I've Moved!!

Instead of living in my quaint little Chinese town of 8 million (that’s Nanjing, baby), I now live in a real town of Dali, located in southwestern China.

The final days of my program were so exciting and busy. I wrote about 10,000 characters in essays and did some presentations (all of which were conducted in Mandarin). Some of you may think this isn’t a big deal, BUT I’ll tell you, this is a big deal for me. I graduated from a graduate program conducted completely in Mandarin Chinese! Take that all you teachers who said I could never learn this language!

I graduated, the ceremony was beautiful, yadda yadda but the best part, by far, was that my diploma is bright pink! Who would have thought Johns Hopkins could be so fashionable (and Asian) at the same time?!

Nevertheless, I packed up (which always takes me 50billion hours) and headed out to a small town of Dali, in Yunnan Province, to act as a manager for a study abroad program for high school students who come over to China to learn about China and Mandarin! It’s through a company called Rustic Pathways (had to give a little shout out…Woot!)

I arrived in Dali on June 20 and it was raining cats and dogs. This was so harsh. After 13 hours of traveling, (taxi, plane, taxi, bus, taxi…), rain wasn’t the way I was looking to be welcomed into my new home.

Either way, Dali is awesome. There are so many more minority groups in this province! For those of you who don’t know, let me give you a bit of history on minorities in China for those who DO know about minorities in China, please skip down to O~(o.O)~o:

China has 56 ethnic groups. Most of China’s population, about 96%, is Han Chinese. The other 55 ethnic groups are minorities and all have their own language, attire, education, culture, and customs. These minorities range in populations numbering just under 3,000, to over 1 million (and yes, a group of people number over 1 million is STILL a minority in China, there are a lot of people over here, by the way). Yunnan province boasts a whopping 25 ethnic minorities, most of which are the Bai, Dai, Yi, Hani, Naxi, etc.

O~(o.O)~o

Ok—So I’ve been busy getting ready for the kiddos to arrive but had a few hours to take some photos. I thought I’d share. This is a woman is of the Bai minority:

Another photo I took my first day in Dali:

It’s quiet, it’s beautiful, it’s laid back. I don’t want to leave!!