{"id":374,"date":"2010-03-13T00:13:25","date_gmt":"2010-03-13T08:13:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ups.edu\/studyingabroad\/?p=374"},"modified":"2010-03-13T00:13:25","modified_gmt":"2010-03-13T08:13:25","slug":"kunming-china-at-first-sight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/2010\/03\/13\/kunming-china-at-first-sight\/","title":{"rendered":"Kunming, China: At First Sight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nimen hao<\/em>!<\/p>\n

\"Dongjing<\/p>\n

Hello everyone!\u00a0 Welcome to gorgeous Kunming, Yunnan Province, China: the business and industrial capital of the southernmost province of the most populated country in the world.\u00a0 I write this in my dormitory room \u2013 comparably equal in size to that of UPS but simply furnished \u2013 at Yunnan Nationalities University, or Yunnan Minzu Daxue<\/em>.\u00a0 There are a number of universities within the city; Minzu Daxue<\/em> (literally nationalities university) is a medium-sized university with departments specializing in studies of China\u2019s ethnic minorities.\u00a0 Appropriate to the theme of our program, Minzu Daxue<\/em> attracts students from nearly half of China\u2019s ethnic minority groups (there are 56 nationalities total, including ethnic Han peoples who make up 91% of China\u2019s population).\u00a0 Throughout the semester, I will be exploring various locations and cultures of these ethnic minorities whose histories reflect a truly unique side of Asia.<\/p>\n

For the next three months, this blog will regale my excellent Chinese adventures \u2013 both academic and recreational, for every experience abroad is indeed deeply educational \u2013 throughout Kunming, the province of Yunnan, and wherever the semester takes me.\u00a0 SIT China: Chinese Culture and Ethnic Minorities<\/strong> is one of the six approved study abroad programs UPS offers in China.\u00a0 Its curriculum is experience-based and promotes on-site learning; we do not enroll directly at a university for a traditional set of classes, but rather, travel to numerous places exploring various themes of Chinese culture.\u00a0 If anyone is considering the SIT China program or has questions regarding the curriculum (or this blog!), please don\u2019t hesitate to email me at ehoshibata@pugetsound.edu<\/a><\/p>\n

Future entries will delve into the heart of Chinese culture, its fascinating people, and my personal observations and feelings of this study abroad experience.\u00a0 Today marks two weeks since I\u2019ve been in China though it feels like I\u2019ve been here significantly longer.\u00a0 The initial culture shockwaves of my arrival have begun to fade, and with it, the fear of regret and the unknown.\u00a0 (And the fear of being arrested for no reason which was, to my embarrassment, something I had worried extensively about.)\u00a0 Studying abroad is without a doubt one of the best decisions I\u2019ve made thus far.\u00a0 It is something I highly<\/em> recommend to everyone.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve included with this blog a picture of the fellow Americans I\u2019ll be living, eating, breathing, and traveling with for the next few months.\u00a0 In this particular picture, we are at an older citizens\u2019 community center in Tonghai, Yunnan (a town close to Kunming where we stayed briefly during our orientation week) where we watched a traditional Dongjing<\/em> musical performance.\u00a0 A group of bound-feet women born as early as the Republican Era of China (1920s, post-Qing dynasty, post-dynastic system, pre-modernization) performed a number of routines they practice day-by-day to keep busy.\u00a0 They were the most adorable old women ever, all adorning impossibly miniscule shoes that only a toddler should be wearing.\u00a0 For those who are interested, the practice of bound feet was outlawed after the Communist Party liberated the nation in 1949.\u00a0 It had been practiced for over a millennia; established during the Tang dynasty as a way for women to appear and be<\/em> more beautiful and delicate, bound-feet became the epitome of beauty.\u00a0 Nowadays, only extremely traditional communities observe the practice.\u00a0 It is generally looked down upon.<\/p>\n

Until next time, comrades!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nimen hao! Hello everyone!\u00a0 Welcome to gorgeous Kunming, Yunnan Province, China: the business and industrial capital of the southernmost province of the most populated country in the world.\u00a0 I write this in my dormitory room \u2013 comparably equal in size … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":78,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spring-2010-erin-hoshibata-11-china"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/78"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.pugetsound.edu\/studyingabroad\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}