Submitted by Mengzheng Yao on the 2016 winter session program in China sponsored by the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice..
As I mentioned in my application, although I’m Chinese myself, it is still vitally important for me to maintain a strong bond with it through all kinds of opportunities such as this study abroad program led by Dr. Sun. Last week was an intense week. We basically had classes in the morning and field trips in the afternoon and during the night time. We went to Tiananmen Square, which is the largest outdoor square in the world on the third day after arrival. It is also a great criminal justice field trip since we saw and experienced almost all kinds of law enforcement agents both on the ground and in the subway including army officers, police officers, people’s armed police officers and many others. It’s extremely beneficial for us to get an experience to apply what we have learned in the morning to real world situations. Besides Tiananmen Square, we also went to the Palace Museum, Wangfujin Commercial District and Silk Street Market where lots of famous politicians worldwide have visited.
The most impressive experience I had during the last week is how my American peers reacted to an ordinary event in the subway. When we arrived at the nearest subway station one day, we saw many subway workers lined up along the stairs and they were like this because there were a stack of supplies they needed to transport downstairs. They used the armrest of the stairs as a channel for supplies to flow downstairs. However, those supplies don’t always go down as expected, so there were many others along the way to make sure that the flow of transportation was as smooth as possible. After seeing that, one of my American peers said that’s why China is the No.2 economy in the world. If American workers faced similar problems, they might just carry one or two boxes downstairs by themselves and it would take a considerable amount of time and energy. I think as time proceeds, all of us will learn more about China.