International .21
Eline (left)
‘The Chinese can sleep anywhere’ Eline Jansen, a 21-year old Communications & Information Science bachelor student and Accounting pre-master stu dent, went to a summer school in Hong Kong for six weeks.
her course. “I sometimes really had to force myself to study, it was a voluntary course after all.”
She applied after seeing an announcement on BlackBoard. “I was never really drawn to Asia, but the Outreaching program requires you to discover a new culture. You could go for the safe option, but I thought of it as an opportunity to have new experiences.”
Eline was most surprised about the sleeping Chinese everywhere. “Honestly, they have the ability to sleep wherever they like, and seem to be able to do so at will. During lecture breaks, their heads would fall on the table, and when the lecturer started talking again fifteen minutes later, everyone woke up in the blink of an eye, as though they were never asleep at all. Very strange.” She reckons it’s admirable that everything runs so smoothly in a city this size. “In the Netherlands, there are always problems with the public transportation system, while in Hong Kong, you only need a single card. Everything goes without a hitch, so it’s actually possible.” She was struck by the amount of rules; the subway is rife with instruction stickers, while the bathroom stalls have signs such as ‘don’t stand on the toilet’. Sometimes, there would be entire manuals, including pictures at the sinks about washing your hands. “Maybe that’s the key to good organization.”
“It’s all big, high and immense, wow!”, that’s how Eline describes her first impressions of Hong Kong. “Skyscrapers everywhere you look. I couldn’t quite comprehend that behind each little window, someone was living or working.” But, Eline actually didn’t experience any culture shocks. “Everything is ultramodern and perfectly organized. Hong Kong really is Europe on speed: a hundred times bigger and busier. It’s a completely different world, but China, it’s not.” In the first week, Eline suffered quite a bit from jetlag, so luckily, she only had an introductory lesson on her first day. She then started her courses properly: Asian Business & Management and Chinese Foreign Policy. She had two three-hour lessons on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays: one in the morning and one in the afternoon. The students were free to explore the city and its surroundings on other days. “This way, I was able to visit Macau, Malaysia and also Shanghai, which is truly Chinese.” Eline was a regular at the Shake Shake club on Thursday nights, where the summer school students met up. “We partied until the small hours, and best of all: Thursday night was Ladies Night, which meant free entrance and free booze for the ladies all night long!” At times, it was difficult to study for
Heads on the table
Eline missed her privacy the most, since she was always together with other students. “Once I came home, I was happy to have some peace and quiet. I had actually grown a bit tired of the city.” She feels the Chinese are hospitable, kind and truly interested. Her most memorable experience was eating at the cheapest Michelin-starred restaurant in the world. “It was so cheap, that we ordered each dish four or five times. We expected each dish to have one piece. As it turned out, each dish consisted of three pieces, so our table was soon packed with dim sum. Kind of embarrassing, we had to take a lot home in doggy bags. It was nice, but I’m not sure if it was worthy of a Michelin star!”
Univers 16 mei 2013