Hello! We are five Dutch students working in Xiamen, China – one programmer, Bob, and four designers, Emal, Daniel, Ruben and Vincent. For our internship we wanted to have some experience in the working field and a cultural challenge as well. This is why we went to China with CHECK-IT.

 
On Friday the 10th of February, we landed in Xiamen. Driven through town by taxi, we got the first glimpse of this wonderful city. It was great to see the city after all the preparations and we were not disappointed. All the Chinese signs were a little bit intimidating at first but we quickly warmed to our new hometown.

The next five months we will sleep in the dorms on the main campus of Xiamen University. No initial sleeping material like a mattress or a pillow was provided, so our first trip was to the store to buy all of these necessities. In the store, we could not read what was inside of the product so we looked at the pictures and hoped for the right products. We quickly learned that the Chinese people are really helpful and they really made the effort to understand us.

Of course the dorms took a little while to get used to, but it is a truly perfect way to get to know people. There is a big variety of nationalities and this helps to integrate very fast in the Chinese culture. Why? Because you hear from everyone how they experience daily life in Xiamen and how to cope with Chinese student life. I dare say that the coming months look promising for us and we can learn a lot from the Chinese! It is awesome that we have the chance to be here and we will take every chance to make friendships and see China.

We’ve already met several people from businesses in Xiamen and it is great to see how they operate. In the coming months we will see a lot more about these companies and hopefully we will experience the working environment at every company. But above all, we get to experience this Asian Dragon inside out! In the next blog, there will be more about our working experiences and how we get along. See you in the next blog!

Vincent Schepers, Check-IT 16 student Hogeschool Arnhem Nijmegen