By Karolina Kopek, 4/23/2015. I narrowed down potential hostels and will be finishing booking accommodations in just a few days – I decided to ditch private rooms and go with the cheaper, spacier dorms after researching people’s solo travel experiences. Staying at a dorm will allow me to both meet fellow travelers and save a lot of money that could be spent on transportation and food. I am also at the point of probably changing my means of transportation from Hong Kong to Shanghai to a plane rather than train (seeing that the train takes twenty hours while the plane takes just two, costing only about thirty dollars more!). I decided that my Tibet plans are most likely not happening due to a very tight budget, so I decided that I will visit areas closer to Shanghai/HK such as Zhangjiajie National Forest Park or Yellow Mountain. I am so excited that I will be able to see such amazing places!

Regarding my fieldwork, I have been researching gender perceptions amongst youth in China in order to give myself even more background knowledge and preparation prior to talking about such subjects with people there. I decided that it will be much more effective to spend time with youth groups and get to know them over longer periods of time rather than conduct formal interviews which could be difficult and awkward considering the topic.

I am making time to teach myself Mandarin and I am pleasantly surprised at how quickly I am able to memorize terms and phrases – this was not the case when I was first exposed to the language. Being bilingual definitely helps and I am really grateful for it! I really hope that by the time I get to China I will be able to at least somewhat understand what people are saying and that they will understand me. But even if that does not happen, I will still manage and make the best of it!