(Fire alarm sounding)
Beryl’s first chat with her Pakistani roommate was unluckily drowned by the dissonant scream of the alarm. She hurried to get out even without taking her overcoat.
It was her second time to experience the smoke alarm. Three days ago, the first day Beryl moved into the flat, she encountered a drill. However, she was frightened by the sudden shrill sound again.
A few minutes earlier, students in the flats were cooking their meals. All of a sudden, they gathered in front of the building, calmly talking to each other.
Beryl recovered from the shock quickly and joined in their talk.
Accommodation
After the alarm went off, people walked into Beech Court again. The roar of the crowd stilled.
Beryl and her roommate Apricot went back to the kitchen in their suite. The fried potatoes on the table were cooling down.
Most Chinese students are obsessed with complicated and delicate Chinese dishes / For most Chinese students, it’s important to have complicated and delicate Chinese…: tomatoes scrambled eggs, broccoli fried with carrots… However, the Chinese food needs a big fire of the stove with the “smoke” that comes with it, which means that Beryl needs to be extremely careful about fire safety issues.
Beryl poured the eggs into the hot oil/into the pan after switching on the stove and turning the heat up. With the sizzling sound and the rising smoke, Beryl began to worry about the smoke alarm and immediately opened all the windows in the kitchen. The scent of the food quickly filled in the entire flat, which successfully attracted the Pakistani roommate who came to the kitchen for a glass of water. Beryl invited the roommate to have a taste.
“It is delicious!”, he replied surprisingly.
After their “unquiet” delayed meal, Apricot realised that she had left her room card in her room. The sudden alarm was so loud, jarring, and frightening that she totally forgot to take the room card with her. Without it, she couldn’t even enter her flat, neither the suite, nor her room – she was locked out.
Although she understood that such a strict access control system can guarantee the safety of students, she felt a little upset. She had to go back to the reception desk and get a replacement card for her.
Clubs
Almost lost in Cottrell, Angel and her classmates struggled for a couple of minutes to arrive to the room on the 4th floor of B-Corridor where “Give It A Go” by Air TV was located.
To be honest, Angel was surprised when she was told everyone here had to make a video clip in the following one hour in groups. She was a little stressed. According to her previous experience of the similar clubs in Nanjing University, Air TV staff might just introduce their previous works. However, they went into practice so quickly, which totally went beyond her wildest expectations.
The clip to make was an imitation based on the film Matilda.
Everything was well-organised. After actively discussing the video theme, a girl with black curly hair started to draw shooting scripts. Boys racked their brains to make the scene of eating vivid enough. Everybody gave a big applause to a tall boy in red who acted quite excellently by stuffing five chocolate cakes into his mouth. Angel helped with the camera. Each did his or her own part and was completely engaged in, not checking their mobile phone messages even once.
Here in Air TV, everyone can be a director, scriptwriter, photographer and actor. Students didn’t know each other at the beginning, but they talked about the movie enthusiastically. Through the videos which they have uploaded to YouTube in the past, the most intuitive feeling was happiness.
Even though some of their works were not very elaborate, they enjoyed the process of turning their ideas into reality. Everything can be put into a video and each fantastic idea is worth a try.
Culture
UK is a country offering a subtle blend of traditional and modern elements.
The traditional habits can always be seen in daily life. Autumn is a rainy season in Stirling, which means umbrellas should be taken along everywhere according to us. However, few in the campus use umbrellas or wear raincoats. Usually, they walk quickly, or just enjoy the rain at ease. Besides, we surprisingly catch sight of many teachers wearing suits and ties in class who look polite and gentle.
Ancient architectures make University of Stirling cool, while some modern elements make people feel warm. For example, facilities for disabled people can be found nearly everywhere – there is a button on the wall for wheelchair users to open the automatic door; in front of Pathfoot building, there is also a special downhill passage for the disabled. For the convenience of students, University of Stirling has the bus “University Link” for specialized downtown travel. Domestic different, the bus is not crowded and every student who gets on and off the bus will greet the driver politely.
The British coins with different face values have similar and confusing shapes. But they don’t drive us crazy as we thought. Whenever we look for change at the front of the long queue in the supermarket, the clerk’s “Take it easy” will always comfort us. All the similar wonderful experiences surprise us with delight.
Whether it is ancient or modern, we have really experienced the true meaning of “be the difference” in us Chinese girls’ “adventures”. Amazing customs in the multi-faceted school lead us to learn more about Scotland and understand the culture of Stirling.
Written by students from Nanjing University