Anita Suen, a Political Science major with a concentration in International Relations and a minor in Chinese Studies, is spending her senior year studying abroad in China at Beijing Normal University during the summer and at Peking University during the academic year. She is a Chinese-American who grew up in San Francisco speaking both Cantonese and English. During her year abroad she will primarily be advancing her Mandarin language skills with hopes of becoming fluent, exploring her Chinese roots, and learning about Chinese society, economics, and politics. During her summer program the EAP office in Beijing organized a field trip to Shandong, the province directly south of Beijing, where she spent four days visiting Jinan, the capital, Tai’an, the city at the base of the Taishan Mountain which she climbed, and Qufu, the home of Confucius. In addition to her studies, Anita has kept up an ambitious travel program, visiting Mutianyu, Xi’an, Chengdu, Jiuzhaigou, and Shanghai. She wrote us an e-mail on the overnight train to Hohhot, Inner Mongolia where she was going to spend a few days in the grasslands and the Gobi Desert, experience sleeping in a yurt, herding sheep, and riding horses and camels. It was a ten-hour ride in an overcrowded train on the way there and the same on the way back with only standing room tickets available. “But, things can always be worse,” Anita wrote, “and it will be a memorable learning experience, and I’m very excited for Inner Mongolia, which was at the top of my list of places to visit in China.”