Five Tips on Recharging While Traveling

Traveling can be great fun, but it can also put a strain on ourselves. Sometimes, we over-extend ourselves, sacrifice sleep, and even get sick because we’re pushing ourselves too hard. When we compromise our bodies, we can end up feeling off balance! How can you be proactive to avoid some of these issues from happening? 

We’ve gathered tips to help you make the most of your time abroad!  

Prepare

Before departure, take care of any loose ends and give yourself plenty of time to do it! Gather any necessary documents you may need during your trip or copies of valuable identification in case of emergencies. As you give yourself time to prepare beforehand, you’ll not only have less stress during the trip, but you will be free of any action items that might still be in process when you return home. 

Unplug 

Technology is a beautiful thing! It’s allowed us to communicate better and have a personal GPS at our fingertips. However, you are exploring a new and exciting place! Keep your phone handy for photos or Google Maps, but you’ll take more advantage of being in the moment and enjoying your surroundings if you stay off of your electronics for the most part of the day.

Bruce Kasanoff, a contributor for Forbes, wrote an article about why people shouldn’t take their phones on vacation and said, “When you take a tram over a gorgeous landscape to the top of a mountain, you will form a wonderful memory that will stay with you for the rest of your life”. Though we’re not advising you to leave your phone on your bedside table back home, the idea of keeping a moment as a memory, is a nice alternative to the usual filtered image we might feel the need to post immediately. 

If you take photos and videos and upload them in the evenings when you're back in your room, you’re more likely to enjoy the moment at a landmark or popular attraction. Give yourself a time limit, such as 15-30 minutes each day, to check out your friends’ social media updates and respond to messages, and then take in the world around you!

We encourage our students and teachers to keep a journal as well! You’ll surprise yourself years later when you have a chance to remember your thoughts and feelings as you visited different places with fellow classmates. 

Slow Down

Most times, this is out of our control, but staying aware of your immune system before traveling is possible. While you're on the go, stay hydrated before, during, and after flights and travel by keeping a water bottle in your belongings that you can fill up when needed. 

Another tip is sleeping patterns, if you need to sleep, or are feeling jet lagged, then sleep! It sounds self-explanatory, but sometimes we need a little reminder that being well-rested will actually improve your enjoyment for a day of endless exploring!  

Fortunately, you can always visit a pharmacy in the city if you start to feel a bit under the weather. Regardless, try to catch the cold before it catches you! 

Communicate

If you’re traveling with a group, get to know your group members and leaders as best as you can. You should find a friend or a group leader and tell them when you aren’t feeling 100%, or if you are starting to not feel well. If your fellow travel companions and group leaders don’t know how you feel, you might start to feel more burned out and frustrated as you continue to partake in activities. 

Everyone experiences jet lag and culture shock differently, and the importance of sharing feelings and emotions will help your friends and group leaders provide advice and assistance. Having a great time abroad heavily depends on your ability to gauge your energy and understand when you need to rest. By communicating, you will be able to support one another when help is needed! 

Do Things You Enjoy

This ranges from outdoor adrenaline activities, to museums and walking tours, and may even include a relaxing afternoon at a cafe or park. The idea is that participating in activities that you feel comfortable and confident doing will alleviate anxiety and allow you to return home with the same positive attitude. 

Feeling well-rested doesn’t only come from sleep, but also from engagement in meaningful activities. Find time to do things that will lift your spirits and make time for great meals, relaxed moments, and genuine connections. 

Another idea is ending your travels on a high note. Recency effect is the idea that the end of one’s time abroad is more easily recalled than the beginning, and the Wall Street Journal suggested using recency bias to end overseas adventures with a bang. If you’re on a budget trip, you might upgrade your last night’s accommodation, or save specific cuisine you’ve been most excited for as your last meal.

Overall, respect boundaries you set by listening to your body and don’t push yourself to do everything. Travel itineraries should allocate for fun, adventure, and education, but also enough time to rest for you to recharge! 

Most importantly, take the time during your final days on your journey to reflect on your time abroad and how much you have accomplished. This will not only give you feelings of satisfaction, but also appreciation and thankfulness for the valuable moments you got to spend. 

Did you know that travel is good for the soul? Check out our past blog, "Four Ways Traveling Can Improve Wellness”!

How to Manage the Ups & Downs of Study Abroad

The semester will go by quicker than you think! For those of you who are living overseas, take the time to check in with yourself and slow down when you need to!

Here are a few tips and tricks on maximizing your time while you’re abroad:   

What Do You Want to Accomplish?

Set goals for yourself about what you want to accomplish whilst abroad. Keep these realistic, but if there’s a nearby city you want to explore or activity you want to get involved in at school, having a “study abroad bucket list” of sorts is a great way to organize extracurriculars.  

EdOdyssey’s current study abroad students got to explore Macchu Picchu in Peru - a bucket list item for many travelers!

The key word here is realistic, be mindful of how busy your semester will be and prioritize additional adventures accordingly so you won’t be stressed out by Week 3. If there are places you want to visit, it’s never too early or too late to start planning. Don’t wait for friends to get on-board with your tentative plans - prices for cheap tickets and good accommodations will come and go!

Stay Connected With Home 

If you’re missing your family, find an accommodating time, per week or per month, that you can schedule and look forward to talking with them. Keep a group chat open on WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger so you can stay updated with all of your friends at once. 

You might even send postcards from places you’ve visited. Staying connected is important, because it can alleviate loneliness and encourage you to exchange stories with your family so you’re both up-to-date with what’s new.

Keep A Positive Attitude

Mid-semester can be tough, and final exams can be difficult when it’s not the same education system as America’s. Besides school, it’s totally normal to feel overwhelmed when trying new things, but this can actually benefit travelers to stay open-minded. 

Be optimistic - there will be times when you’re being challenged acclimating to a new country and all that it brings, but staying positive will only make your experience better. It’s almost guaranteed that you will come across moments that grant cultural misunderstanding, whether that be language barriers or situations dealing with cultural shock, that you will just have to accept and move on from. 

Staying flexible and having a good sense of humor when things like this arise, can aid funny stories later on, by finding a way to create an optimistic frame of mind. Also remind yourself that your time is limited while you’re abroad, so it’s still a fantastic opportunity to learn and grow. 

Document As Many Memories As You Can  

Make friends from other countries, enjoy your time with your homestay family, and try new things as much as you can. It’s amazing how we can pack thousands of photos into our phones, where we can save our memories from any daytrip we may take. However, try not to live through your phone, and look up to enjoy your surroundings. Too often we end up glued to our phones, snapchatting or instagramming a moment without being present with those experiences in real time. 

You might try documenting it in a journal at the end of your day, so that you can immerse yourself while an experience is happening and reflect on it in the evening through writing. Another idea is creating a blog or website that your family and friends can follow along with during your semester. That way, your network back home can read when they have time, and you have something to go back and glance over whenever you want. 

Regardless of a mode of documentation, take opportunities to explore your host country and make the most of it. Check out “5 Ways to Keep Study Abroad Experiences Alive” to read about a few ways to keep your study abroad experience alive once you return home! 

How to Make Studying Abroad Work For You

EdOdyssey Marketing Intern Amanda Lowrey (right) shares her experience with peers during a study abroad mixer.

Whether you’re going into your freshman year of college or senior year, you’ll always have to come up with an academic game plan and adjust it along the way. As you figure out what classes they want to take, clubs, which classes to take and what your future will look like beyond the classroom. These are all stressful ideas to manage! As a recent college graduate who worked and volunteered during college, it is important to come up with a plan in order to set goals and achieve what you can.

In my spare time, when I volunteered as a Study Abroad Alumni Ambassador on campus, many prospective students felt nervous over the fact that they’d have to leave familiar territory for a semester of unknown coursework and professors. I remember how intimidating and overwhelmed I initially felt about studying abroad, and wanted to alleviate some of their similar concerns by having open conversations about what going abroad meant to me. 

Some major questions that I faced were: 

“How will I graduate on time?”

“How will I be able to take the credits needed to graduate while overseas?” 

These were common, and very valid, concerns. Let’s talk about how you can manage your workload with school and be able to study abroad! 

Setting Realistic Goals

Although goal setting can seem fairly straightforward, it can be demanding to actually achieve them. Studying abroad is all about maintaining manageable coursework and making the most of your time abroad. 

Have you started the conversation with your advisor about how to make studying abroad work for you? Have you mapped out your credits to see which classes you'll need for your degree in the future? It's always best to double check everything in order to figure out which courses can be taken while overseas!

As you plan ahead, you’ll visually start to see how many units or courses are left, you’ll begin to realize that studying abroad doesn’t affect your major as much as you’d expect! If anything, you’re able to be guaranteed a number of units with approved courses while abroad since you’ll be required to partake in specific classes. 

Thinking Outside of the Box 

Are there alternative ways for you to get courses planned out and completed before, during, and after studying abroad? Independent study, online courses, and summer and winter intersessions, are three options that can positively impact your progress toward graduation. 

Independent study, refers to choosing units with your advisor and making your own arrangements for coursework to enhance your academic goals. Online courses may also be available to you through your university where you can take a few classes online in order to add additional credits, get ahead, or have a flexible class schedule. Online classes and independent study both allow you to knock out courses in less time with fewer distractions.  

Last but definitely not least, summer and winter intersessions are sometimes available to certain majors where students can participate in classes during their seasonal breaks. Taking a class or two during intersession generally has a moderate workload, and you’re able to stay ahead on credits needed before studying abroad, or afterward. 

These are examples of making the most of your time in school prior to living overseas, and having alternative options of staying on track when you return. 

Communication is Key 

Planning to study abroad with your campus is all about keeping an open line of communication. Communicating clearly with teachers and professors about how you’ll benefit from a program abroad and illustrating your passion of travel is pivotal when getting courses approved. 

Let them know that how a certain course at the host university will benefit your academic understanding. Having the support of your home campus while overseas will make it easier to maintain a relationship with them when it comes time to apply for registration and graduation. 

As frustrating as your preparation can be for study abroad, you will ultimately make your experience abroad and your transition back home much easier! 

Check out our blog post which discusses a few steps students can do to be proactive about studying abroad: "Three Steps For Preparing Your Study Abroad Now"!

Eight Must-Have Applications When in China

We all use our smartphones daily and presumably this will be true if you travel to China as well.  There are some applications on your smartphone that you will use frequently in China, and some that you will discover are actually a necessity.  We get into routines and comfortable with applications’ functions, and I had an initial discomfort of learning a number of new apps, but later discovered their great value.

Here are eight apps that you should download and use when in China:

1. WeChat

WeChat is a free application that you will use every single day in China.  It is used for messaging, calling, and even has a social media aspect. It is akin to any other messaging app, with audio and messaging, built-in emojis, and group chat functionality.  I found WeChat to be extremely useful when I was in China, as I was to able to message my friends and even pay for items at stores or at street vendors through the app with QR code technology.  If you have a Chinese bank account, simply link your card to the app and you are ready to easily shop!

2. DiDi

DiDi is the Uber of China.  It is super convenient to order a ride if you do not want to take a taxi or there are no taxis around you.  I found that riding with DiDi was a little better than taxis, since taxis are metered and often more expensive.  The user interface is very similar to Uber, as you can also split rides with other users. Also be prepared to almost always speak to the driver on the phone, the driver will call you to ensure your location and pickup, so be prepared to speak Chinese!  You can alternatively message the driver through the app to ensure a proper pickup and even pay the driver in cash if you prefer to.

3. Ofo & Mobike

Both Ofo and Mobike are very convenient bicycle-sharing applications.  In China, I would walk on the sidewalk, find an Ofo or Mobike, scan the QR code with my phone, and then the bike unlocked and I was ready to ride!  Within the app, there are the fees for riding, but they are very cheap prices, most of the time around fifteen cents for each ride! Of course, you want to be cautious when riding bicycles especially in a foreign country.  In major cities, there are separate bike lanes in the street going in the same direction, but you have to always be cautious of other bikes, mopeds, and bicycles sharing the same lane.

4. Taobao

Taobao is the perfect application for all of your shopping needs.  You can practically find any item that you desire on Taobao, which is also a website.  I have used Taobao to purchase cheap clothing, shoes, and accessories in the past, and the items were shipped right to me!  You can easily have items shipped to any location in China, including your school or university shipping center. It is the best site in China for cheap, online shopping, and you can always find great deals.  However, this may not be the best idea for buying gifts for others, as it depends on what it is you are buying.

5. Ctrip

If you are planning on travelling within China, Ctrip is the application for your travel needs.  Through the app, I compared flight prices from one city to another and purchased my flight tickets.  Through Ctrip, you can also book bus tickets and even hotels. Ctrip is very convenient for purchasing your tickets, and they are usually the cheapest prices out there!

6. Amap

If you are looking for more local commuting routes and updates, consider Amap you Apple or Google Maps.  Well, in China you will most definitely need to find your way to your destination, and Amap is the perfect solution.  With basic functions just like Google maps, you will never get lost if you use this app. I used this app every day in China, as it is also great for providing locations, authentic reviews, and recommendations, in addition to directions.

7. Xiami

Want to listen to music in China?  Xiami is the best application for listening to music and watching music videos.  Think of it as Youtube, along with the functions of Spotify. I love this app because I was able to listen to my favorite English-speaking artists, but also discover new and amazing Chinese artists!

8. Pleco

When in China, you will want to practice your Mandarin.  Pleco is an amazing application for learning new Chinese words, with a focus on self-learning.  You can simply type in an English word, and learn the Chinese character, stroke order of the character, related words, and even sentences using the word!  Additional capabilities include being able to bookmark words you want to save for later, and a built-history that allows you to look back at previous words.  I found this app to be extremely helpful for a daily practice of Chinese and I could even translate from Chinese to English too!

I can say that with the usage of all these applications, my life in China became much easier.  In some ways, it was even easier than life in America, as I was fascinated by the widespread use of QR code technology.  I was amazed at how easier and faster it made daily activities, such as paying for items at checkout and grabbing an Ofo or Mobike.  

For me, there was not a huge adjustment to using these apps, since they all have equivalents that would be used in America for example.  To this day, I still use WeChat and Pleco in America. I love to keep in touch with my friends in China through WeChat and practice Mandarin even more with Pleco.  These are not all of the applications you will find yourself downloading in China, but these are eight essentials, making for an easy transition to life in China!

Interested in learning more about life in China? Check out my Five Customs You Should Know When in Public in China!

Four Gestures in China to Avoid

When in China, there are certain gestures in everyday life that can be misinterpreted.

You want to ensure that you are extra careful when communicating with your hands and your body so you don’t send the wrong message.  There are specific gestures that should be avoided while abroad to show respect to Chinese people and to best connect with them during your time in China.

These are four gestures in China to avoid:

If you use hand movements to express yourself, it can be viewed as being very dramatic and unusual.

1. Excessive Hand Movements

People in China tend to not use their hands a lot when speaking.  If you are a person who often uses your hands when speaking, you want to be extra careful when having a conversation.  When I first moved to China, I simply had to tone this down by keeping my hands closer to my body to not annoy or discomfort anyone.  

In China, one of the go-to gestures when taking photos is making a peace sign with your fingers.

2. Gestures With Certain Fingers

When you are taking photos with others, you generally do not want to put your arms around other people or touch others in any other way.  The solution to this is making cute gestures such as the peace sign, with one hand or even both.

I found myself constantly making the peace sign (facing outward) in photos, and later realized that I rarely done this gesture outside of China.  When taking photos with others, you want to be respectful and do not want to make any obscene hand gestures. Two gestures in particular to especially avoid is sticking up only your pinky finger and also sticking your pointer and middle fingers together in photos.

After you become friends, you can hug!

3. No Touchy Exchanges (At First)

You will discover that in China, people are not very touchy when it comes to interactions with others. Especially with strangers or meeting new people, you should not handshake, hug, kiss, or touch them in any way.  Instead slightly nodding your head is a perfect introduction.

The exceptions to this norm are within families and depending on the level of closeness with someone.  When I made some of my closest friends in China, we hugged each other by the end of my time in China before I left and it was fully acceptable.  

In public, it is best to not hum music or whistle any tunes because they are both seen as very vulgar gestures.

4. Don’t Ever Wink or Whistle

In China, the gestures of winking and whistling have very negative connotations.  They are aggressive in nature and there is a sexual meaning behind them so it’s best to avoid them.

When you are in China, you’ll want to make sure that you start your friendships and relationships on the right foot.  As you make China your home during your stay, you’ll want to be a great guest to see the best side of this beautiful country.

Curious to learn more about how to interact with other in China?  Check out Five Important Tips When Meeting People in China!