Christmas away from family

Date: 2011.12.25 | Category: Life Abroad, Me | Response: 5

I had a great time at our pre-Christmas party on Friday with my classmates (photo above), I ate delicious Korean food yesterday at my Finnish friend’s place and spoke to my family members through skype. I have my Christmas Tree and chocolate. But it’s not the Christmas I want.

Christmas used to be magical time when I was a kid. Lots of excitement and traditions. I was able to hold onto it as long as I spent the holidays with my family, but then I moved to China. It’s just not real Christmas for me if it’s not spent with my family.

Last Christmas I  spent it with my boyfriend, but this year he unfortunately had work at his hometown. I have my cat beside me (even right at this moment), but even though she loved the pork I gave here, she doesn’t care what day it is.

In Finland the Christmas Eve is the most important day and now it feels like  that the Christmas is over already. It’s not a holiday here in China and I can’t forget that I have lots of schoolwork next week, including Cantonese spoken exam tomorrow.

This may all sound way too sad, and it is, but it’s the price I’m still willing to pay in order to spend the rest of the year happy here in Guangzhou. And with a thought that maybe after I graduate I have the chance to spend my Christmases again in Finland.

Anyone else living far away from family and missing the childhood Christmas?

Finland’s Independence Day Reception in Guangzhou

Date: 2011.12.08 | Category: Life Abroad, Me | Response: 42

Yesterday I asked at my Facebook Page if there’s interest to saw some photos from the Finland’s Independence Day Reception held by the Consul General of Finland in Guangzhou. Thank you my readers Barbarka, Alex, Twang and Marcus, here are some photos for you!

Me and my handsome boyfriend

Reception was held at the Shangri-La Hotel

I think I have never seen my boyfriend as handsome as Tuesday night

Unfortunately the Consulate in Guangzhou will close it’s doors next year and this seems to be the last time we have the chance to celebrate our country’s independence this luxuriously.

If you liked this post, visit my Facebook page to find out more about me!

My everyday life in Guangzhou

Date: 2011.10.19 | Category: Life Abroad, Me | Response: 15

Usually I update about my daily life to my Finnish blog so my family and friends could read what is going on in my life. But yesterday Alexandra and Kelly asked me on Twitter how I have been doing these days. I decided to open a window to my boring life for all of you international readers and see if you fall asleep or want to hear more!

My life revolves around my studies at the moment. Like most of you know I’m doing my undergraduate degree at Sun Yat-Sen University in Chinese language. I’ll be deciding my major soon as I found out that I will be starting my third year next Spring, not next Autumn as I thought earlier. Teaching Chinese (汉语教育) or Business Chinese (商务汉语)? That’s the question.

I spend 16 and a half hours at the university each week at classes. Besides that I do my home work and study some extra at home. If I’m not studying I am usually surfing around the Internet reading your amazing blogs! Or watching Desperate Housewives or Gossip Girl or The Lying Game or Pan Am or… I know! I should watch Chinese TV and practice my listening skills.

Usually I spend my Friday nights and Saturdays at home doing nothing useful. Then on Sunday I start studying, finish my home work for the next week and prepare for classes. This seems to be a good routine for me as I also need some time away from all the studying. Still I can’t get away from Chinese, if you remember that I live with my Chinese boyfriend and I’m surrounded by Chinese people in this city that don’t speak English. (Well, both of these are a good thing!)

And then sometimes when I’m not studying, not watching American television drama and not doing nothing, I might be helping a friend to buy goods from here and send them to Finland. She was brave enough to open her own business after seeing the prices here at Guangzhou. Just remember that I am in China with a student visa and can’t work officially. So lets just say that I am helping a friend. (But if you want to hire me and pay me a lot of money, email me!)

Besides all of this I’m thinking about my future. What could my next big dream be? Which major could offer me enjoyable study time and later on an interesting job? Until now I have followed my dreams and interests and I don’t want to give up going that road. I want to show that you can have a comfortable life (meaning earning enough money) doing a job you really like. But there’s a problem! I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up! Any ideas?

Last, but not least, my life goes around my dear boyfriend who cooks pork cutlets for me when I’m tired of eating Chinese food. And then there’s my dear lovely cute Lucy (in the photo above) who must be the best cat in the whole world!

This is my daily life like here in Guangzhou. No fireworks, nothing fancy, just normal life that could happen anywhere in the world. A student’s life where I have to consider if I really want to pay 200RMB to eat meat, to meet fellow northern Europeans and to network.

The shadow over my dream

Date: 2011.09.07 | Category: Chinese Education, Life Abroad, Me | Response: 14

During these few days I have been trying to register to the Sun Yat-Sen University. Trying meaning there are lots of other student doing the same thing and it’s just not possible to do it in one day. I will hopefully have everything ready today afternoon.

Already in high school I dreamed about studying in China. First I thought going to Beijing and considered Beijing Language and Culture University. Then a year ago I finally decided to stay in Guangzhou and do my degree in Sun Yat-Sen University. That dream is coming true right now, but there’s still a shadow over it.

As a Finn the Finnish government gives me student money so I can pay for my tuition and living. But I have used most of it already and they will only continue paying me that money until May 2013. Today I heard that I will start my degree on the second year which mean I’m going to graduate in July 2014.

The problem is that for the third and last year my government isn’t helping me financially. There is only one solution to the problem and that is to work really hard for the following years and be really careful with spending money. Because I’m a student I can’t work officially here in China. My English also might not be good enough to teach it to Chinese students. I do some business in here, but it’s just in the beginning and earning enough money for tuition and living is not too easy.

In some cultures money is considered as a some kind of taboo. Finnish people for example don’t like talking about money, but in China money isn’t private information. I’m probably somewhere in the between and wanted to share this with you, because it’s unfortunately shadowing my excitement to start my degree.

My foreign name is too long for ICBC

Date: 2011.07.29 | Category: Everyday adventures, Life Abroad | Response: 16

Two weeks ago I wrote about the Chinese supermarket experience and I would say that going to a Chinese bank is an interesting event too. I have an account in ICBC (Industrial and Commercial Bank of China), but had some problems with it. When someone tried to transfer money to my account the bank said my name was written wrong. How could I not know my own name?

I went to the bank yesterday to solve the problem. Luckily there was a bank clerk whose English was quite good and I didn’t have to rely on my weak “banking Chinese”. The answer to my problem was obvious. Chinese name usually consists of three characters, on some rare cases it can be four. But I happen to have not only one first name, but two. In total my name is 21 letters.

That is just way too long for their system and so my name was written all together with no spaces and they also dropped the last A from my second first name. Wouldn’t have figured that out on my own.

The fun part about going to a bank is to see how many staff members are needed and how many different kind of stamps are used. I wanted to register for the online bank so I would have less visits to the actual office in the future. In total three bank clerks and three stamps were needed.

One clerk translated and two handled the registration. There was one big stamp on the table that is used by the clerk who is working behind the table at the time. Then all the bank clerks also have a small individual stamp so it’s clear who have handled which client and signed which papers. My online bank registration papers needed to be verified by two persons so in total I got one big stamp and two smaller ones.

While I was waiting for all the paper work to be done, a young man came to the counter next to me. He had a big black bag with him and he started pulling out hundreds of thousands of RMB. I had never seen that much money in my life! Was he a business man and came to deposit his profits? What kind of business could that be?

In general you can trust banks in China. I have lost my bank card once and when I went to the bank to collect it they were really careful about checking my identity and that I truly was the owner of the card.

Or does some of you have opposite experiences about the reliability of Chinese banks?