There are three main reasons I have chosen Yunnan University to do language study.

First, I have a keen interest in the cultural richness of Yunnan Province. This variety is greatly manifest in Kunming. As an aspiring future anthropologist who wishes to work on Yunnan, I want to have more first-hand exposure with the linguistic and cultural context of the province. There is no better way to do that than study Mandarin Chinese in Yunnan's best university.

Second, I have already been to Kunming before, in the summer of 2014, and I instantly fell in love with the city. This brief visit made me want to return and spend a longer time there.

Finally, Yunnan Province and Yunnan University, in particular, hosts great anthropologists that I am very interested to meet.

Equipped with a good knowledge of Mandarin Chinese and having had a great experience in my future fieldwork location, I hope to start my PhD in social anthropology with a focus on China in the autumn of 2017.