A batch countdown party is mandatory, of course. We held a countdown-cum-housewarming gathering at one of our houses. The New Year’s Eve was filled with much fun, laughter and FOOD. Everyone brought something for the potluck party and we found some serious chefs among us! We’re talking homemade chocolate gingerbread cookies, curry chicken and chunky mushroom soup. With a (paper) cup of Moscato in every hand, we did the cliché countdown together, ending in a resounding “HAPPY NEW YEAR!!” that probably annoyed some of our not-so-enthusiastic-about-New-Year local neighbours. Chinese New Year is definitely a much more hyped up affair here compared to the Gregorian calendar New Year. Nevertheless, it’s safe to say we partied the night away because nobody went home until a whooping 4am! BUT. Our New Year celebrations didn’t stop there. After spending the 1st of January recuperating from the lack of sleep, we went on a day trip to a strawberry farm on 崇明岛 (Chongming Island) on 2nd January. The whole journey took about 2-3 hours before we finally reached a huge farming area. Chongming Island is famous for its vegetable produce so we found a large, empty restaurant and had our fill of various vegetables there. Even our anti-vegetable friend Douglas approved the vegetable dishes! We found the strawberry farms – albeit with some initial struggle – and got straight to picking. The rates we got were 30RMB per 500g to pick our own strawberries straight from the greenhouses, or 25RMB per 500g to buy from those that the farm workers already picked. Most of the ripe strawberries were already picked by the farmworkers, but you can still see some hints of red if you look close enough. We asked for plastic bags after picking our fill of strawberries...but were told that the ENTIRE BASKET was for us! You can imagine how odd we must have looked back on the Shanghai Metro afterwards. Needless to say, we got some curious looks with our hot pink baskets of strawberries and strange English accents haha. And the strawberries...they were the BOMB. Think crunchy, juicy and just the right mixture of sweet and sour. Totally worth the long journey and muddy greenhouses! The New Year celebrations were made so much more meaningful spending it together with our batch mates. I guess you can say we are each other’s family away from home. Since we ended 2016 and started 2017 right, here’s to an amazing year ahead! *Cheers*
P/S: Batch 27, we’re looking forward to seeing you soon too!
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SHEN
申城 (shen cheng) is an ancient name for Shanghai.
As a group of NUS and NOC students who are in Shanghai for a year-long internship programme, we have named our student organisation as SHEN (Shanghai House of Entrepreneurs). Archives
November 2017
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