By Shelby Stewart
Staff Writer
Most students might be fearing the SAT on March 9, but foreign exchange student Dun Hu is looking forward to it.
“In China, there is a lot [that is] different,” said Hu. “We have to live at school, Monday through Friday, and study eight classes every day. The classes [here] are easier too.”
Hu comes from Shenzhen, which is a large city in the Guangdong Province in southern China. The city has over 10 million residents.
“I live with my mom,” said Hu. “My mom and dad are separated.”
Hu, 17, is an only child, and is hoping to attend college in the states after high school.
“I’ll go to community college in America. In China, we don’t have community college,” he said. “I want to study about history, but I don’t know what I can do with that.”
Hu said his favorite part of America is the culture, which is different from where he lives in China. He spent Christmas with his host family, Ortonville Village President Tonja Brice, and found going and getting a Christmas tree to be his favorite experience, since he doesn’t celebrate the
holiday back home.
“I like the presents, and the meal on Christmas morning,” he said. “And I like the snow, but it is very cold.”
He also said that back home, he communicates with his family a lot more, and most time is spent together as opposed to in their own rooms at home.
“Sometimes we go out of the house and hang out with each other, but most of the time we stay inside,” he said.
Another large difference Hu noticed is that there is less convenience here in Ortonville as opposed to Shenzen.
“If I want to buy something, I have to ride a bike to the store,” he said. He did notice that there was one significant advantage to the countryside however.
“The air, this countryside area is nice,” he said. “I like it here. In China, my nose is stuffy, I have problems with my nose, but in this place it’s not. It used to be a lot of [pollution], especially in Beijing. I’ve been there twice and it was very terrible, but it’s become better now.”