My experience with Sojourn Abroad in Xi’an

I wanted to learn Chinese in a city with real history. Xi'an is older than most British cities. My advisor, Zhouzhou, helped me find my apartment. Xi'an is famous for the Muslim Quarter. I ate yangrou paomo it’s lamb soup with bread. You tear the bread into tiny pieces. I tore for 20 minutes. My fingers hurt. Worth it. I also biked on the city wall. 14km. It took me 2 hours. My legs died. But seeing the city from above was incredible. My teacher, Mr. Liu, is a former archaeologist. He worked at the Terracotta Warriors site. He told us stories about digging up the soldiers. one time he found a clay horse. He was so excited. His teaching style is storytelling. Every grammar point came with a historical story. "了" (le) indicates a change. "After the Qin dynasty unified China, everything changed – use 了." I never forgot that. Sojourn Abroad organized a calligraphy class. I'm terrible at holding the brush. My characters looked like spiders. But the teacher said "you have spirit". For Brits: Xi'an is not as polished as Beijing. It's real, a bit dusty, and the food is amazing. Sojourn Abroad's advisors are like fixers. Anything goes wrong, they fix it. Top marks.