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Are local trips better than China trips? Local trips allow further understanding of the city itself, and give students a chance to explore “hidden” areas of Guangzhou. On the other hand, China trips let students appreciate a variety of different Chinese cultures and allow more connection between nature and the student body.
During this year’s local trip, we explored a Christian church and religious temples such as: Daoism, Islam, and Buddhism. For community service, we visited the Ersha campus and helped supervise preschool students, then we went to local toy markets on Yide Lu. The next day, we went on a tour around Guangzhou and visited more historic places such as Sha Mian island. Regarding the local trip, there have been many mixed feelings towards the activities we did, so I have interviewed some students, asking them how they felt about the local trip.
New student Isco A. didn’t enjoy the local trip as much as he expected to, and commented that “the local trip was pretty boring.” During the four days, activities such as the religious sites, walking around Sha Mian Island didn’t interest him and he thought that overall, “the places we visited weren’t that fun.” In addition, Isco felt that on the last day, when we visited the art museum located in Ersha, “was pointless; the opening time was delayed for an hour and we only explored the museum for fifteen minutes.” However, Isco had lots of fun spending time with the preschoolers on the Ersha campus. He stated that “at first, [he] didn’t really enjoy being with the preschoolers, but as [he] spent more time with them and interacted with the kids more, [he] thought that they were very fun to be around.”
Nick G., is attending the local trip for the second year and overall, enjoyed the local trip as he “got to see some parts of Guangzhou that [he] had never seen before.” Although Nick visited some of the same religious sites last year, he still enjoyed exploring the temples as they were “really decorative, cool, and the meaning behind the artwork was very interesting.” He also commented that “[he] liked how they changed some of the activities this year so it wouldn’t be as boring.”
Celine F., who attended the local trip for the first time thought the trip was overall fun. She commented that “the most memorable part of the local trip was being with the preschoolers and playing with the kids.” She enjoyed the environment on Ersha campus as it was very welcoming and easy to adapt to. As a former student that has experienced China Trips, she compared the two trips and concluded that “local trips is generally less active than China Trips, and [she] liked how we were able to interact with students from different grades. The China Trips schedule is very tightly planned and has different variety of activities to do.”
There were many opinions when the students were asked about how the local trips could be improved. Celine F. stated that “the schedule wasn’t really planned out that well.” She thought we spent a lot time in the local trip wandering around, and “if the schedule was planned better, we could have had more activities.” On the other hand, Nick G. commented that “majority of the trip was kinda of boring and history based. It would be better if we had a variety of different types of activities.” Isco A., with a similar opinion said that “the activities weren’t that fun and it would be more fun if the school had plan activities that didn’t include a lot of walking, and exploring historic places.” Overall, local trip was a great opportunity to meet new friends, and explore different areas of the city.
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