Today was our first University visit! It was so neat to be able to talk with the Chinese students and walk around their campus.
After another wonderful breakfast at the hotel we were on our way to the Central University of Finance and Economics. When we first arrived, a few students met us at the bus and walked us to the lecture hall. In the first part of our day we got to learn all about ecommerce and the smartphone industry in China. In china about 80% of people shop online as opposed to in store, e-commerce is known to be a lifestyle in China with how common it is. Within the presentation our lecturer talked about “Singles Day” a day originally celebrated for single people on November 11 however it has since turned in to a day of shopping, similar to what we have in the U.S. in Black Friday. Although, what makes this day very different from Black Friday is these 50% off sales are only found online and that is where all of the shopping is done. No five-a.m. craziness of rushing to get the best deals at the local mall, which to me, is half the fun of it! There are around 812 million products packaged on Singles Day to ship out, that’s insane! After learning a great deal about the ecommerce in China we moved into smartphones. Surprisingly, Samsung ships out the most smartphones in the world, with Apple second, and Huawei third (which we will be visiting tomorrow!). It seems that people in China use their smartphones for nearly everything, including payment. Around 55% of people in China use WeChat and Alipay as their main source of payment. Forget cash or credit cards, all you need is an app! Our professor who spoke to us today said that he has gone weeks without carrying a wallet, with a smartphone and a QR code he was set. Only about 20% of people in the U.S. use smartphones as a source of payment but I’m sure that number will continue to grow as the years go on. Following the interesting lecture, we went to the dining hall at the university and had lunch with some of the students. I had the unique opportunity to get to know a Marketing student, Grason who attends this university. We had a very long conversation and I loved getting to understand her way of life and what she enjoys. She told me about how she is currently studying to take a test so she can study abroad in London this summer! Grason said that every student who wishes to study abroad must take the test. The Central University of Finance and Economics has three different campuses and Grason is currently studying at the one in central Beijing, different from where we toured today. Each campus has unique programs and majors depending on the student’s interests. Following lunch and my very interesting conversation we went and toured the library; it was absolutely stunning! Wow. The whole campus was so beautiful and very modern, I loved it! While walking throughout the library we got a chance to learn about the logo of the university. It is a dragon horse spirit which is meant to inspire students to always be creative and innovative, there was a huge sculpture of it on the wall. Following the library tour, we went to play some games! I was a little nervous about this because of how hot it was but it turned how to be a lot of fun! We played with a huge jump rope and also had a competition to see which team could pass the hula hoop the fastest, my team won! As the champions we were awarded certificates and got to tell the losing team what to do as punishment…they had to sing Old Town Road and dance, it was hilarious! As our day came to a close and we were walking back to our bus I just couldn’t stop admiring the campus, it’s beautiful! After arriving back at the hotel a few girls and I went to get dumplings for dinner, it was amazing!! I’m not sure if I can ever go back to eating dumplings from home.
I learned so much today and I can’t wait for our company visits tomorrow!
