Day 14- 24 (July 2016)

Last day
Today was a very special day for us all as it was our last official day in Harbin and China. We have been on the most amazing adventure and have experienced the most incredible things. Most of all we have made new friends which I know will be friends for life.
First off our day started with a test, which we were all slightly nervous about even though everyone kept reassuring us that it would all be fine. Needless to say we had nothing to worry about and we all passed our YCT Mandarin test with flying colours yay!  
After this we had free time to practice and perfect our performances before the closing ceremony. We got together with our new friends and and practiced our cha cha slide piece for the ceremony, which went extremely well! 
Late afternoon we had the closing ceremony where all the Harbin teachers, organisers and our teachers did a speech. The volunteers had also put a slide show together showing lots of special moments in our trip. It was amazing to look back and remind ourselves of our time here.  
After the closing ceremony we had a little farewell party. Everyone participated in different performances, we all got up to sing and dance with the others. This night was very special for all of us because we all realised that we have made some incredible friends for life. We had a huge banquet (it filled the hall!) with so many yummy foods which even included some British classics which Alex B and Rosie loved (potato balls and garlic bread). 
We were first up performing our dance, it was fab ... So much fun. Mrs Hudson videoed us so we can show everyone when we get back. Alex did her solo next and everyone was so amazed by her skills. We think she's gotten used to all of us because she looked so shocked when everyone gasped and cheered. She got so much praise as we all did. After, everyone joined in dancing to some traditional Chinese party songs and we even did the Macarena! It was so much fun. We danced, sang and laughed together.  As the ceremony drew to a close everyone took loads of photos and gave lots of people hugs and love... there were even a few tears. It was such a special ending to a once in a life time trip none of us will forget. The Chinese helpers, volunteers have been amazing, the Chinese people are the most friendliest people I have ever met. We love everyone so much here it feels like our second home. We've made so many unforgettable memories together. 
We are so happy to hear aswell that people back home have enjoyed reading our blogs. We've loved writing them and sharing our stories to try and show you what we have experienced whilst we've been here. 
We are very grateful for this opportunity and would love to thank our parents and everyone else who made it possibly, especially Mrs Green, Mrs Phillips and Mrs Hudson. Thanks to Mrs Davies aswell for our travel journals which look incredible, we can't wait for you to see what we've done. 

This trip was life changing for all of us and I'm hoping we can meet our new friends again sometime. We are all so thankful and have loved every second of this trip. We will miss everyone.

Final goodbye from China ... see you all soon 

Written by Dannielle and Roxana