Hey everyone, long time no blog! I know I uploaded an update post a few months ago but things are different again, so I have to get another update post published before anything else!
It's been a crazy last few months and I'm only now getting used to how my life is now, what with starting university and moving to CHINA! Yep, if you follow my Instagram, you'd know that I've been living in China since September and I'll be here (God willing) for the next six years. It sounds like such a long time, but day-to-day, it feels like I've been here for a year already.
China is amazing! The food, first of all, is everything I wanted it to be and more. I'd eaten enough Chinese takeaway in the UK to have an idea of that it would be like when I got here but the food here blows your local takeaway out of the water! Each province in China has its own distinct flavor, and in Hunan the food is hot and spicy. I'm building up a tolerance for spicy food, and good thing too because it's too good to resist!
China is also huge; walking anywhere is a struggle and I want to take the bus or subway everywhere. At least all the running around I do to not miss my bus is a good way to keep fit for free (sort of!).
Onto the reason I'm here; I started university in October, and my first semester finishes in a couple of weeks after I have my final exams (eek!). After being out of school for two years after A-Levels, it took me a long time to get my mindset back into school mode, and I'm still getting used to it! It's amazing being in school and I'm so grateful for the opportunity to be here and receive an education. It's definitely something I won't ever take for granted because I know so many people my age, younger than me, and older than me don't have this chance.
At the moment I'm studying Chinese language before beginning my major which is Medicine. After speaking to some seniors about medicine, I'm choosing to focus on my year learning Chinese before worrying about that's in the future! Being told one year of Chinese is equal to 3% of what I'll learn in my first year of medicine isn't really good for lifting my spirits!
A part of university life I didn't count on was the loneliness and imposter syndrome I've been feeling alongside the awesome stuff. It's strange; one great moment can be quickly overshadowed by this nagging and limiting belief that I'm not as smart as I think I am, or that I don't have “enough friends”. This is a blog post I definitely want to go into depth with because I feel like it affects a lot more people than we think.
University is always painted as “the best time of your life” and sometimes it's true, like when you're out with your mates and you feel like nothing can bother you, when you get a great grade after studying a ton, when you wake up and realise that yeah this whole new life is real and not a dream. But we definitely have to talk about the nasty stuff that comes with university, and make it more known and open! Anyway, like I said definitely another a post for another time!
Being this far away from home and my friends and everything I've ever known isn't easy, especially when you factor in the time difference. I'm 6 hours ahead of Zambia, and 8 hours ahead of the UK, so when I'm waking up everyone is asleep and when I'm asleep, everyone is up! Communication is tricky, and it's been hard keeping up with social media, especially Twitter.
In China, you can't access sites like Instagram, Facebook, anything to do with Google, and a lot more so I have to use VPN to connect to anything. It's annoying but I'm now at the point where I immediately turn my VPN on whenever I need to use my phone. Because of VPN, I've been locked out of my original Twitter account and I have no way of getting it back! *Insert a thousand crying emojis*.
So, that being said, please follow me on my new account @elliekblog!
That's all that's been going on with me for the last few months! It's another amazing chapter in my life that I'm so grateful, happy, and excited to be on.
I don't want to promise you all a blogging schedule because I don't have a laptop, and I'm using my phone to upload this, so the next post will come when it's ready! If that paragraph that has been made centerised annoys you just as much as it annoys me, you see how blogging from my phone is a pain!
I hope you all have a wonderful day or evening, and that you all enjoyed this post! I hope your 2019 is everything you want it to be! Whether you want to travel more, see new people, be more grounded or anything else, I wish you all the success and happiness the world has to offer.
I'll see you in the next one!