Schools of the Department of Education and Trainning, Sydney Region went on a performance trip to Shanghai , China on 2010.09.22. The delegation was formed by 234 students and staff, and it was the most significant student cultural exchange project ever between Australia and China.

EXPO was undoubtedly the highlight of the trip, the big group visited the Australian Pavilion on 23rd of September. Boys and girls yelled "Aussie Aussie Aussie" when entering the venue while pride and honor was floating in the air.

George River College students and their not-so-typical principal Mr Seretis squeezing smiles.

While 70% of delegation members were girls, boys were surely becoming rarity.

To the visitors from down under, queueing 3-4 hours was surely unexpected and beyond imagination, but that made it the unforgetable part of the trip too.

We had 3 performances in Shanghai within the week, 2 smalls and a major - exchange performance with Huangpu district students at Huangpu Youth Centre on 24th, Sister school exchange performance at Huangpu schools on 25th morning, and a grand performance gala at Pudong Oriental Art Centre on 25th evening.

Photo of my personal favorite performance item of Sydney Region - Gamaranda (Drama), presented by Newtown School of Performance Arts. Art Director Ned Manning is a very nice guy who has huge confidence and passion in his students.

Fort Street School chior has won many awards in Australia in the past years and performed in Sydney Opera House. Conductor Mrs Renee Scott is a vegetarian with easygoing charactors.

Incredibly considering teachers, I am so impressed by their connection with students, they are as patient as parents and as understanding as your mates. Left to right:Kipi, Jacqueline, Brett and Ned.

Properly catering 200+ kids was quite a task since the demands were overwhelmingly picky, let along vegan, lactose intolerance, nuts allergy, I have had students asking not to have fairy tomatos and the fry pans must not be in contact with any kind of nut product before.

Lucky to have kind and humorous leaders, Mrs Anne Millard, Director of School Promotions and Mr Rod Megahey, Director of School Education, DET, Sydney Region.

And that is me. The SR performance trip in Shanghai was surely memorable, it was exciting and breath taking, or as Rod said - it is surely an epic tour. As a blessing, I personally experienced another memorable journey while I was given a few days‘ break after the project, the story was so complicated as it was experiencing heart warming and breaking at the same time, but I will take it as a blessing and cherish it deeply forever.