MAKE A NEW FRIEND
This is your final and most difficult homework assignment. You have two weeks to complete this assignment.
Introduce yourself to a foreign exchange student who is a complete stranger to you.. Engage in an extended conversation or even an activity such as inviting them to join you at English Corner, go to climb a mountain, go shopping, have lunch or just coffee, etc.
Write a 250 word summary of your experience.
At the beginning of your summary put your new foreign friend’s name, home country and telephone number. Post your summary here.
THE NAME, COUNTRY AND PHONE NUMBER WILL NOT APPEAR ON THE PUBLIC WEB PAGE. The name, country and phone number is required because if I think you are making up a story I will call your new friend.
The foreign exchange students have classes in the same building as HEL both on the 3rd and 4th floors.
Most foreign exchange students also speak English as L2 and will appreciate having a new Chinese friend to practice English. Last semester this was the most successful and appreciated homework assignment. Just read “Holistic English, A Revolution, not an Evolution” to confirm this.
What a coincidence! This Tuesday I just met a friend from Indonesia in the Fifth Students’ Food Court. His nsame is Sidhimartanasantosa, usually Sidhi for short. His mother is Chinese but he was born and lived in Indonesia.
With 2 months study in China, his Chinese speaking is not bad. And he said he is trying to look for a Chinese girl to be his girlfriend.Certainly I’m not his dreamboat,but I can still make friend with him and help him. At the end of talking, we changed QQ number.
That’s the first step to make a new friend. And I’ll continue my post in next 2 weeks.
Luckly,I have exchange student in our special field of study.
It was Monday when I first meet oscar in our class. This class is about National borders. Our teacher is pro. winner who is also come from German . That class is about USSR , a classical example about National borders. So, we discused a lot about the example, and oscar asked a question about the Sense of belonging in Pearl River Delta where we live.
It’s very good to make friends with a foreign students.
Firstly, I must make special thanks for Lin Tao, he introduced this exchange student Oshin from Universität zu Köln in Germany to me.
Yesterday at 7:00 pm, we three went to an office in dihuan building according to the appointment we made before. Primarily, I joined their discussion of the pollution in Pearl River delta. Lin Tao and Oshin had looked up Nanfang Daily and China Daily respectively in recent around 20 years and picked up some useful information about pollution in Pearl River delta. In the discussion, Lin Tao and Oshin exchanged the information of their own, and then we began to talk about how to make the presentation ppt of their homework.
After the discussion of homework, Lin Tao and I wondered the education system of Germany, so we let Oshin to introduce their general education system. He said that in Germany, their primary school is 1st grade to 4th grade, middle school is 5th grade to 10th grade and high school is 11th grade to 13th grade. There are three types of middle school and high school, Gymnasium comes first, taking part in this type school required you got high marks. The second is Realschule which require less marks than Gymnasium. The last is Hauptschule, and it is the lowest marks. Only in Gymnasium school can you go to the university. After finished in high school, you can apply for university in Germany. And you can apply all the universities in Germany simultaneously, but one university you can only apply one major! This is very different form China. Then Lin Tao and I introduced the general education in China to Oshin, and emphasized the difference with Germany.
At last, we just talked something else about Germany, like mathematicians in Germany. I mentioned mathematicians use ancient German letters in mathematics papers. But Oshin told me they German don’t use these letters now, he can only read these letters, but can not write.
It’s more than ten o’clock, Oshin leaved his telephone number to me and we went back.
It was cold in the afternoon in November 18th, 2009. There was no class for me and so I went to HEL building. I handed about in 3th and 4th floors, and tried to find some exchange foreign students to make a friend with, in the hope of building a relationship for an extended conversation between us. At first I thought doing this may be very tough for me and I also assumed that they may be shy and unease when talking with the strangers. However, later I found that it was not necessary for my consideration of that. The foreign students were very friendly as Dr. Martin said and they were really willing to make a friend with you and share their ideas too. I occurred to a student from Russia whose name was Amin Goldzhiec. He was tall with a green coat outside. He was funny and I recognized him because he went out of the classroom from time to time. Primarily I thought he was English judging from his clothes and when I learned his home country I got to know that most of Russian is very tall. He told me that he came to China twice, first in Beijing and now in Guangzhou. He said that he likes Beijing more than Guangzhou because he felt that the consumption in Beijing was cheaper. I said that now the weather in Guangzhou was cold but he told me that in Russia it was much colder. He said that he didn’t learn the Chinese characters for longtime. In his opinion the Chinese characters were easy to speak than to write. It was very difficult to memorize the shape of Chinese characters. I was amazed when I knew that his hobby was boxing for I always found that the students who are tall would tell me that they loved basketball and so on. I felt it was interesting when I found that they had Chinese Corner just like us to attend the English Corner. Ha-ha I think there is no need for them to create the Chinese speaking environment, and here is China. I sent him an email to express my thanks to him and asked him to join my MSN number which would help us get easier to exchange ideas. I appreciate the interesting assignment acquired by Dr. Martin and it was not very difficult to commit in fact and what it needs most is our encourage and now I get to know more about the reason why dear Dr. Martin told we can create an English environment and the meaning of “Steel shapes steel”.
Lear the experience from my senior roommate, I decided to fellow her advice, to make friend with a foreigner in English corner. It’s Wednesday, two classmates and I went to English corner, there were so many persons there when we got there, but only two foreigners here and so many students crowding them. Hours, I think, later, we got a position to talk to them, we introduced each other, they are Said and Diamond. They told us that Said stayed in China for two years: Diamond for only one month, Diamond’s home country is Togo, which is at the west of Africa. Said, I can’t come out with his home country, but what I can told about him were that he can speak 8 languages, he won’t stay one place for a long time because his father’s job, some languages were learn from the location others were taught by hi father, and he may go to Japan in next two years, their mother language is French. They talked us in English, but they talked each other in French. In English corner I also met some other person, they are freshman, two children, doctor, professors, it is a wonderful experience for me, I think I will go to English corner next Wednesday.
Today is November 18th; I did the final assignment in this afternoon. I know the foreign exchange students have classes in the same building as HEL both on the 3rd and 4th floors. So I decided to go to the 3rd floor to meet them. In the balcony, I met a foreign student sat there. I went to introduced myself and we had a pleasing conversation.
Now let me introduce my first foreign friend. His name is Pranoto Wisaya. He comes from Indonesia.We talked in English, even though his mother tongue isn’t English, we can communicate fluently.
I showed him the idea of Dr. Martin about the ESE. If we learn a language, we should build the environment for this language. Not just in class, we should also create the speaking environment in our usual life. He agreed with the ESE idea and he thought that speaking environment is important for learning language not just English. Then he showed me how his Chinese teacher taught Chinese. They should do the assignment on reading. Read the Chinese newspaper and write down the summary. This will help them to understand the Chinese writing style and learn more Chinese characters. In my memory, he just learned Chinese for two years, but he can speak it fluently. One of the important reasons is that he lives in China and the Chinese speaking environment is naturally formed. Even though the CSE is naturally formed for them, their Chinese teacher still required only Chinese in the class and no English. Time was short and he had to go to the class.
This is my first experience to talk with the foreign student. Pranoto Wisaya wasn’t the only foreign student I talked with in this afternoon. I also talked with the Turco- and Jordonian. They gave me an impression that they are all nice and happy to talk with the stranger. This is different from the Chinese.
I have been studied English for more than 10 years, I had never speak to a foreigner except my English teachers.
Last evening, I went to the English corner with my friends Eason and Sam. It was so cold, but there were many people there.
We met a tall and strong boy and introduced ourselves to him. The boy was very friendly. He told us that his name is Said and he came from a northwestern African country whose name is Burkina Faso and with French as its official language. Now Said is a student of the school of Chinese as a second language, SYSU. He had been studied Chinese for over two years so his Chinese was very better than we expected. What astounded us more was that he knew seven languages and he would go to Japan to study the eighth language because of the need of his father’ business.
Said is so kind that he answer almost every question we asked, though some questions, such as “where are you come from?” and “Do you like China” were asked for several times by different people. Said said he didn’t think it was a waste of time to do that because we spent our time for him and he spent his time for us than all of us would get improved. Such a kind boy he is.
It was the first time I make a friend with a foreigner and it was very different from take to my Chinese friends in English. I think it is good for me to improve my oral English and know more about foreign countries.
This semester,I choose the course called “Theory of Urban Planning in western countries.There are some exchange students from German attend the class.So we have a lot of opportunities to communicate with the foreigners through the presentations and discussions.However,we just talked about the content of class,no more than anything.I don’t know why I can’t get into the circus of them,it seems quite preculiar.As a result, today I went to make real friend of them with great courage.After class,I ,with my two classmate,invited a foreign student called Simon to have lunch outside school.Out of surprise,he is eager to have more communication with us.And we came to a restaurant to enjoy our meal.During the time,we had a lot of topic,and he showed great interested in Chinese culture.He said he would stay in China for one year for studying special phenomenon of urban in china.And he said it was also great challenge for him to get used to daily life in china.Local language also played very important role in his interview of the common people.But most of them can not express themselves fluently in English.And they often misunderstood each other.Luckily,Simon said he liked Chinese food very much.There are different kinds of food,as he get into maze of food kingdom.He also said sometimes they felt that Chinese students were reluctant to be on the stage,in other words,they were lack of confidence.Actually,he thought that some of us have active and creative idea,but we felt shamed to express our opinion.It caused that we lose a great deal of chances to create sparkle of inspiration between the classmates.After the lunch,we exchange our telephone numbers and invite him to join our activity next time.
He is one of the three exchange student in our class. Actually I wanted to meet him for a long time, but since I am a girl, it’s always a little embarrassed to do such a thing. However, this homework gives us this opportunity. This Thursday, we had the lesson together as usual. But after the class, we several students (Jeffery/Sammy from Class9) mastered our courage and went ahead to tell him about our intension. Out of our expectation, having got known this, they agreed at once. So we went to have lunch at a restaurant of XiaoPei Gate. Wow, the lunch was good, the friends were good and the conversation was good. We talked about how to learn English, different aspects between German and Chinese culture, ect. They seemed to have fun, too. When we said goodbye, Simon sent a message to me saying “See you next Thursday”. Fabulous! So in this way, I also think, we should thank Martine for providing us this excuse to meet some interesting foreign friends.
Tonight (Nov. 19th) I went to the business English salon (ES) in the MBA building. Because it was very cold outside, so it changed the place to M102 indoor. This English salon was so different from the English corner that I had attended before.
At the beginning of the salon, there were two speeches. One was given by Amanda from China about “Re-discover China: Chinese Zodiac”. The other was given by Nicolae Doru Berbec from Romania about “European Union: United in Diversity”. The speeches were so interesting, and not just only focused on western issue but also Chinese.
After the speeches there was a free talk. In the free talk, I joined a group. In that group, I made a friend with Jon Haase. He was a so voluble man. He comes from Hawaii. What a nice place! He told me many things about Hawaii, such as landscape, travelling, and the life in Hawaii and so on. He warmly welcomed all of us to pay a visit in Hawaii. He said that he just had come to China for two months to take the MBA course in Sun Yat-sen University. He said that he could also speak Thai since he had lived in Thailand for two years. He loves traveling around, so his experiences were so abundant. We talked about many topics such as cultural differences, discrimination, and even president Obama and so on. We have a nice talk and forgot the time until the administrator told us that time’s up. At last, we exchanged telephone number and e-mail address. Haase also welcomed me to make an appointment for some activities such as having a dinner, or attending an English corner and so on, in the future. So I believe that our friendship will last for a long time.
I benefited a lot from this ES. In ES, there was a real English speaking environment, and I listened and spoke more English in this ES. And the happiest thing is make a friend with Haase, the first foreign friend in my life. What a wonderful night!
On Monday afternoon this week, Nov 16th , I was going to have HE class on the 4th floor in HEL building. I got there a little earlier in order to meet some foreign exchange students on that floor and make some friends. I went across the porch, looking for some student that looks easy to talk with, and found 3 students talking aside the porch. They looked amiable and easy to approach, so I just walked to a young man among them and asked him to do me a favor. He was a little puzzled, so I explained the homework I had to finish to him, and he was very pleased to help me. He’s name is Erwin, from Indonisia. He’s an Indonisia-Chinese, major in Chinese. He can speak a good mandarine chinese. In the beginning when he was a little puzzled with me, he speak chinese to me. So I explain to him in both English and Chinese. Soon he understood, we started talking in English. His English is good too. We talked about sports and music we like. He told me that he loves play basketball very much. He’s also a music fan. I asked what kind of music he like. He misunderstood that I was asking him about music stars or bands he like and found hard to say. So I said that: for example, pop, rock and roll, classcal. He understood at once and said that he likes trance and R&B. I wanted to talk with he a little longer, but unluckily the bell rang and he had to go to class.
When I received the E-mail last Friday, I was always thinking about how to make friend with a strange foreigner. I didn’t have the courage to say hello after their class, because there would be too much foreigners and I would be nervous and shy.
I was so lucky that I met one near the north gate of the school. I thougt he would be a foreigner because he was speaking a language that I never heard before. After a short talk, I knew that language was his mother language and it was a dialect.His name was Yimo. He was Filipino and their official language was English. He didn’t use it at home. He didn’t have the time to have coffee with me at the time, so he invited me to go to church together this Wednesday.
This Wednesday was very special for me. I had never gone to church before. We went to the Dongshan Church which was nearest to the school. We take the subway to the Dongshankou Station and walked about fifteen minute to the church. Yimo gave me some messages about the Christian. Many believers would check and study the Bible together every Wednesday. Both the young and the old were very serious. And the father would be here to give some explanation. It was in Mandarin. The expression was easy. I could understand it very well. Yimo could understand it, too. He said that the father wanted much more people could hear the Gospel of God, so he explained it as easy as he could. Before we leaved, Yimo gave me a Bible. And I took him to eat Shuangpinai in Renxin Dessert Store, which was very famous in Guangzhou. I was happy that he liked it, too.
Make a foreign friends, come on, it’s not a easy work! But it actually give me some new feeling that it may bring something fresh.
Professor Martin advice us to create the chance in the NO.3 teaching building. He said that there has many foreign students like exchange students. It recall me that I saw many foreign students when we went to Martin’s class. From their skin and hair, I can differentiate there must be some Koreans or Japanese, and many are white people and black people. Is that true that I have to introduce myself to them to make friends with them. God, maybe I am not a shy man, but that still needs courage. I can’t help thinking that the scene I went to know them.
My first choice is go to English Corner. If I cannot find foreigner there, I will go to the NO.3 building. The wind was so big that I doubt that whether I should go there. I asked a friend who was knew in the English Corner last week to go there, I think he may help me to start the conversation when I need to talk to foreigners. I went there with two classmates, we have the same duties, to make a new friend. Two black man was there, and many people around them, interesting and lucky, I kept waiting for the chance to talk to them, so as my two classmates. When I found out that one of them like basketball, I knew that chance has come, and I began to talk to him, I knew NBA well, so we have a happy discussion, he told me that he knew more than 8 languages not including Chinese, and he came here to learn Chinese. My god, it make me ashamed, maybe he was so young as me, I knew so little about English compare to him, and I even cannot learn it well. That is why Professor Martin so angry about the way of teaching English of China, and he always asked us to learn English. He was the first foreigner I knew though he wasn’t a exchange student, and we exchange our personal message.
The second one happened when I went to the supermarket called many and cheap in the university. When I and my friend went to buy something. A foreigner has some trouble with his phone, he cannot explain clearly with his poor Chinese but to speak English which cannot understand by the sales. Then, I came out and a the man asked me to give some help. After the business, he shake my hands to say thank you. My friend and I laughed and asked him to help us to finished homework. Interesting, he is a exchange student from America of MBA. Anyway, he is glad to have a Chinese friend, so he give us his card. OK, we’ve done.
Today,I finished Martin’s assignment what I have expected for a long time. However,this is rather than a assignment but a nice experience.My roommate and me were waiting their appearance on the 4th floor of HEL building until they got out of class at noon.However,when those foreign students passed by,we just stayed there and didn’t know which guy should we talk to.Thus,after most of students have gone,we began to search our target.Fortunately,we happened to meet a tall blackman standing outside the classroom with a big smile.We gave him a cheery greeting,he was also very polite and talked with us.He told us they were practicing their program that will be performed on tomorrow night.And we greatly honored to enjoy their rehearse.Their group members were five foreign students from different countries.They were quite cordial and gave a performance to us.They sang a Arabic song named”amarain” accompanying with dance. Since the dance is mixed of Italy ,Russian ,Congo and Arabic elements,it’s so interesting that we joined their dance ,cheering and clapping.After their wonderful dance,Danny showed us many beautiful photos of his hometown and introduced Congolese local conditions and customs.Because all of them are learning Putonghua,they asked us to be their Chinese teacher and also would like to practice English with us from now on.And the greatest gains is that all of us hope to be good friends!We exchanged our personal information and promised to take part in their activities tomorrow night.It’s really a nice and menmorable experience,I expect tomorrow’s meeting with them.
I knew her When I helped my teacher revise the examination papers.But she didn’t knew me until I found her.One day while I was revising the examination papers,I found that she was a foreign exchange students from Malaysia.I remembered her Chinese name at that time.
So,this time when aked to find a foreign friend,I firstly thought about her.I found her QQ through my other junior,then we started comunication with QQ.
We talked about the life in ZhuHai where she now lives in,and discussed the delicious food around the campus.Because we are subjected in the same major,we also talked about our major: Psychology.We discussed how to learn the psychological courses and how to communicate with our teachers.I told her some of my own experience,and she told me some new things just happened around her.We are all enjoy the process in talking with each other because we surely have some common things to talk about.From the communication I knew that she had made a big progress in her Chinese level.She can speak and understand Chinese very well now,but may still have potential to improve the written level.
Because she had a lot of homework to do,so we did not have a long time to talk at the first time.,but we decided to make a long communication in the future.If I go to ZhuHai campus,we will meet each other and go shopping together.If she come to GuangZhou,I will take her around the campus and “The Red House”—the symbolic architecture in this college,owned by our major.
It is really a good thing to know a friend,for any reason.
I think I can finish my final homework assignment now. Tonight, my roommate Lebron, Hardy and I attended a Chinese Courner, which is about dumpling.In the Chinese Courner, we met many foreigns. Some of them came from Korea. Some of them are Japanese, and some of the are Singaporean.I made friends with two Vietnamese, I taught them how to make a dumpling, but we talk in Chinese and I did’t get their connection.There was an African, named Joe. Joe came from Accra, the capital of Ghana.His Chinese lever is improving. So we talk with him in English. We explained the game rules and how to make a dumpling to him.He felt interesting as well. At last,we exchanged our telephone numbers and E-mail address.Maybe we will go shopping or play football with Joe after we date him .
I have a classmate from Nepal , so I ask her to look for a foreign student for me. He came form Roumania. He’s a graduate student whose expertise is International Chinese education.
My classmate introduced me to him and explained something about my oral assignment, then she gave me his telephone number. I contacted with him . I sended him message and introduced my hometown.At first ,I planned to watch movie with him on Saturday night.However ,he wouldn’t have time. So, we met tonight.
We had dinner together at the food street “xiadu”. He had gone to the restaurant many times and he said the food there was very delicious. To my surprise, he liked hot food very much. His Chinese was so good that I almost communicated in Chinese . So many topics had we talked about that I couldn’t repeat every things. For example ,we had talked about china’s “drink culture”. He said he didn’t like the culture, because he had to drink although he didn’t like it .Excessive drink wasn’t good for the health. We talked about “culture revolution”, which had such bad influence on many people’s fortune. He said that Deng Xiaoping had such great contribution on china’s progress and China’s capitalism. China’s economic capitalism, not political capitalism. However, if China wanted to get the aim of “socialism”, it should get the way of “ Chinese specific socialism “—“reformation and opening”.He liked some Chinese things ,for example , his favorite sports was “shadowboxing” .
He would go to hongkong tomorrow because he was invited to take part in a party held by his country consulate. So he should go to “parknshop” to take his western-style clothes back .Because the trousers was long and he told the shopper to cut it a little. I went there with him. It was so far . On the road ,we had talked a lot ,too. For example, he told his “Chinese study” story. He had worked for a few years in his country, but he didn’t know what he really wanted to do until he found language studying was his favorite thing. He went to college and came to China.He had learned six countries’ lanuage. I learned from him that language studying was not just reading and writing, but also speaking and listening.
Although the time was not very long, I had learned so much from this experience:how foreigners see china,how to learn language well,how to do some meaningful things in our life ,how to be kind to everyone around us.
Today is Friday, a special day. I went to TV station of Sun Yat-sen University as usual. At TV station, I met a Korean who went with his classmate. Then I chatted with him. He is Piao Yongte from department of history at Zhuhai campus. Today he went here to see a friend from Thailand, and came to TV station by the way. We had a long talk. His English was not very good, just like me. But he was good at Chinese. I thought he was very lively. But he said that he had been too shy to talk with people before. However, he began to communicate with other foreign students after he came to China. And gradually he became conversable and made many friends here. When we talked about hobbies, he told me that he liked to travel and take photos of local environment. Actually he has been to 18 cities of China and other countries such as Malaysia and Singapore since he came to China in 2004. He even had been to my hometown Jiangsu which made me excited! He thought Jiangsu was a beautiful place, especially Suzhou. Afterward we found that we both loved music very much, although we listen to different songs. We exchanged phone numbers and QQ numbers at last in order to keep touch. In the evening, we continued to chat on Internet. He showed me many beautiful pictures which he took in China.
There always is a Chinese saloon at Friday evening. And many exchanged students will be present in the Chinese saloon. I thought it is much more easy to make friends with exchanged students in the Chinese saloon. So I went there with some friends.
We make two new friends there. One is from Ghana, named Joe. He is a black youth and come to China in order to learn medicine. But he must stay in the south campus of SYSU to learn Chinese for a year. We speak in English because we want more practice of oral English and Joe can not speak Chinese. Joe told us that he was willing to be a scientist. He said he was happy to be frinds with us. Another exchanged student we made friends with was a Korean young lady, named Han Junghee. Now She was studying in SYSU for the second time. In 2007, she was sent to SYSU as a exchanged student. And now she is studying in SCSL(School of Chinese as a Second Language) as a post-graduate student. She will stay in the campus for two years learning and she can speak Chinese well. We got the cell phone number and e-mail address of our new friends and told them about our homework “making new friends”. At last, we made a promise to Han that we will present in the Chinese saloon next week when she will take charge of the saloon. And we also invited Joe to climb the Baiyun mountain while the exact date will depend on our schedule.
I thought the most difficult step of making friends with the exchanged students is to initiative a conversation with them. Things will be plain sailing after the first step.
Today I am very happy to get acquainted with two new friends, both of whom are returned students studying in China.
As we were ever told that there is a Chinese Salon in School of Chinese as a Second Language (SCSL) every Friday, I together with four of my classmates went there to meet new friends. Today’s topic is JiaoZi, and we sit together with two foreigners: Joe and Han Jung Hee. Joe comes from Ghana and almost can’t speak Chinese. He has been in China for only two month so he doesn’t have any friend in China. He speaks good English and we talked about many interesting things such as football and Chinese food. Han Jung Hee is a lovely girl from Seoul and now she is a postgraduate in SCSL. Unlike Joe, she has been to China two years ago and stayed here for one year. After a few minutes talking, today’s high-light came: making JiaoZi! It seems to be a difficult task for we Chinese students, let alone for foreigners. So I served as a teacher, teaching them the basic way of making JiaoZi. Then they all finished their own works and gave them to organizers to cook them. Five minutes later, we all enjoyed out fruit of our labor. It seemed the most delicious JiaoZi I have ever eaten!
Time passed quickly. We said goodbye to our foreign friends when the activity came to the end. We all enjoy ourselves and look forward to the next meeting.
Ruan Xuanzhuang is her Chinese name which has been adapted from Vietnamese.
This Wednesday, I learned that there would be an activity about making and eating dumplings this Friday. So I planned to go there and make some new foreign friends.
At first, I didn’t know the place for this activity. I went to the no. 3 teaching building where we had Holistic English class. I thought maybe I could learn the exact place from some foreigners. There, I ran into Chris, a man from USA. We chatted for a while and exchanged our mobile phone numbers. We planned to make an appointment to shoot pool later. After that, I went to the party with my other friends.
At the party, there were many foreigners. But the first one I noticed was Ruan Xuanzhuang. Her hands were the most beautiful I had ever seen. She sat just beside me. She told me that she came to China just three months ago and she was attending in the advanced studies about Chinese in Sun Yat-Sen University at present. She hoped to be matriculated by the major of Chinese as a foreign language professional. And then she wanted to go back home to work as a translator. This was why she gave up on the degree in Vietnam and came to China. Since she came to China, she had been too busy to go out. Besides having class, she took on part-time job. I volunteered to show her around the Guangzhou city. She said she looked forward to going out with some Chinese girls. So we exchanged our mobile phone numbers and made an appointment to go shopping. I started to introduce some famous places for shopping, Beijing road and high and low nine for example. She said she once went to Beijing road. She went there not for shopping but for part-time job. There was a Vietnamese restaurant. Later, she asked me how to bargain. She said she always paid what the shopkeeper offered, because nobody would bargain in Vietnam. I told about my past experience to her. We also talked about our languages, hometowns and friends. To our surprise, one of her friends and I were from the same city, Jieyang. We kept talking until the party began.
At the beginning of the party, I gathered round to make dumplings with some other foreigners, who came from Vietnam, Korea, Japan and Italy. I found that the foreigners were all good at making dumplings. One of them shaped the dumplings like fish, boat, and gold ingot. Later, we began to play Chinese games. An Indonesia boy won the game for the first time. As an encouragement, he asked his friend to shake his ass for ten times. This set the whole room laughing. And then a European won the game. He asked a strong man to make 12 push-ups. The man finished it quickly and easily. His performance brought round after round of applause.
I had a good time at the party. The foreign friends were all nice and cute. I believe I will keep in touch with them, especially with Ruan Xuanzhuang.
“This is your final and most difficult homework assignment.” Shocking! After reading the assignment, I’ve been thinking that how can I fulfill this on time. Fortunately, the School of Chinese as a Second Language (SCSL) is holding this so-called “International Cultural Festival”, which provides opportunities for me to get to know lots of foreign students. After talking with a Thai boy with Chinese for a while, I found this charming Russian girl, Stasy, who is a foreign exchange student, speaking English as L2 or L3. We’ve been talking with each other for about 25 minutes. She told me she came here for her second year in university as a exchange student and she was studying in University of Moscow and would go back accomplishing her study next year. She introduced some interesting pictures of her country, including their incredible metro hall, their modern building and traditional churches, Russian style costume and their harsh weather. Impressively, she told that they studied Chinese characters as a course, during which they wrote a lot and spoke less and their Chinese teacher is Russian who spoke Chinese not so well either. This reminds me the assignment ‘Mute English’, they are doing the similar things as we do and should be given the assignment ‘Mute Chinese’. Oh, this beautiful girl said that my English is pretty good, which making me happy for quite a while until I come to realize that English is also a L2 even L3 to her, however it do feel good been praised. Then, she told me her Russian, English and Chinese names to me and gave me her number, I left her mine. By the way, her Russian name is orphean but hard to pronounce. Wonderful experience!
I have been finding new friends all this week, and I have known 5 foreign friends now, so amazing ! I now learn that “you will never know until you try”, because I find it’s not so hard as I thought before to make a foreign friend, and foreign students are so kind to us. But all things are difficult before they are easy, I mean when I search my first new friend, I hesitated for a long time and I followed the Korea girl for half an hour and finally I came and spoke to her:”Excuse me, can you do me a favor ?I’d like you to help me finish my homework.”Then she answered:”Ok, give me your homework, please!”Then I burst to laughter and explained to her that my homework need not write but speak! We became closer with this mistake and she told me that she thought there must be something wrong with me because she noticed that I followed her so long and I must be a bad person. After some chat, she introduced to me her friend who is a handsome guy form Czech Republic, then the boy and I often keep in touch on qq from then on. Today is another nice day, I took part in a cultural exchange festival for Chinese and foreign country students, there I saw so many foreign students, I took photos with them, I had a taste of all kinds of their delicious food, I watched the well done performance of them, and I made another new friend too for I had the chance to teach him how to eat with chopsticks. It’s really funny and unforgettable to do this homework!
I have made a friend with Joe on thursday morning before I attend the holistic english lecture.That day Joe was sitting next to the window and look out of it.I went up to him,and asked him if he can make friend with me,he said yes and then we exchanged the contact.In that afternoon I sent a e-mail to him to introduce myself briefly,and he replyed it very soon,then I knew he is major in pharmacology,he will study in China for about 4 years to get a master degree.He has been here for only two months,he will study chinese in SUNYAT-SEN university for one year,and then he will stdy pharmacology in some reserch institute.He said we can learn more form each other.
In this morning I gave him a call to invited him to attend the “international culture festival”in Xiongdelong building this afternoon.Therefor in around half past 2 he has been there.Then we walked around the room where the foreign countries display their traditional food or other interesting things,We eat some foreign food for free,and had a chat with some other foreigners .Joe was so popular with chinese girls,a group of girls came to talk with him and took photoes together.Maybe the whole afternoon I was accompanying with Joe to chat with the chinese friends,this cute black man has attract many chinese students attention because of his kind and reachable character.At about 5 pm we went out of the building ,and showed the english corner place to Joe and his friend ,for they will participate in the english corner next time.
Every country’s food are delicious,but speaking english maybe more enjoyable.
I was a bit afraid when I knew this assignment. Sometimes people appeared indifferent,that made me very depressed and frustrated.these years Chinese became used to distrust strangers. Cities are too small that people who came to cities to chase a better life found that urban life made you hardly breathed. Too much people here, they hated others entering their space.I had quite a lot of this kind of experiences. But I knew I must made this done, and fortunately I found this foreign customs festival hold by foreign exchange students, I made up my mind and went there with my two friends this afternoon.
Wait, I noticed that the person I met shared the same family name and same nationality with that one mentioned in last comment,but he’s he,not she.Anyway, I got his name in English,which is Ngyen Van Thenh(hope it’s right,he wrote it down, but not very clear), from Vietnam.
let me finish it.
I went there, hung around, looking for people seemed like easy-talking.Foreign students showed up their home food, and I was quite interested in Vietnamese food so I asked him what’s what, and he explained patiently. I really wanna have a taste, but it was not offered until 4pm. Then it came to me that I should do something further.So I said,
I have an assignment requiring to make a friend with foreign exchange students, would you help me?
Ok,why not?
He wrote down his contact information.I knew that He majors Chinese, his name in Chinese, something like that.He even knew a little Cantonese, quite amazing.Then he taught me some Vietnamese cooking tricks. One of my aunts is Vietnamese, I think I should learn some Vietnamese.
A couple of days has passed since I have recived the homework.But I was always hesitated to do such a homework,not for couldn’t find or make a new foreign friend.In contrary,Iwas full of confidences because I am optimistic and have an outgoing personality.But there is no much grace period for me.So yesterday,Friday morning, I made a decision with courage and told mysel that “I should complete it without any excuseor reason”.After my classes,I rode to the 3th Teaching Building and went to the 3th floor.At first there was few foreign in the corridor for they were all having classes.I had to wait at there.When the class was over,all the students got out and had a breath. I chatted with one of they in random.His name is Adja,who was from Algeria-DZ.He has been in China only for 2 months.When I asked he why did he come to china ,he told me that his purpose was just for learning Chinese.And I found that he can speak chinese not bad.He told he learn it only for 3 month ,and I was really shocked.I had learn english for more than 10 years but still cann’t express my self freely.I was so shamed.He told me that he was also very glad to know me and he hope that I can teach him chinese and as well he teach me english.I told him that I was very glad to do that.I will have futher contact with each other.In deed,I had know more than 3 foreign and were in touch with them.
I made a new friend with a foreign student who is from Indonesia today. I am a student of psychology major, and my tutor has been studying the feeling of “nostalgia” these days. She wants to know the difference of feelings between Chinese people and foreign people. A part of this study is to do a psychological experiment with Chinese and foreigners. Having dozens of Chinese people done this experiment, she asked me to recruited 30 foreign students to join the experiment. So I wrote a advertisement and put it up on the information bar of the building where exchanged students have classes. Then a guy named DIDI called me yesterday and told me that he is interested in my experiment. Therefore I made an appointment with him today. I asked him to have lunch together first. And my roommate Kathy was with me at that time, so we three, DIDI、Kathy, and me, went to the “Xueyi” canteen to have lunch together.
DIDI is a 27-year-old boy who comes from Indonesia. He just has been in China for two or three months, but he can speak a lot of Chinese. And his oral English is very good, as well. He said he had finished his master’s degree in Indonesia, and he wants to learn Chinese well. After he graduate from the Sun Yet-sen University, he would like to establish a trading company in Guangzhou. He also told us that his grandparents, who are parents of his mother, are immigrants from the Fujian province of China. So he knows much about China, especially the Chinese culture.
DIDI is an outgoing guy so we talked a lot during our lunch. After finished the lunch, we were still be talking for almost an hour. The topic that we talked was the Chinese culture. Although DIDI has known much about Chinese culture from his grand parents, there was still more that he doesn’t know. So Kathy and I told him a lot.
We enjoyed our lunch and talking very much. And we also made an appointment to go the Changlong Wildlife Park in December.
Today is my lucky day, I think. I was going to lab with my roommate Selina, and her phone’s ringing. It’s her participant. Selina has to finish a psychology experiment with some foreigners, so she stuck an advertisement. And today, one of the foreign students called. Lucky I was with her at that moment, and I suggested eat lunch together.
The participant is from Indonesia, boy, high educated, thank god for that. Because of high educated he can speak in English, very good English!
Didi is his name, a little strange but, what I can say, it’s his name. He has been to china for two month almost three. He said he wanted to have some Chinese friends to help him with his Chinese. So it’s a fair deal we (Selina and I) could help his Chinese and he can also talk to us in English.
Lunch time was happy. We talked a lot. He asked lots about Chinese issues. Something only happened in Ancient China, and something happens now. There was one thing he mentioned I really care was killing babies. He did not understand why the man who killed his just born baby did not need to go to the prison. For me it’s a common thing in China but when he mentioned that in his country the man who killed the baby is felonious, I thought maybe this is not a common thing but all of us do not realize this. Awful!
Something common to you and someday when you change your angle of view you would find that the thing is a big deal!
Lucky to have a foreign friend like this, can have a nice lunch like today, so lucky to have such a roommate, Selina, Lucky to have this wonderful conversation.
Li Xiaofen, Thailand,
I haven’t thought of making a foreign friend until Martin assigned the final homework. But fortunately, after talking about that with the boy whose governess I am, a middle school student, he introduced his foreign teacher to me. Her name is Joy and she is from America. We communicated by sending telephone messages. She said that she has come to China for five years. She is living in Guangzhou now and working for Li Yang Crazy English. She was glad to make friends with me.
But by writing English, I thought I didn’t complete Martin’s assignment. So I went to “2009 International Culture Festival of School of Chinese as a Second Language of Sun Yat Sen University” which was hold in Xiongdelong today, hoping to meet another foreign friend. Then I met the Thai girl Li Xiaofen. She was cooking “hot and sour soup”, that was delicious! She came to China a year ago and can speak Chinese very well now. In her opinion, a language environment is important. She said that she had been to Beijing, Shanghai, and some other north cities of China. So we talked about the culture differences between China and Thailand. What’s more, we talked about our Buddhism belief, through which I knew the monks of Thailand are different from those of China. In Thailand, monks even should shave their eyebrows and they are still begging for alms nowadays, but that’s not existent in China now. After the conversation, we went to watch the foreign exchange students’ performance in the evening.
This is the first conversation I made with foreigners, but not the last one. I will keep in touch with Li Xiaofen. Though she is not from English-speaking countries, but I believe “Steel sharpens steel”!
My foreign friend’s name is Zhang Ming with a nickname called Black Ant, a man coming from Thailand
Frankly speaking, I have never thought of talking or chatting with a foreigner, to say nothing of making a friend with a foreigner. But now I have to consider seriously because at least I need to finish homework. So today’s afternoon Lily and I went to take part in the International Culture Festival in the Xiong De Long Action Center. We hoped that we could make a foreign friend with whom we could chatting freely and help each other, not only for finishing the homework. At last we found Zhang Ming and he looked lively and easygoing. The fact is really so. We three soon recognized and began to talk. He introduced his country and the relation of the Emperor and the Premier, and he told us that he had lived in China for two years and he would go back to Thailand this year, then after that he will come to China once again. I also knew from him The Ramayana is a very famous literary works in Thailand. Because he is very busy, Lily and I leaved his phone number and E-mail and then said goodbye to him. We appointed to talk by means of email. Now my opinion about foreigners changes greatly, I think they are the same as us and they also like to make new friends. It’s a nice experience.
On November 20th noon I went to the third teaching building with my roommate to search our new foreigner friends.At first we found two Russian girls and exchanged our information,but they had no spared time.We failed to talk further.We were unwilling to give up,so we wandered between 3rd and 4th floor.Fortunately,we saw four boys and one girl in classroom 405,through conversation,we knew they were rehearsing song-and-dance program for tomorrow’s 2009 International Culture festival . We were allowed to watch their rehearsal,and Gao Mo invited us to dance with him.Ameel asked us to help him translate a short speech from English to Chinese.Danny showed us many pictures about his motherland Congo such as their national flag,national emblem and their forest which they cherished most.In the end,we promised to watch their actual presentation .On November 21st evening,we arrived at Xiong De Long and looked for our new friends, after saying hello to them,we sat on our seats to watch the performance.The Russian hostress is beautiful , the Korean host is cute and the presentation is pretty good. Thai boxing is wonderful as well as Chinese Wushu.We also watched a small live concert from Korea and the leader singer is very devoted.At the very beginning we also send blessing messages to our new friends. Their song named ”amarain” was originally sung by an Egypt singer “amr diab”,but they modified the music with adding Italian,Mexican, Arabic,Russian and Congolese culture.And Danny’s dance “black hands” made us so high,everybody was absorbed by the presentation.
I think this assignment is really difficult for me. Last week, I have tried again and again but just get the refuse. The foreigners students are always say that they are so busy that they have no time to go with me even just a dinner. Sometimes I was so disappointing that I keep thinking some gloomy things like this: Professor Martin Wolff has hundreds of students, so maybe the foreigners were invited too many times and lose their interesting.
But this idea was kit out from my mind on Saturday. When I knew that there was International Cultural Exchange Festival held in Xiong De Long Action Center, I decided to catch this chance to try again. It was a mazy time. Actually, the Chinese Students were as several times as the foreigner students, but the foreigner students were really friendly.
The man from Pakistan gave everyone a little flag of Pakistan, he came to China only three years but he can speak good Chinese. He also said some words of the GuangDong dialect. That made me ashamed that I had learnt English for many years but my oral English was still poor.
The Japanese boys were very handsome and polite. They were wearing their folk dress. I have take photos with them.
There were many delicious food were showed from the Turkey. So I kept asking the Turkey boy about the food.
The English boy is only 20 years old. He has accepted the investment from one of my friends and maybe we can go for some other activity with him.
Well, Zhang Ming was the first foreigner student I talked with. He was a quit and lively boy. By the time I arrived, he was already surrounded by a group of girls. So I knew some information from him such as he had been China for two years and his ancestors were came from China. Well, I thought that was not good for kept him told his personal information again and again. So I decided to talk about Thailand first. We talked about the emperor of Thailand, the rare white elephants, the dance of Thailand and the different of Thailand Northern and Southern. I haven’t known so many information of Thailand before. And I talked about my hometown FuJian and the teachers of mine. We really had a good time. Well, he was a kind boy that he made friends with all the girls and boys surround him. I was one of them. That’s why we all got his mobile phone number.
I love this experience.
Yesterday there was a party international communication in the ballroom of Xiong Delong Recreation Centre, I heart that forenotice from my classmate. Because of my “make-a-new-friend” assignment, I thought I had to join the party to search one foreign exchange student who can help me. In fact, I had posted a call-for-help paper in the 3rd Teaching Building before last weekend, but there was not any response. So you can easily imagine that I went to that party with little hope. However, to my surprise, there were a lot of accommodating foreign students in that party, further more, most of them could speak fluent Chinese. Effortlessly, I made friends with two beautiful Russian girls (Nastya and Okasna), two Turkmen (Ali and Murat) and a Vietnamese (Nguyen Van Thanh). I may say I had accomplished the assignment by then, but I was aware of that it’s not so accordant Martin’s original intention because all my new friends were so good at Chinese that we needn’t speak a single sentence in English. I kept roving around in the dance hall to look for a n English-speaking friend and I succeeded– I came across Hugo late in the afternoon, he’s a native Spanish speaker and he can speak good English, but his Chinese was poor enough that I could hardly understand him. Ok, he was whom I need! After introducing each other, we had dinner together and engaged in an extended conversation. He told me there would be ten months before he leave China, his major was law… We continued to watch the performance last evening together. At last, I found that we’re living in the same apartment building. We made an arrangement that he would come to my room to play Pro Evo Soccer in a few days.
Oh Year! Mission Accomplished! I’m too happy!
I took part in the international exchange festival in Xiong De Long yesterday afternoon, where I met many exchange students from overseas. Those students are too busy, some of them are publicizing their own national cuisine, some are promoting their national culture. At that time Li Xiaofen and her Thai friend ZhangMing is responsible for promotion of Thailand, Thailand has been the country that I want to travel most. In her behind there are a lot of posted photos of Thailand, she gave a lot of their own country’s customs for us. I was attracted to that beautiful country. I invited her to dinner at night, but she was too busy, because they have to performances at night, so she gave me contacts anfd said that later I can always contact her . I also told her that I would look at programs for refueling your country tonight. Night her Thai friends performed a blessing of the national dance and Thai boxing. That noon ,I tasted cuisine of different countries and knew more unknown knowledge. This is a very exciting day and of course it is a wonderful experience.
At this Friday, November 20th, I met her in the classroom in the 3rd floor in the foreign language school. Her pretty face shocked me. No more words could be used to praise her beauty. I just spoke slowly as my heart down. I asked her if I might be her new friend. She laughed and said “yes”. Oh my god, so eye-catching when she smiled, that white tooth like two curved moon on the air, shine and charmingly feminine. She told me that she had come into China only few months, so she couldn’t speak Chinese, but her English is very well. I’m so surprised for her great English. In my opinion, English is not mother language for her and there’re many difference between English and Russian, even in the pronunciation. Actually in her voice, I couldn’t hear the Russian accent in her spoken. I asker the reason. She laughed and explained that she just practiced many times with her friend from England. After a while, she said: “If you want to increase your oral English, you only can do is speak, speak, and speak. ” “I think so” I answered, “In my second oral English lesson, my teacher told me that L2 can sharpen L2, like this time, you sharpen me. ” Yes, at this time, a pretty Russia girl, from non-English country, talked with me ,a typical Chinese man. Both of us are using English as second language. A new friend, a pretty girl, a language sharpener, that all are you, Dasha. Thank you for your passion and help.
A few days ago, I thought which method I should choose to recognize a foreign exchange. Wait at canteen, the third teaching building or chat up on their way to somewhere. First roommates and I went to the English corner again. Only a few people were here. I researched a foreigner, I found but they were surrounded. I tried to take part to them but I failed. Then a second opportunity appeared-the . I arrived there early. The foreigners were all busy preparing their stands. I thought this was not a chance. I changed my purpose and enjoyed the delicious and unknown food. Luckily a lot of foreigners participated to this activity not very soon. I get up the courage and say hi to a foreigner, he is very kind and smiled at me. Then we began to chat. Because he got to china only two moths ago, our talk never depended on some Chinese words. If I spoke Chinese that would more trouble than I speak English, because if he didn’t understand I would explain my means in my poor English. I used all my English sentences to communicate with him. But he just a student not a professional educator, I can’t hear him well, there were some mistakes between us. I was shy of my misunderstanding and thanked him for his tolerance. We will see each other again sometime.
On Saturday afternoon I went to take part in the International Culture Communication held by SCSL (School of Chinese as a Second Language). Luckily I met a friend from SCSL called LuJiaGuo who is my partner in the Graduate Union of SYSU. He was glad to introduce his foreign classmates to me and my friends, Wen Qing is from Vietnam and very friendly, He shook my hands on his initiative and told us to call him Wen Qing. So coincident, we had played Ping-Pang under our dormitory and we lived in the same building 351. He is thin and not very tall just as standard Vietnam looking. He is good at English, Chinese and of course Vietnamese. After some talking, he invited us to have some Vietnamese food which had a good looking and was delicious especially the blast shrimp. Because we all like playing ping-pang, we decided to play ping-pang together next time. In the evening, we exchanged the QQ number by telephone. In the Internet, he introduce me some culture of Vietnam. I am greatly happy to make my first foreign friend.
Several friends of mine and I went to the overseas students culture exchange festival yesterday, where many abroad students from different countries built a simple exhibition area to display the distinguish culture of their country which made all of us feel excited and curious, such as the beautiful blond hair of Russia girls and the Korean Pickles and so on . When I went to Pakistan exhibition area , a men said hello to us in Pakistani heartily, and he taught us to learn his mother tongue such as “Hello”﹑”Thank you” and so on. Then his fellow named Zafar showed us some pictures of Pakistani culture and famous buildings and we talked much about the differences and similarities of customs between Pakistan and China. I remembered a picture in which some men wore western –style clothes with white artificial snow on their heads and bright smile on their faces ,one of which sitting on an chair was being took off shoes by the other . When I pointed at that picture and asked him “ what are they doing ?”, he beamed and said in his country bridegroom will go to the bride’s family and the bride’s family will take off the man’s shoes and throw it away and they won’t get the shoes back until the bridegroom give them money. I laughed because Chinese also have different strategy to make money from a bridegroom. Half an hour later , I thought it was time to ask his phone number and name ,so I did that. He was so happy and kind to leave his private message for us and we invited him to come to the English corner at Saturday night every week . But it was so pity that he isn’t the student of Sun Yat-Sen University but South China University of Technology majoring chemistry . However I was so happy to make a friend with a foreigner. Several friends of mine and I went to the overseas students culture exchange festival yesterday, where many abroad students from different countries built a simple exhibition area to display the distinguish culture of their country which made all of us feel excited and curious, such as the beautiful blond hair of Russia girls and the Korean Pickles and so on . When I went to Pakistan exhibition area , a men said hello to us in Pakistani heartily, and he taught us to learn his mother tongue such as “Hello”﹑”Thank you” and so on. Then his fellow named Zafar showed us some pictures of Pakistani culture and famous buildings and we talked much about the differences and similarities of customs between Pakistan and China. I remembered a picture in which some men wore western –style clothes with white artificial snow on their heads and bright smile on their faces ,one of which sitting on an chair was being took off shoes by the other . When I pointed at that picture and asked him “ what are they doing ?”, he beamed and said in his country bridegroom will go to the bride’s family and the bride’s family will take off the man’s shoes and throw it away and they won’t get the shoes back until the bridegroom give them money. I laughed because Chinese also have different strategy to make money from a bridegroom. Half an hour later , I thought it was time to ask his phone number and name ,so I did that. He was so happy and kind to leave his private message for us and we invited him to come to the English corner at Saturday night every week . But it was so pity that he isn’t the student of Sun Yat-Sen University but South China University of Technology majoring chemistry . However I was so happy to make a friend with a foreigner. Several friends of mine and I went to the overseas students culture exchange festival yesterday, where many abroad students from different countries built a simple exhibition area to display the distinguish culture of their country which made all of us feel excited and curious, such as the beautiful blond hair of Russia girls and the Korean Pickles and so on . When I went to Pakistan exhibition area , a men said hello to us in Pakistani heartily, and he taught us to learn his mother tongue such as “Hello”﹑”Thank you” and so on. Then his fellow named Zafar showed us some pictures of Pakistani culture and famous buildings and we talked much about the differences and similarities of customs between Pakistan and China. I remembered a picture in which some men wore western –style clothes with white artificial snow on their heads and bright smile on their faces ,one of which sitting on an chair was being took off shoes by the other . When I pointed at that picture and asked him “ what are they doing ?”, he beamed and said in his country bridegroom will go to the bride’s family and the bride’s family will take off the man’s shoes and throw it away and they won’t get the shoes back until the bridegroom give them money. I laughed because Chinese also have different strategy to make money from a bridegroom. Half an hour later , I thought it was time to ask his phone number and name ,so I did that. He was so happy and kind to leave his private message for us and we invited him to come to the English corner at Saturday night every week . But it was so pity that he isn’t the student of Sun Yat-Sen University but South China University of Technology majoring chemistry . However I was so happy to make a friend with a foreigner.
Yesterday, I participated in the party which held by the International Chinese Language Institute. In there, I known Joe. He comes China three months ago, and he wants stayed in China one year. He is a kindful man. We watched the party yesterday, and we very happy. The party is very successful. Many people who come from different country together to watch the party. I have not watch such paty before. I told Joe that we have the oral homework, and he is very like to help. After the party, we walk in the campus and chat. we are very happy.
Several friends of mine and I went to the overseas students culture exchange festival yesterday, where many abroad students from different countries built a simple exhibition area to display the distinguish culture of their country which made all of us feel excited and curious, such as the beautiful blond hair of Russia girls and the Korean Pickles and so on . When I went to Pakistan exhibition area , a men said hello to us in Pakistani heartily, and he taught us to learn his mother tongue such as “Hello”﹑”Thank you” and so on. Then his fellow named Zafar showed us some pictures of Pakistani culture and famous buildings and we talked much about the differences and similarities of customs between Pakistan and China. I remembered a picture in which some men wore western –style clothes with white artificial snow on their heads and bright smile on their faces ,one of which sitting on an chair was being took off shoes by the other . When I pointed at that picture and asked him “ what are they doing ?”, he beamed and said in his country bridegroom will go to the bride’s family and the bride’s family will take off the man’s shoes and throw it away and they won’t get the shoes back until the bridegroom give them money. I laughed because Chinese also have different strategy to make money from a bridegroom. Half an hour later , I thought it was time to ask his phone number and name ,so I did that. He was so happy and kind to leave his private message for us and we invited him to come to the English corner at Saturday night every week . But it was so pity that he isn’t the student of Sun Yat-Sen University but South China University of Technology majoring chemistry . However I was so happy to make a friend with a foreigner.
When I knew the assignment from Professor Martin, I realized that it really would be a formidable task for me, I could image the difficulty with which I would be faced with. Fortunately, there was an International Culture festival held in our school yesterday, and many exchange students from different countries engaged in this activity. As soon as I entered the hall, it really enlightened me. People from different countries with different cultures, they showed us their motherland with a variety of pictures, and introduced many interesting things from their own countries. A passionate Pakistani student gave me a flag of their countries with a star and a moon on it which represented Islamic religion of their people, he introduced his own countries half in Chinese, half in English, he also showed us many pictures and their national costumes, it was really very interesting. Then I asked him for his name and telephone, It was so kind of him to write his name and telephone number down on the paper and taught us to speak their language.
When I went to Turkey, I was attracted by the dazzling ornaments many of which were in shape of eyes, the exchange students from Turkey explained to us the significance of the eye-shaped ornaments for Turks, and showed us the food prepared with great care which representing their dietary habits
At last I saw Joe who is from Africa with perfect white teeth, an easy-going people, he had been in China for one year, and his Chinese was not very fluent, so we talked both in English and Chinese. I taught him something about Chinese, he also told something about his motherland. At last we both left our names and contact information to each other. After I came back to my dormitory, I emailed him to express my pleasure to make friends with him, What moved me most was that he answered the email with the end saying good night in Chinese.
It is really an unforgettable experience for me, although we respectively own different nationality and different culture, we can still communicate with each other in various methods, just we want and try to do it.
Amazing! This week, I together with a few friends went to the 3rd building (HEL) just for making friends with foreign exchange students. To be honest, we headed there because of the assignment Prof. Wolff gave us at first. Thus, we didn’t imagine that we’ll keep in touch for a long time. Actually, what we guessed was wrong. It was Thursday, after exchanging phone numbers with them, we planned to meet them again the next day as both they and we wanted to know more new friends.
The next day, after class, I met Rocky again. He was a tall, good-looking and nice person. He was from Indonesia. He did me a good favor. He introduced many friends to me and my classmates. Rocky and I not only communicate with each other face to face, but also keep in contact by SMS. His English is very good, I enjoy chatting with him and I learn a lot from him. Aiming to strengthen our friendship and show my thanks to him, I invited him to attend the International Culture Festival and have dinner together on Saturday. He politely accepted my invitation. I was excited and sure that we were going to have a fantastic time that day.
Saturday came very fast. In the afternoon, I left for XiongDelong building from dorm and attended the fair there to enlarge my horizon. A lot of delicious food was displayed and we tried many kinds of food from various countries. Moreover, with the help of the foreign exchange students and the impressive pictures, I found the difference among the culture of China and their countries. Around six, I led Rocky to the restaurant for diner. He liked spicy food and appreciated me for the wonderful meal. When diner’s over, he told me he expected to watch the show of the festival and we made a beeline there so as to catch the show which had already begun. The show was really a big surprise to me. I couldn’t help cheering and applauding. Besides, I couldn’t imagine foreign exchange students are able to speak Chinese as well as they do in English. Their performance was brilliant and fabulous. During the show, I began to know that Rocky was mad about shooting pictures. As soon as the show ended, we said goodbye to each other and went back to the dorm respectively.
After the time with Rocky, I felt that foreign friends are not that hard to get along with, they are cordial and hearty. It indeed was a splendid time being with them.
Last night, International Chinese College have a International Cultural Festival Evening at the 2F of Xiongdelong at the half and nineteen o’clock. I have a roommate she is a student of the International Chinese College, and she told me that there will have many students studying abroad and some of them will give us performance. About nineteen o’clock I came to the xiongdelong, there are many foreigners and they come from different country such as Russia ,Vietnam, Korea, Japan, Congo, Turkey and England and so on. Those students are very warm and interesting and I know many countries have different costumes and dance and I very like them. I think I am very lucky that I make a foreigner friend. His name is Kristian and come from England, I know he came to China only three month and he will stay one year at here. He and his friend love China and they want to study Chinese language, and he think that evening is very interesting. And at he end of the evening he give me his telephone number and I think he is very handsome. I think it is very interesting day.
Last night, International Chinese College have a International Cultural Festival Evening at the 2F of Xiongdelong at the half and nineteen o’clock. I have a roommate she is a student of the International Chinese College, and she told me that there will have many students studying abroad and some of them will give us performance. About nineteen o’clock I came to the xiongdelong, there are many foreigners and they come from different country such as Russia ,Vietnam, Korea, Japan, Congo, Turkey and England and so on. Those students are very warm and interesting and I know many countries have different costumes and dance and I very like them. I think I am very lucky that I make a foreigner friend. His name is Kristian and come from England, I know he came to China only three month and he will stay one year at here. He and his friend love China and they want to study Chinese language, and he think that evening is very interesting. And at he end of the evening he give me his telephone number and I think he is very handsome. I think it is very interesting day.
Yesterday 7:00PM,Tina and I went to the active centre of Xiong Delong when we were off from our class. We got there to watch the performance which were held by the exchange students from Chinese language college in our university.
Many exchange students were there. They were from Korea, Russia, Vietnam, Pakistan, Japan,
Thailand so on. We found a seat to sit down near to two students. They looks like exchange students. Before the palying started, we had a talk with the two man near by us and we knew really they are foreigners. We communicate with each other in English, of course. They told us where are they from and how long have been in China. They said the performance were mainly showing the different culture from different country. And the performers were all students from different countries. Dennis said he has been in China for 8 years. And his mother is Vietnam and father is Russian. He was born in Russia and until now he visited many countries when he was exchange student. Dennis’s oral English is very fluent. What’t more. He can speak four languages.
At the same time, we also talk about our country’s some culture. They were interested in listening to what we said. Later, we watched the show together. When the show was over, we asked their phone numbers in order to get along with each other someday. And Dennis promise us to practice our English and make friends.
His name is Joe. He came from the United States. Before the teachers arranged the homework, I heard that my classmate in our laboratory recognized him. My classmate and he met in the campus. That day they talked about half an hour. I asked my classmate to make an appointment with him, and we explained to him that it is for our homework. He was very happy to help us. It made me very happy too. That day we met with each other in the English corner in our campus. We not only talked about the school, but also something of the culture and history of China. My English is not good, but most time he could understand what I said. He also speaks to us slowly as much as possible so that we could understand clearly what he said. After talking with him I found that he knows lots of things about China. At the beginning I was afraid that we cannot link up with each other, but we were in progress successfully. That it is no longer as before this time, I just to say the simple words. I am trying to say the more complex sentences. The teacher gave us homework assignments every time to make my English improved a litter. It is the first time for me to experience this teaching method. I feel it is pretty good.
It seems that make a foreign friend is not an easy issue. Maybe you could acquire the number of a foreign friend, but it’s not easy to continue connect with him or her. Luckily, my new foreign friend and I continue well. I also met her at the HEL. The first foreigner whom I intended to contact to has two kids, obviously, she is really too busy and she introduced me to her classmate—my new foreign friend. She uses English as L2 as well. It’s lucky that she can also speak Chinese and her pronunciation is much better than most foreign exchange students. There is no better news than that she can speak Chinese. It means that in the future we could communicate easily,
Yesterday afternoon we went to the 2009 International Culture Communication Festival at Xiongdelong. I came there earlier than her, when she came in I had already visited all of the booths. So I be the guider of her, everything went very well. A Japanese taught us how to make Paper Cranes, though at the beginning she was not good at handicraft, several minutes later she made a Paper Rabbit which was much better than I did. Some of the other booths are also very interesting, e.g. Korea cooked food for tourists, Turkey introduced their country and national culture, Thailand showed their national costume, and so on. Time went so quick, when we had supper it’s already 18:00, then we went to see the performance held by foreign exchange students.
Then troubles came, it’s totally different from the afternoon and before. All of the shows were about culture of different countries, I couldn’t translate them exactly to her, so among the 2 hours we seldom talked, only at the beginning of each performance I translated to her what was the performance about, I felt a little embarrassed. Fortunately the performance is very good.
We had a great day. Communicating with a foreigner is not as difficult as most people suspected. I really love this experience. I hope we can be good friend in the future.
One of my roommates is English major student. Every Sunday, she will visit her foreign friends to study Bible. That evening, she with me go to her friend’s home.
We meet in the front door of Baijia supermarket at 6:30. Then we went to the friend’s home. When we arrived there, another friend was waiting for us. The host was a girl who came from Singapore. All of them were Chirstian. But that day my subject was another foreign friend, whose name was Shannon. My roommate had told me that Shannon was good at drawing. I walked around the house, and there were many pictures on the wall. The Singapore girl told me that all the pictures are painted by Shannon. And on the table, there was a new work. It was about a girl with blue skirt and thin fingers. It looks peaceful.
Several minutes, Shannon came back. When she came in, she shouted that it was cold outside. It looked like a small cat, and we all smiled. Then I introduced myself to her. She was warm kind and introduce herself to me. Then we watched a Vedio about a disabled girl who believed in god. The vedio lasted 30 minutes. When we finished it, then we should talk about the story. Maybe all of them are Christian, they all talked the god, they thought that the god always helped them when they were in trouble. Luckily, this subject finished soon. Then we talked about other things. We talked about the weather, and the worst city in China. They all felt that the weather was abnormal these days. And they thought the air condition in Guangzhou was bed. But when I told them the situation in shijiazhuang, they all felt they are so happy. Because the air condition in shijiazhuang is the one of the worst city in the world. 300days a year in shijiazhuang, you will not see the sun clearly. At the last, we had a conclusion that we should protect our earth.
I have a happy day!
Yesterday it’s international exchange festival. Certainly it is a big event for our school exchange students, also it is our opportunity to make our foreign friends. And for me, I am very curious of their culture, their living habit. The activity was hold in XiongDeLong Building. In the afternoon many students from different countries get together and dress up in their national costume. To my surprise some of them are from Korea, some from Viet Man, some from Japan, and so on. I just can’t tell the differences from them. They are all busy making their national food.
Fortunately I come across a young handsome man from Japan. He has been in china for less than two months, but his mandarin is very great. He told me he also study Chinese in Japan. He wants to do Chinese trade in the future. I think he really likes Chinese culture. Japan is close to China, and I think in the future the people from two countries will get in touch more frequently. He shows us their wooden bauble which they often play in their childhood. But unfortunately no matter how many times I have tried, I just didn’t acquire the handicraft. I am very regretful for that. All in all, it is a very interesting experience for me. Till now I get to know that the exchange students are very friendly to our Chinese.
It is such a diiffreent problem for me,there are so many exchange students in the third floor but I am embarraced to chat with them.But I have to complete my homework,there was an Chinese culture festival yeaterday.It is a good and last chance for me,so I went with Joey.I saw a Japanese girl teaching make The Thousand Paper Cranes,there were so many people surrounding her so I can’t get closer to her. What a pity,there were always people surrounding beautiful girls.I had to change my aim.I saw a handsome man aside,so I talked him with “Hi”,he replied and smiled to me.I was encouraged and went to chat with him.I told him I was a Chinese student and want to make friend with him,he was friendly and always smiled.But he asked me to talk with him in Chinese,I was astonished and began talk with him in Chinese.I found his Chinese was very poor so I must explained to him with English.It was very uncomfortable so I deceided to leave,Joey found a beautiful Russian girl and chatted with her.I wanted to find a lady to make friends.So I went to chat with girls but they always ignore me,at last,I had to go back and talk with the former man in Chinese,fortunately,he did not get angery and we chatted happily,at last,I asked for his telephone number and his name,I get my homework completed finally.