此文作者于本科阶段交流到纽卡斯尔大学，之后升读爱丁堡大学管理专业，毕业后留进入Pampers工作，负责中国市场的开拓。在英国学习期间曾经以实习生的身份进入英国保守党工作，帮助保守党党魁（现任首相）卡梅伦主持会议工作并得到极大的赞扬。
I’ve been living in the UK for a good five years now. I first came here in 2005 as an exchange student studying English Literature in Newcastle university and moved to Scotland to do my Master’s degree in Management at University of Edinburgh and then worked as a consultant in FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) industry ever since graduation.
我已经在英国度过非常愉快的5年了，这几年的留学生活让我对自己也对这个国家有了更深入的了解。我最初是在2005年以交换生的身份来到这个国家的，当时我在纽卡斯尔大学修读英国文学。接着我便搬到了苏格兰，在那里的爱丁堡大学攻读管理硕士学位。毕业之后我就一直在快速消费品行业做咨询工作。
I’m not a very good narrator of my life and rarely do so since exciting things happen every day. To record and recall every single incident seems almost impossible. So I decided, instead of being a narcissist and giving you a full account of my life story, I’m just going to give you some taste of the following aspects of UK life that you almost certainly will encounter at some point of your life abroad. I will also give you some of my thoughts and how I interact with these things. But that’s my opinion and you are free to make your own as after all you are your own mater!
我并不十分擅长记录我的生活，我也极少这么做，毕竟每天总有有趣的事情发生。把每一件事情都记录下来并重温，看起来几乎不可能。因此我决定概括性地向你们描述一下我的生活故事，而不是全部都仔细地一一道出。我会向你们介绍以下关于英国生活的几个方面，而这些都是你们在国外生活中都会遇到的。我还会提到我的一些想法以及如何处理对待这些事情。当然这仅仅是我的个人观点，你也可以有自己的想法，毕竟你才是自己真正的主人！
Drinking
UK Student social life (and in many occasions of a person’s adult life) will involve some degree of alcohol. When I first arrived here years ago, I found it one of the greatest cultural shocks as I’m a person enjoying social life but not too much drinking. That is probably the case for some other Chinese students. The best thing to do from my experience is probably do go out with your mates if they invite you for a pint, but stick to non-alcohol drinks if you don’t fancy any alcohol.Never feel pressurised to drink and if you do drink, be sensible and know your limits. The balance here is to understand people here like to socialise in cafés/pubs/clubs over a drink (which can include coffee), just like we Chinese like to do that over a meal. Going out for a drink with your classmates is often the best way to get to know people and find friends as people tend to feel more relaxed and less shy and therefore become friendly towards you in such environment.
饮酒
英国学生的社交生活（以及作为一个成年人会遇到的许多场合）都会或多或少地接触到酒精的。虽然我是外向的人，但我并不怎么喜欢喝酒。因此，当几年前我初次来到这里的时候，这对我来说便是最大的文化冲击之一。估计很多中国学生都遇到过同样的情况。我个人觉得最美妙的事情就是在你朋友的邀请之下一起出去喝两杯。如果你实在不能碰酒精，那就选择无酒精饮料，不需要为此感到太大压力。如果你能喝酒，那么就要注意控制和清楚自己的酒量。要知道这里的人们喜欢通过去咖啡馆，酒吧或者会所喝点东西（咖啡也包括在内）的方式互相认识和联络感情，相当于我们中国人喜欢一起出去吃饭一样。和你的同学一起出去喝两杯是结识新朋友的最好途径，因为在那种氛围下，大家都不会很拘束而是比较放得开，人们也会对你更加友好了。
How to improve the English
While many may take for granted that you will be improving your English whilst living abroad, the bleak fact is many of people don’t. If you have decided to study abroad and probably want to improve English then do try to be a bit more sociable and make an effort to have some English conversations. We Chinese have the habit of sticking together especially living abroad, probably because we feel more at home and feel the whole experience less daunting when we do things collectively instead of alone. While in general this is good, it can be a major obstacle when it comes toimprove your language skills because you don’t need to speak English if you only deal with Chinese. Some Chinese students I met here rarely speak English and many secretly confessed that their English have not really been improved after studying abroad. So sometimes you will have to be brave enough to step out of the comfort zone of being accompanies by your Chinese friends and ready to make friends with local students or people from other countries. Let’s face it. You are not going to improve your English if you do not try to do so!
如何提高英语水平？
很多人都理所当然地认为，你在外国生活自然而然英语水平便会提高。但是残酷的事实是很多人都并非如此。如果你已经决定到国外学习并且希望提高英语水平，那么我建议你尽量多交际并且使用英语与人交谈。我们中国人总是习惯粘在一起，特别是在国外生活的时候。也许这样会让我们觉得比较安心，一起行动的时候总比单独行事要来得大胆些。虽然一般来说这倒无可厚非，但它却会成为你提高英语水平的主要障碍。因为如果你只跟中国人交往，那你根本就不需要讲英语。我在这里所认识的一些中国学生里面，有些人几乎不讲英语，暗地里他们都会承认在外国学习之后他们的英语并没有真正得到提高。有时候你必须鼓起勇气，踏出中国朋友陪伴左右的舒适圈去与当地的学生和来自其他国家的人交往。勇敢地去面对吧，不这么做你的英语水平是无法得到提高的。
Job
Finding a graduate job here is never easy for people from non-EU countries and more so now that the job market is still dire and immigrant policy has been further tightened.If some of you are thinking of having a bit of working experience in this country after graduation, you have to be really determined to do this and give yourself a deadline. Check if you meet the following criteria (I’m not saying you are definitely not going to get job if you lack any of the following, but your chance will be extremely slim if I’m being honest). First, you need to get a really good result for your degree:2:1 will be the threshold requirement, preferably a first. And then you will need to have a very good degree of English because bear in mind you are competing job with British students at the same time. Students in IT, engineering degree may find it easier to get a job than students in humanity and business degree since talents in the former subjects are more likely to be sought after. Those have previous working experience in China are more likely to find a job than people have never worked before. Do try to volunteer if you can to get some hands-on experience and get involved in societies in the university give you are good grounding for various skills. Finally keep trying! You are unlikely to get your dream job straightaway but don’t give up if are determined to do so.
工作
对于那些非欧洲国家的人来说，毕业之后在这里找一份工作从来就不是一件易事。人才市场的激烈竞争和移民政策的收紧让找工作难上加难。如果你们有些人打算毕业之后在这个国家工作积累一些工作经验，那么你得真正下定决心并给自己制定一个最后期限。检查一下你是否符合以下几点：（我并不是说你若是缺乏其中某一点就肯定找不到工作，但是老实说这样子的话你找到工作的机率就会微乎其微。）首先，你必须拿到很好的学位成绩，二级一等荣誉学位是最低要求，最好是一级荣誉学位。其次，你的英语技能必须很好。要知道，那些在跟你抢饭碗的人里面，还有英国学生。计算机、工程专业的学生通常要比人文、商科专业的学生更容易找到工作，因为人才市场对前者的需求更大。那些之前在中国工作过的学生要比没任何工作经验的学生更容易找到工作。只要情况允许，你可以自愿参加一些工作积累实际工作经验，学校的社团活动亦能为你发展多方面的技能提供很好的平台。最后，就是不断地去尝试！也许你无法一下子就找到理想的工作，但是如果你已经下定决心，那么就不要轻言放弃。
Travel
While you are living in the UK, you should make the best out of it by doing some travels either within UK or in the continent Europe if you can afford so. One of my most fond experiences of living in this country is it enables me to travel so easily and often cheaply (budget airlines & advance planning) to places I’d never dreamed of going. So far I’ve been to almost 20 countries in the Europe and numerous locations in each country. It’s probably unlikely you will be travelling as many as I did if you are only here as a student (since I also travel a lot for my work), but you will certainly be able to do some trips whilst here. Needless to say, travel is great way to open your mind, see and experience different cultures and people. The more you travel the more you will want to see the world. It also gives you a fresh perspective of how you view your life and want to live your life as well as give you a good degree of motivation to develop yourself and the world. So I’d say while you are here, forget about online chatting, games, dvds (you don’t need to go abroad to do all these things), go out and see!
Even you cannot travel to other locations, the place you are living probably offer so much more than you actually know. Do pay attention to your local areas and vicinity, there are plenty brilliant art galleries， museums (and most of them are free) for you to explore. Many locations in Britain also offer great walking routes if you fancy a bit of trekking when it’s not raining (or even if it rains a little bit).
So I guess the catchword for living abroad is ‘experience’ and yours will probably be a bit different from mine, but do enjoy your experience as for most of us it’s probably only once in a life time, after which most of you will go back to China: find a job, get married, have children etc, but hopefully your year (s) at the other side of the world will provide you with great strength and inspiration for all other splendid things to come in our life!
旅游
当你在英国生活的时候，只要你负担得起，你就应该最大限度地利用这个机会在英国境内或者到欧洲大陆上到处走走。我在这个国家生活最美妙的体验之一就是它让我可以方便又经济（廉价机票和提前计划）地到一些我之前都没想到过的地方旅行。到目前为止，我已经差不多去过欧洲的20个国家以及这些国家里面很多地方旅游。如果你只是在这里读书，那么你就未必会像我这样经常旅行（因为我经常因公出差），但是在这里你肯定或多或少都有机会旅行。众所周知，旅行可以很好地开拓你的视野，让你看到和经历不同的文化和人。旅行得越多，你就会越渴望去认识这个世界。它还可以让你重新审视自己的生活和思考你想要过的生活，并且会很大程度地激励你去发展自我和世界。因此我会说，当你在这里的生活，把网聊、游戏和电影都统统抛到一边（你不需要大老远跑来这里做这些事情），走出去看看这个世界！
即便你无法到别处旅行，你居住的地方一样可以带来很多你意识不到的惊喜。留意你居住的地方和周围，你会发现有很多艺术馆和博物馆（大部分都是免费）等着你去探索。如果在不下雨（或者有点毛毛雨）的时候你想徒步旅行一下，英国很多地方都是徒步旅行的好去处。
我认为国外生活的关键词就是“体验”，也许你我各自的感受会有所不同。但是请一定要好好地感受你这段经历，因为这对我们很多人来说一生中只有一次。在这之后我们当中的大部分人都会回到中国，然后成家立业养家糊口。但是我仍希望这些年来在地球另一端的生活经历可以带来强大的力量和灵感让我们去创造生命中更多的辉煌！
