Day THIRTY - 2 April 2013

Counting down to 5 more days back in Singapore! Although I just recovered from my sickness, I was fit enough to do my Forensic Presentation in the morning. My group and I did on Fingerprint Analysis. We had activities. First activity is for them to check on their own fingerprints on the shape and characteristics as we explained. Secondly we had a mini Crime scene for them where they have to find whose fingerprint were on which object by using the techniques we taught them earlier on. Some took a longer time than the other but was completed in a great experience for them. After us, we had handwriting analysis presentation. I have learnt on how to check for handwriting by using tracing paper on my own. There is the dot and line method as well as the slant method. It was very interesting and unique as different people have different handwriting. We went for lunch after this. The last two presentations continued after lunch. We had the shoe prints analysis first. We could actually use simple items to get our shoe print like an alcohol spray, a paper and flour. It was fun. Lastly we had the blood splatter presentation. It was done by Joel’s group; as usual it was funny with all the acts. We did a few activities like identifying the various pattern of blood splatter. The day ended with Kenneth still taking care of me, watching my meals. Hope my appetite comes back soon! J

Day TWENTYSIX TO TWENTYNINE - 29 March 2013 to 1 April 2013

This weekend started late this time! Also, this weekend was no enjoyable for me! We are going to take a cruise to the Three Gorges Dam for the next 3Days 2Night.

On Friday, we set off to YiChang, the place where we will board the cruise. It was another long bus ride. We had lunch at a restaurant. I had DrTan and Ms Chuah to sit with me as the rest of them want to sabotage me by getting Samuel to sit with me. The six of us together with the two teachers finishes almost all the dishes! So proud of it! After our lunch and just before we board the bus, we pass by a mini playground where there are children playing. We said hi to them and try talking to them. They were quite cute and look at us as we wave to them. After that, we set off to change to the smaller bus to get to the port to board the cruise. We were told that it is a 4-star cruise and that a 4-star cruise is much different from a 4-star hotel. As being told that, we did not expect much from the cruise.

However as we were proceeding to the place to change our bus, I had a serious headache. I thought it was just motion sickness and hence rest a while. As we were changing bus, I felt worse and cold. My friends gave me their jackets but were not enough to keep me warm. MY SICKNESS HAS ARRIVED!

In the next two days, I was sick all along, of course getting better each day. In these two days, thanks a lot for all the concern that you guys gave me.

Firstly, thank you Ms Chuah for giving me your gloves to keep me warm, fanning me for two hours when I was asleep and the rest was not on board that you sacrifice not going to tour the BaiDi Cheng, making me hot drinks after I was awake, taking care of me and cooking porridge for me after the trip.

Secondly, thank you Dr Tan for giving me your scarf to keep me warm, also making drinks for me to take with my medicine, checking on me while I was asleep and being my personal doctor!

Third, thank you Mr Lee for the concerns for me every day by asking if I was okay!

Next, I want to give a big thank you to Kenneth and Li Si. Thank you Kenneth for taking care of me, staying up the whole night to check on me, waking me up to ask me drink water and go to the toilet, piggy-back me up the stairs, taking food for me and worrying for me for all the days when I was sick.

Thank you LiSi for buying all the stuffs like water that I needed badly when I was sick, wiping my sweat and tears for me, checking on me in the middle of night together with Kenneth, not having a good sleep with my loud breathe and sometimes snoring and worrying for me all day long.

Also, thank you PeiPei for feeding me dinner and helping me to wipe my body with cold water. Furthermore, thank you Jodie for helping to get hot water and feeding me lunch. Thank you Karize and YanWen for all the concern and laughter that make me felt better. Also, thank you Brandon and KangMing for checking on my sickness. Thank you Benjamin, WenKai, Wilson, HaoYi and Johanna for the concerns and entertainment that make me felt better. Thank you Trevin for the vitamin water, thank you the tour guide for the fruits, thank you to the rest for the concerns and blessings!

Through this sickness, I felt blessed and really a burden to the rest of the people around me, sacrificing their sleeping time to take care of me, hence giving all the thanks to them. After the Three Gorges Trip, I was sick for another day and gradually get well the subsequent days. Sad to say, while I was getting better, few more were falling sick. Brandon, Christine, Clarissa, Irfarnah were starting to get sick! Hope that they will get well as soon as possible!! J

Day TWENTY4OUR & TWENTY5IVE - 27, 28 March 2013

Yesterday we had our last Forensic lecture with Dr Tan, Crime Scene Investigations. She showed us videos that I find it interesting. I have always been interested in Forensic Science and hence all these videos and lessons interest me a lot! The whole day was normal that nothing special happened!

Today is so different. Brandon, KangMing, Li Si and I went for breakfast at two different canteens. There was no MianWo, which is one of the Wuhan specialties and hence we had other kind of dough for breakfast. I ate dough with fillings at the first canteen and second dough which is sweet at the second canteen. Kenneth came to join us later where he tried the sweet dough. We then slowly walked to our classroom as we had plenty of time left before the IS session starts.

We had Calligraphy and Tea Appreciation as part of our IS lesson. I had the calligraphy lesson first. The teacher is very skilled and showed us the different calligraphy style as well as a brief introduction of how calligraphy comes about. The teacher also teaches us the way of holding the brush and all us to practice. We had time to practice on the calligraphy where the teacher come along and give us some advice as we write. I had no problem with writing Chinese characters; the problem is I still not familiar with the way to hold the brush as the teacher had taught. This really shows how much patience and experience is needed to do a good calligraphy like the teacher does.

(PICTURE FROM JODIE)

Also, we asked Ms Chuah to show us how she writes her name in the calligraphy style. Surprisingly, Ms Chuah, HuiQi and I share the same ‘HUI’ in our name. We then jokes that we should just write our remaining name (Fang, Qi, Ting) beside the ‘HUI’ that Ms Chuah writes! Ms Chuah also helped Li Si to write her Chinese name. She is really good in this! J

After which, we continued with the Tea Appreciation. We were taught by a lady who specializes in tea. She taught us on how to make a good tea and the different types of tea like Red Tea and Black Tea. I also tried once on how to make the tea. It was a fun experience but definitely a new one that requires more practice!

(PICTURES FROM PRISCILLA)

After me, Joel and PeiPei also tried in making the tea. They did a great job as well and I believe they had fun doing that as seen from their smiles on their faces.

(PICTURES FROM PRISCILLA)

Though these two sessions, I learnt that in China there are still many people who follows the traditions like Calligraphy, Paper Cutting and Tea Appreciation. This really shows how long and deep the Chinese Traditions are in their heart. In Singapore with many races, it was hard to have such deep and long traditions as we are always adapting the new fashion. It is very rare in Singapore that people will do Calligraphy, Paper Cutting and Tea Appreciation.

To add on, we had our directors from NgeeAnn coming over to see us and view how we are doing in the IS sessions. They also tried in the Calligraphy (not sure about tea appreciation). After which, they went for lunch with Dr Tan, Ms Chuah and local teachers who taught us Calligraphy and Tea Appreciation. On the other side, we had to stay to pack up and lock the room as instructed to Kenneth by the teachers as he is the student leader. We then had our lunch and went back to prepare for our forensic presentation. I was tired and went to take a nap for 7hours. My friends wake me up as they bought dinner for me. i ate slowly like a small kid and went around looking at the rest of them packing. I went back to sleep again for another 10hours to the next morning! This had to be the longest time (17hours) that i slept since i come to Wuhan. J
*My friends all call me pig after i slept for so long*

Day TWENTYTHR33 - 26 March 2013

Today is the twenty-third day in Wuhan. We had our IS Presentation in the morning. I had listened to the other groups presenting and they were mostly discussing on the lifestyle in Wuhan comparing to Singaporeans’ lifestyle. There are many differences we can see such as the eating style and transportation. One obvious difference is that in Wuhan, the locals litter and spit anytime they want on the street while in Singapore, we will get fined if we do the same thing. My group and I did on the festivals in China which we used it to compare to Singapore’s festivals. Through this presentation, I learnt many things such as the history of some festivals and the tradition.

Also, I have learnt the different kinds to food and different traditions in the different festivals. For example, in QingMing festival, we eat cold food as we are not allowed to have fire in that day.

In the evening, we have a lecture on Fengshui. Through this lecture, I learn that there are different types of burial like cliff burial where the coffin is raised to be put in the caves of a cliff. This is very different from the normal burial practice we often see in Singapore which is cremation or soil burial. Besides that, we were also taught the different specialty in the different province. For example, in Wuhan which is the Hubei province, the specialty is the seafood especially fish. This is because Hubei or Wuhan is surrounded by sea where supplies of fresh seafood can be easily obtained.

The day ended where we went for dinner at street shops after the FengShui lecture and rest in our hostels! J

Day TWENTYTWO - 25 March 2013

Today is the twenty-second day in Wuhan. We had an interesting IS lecture on the traditional paper cutting. Before this lesson, I had very little information on paper cutting, but known of many people who can do it and seen the different design especially during Chinese New Year. In this lesson, the teacher showed us the different design and even did a paper cutting on the spot, using it to teach. I was more interested in the design of the historical people in Water Margin (水浒传). We tried the simpler paper cutting, using the techniques the teacher taught us.

Through this lesson, I learn the traditional paper cutting which I find it a great experience as paper cutting is very rarely seen in us especially the young people nowadays. It was a great lesson learnt! After the paper cutting session, we were free to go and most of us would probably go back to the hostel to prepare for our IS Presentation tomorrow! Hope everything goes well tomorrow! J

Day TWENTYONE - 24 March 2013

Today is the twenty-first day in Wuhan, about two more weeks to go. It started early today. We went strawberry picking. We walk through the muddy and slippery road to the farm. We did have fun picking strawberry and learning from the locals to eat it immediately after plucking it. We got ourselves very dirty too! We brought a big pack of strawberry back to our hostel. When we were back, the strawberries were soften and squashed. We ate some and brought some to the party with the local students. The second party we have with them. This time we have our party at the singing and dancing hall. We had performances and games during the party as well as the Karaoke Session at last with them. We sang songs and cheer for each other too! We did cleanup of course. For this party, we had fun as well as notice that the local are very enthusiastic and passionate. We were shy at first but they always take the first step to invite or encourage us to play and enjoy the party like they did. After the party, we took a group photo with the local students and said goodbye. We went to have our dinner at the restaurant to the left side of the school which said to be the first restaurant to sell authentic fish balls. It was a farewell dinner for Ms Mikia. It was a pity that Ms Mikia’s transport was brought forward and we had no time to complete the dinner with her. We took pictures with her as well to keep as a memento.

We continue our dinner where we had the famous authentic fish balls. It was made of fish that we can find fish bones in the fish balls. We finished dinner quickly and went for the street food after it. The only thing I learn from this dinner is that street food still tasted better than the restaurant and it cost a lot cheaper with it more filling. J

Day TWENTY - 23 March 2013

Today is twentieth day in Wuhan, start of an early weekend again. For today, we will be going a one day Wuhan city tour. Firstly we take the bus ride to Hubei Province Museum. In the museum there are many halls with different artifacts and history records. The first hall we went is the exhibition of the tomb of Marquis ZengYi.

It had records of the things buried with Marquis ZengYi as well as the markings and design of the tombs and artifacts like the weapons. This had taught me the historical artifacts and a clearer view of what is the life was in the past when Marquis ZengYi dies.

The next hall is the exhibition of the origins of human. We see the different bones of our origins like Homo sapiens. We also see from there how the people lived their life.

For example, I see one of the exhibits as how the human start fire by rubbing two stones.

Also before I leave, I went to the hall where it shows the bowls and artifact from the different dynasty. The pattern and design of each bowl is different from each dynasty and means differently.

After the museum, we went to East Lake to explore. At the east lake, we spent not much time as we were all hungry and wants to go for lunch as soon as possible. We were brought to ShouYiYuan eatery, a place where it has the entire specialty in Wuhan. The first food we wanted to eat was the TangBao, which is our Singapore’s XiaoLongBao. The TangBao was so delicious that some of us ordered the second serving to be packet back to our bus. Also, a ‘must-try’ food is the HotDryNoodle (ReGanMian). Kenneth and I bought from different stalls and tried it to compare it. Both were nice but Kenneth’s ReGanMian was nicer because it was more fragrant and authentic. I also bought the green tea cake, rice cake, soymilk as well as takoyaki (octopus balls) and the fragrant squid skewer. It was a great and happy lunch for me! I hope that I could go back to this eatery again when I have free time. After lunch, we went to Yellow Crane Tower.

We have to walk up five levels to reach to the top of the tower. It was said that the Yellow Crane Tower was destroyed seven times and that rebuilt again and again. At the top of the tower, I could see nice sceneries of the city. These scenes cannot be normally seen in Singapore as all of you should know!

After Yellow Crane Tower, we went to explore the YangTze River. It was a short one that we were free to look around. We saw a lot of couples having their wedding photos taken there. We were bored that we mimic the couples in the funny way. We also took a lot of pictures, mostly unglam and retarded!

We were then bought back to the bus and went back to our hostel to rest for the day after dinner! The day ends with an early rest and preparation for the next day strawberry farm. J