26. Advice for Pre-Gophers

The very first thing you need to keep in mind----bring ALL your documents: passport, I-20, transcript. Please make sure to bring them all with you when you take a flight, pass the customs, and go to school for the documents check in. Even remember to bring your documents whenever leave the U.S.. I had left my I-20 in my dormitory when my first time went back to China during the winter break. Then when I came back to the states I couldn’t pass the customs until my friend sent my I-20 form to me. Anyway I was so lucky.

Once you choose U of M, you must get prepared for the winter in Minnesota. You will believe that any clothes will be warm enough for the winter here.

From my personal experience, I would not encourage you to buy too many clothes before you leave. Just bring what you have for different seasons, then enjoy the shopping later. For example, I have a few of clothes are in the bottom of drawer that I’ve never touched. Especially for girls, girls like to follow the latest trend of fashion of outfits. So the local dressing style might leading your taste of choose clothes. In short, save room for your baggage to bring something that is necessary, and shopping for clothes here.

Should you worry about eating? Of course you shouldn’t. The only thing you ought to worry about is how to stop increasing weight and maybe you need to lose your weight when you leave here. You can never imagine how many delicious foods here. Restaurants in different countries are located in U of M because it is an international university. You can find Mexican restaurant, Korean restaurant, Japanese restaurant and Italian restaurant. You can even see a Vietnamese restaurant. All of them are perfect. Of course you will not miss the best Chinese food to eat by reason that Chinese restaurant is always packed and everyone likes it including me.

As for living, usually freshmen are required to live in dormitory, however a few people were moved into off campus apartment during their freshman year. But as my point of view it is better to live in dorm at least for the first semester. I would say it is really helpful to adapt to college life sooner and better. Particularly, for international students, living with native speakers will improve your English rapidly.

U-pass! Going everywhere. U-pass is a prepay unlimited bus card you can get for the whole semester. I bought one at the beginning of the first semester because I live in one of the school resident hall which is located off campus. For student who is going to live in other dormitory, campus connector is really convenience. There are both east bank and west bank routes. East bank is towards St. Paul campus. If you live in Bailey Hall you may have to take the campus connector as daily transportation.

Subjectively, the most important thing you may need to get prepared, yourself. Take few minutes to think about your motivation, why are you going to study abroad? Why is it better than stay in your home country? What will you get or lose when you are going to study abroad？Then make a plan and set a goal for yourself as a college achievement.

Last but not least, one of the biggest challenges for international students must be homesick.Language barriers and differences in lifestyle may cause the feeling of loneliness. I believe you will come over it           

            Welcome to the University of Minnesota!

25. Internet: Online Social Networks

Now probably most of students have their own blog or profile online, and the first thing they are going to do when connecting to the Internet might be log on social networking sites such as, Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. Some of students even set the site as his or her home page on the computer. I still remember the first time when I created my own account on Facebook everything seems new for me. Then I started adding friends, editing my profile and checking others’. In the beginning, I keep updating status frequently, posting photos on my profile, and chatting with friends online. But later on, I found that is just waste of time and it shouldn’t be included in my daily routine, I have something more important to do such as my schoolwork or spending time with my family. Just like when I became, as the majority of Facebook user are teenagers, there arises some problem.

In contrast, there are some people find themselves more comfortable on the Internet. Especially for people who are unremarkable in the real life, it gives them a chance to be somebody else. They could have a better expression on social network sites to share their feeling of life and try to make more friends. Social networking is a new way of communication. 

In my point of view, it is necessary for students to communicate with others through online social networking although it might spend some time. It will be an improvement of interrelationship as long as students use online social networks properly.

24. An Image Analysis

                                                     The Edenton Ladies Tea Party

This is a political cartoon shows a society of patriotic ladies at Edenton in North Carolina. There is a woman in the left of the picture who is pouring some tea into a pauper’s hat. A woman stooping in front of the desk is signing the petition. There is another woman sitting at the table flirting with a man. The woman next to her is holding a hammer with an angry look. There is a woman standing behind them is drinking a large bowl of tea. A slavery woman next to her, who is serving a puill pen and peeking at the petition on the desk curiously. Besides, there is a dog peeing on a box of tea and licking a child in front of the desk. The child is playing with a plate of cookies under the desk.

This image was published in a London Newspaper in March 1775 which British drew it to making fun of American. The image shows that women also played an important role in the American Revolution. Women did not sign petitions before the 1770s. However, as we can see in the picture, there are ladies in different positions are going to sign the petition to boycott English goods, especially, tea. The picture of the Edenton Ladies Tea Party is one of the earliest organized groups of women that influenced public policy.

23. My Thanksgiving in MN

     This Thanksgiving is my first Thanksgiving spending in Minnesota. Last year I went to New York with my friend, Wendy and Sharon. But this year we decided to spend the holiday in different places. Wendy has been to Chicago, Sharon was in Miami while I was just stay at home. Fortunately, my first Thanksgiving here wasn't boring at all since I had a friend who was coming from Indiana. Her name is   Tizzy, but usually been called dizzy. She is my neighbor in Beijing. Actually we had never been to a same school but our parents know each other very much. That's why we still neighbor when we all moved.

     Tizzy called me two days before Thanksgiving said "what is the airport code of your city?" 

     I couldn't believe my ears then asked "what did you say?" 

     She said in hurry "three letters airport code."

     I finally got her, "MSP. Are you booking a flight? Are you coming? When? " The phone ended with my tons of questions.

     Tizzy arrived Minnesota in the afternoon on November 25th, then we went to my aunt Joy's house for a family party.(In China, people called their parent's friends who is about the same age with their parent's as uncle or aunt to show respect.) Joy has a daughter and a son. Her daughter, Melody, who is a student from Harvard University did all cooking with her friends for the Thanksgiving night. Later on, when everyone was coming, they curved the turkey and the party was started. It was a sweet family party! At Thursday midnight, we went to Premium Outlet for "black Friday" shopping. However we weren't stay there for long because of the unbearable cold weather, especially for Tizzy who had never experienced the winter in Minnesota. When backed from Outlet around 3am, we slept till the next afternoon. 

     Tizzy said, what she likes most was one-day tour in Mall of America on Saturday. It wasn't only because there were lots of good deals but also it is a indoor shopping mall :P

22. Harry Potter and Yuki

I have never missed a Harry Potter movie though I’m not a Harry Potter fan. It is only because it’s too popular for me to ignore it. I watched Harry Potter 7---- Harry Porrer and the Deathly Hallows with my roommates on Sunday night which was fantastic and reminds me of my memory of the passing ten years with Harry Potter. People in my generation are mostly growing up with Harry Potter. The Harry Potter here not only means the name of this specific character or the book, it’s everything about Harry Potter.

As Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone came out in 2001, it was a bomb. Then, in few years a Harry Potter trend are slowly filtering into people's minds. Remember when Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire came out in 2005, all my friends were talking about Harry’s hairstyle, especially girls. It seems like high school students are highly concern about Harry Potter movies. Some of them are keep tracking it.

     For all the actors in Harry Potter movies, people almost treat them as the real characters. During filming, actors even call each other as the name in movie. Such as, Daniel Radcliffe, both crew and his fans prefer to call him Harry, because they are Harry, Hermione and Ron in our eyes.

     When all the actors were growing up, I found some of them surprised me while some disappointed me. Daniel again, who disappointed me the most. He is neither tall nor handsome when he grew up. Contrarily, Emma Watson, the more grown the more beautiful. She has become a graceful young lady. Well, why didn’t they change actors? Actually it doesn’t really matter who they are and how they are looking when they grew up. Keep the original actors are in order to keep the initial characteristics of Harry Potter and satisfied all fans.

21. Chinese Spring Festival

There is no doubt that the Spring Festival is the most important an celebrated in China, which is very similar to Christmas in west countries. Spring Festival is a festival for family reunion. People living far from home go back and get together with their families. The Spring Festival falls on the 1st day of the 1st lunar month which means the end of an old year and the beginning of a new one. And the Chinese government now stipulates people have seven days off for the Chinese Lunar New Year. Theose days off are always during the winter break for students, so it doesn’t really matter as I was a student there. Moreover, since China has 56 minorities, although all the minorities celebrate the Spring Festival almost at the same day as Han people, they have different customs. In general, Chinese people celebrate the Spring Festival in the following ways.

The 23rd day of the 12th lunar month is called Preliminary Eve. People offer sacrifice to the kitchen god at that time. Now however, most families make delicious food to enjoy themselves. Then all the department stores and markets will be super busy when the New Year’s coming, because everyone is going to purchase for “New Year Goods”. That we called goods for the New Year are not only grocery but also various decorations, new clothes and shoes for the children as well as gifts for the elderly, friends and relatives.

Then people begin decorating their clean rooms featuring an atmosphere of rejoicing and festivity. Doors will be pasted with Spring Festival couplets, highlighting Chinese calligraphy with black characters on red paper. The Chinese character "Fu" which means blessing will be pasted upside down. Because in Chinese, the "reversed Fu" is homophonic with "happiness comes". Whats more, Red paper-cuttings can be put on window or wall and brightly colored New Year paintings with auspicious meanings may be put on the wall. People believe that those decorations can bring house owners' good wishes for the New Year in lucky and health.

There is another important part in Chinese culture----food. Of course, food is indispensable in Spring Festival. At the Spring Festival Eve, all the family members will sit and eat dinner together. The meal is much more luxurious than usual. In the North of China, people usually making dumplings for their New Year meal. After the dinner, family will sit together and waiting for the celebration broadcast on China Central Television Station (CCTV). That is almost become a new custom in recent years. Then at the midnight, people might go out to see fireworks. Finally, the most excited part in Chinese New Year is that elder generations will give child a red envelope with “Lucky money” in it. Although I’m not a kid anymore, I still enjoy the atmosphere in Spring Festival. I enjoy every moment of time with my family.  

20. Superhero Power

     If I can have a superpower I wish it is a ability to scan anything I saw and turn it to real. However, all the objects I have turned would just exist for 72 hours. Under this circumstances, I can have all the thing I want to buy through window shopping. I can help beggar by scanning some bread from the bakery. I can make a copy of my classmate's book when I left mine at home. I might also scan a fancy clothes which I won't wear twice to attend to a ball.
     However, this superpower can be used in a extensive range of situations except things with illegal copy right, such as money. Excess illegal moeny would lead to a matter of inflation.
     This superpower would be helpful in some case of urgency or something I might only need for one time which is unnecessary for me to own it.