Grange in China

18th july!

Hey!

I just thought i'd let you all know how we're getting on. Today we learned Chinese in the morning for 3 hours and played games and stuff then in the afternoon everyone at the summer school went to a international middle school and had a lecture for an hour or so. We learned about the ethnic minorities in China and stuff like that.

Later on in the afternoon the children of the school performed dances and songs for us and we joined in some of the dances. We then came back and played basketball with some Chinese visitors (and we won awoohoo!!) We did have mixed teams though.

Tha's pretty much it for now. I'll be back on soon because there's so much to tell hehe!

Love qiao na, ai bi jia and ai ma :O) We're having a fab time xxxx

Our journey to China

Hey it's Sanketa and Genna here.

We started our journey at Glasgow heading out to Heathrow. There's not too much to say about it apart from it was fairly quick. We were delayed for about 2 hours in Heathrow before going on to Frankfurt, but the journey was fairly straightforward and the delay wasn't too much of a problem - probably because we knew that we still had quite a big journey still ahead of us.

The real test of our patience was the flight from Frankfurt to Beijing. Most of us slept for the the whole flight apart from when eating our "delicious" plane meals, and occasionally strolling up and down the aisle stretching our legs. When we finally reached Beijing we spent a few hours looking around the airport shops and cafés.

The final part of the journey was the flight from Beijing to Kunming. I think that was the worst flight of all - we slept for the whole three hours.

It's almost 10pm here and we've got to go back soon so we'll finish this for now and hopefully be in touch soon.

Love qiao na (桥那) and shang ke ta (上克他). Not quite sure about the Chinese characters there, but we'll check that for next time! Speak soon!

你好 Ni hao from China!

Hey guys! The weather here is soo unbearably hot but we're having a fantastic time.

We'll write more about the journey when we get time, but this is just a quick update. We were at the opening ceremony yesterday and did some Scottish dancing for them. I said a sentence in Chinese at the beginning to represent my class, then as i was leaving i spoke Chinese to one of the important people. I think his name was Mr Yahan! And of course i had know idea and i'm just jibbering away hehe trust me! But he was pleased and was smiling so i think its all good lol! (A bit like the Rachel incident for those of you know know what I mean!) Today we went to see Karst Caves and it was amazing. I've got great pics to show u all when i get back and hopefully I'll be able to get some of them up on the blog v soon.

I hope this works!

Love qiao na!! (that's my Chinese name, by the way!) xxx

Wow!!! We're in China!!!

Message from Genna:

We've arrived safely in China. It's amazing! I can't believe I'm in China - it's AMAZING!!! I know I've said that already lol. Anyway, we're all shattered - long journey. We'll post more into the trip, but we just wanted to let you know we've arrived safely.

Bags are packed...

Tomorrow, Wednesday 12th July, a group of students from Grange Academy in Kilmarnock will set off on a journey of a lifetime. Their destination? Kunming in China, where they'll be learning Mandarin Chinese and taking part in a range of cultural and educational activities which will allow them to experience China first hand.

On behalf of the group I've set up this blog. If things go according to plan they'll be able to post to the blolg throughout the visit and there will hopefully even be some photos of their experiences in China.

From everyone at PiE, 旅途愉快 lǔ tú yú kuài - have a great trip - and we look forward to reading about your adventures.