English Corner

On Thursday night, I went on over to English corner. I was not sure of what to expect, just that David had heard from one of his students that there was an English corner on Thursday at 6:30. English corner is a widely used term in China (and maybe other places) to refer to a gathering of English language enthusiasts to practice their English. So I met David and Bryan just across the plaza from our apartments in a little garden area with some benches. There were but three or four people there at that time, but the crowd gathered over the next half hour and we moved over to an area with more benches and sat down and began talking. I spent most of the night talking with a small group, which included 4 girls who were juniors majoring in English, as well as a couple others, an automotive engineering major, a computer science major, international trade, and a man who graduated from the university a few years ago and works as an engineer at a water treatment facility. Apparently there are usually not any native speakers there, and last semester only one of the foreign teachers came regularly. It was an incredibly enjoyable experience. I did do most of the talking, as they were full of questions, and I do have a tendency to be somewhat long-winded. But I did my best to ask questions, but aside from the English majors, most of the others only gave fairly short answers. We talked about all sorts of things: future plans, the American college student's lifestyle, compared educational systems, touched on the ensuing election (I was disappointed none of them had heard of Ralph Nader...but then again I might get the same blank stares at an American university). I taught them a few pieces of the American vernacular, "hanging out", "what's up" and when they asked why I didn't go to Starbucks I told them it was "bullshit American marketing". As you might guess, I had to explain this phrase. One funny thing that has happened a few times is people's surprise that I can use chop sticks. At about 7:30, when I realized we would be there for awhile, I went and grabbed some noodles to go. Upon returning, twice a person was amazed I could use chop sticks. I'm thinking 'how else am I supposed to eat?' because it's not like a fork, knife and spoon are offered at every restaurant. We ended up being there for three hours, which, in my opinion was time well spent. There's nothing to better educate one about another culture than honest, open dialogue.