Finally got a little time to sit down and write down something about the Teikyo welcome party last Thursday. Actually Megan had written a post about it. We have been co-blogging about quite a few AJS events already. It’s interesting and I like this way of blogging, because you can see different points of views and experiences on one thing.

Anyway, the party went very well, somehow it was much better than I expected. We had planed and decided this party three weeks in advanced, however just one week before we got a news that there are formals in St. Merry and Van Mildert, which are the same day as our party. Because those Teikyo students who live in these colleges were required to attend, I don’t think they will turn up to our party. Surprisingly, all of them came to the party right after they finish their formals, one of them even said he was willing to join our party rather than the formal dinner. So we had almost 100+ in our party at that night.

This is the good beginning of this AJS, and a grate motivation for all our execs. Although it’s coming exam time, all the execs are still working hard and show a lot initiative to the society, I am so happy to see that. There will be more events coming out in the next few weeks, the closet one is a ‘Teikyo festival’ organized by Collingwood’s Teikyo reps on Saturday, we were asked for some cooperation. Details are on the AJS website already.

Here are some photos of the welcome party, enjoy!

I went into the DSU shop to get a chocolate cookie for quick lunch yesterday, and I found this special oriental-food-only shelf.

They had them there for a long time (since this academic year), but it was only a small section at the beginning. And now it expended to the whole shelf. I asked the stuff there why they offer these items, because some of them didn’t even have English names or instructions and I don’t think English students will buy something they don’t actually know. She didn’t know why the shop increased those items, but she said they are very popular to English students as well, that’s why they expended it to increase sales.

Looking at the price, they are about three times more expensive than those in China. But it’s quite acceptable price compare to other drinks or snacks like Coke or Crisps.

I think this would be quite handy for Chinese or Japanese students if they need to buy some Chinese snacks or ingredients. I remember there was an oriental food shop next to ‘the elephant’ in my first year, but it closed for some reasons. So this might be the only places to get limited oriental stuff in Durham.

I have been quite busy these two days. The new Teikyo students finally arrived Durham last week so we started our well-planed ‘welcome campaign’.

Yesterday morning Andy and I went Teikyo to show give an informal presentation about AJS. Because it’s still in holiday and other execs were unable to attend, I made a video with welcome messages from other them. It took quite a lot of efforts to make it, but it was all worth when saw the students’ ‘wow’ faces after showing it. And then Megan, Andy, I and a few other AJS members joined their ‘walk around Durham’ section in the afternoon. They had a competition between groups of students. Basically they need to ask people on the street some questions like ‘How many Chinese restaurants in Durham’ and ‘What time does Waitrose close on Sunday’, and the team get the most right answer within a certain time could win a prize. It’s a good game for learning English and also got to know the city.

Today we went to Newcastle for a day trip. We had a good time walked around the city and get to know more about the new Teikyo students. They are very nice and friendly and very much wanted to improve their English. Although they know we can handle some conversational Japanese, some of them were trying hard to speak English to us. I would like to see them making this kind of efforts rather than group together and only speaking Japanese. We also had a very nice meal in that restaurant I wrote before. They said this is the first non-English meal they had since arrived England two weeks ago and it was extremely delicious, I totally understood how they felt even though I have been living here for almost three years.

So, that’s what I have been up to for the last two days. I am very happy to meet these new Teikyo students. We are going to have a good company this year! Megan also blogged her experiences of these two days, take a look:
Welcome Teikyo Students! & Trip to Newcastle

I have been making a welcome video for the new Teikyo students for the whole day today. While I was editing, Megan came into my room and I showed her the video. I used a Japanese music as background but she suggested using an English one is better, because it will give the students a feeling of being in England now. That’s a good idea, so I was thinking to use an ‘American pie’ song which is similar to the Japanese one I was using, punk. But then, Megan insisted not to use an American music because it’s England here, it’s better to use English music. She is an expert in music (at least to me) so she can tell which piece is English or American, and exactly what genre it is. But to me, as long as it’s in English and I like it, they are all the same.

When I visited a friend in Spain two years ago, I was surprised by a question like ‘Do you know Kong fu? You are Chinese you must know Kong fu, don’t you?’ Apart from that, I can’t remember how many times I have told English people that China and Japan are two very different countries, although both of them are in East Asia. But to them, these two countries are just somewhere in Far East, doesn’t really make any different to them. It’s kind of like me this afternoon, although I know there are big differences between England and America, but to most Asian people, western is western, they are all the same.

I remember when Jay visited my family, we had a dinner with Maggie and my family all together. Jay can speak Spanish and Maggie can speak Portuguese, I know they are different but similar. So they had a little conversation. I told my dad that they weren’t speaking English, he laughed and said it made not difference to him, they were just foreign language, English, Spanish or Portuguese, all the same.

It’s interesting when think about this, but it’s totally understandable. For example, although I know there are many countries and different religions in Middle East, but they aren’t much different to me. My image of Middle East is ‘unstable’ and ‘war’, because that’s all I see from the all sorts of media. I supposed if an Iranian read about this post now he/she will give me a endless lecture about what’s going on there now, but it doesn’t really affect my life therefore I don’t have any interests to listen. Same as my dad doesn’t know about what language were Jay and Maggie speaking, and same as what Megan tried to convince the difference between American punk and English punk to me this afternoon. But it was still interesting to know.

A related article here is worth to have a read: A new tourist attraction?

::: Update :::
Megan wrote about our discussion on her blog as well, and there are a lot interesting opinions about British and American musics, have a read: http://sinju.livejournal.com/98019.html