Where I Live

Although I have been here a month I did not yet write a post about where I am specifically living and studying. We can start out with the dorms and then work our way to the campus in general.

The huge building in the picture is the main international dormitory and across from it are smaller dorms; I live in one of the smaller buildings on the 7th floor (the top) with no elevator. You get used to trekking up and down the stairs pretty quickly.

I'll post some of the inside as well. I have 3 suite-mates, but we all get our own room, the only thing we share is the common room that has a table, sink, and mini-fridge as well as two bathrooms. Each bedroom has a desk, end table, dresser, bed, and a balcony, which I will find more useful as the weather gets nicer and nicer. One roommate is from Sweden (Christopher), one from Singapore (Leon), and the last is from Romania (Lana I think, I barely ever see her). I find it amusing that my Swedish roommate goes to IKEA a lot, he likes their stuff and sometimes takes his Chinese friends there to get Swedish food. My roommate from Singapore is here for his fourth and final year, he speaks fluently in Mandarin and English which comes in handy. My roommate from Romania is apparently using her boyfriend's dorm who is a scholarship student and gets the dorm for free. That explains why there is a girl living in our dorm, though I have never actually seen her boyfriend and do not know why he doesn't use this dorm at all. Anyhow, here some pictures of the inside.

 In these flattering pictures of my bathroom you can see there is a meter in the shower. We have a card to put in there that turns on the hot water. Time checks off the meter from your card as you use it. I have not had to recharge it since being here and am not sure if it is charged along with my electricity (which I have another card for) or if I have to pay for it separately.

 You can also see a fence separating the international dorms from the other ones, they keep the international dorms sectioned off and you have to show your room key to get in through security. You can just walk into any of the other dormitory complexes.

The international dorms are much nicer than those of the native students. Chinese students do not get their own showers and have to go to a separate public shower building. They also have anywhere from 2-4 people in a single bedroom dorm, where their beds are raised with their desks underneath. This is just for the undergraduate dorms, I am pretty sure the graduate student ones are better off.

I will also provide you with a smattering of photos from around the Handan Campus (There are 3 other campuses). Isn't smattering just a fun word to say? Try working it into your day after reading this.


The first picture is what the international students just call the towers. A lot of English taught classes are in here but all of the classrooms seem to be in the first 4 floors.. I have all but one of my classes in here. I also took some pictures from the top floor (the 40th). The windows were extremely dirty and the weather was hazy so the visibility in the pictures aren't very good.

 This is what the classroom that I have which is not in the towers looks like. It is in a building aptly named "Teaching Building 6".

This is the old gate of the campus, now it leads to a dead end.

There are a few nice garden areas on campus, I didn't include pictures of all of them.

 There is a pedestrian road right in the south part of campus with a lot of little shops and resetarunts which I what is pictured right below this text.

Below is a picture of some of the street vendors that line up right outside of the north gate of campus (which is very close to my dorm). I get food out here almost every day, most of the street vendors recognize me as I come by and give me expectant looks, I always have to let some of them down each night.

This is how crazy my hair looks most of the time. I have considered investing in a comb, but no moves in that direction have yet been made.

There are a lot of places on campus that I did not yet photograph. The campus is pretty huge with a lot of places to explore. Buildings not photographed on this campus include the gym, the pool, the stadium, three different cafeterias (where I have still not eaten as I did not go to get my student ID yet), multiple stores spaced all over the place, plenty of dorm building, and a giant Mao statue that I am surprised I did not photograph yet and much much more. But this is all I have for now, it is late here and I should be going to bed. This post may not be ordered very well, I was having a few technical difficulties while trying to write it.

 I bid you good day sirs and madams.