Even after a visa has been granted, entering China safely, going through security at the airport and registering at the police station, you're still not sure whether you can actually stay in the country or not. In order to obtain a residence permit for the country, a physical examination is needed. Today was the day to get myself checked in the hospital.

The first night in my new apartment I slept like a baby. I was exhausted from the trip, time change and new impressions. At 7:15 I had to get up though, I needed to go to the city to get my physical examination done. A student from here picked me up and we went together by bus to the city and the hospital. It was a one-and-a-half hour ride by bus to get there. The city of Jinan is pretty far away from the campus. Luckily it is cheap to travel by bus here, just 3 Yuan per trip, which is about 40 eurocents. That's not like 3.2 euros in Finland or 3.7 euros in The Netherlands.

In the hospital I got a kind of checklist with seven different tests that I had to take. For example an E.C.G., X-ray, blood test and so on. For every test I had to see a different doctor. Not all of them spoke English but luckily I had my Chinese translator with me. It didn't take very long to collect the signatures and complete the test. In three days I'll know whether I can actually stay in China or not.

On the way back we stopped for some food near the campus. It was a small Chinese restaurant which was mainly occupied by students. My 'student tutor' (I don't really remember his name) took me there and ordered rice with chicken for us. The way that the food is served and how it's being eaten is a bit different than in Europe.

The rice got served in a bowl and the chicken, together with some vegetables, came in a so called 'hotpot'. Like the name implies, this is a sort of bowl which is heated up. The oil in it is still boiling while it's served. The chicken was prepared in a different way than I am used to. It looked like the chicken as a whole was put into some machine which cut it into several pieces. Because almost every piece had some bone in it and some also still had the skin on. It was a bit strange to see.

The way of eating was rather interesting. Of course chopsticks are used to eat and that was a bit tricky in the beginning, but I'm sure I'll get better during the year. When eating you basically take a piece of chopped chicken, some piece of vegetable and eat it together with the rice. Oh and before that, it's recommended to put some of the oil and sauce that the chicken comes in with onto the rice so that it gets some taste. While eating, there are still bones in the chicken, but that's not a problem. It is common to just spit it out on the table and continue eating. To be honest I think it'll something I'll get accustomed to pretty quickly.

Unfortunately I was too hungry and forgot to take a photo, so this photo is from yesterday's dinner. The struggle with the chopsticks was still the same though.

The rest of the day I was just lazy or tired. I actually thought that I didn't really have any jetlag, but when I came home I feel asleep and slept for about six hours. I woke up again at 8 p.m. and felt a bit better. Still I have a strange feeling which I've never had before. Hopefully it'll be better tomorrow morning.