Both Harrow Beijing and The British School of Nanjing were back in Anhui province for their second year in a row for The Hutong Education’s Enlightened Rebels program. The beautiful Dabeilou Monastery provided the perfect jumping off spot for numerous activities. Upon their arrival at the lake house, students and teachers were greeted by their hosts for the program, Ameng and Dawei, who showed them the grounds, and highlighted the features of the lake house.  After settling in in their sleeping quarters and setting up their sleeping bags, students and teachers feasted on a delicious barbeque, complete with lamb, chicken, and vegetables prepared by their hosts.

Both programs included an epic hike up the backside of majestic Jiuhuashan.  The six-hour hike was a feat of physical and mental endurance and students supported each other along the way singing songs.  Other hikes were also highlights of the program.  These included two water facilities walks through the stunning bamboo forests surrounding the Dabeilou Monastery.  Students were able to explore the water system that brings the fresh spring water from the mountain down to the monastery as well as the filtration system that purifies the water, providing pure and clean drinking water for the Monastery and it’s guests.

Students were able to spend an afternoon immersed in the vibrant tea culture that is ever present in Anhui as they picked the local organic tea cultivated at Dabeilou.  They then watched the way in which tea is processed traditionally and had a chance to try their own hand at roasting tea the traditional way. Our expert guide to the tea roasting process, Dawei, has years of experience under his belt when it comes to tea processing, and students quickly found out roasting tea is much more difficult than it looks!  After roasting tea, students then participated in The Hutong’s Tea Jeopardy, where they had the opportunity to test their knowledge of tea culture.  Students surprised themselves and their classmates with their own extensive knowledge of tea history and culture!  Program leader Joe also led the students in a tea marketing activity.  In teams of four students were tasked with creating their own tea combinations and working to market the tea to their teachers and fellow students.  At the end of the session, students were also given time to decorate a tea label to label the green tea that they picked the previous day to take home as a souvenir of the trip.

In the mornings, everyone was up early for yoga practice and out for breakfast on the front lawn to fuel up for the morning activities, which included trips across the lake by boat to scour the shores for ancient pottery, a sketching activity around the lake house, and an activity that had students examining the many uses of bamboo.

Anhui’s capital of Hefei was the location of two exceptional learning experiences on the Harrow program: one at a local school exchange and another at a water testing activity with the environmental NGO Green Anhui.  At the local school exchange, Harrow students conducted short classes for their Hefei peers on topics relating to environmental sustainability. Both groups of students had a great time working together to create posters advocating for water conservation in Hefei. While working with Green Anhui, student visited a local lake and took water samples to determine which pollutants may be contaminating the water in the area.  Given the extensive construction taking place in the vicinity of the lake, students were able to see first hand the effects that rapid urbanization is having on the environment in Hefei.

The Hutong Education loves exposing student groups to Anhui and we look forward to more great programs in the coming year.