Shanghai Marathon (well, half of it)

I would certainly never call myself a runner, by any means. But, occasionally I enjoy the fun of a competitive event. Races, in my opinion, are pretty much the easiest way to do so, as running requires minimal equipment. So, I decided to run in the Shanghai Marathon, but, as I ran the Great Wall Marathon last year, and realized that 26.2 is a long ways, decided on the half marathon for this event. It was a good choice. I used my charm and wit (insert sarcastic comment here) to convince Sean and Sarah to run it with me.

I went to Shanghai for the weekend, had a great time hanging out with my second cousin Tyler, who's studying Chinese at FuDan University, and enjoyed a great dinner with Sean, Sarah, and Peter (who was in Shanghai with a friend) and spent way too much money at the foreign language bookstore there. In the worst preparation to

make a 7:45 a.m. start, I spent the night with a friend from my CIEE orientation group-who was at a costume Thanksgiving party. So, I was able to make it to bed by about 1:30 a.m. having snuck in a bottle of water or two along with a cup of sangria.

The race itself went very well. It was a great route, starting out

right in the middle of East Nanjing road, which is one of the main shopping/business streets in Shanghai. It didn't go along the river or The Bund, but otherwise went by some of the great locations in Shanghai. Not only that, but the route, through almost all of the race, was lined with neighborhood groups dressed in various traditional Chinese costumes and banging or drums or shaking noisemakers while cheering us on. It makes the miles go by much faster when you can constantly people watch. Additionally, the race was incredibly well

organized, especially considering that it

was in China and had a really low entrance fee. The route was occasionally a little tight due to encroaching traffic. On the other hand, at one point, a guy on a motorbike tried to cross the rope and I got to see a cop just kick the guy's bike, and then kick him off of it. Needless to say all the other bikers retreated a little.

By far the most noticeable thing about the race was the number of runners. I haven't really run in any big city marathons before (and only did half of this one), but there were straight up just a lot of people. From what I heard/guessed there were upwards of 20,000 runners in the 5K, half and full marathons...which ran together for most of the route. That's a lot of people, which meant that Sean, Sarah, and I had lots to talk about. Now-you might think that running doesn't involve talking. But, the three of us all had no interest in working hard, and we all knew that the three hour cutoff time wouldn't be too hard to beat, so we just chilled and kept a nice

steady jog. This allowed us plenty of time to observe other runners. I only chatted with one other guy, a very amiable, enthusiastic Singaporean who was running his 67th (or so) marathon and was taking pictures with about every single person he could. As he explained this was a marathon and a trip to Shanghai, so he was half tourist/half runner. He was also able to stop and take pictures and run at a faster pace than us-and he was doing the real thing. He had a shirt that said something like "running crazies" that seemed to fit him quite well.

As for our take it easy technique, it turned out quite well. I ran out the last halfkilometer, but Sean and Sarah weren't into that, so I finished a bit ahead of them. Gashaw Melese Asfaw from Ethiopia won the marathon in 2:10 before I finished the half in 2:21:19, in 3,349th place. This placed me in the bottom 25% of the male half marathon runners...well, if nothing else, at least I finally got up early on a weekend and exercised. Furthermore, I got the same medal that got 11th place did (top 10 got some dollar bills) so it just seems he worked a lot harder for his hardware.

Being American is a skill

A while ago, when I met up with one of my tutors she asked me if I would be interested in doing some part time work. I said I might be. Last year I did some part time work teaching English to the managers and engineers at a company. I didn't take a part time job this semester even though I have a very easy schedule mostly because my job allows me to be lazy, and I have become accustomed to it. But, the job the student was talking about was only for two sessions of two hours a piece, so I said why not. I was instructed to give a presentation to some 12-14 year old students about American culture. These are middle school students who have extra classes on Saturday morning because their parents have the money, and recognize just how competitive the Chinese educational system and job market are.

The class went really well, I was amazed at the students' English level. They were obviously from wealthy families and attended the best schools in town. A few of them could've given some of the shy freshmen I taught last year a run for their money. I gave a pretty general presentation each week covering some big points in American history and demography that shape how we as Americans see ourselves and our place in the world. Furthermore, I touched on major themes in American food, TV, music, films, places of interest, and literature. I was also pretty impressed with their knowledge of various American figures and places. This is representative of a general condition I notice seeing America from the

outside. Foreigners will invariably know more about America than we do about their home country. Many attribute this to American hubris, and that may be a small factor. Yet, I think it's much more due to the fact that America is the greatest producer of the film, music, television, and literature in the world, due to many, many factors. I'm not saying the greatest in magnitude or importance, America may not lead in either of these measures in many of the aforementioned mediums. But, combined, America simply makes more of the most important or popular forms of media than any other country, by a large margin. So, while both Chinese and American female college students are watching Sex and the City; the former is learning about another culture while being entertained, why the latter is just being entertained.

With that in mind, being an American, at least here in Changzhou (and most of China) is a skill. By simply making a quick Powerpoint about things I learned in elementary school or already am interested in, I can make very good money, and be treated with the courtesy and respect given to a guest lecturer. I was kind of like, really? is it really that easy? Even in a the most developed part of an increasingly advanced and developed country, talking about where I'm from (usually reserved for cocktail parties and the first day of school) is a marketable skill, in reasonable demand. My job here is to teach English, the value of which being a native speaker goes without saying. It's certainly nice to be regarded in high esteem as educators are here, when in reality, I'm just stoked to be able to be paid to engage in a cross-cultural experience every day. I don't really know if I should write a letter to the descendants of the business magnates and Army officers of the 1920s-1940s who established America's dominance in the world, or send some of my pay to people like Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs, who have helped America maintain its preeminent position in the information age (but I think they're doing okay). I guess that just inherently being skilled and in demand goes against the American idea of justice and work ethic. It's a pretty sweet situation to be in for sure, and hopefully it won't go to my head (see picture).

TMI

As I slowly catch my blog up to real life, I will again look back a few weeks to the end of my classes. This semester I only had one section of oral English (which is generally the default class for all foreign teachers here). I taught a class of junior students studying to be secretaries (or so they told me) twice a week. I got to know them pretty well, due to the frequency of class and because I went on a class trip with some of them. Yet, I didn't develop any sort of close relationship with any of them, not like I have with a few of my tutors or some other students I see around a lot. But, there were two instances that really stood out during the semester of what I refer to as TMI-too much information, and what Danthemanstan calls the "overshare.

One class period there was way too much Chinese going on from the whole class,

so I assigned them homework; to practice their English so they won't have to use Chinese at all in class (and to punish them, I guess). I gave them a simple assignment to write about their plans for the future. Most of them were fairly interesting, if not strikingly similar. One though, was a little tough to read. The student wrote about how she just wanted a peaceful family life. This is normal enough, but that she then said she wanted it because her family wasn't peaceful, because her father used to come home drunk and beat her mother and older brother. I have

had other students display similar openness that would seem incredibly out of place in the States on a homework assignment, but it was still a little shocking. I indirectly and discretely asked her if there were still problems at home after class when I returned the assignments, and she quietly said no. I honestly think that was the best I could do here, as these sort of matters are incredibly hushed and private in China. Which is why it's always odd when students share such information on a simple assignment. I don't know if using a foreign language, or knowing that it's being submitted to a foreign teacher (who despite a year and half here, and lots of reading) is still far removed from Chinese society. Either way, this openness seems very strange in what I consider a much more reserved culture.

When I assigned the students to give a speech about a relative or teacher who they admired or had helped them considerably, I generally planned for the speeches to be pretty positive. Most of them were, and most were also pretty emotionless-as the students were focused on not making mistakes, which preempts much in the way of expression. But one of the better students started sharing about her grandfather, and about the last time she saw him, as he was slowing dying of cancer. As many of us would, she broke down and started crying. A classmate rushed to give her a tissue, and I motioned to her that it was okay, she could take a break. After collecting herself, she said "sorry, it's my first time ever talking about this." She was shaky but good for the rest of the speech. I was glad that she had opened up, but was utterly shocked that this was the first time she had talked about it. I just really can't figure out why an in-class speech in English is the time to talk about it. I tend to think that there had to be some time that she would have talked about this with her parents/cousins/friends/roommates before then. I briefly consoled her after the speech, thanking her for her willingness to share. These displays of way too much information are the anomaly here-but they really strike me as odd in a culture that for the most part seems to encourage people to bottle up their emotion from everyone except for close family. Just yet another interesting thing about being a foreigner in China to add to the already very, very long list.

Halloween Party

This post is long, long overdue, and I haven't been busy. Rather, I have just been quite lazy and have done a bit of traveling. I'd like to say that I haven't been blogging because I have been studying Chinese, but that'd be a huge stretch of the truth. Nevertheless, I'll do my best to keep updating through the holiday season until I get on the road traveling during our long break for Chinese New Year.

In a feeble attempt to suppress some of my guilt (or just awareness) of my rather posh lifestyle compared to the average Jiangsu resident, I contacted one of my students from last year. I knew that he was involved in helping out at a school called 蓝星小学 (Blue Star Elementary School). This school is a privately run school for the children of migrant workers. There are an estimated 130-200 million migrant workers in China (between 10-15% of the population) and they play an integral (and often unnoticed) role in China's growth. There certainly are plenty of charities run by the good ol' Party, but I tend to be skeptical of where that money ends up. So I had asked Edison (Lu Wenbin) if I could donate to the school. He said not really, but instead, a few days after I asked, he invited me to come and help with a Halloween party some of he and his friends were throwing for the kids. I actually donated by funding the party: by giving the student group some money, as apparently donating directly to the school would have been "complicated."

As I was interested in visiting the school, I accepted. As for planning, it was typically Chinese and I got a text message on the morning of the day we were going telling me where to meet that afternoon (I was, of course, free). In the van on the way there I was informed I would be helping with a vocabulary game, and was asked to sing an American song and teach them an American dance. This is a pretty typical request when foreigners are put in front of any group; partially because Chinese people generally enjoy singing in front of groups/socially and because I get the impression, that to some less 'cultured' Chinese, foreigners are seen somewhat as clowns/monkeys. I said no, call me a funhater, but I need a little more forewarning before a song and dance show.

Upon my arrival, I realized that my hope of not making a big show of being a foreigner was dashed. Many students from the class had lined up on either side of the gate, creating a welcoming tunnel, and in unison said "Welcome to our school" in very good English. Then, one of the better students came up and gave me a big and beautiful bouquet of flowers and welcomed me again. Of course, I only showed up once and did no planning; whereas some of the students go every week and plan the lessons/activities in addition to being pretty busy with classes, activities, and whatever pointless mind numbing quasi-repressive authoritarian government duties they must attend to. Needless to say, this reception and the compliments I got the whole time didn't help me feel like I was "helping"-but I'm not too worried.

The school wasn't in horrible shape, and inside the classroom, it wasn't much worse than some of the older rooms on our campus. But, it was kind of tucked away in an ally, and didn't seem to have any open space/lawns/gardens except the small paved area in the courtyard-doubling as a parking lot. The kids were just as cute as you imagine Chinese kids with red bandanas tied around their necks (worn by all young students) would be. They showed great energy in learning the new words, making masks, and playing some sort of vocabulary/call and answer game. I think what was really touching about seeing the kids is how similar they looked to an American kid making a mask for Halloween. To go from that image and then realize the social, economic, and emotional differences between the two is pretty daunting. The really disappointing thing for me was when I tried to help a few girls make their masks, just to realize how bad my Mandarin is. The students volunteering me (mostly my former students) had no problem understanding me, as they've some exposure to foreigner's Chinese. But the young students were frank with me, which is what I needed: my Mandarin was far from anything they could understand. What was lots of fun was a pretty good mask that Edison had found and instructed me to wear. Needless to say, the white guy speaking some foreign tongue with a really creepy mask got the Halloween spirit going in the classroom.

I had a great time seeing the kids, but even more so, enjoyed seeing the dedication and kindness that the students of our school exhibited in planning and carrying out the activity. As I mentioned, the fact that many of them do this each week is really impressive. I would venture to say that the students at my school don't have quite the discretionary time that students at TU had. While most of them spend it playing mindless computer games or watching B-rate movies, these kids are refreshingly socially aware. In a generation of growing wealth, massive consumption, and spoiled only children; I was happy to help out these students who may or may not recognize the great benefit that cheap, migrant labor is to a growing economy, but are at least doing something about the social services inequality. Edison, the leader of the group, is a very engaging, intelligent student. His ambition is to take the civil service exam and become a government official. I hope that he keeps his keen perception and servant attitude as he progresses through school and into what should be a promising career. The Chinese government and society need that attitude as 1.33 billion people will soon all be expecting significantly better living standards. I'm not saying that all societies, and especially one as complex as America's don't need people with this attitude. But the thing about China, is that the busyness, the dirtiness, the inequality of wealth, the competitive workfore, the substandard conditions; they are all right in front of you. Right in front of you.

Jump, push, run

Just like last year, as the cool fall weather came, so did the buzz about the campus wide track meet. Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten any clear indications about the basketball tournament, as Sean, Jordan, and I all are interested in bringing some red, white, and blue skills to the Foreign Language Department team. But, the track meet (or sports meeting as it’s poorly translated) is a staple here, and went down a few weekends ago. Sean, Sarah, Peter, and I all got up early and got dressed for the opening ceremony on Friday morning. It was just the same as last years, but still provided me with plenty of entertainment. Seeing ‘volunteer’ female students standing, slightly dancing and holding flowers at attention as all the teachers march by reminds me again of the value of equality between the genders and onerous duties of students in such a hierarchical system. I was able to skirt around the dark suit requirement for the teachers in the School of Foreign Languages because I am, umm, not Chinese.

After the ceremony, I hung out on the track for a bit talking with students about how much they didn’t want to be performing in the ceremony but how little they could do about it. I then met up with Sean and Sarah and Steve (吴雪松)to watch the faculty high jump. Now, Sean high jumped in high school, and was very good. But, as he noted, he graduated high school ten years ago. Nonetheless, this strapping Irish lad from small town Michigan put on quite a show. There were two apparatuses available for the competitors to use. One was the high jump set up you’re thinking of. The other was a pole on top of two supports along the side edge of a long jump pit. Instead of the Fosbury flop, the majority of the competitors (and all of those eliminated early) would run parallel to the bar, and when reaching it would kind of scissor kick over it. This meant many would fall into the sand pit if they didn’t get their feet set. Many did. Much more grave was the possibility that a jumper (mind these are men) wouldn’t get his second leg over the bar, thus landing on the bar with the part of his body he least wanted to land on the bar with.

Sean, on the other hand, didn’t look like ten years had passed him by since his high school jumping days. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite understand what was going on (although the students volunteering were pretty helpful) so he didn’t get to skip the early heights. Despite this tiring him out, as the bar got higher, he outlasted every other jumper. One of his last competitors gave some valiant efforts, and had track spikes and a water bottle and shoe to mark out his approach, but Sean wasn’t having it. He ended up not only winning, but literally raised the bar and set the new faculty record by 15 cm or something ridiculous like that. At some point, the other departments are going to quit letting the school of foreign languages use the foreign ringers.

My only event of the day was the faculty 4x100m relay. One of the secretaries from the foreign language department had approached Steve (most likely because he is known as ‘that one Chinese teacher always hanging out with the foreign teachers’) and asked if he could get a team together for the 4x100. Of course, Sean, Peter, and I have nothing better to do, so we all consented. Steve took the lead off, Peter in second, me third, with His Airness Sean anchoring. We ended up getting fourth in our heat and eighth overall. We didn’t practice handoffs because if the U.S. Olympic team isn’t practicing them, then I feel no need to do so. Peter stumbled a bit out of his handoff from Steve, but otherwise we did all right. Now, in general, the school of foreign languages isn’t too well known for its athletic prowess in the faculty competitions. Apparently the type of people holing up to write their thesis about Leaves of Grass or Wuthering Heights isn’t exactly the athletic type. So, just having a team, and on top of that beating more than half of the competition is much appreciated by our Chinese colleagues.

I got up early Saturday morning for my main event, the faculty 800m. I had big shoes to fill as last year Dave not only finished first, but also set a new faculty record. As the picture shows, I wasn’t messing around this year. I was the only ‘merricun running in the race, and I was representing. I was sad to see that there were only eight or nine competitors, as last year Dave ran in a pretty good pack. After the customary dead sprint (Chinese people seem incapable of pacing themselves) at the beginning of the race, I settled into first place. Which of course, is the worst place to run a race in. I was aware of some footsteps behind me, and as we turned the 600m corner, two other teachers were right behind me and slowly drew past. The crowd started to cheer and as they passed me they either yelled 加油(jia you) meaning ‘let’s go’ or ‘come on’ or 中国 (zhong guo) meaning China. I couldn’t quite tell, although I’d like to imagine they yelled China as they moved past the foreign devil. You can see from the picture that they really did run past me, but fear not; I gave it the old Ken Ferrell puuuddsch (inside joke) and came by in first place. Of course, my fast jog didn’t set any records, but I ran it in 2:26, no more than ten seconds off of what I was running in high school. Sean mentioned that all the students around him were cheering really loudly when the other two runners passed me, but that after I won the photo finish, they all just went quiet, looked down and walked away. I wasn’t really trying to ruin people’s day, there just aren’t a lot of times for me to rock the red, white, and blue bandana over here.

My other competition was the push-up competition. Peter was also competing in this competition; he placed in the top eight. I ended up getting second, which was disappointing, but you can’t win them all. There was incredible irregularity among the various forms of push-ups allowed (mine was admittedly not the best). As I watched the rest of my competition I got kind of worked up about what I considered unacceptable form. Danthemanstan reminded me that “this is a faculty push-up competition at a tier three college in China.” He was right, so I shut up. So, a first and a second isn’t two firsts, but it’s not too bad. Of course, some of my competition was twenty or thirty years my senior. All in all, the great weather and great competition made this year’s track meet lots of fun, and once again made me wish that somehow, even without the power to wield a giant authoritarian stick, schools in the States could pull something like this off. (The middle picture is of me with some random admirers after my win.)

Class trip

At the beginning of almost every class, as I do the attendance, I ask for any announcements, jokes, stories, or gossip. I’m not one to ever be in a hurry, and early in the morning I am rarely raring to get right into class. Generally my students act like they’re taught, and are silent. But, one day my junior secretarial studies class told me that they were going to be going on a class trip. I inquired a bit further and found out they were headed to a ghost town and cave on Halloween weekend. They kind of invited me to go, and I said I’d like to and to give me some more details. Well, it turned out that their Chinese teachers couldn’t chaperone the trip, so that job became mine. I had a student (Zhenzhen…from the trip to Song Shan) help me write a letter to the administrator for the class explaining my (supposed) qualifications for chaperoning the trip. They really needed two teachers to come, so Danthemanstan agreed to come. Well, as always, things changed a few days before the trip, and it switched to an overnight trip to a lake. Well, that would’ve had Danthemanstan missing a World Series game featuring his beloved Yankees, so it was just the students and me. It turned out just fine, they had the whole trip planned; I didn’t do a single thing that one might normally term as “chaperoning.”

We started the trip at the ungodly hour of 05:30, when we met in total darkness to board the bus. Our group was about half of my class and then about ten or so of their friends from our campus, some of which were my students last fall. We went with a travel agency, so we were joined on our bus by a few middle-aged couples and a hearty, jovial group of grandpas and grandmas, as the elderly are affectionately called here. I went right to my seat, pulled my hat over my eyes and did what people should be doing at that hour.

Our first destination was Da Ci Yan(大慈岩), a national park in northern Zhejiang province, the coastal province south of Jiangsu, where I live. We hiked up to a couple different points along a ridge. It wasn’t quite mountainous, but was a pretty are filled with steep, forested hills. There were many archetypal pagodas on cliffs overlooking valleys. One of the big features was the two-sided Buddha, which was pretty impressive, if not a bit out of place due it its obviously recent construction.

Our next stop was a cave named Ling Xi Sheng Jing (灵栖胜境).It wasn’t too inviting, as all of the ponds leading up to it were at that nasty stage between needing to be drained or filled. But, the cave was pretty impressive and expansive. I would’ve liked to spend a bit more time there, but we were herded through it in classic Chinese tourist fashion. I recognize that tours I have been on in many countries rushed me through the site, but in China this rushing is exacerbated by the fact that you are also being pushed and shoved the whole time, due to the inescapable throngs of visitors. Walking around the caves and the national park was really enjoyable. My students and I talked a mostly Chinese with some English mixed in for my convenience. They were all girls, as the two boys from the class didn’t make the trip. I really enjoyed talking with them outside of class, as they really let down their guard, and we could joke around, they could teach me some dirty Chinese words and phrases. I try to make my classes pretty light and enjoyable (while still prohibiting Chinese) but the classroom itself just adds some seriousness on its own. Just these conversations alone made the trip a joy.

As I have to with many things in China, I just laughed and sighed during the bus ride. The tour guide, for some cultural reason I am still working on understanding, was constantly blasting trip updates through the bus speakers as well as begging for people to come to the front of the bus to sing or give some sort of performance. There were also some call and answer type games. This type of in-bus entertainment is pretty normal here, but in no way aligns with my idea of what should occur on a bus, train, or plane. Thank god for iPods.

I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the hotel we stayed at, as the trip was fairly cheap. But I guess economies of scale combined with some travel agent kickbacks makes for such. I had an awesome dinner with the grandpas and grandmas (all the students went cheap and brought their own food). It was great food, and I had a heck of a time trying to understand the flurry of questions from my companions. They seemingly predated the implementation of standard Mandarin in the schools, so I could barely decipher even the most basic phrases in their Changzhou dialect. Regardless, they were (like most Chinese) very hospitable and continually passed the dishes to me and showed me how to scoop out the spicy snails, which were superb. I passed the rest of the night, after some prodding, playing cards, drinking beer, and eating various snacks with some of my students. They did their best to teach me the most popular Chinese card game, but as we weren’t betting, I wasn’t too worried about doing it right. Typical Chinese snacks (read: lots of spicy tofu) and warm beer isn’t really my idea of a great night, but being able to see some of my students’ personalities come out was well worth it. By the power of numbers I wasn’t able to head to bed until showing them that I could clearly out-drink any of them, including a few boyfriends along for the trip. It took only four or five beers to show them that an American fraternity is a little better practice than a prison-like Chinese high school.

On Sunday morning we headed to Qian Dao Hu (千岛湖)which is a man made lake whose name roughly translates as lake of a thousand islands. We took a boat to only two islands, and spent very little time on the boat. I was hoping to island hop around the island, but that didn’t happen. In fact I got the impression there are much fewer than a thousand islands. It was cool and misty, so didn’t make for the best day to boat around a lake. There were some passable temples and stone bridges over streams, but I wasn’t too impressed. I did have a riot shaking a rope bridge with some of the more adventurous students while the rest of the girls shrieked and clung to the ropes. I couldn’t help but laugh and take a picture when we passed a stream and a few of the grandmas from our group were bending over picking some a reed like plant and filling plastic bags with it. I’m guessing it’s good for cooking or some herbal medicine (and isn’t sold at the supermarket?). I doubt they had any detrimental impact, but picking plants from a park/nature preserve is a bit unsettling. Arriving back on campus after an equally annoying but eventless bus ride, I was quite happy to have gone on the trip, especially to get to know my students better and see them hang out/interact with each other naturally. I also was satisfied with my role as chaperone’s complete lack of responsibility.

Song Shan, Shaolin Temple, Yuntai Shan

The reason for one of my recent trips came in a discussion with one of my students about places she had visited in China. I thought I had been to three of the four famous/important mountains in China. But, she corrected me and let me know that I had only been to two. Later that night, I was talking with her on QQ (the ubiquitous Chinese chat program) and suggested taking a trip that weekend. I of course thought she would reject immediately, because of the lack of time for preparation coupled with the oddity of traveling with a foreign teacher. Surprisingly, she said yes, if she could find a friend to come with us. I said the more the merrier. So, Zhenzhen (真真), Zheye (哲烨) and I headed to Song Shan in Henan province. Both of them are my students, seniors majoring in English Education.

Our overnight train trip was uneventful, which is how train trips ought to be. Upon arrival, we needed to find a hotel. Both of them had traveled a fair amount before, with their parents. Both of them are from families with sufficient if not excess money hence the traveling. So, they were pretty unhappy with my hotel selection method…essentially look for the grimiest location, knowing it will be cheap. They didn’t agree with my assessment that it’s all the same when you’re asleep. But, they consented, and the three of us shared a room for only 90Y.

We first visited Shaolin Temple(少林寺), the world famous home of Kung fu (better termed Chinese martial arts). It is also the titular location of Jet Li’s first movie. The temple was very similar to the Confucius Temple, in the absence of a guide telling me the significance of the structures and tablets, wasn’t too interesting to me. We were able to watch a performance by mostly teen martial arts students. It was pretty impressive. One of the students did a few push up modifications that didn’t look that easy. I tried them when I got home: I was wrong. They were incredibly difficult. Throngs of visitors (mostly Chinese—thus pushy) made the temple less spectacular than it might have been.

In stark contrast to the temple, a pagoda garden, filled with burial pagodas of past martial arts masters, was gorgeous. Amid the mountains and filled with a bright afternoon sun, the pagodas majestically (I borrow this word from President Obama) rose into the sky. I really enjoyed just walking around and pondering about history and the thoughts and desires of the men buried beneath the pagodas, (as one does in any cemetery or memorial). One funny thing happened when I asked Zheye to take a picture with me in front of one of the pagodas. She politely refused. When I asked (because I always ask) she said that it was bad luck to take pictures in front of graves/memorials. I had heard this before here, but didn’t really think of it. I held my anti-superstition tongue and took the picture with Zhenzhen. After the pagoda we took the cable car up to a peak, as it was too late in the day to climb up, and my companions didn’t want to. Song Shan is more like a collection of peaks than one stand-alone mountain, and this peak was spectacular. There were some great paths along precipices and the views of the valley below, changing into autumn colors, was a great change from the bustle and overwhelming grayness of Changzhou. Back at the hotel that night, as we discussed the next day, I was just planning to try to climb up one of the other well-recommended peaks. Zhenzhen though, true to the adventurous spirit which made her consent to the trip, wanted to head to a national park nearby which she had heard goo things about.

So the next morning we headed to Yuntai Shan(云台山), which although called a mountain, is much more famous for its waterfalls and gorges. So we hit up two buses to make it to the town nearest Yuntai Shan. Both of the girls weren’t super keen on using the (admittedly) rough and dirty intercity buses. Apparently when their parents foot the bill, it’s either private cars or chartered buses. Contrarily, I love the unadulterated humanity that exists on such bus rides. Once we got there, it was a great relief to have the two girls figure out the taxi, tickets, and a hotel for me. The park itself was beautiful. We enjoyed a nice hike up to the highest waterfall in China, that was a little weak that day…but infinitely higher than anything I’m used to in Iowa. The main gorge was impressive, and had trails running right through and around it. I noticed that the valley below it was dry and overgrown with vegetation, due to a small dam and reservoir at the bottom of the gorge. I appreciate the eventful gorge that this created, but also think it might be a symbol of the developing water shortage problem in northern China. At the end of this site was a massive construction project of a new dam. I wondered if maybe I was glad we went as the whole gorge might soon be go the way of the valley. Of course then they can run tours of the dam like they do at the Three Gorges or Hoover Dam.Our taxi driver to and from the park was much more like a business consultant. He arranged the hotel for us, took us right to the ticket booth and told us about the discounts, and kind of gave us our schedule for visiting the different sites in the extensive park. This is because the infrastructure prevents it from being a DIY place. I don’t know if this is due to a lack of tourism or a lack of government interest in creating the infrastructure. It seems like there is much more of these limited option stops in China than anywhere else I have traveled (save Laos, where there literally is only one road). I hope it’s due to lack of volume to warrant the creation of more varied options, but tend to think it’s more likely to be the often seen Chinese government tactic of controlling/extorting tourists. They do this because, well, they can and no one’s going to tell them they can’t.
Both Zhenzhen and Zheye were great travel partners. They seemed to be much more easy-going than many of my other students/acquaintances. Finding a hotel room and getting what I wanted to eat was no longer one of the main challenges of traveling. As I have maybe mentioned before, I was still amazed at how I was more proficient at figuring some things out and finding places. I probably shouldn’t have been though, because, even though they have both traveled a lot in China, they hadn’t ever been on a trip with this small of a group in which everyone was unfamiliar with the place. The three of us stayed in the hotel room without any troubles, which might seem awkward to many, but it was fine. For starters, it was cheaper, so an easy decision for me. Additionally, having assigned roommates in middle school, high school, and/or college as well as often sharing rooms with relatives and friends makes young Chinese people much more comfortable sharing rooms than a lot of my American friends. They complained a lot about being bored on the bus/train rides, but after I offered the line “the only people who are bored are those with boring minds” from my fifth grade teacher, they didn’t complain so much. It was a great trip, and I think it’s pretty cool that I can say I have walked among the same stones and trees that first inspired Chinese monks long ago to begin martial arts.

Teaching and learning

As this blog often looks much more like a travelogue than a reflection of living in China, I thought I ought to write a bit about my actual “job”. Now, I put it in quotations because, honestly, it doesn’t really feel like a job. Almost all of the time, I thoroughly enjoy my time in class, and as I taught here last year, am able to recycle many lesson plans, so that my out of class work is minimal. This year I am teaching a whopping twelve hours of class per week. While that is the normal course load for a professor in the U.S., I don’t have to maintain office hours or a rigorous research project like a real professor. Now, don’t worry, I never refer to myself as a professor, save a few ironic boasts. My twelve hours consist of four sections of “Selected Readings of English Publications” and one section of the default oral English class that meets twice a week. The oral English students are juniors who study what is best translated as secretarial studies, and thus have English on par with some of the freshman or sophomore students. I don’t have nearly as stimulating discussions or activities as those I’ll discuss below, but they are good, kind students and I have fun joking around with them. A few assignments have allowed them to open up a bit emotionally, which is marginally enlightening and a bit touching.

I teach the publications class to senior Business English and English Education students, and they have been a joy to teach. The only negative in teaching them is that in the spring they do an internship, so this is their last semester of classes, which makes for some shotty attendance. Yet, the students that come to class generally have very good English and thus can understand almost all I say at normal speed. They also show much broader ranges of openness to new ideas and concepts, as well as a little more diversified life experiences. In my opinion, this openness to new concepts and ability to understand them is much more what a liberal arts education ought to be. In contrast, even subjects like foreign languages and the social sciences here reflect a more technical training. I have been pretty surprised and impressed with the interests of my students. Two students, for example are currently reading Wide Sargasso Sea and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, in English.

In a rare spurt of idealism, my goal for the publications class was to develop the students’ ability to summarize and analyze a newspaper or magazine article using critical and creative thinking. If you’ve read many entries in this blog, you’ll know that (in my opinion) the Chinese educational system and mentality in general, is bereft of critical and creative thinking. Aside from a few of the top national universities, schools here (from kindergarten to cap and gown) neglect these two related skills, which for me were what I most enjoyed in college. I still remember one day in Spanish literature class with a superb professor when most of us had analyzed a pretty polemic and graphic passage in the most obvious way. He got up, stepped back, told us to clean out our brains, and look at it anew. Now, I certainly don’t think I’ll be able to have this impact on my students. But, I am hoping, by providing some important examples, to at least make a few students think differently. I think it’s pretty darn important in a country where the media is heavily controlled, books are censored, the Internet is monitored and controlled with the best Internet surveillance program in the world, and people who speak their mind often aren’t heard from again. Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t think I am doing anything really grand or that could even pale in comparison to the work of the few Chinese dissidents. But, I think that encouraging students to not take an article at its word is the kind of cultural exchange I am paid to provide.

One of the more interesting things about teaching most of the senior students in the English department is to really see the different personalities that different classes take on. My sister Jane had told me this was certain to happen, and teaching four different classes of similar students has really shown me this. Being seniors, they have had three years for their class personalities to develop, and also can communicate much better with me than my freshmen and sophomore students last year. My two Business English classes are much more talkative and responsive than the English education students. One class, which has the most boys, is a lot of fun and for the most part gives me the least trouble in following directions. I think that having more boys is actually one of the big reasons for this. Although their role in China is quickly changing (as it ought to) women here are still often held to a very conservative, patriarchal standard. Until recently, when the Communist Party criminalized the binding of feet and promoted women’s role for both economic and egalitarian reasons, women in China were expected to be obedient, passive, servile, and delicate. Bring that attitude to my class where they’re expected to discuss and doubt articles in a foreign language, and class can be quite quiet. So having some assertive boys makes class much more enjoyable. One of my English Education classes, to be frank, sucks in comparison to the others. Sucks may be a crass word, but they often suck my energy and patience away by refusing to ask questions, answer questions, or suffer a little embarrassment by guessing the answer. I can understand the freshmen being very worried about the Asian tragedy of “losing face” by being wrong amongst their new classmates. But after three years of tracked classes and living next door to each other, I doubt many surprises will emerge, so it’s frustrating that the won’t answer any questions.

I do my best to select articles that balance what I think is beneficial for them to read and their preferences, which I solicited during the first class. One thing I noticed when asking for topics is the sharp divergence between the guys’ and girls’ interests. Most guys were looking to read about computer games or the NBA, while I had an overwhelming preference by the girls for articles about fashion, movies, or American-Chinese cultural differences. Of course, all I want to read about is politics and economics, so I have to show some restraint. Recently they read an article about the Nobel Prize and the military, and the discussion questions were in the general military/war/peace/personal sacrifice field. One student, who is normally pretty quiet and seems much more concerned about her bracelets and make-up made an interesting, if not somewhat obvious statement. She explained to me (I paraphrase) “that the government’s opinion about political subjects is the only one that can exist. If you disagree with it, you will just go to jail. So the only real option is to just say what the government says”. Many of you, like me, might be pretty eager to criticize this apparently lazy and defeatist-esque attitude. But I know that I can’t fully understand the risk vs. reward analysis that past and recent events have formed in my students’ minds. It’s comments like these, and the thinking they make my brain do that make teaching here very enjoyable.
(included are pics of two of my senior classes)

Shacking with the fellas

A few weekends ago (I know, I am a little behind on posting) I spent the night in the main boys dormitory with some of my students. During one of my classes, when I had the students suggest article subjects for class, one student-English name Terry-suggested the EPL. Luckily, my wee bit of soccer knowledge allowed me to know that he meant the English Premier League. I later found out he picked his name after John Terry, the English defender for Chelsea FC. Oddly enough, when I talked to him during the break, he informed me that Real Madrid was his favorite team. So I was ecstatic to find out that he watches almost all their games (even though they're on in the middle of the night). Well, he misses the mid week games due to the fact that the electricity is cut off after 23:00 during the week.

So, I arranged to watch a game with him and his roommates one weekend. In their room of eight beds, there are seven guys living there, as one moved out previously. Many students go home every weekend, so there was room for me to sleep in Terry's bed, and he in another. The extra bed is littered with old class materials and extra bedding. I have already visited the boys dorms and discussed it a little in this post. I had actually already been to this building and floor, as some of the students I taught last year live last year live there. The floor has four rooms, three of which have senior English students and one with sophomore English students. The game wasn't on until two in the morning, so I had plenty of time to hang out with them before it started. I came over at 22:30 (before the 23:00 curfew) with some fried dumplings and a six pack of Snow Beer. Most of them were pretty excited to have me spend the night, and honestly, I was excited to do so.

Immediately upon entrance in all four of the dorm rooms on this floor it is apparent what the main weekend activity of Chinese male college students is: computer games. They are wildly popular here. Wildly might be an understatement. At least two, if not three or four computers are set up on the one main table in the rooms otherwise cramped with beds, books, and bags. From the minute I showed up until a little after 02:00, there were never less than two guys playing in each room. If I had money to invest, I would be pouring it into companies developing games for the Chinese market. I have been told the girls also are glued to their computers, either watching movies, tv shows, or playing simpler flash games. They seem to really enjoy it, and have some beer or pop to drink while they play, as well as munch on sunflower seeds, spicy tofu strips, or spicy fried chicken. As I was when I first visited the dorms here, I was impressed by how well the guys got along and joked with each other. Their decorations were pretty sparse, the main one being an "inspirational" poster with a picture of all eight roommates that the school required them to make. Some of the guys had used a Sharpie to add some real inspiration to the poster. A few guys were reading on their cell phones (very popular here) or watching movies on their laptops, but playing or watching computer games was by far the most popular thing. Terry and I stayed up to watch the game, which Real Madrid won, so it was worth the late night.

In contrast to a Saturday night during my time at the University of Tulsa, these guys' night was pretty mild. The 23:00 curfew and lack of co-ed dorms really limit the type of parties that have suffused American campuses. Furthermore, the dorms are packed tightly enough to effectively prevent any sort of gathering even among the guys or girls. The fact that many students spend Friday and Saturday nights in the library studying or "relaxing" and reading magazines displays a studiousness that inhibits any keggers from gaining much ground. My (invalidated) opinion is that they choose to do more individual activities on the weekend nights because they already spend so much time with their roommates and classmates during the week. It's fundamentally difficult to be alone in a place as populated as this part of China, and even the senior students still have pretty regimented lives during the week-most of it with their classmates (who are also their roommates). I never saw my senior year roommates in an academic setting, as they had different majors in different colleges; so hanging with them and other friends on the weekend meant seeing someone different. Not so for the students at my university. It was a great experience to spend the night with them, and even furthered my respect for the resiliency that so many Chinese people in all walks of life exhibit to make their place in a very competitive and unforgiving economy/environment.

Mo' money, mo' problems

At the end of last year, I meant to write a blog with some sort of summary about my year teaching in China. For all sorts of reasons, my “year” teaching in China has turned into two. Yet, there is still a post it note on my desktop about writing a sort of summary blog. I was reminded of it last week when on a trip with a student and the subject of it came up. We were riding on a bus through the outskirts of Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan province. Henan province is northwest of Jiangsu, but more importantly is in the second line of provinces in China. By this I mean the row of provinces that border the coastal provinces, which are the most developed. So in places like Henan, and Zhengzhou, which is an emerging city, one can really see China’s development in process.

There are myriad works written about China’s economic and social development over the last 30 years. They are undoubtedly written by people much more intelligent and better informed that I. So, I don’t know that I have much to offer. Essentially, though, I think I ought to try to answer the frequent question “what’s China like?” as I saw it after a year here. Such a question is broad, so my answers ought to be. But to be succinct, China is busy. Busy building, busy selling, busy making, busy buying: in essence busy consuming.

This busyness worries and intrigues me. It worries me because I don’t believe that China can consume the way we do in America. I’m not sure that they want to do so, but most of what I see tells me they do. There’s no doubt that China is growing rapidly, wealth is increasing, and its society is modernizing, albeit much slower than the economy. The most common reason students have missed my classes this semester has been to attend driving lessons. Now surely every student that is taking driving lessons isn’t going to be driving his own car upon graduation…but the trend is shifting that way in China. And the roads are already crowded and the smog already thick. Chinese people love to display their wealth (I’m not saying Americans don’t). There may be many reasons for it, but I mainly attribute it to the fact that wealth is so new here. The fall of Imperial China, the civil war and Mao’s regime pretty much ruined any chance of China joining the Industrial Revolution. So, instead, now, China is doing its industrial revolution and its technological revolution at the same time. This means a family can go from farming rice to surfing the web on their smart phones in not too much time. With such a dramatic shift, why not buy the flashiest phone there is.

More precisely, I worry because the way America consumes is highly irresponsible (in my opinion). I generally believe that as the world continues to grow and consume naturally resources, the pressure on these finite resources will increase, causing tensions to escalate. I also believe as the gap between poor and rich widens, the moral question surrounding this gap will become more central in our lives. America puts a lot of pressure on natural resources, especially per capita. The wealth gap in America is huge, not because our poor are poor, but because our rich are really rich. China puts a lot of pressure on natural resources, but not so much per capita. Its wealth gap is huge because its poor are really poor and its rich are becoming really rich. Chinese people are very diligent and very nationalistic, thus if they put their minds to something, they most certainly can achieve it-if you don’t believe me consult an Olympics medal count from the most recent games. I am worried because if China tries to consume like America, which it really seems like they do; I think they will be able to do it, but only with huge conflicts that result from natural resources allocations and massive problems that come from unequal wealth distribution. China’s potential consumers are the most numerous in the world, so the problems and conflicts will be bigger; this is why I am worried about it.

Much of the reason I returned to China (besides the good pay for easy work) is that I am intrigued by the way China is developing and how it will choose to deal with the problems that, in my opinion, are nearly inevitable. Being here has allowed me to see the main of the advantages of an authoritarian government: when a public measure needs to be implemented, it is done so with amazing speed and efficiency. Of course, whether or not the public measure is beneficial or just is not weighed on by the public. In my opinion, which is obviously heavily influenced by my life in America, the efficiency isn’t worth the lack of control. Not at all, especially in the long run. China won’t be able to continue to open up its economy and grow its wealth without re-addressing some of the issues it put down via the Tian’anmen Square Massacre. Most of my students say that they just want a stable life, but yet also show an amazing propensity for coming to class with the newest cell phones, portable video players and name brand clothing. I’ll trust their actions on this one. I am very intrigued to see how the government responds to these desires while still keeping its incontestable grip on power and maintaining what it calls a “harmonious society.”

I recognize that this post may seem too serious and that I touch on all sorts of issues here that may be controversial, but I don’t know that I did a good enough job of expressing to friends and family when I was home this summer my general impression of living in the world’s most populous country. As you might expect, China is busy. It’s on the move, hustling here and there to get rich and gain power. I’m sure that about every country on Earth (except Bhutan) is doing the same thing, but it’s right in your face over here. It’s what I see every day.

Visit to Qutang

To my more faithful readers, no, there's no excuse for the two week delay in posting-but this post is long, if that's any concession.

Due to the swine flu vacation, the Chinese National Day vacation was shortened from eight days off school to just two. This put a wrench in any plans to make a trip of sizable distance. But, since it was the 60th Anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic, and because the break coincided with mid-autumn festival, I decided to keep it traditional. So, I accepted my good friend Qin Chen’s invitation to go back home with her. Danthemanstan also accepted the invitation; so we would both accompany Qin Chen back to her hometown of Qutang, near Hai’an, in the Nantong prefecture in southeastern Jiangsu province.

There are two major holidays in China. Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) is usually in late January or February and is about two weeks. National Day is October 1st and the holiday lasts one week. These three weeks are beyond crazy for travel. You can look back at my blog to read about the experience Dave and I had last year. This year Qin Chen had bought tickets ahead of time. Danthemanstan, Sarah, Sean, and I got up early and headed to the bus station on Thursday morning (Sean and Sarah were going to visit Zhao Min, another friend). Knowing the imminent crowd, I was keen on getting to the bus station early. Quite surprisingly, Qin Chen and Zhao Min didn’t share this urgency. Apparently they had never traveled on the actual holiday before and didn’t expect the crowds (see picture to understand what I mean by crowds). I don’t know how they have both lived here their whole lives and not understood the travel craziness on those days, but I don’t know lots of things. Either way, we made it into the bus station, pushing and shoving as best we could. At one point, I actually felt like I was floating as the pushing carried me off the ground. Some nasty pickpocket’s day was made as Danthemanstan had his wallet stolen the scrum.

When we got to Qutang, we went to Qin Chen’s grandparent’s house, as it was a holiday and her parents and aunt were there for the day. Danthemanstan and I were really excited about the National Day parade. In China, multiples of ten for anniversaries, birthdays, etc. are a big deal, so there was a full military parade in Beijing, through Tian’anmen square. We were interested because military parades aren’t that common in today’s world and because I am very intrigued by the Chinese patriotism/nationalism. Qin Chen wasn’t really interested at all, her grandpa showed some interest, and her grandmother was busy making us a feast. I am sure her family was intrigued by our intrigue in their national parade. We, of course had a delicious lunch, as the Qin family stayed true to the Chinese custom of offering guests copious food and drink.

After lunch, we headed to one of the local parks in Hai’an with Qin Chen’s grandfather. As a typical Chinese retiree, he goes to the park almost every day to play Chinese chess. Meanwhile her grandmother shops, cleans the house, and hits up the local mahjong hall. The park was pretty, and very similar to those in every other Chinese city. It was nice to sit and watch him play chess against some other old men and chat with Qin Chen. We attracted a fair bit of attention at the park, as foreigners are sparse in Hai’an. One man treated Danthemanstan and I like monkeys or Martians. He sat near us, pointed us out to anyone who would listen, and as I was writing a text message, was tapping at my phone’s screen while laughing. On the way to and from the park, I noticed that Grandpa Qin was very brazen in his street crossing, paying no attention to the oncoming cars at all. Dangerous as it may be, he is eighty and probably isn’t nearly as afraid of death as me. Or he’s just plain tough.

Dinner was just as tasty as lunch, and the best thing we had was fried lotus root stuffed with pork and greens. They were awesome. Generally, when eating with Chinese people, in order to be hospitable and good hosts, they will put food onto your plate for you. I don’t like this practice at all, but put up with it, as the people putting the food on my plate usually slaved away making scrumptious and abundant dishes for me. After Grandpa Qin had put more dumplings than I could ever eat into my bowl, I ate a few, and he was reaching over with more. I tried to refuse them (also expected in Chinese manners) but he actually poured some dumplings onto my hand blocking the bowl. They were hot, so I withdrew the hand; the dumplings were added to my already heaping bowl of dumplings. Grandpa Qin won. He was quite a character: another night he poured me a shot of baijiu mixed with ginseng out of a Sprite bottle. It kind of lingered and burned in my throat for a while. He didn’t seem to mind as he drank cupfuls. He also enthusiastically showed me pictures of when he was a soldier in the late 1950s. He was stationed in Xinjiang, the massive, mostly Muslim/Turkic province in northwestern China. China took over in the early 1950s. The takeover is called a “liberation” by the Chinese government, but my little knowledge makes it sound a little more complicated than that. Hence the reason soldiers like Grandpa Qin went out there to serve. I really wanted to talk with him about it, and started some conversation, but no one really seemed interested in talking about it. I was a little surprised about how little Qin Chen or her father knew or wanted to know about her Grandpa’s life. But, as a friend reminded me, life in China in the 1950s and 1960s was incredibly volatile, horrendous, and trying-so it might be something still too sensitive to discuss. It was cool enough to see the pictures though, he was quite proud of how young and handsome he looked fifty years ago.

We spent the night at Qin Chen’s rich uncle’s house-also in Hai’an (staying with the wealthiest relative is the modus operandi). It was quite nice, newly purchased and very well furnished. Danthemanstan was only staying for one night, so we got up the next morning. As we were on our way to the bus station, a classic Chinese experience occurred. Instead of getting to the station on time comfortably, we had to stop by one of Qin Chen’s friends’ parents’ restaurant. This has happened to me before when visiting Chinese friends. Instead of making it to the bus/train on time, thus reducing stress and making the visit better, the host will make sure to take the guest to one last place, to do one last thing. Thus, we had to hurry to the bus station; worried Danthemanstan would miss the last bus of the day. Even Qin Chen, who has spent so much time with some of us foreign teachers, can’t shed some classic Chinese tendencies now and then.

I spent the rest of that day the way most Chinese seemed to be spending it, walking around town, buying some snacks and shopping. I did buy a camera case, which was a way too complicated process for a country that is trying to use increased domestic consumerism to grow an economy at 8% annually. Visiting Qin Chen’s house in Qutang (the actual town/village where she lives) was very interesting and fun. Qin Chen and I rode bikes around town; it was very enjoyable. Qutang is a pretty small town, in that you can cover most of it on bike in half an hour. Yet, it’s still a full on, all senses, fast paced rush-as riding bikes in Chinese traffic, no matter how small the town, always is. There were a lot of people milling around due to the holiday and that there are villages all around the town, with rice, soybean, greens, and other fields interspersed. Qin Chen’s house hasn’t been hit by the Usain Bolt speed development in China, which makes it pretty cool to visit. In my opinion, it is a great example of the dramatic changes occurring in this country. The toilet consists of two concrete chunks on either side of a hole above a stagnant cesspool. It’s in the corner of a dirt floor, brick shed used mainly to store and dry bean stalks-which are used in one of the stoves (the other is gas). Meanwhile, Qin Chen sits in her parents’ bedroom on her laptop, sending videos she took with her camera phone to friends. Her cousin is talking with her and browsing and playing the collection of American pop songs on her phone.

As mentioned, the reason for the trip was the joint holiday of National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival. Like any relatively noteworthy holiday in China, Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated by lighting off fireworks. Chinese fireworks (in China nonetheless). Qin Chen wasn’t too excited about the fireworks, but you bet I was. So I spent about $15 and got a lot of fireworks. I kind of just pointed at about everything the guy on the street had, and got a big box of the type of fireworks you see at a fireworks show. I had a great time setting them off in the street outside Qin Chen’s house. Her dad and uncle were equally enthusiastic, and her dad even lit his huge stash of black cats off. All the neighbors came to check it out, and some even brought their fireworks to the party. Other than that the holiday consisted of Qin Chen’s grandmother doing some sort of incense/candle/laying out of food prayer that was to remember and nourish dead relatives. Her grandmother was way more into it than anyone else. The painting above the small shrine was Taoist, but the shrine looked more Buddhist-all in all it was probably more of the difficult to classify Chinese traditional mystical beliefs.

I have touched in this blog, and others about visits to Chinese homes, about Chinese hospitality. I returned to China both because I lead a comfortable life here and I really enjoy learning more about and experiencing foreign cultures. Even so, I don’t enjoy or understand everything about China, and I’ve never been one to hold my tongue. Visiting Chinese people is an awesome experience because you get to see how many of the people on our planet live, and this helps a lot in understanding the things my students and friends do and think. It is also a very trying experience for one’s patience and tact. I am aware enough to recognize that I have trouble exercising both of those traits. When visiting people in America, (well people that have been in America for awhile) it’s not that trying, because, in sharing a culture, almost everything is understood. The towels are over there, the juice is in the fridge, and all that jazz. Not so in China. It’s not like getting juice or a towel is that difficult (although dry towels can sometimes oddly be in short supply) but it’s rather the way it’s done. Essentially Chinese people think that they are doing what’s best for me by directing and telling me what to do at all times. They also think they’re helping me by repeating questions, which are often unnecessary or inane to begin with. I am the guest, and additionally a foreigner, so it’s best for them to explain every detail and ask multiple questions about said detail. All these questions, instructions, and general overbearing attention do nothing but frustrate me and add stress. At times I wonder how many times I have to say I’ll shower in the morning to convey the fact that I do, in fact, want and plan to shower in the morning. In order to be polite (and thus inefficient) I will refrain from expressing my frustration to the host. But this just means the frustration grows greater. Not insulting the cook is easy to do at a family style meal where one serves one’s self, and even easier when it’s buffet style. It’s not so easy when the cook is sitting next to you and is putting the food onto your plate. In this case Qin Chen’s mother, father, and grandmother were good cooks, so it wasn’t a problem…but I can’t say the same for everywhere I’ve visited. In complaining about this I remember when my family used to host visitors to Des Moines through some cultural exchange program. I wonder if the Taiwanese girls that visited would later complain about how the rude Americans just left them alone, without repeating the questions many times and generally looking after them at all times. Then again, we did make bowls of white rice for them at every meal…and I haven’t had any bread and butter put before me yet. Then again, those fried lotus roots were damn good!

Swine flu vacation to Qingdao

After just two days of class, class was over. Well, temporarily, at least. A number of students had become infected with H1N1, so the school wasn’t going to take any risks: classes were cancelled. The students infected were all sent to the hospital, while classmates and roommates were put into quarantine. The security guards at the front gate took everyone’s temperature upon entry and exit. Well, they allowed those in cars and us foreign teachers to walk by uninhibited. Apparently if you have enough money to buy a car or are foreign, you can’t contract the flu. This was quite a change from the spring, when all foreigners (since we all look alike to them) were assumed to have the flu. Luckily, (for me) China since developed a local case of the swine flu, so I have regained my larger than life status as a foreigner here.

Now, the isolation of the classmates and roommates who were not displaying any symptoms may seem a bit draconian. I don’t deny that it was to an extent, and the authoritarian attitude with which it was carried out is unacceptable. But, in this case, I can’t say it was as extreme as most of what the Chinese government does. Our campus, and eastern China in general, is a petri dish for communicable diseases. Huge populations crowded into small living spaces combined with a complete lack of both sanitary conditions and (in my opinion) poor sanitary education means that diseases will spread here…and fast.

I had the opportunity to visit one of my friends in isolation. I did this partly because I hadn’t seen her since returning, and because she had clearly relayed to me the boredom of isolation, and I wanted to find out if all the rumors I was hearing were true. So, I went over to the building, was stared at by the guard and attendant until Yuxi came down to meet me. The guard stood a few feet away from us while we chatted. We maintained a good three-foot gap as we chatted in the entryway (I didn’t want to give anyone any reason to put me in quarantine). She explained that she and her three roommates were sharing three beds and a desk in an old classroom. I actually taught a class in the building last year. It is definitely among the worse of the buildings on campus, and is mainly just used for offices. She said it was unbearably hot (the fan was broken); they were essentially at a flash shower every other day due to volume of students and supply of showers/hot water. She had only been given thirty minutes to get her stuff together and get to the isolation building. Thus, she didn’t have the time, or calm of mind, to pack well. So, she and her roommates were playing cards and sending text messages to friends (and apparently foreign teachers) the whole time. This was on day two. It lasted nine days. I’ll let you imagine. She was in a quandary because friends could bring her things if she wanted…but her whole class was in quarantine. Because they take all their classes together and live with their classmates…her list of friends to ask was pretty short. And no, I couldn’t help. No boys in the girl’s dormitory. I had dinner with her the other night…she said it was horrible; she was glad it was over and didn’t want to talk about it.

As oft is the case in life, one man’s loss is another’s gain. So, after a day or two of doubt about how long classes would be cancelled, I headed to Shanghai to attend a party at the apartment of a girl from my original CIEE group, meet up with Clark (who taught here last year) and search for some stuff for my computer-(note-the Apple store in Shanghai is not yet open…or just really hard to find). While enjoying some amazing food cooked by Clark’s girlfriend, Danthemanstan called me to see if I was down for a trip. Of course I was, although I’d have to manage with what I had brought for a one-night stay. So, I grabbed an early train back to Changzhou and met up with Danthemanstan, Sean, and Sarah. Jordan had already headed up to Qingdao to meet up with some people from his CIEE group, and it was on a short list of places that would be good for this trip, so we headed up there.

Qingdao is a beautiful, clean, calm city on the beach. For those who haven’t been to China, or are only reading government approved media, saying that somewhere in China is calm and clean is a bold claim. Bold. Because China, in a few words, is crowded, dirty, loud, and busy. Well, actually, the western third of this country consists of a huge desert, massive tundra, an expansive steppe, and no people. But, the aforementioned words apply to the center and east. Qingdao’s traffic was relatively orderly, its streets wide, and sidewalks weren’t too overrun with vendors. The business side of the coast was filled with a not too loud port complimented with hordes of fishermen. Every gap in the boats featured some fit, older Chinese men swimming or doing a pre or post swim stretch/slap. The slap refers to the Chinese custom of slapping/hitting oneself in all sorts of places and ways when doing exercise. My skeptical and American mind sees this as pretty useless, but they did win more gold medals than us in the most recent Olympics, so I am trying to be more open minded about some Chinese health techniques (of course those medals might just be due to 13-year-old gymnasts and massive government rewards for obscure medals).

The pleasure side of the coast featured some great beaches, generally full of couples taking wedding photos. 9-9-09 was a big wedding day in China due to numerology. October 1st (National Day) was a big wedding day in China due to patriotism. We hit that gap in the middle-hence the couples. We spent a day at the beach, haggling beer and umbrella prices in between dips in the perfectly warm water. What wasn’t perfect was the swimsuit I had to buy-it was bigger than a Speedo, but not by much. We spent another day checking out the old Protestant church (Qingdao was a German concession for awhile) and trying to go to the Catholic Church…that was apparently closed to tourists contrary to the guidebook’s “guidance”. Notch one for the Protestants in the ongoing post-1517 tally. When searching for a hotel, I had my first encounter with the “no room at the inn” syndrome for foreigners. Lots of books about foreigners in China, especially just after the 1978 opening, talk about how foreigners are only allowed to stay in certain hotels. Ostensibly this is done to direct foreigners to the nicest hotels that can best serve their needs. Realistically, it was done as a control/record keeping measure, which is why it has pretty much vanquished in most cities. Qingdao is holding on to the tradition in order to most likely boost tourism revenues. My pitiful attempts at Chinese wouldn’t convince them to let us stay…although at first I used whatever charm I may have to convince the receptionist, but the boss was having none of it. The next hotel was too expensive, and we were walking out to genuinely go to another hotel, but it worked as a bargaining strategy: the receptionist came out and offered us a good rate.

Danthemanstan wasn’t keen on the description of Mt. Lao in the guidebook, so he checked out some temples and the old prison next to our hotel while we climbed the famous Taoist and Buddhist mountain. Disappointingly, you can’t climb all the way to the peak (or we couldn’t figure how) but the climb does end in a pretty cool Taoist temple. Cool not because of the figures in the temple (same old, same old) but due to the sweet scenery and views of a mountaintop temple. Among the more interesting things we encountered on the mountain was tan, almost opaque gel that many vendors had for sale. It was made of something that looked like kind of like camel’s hair…but apparently came from the ocean. I tried to have Xingxing translate the name of it (which the vendor wrote down for me) but she said it didn’t really make sense and was more like the local name of the dish less than a description. It was served with garlic, peppers, vinegar, and hot sauce. They gave it some flavor, but it still pretty much tasted like it looked: bland and gooey.

Hands down the best part of the trip was what went into my mouth (that’s not an innuendo). Qingdao is famous for Tsing Tao beer (it uses the old English approximate spelling). It’s essentially the only beer exported from China to the rest of the world, although everyone here drinks Snow Beer (kind of like how you can find Budweiser in Europe, but no Bud Light). It’s pretty good, and uber-ubiquitous around town. You can even get it in a bag on the street: we did. We took the brewery tour, which was mostly through a museum. The best part was watching the bottling room, which despite 17% investment by Anheuser Busch has a long way to go to match the bottling at the brewery in St. Louis. Along with lots of Qingdao beer (including the dark variety) we ate fantastically. Kebabs of all variety were very tasty and go great with beer and some fried rice. By far the best thing that Qingdao had to offer was clams in a pepper sauce. They were incredibly tasty. I admit that I forgot my manners at one dinner and just parked the lazy Susan in front of me and unloaded all of them onto my plate. Now I just have to find a restaurant in Changzhou that serves ‘gala’ the clams…although we’re a bit inland, they might not be quite so good.