DAY 19, 20, 21 ( BEST EXPERIENCE SO FAR!)

DAY 19, 20, 21 ( BEST EXPERIENCE SO FAR!)

DAY 19:

I am all hype up for Jiu Zhai Gou because i have heard from a lot of people that the place is really, magnificently beautiful. But before reaching there we have to take an approximately 10 hours bus ride. We take a few pit stops in between the bus ride. The first one was a rundown school. An earthquake took place in the school. It appears to me that the school took quite a heavy hit from the way the school looks right now.

Not only that but I also heard a lot of students and the staff there actually did not make it out alive. I feel really sad for the family and friends of the earthquake victims after losing something irreplaceable.): But things happen for a reason. So we just have to look forward for the future as something BIG might happen anytime.(:

We went to have our lunch and look what I found...

A yak! It is the first time I saw a yak and it is super duper cute!

Then we went to a place filled with waterfalls. I am really surprise that there are still snows left beside the roads. I thought that it would have been melted.

After another exhausting 8 hours of ride, we FINALLY reach Jiu Zhai Gou. We are then welcomed by the Tibetans. They welcomed us with their own brewed wine, tea and delicious foods! I find that Tibetans people are very friendly. Not only that but they are also talented people. They can dance and sing . I swear that they are really amazing. But what i find interesting about them is their dressing sense. They LOVE bright colours! So they wear all the bright colour clothes. After meeting those wonderful Tibetans we went to our hotel. It took only five minutes from where we were before. Even though it was only a 3 stars hotel, it was not that bad. So we end off the day with a late supper meal.(:

DAY 20:

Morning breakfast! Like i have said before, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. We went up and up and up the mountain. I am not used to this kind of high altitude so I face a little problem breathing the thin, cool air but it doesn't really matter as the beautiful, jaw-dropping sceneries make up for all of it. Mountains, waterfall, flowers. What more can you ask? I feel like staying here forever because it feels as if I am in paradise. But everything eventually ends right? So here are some of the pictures I took in Jiu Zhai Gou!

Look how clear and blue the water is.

We can even see the rocks underneath! This shows how clear the water is.

Guess what?! It snowed! This is my first time experiencing such weather. I am really shocked to see that it is snowing. I was super excited and I even thought I was dreaming because it was too unreal.

Can you see all the snow! It is so white!

Here are more pictures:

Panda Lake

Super clear water

Waterfall

 

Cute ducks

After so long of walking, my legs are getting really sore. And it is time to get back to our hotel room. So we took the time rest till the next day.

DAY 21:

Today is our final day in Jiu Zhai Gou. I am a little bit upset but at the same time I am really happy that I had the opportunity to experience a lot of things such as experiencing snow, the high altitude, seing the moutains and a lot more.

Today, we get off and chill at an area as we waited for those who bought the tickets to see the performance because I did not buy it. It took about 1 and a half hour to end so we have a lot of free time. Me and my friend decided to climb up a hill and we can see the whole place in bird's eye view. It was so beautiful.

When I was going back down look what I found...

PIGS

After the performance is over and everyone gather back together we all went back straight to Sichuan Aerospace Polytechnic. Therefore, I can say that these past three days are the best experience in this whole trip so far.

DAY 18

DAY 18:

Strength of Material again. Time really moves slowly when I am in the class studying. And do you want to know a good news? Today is the last day of IS lesson! But I find that today IS lesson is the most interesting one. I learn a lot about Chinese culture. Like for example, if you want to give flower to someone for example your lover make sure you give red rose because other flowers might mean something else as they use flower for funerals all the time. And the number four is bad luck because when you say it in mandarin it sound similar to the word die. When dining, sitting arrangement is really is an important factor because if you get off from your seat to try and reach a certain dish which is out of your reach is considered rude.The lifestyle here and in Singapore is totally different.

After IS class is over, me and my friend head down to the football field to play soccer with the China student. It was really fun plus at the same time we can remain fit here as soccer involve in a lot of exercising.After that we went to have dinner at the Muslim Stall. Getting really, really bored after every meal I ate there.

Tomorrow, is the day where we go to JiuZhaiGou. I hear that the place is really beautiful but the bus trip is amazingly long. It takes about nine to ten hours ride. So me and my friends decided not to sleep so that we will feel really tired and we might just sleep throughout the whole bus trip. I hope it works! So wish me good luck.(:

DAY 17

DAY 17:

Today is one of the most interesting day. I learn a lot of things today when we went to SanXingDui. We actually walk there since it is quite near from here. It take us about 20 minutes from school to reach there. When we reach there, I took as much picture as possible. So let the picture do all the work.

A beautiful scenery when we are on the way there.

 Statue of a big mask.

 Beautiful scenery in the museum

Looks like a pokemon to me. Haha!

 A few of the artifacts.

 A model of a village.

 Tiger's teeth. That is what the description wrote.

 Gemstone. Might just cost a fortune.

 Golden sceptor!

 Bronze sword. Looks really heavy!

 A shield made of stone I think. Haha!

 And then we entered a room filled with masks.

 A statue of a mask.

 A bigger one!

 Golden bronze statues of masks.

 Simply beautiful.

 Snake artifact. But it is broken!

Some ritual place, just guessing by the looks of it.

Overall, the trip was really fun but it was really tiring as we do not have a proper transport. But in my opinion, I think it is worth the walk.

DAY 16

DAY 16:

Boring Strength of Material class like per normal. But IS seems to be quite interesting today. Get to learn how to play Chinese chess. Played with Shaw Yeong and it seems and I won. He is pretty lousy.

After IS Module went to buy take away food at halal food store with friends. We all ordered the same which is Egg Fried Rice. We went to my room  to eat since I brought Nasi Lemak Sambal and everyone want to try it as everyone misses the taste of Singapore's sambal. When I taste the sambal, I suddenly miss Singapore as I felt as if I was eating with my family when I am eating with them.

After lunch, we head down to the basketball court to support our friends as they played with the China students here. As expected we lost but I can see that the China students gave us chance but still we get trash. But winning is not the important thing here. It is to have fun and bond.

DAY 15

DAY 15:

Today IS module we learnt about paper cutting.We learn about the history of paper cutting. How paper cutting really came about. You may think paper cutting is easy but let me tell you it is harder than it seems. Here is my materpiece. Did this all by myself. I used to be good for my secondary school art. Thus, don't be surprise by my natural cutting skills.

But compared to the shi fu (master) mine are just trash. But I am really proud of nyself because this is my first time doing paper cutting.

This is two of his masterpiece that i find really amazing. I wonder how long it takes for him to finish them.

DAY 14

DAY 14:

Today, nothing much really happen. Morning class as per usual. Went down with Randall, Jasper, Kenneth and a few more to play table tennis with some of the China students. I am really getting the hang of it. After that went to dinner. Really getting bored of the food at the Muslim food stall but what can I do? ): Went back to the room and I went to see the online shop site. To my surprise, they sell everything at a low price. I really should buy something online. Plus, it is free shipping. But the bad thing about online shopping is you cannot check the item first. Nevertherless, here is a screenshot of the online shop site.

DAY 13

DAY 13:

Finally it is saturday but sadly we still have to wake early in the morning as per usual. First we went to play with the kids. We played whatr we called "zero point" in Singapore where two people hold a long string or rubber bands, one on each side, and a person must jump over it. The students then put up a few performance. I am really impress by all their talents. My favourite is the magic tricks. It is really hard to perform in front of a lot of people i tell you! One fact about me. I have stage fright. I tend to freeze or my whole body will shake because i am really afraid as everyone is looking at me. But the magician is amazing. There is also a guy who played the violin. A group of dancers. And a lot of singing. They all did so well.

I went down to see the guys play table tennis against China students. They played like proffesionals. Obviously I am referring to the China students. HAHAHA! But I am really proud of our players because three out of ten of our players manage to win them. Kudos to them. But the ones who did not manage to win also did well.

Meanwhile, a few students including me played five aside soccer with the China students. We manage to win 2-1. Raihan and Mogan are the ones who scored the goals. I played like Ronaldo today. I look foward to play with them again.

DAY 12

DAY 12:

Today IS module is all about tea! And you kno what?! I LOVE TEA! They teach us how they are suppose to serve the tea to the guest. It is really confusing because there are a lot of steps. Here is a picture of the whole set of things you need to have.

 

We tasted two kind of tea. If I remembered correctly one of them is the chrysanthemum tea and it smells rather sweet and it really does sooth the throat. I think the best time to drink it is when you are haing a bad sore throat. Thus, I really enjoyed serving people the traditional way, i guess.

DAY 11

DAY 11:
 
Today no lessons. Hooray! But still we have to wake up early to go on a trip. First we went to Ancient Town.

We are given 3 hours to shop there. Yes, it sounds long but let me tell you that it is not enough. Everything there is so cheap and there is like hundreds of shops there. I ate a snake which one of the stall sell there and they say it is a local delicacy there. It was crunchy and taste a bit like chicken. Next up me and my friends (Raihan, Jun Bin, Jasper and Shaw Yeong) we went to try the insects there.

 

First we tried the beatles. It has some sour taste. And when you tried the second bite it gets sweeter. Next we tried the scorpions.

 

 

I am really afraid to eat it because I am scared if the scorpions have poison. But as the saying goes "YOLO" (You Only Live Once). Next up Crickets.

 

 

It does not taste like how it looks. I bought like five sticks of crickets because it tasted really good. Overall, I think insects tastes good when it is fried. Plus, it have high protein. I honestly have a fear of insects and today I felt that I have faced my fears and actually eat it.

 

Next we went to the car factory. Unfortunately, we could not take pictures inside but I learned a lot of things about the manufacturing of cars. How actually a car is produce. The steps, the procedures and the safety matters. And I find the working conditions really nice. It is really organize. I am really looking foward to my working life. Maybe someday I can build my own car or even an airplane.

DAY 10

Day 10:

IS lesson today taught me so much things that I dont even know about. They taught me about Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism. These three religions is the most commonly found ones in China. I'm starting to undefretand more and more about these religions. After every IS lesson, I always look foward to the next one as I find each and every one of the IS lesson very interesting.

After the lesson, Me and 12 other friends played soccer with the China's school soccer team. We played 11 aside and we played using the whole field. The air here is really different from Singapore's air. Thus, I find myself really tired from running just awhile. We did not expect that they would be really good. In fact, we lost 4-1. But I really had fun playing with them and gain a lot of experience. We shook hands after the game to show our graditude. If I had the chance to play with their team again, I would of course want to. Ended the day with spicy spaghetti.

DAY 9

DAY 9:

Another day of waking up early in the morning for a boring Strength of material lesson. We played snooker during the break to wait for the next lesson which is IS module to start. I learned a lot about China's economy. After lessons are all over, we have the whole day to ourselves so we decided to go to the town area to do some clothes shopping. When we did the shopping, I find that China have cool fashion sense of  dressing. We saw a lot of peddlers who sells food. I bought and tried some. It is a ball shape like a malay kuih made fully of dough. It taste really, really nice. But we cannot eat too much as it is deep fried. Back to shopping. I found out that the prices here and in Singapore are slightly the same. I thought the prices here will be really cheap but i was wrong.

My friend saw a women selling strawberries. He bought 100 grams for 13 rmb. But we found out that the strawberries they she sell have fake colorings to make the strawberries' color much brighter. Here is the photo of the strawberries after washing it.

After this incident happen, I am really, really scared to buy food from peddlers. I learn to be more cautious.

DAY 8

DAY 8:

Woke up early for Strength of Material and IS Module lesson. After we are done with school stuff, we went to play soccer on the school football field. We played with the China students. They are pretty good but ERHMM we are better ERHMM. But I find that it is rather hard to breathe here while I was running because of the cold weather and the smoky air. Maybe we are so use to the conditions in Singapore. Where it is much hotter and dry. But nevertheless we won them one to nail. I am so proud of my team as this is the first time we played together but still our communication is so good. Ended off the day with Neu Ro La Mien(Beef Noodle).

DAY 7

DAY 7:

Woke up pretty late around 1 P.M. and had the whole day to ourselves because it is Sunday. WOOH! Me and a few of my friends, Jun Bin, Raihan, Ansaari and Jasper planned to have a boys night out. So the first thing, we went to play snooker. I find that my skills are getting rustier and rustier as I have not played snooker like for a year. We really had fun but the fun has only just began. After that we went to karaoke at a place called KTV. I was really shocked to find a few malay songs. A few of them are "Mungkin Nanti" by Peterpan and "Dayung Sampan" by M. Daud Kilau. We sang a few other Chinese and English song. Technically, we are screaming actually our voice out. My favourite song was there and it was "It's My Life" by Bon Jovi. It was really getting late. My gosh, time really flies when you are having fun.

DAY 6

DAY 6:

Finally it is our first weekend but we had to wake up early to go to a lot of places. It was 7:45 a.m. and everyone gather downstairs. Our first destination was The Panda Base Research Centre. I have never seen a panda in my entire life so I am really excited to go there and they say that Pandas are the China's National Treasure. When we reach there, I quickly took out my phone and took as much photos of all the adorable pandas. I did not notice that I took quite a number of pictures. So here are the pictures I took at The Panda Base Research Centre.

There was a lake where we can feed the swans, ducks and fishes.

 

Our second destination was the Chinese temple I realise something about all of the building designs. They have some ledge for us to step over before entering. Maybe it is a tradition or some superstition that they believe but it was quite beautiful inside. There was a lot of God, Emperor Statues and it really amazes me on how some of the artifacts there was manmade. I really learn a lot about the Ancient Chinese. There was the Tang Dynasty, the Han Dynasty and a lot more. Me and my friends went to do some cosplay and we dress up as two of the Emperor and two of the fighters. After we are done visiting the temple, we are given 30 minutes to do whatever outside. We can either shop or relax but there was nothing much to buy so we relax instead.

Our next destination was the famous poet house replica. The visit there was quite short as there was not a lot of things there. But I mange to snape a few pictures.

And lastly we went to shop at some place that we were brougt to. We were given an hour to do so. I was shocked to see some Muslim food peddler. They sell satays and some breads. There was also Starbucks in China but the sad thing is the prices of the drinks of are almost the same in Singapore. I was expecting it to be a lot cheaper but it's fine.

Overall, it was really a fun experience but it was really tiring as we walked the whole day till we nearly drop.