Chinese Profile #7: Steve Wu

Faithful readers of this blog are certainly not strangers to Steve. Wu Xuesong (吴雪松)or 吴老师 (Teacher Wu)as he’s know to everyone on campus, has been a frequent subject of this blog. DTMS and I often commented that we could easily write a book about him, and how disappointed we were to not have been prescient enough to have carried around a voice recorder to document all conversations had with the affable, inquisitive, irreverent, forthright, and jovial professor. Eating dinner at his house, sharing a beer or some tea with him after class, getting drenched playing badminton together, and poker nights peppered with his unpredictable comments became an institution of my two years in Changzhou, China.

Steve grew up in a rural community in Nantong, Jiangsu province. Nantong is the city north of the Yangzi River as it hits the Pacific. Shanghai is just across the river, but as the Yangzi is the third largest river, it divides these two cities completely. Nantong is a central city for the poor rice, peanut, and rape growing area. His family had been fairly well off landowners before the Japanese invasion/civil war/Cultural Revolution. But, having land was bad, bad news during the Cultural Revolution, so his grandparents were stripped of their land and his parents were pushed into the general poverty that permeated all of China in the 1960s and 1970s. Yet, his parents pursued and received some education, as well as saving enough to allow Steve to attend high school and college. Of course, he had to score well enough to do these things, and he did. He studied English education at Nanjing Normal University, a top tier university. He was a self-described nerd in college, never venturing very far from his English books, and certainly nowhere near the students of the fairer sex. He used a special relationship (关系) to allow him to take a job in Changzhou instead of returning to his hometown, Nantong, which was then the protocol for university graduates.

He would marry the first girl he kissed (Su ChuanXie?) and they would have a son, Wu PenFei (Michael) eleven years ago. But, for me and the rest of the “foreign experts” at JSTU, the important moment in his life happened about eight years ago. Steve was working as an English professor at an accounting school associated with JSTU (and now part of it) as well as its coordinator for foreign teachers (the job Teddy did for me). He was interested in the cultures of these young foreigners he was responsible for so he decided to make a big decision. He decided to lose lots of face (maintaining/losing face is super important in China) and try to talk with these foreign dudes in their own language, which would assuredly involve him making mistakes. Additionally, befriending foreigners would but him at some distance with his colleagues, family, and friends. The thing is, (and I’m generalizing because, generally, generalizations are true) Chinese people are really excited about Westerners, think they are all beautiful, rich, and smart yet, they don’t want to get to close to them or be seen as welcoming them too much. This is because a huge part of the Chinese identity is the purity of their race, culture, and history. In their minds, the Chinese have been an exclusive society, not bending to foreign ways, not interbreeding with others, and maintaining reign over their kingdom for 5,000 years. So, welcoming a foreigner or adapting too much to his ways, is seen as a traitorous affront to one’s identity as Chinese. Steve’s curiosity won out, and he made such an affront, so for the past eight or nine years, he has been going out of his way to befriend the foreign teachers that come every year, and most often, leave within one or two.

Steve has had the opportunity to travel to Australia twice, once for an English teaching conference and once to spend part of his summer with the family of an Aussie that taught at JSTU years ago. This brief glances into Western culture had piqued an interest in Steve that is almost insatiable. Some teachers found Steve a bit too needy at the beginning (always wanting to hang out) and a bit too direct when he would chat with them. Well, frankness isn’t really something that I have a problem with, so I was always happy to chat with Steve. Whether he was discussing his worries about the pressures the Chinese educational system put on his son (and how much pressure he should put) or whether girls with long fingernails get injured when masturbating, Steve always (and I mean always) had something on his mind that he wanted to discuss. Plus, his wife wasn’t a big fan of him drinking more than two beers, so Steve would occasionally seek refuge at my or Dave’s apartment for a few extra cold ones. And, man, did a couple of TsingTao’s really loosen Steve up. Needless to say I’ll look back with nothing but fondness and gratitude at the afternoons sitting on my porch with Teacher Wu.

Chinese Profile #6: Cao XingXing

(the one on the left)

I have to dust off my memory a little bit to write this profile, as Cao XingXing (曹星星) was not in Changzhou, or China for that matter, during my second year there. She took her love of English to England (quite appropriately) and studied at Coventry University there, getting a Master's in Marketing/Business Management. But, that doesn't diminish in any way the incredibly important role that XingXing played in making sure that I didn't end up stranded on some street corner in the middle of the night unable to say more than hello in Chinese.

XingXing was undoubtedly my first (Chinese) friend in China. I met her one day during my second or third week at JSTU. She was sitting at the extra desk in Teddy’s office, a place I visited with great frequency during my first semester. At this point, I was barely able to take in all the stimuli that one’s first few weeks in China involve. XingXing was cute and seemed cheery, so, I saw no reason to make her my main source for all questions Chinese. It turned out to be a good thing. I spent a lot of time with her during my first fall, and she would introduce her classmates Qin Chen and Zhao Min, who have also been frequent characters in this blog. XingXing was an awesome friend for two main reasons: 1) she spoke English incredibly well and loved doing it and 2) she had (among Chinese people) an uncanny and generally unmatched ability for sarcasm. The former quality made her a great friend of all the English teachers; the latter was especially appealing to me and my partner in crime, Dave.

It was not an attempt at hyperbole that I called her ability to use and understand sarcasm uncanny. Chinese people don’t really get sarcasm. Female Chinese college students (at least those in Jiangsu) are incredibly genuine people. This means they often paid me delightful compliments. It also means they were almost always shocked, offended, and sometimes even dismayed at even my most lighthearted and innocuous jokes. Not XingXing, she would laugh and dish it right back. (The only other girl I found capable of this was ZhenZhen, my former girlfriend.) XingXing was also a source of constant entertainment. Like many other English enthusiasts, XingXing made every effort to improve her language by learning and incorporating phrases and idioms into her language. XingXing was very intelligent and a good language learner; she thus knew that the key to learning new words/phrases is to use them frequently. Unfortunately, there are only so many times that the phrase “silver lining” comes up. XingXing would not be deterred, and I still remember the fortnight or so when XingXing tried relentlessly to find the silver lining in ever situation we encountered.

XingXing was fortunate enough to have hard working parents that had saved for half their working lives so that their daughter could do more with her life than they had been able to do. She admirably left the comfort and familiarity of Chinese society and went to a foreign land where they don’t use 汉字 (oh the horror), don’t eat rice with every meal, don’t even use chopsticks, and, on top of all that, call the hood and truck of a car the bonnet and boot (double horror). It was awesome to talk to XingXing as she studied in Coventry, England and experienced what I had experienced/was experiencing in China. Although, as we shared notes, going from a rich/developed/clean country to a poor/developing/dirty country and doing the reverse are in many ways different experiences even though they are both cross-cultural. I missed not having her and David around during my second year, but luckily DTMS was still there, and some awesome Americans came to teach, as well as a really cute, brash transfer student to keep me company.

Todo bien

Todo bien, or, everything's all right. I will blog more about my life here in Costa Rica soon, but it is going wonderfully, I'm in a town with a host family and my week is filled with Spanish classes (mine's quite rusty) and classes with the whole group in a central town

for lessons on teaching methods and cultural adaptation. Both the training hub town and where I live are located in the Central Valley, the area that holds San Jose, Heredia, Alajuela, and Cartago-the majority of Costa Rica's cities. I'm using some of my spare time to finally write up some thoughts on my two years in China. Internet is pretty sparse in my training town and training takes up a fair amount of time, so posts might take awhile. There is lots to learn in our three months of training to get us ready to be Volunteers, so lots of time is spent reading and doing worksheets. Included are some pictures from a walk around the woods with one of my many host brothers.

Profile #5: Zhao Min

Unfortunately for her, my most distinct memory of Zhao Min (赵敏) is the trip to the hospital I took after a weekend at her house when she graciously hosted my fraternity brother Clay and I. Now, there’s no conclusive evidence that the otherwise delicious food at Zhao Min’s gave me industrial strength food poisoning. But as delicious as the endless crayfish meal was, it may have been the culprit. It’s unfortunate because getting someone sick is about the last thing Zhao Min would try to do to someone. I met Zhao Min through Xingxing during the middle of my first year in Changzhou. Zhao Min, Xingxing and Qin Chen were a unit with whom Dave and I spent a lot of time during the first year. This past year she was generally present at dinners, parties, and most social activities that the foreign teacher crew engaged in.

Zhao Min is from a fairly well to do family in a very poor part of the country. Her dad is a retired teacher and with her mother manages a small hardware store in Da Feng, the town where they live. It’s a nice, quiet, if country tough town north of the Yangzi, and close to the Pacific Coast in Jiangsu Province. For me, Zhao Min represents very well her generation, and a generation that will be the business owners, teachers, government leaders, and possibly voters (oh the horror) in the China that will undoubtedly be of major import over the next few decades. She came from a family that had lived in the same general area for a long, long, long time. China’s massive development over the last 40 years allowed her to attend college in another city. It allowed her to learn a foreign language (something held for only a few (very few) elites in China until these past 40 years. Learning this foreign language allowed her to get a job working in exports, another thing which was essentially unheard of in China until 40 years ago (some of the 19^th century experiments with foreigners did not work out too well). This job gives her enough money to buy all sorts of products, especially name brand clothes from Europe and the US and make up from Japan. All these things are so utterly new and different from a China that for thousands of years avoided expansion and invasion.

Zhao Min works for a company that makes and prints shopping bags for Abercrombie and Fitch, Wal Mart’s specialty and holiday bags, and an assortment of lesser-known Western retailers. Her job, with her business English degree, is to translate contracts, orders and printing instructions for these bags. Not exactly growing rice and peanuts like the generations of people in her family did before her. Another way in which she personifies China’s generation Y is that Zhao Min works a lot. A lot. Even during her final semester, as she was interning at the same company, she would put in 50-60 hours a week. She’s paid by monthly salary. Such is the competition among China’s current college graduates. China’s commendable push for education has created a surplus of college-educated workers as the economy has not developed quickly enough to need these skilled workers. Contrarily, there is a dearth of unskilled laborers. So, Chinese workers like Zhao Min will put in long hours without any overtime pay, just to keep a job. I think the pressure making Zhao Min work 70 hours a week for pay that isn’t going to make anyone rich anytime soon comes from two sources. With its lack of religion or open discussions about society, values, and all that jazz; young Chinese people seek acceptance in consumption. China’s never been rich before, at least not across such a wide part of society, so it’s buy, buy, buy. Zhao Min, as humble as her roots, is certainly a part of this group. So, you have to work if you want that new jacket or purse. Additionally, the other pressure comes from China’s older than dirt filial piety. Zhao Min thinks that she owes all her success to her parents (and not at all to the fact that Americans won’t think twice to open a new Abercrombie and Fitch credit card). So, Zhao Min will throw her all at the best job she can get to prove her love to her parents. Zhao Min is very traditional, so despite the many pleads I made her to take just sentence off a page of a chapter of my book and try to enjoy her youth when she is more or less unencumbered, she is still grinding away at a job she does not necessarily like. To be clear, there are plenty of job opportunities in China, even with all the competition, and Zhao Min would be overqualified for jobs in the area she’s from. (The Yangzi River Delta, where Changzhou is, is maybe the most competitive region in China).

But don’t just think of Zhao Min as a workaholic, because she also is, like so many Chinese people I met, gracious and hospitable like no one else. Always willing to do a favor and suffer through some poorly planned shopping adventure in Changzhou. And, like the food poisoning, I won’t soon forget how her parents gave up their bed (despite our protests) so Clay and I could sleep in the room with air-conditioning when we visited.

Chinese Profile #4: Lu Wenbin

Much like his roommate and friend Jefferson, Lu Wenbin or Edison, also chose the name of a famous American luminary. I had the wonderful fortune of teaching Edison spring of my first year, but remained friends and frequent conversation partner with him over my second year as well. Edison was a sharp kid, and also quite the rising star within the Communist Youth League (apparatus set up for high school and college Chinese students to prepare themselves for joining the Chinese Communist Party). Edison was amiable and gregarious, and seemed to maintain friendships with oh so many of his female classmates. He, in true Chinese fashion, would sharply rebuke any suggestion I made that there was anything romantic to the relationships. Chinese students have the famous DTR (determine the relationship) talk much earlier in the relationship than Americans (or at least my American peers). Kissing, holding hands, even light petting unequivocally do not occur before the boyfriend-girlfriend status has been achieved.

Despite being very interested in politics, social order, and religion, like his friend Jefferson (and Steve Wu) he was, in my opinion, much more typical than the other two men who I have written/will write about. One common misconception about China and the Chinese is that it is very ancient, rustic, and everyone is walking around in the drab or navy suits of Mao’s era. Such a thought couldn’t be further from the truth, well at least not for the majority of Chinese that now live in cities, mostly along the eastern seaboard. Edison was as interested in fashion as the checkout girl at Banana Republic. Yes, Chinese people put the family above all else, and think of themselves as a part of a family-not really an individual. But, Chinese kids in the city are spoiled. So, Edison was always showing up to English corner or a lunch and chat with some new flashy graphic tee, a super Asian-y white men’s jacket, or some stylish jeans that might qualify as metrosexual back in the States, but pass just fine in Changzhou.

Edison really enjoyed learning English and was very involved in a volunteer project teaching English to a school for students of migrant workers. He is studying English education, and I think his genial personality and eagerness for the subject would make him a great teacher. But Edison most likely won’t be a teacher. A conversation I had with him is one of the best examples I can give to demonstrate the collectivist thinking that the Chinese employ. Upon asking Edison what job he was planning to take after graduation, or would like to take, he responded, “I will become a soldier.” Normally, those trying to become soldiers go one of China’s many military colleges. Some produce officers, many less competitive schools provide common soldiers. Being a soldier in China is quite prestigious. China has a huge affinity for its military, which they view as protecting it from the ‘evil separatists’ in Taiwan and the ‘evil imperialist Americans’ that help them, the ‘terrorist Buddhists’ in Tibet, the ‘rebellious Muslims/Uyghurs’ in Xinjiang, their old foes the Japanese, and all the other threats to China’s ‘long overdue’ resurgence. Now Edison just said, “I will become a soldier,” and worry not, it wasn’t a lack of English that formed his terse reply. When I inquired why, he informed me that it was his father’s wish. I, always willing to push an issue, asked him if it was his wish. His response, which I still remember, was so telling (even more so coming from a student that had fairly good critical thinking skills). He said, “it is also my wish, because it is my father’s wish.” And that is just one example of how Chinese culture, despite all the rapid changes/development that have occurred, is still very different from that of Uncle Sam’s land.

Heading south for the winter

Well, actually this winter, next, and then much of a third. I leave tomorrow to begin serving in/working for the Peace Corps. Note: I prefer to say working for the Peace Corps because my housing, food, and a small stipend are provided-sounds a lot like a job to me. I will be teaching English as a foreign language in Costa Rica. More information on the Peace Corps and Costa Rica is in the super handy and appropriately named 'Related Links' menu on the right. After three months of training, I will be assigned to a location based on my skills/lack of skills assessed during training. I am incredibly excited about the opportunity to spend time in a new part of the world, to meet people from a culture different than mine, to better understand another culture, and most importantly have fun doing it. I feel very lucky that I was placed in a country known for it's natural beauty and work protecting it. I don't yet know what my telephone and Internet situation will be during training or during service. If you would like to contact me, email is by far the best way to do it, if you don't have it, leave me a comment on this blog (preferably after the most recent post).

I will continue to post to this web log (aka blog) a few more posts about my experience teaching English in Changzhou, Jiangsu, China. I spent the summer working, hanging out with friends, getting to know the Des Moines bar scene, and traveling to visit friends in Tulsa, Colorado Springs, and St. Louis. Thus, I didn't spend much time in front of my computer typing up blog posts-but spent lots of time in front of the computer trying to soak up American culture. I hope that posts about China while I'm living in Costa Rica don't get too confusing. I'd like to thank everyone who reads this blog, I hope you find it slightly above bearable. I appreciate any and all comments you would like to leave; especially any spelling or grammatical corrections. I'll do my best to get back and change them. Also note that if you click on the link titled My Photos-Picasa Photo Gallery, you will be able to see all the pictures I have taken in my travels.

I spent the last two years getting paid by an institution run by the Communist Party of China. I'm assuming there will be some differences working for Uncle Sam. I'll keep you posted. With that, I'll next be reaching you via the magic world of ones and zeros from Costa Rica.

Post script: this blog will begin to carry a disclaimer that it expresses my views and not those of the Peace Corps. I fully agree with that statement and the reason I should display it. I think the blog's title makes it clear whose thoughts are being expounded.