End of semester exams and winter holiday travelling

I still need to write a post on spending new year in Hong Kong but as soon as I got back to Xiamen on 3rd January I was busy catching up on lessons I'd missed and preparing for my end of semester exams. Exams started on Monday this week and finished on Wednesday. I also had to do a performance for my 唱歌学汉语（Learning Chinese through Song) module which I didn't find out about until that day! Exams went ok apart from a not so good 口语 (oral) exam and I passed all of my modules. The pass mark in China is 60% which is a bit of a difference from 40% in the UK! On Wednesday night we had a last night out together as a way of celebrating exams and end of semester. Some people are leaving as they were only here for one semester so there will be new people when we go back. 

The majority of those who are staying are spending the month-long holiday travelling either in China or southern Asia. We were advised by teachers and Chinese friends not to stay in China over the holiday as lots of Chinese people are travelling at that time to be at home with their families and many shops and restaurants close over the period. However, some people are planning to stay in China to travel to Harbin for the ice festival, Beijing, Xi'an, Shanghai and Chengdu as these cities are a long way away from Xiamen so difficult to get to during term time. 

From the warnings it seemed to me that a better option was to get out of China for a bit and go to other countries in Asia. I had originally hoped to go to Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand but realised that that was a bit too much considering the time we have. My current plan is to go to Vietnam for almost three weeks with Alex and meet Chloe, a friend studying at Nanjing University, in Hanoi which is our first stop there. We plan to travel our way down the coast, stopping at cities along the way, to Ho Chi Minh where I will be for my 21st birthday. From there Alex will fly back to Xiamen as he is going home to Dubai and Chloe and I will fly to Chiang Mai in Thailand where we will spend some time before leaving the country and going back to China from Bangkok. I will have a day and a half in Xiamen before flying off again as I'm going to my cousin's wedding in Kathmandu, Nepal, for a week in February where I will see my family for the first time since September. Finally, my family and I will go to Xiamen so that I can start next semester and they can spend another week with me. 

I'm writing this in Hong Kong airport as we have a 6-hour stopover which isn't enough time to leave and go into Hong Kong so my journey's already started! Hong Kong airport has free WiFi which is great for keeping us amused during the long wait. Our flight from Xiamen left at 8:30am so we've been up since 5am having got to sleep at about 1am. We got up late after going out on Wednesday night so couldn't sleep! It's already been and will continue to be a long day... but hopefully worth it!