PETALING JAYA: Students Esther Teh and Edwin Koh do not speak fluent Mandarin. Today, however, they will lead 34 other students of Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) to the land of their grandparents.

The 12-day trip to China is the university's first overseas educational tour, which will include visits to three universities there - Fudan University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Wanli University.

Two members of the staff from the Department of Student Affairs, Sum Kwai Seong and Kuan Swee Shan, are accompanying the students on the tour, launched at its Centre for Extension Education by UTAR Council Chairman Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik yesterday.

"To say that language is an obstacle is rubbish. It never stops you from anything. As long as you have the initiative to learn, just go ahead," said Teh, 22, whose grandparents came from Fujian to Malaya in the 1930s.

Koh, a second-year journalism student, said he was apprehensive at first because Mandarin was not his mother tongue but he was curious to find out the development of the people's mindset in China.