This will be my first blog about studying abroad in the Nanjing, China program. Although I hope my others will have more descriptions and information on places you can go, this one is more of a cautionary tale of how not being prepared is. Well, don’t do it.
For those of you from mill towns you know the sweet but disturbing smell of home. You may be glad to know that most of China has this same smell, with the exception of the mills. My advice is to not arrive in Shanghai in a Zanex haze, as i did; this will prevent you from having the “first morning” in China that I had.
I woke up determined to get a traditional Chinese breakfast. Molly, my roommate at the hotel volunteered to stroll with me to the nearest ATM and breakfast shop. When I stepped outside my nostrils burned. I felt like I was trying to breath in a steam room where three smelly old men had just put too much water on the hot rocks. It was horrifying. I was most baffled that I had not noticed during the ride from the airport to the hotel on the night before how horrible Shanghai 
actually smelled. I also remembered that I was the only one who managed to lose the cell phone we were given in the taxi from the airport, before I got out of the taxi. I suppose it was not that amazing that I missed the stench. Molly seemed surprised. We walked across the street to the ATM and waited for a local to finish using it.
It was at this point that I started to feel like my legs were exceedingly hairy. I was positive that I had just shaved before I left and this could not be the case, but the feeling insisted. I looked down and there were three mosquitos on me. I slapped at them in a fit of fury, to no avail of course. Molly laughed at me, and made the comment didn’t you put on bug spray?
“Didn’t you put on bug spray...” The phrase that would haunt me. Instead of letting my pride keep me from asking, I stupidly replied why would I do that. She then informed me of the common knowledge that there are mosquitoes everywhere in China this time of year and how could I have not packed bug spray. By the time I got to use the ATM I had ten mosquito bites.
After I had taken out some cash we went back outside to find breakfast. I was starving. I hadn’t made it past 5:30 the night before because I was so tired and had gone essentially a whole day without eating. Nothing makes me more cranky than going hungry. At least, I thought nothing did until the humidity started to make me perspire profusely. Not only is that uncomfortable for me and presumably everyone around me, but it also intensifies the itch of my mosquito bites. So I’m walking down the potent streets of Shanghai, hungry, sweaty, and itchy. It’s acceptable to say that I may have been unhappy.
Luckily, I thought, we found a vendor fairly quickly. They had two options which looked like a plain bread roll or a bread roll covered in cheese. The vendor was friendly enough and tried his best to speak with us in English as a courtesy. He suggested cheesed covered roll. One thing I have always been told is to never buy clothes without trying them on. This thought came to me when I unwrapped my roll. The top that I assumed was cheese covered looked like orange hair under close inspection. I asked Molly what she thought and she said it’s a foreign food and she was positive it would taste good. Molly had been to China before and had an undying love for local food and culture.
I bit in. What I spit back out was a mixture of bread, lemon jelly which was a surprise center, and pork. The cheese turned hair was actually shredded pork. It could quite possibly have been the worst thing I had ever tasted. I proceeded directly to a trash can, and then on to the closest McDonald’s for a sausage biscuit and hashbrown.
Although the cashier did rip me off by one kuai (6.8 cents) it was not worth arguing in what now felt like my extremely limited Chinese. The breakfast tasted exactly like it did at home. I told Molly it was too good to be true and that I had probably got bitten by a mosquito with typhoid fever and 
had just died. I also informed her that as odd as it was for McDonalds to be in Shanghai, it was more odd that it had opened a store in Heaven.
This may feel brushed over but I do not want to give too much away about what you will see in Shanghai. Henry, one of the program directors here, is a wealth of knowledge and will be able to explain the pictures that are up with this in a way that makes you excited to be there. So I will leave that to him. But....from this point on the day gets exponentially better with only a few drawbacks. The smell subsided just like it does in my hometown because you get used to it. We saw many amazing sites that took my mind mostly off the itching of my legs. I did regret the shoes I wore because my feet felt like they had swollen to the size of small watermelons from all the walking and waiting in lines. Other than that the day turned out well and I thoroughly enjoyed my trip around Shanghai.
So to end this story I will leave you with some hints if you plan on taking this study abroad program.
1. Be prepared for heinous smell. It will go away.
2. Bring bug spray!! Lots of it. Candles too if you can.
3. Exchanging money is cheaper outside the airport, wait until you leave to exchange it. You will need your passport, and allow yourself at least a half hour. Chinese banks are stamp happy and they will stamp the papers you give them several times, in several shades of red. Possibly just because they like the color and stamping adds fun to the workplace.
4. If you bank at Bank of America use ATMS at China Construction Bank. BofA owns 10 percent so when you use their ATM they will not add an extra surchage like the other ATM’s.
5. Leave out a pair of tennis shoes for the travel day in Shanghai. They will ship your luggage to Nanjing in the morning so whatever is in those bags you will not be able to access for two days. You will be doing A LOT of walking.