TV: Inside China

One of the first things I do when I get to a hotel after a long trip is to relax a little. For my trip to Spain, I found it difficult to jump right into the sightseeing after I had just spent 20 hours traveling, so I watched some TV in my hotel room. The problem? There wasn't much television programming in English, save for the BBC World channel. While this was mostly just news, they also had some documentaries, one of which was "Inside China."

The series covers elements of everyday Chinese life that might be unknown to the average person outside the country. I saw the episode concerning the Chinese school system, and the various pressures that students go through when they take their exams. Particularly interesting was the sheer amount of study needed to perform well on college entrance exams; if you thought SAT preparation was stressful, wait till you see the mindbending 16+ hours of study a day required to get into the top colleges in China.