tighter than one would if in a normal NUS setting. Was exposed to different perscpectives and ways of handling various situations. Victor - the fatherly figure, Xin An - the unexpected older brother who can't seem to smile properly for the camera,  Eugene - the uncle :P *runs away* & my crazy friend, JJ - wonderful senior who has good memory and excellent singing skills, Yijie - forever da boss, Shandy - the jolly fellow running mate, Natalie - my same height same photo buddy, Tian Shou - the one who helped me top up my simcard and fellow indo speaker, Min Hui - my roomie and our yoga instructor, Ying Xi - the ever thoughtly mother to all (getting me vegetarian sushi and healthy steamed potato chips), Siyun - the quite normal one within the group (well, at least in front of me) who lent me her shoes for my dress, Kim Soong - the quiet guy who has quite a number of surprises up his sleeves, Hui Ming who allowed me to shop with her, Minli and Kenneth with their zai cameras and a lot of wonderful people that I have made, the lovely F4 girls (Pei Ying, Hui Bin, Si Ling  and Xin Ling) who sent postcards and helped us bargained, Adeline (my buddy in flight booking), Bernice & Jocelyn who so nicely invited me for dinner and frisbee, Beibei who showed me how to eat lotus seeds, Xinpei & Tram & Philine - the ukelele group and my picture buddies sometimes, and many other wonderful friends - Dai Yong, Wai Tsun, Chong Hui, Alvin, Shawn, Amanda, Maryse.

My lecturers (Dr Nidhi and Prof Tan) and TAs (Tao Ye and Siew Choon) were all very friendly to us and their lectures and tutorials were ever interesting - they reminded us how one can apply our knowledge to real day applications (solar cells) and appreciate the beauty of things (especially chinese paintings and architecture after exams in Beijing) and that knowledge indeed does not stop once we are outside the classroom.

Now that I am back in Singapore, I really missed the time that we spent there. Waking myself and my roomie up and having "jian ping" (I called it Chinese prata) for breakfast while rushing to lectures and having lunches, dinners, suppers and my favourite - watermelon parties where we did more crazy stuff. From crossing the roads anyhow in China is a totally different experience compared to orderly crossing of roads where the drivers will actually stop for you at the zebra crossings and red lights.

All in all, I am glad I took the plunge and come for this Suzhou Summer Programme (I was hesitating right up to the day of flying itself), I would never trade away my new-found friends and experiences gained for anything in this world. I emerged a better and stronger person with new insights at the end of the day like a lotus flower..