Johanna Herman '07 - China
“Going to China was amazing; it opened my eyes to a totally new culture and made me want to get involved even more in international affairs”
Johanna grew up in Garden Grove , California with her parents and an older sister. She has always loved to read, and counts that as her greatest hobby. Learning about other cultures was a passion, and History and German were her most interesting courses. Very active in community service, she worked at a church during vacations, and took many trips to Arizona.
Johanna was very happy to enroll at Trinity, as she received a scholarship, and looked forward to living in Washington.
Having taken some East Asia classes at Trinity, she found this area particularly interesting, so when the opportunity arose for her to go abroad, she chose China , which was luckily one of the options. She was there from May 25 through June 9, and found that the area is becoming increasingly interesting because it is one of continuing change. This trip held great fascination for her, as she hopes for a future in the intelligence community and to do area studies in East Asia.
She describes her trip for us:
“This summer I was given the opportunity to travel to China for two weeks on a Mission of Diplomacy. I was so excited to be going because it was somewhere totally new and the country had always interested me. We were given the great opportunity to hear from some important people that make up Chinese government. We got to listen to what the Chinese agenda is on world politics and to interact with students our own age in the Beijing University . On top of that we had the wonderful opportunity to see the many wonders that make up Chinese history. The Great Wall of China was amazing, as was the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace . The culture of these people dates back centuries and it was simply amazing to be able to see all that and more during my trip.
I was nervous going into the entire experience because China was so far away and I thought it would be so different than what I am used to here. But it was a wonderful place and I had a wonderful experience. I got the impression that the Chinese people are just like us. We were only in their large cities and those were very Western. But of course you could see Chinese culture everywhere. I loved the amazing food we got to eat everyday and I loved being able to go out on our own and explore the cities for ourselves. I was impressed by the way that the Chinese people live their lives and try to shape themselves into a more modern country. It was a wonderful experience and I am glad that I was able to attend. It also gave me the desire to study more about China and to go deeper into its politics and where it stands on the world stage.”