Official blog of Liuzhou's biggest social meetup and language exchange; our aim is to bring together the local and foreign communities in the city. We get together every Sunday evening to chat, practice different languages, have a drink and make new friends. We also organise regular special events.
If you're interested in attending, please get in touch and we'll give you the details you need to join in. Email: guangxier@gmail.com
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帆船 - Sailing
One of the great things about Liuzhou Meet & Learn is the variety of people that get involved; not just in terms of nationality (though we have members from nearly 20 different countries) but in terms of people's backgrounds, employment and interests. One of our members is a sailing fanatic and president of the local sailing club, allowing us the opportunity to go sailing on the 柳江 Liujiang river as it winds it's way through Liuzhou.
Following a late decision to get out on the water, due to an earlier thunderstorm, we made our way to the riverside at 3:30pm. Though the rain had moved on, the high winds remained and, coupled with decent cloud cover, made for perfect sailing conditions.
This being China, where they aren't huge on health and safety, we got just two pieces of advice before setting off: 1) the boat can't capsize, so don't worry; 2) keep your head lower than the bottom of the sail. Right, off we go!
All in all, it was a fantastic afternoon with the high winds making for great sailing and really high speeds. It's a real privilege to be able to do activities such as this and we're lucky to have members with such great connections! If you fancy joining in future activities, email us and we'll let you know how to get involved.
Whilst Brits tend towards pubs and bars for their evening socialising, the locals in Liuzhou go to the 烧烤 BBQ to chat and drink late into the night. These restaurants are on roadsides throughout the city and, given the great weather in summer here, provide the best opportunity for some al fresco dining with Chinese characteristics. By all means go to the BBQ for your main meal but many locals, after having dinner at home or elsewhere, descend on these restaurants for 宵夜, which roughly translates as a "midnight snack". Sitting outside on benches or yellow plastic chairs, you'll see dozens of tables packed with people eating 烤鱼 BBQ fish, 串 skewers of meat and veg, 炒米粉 fried rice noodles and other specialities. As well as the regular BBQ stalls, there are also some speciality places, including our favourite Mongolian style restaurant which serves up the most amazing lamb legs and ribs. Sitting in 30 degree heat at 11pm, eating amazing food, drinking cold, cheap, wate...
Everyone loves KTV. Everyone. If you don't like sitting in a dark, enclosed space, listening to your friends murdering classic mandopop hits at ear splitting volume, there has to be something wrong with you. I've heard people ask what the point of learning to read Chinese is, what with the use of pinyin as a phonetic system, and the ability to use your phone to translate text. The answer is obvious: if you can't read characters, how will you sing Chinese songs at KTV? In China, and across Asia, KTV culture is huge and, if you want to engage with life here, learning to sing a couple of songs in the local language will get you a lot of kudos. At Liuzhou Meet & Learn, we organise regular KTV evenings, and I'm always surprised by how good people are at singing, particularly our local Chinese members - unfortunately, us foreigners don't always hold up our end of the bargain and I've witnessed some performances that made my ears bleed. I admit to bei...
Famous for being the busiest travel week of the year, when foreign residents who've spent any period of time in China will tell you to stay at home to avoid the crowds, 国庆节 National Day, or 黄金周 Golden Week, is a public holiday where seemingly the entire country leaves their villages and crowds into the cities and popular travel destinations. I experienced the holiday last year and, as such, decided to stay in Liuzhou this time, to avoid (not entirely successfully) being jostled and gawped at by tens of thousands of farmers. Besides, one of our members at Liuzhou Meet & Learn has some connections within the local tourism department and wanted some foreign volunteers to be taken around the city to attend the various events taking place. So, four members from our group set off to be photographed doing everything from walking around, to eating noodles, to being force fed tea by members of the local ethnic minority groups. One thing that is so seductive about living in a sm...
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