Less than a week to go

Hello All! I've decided to try writing a blog for the year in the hope that creating a space to write about interesting things will make interesting things happen to me. This entry is from the pre-trip perspective, I'll try and give a bit of background on what's ahead and how I feel about it by answering some of the questions I keep getting asked.

1. Who are you?
I'm Kate, I am studying Chinese at Cambridge University and I've done two years of it so far. When I started University I'd never spoken a word of Chinese before but I've always wanted to learn.

2. Where are you going?
I'm going to Beijing for the next year, I've booked a one way ticket out there leaving on Wednesday and I don't exactly know when I'll be coming back, sometime after June and before October I expect.

3.What are you going to be doing out there?
I have a place at Peking University along with about ten other classmates, so we'll be continuing our course out there together. Apparently classes begin at 8am and go on most of the morning but hopefully I'll have plenty free time to travel and get involved in various other things. I've been thinking tutoring English would be good fun, maybe volunteering, getting some type of internship part time, doing some sport would be great. The truth is though that I don't really know what there will be so I'll have to wait and see what is actually available and choose when I get there. I basically know that I'll be studying, and that if I make some money then I want to see as much as I can by travelling around China and the rest of Asia.

4. Where are you living?
Again, not really sure yet! I know that I'll live with two of my course mates, Dani and Anna. However we have to sort out finding a flat once we get there and go house hunting then. I'm a bit concerned about having to find accommodation and sign housing agreements in Chinese right when I arrive, we really haven't covered that kind of vocabulary in class and I'm the type that always get scammed even in my own country let alone abroad. Anna and Dani are great though and a lot better at this stuff than me so I think they'll stop me from making any serious errors! I think we'll be living in the area of Beijing called Wudaokou which is pretty close to the university and studenty.

5. Are you ready?
So I've made loads of lists and tried to get everything ticked off, I feel like I'm pretty close now. I never feel ready to go anywhere though, even when I'm off on an overnight trip I always have the sensation of something important being forgotten, so I don't expect to feel prepared. I've made a pile of stuff I need to take in the living room which my sister has promised to help me pack (she's amazing at stuff like that and professes to enjoy it so I won't stop her!), we'll see how it goes. The weather ranges from very very hot in the summer to -20 in the winter, I'm finding it challenging to fit clothes for all temperatures in one rolling suitcase but I guess I should be able to supplement when I get there if I've forgotten anything. I hope so anyway.

6.How do you feel about leaving?
I went through some serious panicking about a week or two ago, and was dreading leaving, but I feel a bit better now. The closest comparison I could make which I've said to some people is that it felt a bit like the last bit of the ascension of a roller coaster, the slow rise to the plummet. I love rollercoasters so much from the ground thinking about the prospect of them, and once I've had that first drop, but I hate the climb to the top, and that's what the last few weeks have been! As much as I love the idea of travelling and Asia in particular, the truth is that I haven't really had much first hand experience of it. The longest I've been away from home is a university term which is about 9 weeks, and I've only been to China once when I was fifteen on a school trip, for a week. That was a long time ago and had an influence on my decision to do the course, but it's a lot less than most of my classmates who have done some substantial travelling around Asia and generally. I'm spending all my time at the moment talking to well wishers who presume that I know what I'm talking about, but I don't really! I'm just bluffing based on what other people have told me. I'm hoping at the moment that the China I go to is just as amazing as I found it back in year eleven, and as interesting as it has seemed while I've been studying it these past two years. Then maybe when I return I'll actually have some stories of my own to share with people and feel a bit more knowledgeable in a non textbook way about my degree!

When I was fifteen and went to China, I felt so strongly that I wanted to live in this country, that I wanted to have conversations with all the people I could only wave at, and that there were things happening all the time in this place that I wanted to be there for. I loved the writing, I collected everything I could get my hands on with characters written on it and took it back to the UK with me because I thought they were so beautiful. Every now and then I  find a disposable hotel toothbrush or something like that from the trip with characters on it in my room, and think how far I've come since then. I had no idea then that it would actually happen and that I'd be able to write and speak Chinese one day, if you'd told me then I wouldn't have believed you. But it feels really right that I'm going now, although I've found it hard to say goodbye.
I definitely have a long way to go though, and I really want to get a lot better at the language and use it as much as possible. Sometimes it feels like I'm learning a dead language when I study it in England, I've been studying so long from a textbook but what I actually want it for is to use it practically and as a way of talking to people who I'd otherwise never be able to speak to. Hopefully I'll manage to make some Chinese friends and get lots of chances to use it and feel more comfortable with the language, right now I still feel awkward talking in it unless it's a good friend.
It's really hard thinking that I won't see all my friends and family for a year, and that I'm leaving all my comfortable routine at home for a while. It's like there's a year of blankness ahead, I have no idea how I'm going to fill it. For that year I'm time capsuling all my relationships here and hoping that they'll last till I get back!

Anyway, I'm off to have my last British roast dinner with my family now, who knows when I'll have one of those again! I'll write once I get to Beijing, and see how much has changed. It feels completely bizarre to think that in less than a week I'll be on the other side of the world, making my new home there. A bit daunting to be honest, but exciting too.