If you’re considering studying Chinese at somewhere like Nanjing University, this post is for you. I’ll be going through my experience here and what you can expect. This is written entirely in my limited perspective as a Chinese Language student, and is based on personal experiences or word of mouth as a student at the non-primary campus, Gulou.

About Nanjing University

Nanjing University (南京大学 or 南大 for short) is a famous and highly-regarded university in China. A brief look at the Wikipedia page shows that the university as an academic institution has been around since 258CE and established as its current form in 1902. Many famous people graduated from this university.

As for culture, it’s hard for me to understand what the Chinese population thinks about the university. However just by looking at the alumni, there are many famous people that graduated from the university.

As a Chinese College, compared to Western Colleges

In talking about NJU as a chinese college as compared to a college in say the United States or Germany, there are a few differences to get used to:

• Dorm life is much different – Chinese people usually stay 3-6 to a room. They leave their dorms to take showers in a shared shower area. You aren’t permitted to leave the dorm or enter the dorm “after hours.” Students are much more reliant on the canteen and rarely live off-campus. Dorms are typically segregated by sex, and I don’t think students can bring anyone else into their room. Read more about chinese dorms in NJU here.
• Studying is much more serious – Students are much more likely to spend a lot of time studying in the library and with their head buried in books. This is a famous component of chinese society and shouldn’t be too surprising.
• No “college parties” – Especially considering that there aren’t many off-campus students, there’s not many students that “let loose.”
• College Pride! – China is one of the hardest countries to advance academically in, and Nanjing University is one of the hardest colleges to get into. Therefore students feel a lot of pride to call NJU their school. I’ve heard from students that “you’re not a real student unless you know the school song.” There’s some cultural differences between dorms, and a common question between two students meeting for the first time is “What dorm are you in?”

Campuses

There’s two campuses, Gulou (鼓楼) and Xianlin (仙林). Gulou is the historic campus near the center of Nanjing, in between the old drum tower, the province capital building, and Xinjiekou (the main shopping area). This is where I’ve been studying! It’s very crowded, and my 10 minute walk to school involves nonverbal negotiations with cars, bikes, and scooters on narrow streets.

If you’re a Chinese-language student (learning chinese, not doing an undergraduate or graduate degree), you’ll be taking classes on this campus. While you’re somewhat removed from the core student body and the academic departments, you’re much closer to the action if you’re looking for internships, shopping, interesting food, tourism, etc. It’s much more of a “Chinese” experience since the surrounding area has been inhabited for hundreds of years and has many shops and houses packed in together. The Gulou area has a lot of expats doing other things (usually teaching english). Most of the students here are graduate students or research students, and many students at Xianlin campus aim to study in Gulou.

Xianlin was constructed on the east edge of Nanjing, and has been the “primary campus” since 2009. It’s a very modern campus with fantastic architecture. It’s very big, so people rely on shuttle services and sharebikes to get around. From the international student’s dorm to the subway station by the entrance of campus, it can take 20-30 minutes of walking! There’s many more student activities here since this is where most undergrads study and live. The area around it isn’t too developed, but there is a decent shopping area on the other side of the metro line from the university.

Classes

Typically you will have 3-4 types of classes, and will spend 20 hours a week in class. There is a list of extracurricular classes which you can optionally go to, as long as they don’t interfere with your normal classes.

The progression of classes is such, starting with no knowledge of Chinese and working up to reading complex Chinese texts: 基本 -> 初上 -> 初下 -> 中上 -> 中下 -> 高上 -> 高下 -> 文化. You can take a test at the beginning of the year and see what class you should take, but nothing is stopping you from taking whatever level you want. You can officially switch between classes for the first week or three.

Each level has 1-3 class sections with varying teachers and schedules, so you can choose which one you want to join depending on friends, prefered teachers, or extracurriculars. Classes are blocked off into blocks of two hours, either 8-10, 10-12, or 14-16, with some extracurriculars from 16-20. In the middle of classes there is a 10 minute break and a 20 minute break between classes. Most people on campus and around the city eat lunch from 12-14.

The format of the class depends on the class itself – They’re usually seperated into reading, writing, listening, speaking, and “synthesis” which includes all of the above plus grammar. Most classes have some sort of 听写, literally “listen-write” where a list of words is given to you to study the day before, and the teacher recites most of the words during class and you need to write the characters from memory. At higher levels there is more focus on presenting ideas.

Expat Culture in Gulou

There’s a huge variety of students from various countries. My first class had about 40% koreans, 10% japanese, 25% slavic/russian, 20% european, and 5% North or South American. I would guess that 50% of the students are korean, as there is a large korean population in Nanjing. You’ll find many foreigners around the Nanjing University area, especially on Hankou and Shanghai road.

Bars and Clubs

Most expats from western countries would consider going to clubs or bars a good time. There they can meet other expats, speak in their native language, and get drunk to the same pop music they’re used to in their home countries. There are a few places to do this. The first is “Talking” which is directly south of the main Gulou teaching building, Zeng Xianzi Lou. Tiger beer is 10元 before 2am (“happy hour”) for foreigners. There are tables outside and inside to sit people, but also about 6 bar seats if you want to talk to strangers.

Hellens on Hankou Road to the west of campus across from Bank of Nanjing, or Ellen’s on Guangzhou road to the south both have a table setup and no bar. West of Ellen’s on the corner of Shanghai and Guangzhou road is The Basement which has a bar, tables, a dance floor, pool, and live music. This is personally my favorite although beer is 2-3x more expensive than Talking.

The 1912 district southeast of campus is the “clubbing district” where people stay up all night to dance and drink. Ellen’s here is the main expat hangout, but the other clubs are lively.

However, my recommendation is not to get caught up in the expat party/club scene too much – You’re trying to learn chinese, right? I’m sure there’s plenty of places to drink with chinese people if you’re interested, but I wouldn’t know where. It should be of note anyways that if you’re looking to party and go clubbing, Nanjing isn’t really the place to do it – There’s much btter oppertunities in Shanghai.