This summer, 10 students and two faculty members are traveling to China to enhance their Chinese language skills while experiencing the country’s vast and diverse cultural landscape. Please enjoy this next blog post below from Tamutenda ’26 as she reflects on a full day in Shanghai, from a peaceful sunrise and joyful breakfast with her host mother to navigating the metro, completing a community service project in Chinese, and discovering unexpected cultural connections between Chinese and Zimbabwean cuisine.
I woke up unusually early today. I knew I was doing the blog from the day before. Excitement pulsated through my entire body. It wouldn’t allow me to sleep much longer. I couldn’t help but stay awake.
At 5:30 the sun peaked through my window. I embraced it, opening my window as wide as the hinges allowed. I took in the fresh air. I admired the view for a while—the tall buildings that made up the apartment complex rivaled the surrounding vegetation in height. It’s beautiful seeing the two coexist. I listened for a while to the sounds of cars, people, and birds—all humming along. At 6:30 I started getting ready for school, and saw myself in the mirror, one of many kind gifts from my host family. I noticed the Shanghai sun had turned my skin a richer and darker hue. The weather has been hot and sunny half of the time, and rainy half of the time.
At 7:30 the most delicious fragrance wafted through the air. Instinctively my nose followed the smell to reveal 葱油饼, which is essentially a type of savory pancake composed of scallions and a type of batter. It pulls apart beautifully and the pieces are perfectly tender. It melts on the tongue. It’s such a simple carbohydrate but contains SO much flavor. I have become more and more fond of this savory pancake. Every morning, I and my host-mother, Laura, have breakfast together and talk about various topics which often leads to many laughs and makes breakfast even more delicious.
At 7:50 I was on my way to school. I had gotten lost on the subway the day before, thankfully Shanghai’s subway system is very forgiving, and easy to navigate. Still, I was especially attentive because I wanted to arrive at school early to finish my project. We have a project to survey and present results regarding Chinese people’s opinions on American food. In class we focused on pronunciation of new vocabulary accompanying the unit. I could feel the foreign syllables in my mouth. During the afternoon activity, we went to a Charity Shop for community service—organizing books and other donated goods. At the end we had the opportunity to suggest ways in which the Charity shop could improve access of necessities for low-income communities. We had to present our suggestions in Chinese. I was a bit nervous, but I persevered. After my presentation one of the chaperoning teachers, Ms. Nichols, came up to me and expressed how well I sound now compared to how I sounded before embarking on this wonderful journey. I was so pleased to hear this! Additionally, we all received certificates for helping around the shop.
The bus ride back to our class building was filled with the tranquil sound of the pitter-patter of the rain, my heart full of gratitude for having this opportunity to help others. I contemplated going to a cosmetic shop before returning home but I chose otherwise. Instead, I went home and got a snack on the way. There is a Family Mart, a popular chain store in China, near my subway exit. That’s also something I found very interesting about China’s subways. They are very clean. To create and maintain a pristine environment in public transport facilities they strategically place their stores near subway exits, which discourages people from eating in the subway which is not permitted.
When I got home, I got to try chicken stomach which was delicious and I recognized the dish from my own Zimbabwean culture. In terms of culinary arts Zimbabwe surprisingly has some of the same methods used in Chinese cuisine. For example, most the vegetables are stewed in both types of cooking. It’s interesting seeing the intersections of my culture with another so far away.
