SPA012 = finito!

WUHUUUUU! I just finished my oral Spanish exam! Didn't get top grades but I definitely didn't expect that either and I'll nail it when I get back from Chile anyways.
Ah, life is good :-)

Funny quote i stumbled upon

"Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark.
You know what you´re doing, but nobody else does"
Stewart Britt


Btw: just finished half of the climbing course! It is so much fun and I'll buy some climbing equipment when I'm in The States :-)

AIESEC Christmas dinner, 19.11.2011

I just got in the door an I'm sitting here in my pink dress with so many thought (to the point girl!). Tonight I've gained my motivation in AIESEC 110 %. I thought I had got it back last week but tonight reminded me of why I spend so many hours every day working for this amazing organisation. In the Nordic circle Runar said in his speech that I was one of three persons that have had a huge impact on him this semester. I repeat: that I, Minh Chau Anita Thi Bui, was one of them! Can you believe that?! Looking back at that shy girl in fifth grade, who barely spoke unless she was in a classroom, to the girl that didn't have permission to be with her first boyfriend in seventh grade to the girl (or even woman) I'm looking in the mirror today I must say that I have grown - both in kilogrammes and as a person. Hehe. If you're just a random person reading this post and you've never heard about AIESEC: you need to JOIN US TODAY.

Definition of the Nordic circle: it's a tradition where the one with the bottle of liquor is the only one who can speak. After the speech you take a zip and pass it on to your fellow next to you with your left hand. Look it up on wikipedia. Well.. Back to the Nordic circle. His words really got to me and when Caroline also thanked me I was filled with pure joy.

Next year I'll give my best and contribute to take AIESEC to new heights. I can't seem to find the words. Tonight changed me and I want to keep this feeling. I'm in the state of mind where I feel that nothing is unbreakable and I can do whatever I set my mind to.

Plan: make my 5 years plan on the 16th of December.

Where is my ship going?

Start project value. Note to myself next semester: prioritise!!

"Don't take life too serious because one day it's going to be game over". I want school to be a better place for the students and I want the people in the society to be more happy! What a strange world we are living in: always competing with each other, focusing on the things we are missing, our looks and constantly complaining about the weather!

We talked about the dating culture here in Norway and came to the conclusion that there isn't any. "Facebook has destroyed our way of getting to know each other!" Runar said during this discussion at the Christmas table. He said something there because Facebook has changed the way we think about each other and has kind of replaced the first impression we have of people. I realised that I've never been asked on a date by someone I just met. It's not on my top of my wish list, but it would have been nice to experience that once in my life.

A huge thanks to everyone who made this night memorable. Tomorrow is a new day. Is it one thing I've learn from today is that what you invest in AIESEC you get back, sooner or later. AIESEC is its members and so much more than meets the eyes.

It's such a shame that most of the students at NHH haven't got this experience and that they can't see the value of being a member. I'm afraid that my parents will get furious at me if my exams doesn't go to well this semester. How can they? All they see is my grades and I need to be better at sharing these kind of moments with them in order for them to understand. I'm climbing tomorrow morning and needs to get to bed.

I'm hitting the shower!

A beautiful day in Bergen, 07.11.2011

Recap

Hi! So it's been too long since I posted something. I've decided to be an active blogger since at times like this, when it's hectic, I should write. The future 90 years old Anita will appreciate reading about the happy days when I was young and happy with no wrinkles and having an astonishment view of the world. Then again the exam period is here and I'll be living at the AIESEC office studying the next month so it won't be much to excited things to report.

Just a recap on what has happened this semester.
Starting from the summer I must tell you more about Adrian Chan. Briefly. Summer 2011. Love with no commitment. Home and long e-mails. Just to give you an impression of him:
" I can't help similing right now. Its like whenever I see, read, or think of anything that has the slightest connection to you a rush of emotions just fills me up. Happiness, sadness, and an incredible longing to see you...It feels so good finally hearing from you. I did send you an email the first night I got back to Hong Kong! "
I wrote him a poem:
I miss you Adrian Chan,
You became my mi fan.
As the basic to every meal
you were something I needed, for real
Everyday
I would pay..
To have you here
I want you near!
I still have your smile on my mind.
Another you I will never find.
I'm sitting here thinking of an end.
Wondering if you and I are going to pretend
That this didn't happen when we meet again.
But I'm done "fast forwarding" my lover and friend
I want to be with you
Hope you feel the same too!
(...)
I know... And I agree
This is not American TV
It's hard, and I feel an emptiness inside
'Cause you and me we just collide
Why do you have to be so far away?!
There is not much more for me to say...
You became my mi fan
I miss you Adrian Chan


God I'm so chessy. Haha. I will stop now.
Before we went seperate ways I gave him a love passport (god I really am the chessiest person on the planet).

Skyping with Adrian

"I wrote two entries in that love passport you gave me, in the empty pages. I think they sum up really well what I've been feeling the past days at night.

I miss you a little too good for my health Anita! I would give anything to have you next to me right now. I just can't stop thinking about you. Everywhere I go you're there. I try to keep myself busy but it just doesn't help. You are seriously everywhere I go. Never thought one month with you would cut me so deep. I try running away from you but there's no escaping.

7-30-2011

1:55am

I don't know if you remember the time I told you I believed in many loves of my life. I think you're one of those loves Ani. Don't know how I"m going to survive without you. I want to be with you but I don't. On one hand, I think it's best if we aren't together but I just can't help thinking about you. Tell me what to do. 

7-31-2001 

Haha I was going through some pretty depressed moments those nights. Yeah, I checked plane tickets to Bergen as well. So when we began this relationship, we said that one month and it would be over right? That was when we didn't really care for each other and had logic instead now where we have emotion. (I'm just trying to reason with myself) And still, now we are going through the same plan."

At that time nothing was decided. He thought that we would never meet again and I had a difficult time accepting that. And guess what? On the 10th of September, at night, I just booked the flight tickets and told him the next day.

I can't really recommend you to have a long distance relationship. It eats you up inside. Knowing t at on the other side of the planet is a person longing for you as much as you want him to be a part of your life. Bergen is a pretty romantic city and even though I'm very social I often feel alone because I miss his touch and his calm voice and joking with him. I've come to the point were I'm still thinking of him, but I'm not sad anymore. I smile and look forward to the day I see him again. The 26th of December. Gosh, I can't wait!

I'll leave it like that and update you when I get back on the 9th of January.

AIESEC is an organisation I'm part of. During this semester I've encountered several challenges: I had booked a meeting with the UIB people without consulting Thao. It was during the Excel conference and I was confused etc. I've been having meetings, planned the process and giving trainings while making documents for the exchanges.
It has been a lot of work and late nights but we have had such a good time. The celebration on the 29th of October was great! Morten Sortland and singstar is a chapter of its own. It was hilarious and Runar's ladies speech was incredible! He compared internships with ladies. Hehe. I've met a lot of students and having good talks and moments with the members throughout this year.
The OPS today was a success. I felt like I've gotten through this fear of talking in front of an audience and are able to breathe and relax when I'm talking. I'm present. FINALLY!
















I've also managed to be a volleyball judge this semester and has judged 2 matches so far. Wuhu! I got the opportunity since I'm playing volleyball twice a week now. I met Rosie, the most outgoing girl from England, at the swimming pool and we've had our "dates" there. I hate that I've been so busy that we've lost contact and I'm writing on my to-do list that I need to get back in touch with her.
One of my best friends' birthday was a hit! It was so nice seeing everyone again and I made a video for her. I'll post it.

Old picture of us I used making the video

Bergen challenge

Spring roll!

Home :-)

The opening ceremony of Bergen Challenge. Red Cross strategy meetings (great food and incredible people!). Dinners with friends. Movie nights. Helge Marie and I made a dance and a song for Chen and Thao at their birthday.
Piano song. Poems. "Sveiseaften". I'm just summing up things now.


Can't believe how lucky I am. In AIESEC I'm in environment that in many ways reflects an international work area and I'm surrounded by people that gives me energy. I'm growing as a person. I have a lovely family that supports me (I sent my dad his birthday present: socks and boxer with a card I made and wrote in Vietnamese!) and friends that are amazing. I have a luxury problem: I got too many things I want to do but I need to remind myself that I only have an amount of capacity.

"Be the change that you want to see in the world"
Mahatma Gandhi
Good night!

Nice quote!

Hey hey!
So I came across this awesome quote while working on my home exam:

“Advertising is the last thing you bring to the mix. You start by getting the product right, getting your attitude right, getting everyone internally understanding the mission. Then you move to telling the story through PR. You build the advertising last, and that way you can live on realistic budgets.”
Amy Curtis-McIntyre, Vice President of Marketing i JetBlue

And I simply love this quote as wellSteve Jobs
“Stay young. Stay foolish”

And that reminds me of his inspiring video at TED.com
Check it out! (I promise you that it's time well spent)

My AIESEC experience in China

My incentives to go:

- I had to know the product.
At that time I had been a member in AIESEC NHH for 7 months and in the outgoing exchange group: sending Norwegian students abroad. I felt that I had to know what I was talking about!

- View of life
I wanted to realize that I’m very lucky and thought that by having “a taste of poverty” I would appreciate everything I have more. Another factor is that my parents came as refugees from Norway for about 25 years ago and I wanted to have an impression of their previous life in Vietnam.

- International network and get to know the Chinese culture

- Learn the language: At NHH I have 3 Chinese friends who are very close to me.

- I’ve been working every summer since I was 13 and urged to have a different experience and challenge myself by putting me out of my comfort zone.

So I paid the fee and from there it was no turning back!


My first encounter with China
20.09.2011 – 26.06.2011

20th of June I left Gardemoen and about 14 hours later I was in Beijing. I spent the first three days in the capital with Chen Cui and her family.
My first memory of China:
I grabbed a cab at the airport and quickly realized that the driver didn’t speak ANY English. At that time I only knew:
Ni hao (hi), wo hen hao (I’m good), nouwei ren (Norwegian), ni de pi guo zen hao kan (“Your ass is fantastic”), Tai giu le and to count after having a few Chinese lessons with my friend Li. I used the three first sentences, called Chen and gave him the phone. I managed to ask him to turn up the radio: some body language and a smile and you can conquer the world!
Eventually we got to the hotel and then the journey began…
Note to all future travellers: write down the name of the hotel in Chinese letters or learn some Chinese before you got to China!

The Great Wall, the silk market (had to bargain like a mad woman.), The Temple of Heaven, The Forbidden City and The Tiananmen Square: check, check, check and double check!
On the 24th I met Anna (EP – exchange participant) and Kerry from New Jersey, Kasia (EP) and Anastazja (EP) from Poland and Michelle from Canada. We went out for KTV (karaoke) with a group from Yale (VIP room and awesome surround system!). It was SO much fun!

New food and drinks:
Bao dse (white buns with meat), donkey baguette, mini - eggs, Mung bean drink and Peeking duck (PS: not all Chinese toilets can flush poop… Make sure to read the sign)”


After the first days I felt very much at home and loved the culture: the food was great and cheap and the city was alive at all times. At this point I haven’t been talking to any locals yet so I still felt like a tourist.


Tianjin: homestay and training
26.06.2011 – 01.07.2011

Sonia from the local committee and her friend in Tianjin picked me up on the train station and I was welcomed by a magician, Shawn, and the café owner at the café, Wendy. After some mind blowing tricks I went to my homestay. She’s the sweetest lady I’ve ever met!






The following day I met Bryan, the leader of the project, Adrian (EP from Seattle), Mohammed (EP from the States) and Joanna (my EP buddy).
We didn’t get any training but spent the next two days swimming (in most pools you need to wear a swimming cap. Oh yeah… I looked pretty smashing in a bright yellow one! Adrian and Wendy are my witnesses), doing yoga and Tai shi (6 O’clock in the morning!), eating delicious food, getting massage and getting to know each other. I also participated in an “English corner” with the locals and beat one of them in badminton. Hehe.



29.06.2011: this was the day I met all the EP’s and we had a small session in the hotel room were we practiced our presentation as the teacher and prepared our roll call (a dance for the opening ceremony).
PS: Tianjin is the 4th largest city and has the best soya milk ever!

Fuyang: the internship begins!
Teaching at the Middle school for student between 16-17 years
02.07.2011 – 20.07.2011


We got a tour around the high school and met Steve Rogers and Mike (coordinators at the school) and Mr. Lee (now it really started hitting me that I was in China).
At the opening ceremony all of the students were standing in a row and the view frightened me.


Tomorrow the lectures begin and we still didn’t know what we were supposed to teach them!

1 day as a teacher:
I was afraid. I was going to have 25 students in the two first lessons and 50 students in the last ones. What have you signed up for, Anita?!
When I got in the class room I wasn’t nervous any more. Since this was a summer camp I wanted them get to know each other, so after my introduction (I also showed them a video of my family I had prepared: they fancied it very much!) we played “my neighbor”.

To sum the two weeks up:
It was hard to decide what to teach the students at times. Especially when I found out that their school day starts at 8 am and finishes at 10 pm with 2 hours of break in the afternoon. And this is a summer camp people! From the beginning I wanted them to talk, learn and have fun. Hangman which turned into idiomatic expressions, charades, quiz, translations and “picture quiz” was some of the teaching methods I used.
I also wanted to “bring the world to them” so I had brought brown cheese, knekkebrød and Kvikk lunsj which they tasted. Some loved it, others hated the brown cheese. “This is delicious” or “what is this?!” they kept saying. I also tried, among other things, to have a role play and mixed the boys with the girls. They were going to ask each other on a date and go to a restaurant to learn how to order food. The relationship between girls and boys are totally different in China. To put it this way: if there are rumors that a boy and a girl like each other, they are together. I also tried teaching them pick- up lines.
“if you were a boogie, I would pick you first!” or “Did you just fart?...... ‘Cause you just blew me away” or “You’re the straw to my berry (you complete me)”. They didn’t get it and I stood up there for 2 minutes laughing before I moved on to the next topic.
Note to myself: you have such bad humor!
We also had PE and “enspretten” with asshole was a hit! A secret: they say they don’t want to dance but they really do!

The biggest challenge was the language and that we were just thrown into everything. We learned by doing and got to know their culture, situation and how humble they can are. A student gave me a mandarin one day and I was filled with joy. I loved how they addressed me as their teacher and how they always stood up whenever as an act of respect.

”Funny misunderstandings have occurred. One of my students argued with me when I told them that Mount Everest is the highest mountain on earth.
The whole class was laughing. I'm gonna miss them!”
13.07.2011

Quotes from students

“You are great person, and we are very happy with you”
Uknown

“I hope that you will marry with your favourite boy”
Dick

“I hope you will more and more beautiful!”
Uknown

“You are the most outgoing foreign teacher I’ve ever met. And I enjoy myself when I’m with you and I regard you as my friend. So I hope you can be happy forever”
Miko Yu

I definitely had some of the best moments in that classroom.

“Being a teacher has changed me. I'm not afraid of speaking in public any more. I appreciate what I have. I'm so glad I'm… me! I'm stronger in a way, and this experience has been beyond my expectations.”
16.07.2011



Next stop: Chun an!
Teaching for students between 13 to 14 years old
20.07.2011 – 23.07.2011


At this secondary school in such a small town I realized how bad the school system really is. These students didn’t speak any English and the food was nearly as nourishing as the food we got in Fuyang. Here I could see the progression after each lesson and I felt I made a different.
I only had two hours of teaching a day but during these few days I really got to know them and I wish I could stay there longer. It was hard saying goodbye.

24.07.2011 – 29.07.2011
Shanghai

This was a trip for all of the exchange participants and we spent these last days exploring the city and saying goodbye to each other.
PS: it’s pretty much ladies night every day! (Find the right clubs and you’ll have free drinks and entrance and the clubs have great music, space and view!)
PS: I recommend you The Shanghai aquarium and to eat Ramen!

29.07.2011 – 05.08.2011
Beijing with my brother who came from Australia and we strongly recommend you to stay at a hostel!





Did the budget explode?
No, during these 7 weeks I only spent 9000 all together: transportation, food, gifts, shopping and sightseeing and the round trip flight tickets cost me 5000 kr. + the visa 500 kroner.

All in all: money well spent!


Looking back at it I realize that this was much more than just a project and it exceeded all my expectations even though the duration of the project was almost a week shorter.

If I’m ever in Italy, the Netherlands, Polen, Mauritius, the States, Canada or China I have a friend or two there; an international network in other words. And I’m actually going to Seattle this December to visit Adrian!

I expected to sleep on the floor but I slept at hotels, I expected to get to know people – I got lifelong friends, I thought I was going to just travel in the beginning and at the end of this project: we explored the cities and new places almost every day, I thought I was going to be a teacher – I also became their student, I thought that I was going to starve – that was the least of my concerns and yeah... I think you catch my drift 

I strongly recommend you to do the same.

Thanks to AIESEC, the organization and all the great members for giving me this opportunity. I know for certain that this is one of the most powerful and happy experience I’ll ever have in my life. I’ve grown as a person and I’m sure this project also will help me get my dream job.

Roll call for Excel (AIESEC conference)

I mixed this song and made up a dance to it as well. Tomorrow Helga Marie and I are going to judge two more volleyball matches as practice and then we can officially judge matches and get paid for it! :-D

PS: I just chose a random picture

Friends

Jeg skrev dette til Oanh min kjære barndomsvenninne på Facebok for noen minutter siden. Innser at det er krevende å holde på nettverket sitt, men at noen har en bare kontakt med uansett hva. "Friends are like stars: even though you can't see them you know they're always there". Jeg er heldig jeg har så mange slike venner!

No problemo,

håper du ikke ble emo.

Begynner å bli litt trøtt,

20 år siden du ble født!

Viktig å jobbe og få inn spenn,

ønsker deg kun det beste min venn.

Håper å se deg ganske snart,

Lenge siden sist! Rart..

At vi nå er "voksne",

men glem nå det.

Lev og gjør ting litt annerledes hver dag.

Din heldiggris, du har jo ikke noen fag!

Igjen: mange klemmer fra meg.

Tro det eller ei: jeg savner deg :)

Some pictures from the past weeks in Bergen. Aaaand... Guess what?! I'm going to SEATTLE THIS DECEMBER to visit Adrian!!!

The view from our apartment. In reality it's SO much nicer!

BBQ on the porch in the nice weather (for once) :-D



Me and Helga Marie eating our first dinner together. Soya sauce has become "a must add" to our meals now. Geez I'm so addicted to soya sauce.





"Sveiseaften" - Were about to meet some freshmens!



Hmm.. Wally?





Boat race



At the career day as the only student organization = Proud member of AIESEC NHH :-D

Helga Marie and I had the running trip of all times. We ended up climbing down a hill and fighting though bushes etc in the middle of the night bevause we got lost.

I though I was going to die..

Definitely Wally!



The best EB!







Competition; build the Great Wall!



Adrian: "Songs to remember me by"

China flashback

At James father's furniture factory. These furnitures are in ancient style

Anna chilling on a very expensive sofa

Bryan, Adrian and Francesco playing boss and server 

WOAW. This is so magnificent!

I do look like a Chinese worker

With James' father, the owner

There's only 500 pieces of this item so it's extremely rare. 

She was in one of the rooms at the factory. SO sweet!! 

It's a tradition that the visitors write down there name and were they're from.

Dinner time. The food was delicious!!!