The numbers are impressive: there are now more than 328,000 Chinese students in universities across the United States. When the first wave of students came in the 1980’s, they were mostly visiting scholars (professors). Now the students coming are undergrads, and in many cases high school students. What is it like for Chinese students on…
Cultural Adjustment
Get Smart
Do you want to boost your brain power and productivity? According to this great infographic posted by the good folks at Matador Network, all you need to do is live abroad for a time. Given that I have spent almost as many years outside the US as inside, this made me smile! What say ye, fellow…
Become a Local Laowai
If you have, or intend to, spend any amount of time in China, of word that you will learn rather quickly, whether you want to or not, is laowai (老外). A literal translation is “old foreigner,” but in modern colloquial Chinese it is often just translated as “foreigner,” which means someone who is not Chinese. Walk…
Chinese Students in the U.S.
Last November the Institute of International Education published a report on international students in the United States and American students going abroad. According to the report, there were more than 880,000 international students enrolled in American institutes of higher education during the 2013-2014 academic year. 274,000 of those students (both graduate and undergraduate) were from China, meaning that Chinese…
Only One “Why?” Question Per Day, Please!
A month or so ago I was having a lovely outdoor dinner with group of friends, one of whom was a high school kid from Beijing studying at a school here in the Twin Cities and living with an American host family. As we were sitting around the picnic table, frantically grabbing for brats, corn on the…
7 Things to Know About Culture Shock
The first time I crossed a cultural boundary; I was but 1 year old! And no, it wasn’t my parents whisking me off to some far-off tropical land; it was my family returning to the US after a term of service in Pakistan. My mother says that my older sister and some of the children…