Day 12. (18/9/11)

Today, almost all the girls woke up late. Therefore, we all had to rush down to the canteen to meet the others. After eating our breakfast at the canteen, we set off to wait for our bus. We met a few student helpers which would be going on tour with us. They were very friendly and even taught us a lot of things. Then we boarded the bus, looking forward to reach the panda park.

Little did we know, there was a massive bus jam. We had to wait around 1 hour for the bus to continue moving. The bus jam in China is really different from the jams back in Singapore. Most jams in Singapore, the car/bus will still be moving, but at a very slow speed. The jam we experienced today in China, the bus was totally stationary. The bus driver from the next bus could even come down to talk to our bus driver. It was such a dangerous thing to do. But I think they are used to it here in China. After the jam was over, we proceeded to the panda park.

We walked around the park, looking at all the adorable pandas. We even saw the red panda, which the guide told us was the raccoon. There were even some animal which were similar to an peacock. None of us were sure of it. After all that touring, we went on to buy panda products from the street stalls. Pandas are protected by law in China. In 1963, the first panda was exhibited in a zoo outside of China. All pandas in zoos are given double names; this is a Chinese custom, which indicates affection. There are only about 700 to 1000 pandas alive in the world today.

After that we boarded the bus to head to san xing dui. When we reached the place, we had lunch. It was different from all the other lunchs we had outside. It was way better. Moving on after lunch, we went to two of the museums there. The san xing dui site museum and the jin sha site museum. Both of them contained masks and stones from the ancient civillisations. We then bused back to new campus and had dinner.

After dinner, we walked the long way back to our hostel. I had a really good chat with the other students. Returning to our hostel, we found out that one of our friends had lost his bicycle. We panicked for a little while and then came up with the decision of returning our bicycles that night. As the risk of keeping the bicycles were very big. We then unlocked our bicycles and rode to the rental shop. After returning the bicycles, we walked back to our hostel to get some rest.