Saying goodbye to Lili

This will be my last blog entry, that I write while being in China. Today we woke up early and started to pack our things. Lili bought an extra bag for me to use as hand luggage, which I desperately need for the amount of presents I bring to my friends and family in Germany. Unfortunately on my last flight with my Quadcopter one of the four motors stopped working. I hope in Germany and some spare parts I will be able to repair it with my new learned soldering skills 🙂  We asked Li and his friends to come to our room to grab all the remaining stuff that we can not take with us. They hesitated at first, but then grabbed an Ikea-bag full of alcohol, sweets and food. Additionally we gave Li and Zhu our mattresses, ikea-light and chairs. Meaning we will sleep one night on the normal mattress ….

We finished packing and Lili picked us up to go for one last dinner with her and her family. We again went to the German restaurant „Schindlers Autoladestelle“ and almost ordered everything from the menu. It was the perfect dinner to say goodbye. We had such a great time.

The past two month blew away our expectations. The hospitality, kindness and friendliness of the people was unbelievable. We learned, saw and experienced so much. I would do this trip all over again if I could. <3 Lili

Our China Mother!
Our China Mother!

Thank you for everything!
Lukas and Alex

 

 

Dumplings, Doppelkopf & Roof

It is quite late now, so just a short, irish style, blog entry. Today we woke up early to go one last time to class at the school and joined the server/database class. Then we played some table tennis in the  basement of the school and had some tough matches versus some Chinese students practicing there. Afterwards we took a shower and had some dumplings with Li and Zhu. Delicious 😀

IMG_3479 „Dumplings, Doppelkopf & Roof“ weiterlesen

Accomplishments and Pizza

Today we woke up at 06:30am. We were told to be at the other branch of our school at 8am. We arrived early and our new teacher greeted us and quickly put us to work. Our task, as promised, was to build a fully functional Bluetooth Speaker. At first we were overwhelmed by the scale of the project, the amount of parts and the circuit diagram. But with excellent help from our new teacher everything went smoothly and after a few hours we had a finished and working piece of audio equipment. It has buttons for power, volume up and down, next and previous track and pause/play.
The whole workshop was a total success, they even bought and brought lunch for us <3

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After work the teacher gave us a box of parts for us to bring to Germany. We have 25 DoItYourself Kits now. But I don’t know if the OSZ-IMT has  „Accomplishments and Pizza“ weiterlesen

Last day of work

The days of the last things have come. Today we had our last day of work and our last lunch at work. I still remember the first day of work and the first lunch, time flew away here in China. After lunch we had a final meeting with Lili, Kenny, Tina, Johnny and Winder where we gave our presents to them and also received some. We talked about our stay here in China in general and also specific about all the things we did with the company. All these things they did for us, the visits of the construction sites, where we could get a deep look inside their work and planning, the trips to Shanghai, Hangzhou and ZiBo, the countless delicious meals we had together and the general hospitality amazed us again and again. We also took a nice group picture:

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top, left to right: Winder, Luki, Alex, Kenny, Johhny. bottom, left to right: Tina, Lili, we don’t know, we don’t know

„Last day of work“ weiterlesen

English Class, Workshop and Gaming

This day did not follow the schedule we anticipated. Yesterday Teacher Chen visited us in our dormitory. He told us that he wishes us to exclusively attend school this week, especially for a workshop he finds suitable for us. We were able to negotiate one day for us to visit our company for the last time, say goodbye. So today we went to school at 08:15. English class was on the agenda. The teacher quickly separated Alex and me for us having more language skill impact on the class, I guess. We had a lot of fun at English class, listening to the students trying their best to squeeze out a sentence or two. Due to exhaustion some students literally feel asleep 🙂

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For lunch our new best friend called Jason invited us to „English Class, Workshop and Gaming“ weiterlesen

Table Tennis Endurance

Today we stayed at school to participate in class again and to have some time to buy souvenirs. When school was over we went to the basement of the school again to play some table tennis . When we arrived it was very crowded, it seemed like lots of students tried to hide from the high temperatures outside (36°C in the shadow, in the sun you couldn’t walk ten meters without sweating). All tables were occupied, so we first played some hacky sack with some of the students. Then everyone had to leave and the basement was about to get locked. Luckily for us some of our Chinese friends could convince the teacher to let us play and to close the room later. We then had a total of three hours of ping pong matches versus different Chinese students. That was quite exhausting!

Afterwards we had to take a shower and then met with some other Chinese friends to go for a first goodbye dinner. We tried the Sichuan cuisine, which is known mostly for it’s spiciness. The dishes were delicious and, as expected, it was spicy.

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„Table Tennis Endurance“ weiterlesen

The Biggest Pizza in Beijing

Today we took it slow. The temperatures outside are rising and it was best for us to do useful stuff indoors. After breakfast we started to clean our apartment, wash our laundry and organize souvenirs and gifts. Once in a while we stepped outside and I improved my piloting skills with my Quad drone, now practicing in „expert“-mode. Oh boy, believe me, this thing is fast and agile.
Because our food and water supplies were running low we also headed to Lotte Mart. Beforehand we made sure, that our Lotte Mart was offering our new favorite discovery: coco-tea. A freshly prepared cold beverage with different options, lemon, orange, green/back tea and much more. It tastes amazing and helps fight the heat. Here is a picture of my „Green Tea with Lemon“ in front of a  5L 42% alcoholic beverage also known as „Chinese happiness“:
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After we showered, we decided to try out a new restaurant adjacent to the one „The Biggest Pizza in Beijing“ weiterlesen

Mischa Maisky & Bamberg Symphony Orchestra Concert

Today we went to the Beijing Concert Hall to listen to the Mischa Maisky & Bamberg Symphony Orchestra Concert together with Lili and Kenny. But first of all we had dinner at a nice restaurant rated with five diamonds (whatever rating that is).

As usual it was delicious and we actually managed to order just a little bit too much, we nearly finished everything.

Then we drove to the Concert Hall and first had a look around at the outside. Afterwards we passed the security check and took our seats. The Bamberg Symphony Orchestra played A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Mendelssohn, Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85 by Elgar and Symphony No.5 in E-flat Major, Op 82 by Sibelius. For me as non-musician it was a new experience, „Mischa Maisky & Bamberg Symphony Orchestra Concert“ weiterlesen

Indian Food and Christmas

Today we arrived early at work as usual. With the help of Kenny we ordered a lot of things online, which we will bring back home to Germany. In China alibaba and jd.com are very common websites to get goods very cheap and fast. After lunch Lili and Kenny took us to buy even more souvenirs in a huge mall. Every store in the mall had at least 3+ employees who follow your every step, blabbering and doing everything in their power to sell you stuff. Wandering around the mall in some moments you have to restrain yourself from performing a roundhouse kick to free yourself from the surrounding salesgirl drones. Fortunately our trip was not in vain and Alex found something to buy bargaining the price down to about  „Indian Food and Christmas“ weiterlesen

798 Art Gallery and German Dinner

Today after work Lili, Kenny and Johnny took us to the so called 798 Art Gallery not far away from our school. We took a look around and visited some of the galleries. The 798 Art Gallery is a big district where a lot of artists have a showroom, there are also some nice restaurants like the „Schindlers Autoladestelle“, where we went for dinner. But first some impressions of the 798:

Then we had our first real German food in seven weeks. It was just awesome, we had Weißwürstel, potato salad, bread with liver sausage, lard and cheese, a kind of Schweinzhaxe and most important „798 Art Gallery and German Dinner“ weiterlesen