The Welcome Party!

Different Cultures! The Welcome Party was great and interesting. Most of the event was in Chinese - I picked up very few words. Luckily, I was sitting by outbound GSE team member Kate, who speaks wonderful English. She would tell me what was happening.

I have never received so many business cards in my life. When you meet someone you exchange cards and they all have photos. Good thing so you will remember who gave it to you. It is an event to exchange cards to. They are presented and recieved with great honor - it is an event.

We gave our first presentation. Ann (assistant to the GSE cordinator) save our lives by adding Chinese text to our presentation over the last day. This helped as no one translated our presenation. Most people there spoke English (although the man seated next to me a dinner did not).

Dinner was an event. 15 different dished. The come in stages and on a lazy susan. Kate and the man next to me kept filling up my plate. I have 2 different cups of soup, mulitple fish dishes (river fish, crab, who nows what else.) They all got a kick out of my clumsiness when it comes to chopsticks. Everyone was trying to show me how to do it - but they all do it different. About half way through dinner a nice man thought I was not getting enough to eat and brought me a fork and knife. I was getting plenty to eat though.

Toasting! This is an interesting thing. Everyone walked around mulitple times and toasted the table. My table or I must have been toasted at least 50 times (and that is not an exageration). Our GSE team went and toasted everyone. Toasting is also done a little different. But I will have to explain that at a later point because it is time to go and start another day full of new experiences.