Before I Leave

Hi Everyone,

I have created this blog to share my experiences in Shanghai and the rest of China.  Really this blog serves two purposes: to keep everyone in the loop with my summer and to help me remember my experiences.

I am currently deep into packing-almost done.  I just need to organize my carry on.  I am also starting (probably too late) to learn simple words and phrases.  The language is really really tough to learn.  For any given word, each intonation can mean many different things.  Either way,  I am glad Shanghai is such an international city and from what I hear, most of the people speak English.  In addition, I will have classmates who know Chinese and are happy to translate.  Worst comes to worse, I can use an application on my phone that translates very well.

It truly does not seem real that I am going to enter another world tomorrow.  I have heard that the first couple days are supposed to be awesome, followed by a heaping dose of culture shock, but you get over it eventually.  I plan to combat this by getting out as much as I possibly can so that I can explore Shanghai and meet new friends.  The city is HUGE, like 2-3 times bigger than New York City by population.  Apparently there is so much to do and I am excited to see as much as I can, which should be a good portion in 13 weeks.  I am also planning to go to other places in China like Beijing, Hong Kong, and maybe other places. I have no idea.

I will miss everyone back home a lot, but please understand if communication is limited.  Please add my on skype because I will be using that a lot.  My name is jonathanmorof on skype.  I only get 10 MB of data per week, so communication might be tough.  We'll see.

Anyways, I've got to get going.

再见了！

Jonathan