編者按  2009年秋，作為深圳職業技術學院與英國胡佛漢頓大學文化交流項目之一，由11人組成的英國學生游學團來到我校，進行了為期12天的游學活動。在此期間，英國學生領隊 Alicia Morris 用blog全程記錄了這次游學活動，文章發表于胡佛漢頓大學網站。以下原文轉載他們這次不同尋常的經歷，以饗讀者。

China Study Trip 2009 （中國游學 2009）

This year, 11 more University of Wolverhampton students visited Shenzhen and Hong Kong in China, as part of the University's continued drive to provide opportunities to broaden students' horizons through a series of study visits.
Alicia Morris - Group Leader - blogged the group's experience.

23 August 2009 - Arrival!（抵達深圳）

After a long journey, including a hot coach, a cold flight and a bumpy boat, all of the students were both pleased and relieved to have made it to Shenzhen. After we had collected our luggage and headed through passport control, we met with Jessie and Sam from Shenzhen Polytechnic and made our way to the campus by bus. After all of the excitement of moving into our rooms no-one seemed quite ready to go to sleep just yet, so most of us went out to explore our surroundings and try to find somewhere to eat (a very late) dinner.
Luckily, we found a traditional Chinese restaurant nearby which was still open, and the students decided to have their first taste of authentic Chinese food. After getting to grips with the chopsticks, the students tasted a range of traditional Chinese dishes which they all enjoyed - especially when the bill came to less than ￡2 per head!
After dinner, we all headed back to the guesthouse and settled in for a good night's sleep in preparation for following day's activities.

24 August 2009 - First day in Shenzhen （深圳第一天）

Tonia Namutulo-Siyer writes:
"At 10:30am the group made their way to the lobby of the guesthouse to attend the Welcome Ceremony. We didn't know what to expect. We were met by Jack, a very friendly member of staff from Shenzhen Polytechnic, and made our way the campus which was massive and complete with its authentic lake and bridge. We entered the building and were happy to be greeted with air conditioning and more smiley faces.
We were then ushered into what looked like a meeting at the U.N., complete with an oval table, microphones and flags! With an impressive wall banner welcoming us to Shenzhen P.T.
After a very nice welcome speech from one Professor David Fan, we all took a moment to introduce ourselves individually. We were then each given a small gift and had a group photo, before heading to lunch.
The lunch was a feast fit for kings! We had Chinese wine and tea, but more impressive was the 15+ dishes from noodles to shrimp and sweet and sour chicken... it was out of this world! We then toasted to our arrival and the partnership between our universities and continued the feast.
After eating, we went back to the guest house for an hour and then we were collected by 4 students and taken for a tour of the campus. We were told how to use the sports facilities and swimming pool and then we were taken down the road to a huge junction with all sorts of shops and restaurants. It was our first taste of China, Shenzhen style. We walked down the bustling streets and when we got to the supermarket the group split up and, accompanied by the Chinese students, stocked up on supplies.
We made our way back to the campus for dinner and talked about our day and what lay ahead for us the next day.
Once safely back in the guesthouse, the group dispersed and went to bed with anticipation for our next day in Shenzhen."

25 August 2009 - Our first Chinese lesson （我們的第一次中文課）

Everyone found it difficult to get out of bed this morning as most of the students stayed up late into the night, buzzing with the excitement of the day before. However, everyone made it to their fist Chinese language lesson at 9am.
We met our teacher, Ashley, and set about learning the pronunciation of the Chinese consonants. Again and again we repeated "Bo... Po... Mo... Fo...De... Te..." on and on until we could get the pronunciation right. Ashley then taught us how to say hello and explained that there is a different way to say this, depending on whether you are talking to a friend, a respected elder or a group of people... it all seems very confusing! Nevertheless, all of the students pushed on and by the end of the first class everyone could even make some simple sentences!
Following the class, we were offered lunch at the canteen - this time it was not a banquet like yesterday. It was mainly green vegetables and the students were split - half really liked them and half didn't like them at all!
At 2:30pm we were collected by the Chinese students and we all piled onto the school bus to be taken on a whistle-stop tour of Shenzhen. First we went to the coast, where we could see the tall skyscrapers of Hong Kong just across the water. Then we stopped off at the Shenzhen International Exhibition, but only for a quick photo-op. We then went to the Shenzhen museum, where we saw all sorts of exhibitions about China's long history. We saw some ancient brass masks which were unearthed recently in an earthquake and we learned about some more recent historical events, such as the Opium wars and Sun Yat-Sen's establishment of the Chinese government. It really was fascinating! Finally we found ourselves at the Central Book City, where we split up again to find some dinner.
After dinner, most of the students returned to the guesthouse but some of the guys stayed out to do a bit more shopping with their new Chinese friend. Unfortunately, however, for Junaid it didn't quite go to plan... after finding a perfect pair of shoes and then finding out that they had 50% off, he went to the assistant to ask for them in a size 10 only to be told that the largest size that they stock is a size 8! Shoe shopping in China may prove a bit more difficult than we had anticipated!

26 August 2009 - Valentines Day and being treated like celebrities!（中國情人節與所受到的名人一般的待遇）

Classes started again at 9am this morning and this time we were taught by Sam. He told us that today is Chinese Valentines day and taught us how to say "Happy Valentines Day" as well as some other useful phrases.
Sam's main aim of the class was to help us remember the 4 tones of the Chinese language. Once again we did a lot of repetition of the sounds, until the precise notes and sounds of the tones were embedded in our brains. The students have realised that speaking Chinese is a bit like singing a song, and you have to hit all of the right notes. The students also learned their first Chinese slang: In order to say that something is "so-so", they can use the saying "ma ma hu hu" which literally means "horse horse tiger tiger" - there must be an interesting story behind that strange turn of phrase!
After the language class, everyone had dinner again at the canteen and then had a short break before heading back to the classroom for a lecture with Jack on Chinese history.
Jack told us some facts about China and we learned that the name "China" comes from Emperor Qin, who was the first Emperor in China's history to unify all of the warring states and form the China we know today. Jack went on to show us some pictures of China's famous and traditional landmarks, fashion and entertainment.
Only a few short minutes after we finished our lecture, we were met in the lobby again by the Chinese students and they took us to do even more shopping. However, this time, it was not in walking distance... we had to get a bus AND take the subway! We all got on the bus and waited for the lady to come around to give us our tickets. We were on the bus for what seemed like forever, passing all shapes and sizes of buildings - most of them skyscrapers. Eventually we arrived at "Window of the World" which had small replicas of lots of world-famous landmarks, such as the Eiffel Tower and Buckingham Palace. At that point we caught the subway, and after another 30 minutes, we finally arrived at Dongmen (shopping district) and split up again to do some shopping.
The markets were fantastic, selling everything from bracelets to Nintendo Wiis, and everything could be bargained down to a great price. However, despite being separated, the students were having similar experiences in one respect... photos.
It seemed that everywhere we went, we were regarded as a tourist attraction by the local people who would look and point at us and often ask to take photos with us! Tonia in particular experienced this - especially when one lady asked her to "wait for a minute", before running off and returning with her baby whom she promptly handed to Tonia so that she could take a photo of them! Tonia obliged, much to the delight of the lady, the baby and many other passers by. What a celebrity!
When we all eventually met back in the main square, we once again drew a lot of attention. Every time we tried to take a group photo, all of the people around us would pull out their camera phones and take photos of us too!
At about 9:30pm, after we had finished taking group photos, we eventually headed back to the guesthouse on an equally long, (but also very crowded this time!), subway and bus journey. As we made our way through the streets, we passed many people carrying big bunches of roses and teddies and couples looking very much in love - What a lovely Valentines Day!

27 August 2009 - Splendid China Miniature Park and China Folk Culture Village （錦繡中華與民俗文化村）

The day began, as usual, with another Chinese language lesson. This time, the students continued to practice their short sentences and also learned how to count in Chinese. Finally, Ashley taught the students a Chinese song, which they will practice, in preparation for their performance at the closing ceremony.
At 3pm, the Chinese students met us once again and we all went by minibus to the Splendid China Miniature Park and China Folk Culture Village. This was a sort of theme park where many locations, ethnic minorities and historical periods of China are represented so that you can experience all of China in one place. We walked from a Tibetan style temple to a Beijing Siheyuan (courtyard) in the space of about 10 minutes!
While we were walking around the park, we indulged ourselves with a lot of "tourist" shopping - buying everything from bamboo hats to fans, and we also took the time to try some of the available foods and watched some beautiful Chinese arts being created. Perhaps the most impressive was a combination of art and food, when we watched a man create an ornate dragon out of caramel - when the caramel hardened it became a beautiful lollipop.
The best parts of the day, however, were the shows. The first show that we saw in the afternoon depicted a battle scene from the Ming Dynasty and must have contained at least 30 horses who were all galloping around the ring while the riders battled each other with swords and spears and did tricks on the horses' backs such as hand-stands and standing on one leg! It was incredible!
However, it was the night-time performance that really took our breath away... It contained all sorts of dancers and acrobats with incredibly ornate and beautiful costumes. The scenes depicted all sorts of traditions and culture in China, including farming traditions and a wedding scene and they were all performed with eye-popping special effects. The group was quite unanimous that their favourite parts were the Chinese dragons, the huge puppets and chariots, the indoor thunderstorm (complete with huge downpour of water) and the beautiful contortionist, whom we all now affectionately call "flexi-woman".
After a short ride on the mini-bus, we made it back to the guesthouse and (after a short stroll for some of the group), headed off to bed.

28 August 2009 - The History of Shenzhen and more shopping!（深圳的歷史，還有購物！）

This morning, the main focus of the language lesson was to teach the students how to order drinks in Chinese. Once the lesson was finished, we headed over to the canteen and for lunch.
After we had finished our lunch, we headed back to the classroom for a short lecture on Shenzhen's history with Professor David Fan. We learned that Shenzhen had started as a small fishing village, but it became one of China's first Special Economic Zones in the 80's, which led to rapid economic growth and turned Shenzhen into the sprawling metropolis that we see today. We also learned that Shenzhen has another name which is 'Da Peng', which means big bird - most of the architecture around Shenzhen pays tribute to this name and is designed to mimic the smooth curves of a large bird in flight.
Following our lecture, we met with the Chinese students at 4pm and headed back to Dongmen to do yet more shopping! It was interesting to return to Dongmen, as Professor Fan had shown us some pictures of what the main square in Dongmen looked like in the 70's and 80's and it was completely different to how it looks today - you can really see the how much the area has developed. Most of the students were keen to get their mobile phones "jewelled" and everyone managed to bargain a really good price, so everyone left the market feeling very satisfied.
After returning on the subway and the bus, everyone planned to go to bed. However, that wasn't the case for Suki, who had found that one of her feet had swelled up in the middle of the night. After speaking to the reception staff, we learned that there weren't any hospitals open at 3:30am, so we decided to elevate it until the morning when we would be able to get it checked out by a doctor.

29 August 2009 - Hakka enclosed mansion, Da-Peng fortified garrison and the beach （客家土圍、大鵬古堡與海灘）

An early 8am start this morning, starting with a quick trip to the clinic with Suki. The swelling had gone down a lot and the doctor explained that she believed that too much walking had been the cause of the problem (i.e. too much shopping!!!). The doctor then prescribed some painkillers and, after getting the all clear, Suki decided to join us for the sight-seeing but agreed to take it easy.
So we all got onto the coach and headed off to the Hakka enclosed mansion which was the dwelling of one huge family. It is estimated that approximately 500 people lived in that one mansion and all of them would have been related. As we walked through, there were signs and explanations about some Hakka traditions and one particular tradition that got the girls of the group talking was the wedding tradition which dictated that the bride-to-be should cry for 7 days before the wedding, especially whenever she had visitors.
After the mansion, we visited the Da-Peng fortified garrison, which is a large courtyard dwelling, surrounded by high walls (for protection from outside attack). This garrison has been preserved in its original state, but people still actually live there, so you can walk through some tiny passageways surrounded by history and then find yourself in someone's living room, confronted with a flat-screen HD TV! It was quite bizarre but very interesting, and some of the children who lived in the garrison were mesmerised by our group.
After leaving the garrison, we all went for a meal of seafood, right on the coast. We enjoyed prawns, clams, crabs and fish as well as the classic favourite sweet and sour chicken. This time gave us a chance to speak to the Chinese students and teachers and share our thoughts about the day.
The final stop on our tour was the beach. We opted to go to a nearby beach, as we had already spent such a long time on the coach and spent our time digging holes, building sandcastles, reading and chatting... and also helping Kyle to dig up his trainers which had been buried in the sand by Bobby as a practical joke.
We returned to the guesthouse, bringing along Kyle and Bobby with us and everyone stayed up and chatted for a while, before it was time to go to bed.

30 August 2009 - KARAOKE! （卡拉OK！）

Everyone had a long lie-in today to recover from the all of the fun of last week. When everyone finally got out of bed, Junaid, Tesh and Dale decided to go out with Kyle and Bobby for a while and everyone else started getting ready to meet the other Chinese students at 3pm.
After another long bus journey and a quick stop to exchange some money, we made it to our destination... Karaoke!!!
Alicia started proceedings with a rendition of Copacabana, and immediately all of the other students started to join in the fun. The boys arrived soon after and we all enjoyed eating popcorn and singling along to classics from Michael Jackson to Whitney Houston to the Spice Girls to Kanye West. The Chinese students also treated us to some performances of their favourite Chinese and Cantonese pop and rock songs (for which we provided instrumental accompaniment on the maracas and the tambourine), and they even joined in with some of our English songs! And of course, no karaoke night would be complete without some interpretive dance... especially to Michael Jackson and Beyonce!
After singing for a good 3 hours, we decided to go out and grab some food and settled on Pizza Hut, which was just around the corner. The waitresses' jaw nearly hit the floor when we told her that we wanted a table for 18! But nevertheless, they managed to seat us together and we all enjoyed eating and chatting before returning to the guesthouse.

31 August 2009 - Calligraphy and dumplings （書法與餃子)

This morning in the language class, Ashley reviewed numbers and we practiced telephone numbers, room numbers and dates. We then practiced Tian Mi Mi again (the Chinese song that we will learn for the Closing Ceremony), and we also learned a new lovesong called "The Moonlight Represents my Heart".
After lunch, we returned to the classroom for a lesson in Chinese calligraphy. We watched a short video about the "4 Treasures of Study" and the teachers showed us how to write some characters on the blackboard. We copied their characters and we also asked the teachers to show us how to write our own names in Chinese. We learned that many people in China enjoy doing calligraphy, and particularly the elder generation enjoy to use very large brushes to do calligraphy on the floor, as a method of exercise and to keep their arms strong.
After a short break, we went over to the kitchen to start making some Chinese dumplings. We started by chopping up all of the vegetables into tiny pieces and mixing the fillings in different bowls - there was a prawn filling, a pork filling and a vegetable filling. Professor Fan and the other teachers then rolled out the pastry into a sausage shape and chopped it into small pieces so that we could roll it into thin circles.
We all had a lot of fun trying to figure out how to seal the dumplings, once we had put the fillings into the pastry - the teachers made it look so easy, but our dumplings were coming out all different shapes and sizes!
Finally, Professor Fan and Jack cooked the dumplings - Jack boiled them and Professor Fan fried them and we all got to have our first taste... they were delicious! And we had made far too many so there was plenty to hand out to the guesthouse and university staff, and the Chinese students took some back with them too!
After all of that hard work in the kitchen, the Chinese students returned to the guesthouse with us and taught the English students how to play a Chinese version of 'Snap'. Everyone really enjoyed this new game, especially as it seemed that one of the unwritten rules was that whenever anyone had to pick up some cards, everyone in the room had to squeal as loud as possible... including the boys!

1 September 2009 - Carving Seals and Doris' birthday! （篆刻與Doris的生日！）

Today in language class, Sam Laoshi reviewed some pronunciations and we learned some new ones too, such as the 'r' sound that people with a Beijing accent use on the end of words. We also played a numbers game where you weren't allowed to say a multiple of 3 and anyone who did had to do a forfeit which was dictation on the blackboard.
After lunch, we all returned to the classroom and met one of the art teachers who gave each of us a piece of jade and a chisel and showed us a PowerPoint on how to carve Chinese seals. We then spent some time designing our seal and inverting it so that we could copy it onto the bottom of the jade block. Once we were sure about the design, we started chiseling away at the stone until we had made the lines deep enough - it was very painstaking work, but eventually we each had a personalised seal with designs such as our names, Chinese characters or pictures of animals. We each stamped our seal on a piece of paper which we signed and gave to the staff at Shenzhen to remember us by.
While we were carving, the Chinese students arrived with a big birthday cake for Doris so, as soon as we finished, we dimmed the lights, lit the candles and sang happy birthday to her. We all then shared the Chinese cake, which was delicious! It had a really different kind of icing and was decorated with all sorts of fruit and chocolate curls.
After we finished eating the cake, we went all went out as a big group - Chinese and English students together. Half of the group went to see a Chinese movie and the other half went to a bar with Doris to toast some cocktails to her birthday and listen to some live music. Cici spoke to one of the waitresses and the live band even sang happy birthday to Doris!
Once we had all returned to the guesthouse, there were a few tears before bedtime, as it was the last night that we would be able to spend with Kelly. We all said our goodbyes and gave her our little gifts before she headed back home and the receptionist locked the doors for the night.

2 September 2009 – Guanlan Block Print Village and a Failed Lantern Attempt（觀瀾版畫村與試放孔明燈不成功）

Today was our penultimate day in Shenzhen so everyone was a bit nervous in class about learning our Chinese song well enough to perform at the Closing Ceremony! Nevertheless we rehearsed again and at the end of the lesson Ashley took us to get our Shenzhen Polytechnic t-shirts so that we would look smart for the ceremony.
After lunch, we all got onto the bus and headed out to the Guanlan Block Print Village to see some traditional print art being made. The Guanlan Block Print Village is so special is because it attracts artists from all over the world to use machinery and techniques that are very rare or specific to China. While the artists are working on their projects and learning the techniques, they can also stay in the traditional Hakka houses which date back hundreds of years. The houses have been restored where necessary and fitted with all TV’s, air conditioning and other mod-cons that you would expect in a 21st century property, but they still have original features such as the original stoves, large hammers made of wood and stone for shelling rice and the wooden bars which slide across the doorway and get locked in place so that you can let a breeze blow through the house whilst preventing outsiders from getting in.
After our tour of the studios, houses and galleries we headed back to the coach and back to the guesthouse.
At night time, the students were taken by Bobby to a traditional Hakka restaurant to enjoy some food which is typical of the Shenzhen area – the food was delicious and once everyone had returned to the guesthouse, Bobby surprised us with a traditional Chinese paper lantern and instructed us to each write a wish on the lantern before we set it off into the night sky.
Once everyone had written their wish, we headed outside and carefully lit the wax whilst trying not to set the paper on fire. We had a bit of trouble because there was quite a large hole in one of the sides but eventually the lantern floated up, up and away – over a lamppost and a telephone line… up, up, up… and then… down, down, down! It seems that the hole in the side had got the better of the lantern and it ended up getting stuck in a tree about 10 metres down the road! After we made sure that the tree wasn’t going to set on fire, we all had a good laugh about our failed lantern attempt and headed off to bed.

3 September 2009 – Closing Ceremony and our Final Night in Shenzhen （閉幕式與在深圳的最后一個夜晚）

Oh no! Today was our final day in Shenzhen! But there wasn’t much time to think about it first thing in the morning, as we were all too busy rehearsing Tian Mi Mi (complete with swaying action) for the Closing Ceremony.
At 10:30am we all headed off together to the West Campus, (which was stunning to say the least), and were very touched by the message on the large electronic notice board which welcomed us to the campus as “special guests”.
We headed into another “U.N.-style” room and started the PowerPoint presentation of photos of our 2 week stay in Shenzhen. It was quite emotional to see all of our good memories flashing up on the screen.
After a few speeches (including one from Tonia!) and thankyous to the staff and Chinese students, it was finally time for us to sing our song… which went much better than anticipated! The staff and Chinese students were very impressed!
After our performance, we were all given our “credentials” and Alicia was presented with a traditional tea pot and it was time to head off for lunch.
We walked through what looked like a restaurant in a top hotel, but was actually the West Campus canteen(!), and headed into our own room for a buffet lunch. Once the speeches and lunch were finished, we all exchanged email addresses and Alicia handed out some small gifts to the SZPT staff, and then we all turned our attention to the flat-screen TV on the wall. We were all mesmerised by the music video for Jolin Tsai’s “Real Man” pop-song and it inspired us to do some karaoke of our own!
We all had a go at some classics like Kiss from a Rose and Let it Be, Professor Fan sang some Beijing Opera for us and we were then awestruck by the beautiful voices of our teachers Ashley and Sam!
After another good karaoke session, we headed back to Dongmen for our final ‘big shop’ and returned late to the guesthouse with some of the Chinese students. We ended up staying up late, exchanging gifts and trying desperately to fit everything into our suitcases so that we would be ready to leave in the morning.

4 September 2009 – Arrival in Hong Kong（抵達香港）

After a rather late departure from the guesthouse – and a short speech from Professor Fan about staying safe in Hong Kong and to thank us for coming – we all set off on the bus with some of the Chinese students.
We arrived at (inland) China/Hong Kong border a while later and we all had to get off with our suitcases and head over to complete a departure card before we could get in the queue for passport control. It was time to say our final goodbyes to the Chinese students who had so kindly looked after us in Shenzhen… LOTS of tears and hugs!!! We will miss them!
After passport control and a baggage check, we headed back out to the coach (which was waiting for us on the other side of the border) and off to Hong Kong. When we arrived at our hotel and got off the coach the heat really hit us… could it actually be HOTTER than Shenzhen?! We didn’t think it was possible!
When we got into our hotel, we left our luggage in reception and headed to the bank to change money… which was more difficult than we had anticipated! But every cloud has a silver lining and somewhere along the line, as he queued up at the bank, it suddenly occurred to Dale that he had left his passport on the coach!!! Oh no! Thankfully we called the bus driver and he had found the passport and said he would take it back to the hotel for us. When we returned to the hotel, we found Bobby holding Dale’s passport! He had come all the way over from Shenzhen to show us around.
At this point, we were able to move our stuff into our rooms and then the group split into two groups – one group went shopping with Bobby and the other went for some Dimsum followed by sightseeing. At night time, everyone managed to get to the Avenue of the Stars to see the quintessential view of Hong Kong and some people even headed up Victoria Peak on the tram for a birds-eye view.
Coincidentally, everyone made it back to the hotel at approximately the same time and we all chatted about our experiences before heading off to bed.

5 September 2009 – Final Day and the Flight Home（最后一天與返航歸來）

Our final day in Hong Kong… and would you believe we went shopping (again!). Most of us headed over to the Mongkok outdoor market to pick up some last minute bargains and spend the last of our Hong Kong Dollars – but it was much harder to bargain in Hong Kong than it was in (inland) China!
After we finished shopping, we headed back to the hotel and got picked up by our coach to be taken to the airport. There were a few tense moments as we wondered if they would let us on the plane with the immense amount of luggage that we had accumulated… but they did (thank goodness!) and we headed to our gate.
Despite being slightly delayed, our flight arrived at Heathrow on time and we waited for the coach to take most of the group back to Wolverhampton.
Everyone said their goodbyes and hugged and promised to see one another soon. But even through the jet-lag and the excitement of being back at home there was still a tinge of sadness – we will all miss China and the friends that we made there!

(Copyright: the University of Wolverhampton)

Note: “inland” has been added before “China” in some places and some spelling errors have been corrected by Mgn without notifying the author in advance.