So it’s the first ‘week’ in Shenzhen and what a first few days it’s been! The new batch of interns for July 2015 is a diverse group of 19 from all corners of the world. We have people from the UK (including myself), US, Europe, Australia and Asia, most for whom this is the first time being in China. Everyone is super friendly and we all share the same excitement of kick starting our Shenzhen internship adventure!
The first day of the programme started off with me packing up my suitcase, catching a ferry from the Hong Kong-Macau Ferry terminal in Central and bidding farewell to my relatives who I’d been staying with for the past week. It was time to say ‘See you later Hong Kong, and hello Shenzhen!’ Lucky for us newbies to Shenzhen, we had the wonderful CRCC Asia staff to greet us at the arrival hall and take us to our amazing apartments. These are conveniently located next to Garden City Mall, a few eateries and a big Walmart where you can literally get anything you need during your stay. Oh and also, have I mentioned how awesome our apartments are?
After arriving and settling in, the day ended off nicely with a casual dinner with all the interns who had arrived so far and one of the Programme Managers. The cultural shock of being in a totally different country where English isn’t very well spoken definitely hit home when sorting out food orders to blank, confused faces – hand gestures and body language have been very important!
The second day marked the official start to the programme with an induction training held covering Chinese business culture, practical advice on living in China, and a short Mandarin lesson. We were all equipped with an orientation pack including more info on our internship programme and working in China, a prepaid SIM card, a (Hello Kitty!) metro card and business cards. I was extremely impressed with how the induction day had been structured and the amount of support that was available to us. To all our glee, we were also given CRCC Asia T-shirts and our individual box of business cards (one of the interns actually gave out the whole box of 500 or so cards on that night out!). By this time, I definitely felt at ease and ready to tackle the workplace on the coming Monday!
The weekend was the perfect time to do some exploring around our new home city and we decided to target the Luhou shopping centre, aka ‘Fake Market’ as the older interns call it. In terms of transport, we took the extremely fun, quick and cheap (only 10RMB – not 30RMB like we did at first!) motorcars to the HuaYue metro station and then took an hour-long metro trip to Luhou. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to navigate around the station thanks to English signs everywhere alongside its Mandarin counterpart. Inside the actual shopping centre lay an explosion of stalls that sold handbags, shoes, watches, clothes, sunglasses, electronics – you name it, that place had it. And the prices at which you can actually buy these ‘designer’ goods are just ridiculous, if you can master the art of haggling. Lots of drama, lots of calculator waving, lots of fun guaranteed!
So all in all that concludes the first week in Shenzhen. I’m definitely starting to feel more comfortable and at home in this new city and have developed good guanxi (relationships – an important aspect of Chinese business culture) with my fellow interns so far. Tomorrow, or Monday morning, we’re all being escorted in groups to our companies and introduced to our Supervisor there. Current emotions? Nerves, excitement, optimism – it’s all good!
PRE-DEPARTURE TIPS
– Download Chinese language apps on your smartphone – I’ve personally been constantly using Pleco and Chinese Lite
– Download and install VPN on both your laptop and smartphone – Recommend ExpressVPN
– Bring GBP to be exchanged to RMB with you in case of emergencies (one of the interns’ bank card got swallowed by the ATM on the first night!)
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