Pizza Hut & Tsingtao

Yesterday afternoon we carried on designing sets for S/S 13. The boss came round at the end of the day to look at our work. He thinks that we should design jackets first and design everything else around that. He looked at my jackets and said he liked one with a sea horse print. He then looked at Katie's work and seemed happy. We were told to look at the books for inspiration for print design. I explained that I had designed my own, he didn't seem to understand and pretty much said people won't buy unless its copied. He later retracted what he said about my work and said the jacket was too simple. The chinese don't seem to be open about new ideas and don't understand that simple is often more. From talking to the other girls at their placements and from watching the students they are taught to copy other people's work and alter them slightly and this seems to be apparent in the industry here too. They are finishing their A/W collection at the moment and seem very busy and I think they will have more time for us next week and are taking us out to the fabric and trims markets, so hopefully it will become more clear next week.

After placement last night we went to Pizza Hut near Miss Guo's home. I was so excited and happy to see that the pizza's were real, unlike what we'd experienced previously, as most food seems to be fake over here. We had a few beers and walked home. Me and Kate were very tired and went to bed straight away. Despite going to bed early, I had very little sleep. The beds are ridiculously hard, might as well be led on the floor with a quilt, and we woke up in the night to the sound of screeching cats in the street. It was son morning and time to back for our trip back to Ningbo later that evening.

Having had time to settle in, I feel quite bad on feeling so uncomfortable in the house. It isn't that bad really, just was first a shock to see poor David locked up. Although we think this could just be whilst his owners are at work and whilst we stay. Miss Guo is very cute and is always asking us to speak in English to her. She is trying very hard to learn and is very welcoming in letting us stay in her home.

Just arrived for my 3rd day at placement so best get to work....