Team building in Chinese

So after a slightly longer break we finally report back! The last two weeks flew by. We didn't even notice that it was time for 'News from the Far East' again.

So let's get started...

Last Friday and Saturday we had team building, which happened to be organized by our two departments together. At 1 pm on Friday we finally set off with 3 buses towards Xinchang, which is about 200 km and 4 hours south of us.

On the bus we got a care package first, because we might be hungry again shortly after lunch ;-). Additionally, we got pink caps to wear so that we could find the group again. After a short bathroom break halfway through, the on-board entertainment started: our young tour guide encouraged us to sing karaoke on the bus and played word games with the colleagues - at least that's what we were told.

At some point we stopped in the middle of a town and a second tour guide got on the bus. She then told us something about the city we were driving through - unfortunately also in Chinese. After what felt like an hour of continuous noise, we realized that we were in the middle of nowhere. The bus stopped, everyone had to quickly get off and follow the guide, who, fittingly to the stereotype, led the way with a flag and a portable microphone. We looked around: construction site, excavator, wheel loader and construction noise everywhere... where are we going? After walking across the construction site, we stand in front of the first attraction: a man-made waterfall. This is apparently the first part of a recreational area that is still under construction. And because it's already finished and doesn't cost anything because of the construction site around it, you can take a look at it. You just have to be able to ignore the surroundings, because the waterfall itself already looks beautiful.

Then we continued to the restaurant. So everyone quickly got out of the bus, eat quickly and toast with everyone in the room! Result: many funny colleagues :D

Then quickly back on the bus, briefly drop off the backpack at the hotel and off we went to the evening program. Simon's department went to karaoke and my department went out to eat again - you could almost say I'm in Heidenheim. After my crew ran completely in the wrong direction first, we finally found the small restaurant. This time BBQ was on the menu. I was really looking forward to it, because before that there was almost exclusively seafood and eggs (which I'm not a fan of).

However, the anticipation was quickly dampened when I found something next to the vegetable shelf that I never thought I would see somewhere... the restaurant owners really went to the dogs. I decided to eat vegetarian for the rest of the evening...

Despite the initial little shock, the evening turned out to be very funny.

The program continued the next day after breakfast. This time the goal was a mountain that could be climbed with 999 steps. It would have been a bit difficult for people with a fear of heights. But we had fun :-)

After lunch, we drove through another construction site again. This time the destination was a small river, where we went on a boat tour and then went up another mountain. During the boat tour, something was constantly spoken and shown in Chinese. My colleague, who was still clearly affected from the previous evening, tried at first to translate everything. Eventually she said: 'Oh, I don't really know what she wants to show the whole time. Somehow it doesn't make sense... you can see everything from the top of the mountain anyway.' So we did:

Afterwards, it was time to go home again.

For us, these 1.5 days were definitely a funny and interesting experience! Because how else can you get to know Chinese culture better than with 100 Chinese people on tour?

Anyway, I think we now know how the Chinese manage to visit Neuschwanstein, Paris, Rome and Vienna in 3 days :-)