Profile #2: Wu Meng

I met Wu Meng pretty early on in my time in China, at English Corner. English Corner was held every Thursday night, and is a super common trend across universities and towns in China. China's enthusiasm for learning English is giant, as they look to further expand their economy, development, and power in world affairs. So, I did my best over the two years to be at English corner, to give students (and anyone else making the trip to campus) an opportunity to practice English with a native speaker. Wu Meng (English name Jefferson) was one of David's students last spring, and took David's advice to come to English corner. I have to say that I am very glad that he did. Much to other students' chagrin, by about the third or fourth English corner that Jefferson had attended, I stopped talking to almost anyone else. That was because Jefferson, along with his roommate and friend Lu Wenbin (Edison), wanted to talk about things that most Chinese avoid: politics, government, religion, social change, human rights, and other things that are right up my ally. Of course, almost every other English corner attendee wasn't at all interested in these concepts, which made our conversations nice and small. Throughout the year Jefferson would sometimes come by David's or my apartment and drink some tea or beer and chat. (Only downside was Jefferson didn't need an invitation-he was much more likely to just pop in). I'm sure I have written more than a few times that one of the most wonderful things about China was the opportunity to talk with people that had highly divergent values and opinions than mine. What made Jefferson so great was that he was willing to risk losing face and express those opinions to a foreigner. For Americans, who are raised to accept dissent, critical thinking, and differences, saying what one thinks is commonplace. For Chinese, it takes a great bunch ofcourage.

When my college friend and fraternity brother Clay came to visit last spring, it was our great pleasure to spend a night at Jefferson's house. His family, just like him, was kind, generous, and good humored. Jefferson is from rural Baoying, Jiangsu Province. Baoying is in the northern half of Jiangsu, meaning it is significantly poorer and less developed than Southern Jiangsu (where Changzhou is). His parents run a private pre-school and kindergarten, which certainly is the reason that he is so interested in learning and thinking. Furthermore, he is lucky enough to have-by Chinese standards-open minded and supportive parents. Now, all Chinese parents are extremely supportive of their children (often just child) if they follow the parents' wishes to a t. Yet, as Jefferson often would tell me, he was so happy his parents let him choose his major, his summer job, his free time activities. Jefferson is very ambitious (he spends much free time working part time jobs) and his energy for learning English is substantial. He spends many of his breaks from school attending private English classes. There were some students like Jefferson, but most were a bit indolent when it came to career goals. I would like to think that his parents' more relaxed approach might be one of the causes, allowing him to choose a path he enjoyed.

In a discussion one night at English corner, Jefferson commented on why he thought that no matter how much he talked with me or any of the other English teachers, no matter how many episodes of Friends he watched, and no matter how many Western books he read (in English) he wouldn't ever see things the same as I. As he explained, Chinese people first think about the "mainstream"-as he put it. Their deference to family and society dictates their thinking and decision making. But, Americans think about the individual when making decisions. I totally concur with his analysis. While we Americans might not want to consider ourselves selfish, when compared to the average Chinese, we certainly are. It's Jefferson's ability to notice these things, and being courageous enough to talk about them as well as his personal ambition that makes him one of the more memorable people from my time in China.