Sunday, September 13, 2009

Zhejiang University Impressions

Sorry for the delay. Between figuring out my internet and generally getting situated I’ve been slightly busy.

So far Zhejiang University (浙江大学) has made a pretty good impression on me. Despite a few hiccups in the registration and placement test, I’ve managed to get myself pretty much settled in. The quality of the dorms is fairly reminiscent of some of WVU’s older dorms, and decently comfortable, and the restaurant in the international dorm has pretty good food (I haven’t actually sampled the other cafeterias on campus, though from looking they seem to be similar to what I saw in Suzhou).

My main complaint is that as an international student, my whole world is basically in this one corner of the campus, and it’s entirely too easy to just sit here the whole time and not go out and meet Chinese students, if you let yourself. That’s not a huge problem, though, as I’ve been walking around on the main campus a good bit and been able to strike up some conversations, and it’s not as if the international students here aren’t interesting — I have met some people from Spain, Australia, Japan, and a good number from South Korea. I’m hoping as time goes on there will be some events that include domestic students, and I have seen some potential opportunities starting to appear, more on that later.

Main Gate at Zheda

International Student Dormitory

The "supermarket" (超市) near my dorm

And of course …

… this area is right inside the main gate, you can’t miss him.

Communication Status:

I have recently gotten my Internet working fully again. Most sites are accessible, and Flickr (which from reports had been blocked before) seems to be fully accessible, though Facebook, Twitter, and WordPress.com are still unavailable without using some sort of workaround. I’ve been able to get Tor working, but it’s very slow, so for people following this on Facebook, expect me to just check in once in a while, but not do too much there (having the new Facebook Lite interface is a help). Also, thanks for all the comments wishing me luck, sorry that I don’t respond to them.

If you really need to contact me, the best ways are through my IM services (Skype, MSN, and QQ) or through email.

EDIT: Not two minutes after I posted this, Flickr was gone again. Meh. Could be just me, of course.

[Via http://gacorley.wordpress.com]

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