I haven’t posted in a long time as I’ve been very very busy with University but this is the third article on my two months studying in China! In the mean time, I’ve fully settled into Shanghai, and definitely know that I’ll miss it a lot when I leave. Not least the views but also the delivered McDonalds!
Being away from home is not easy is not easy in any way shape of form. Planning phone calls to friends the other side of the world becomes annoying and some days you will miss home comforts! Although the trip has had its ups and downs, 99% of my time here has been enjoyable and inevitably not every day was be fun and games, but it’s just a couple points to consider before moving abroad for a long time. Many of people of my generation, even with the brexit vote, still see working abroad as a viable and possible option more than any generation before. Here are a four tips I picked up and would like to share with you all!
- Keep Busy! – Keeping busy really does keep your mind off things. For me I decided to throw myself into improving my character writing, which helped a lot with my day to day speaking and character recognition
- Be social – Stepping out and further developing the relationships you have with people and forming new ones also help you refocus. And not just foreign friends. Meet up with local people and those you normally wouldn’t. You’ll be surprised how much you learn from meeting and speaking to people you normally wouldn’t outside of your social circle, be it uni, college etc.
- Reflection – Taking time out to reflect is probably the biggest thing I have learnt in China. Think how many lessons you learn in a day! The only way to remember them and to make sure that you don’t repeat them is to think them over, revise them, and maybe even write them down. A day where you haven’t learnt anything is a day wasted.
- Keep your faith/morals – This leads on to my following article, but being a Christian and missing out on church for the first two weeks of China was difficult it took me out of a routine I had back home. After finding a church I felt a lot more settled! Know the morals you stand by and keep to them!
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努力- nu li- The Chinese character for hard work!
akwasi vs china 