1 Tsinghua University: China's MIT

Tsinghua University, where I’m studying, is often described as China’s MIT. One of China’s oldest universities, it was dedicated to science and engineering during the restructuring of education that took place after the People’s Republic of China took power.

After a second reform, its humanities departments were restored, although it is still known as an elite science school. The Chinese students, many of whom speak a bit of English, were not only brilliant but incredibly friendly. Getting to know them made living on campus fun and rewarding. This picture is of one of the foreign students’ dormitories, where I live.

The school is very large and hosts students from all over the world. Consequently, a large blonde woman in a Boston Red Sox baseball cap tooling around on a bicycle isn’t an unusual sight, and people don’t stare at me as much as they do on the streets of Beijing.