I arrived in Shanghai Pudong Airport on November 16th 2016, what would become my ''Chinaversary'', and I was amazed to find that I quickly went through passport control, immigration, and collected my luggage with no hassle. But the next task was to find the driver who was taking me to the airport. As I arrived and walked over to collections I saw huge groups of Chinese drivers with various names of individuals and companies....I was so happy and relieved when I saw one sign that read EF. I think I was the second person he picked up, as I realised that we were waiting to collect at least a few other people. I remember being shocked to find how warm it was....I didn't think to check the weather in Shanghai but assumed it was cold this time of year to find that it was around 13 degrees and there was no need for layers of jumpers and coats. Slowly.....other future colleagues trickled in, one called Jason, and another guy who had recently finished a degree in law. Learning how young they were, with the law graduate being 21 years old and Jason being 24, I was the oldest, and soon came to realise how young everyone else was in comparison. There was the odd lady who was of a 'certain' age. I also met two other slightly older men, one called Johnny from the Uk and another Australian who both had Chinese girlfriends. After around a forty minute drive we were taken to the Holiday Inn Hotel and checked into our rooms, where I assumed we would stay for two weeks, all fully paid for by the company.
It was still the afternoon, around 4pm, so we decided to freshen up and then explore in the evening for a bite to eat. Me, with three other guys walked into what appeared to be a noodle restaurant, but realised we couldn't read anything. Instead....to the confusion and shock of everyone in the restaurant the three guys decided to start flapping both their arms like chicken wings to communicate that we wanted chicken. It didn't seem to work, so Jason used a translator and that's when the first confusion happened. The server or 'fuwuyuan' asked 'nit rou hai shi ji rou' (牛肉还是鸡肉), would you like chicken or beef, not knowing what the difference was. I still have no idea what I ordered, or what I was eating, I think it could have been beef for around 8 RMB, it 'did the job' and provided some nutrition that would last me until breakfast. That was the next experience on the list.....breakfast.
After spending holidays with my grandparents living in the Holiday Inn during my trips in America, I assumed that everything would be 'Intercontinental'. But this is China....western food is expensive....and the chef would have to learn how to make it. I went downstairs and I saw the buffet, expecting sausages, toast, mushrooms, instead....I saw egg fried rice, and various steamed bread buns....which I didn't want to touch. This looked like food for lunch or dinner, not breakfast, though this would make sense later in my China adventure. After looking at all the options, I realised that my best bet was the egg fried rice and I was going to be adventurous and try a steamed bun. I took one bite of the steamed bread bun, but couldn't go a further.....it seemed to be filled with 'green stuff' I couldn't identify, and decided to have as much coffee as possible.
Jason came over to sit opposite me. I was just relieved to see another expat and fellow colleague. He seemed to be able to try everything and he even said 'Hala' to the waitress to clean the table, as it seemed he took to learning Chinese naturally. I still had no clue, but I was taking everything in my stride.
After breakfast, the EF group met in the lobby at around 8:30 am to be taken to the EF headquarters, and I noticed there were a few new arrivals. We crammed into a couple of mini buses and arrived at the modern headquarters, and it looked the exact same way as it did in pictures, which was actually 'not Chinese' because usually it looks totally different in real life. The headquarters was a modern, huge open space in central Shanghai with free ice cream equipped with a van and coffee. In total there was around 20 expats from the UK, Australia and South Africa. We were debriefed by an American, who told us what we 'should and should not do/say', for around an hour together with some training activities.
I remember my attitude was not great, not positive, but was already starting to build excuses to dislike it, and I remember him just saying 'you're bringing the group down', just because I was still so tired and getting used to the jet lag. The impression of 'survival of the fittest' seemed to be a concept I learnt early on. I can't remember much of the first few days of training, but it was only a few with some group tasks involved and a tour of Shanghai and the famous skyline.
I remember we had some time to look around and we were taken to a supermarket where for the first time I saw something with chocolate on.....a doughnut, but it was 8RMB and I was still converting into pounds, assuming that it was 8 pounds, I was struggling to understand the difference between cheap and expensive. I remember being disappointed....it didn't really taste like chocolate, but more oily.
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