Improve Chinese by Saturday Morning Cartoons

Back during Peace Corps training in Chengdu, I remember being excited about understanding a lot of the Chinese dialogue while watching a cartoon for 5-7 year old kids about a little boy and his parents.

Watching Chinese cartoons for children is probably an excellent way to improve one's listening skills and if you watch it with a language tutor probably will help improve one's vocabulary. I would love to watch fantasy and science fiction cartoons; however, the vocabulary and the situations the characters get into are too alien from Chinese used in everyday life. My language skills are not to that level yet. I am still working on being able to express my life story, dreams, and opinions in Chinese in a fluid way.

I am looking for Chinese cartoons for children that have everyday life situations. I would love to find the cartoon about the little boy and his two parents that I watched in Chengdu. Do you have any suggestions? I found this 大头儿子小头爸爸 cartoon. It is nice for language class because it is a 7 minute show.

When will summer vacation start?

I have teacheritis kind of like senioritis where as the ending of the school year approaches the less motivated people are to work. This is not the time to be having a motivational problem since I might still have at least 7 more weeks of school; although, my 8 hours of senior classes is rumored to be coming to an end in about 3-4 weeks. It will leave me with 4 hours of freshmen classes till the end of the semester.

As an American one would assume that there is a written out schedule for when finals will be and when graduation is, but here in China schedules come out a few days before the event.

The school wants me to have the final for the seniors written by next week; however, I have no idea when I will stop teaching which means I have no idea how many more literary works we will be studying. Because of this semester's chaotic schedule with the seniors I have only actually taught them about a total of 5 lessons in the past 4 months. How many more lessons will I teach?

One must learn to give up the idea of planning ahead and one must learn to expect the unexpected. These ideas are not only important lessons used during work but also for play.

We often learn maybe a couple days before a holiday that we will get a three day weekend. It makes it hard to plan trips.

I have no idea when anything ends or starts. This is probably one of the reasons contributing to my teacheritis. There is no end date in sight. It is impossible to start a countdown of when my summer vacation begins.

It is unsettling and because I am unmotivated to work I kind of wish that next Wednesday someone will inform me that we have a four day weekend next week; although, our school has restricted our travels. We are not allowed to leave our site because of the two cases of H1N1 flu in China.

What can I do as my heart feels impatient for the summer vacation to start? Take each day as it comes and don't think about summer vacation.

Is it time to grow up?

I have never held a high paying job preferring living new experiences than making a lot of money. After finishing my PhD in physical chemistry and biomaterials, I spent a year doing minimum wage jobs in construction, in the bakery of a grocery store and in home health care. Then I did Peace Corps Africa. I am still in Peace Corps, still a volunteer, except now I am living in China.

I have never made money.

I have gained a lot of skills and experience in the past 10 years and I have learned that I don't want to work in a lab nor do I want to be a teacher unless I am living in an interesting place where I am not working 40 hours a week. My priorities are having time and living in a place I love. My priorities are not money or security.

However, it is expensive to die especially if you reach retirement age. Is it time to grow up? Up until now I have lived with the philosophy, "Work to meet one's basic necessities." Must I leave my philosophy to the wayside?

Should I adopt a new philosophy? "Work so I can pay for my death"

If I have to start working to make more than a volunteer's monthly allowance, what type of work should I do?

Clothes Shopping and Tailors

I really hate shopping for clothes in China. There are several reasons:

1. I have to change my fashion taste of simple cuts and single colors for rhinestones, shiny decals, ruffles, lace, bright colored floral and geometric patterns, and jewel like buttons.
2. Finding clothes that fit my broad shoulders can be frustrating.
3. Knowing when and if to bargain makes my heart flutter with worry. I really hate bargaining.
   

My success with tailors?

Well I have had three pieces of clothing copied from clothes that I had tailored made in Africa.

Two of the three were not copied perfectly.

Because I like wearing my pants at my hips rather than around my belly button, the tailor wasn't sure what to do with the crotch and I have a nice pair of warm winter pants whose crotch is too low. Those pants cost 90 RMB.

I had a dress copied. The armholes were way too big such that you can see my bra and rather than being a tightly fitting dress it is more like a nightgown. Hopefully, tomorrow they will fix it. It cost 100 RMB.

I had another pair of pants copied which were copied perfectly. They cost 100 RMB

I want to get a western style sundress made from a picture I found on the internet; however, I am a bit worried. Maybe I should stick with the styles that the tailors are familiar with like a button down form fitting collared shirt.

I accompanied a friend to an expensive tailor who is making her a Tang dress, a traditional Chinese dress. I think they are very pretty; however, I am not sure when and where I would wear one. They are really formal and expensive. Her dress cost 255 RMB.

Who are my friends? students or teachers?

What is the role and friendship life of a foreign teacher in China like?

I believe the life and role of a Peace Corps volunteer teaching in China is unique and cannot really be compared to being a Chinese teacher or a teacher in the USA.

Many volunteers become very close to their students, inviting their students to dinner and to their homes, doing activities like sports, KTV (karaoke), hikes, watching movies, and some even go out and drink with their students. This is unique. One of our Peace Corps goals is to promote a better understanding of Americans while learning about another culture. What better way to do this than through students.

In America do you ever remember socializing with your teachers when you were an undergraduate student in college? Do you ever remember your teachers offering extra-curricular activities for you to join? Professors were busy and had their own lives. Their job was to teach in the classroom and offer office hours. Their life was not the campus.

One might argue that maybe China is different than America. Maybe in China, students socialize with their teachers. How many students actually socialize with their Chinese teachers? In my observations, very few.

In China, as a foreigner our lives revolve around the campus and the students. We offer extra-extracurricular activities. We participate in English corners. We run clubs and throw cultural learning parties. We show movies. We are not like American teachers nor are we like Chinese teachers. We are unique additions to a Chinese college campus.

In China, it is easy to make friends with students. They are eager to practice their English as well as eager to learn about another culture. They find foreigners easy going and available to do social activities with. Friendship with students makes sense. As a foreigner entering into a new community we have no friends and can't really speak Chinese well enough to make intellectually engaging friends with non English speakers. Therefore, the best people to make friends with are students and fellow teachers.

However, many volunteers find teachers not to be very friendly. Volunteers more often have students as friends than fellow teachers. Why is this? Are the teachers afraid of the foreigners? Shouldn't the teachers make an effort to become friends with a foreigner? In my opinion the reason, I haven't made many friends who are teachers is because well, teachers are busy. They teach 15-18 hours a week. They have families with whom they have to spend time with. They have lessons to plan. They have other responsibilities. They have their set of friends. Plus just because I am the foreigner doesn't mean we will get along. How do we know our personalities will match?

Anyways, it is not a requirement to be friends with fellow co-workers. But then one may wonder why isn't there more of an open dialogue or social friendliness between co-workers. Why do we rarely ever say hello or have a conversation with our co-workers when we meet in the hallway? It is like there is a foreigner group of teachers and a Chinese group of teachers and they don't mix. Well one reason we don't mix is because we don't go to the teacher meetings. Thank goodness. I would not enjoy sitting through hours of Chinese twice a month. And there isn't really a place for teachers to congregate and just chat. People go to their classrooms, to the office, and home again. We just don't cross paths.

Playing basketball with the women of the English department, I believe will open doors to become more social with teachers who have families. It is hard making friends with people who have families. Even in America, I knew very few people who were married with children. As a single woman, I make friends with other non-married people. Mothers make friends with mothers because they tend to have something in common to talk about, their children. In China where most people are married by the time they are 25, can you imagine the chasm that I have to cross to make friends with non-students?

In Africa, I learned the best way to start becoming friends with a community was to leave my hut. Go sit under a public tree for an hour. I believe this lesson is also good for China. Instead of just staying in the apartment, of doing errands, of having specific planned social outings, I need to go somewhere regularly within my community for an hour.

This advice has been proven true by the fact that by regularly exercising in the mornings on the playground, I run into people who I recognize but never had a conversation with. They recognize me as the foreigner basketball player and we start a conversation.

Being a teacher and a friend with students is not the only role of a volunteer. Another role is to try to make a connection with people of different generations. This is more challenging, but is possible. Sometimes instead of waiting for someone to make the first move, I have to do it. I have to invite teachers out for dinner or to play badminton. Maybe they will be able to fit me into their busy schedules of responsibilities and desire to spend time with their children.

Of course, I am quite happy and with the friendships I have formed with students; however, seeing the lifestyles of families and single teachers would also be quite interesting.

A non-fuzzy peach

I bit into a peach and was shocked. It had a smooth skin. It wasn't fuzzy. I thought to myself, "I haven't ever eaten a peach that wasn't fuzzy. How strange." Then I realized, oh it's a nectarine. It has been at least 3 years since I have eaten a nectarine. I had forgotten about that type of fruit.

Perfect Living Situation: Give me two dorm rooms

This past weekend, my sitemate and I were invited on a bike ride and dinner in a teacher's dorm room.

I loved the living setup! It was perfect, simple and just enough space.

The teachers' dormitory is a building 5 stories high. The hallways are lined with doors that open up into a room with a concrete floor and big windows. There are doors off the hallway that lead to community sinks and bathrooms. I didn't see the showers, but I would suspect you have to go to another building to pay for a shower.

This particular teacher had two unconnected rooms. She used one as a bedroom/office and the other as a kitchen and dining area which she shared with other teachers.

It is the perfect setup. You have your own private space and then have a community kitchen and dining area. You get both privacy and the opportunity to meet people and form a network of cooking buddies, sports fanatics, and conversational friends.

However, I don't think I would enjoy this setup in the USA. Why? Well in the states, the individualistic society makes it difficult to form a community. For some reason, people like their space and usually meet people out on town to socialize. People create distance between themselves even if it is their next door neighbor. How many people do you know in your apartment complex or neighborhood? How many people do you know who start conversations with someone on the bus?

I remember a friend living in a shared apartment where each person had their own locked room. There was a communal kitchen and two bathrooms. Everyone went into their rooms and locked themselves in. No one talked or socialized. They were living in close proximity but a strong wall was put up.

In China, this wall is thin. People start talking to strangers on trains. They make small talk with store keepers. They exercise together. For example, tonight I saw about 50 older people all doing aerobics together in front of their apartment complex. Every morning, people walk to the hot water pipes to collect boiled water in kettles. In a place where most people walk to the supermarket, forming a tight knit community is easier than in a community of people driving around in their bubbles.

As an American from an individualistic society, I do cherish my privacy and am not lonely living alone which is difficult for people of a collective society to understand. I also, though, enjoy the benefits of living in a community oriented society. I also like the idea of shared community resources rather than having my own personal resources.

Hopefully some day in the future, I can live in my own dorm room in a community that is open to making friends rather than closing doors to strangers.

Bike Trip to a Local Lake

Friday was a holiday, May 1st, worker holiday. Caitlin and I planned on biking to Heshui, a 40-100 km distance, depending on who you talk to; however, the night before the weather had turned cold and windy. Who wants to bike an unknown distance in cold, against wind?

Instead we went on a short 2.5 hour bike ride exploring the countryside. We found this tiny neighborhood in the middle of farmland. We ate ice cream. One lucky girl got Caitlin's artificially flavored ice. We then headed back and fought an hour against wind, dust, and more wind.

When I got home, I received a text from a psychology teacher who I had just met the other night in the English library. It said, "Would you like to have a trip to the valley near the new campus by foot or by bicycle?"

I replied, "I am too tired today," but then we made plans to meet on Saturday for a bike trip and then lunch afterwards at her teacher dormitory.

In Spring, the landscape of Gansu is incredible. You will be riding along this flat road bordered by beautiful green farmland and then boom, you hit the edge of the plateau and wow. It is such a beautiful sight.

We biked to the edge and then started biking down the valley on a dirt road to find a lake.

On our way down, we collected veggies to cook.

Caitlin ground some grain.

Caitlin then wisely suggested that we park and lock our bikes. Who wants to push a bike up a mountain? We headed down by foot.

At the bottom we found motorcycles and a car owned by fishermen who had no luck today. We headed back up around noon and were treated to a lovely meal by the teachers.
It was such a lovely outing, very chill, good language practice, and plenty of exercise.

Knitting in China

The weather is warming up and I rarely wear my knitted socks anymore. Last fall I started learning how to knit socks out of need because the Chinese markets didn't sell any thick socks and my African sandal-adapted feet were freezing. But then Kyan sent me a care-package thankfully overdoing it with socks and now my cupboard is piled high with warm socks.

My students find it funny that I still wear somewhat thick socks as the weather is warming and I find it funny that they wear thin socks even when there is snow on the ground.

As the weather warms up, what shall I knit? Why socks of course. Next fall is fast approaching and it would be nice to be able to give socks as winter gifts. My hands like to always be in motion with a preference for no brain knitting. This is why I picked out The Classic Sock pattern from the book 2-at-a-time SOCKS by Melissa Morgan-Oakes.

My first pair turned out to be too narrow to fit over an ankle and therefore I changed them into fingerless gloves, a great suggestion by my sitemate.

My second pair fits perfect.

My third pair will again be maroon. I hope everyone likes maroon. I bought way too much yarn for my ribbed tank top.
I want to buy new yarn and to start new projects; however, I have so much leftover yarn from felting projects that I really need to use it up. The yarn I can buy in my city isn't very fancy. It is pretty uninteresting, basically wool and acrylic mixtures. It was really hard for me to find 100% wool that is feltable. I would hand the yarn merchant a note in Chinese asking for 100% wool. She would direct me to a wall of color. I went through 100's of RMB worth of 100% wool yarn that didn't felt for some reason. The yarn packaging in Chinese would say 96% wool + 4% + 10% something else. It was such a strange label for a scientist. That 14% something else doesn't felt.

I like felting projects. I have used up all of the wool that I bought in America during my Jan/Feb 2009 homeleave.

He Yelled at Me

Dressed in Muslim hats, male street vendors have been pushing large carts with a foot high cake filling an area of at least four Monopoly game boards. This curious block is decorated with chewy candies on top. It reminds me of Christmas fruitcake.

One evening while sitting at an outdoor BBQ joint, I saw the huge cake being pushed down the street. I try anything that is edible.

My language skills have improved greatly these past few months where my teaching load of 12 hours a week has taken a hit dwindling down to 4 hours a week. Teaching has been replaced with almost daily one hour lessons of Chinese; therefore, I was not prepared for being unable to communicate. Even during my first week in China, I was able to buy food and an umbrella.

Stopping the cake man, I understood the rhythm of his phrases, but did not understand the specifics. When I asked the price, I understood in general that he was saying a half kilo costs this much money. But I did not catch the specific details. He did not speak the Mandarin that I understand but a dialect completely foreign to me.

When in language doubt, I start guessing which this time was not a good idea.

I miss-assumed that food in China is cheap and miss-assumed that this cake was not heavy.

With body language, he asked us to show him how much to cut off. He cut a 12 inch by 12 inch, 1 inch thick slab. He asked me to help him with the bag and once he put it in the bag, I was like, "Uh oh. This cake is SUPER heavy!" It was a dense 15 pound slice of a nut cake.

I asked how much.
I understood, "8 RMB."
I handed him the 8 RMB.
And then he started yelling!
I kept saying, "I don't understand. How much?"
He pointed to a stranger watching and asked him to help us.
The stranger said, "I don't speak English."
The vendor kept yelling, coz of course the logic goes the louder you shout the better the person will understand you.
It worked.
I finally understood that he was wanting 80 RMB for the cake.
I was shocked!
I told him, "I don't have 80 RMB with me."
I handed him 10 RMB.
He cut me a new piece, a 3 by 3 inch sliver.

Twas an awkward miscommunication.
I hate being yelled at.
And the cake wasn't even sweet.

Easy Salty Rice Porridge

Makes about 6 helpings.
Ingredients
1/2 cup of rice
salt
chicken bullion
sesame oil
garlic
ginger
mushrooms
pork
baby bak choy
Add any other meats and vegetables that you like.

Instructions

1. Except for the quick cooking vegetables like bak choy, throw everything into the pot. Add the quick cooking vegetables towards the end when the porridge is almost ready.
2. Add 12 times as much water as rice.
3. Boil for as long as you want. The longer the congee boils, the rice soup will become a thicker porridge.

Tips: I like to start boiling the rice with the water and then start chopping my vegetables and meat to add.

Two More Games!

Thank goodness Caitlin played tonight. We won 38-14 against Chemistry, a friendly game. I totally just walked up and down the court and didn't attempt to score. I was exhausted! Caitlin scored 30 points!
They then asked me to play one more game, a friendly game for show. Older men against female students majoring in PE. I played with the older men, but had to quit. I just couldn't play anymore especially a fast paced game against players who know how to play! It was real basketball compared to the rugby b-ball we had been playing all week.

I am tired!

FYI More pictures of the game can be found.

Last Game? Please!

English Department versus Grounds Keeping Staff 24-14

We won the Championship.

I am pooped.

I have been playing four 40 minute games straight now and they want me to play more tomorrow. I thought we had won the championship 2 games ago. It just keeps going and going and going. When will basketball end?

Yesterday's game with PE really wiped me out.
Then today running from half court to the backline to get the ball trying to beat the girl who was hugging me totally wiped me out.

At the end of the game, my missed layups and my last two free throws indicated just how exhausted I was- one brick and one air ball.

Hopefully Caitlin will be all better from her mysterious sharp constant pain and can play tomorrow! The appendix well, umm... that was a mistranslation from the Chinese doctors to the English speakers. She actually didn't have a problem with her appendix.

Women's Basketball 14-7

PE Department vs English Department

We had our first loss, but we are still playing for the championship tomorrow night against the ground keeping staff. The PE department isn't part of the championship since they are "professional." They are like the varsity team and everyone else is the junior varsity team. There is a grand prize of 600 RMB which is $100.

The PE department was wise to our game and in the first quarter I couldn't play. While playing defense, I was hugged and grabbed the whole time. Finally the refs started calling fouls on the girl even though I didn't even have the ball. The PE team actually started playing better once they stopped playing defense against my defense. They know how to move the ball and get open shots. Plus they can shoot. By guarding me, they were losing a useful player. I don't steal the ball. I play defense to let people play. I have no idea why they think playing defense against my defense is helpful.

Whenever I got the ball and was dribbling, the would swipe my arm as I burst past them and I would lose control of the ball. Offense was hard too because they played a zone defense and our English teachers didn't know how to spread the court. I did score all of the points, but didn't make all of my free throws which probably could have made a big difference in the ending score.

Plus we didn't have Caitlin who was sidelined due to a stupid appendix. The pain woke her at 3 am this morning and she was at the hospital all day long. She is home but still isn't totally out of the red zone.

Tonight's game was a lot more fun than last night's game. There were a lot of PE students and English students cheering and you could feel the competition in the air. The PE department had to win. Their pride was riding on it.

Tomorrow's game will be tough! I bet the grounds keeping staff are strong.

More Women's Basketball

English Department versus Biology Department

Yesterday, the English department had a win against the the Biology department. Caitlin and I sat out for the second half and our English teacher teammates did really well. They played great defense, had great teamwork, and even scored several points.

16-6 English Department versus Library Staff

The day before we had been forewarned that the library staff was strong, but Caitlin and I had no idea what that meant. I have often heard that strong women in China means women who can play sports. I didn't know if strong meant physically strong or had strong basketball skills.

My two years on the rugby pitch did not prepare me for tonight's game. In rugby, I know how to give back what the opposing team gives me. In basketball, I don't know how to tackle the opposing team.

We started out strong with quick teamwork and good passing allowing our players to get close to the basket to make shots and score. My shots were not falling though, yet with good teamwork we still pulled ahead little by little. Our poor teammates were exhausted from playing such great defense. They really hustled for the ball and everyone on the team contributed to the score. I only made 2 free throws and 2 baskets.

Our biggest problem was that everytime one of our players would get the ball, several of the opposing team's players would pounce on her allowing no room to dribble, to pass, to do anything other than get grabbed, tugged at, scratched at, pulled down to the floor. It wasn't a free flowing running game. Turnovers were jump balls and fouls. We were exhausted from fighting for the ball, not from running up and down the courts.

Caitlin said, "My arm hurts it's so scratched up."

Even if I could dribble out, I could only bounce the ball maybe twice before being pulled back into the midst of three players and having the whistle blown for various fouls. This was happening at half court no where near the basket. As I would receive a pass, I would do face smashes against nails. As I would shoot, I would do body smashes against girls trying to defend their basket. While I was trying to play defense, girls would be turned facing me getting into my way, physically blocking me with their arms and bodies so I couldn't guard the person with the ball. They were playing defense against my defense rather than trying to offensively receive the ball to shoot.

It was a miracle that Caitlin could even up our score by six points because even with all of her height, everytime she got the ball she was pulled down smack to the floor by hoards of women two heads shorter than her. It was like Lilliputians trying to bring down Gulliver. "I almost threw up my fangbian mien or shit myself everytime they elbowed me in the gut," commented Caitlin.

I now understand what the forewarning of strong meant. It meant aggressively strong. The library staff also had pretty good skills. They could dribble and could pass the ball around. And their defense? Well, they prevented us from dominating and it was a basketball game, that Caitlin and I had never experienced before.

We have one more game. English department versus PE department. I wonder what that is going to be like. I saw them play a couple days ago. They've got game and I am out of shape.

Happiness: Yours or Mine

"Authentic intimacy is not brought about by denying our own desire to be happy in unhappy deference to others, nor by denying others in narcissistic deference to ourselves." Loving-Kindness by Sharon Salzberg

Having lived 3 years in foreign countries, I find the line between my happiness and the happiness of others quite confusing. Sometimes I have had to deny parts of my identity to make others happy, denial to keep me safe and socially accepted into a community. Sometimes as a foreigner, I was given special privileges denying others their happiness. Sometimes I had to accept situations that made me unhappy, but made others happy.

The most recent example of confusing happiness is the competition for a piano room.

One Sunday morning, I went to practice piano. I thought Sunday mornings would be slow practice mornings at my college. I was wrong. I was using my American assumptions that Sunday is a day of rest. The Chinese students' viewpoint is that Sunday is the day to get back to work after the weekend. The practice rooms were alive with slamming doors, scales, opera, and drums.

The key woman took me to the best piano and kicked a student out. He left with visible anger and unhappiness to practice on a lower quality piano. As the foreigner I was given a privilege. This made me unhappy. This made a student unhappy. Did this make the key woman happy? After realizing that the music department was full of students, I practiced for 30 minutes feeling guilty for taking a piano from a student and then left.

Two weeks later, through indirect communication, I learned that the student had been criticized gravely for showing his emotions of anger and unhappiness for having to give up his piano to a foreign teacher. I was told that music students have bad manners since they are weaker students than the academic students. I was told to come back to the piano rooms to practice. I haven't been back since that incident not because I was afraid of taking another student's piano or because I was offended by the student's manners, but because I have been busy with sports and organized outings these past weekends. I wonder what the key woman assumed by my actions of not showing up weekly causing her to send me an indirect message through another teacher.

This incident is an example of the confusion of happiness. Culturally it is acceptable for a teacher to deny students' happiness for their own needs and wants which resulted in the music student's criticism. I would be happy using a piano that was available. I would prefer to be told that the practice rooms are full and to come back later or to be given a piano that is not the best one. I am only playing piano as a hobby not as a major. What would make the key woman happy?

Who is right in this situation? I could comment that the Chinese culture is wrong to deny others in narcissistic deference to ourselves. But saying that another culture is wrong and my culture is right isn't helpful. The Chinese could criticize me for denying my own desire for a piano in deference to others or could say, "Why don't you accept our kindness of trying to give you a good piano to use?" There lies the confusion. Do it my way. Do it our way. We are just culturally different. I am the guest in this country. It is my role to somehow fit in, to find a balance that I can live with and still make those around me happy, right?

If my language skills were better, I wonder if asking the key woman to give me a piano that is free no matter it's quality, would that offend her? It makes me uncomfortable kicking a student out to be given the best piano, but maybe it would make her uncomfortable giving me a poor piano. So the best solution is to try to find out when the rooms are not busy; however, the best piano will always have a student won't it? The situation will always come back to the competition for the best piano.

Maybe I should just find a way to be comfortable with always being given the best piano even though I feel it is wrong for me to take a music major's piano and should just be thankful for the key woman's kindness.

Sharon Slazberg wrote, "Of course, in different life situations, many different courses of action might be appropriate. But the point here is that metta (loving-kindness) does not mean that we denigrate ourselves in any situation in order to uphold other people's happiness."

When am I belittling myself, sacrificing too much, denying my own happiness, feeling that I am not worth the kindness of another versus trying to be independent? Am I being a people-pleaser because it makes me happy or because I don't feel the self-esteem to take or even know what I want to be happy? When am I being too culturally sensitive and flexible? When is denying my own culture to make the foreign society that I am living in more comfortable, not healthy for me?

Living in another culture I must create a balance. It takes work, self-awareness and understanding of the other culture. I have learned to be a chameleon. I can only hope though that by adapting and changing to fit my surroundings I am not losing something important.

Be Flexible and Find Another Adventure

I was nervous yet ready to play.

Today's activity was to play basketball with the teachers of the English Department against the library staff; however, when Caitlin and I arrived, the gym's two courts were full of other sports. One court had a volleyball net. The other court had a ping pong table. We were waved over to the sidelines to sit down by an English Professor. He was observing P.E. graduate students who were interviewing for a job at our college. The applicants had to show their skills by playing sports.

No one had told us that our basketball game had been postponed till Sunday. It was another lesson in flexibility.

So instead Caitlin and I went biking in search of dirt for Caitlin's patio garden. Carrying dirt on the back of a bike is like the days in Africa, carrying bidons of water or rocks. Why rocks? Why to make a stone walkway from the front door of my house to the latrine in order to avoid the puddles of rainy season of course.

Loading heavy objects on the back of bikes and riding with heavy objects take a lot of practice.

During today's adventure we thankfully had the expertise of several observers who laughed first then helped later to load up our two bikes.

Win 22-10

English Department vs Math Department

About 3 weeks ago, the English department Party Secretary told me that Caitlin and I were signed up for the campus wide teacher basketball tournament. Then two days before the first game, we went shopping for our basketball T-shirts, and tonight was the first game.

Tonight was the first time we had ever met our teammates. Everyone was nervous! I had never practiced with these teachers. I had never seen them play and was doubtful that they had grown up playing basketball. One of the teachers told me that this was her first time playing.

But it was an amazing game! It was full court and a 40 minute game. I loved it! Sprinting and sweating is like a drug to me. It is so much fun!

Women here play differently than in the states. You might think inexperienced players would be timid and shy. Au contraire my friend! Defense is aggressive and almost like football. As soon as a person gets the ball, whoomp, two girls attack giving her no space turning almost every pass into a jump ball. Lucky for me I have dribbling skills and can quickly get out of such a mess.

Offense was surprisingly not panicked. We had some great teamwork. The ball would move quickly and shots would be taken. Our team spread out on the court and didn't cluster around the ball, but got into good positions so that good shots could be taken.

The thing I love about playing basketball in China is that it is more community oriented. Everyone gets to touch the ball. Everyone passes the ball to players regardless of skill. Everyone shoots and tries their best. That is what I think is amazing. Americans can tend to be ball hogs. It is our competitive individualistic nature. But of course someone has to shoot and score. I think I made at least 16 points. I was holding back though coz well, it isn't nice to beat a team too badly right? It is all just friendly competition.

I had a blast tonight. I have been in a funk lately and playing sports I believe will be my cure.

13 Hour Field Trip: Come Visit Qingyang

It was a day for the 10 foreigners of Xifeng to take a private bus provided by the government to travel all around the neighboring sites of interest being pursued by two video cameras and 10 digital cameras of the Chinese paparazzi. We stopped in Heshui first where we walked around a museum looking at many old Buddhas whose heads had been rebuilt. We even saw a mammoth that had been dug up in the area; however, it was only an "original replica" so indicated by the sign. We had a tasty organic meal provided by local farmers using local farm vegetables as well as rabbit and deer or was it donkey? Then we went to a grotto where the green of spring was popping up amongst the brown of Gansu. We stopped at another museum, more of a folk art museum, then stopped at a store that specialized in embroidery. The last event of the extremely full day was a meal like I have never had before with an actual ox steak, turtle, and pigeon. It was super fancy and super rich. I am tired after such a long day and can't really write a good travel blog. Maybe the pictures will entice you to come visit.

When is flexibility too flexible?

This month I am only teaching 4 hours a week because my seniors are doing student teaching at local middle schools. The Dean of the English department so kindly invited me to come and observe the seniors doing their practice teaching with actual middle school students. It is kind of exciting to witness the future lives of English graduates from our university.

However, I am mad.

This morning at 10 am I got a phone call. Tomorrow they want me to reschedule my morning class so that I can go observe a teaching practice at a middle school. My freshmen have a quiz scheduled for tomorrow and rescheduling is a bit difficult because it is a combined class of two classes, class 3 and class 4. Finding a time when they all can meet is a hassle.

Anyways, I told the department that they have to reschedule the class. If they can't, then I will teach it tomorrow at 8 am.

I teach two days out of five days. Why make a simple invitation complicated? My schedule is pretty easy to work around. Why do I have to be so flexible? Why do my students have to be notified at the last minute that their class is rescheduled? Why do we live in this land of unknowns where schedules are so flighty? Since I am the captain, will they want me to reschedule my classes again if the teacher's basketball tournament takes place during one of my classes?

April 20, 2009

I should have known that everything would work out. Having served 2 years already in Africa, I am a Peace Corps veteran. One major lesson that I have learned is that by being flexible, everything always works out. You just have to have patience to wait it out and see that everything always works out. There is no point in getting frustrated or mad at inevitable changes in schedules and last minute plans. Other cultures view time differently than America. Be flexible and go with the flow. It always works out.

I watched seniors practice teach. I taught my class on Friday. The freshmen weren't mad but fully understanding. And I played basketball during the weekend. Why get mad?

Caretaking: Good or Bad?

When does caretaking become not admirable?

I am a caretaker, get pleasure out of helping people, and kind of feel like it is my duty to please people. Am I like this because I have been raised as a woman, trained to put aside my wants for others? Or am I honestly caretaking without feelings of resentment of sacrificing my wants, giving and helping because it is a noble thing to do? Anyways, why and when would sacrificing one's wants for the greater good be wrong?

In Africa, at a rare special meal of care-package sent cheesy tortellini, who would help themselves to a huge portion leaving very little for the other 20 people who are eating? It is considerate to take a small helping, sacrificing your desire for cheesy tortellini so that everyone can have some, right? So why at the end of the line do we run out of sauce and tortellini? Why am I the one who gets a spoonful rather than a plateful? And why am I okay with that, feeling it doesn't matter if I get any as long as everyone else got some.

I exist best when alone. Why? Because I don't have to figure out the balance between pleasing a partner and making sure that I am not sacrificing too much. When you are with a partner, life decisions become complicated because you are suppose to consider the other person's needs and desires. You can't just be selfish and consider your own, or can you? And whose greater good would you consider: the most money, the most stable job, the life adventure of living in a poor village?

I easily fall into the habit of taking into consideration other people's greater goods, other people's needs and desires rather than my own. Is that when caretaking becomes non-admirable?

Here in China, I am often asked to drop everything to take care of someone else's want or desire. 5 minutes before a meeting, I am called to be there. 30 minutes before basketball practice, I am called to be there. Edit this 100 page thesis in two days. Of course I will. At banquets, drink the red wine and down the white baijiu (hard alcohol). To this I put my foot down, because I don't drink at all. Often people would sacrifice their time and wants for me if I had some kind of need or want. In this culture it is an exchange of favors, but saying no is not admirable. It is expected to say yes or find some indirect way of saying no. Also, saying no to someone who is hierarchically your superior seems like a big no no.

In a culture, where saying no is not admirable, I easily fall into a habit of caretaking, of always saying yes and doing what others want of me. I don't know how to balance my need to people please and my desire to be my own person who doesn't sacrifice too much.

Also, often, I don't feel like I am sacrificing anything, but then I fear maybe I am being taken advantage of. Am I just way too flexible with no backbone? The thing is often, I don't care if I have to be somewhere with only a 5 minute warning or if a superior says, "No you can't take vacation," I just shrug my shoulders and say, "Okay." But then am I letting others have too much control over me?

Is there an answer? Do you have any advice?

Today's Vow

The bus from Xian to my city is terrible and I vow NEVER to take it again.

Today though, I was hopeful that maybe today's bus would be fast.

At the bus station, a bunch of men and women asked us where we were going hoping to find more passengers for their taxis or illegal vans and buses. Instead we marched straight to the information desk, asked if there were buses to Xifeng, went to the window and bought a ticket for 8:30 am giving us plenty of time for McDonald's.

I do not like McDonald's breakfast but thankfully this McDonald's served everything for breakfast so I had a hamburger and a fish fillet while Caitlin had a Big Mac and refillable coffee. Imagine that, refillable coffee. What a treat!

Next we went back to the bus station to catch our ride. As Caitlin was tearing the ticket to give me my half, a crowd of men gathered to catch a glimpse of our tickets. It was suddenly known by the whole station that we were going to Xifeng. Even while we were waiting at the toilets, these two women started having a conversation about us and even knew where we were going.

"You skipped the line. Those two were in front of you."
"No I didn't. Those two don't understand anything."
"Yeah they do."
"She looks Chinese. She must understand Chinese."
"They are going to Xifeng."
"Do they understand us?"
"Nah, they don't understand us."

I just laughed at the whole thing. Caitlin and I had given too much space in the bathroom line in our American way. As soon as the woman cut in front of us, we scooted to the door barring it from any other line cutters. It is important to be first in line in a bathroom coz for some reason Chinese women take like 10 minutes in the squat.

The bus was a nice spacious one, big, nice seats, clean with drapes for the windows, and a flat screen TV playing Chinese music videos.

We left right on time at 8:30 am.
But then....

We wandered around Xian for an hour and a half looking for passengers.
We pulled into a different Xian bus station and waited for 10 minutes.
We drove super slow, looking for more passengers.
We hopped onto the freeway and then got off of it after 10 minutes.
We took the crappiest local roads that had a great need for repair.
Going down a ravine, we got stopped by roadwork. Men dressed in bright orange jumpsuits were laying asphalt.

When they finally ran over the sticky black tar with their big machine with a flattening wheel, they let us pass. But then we got into another traffic jam as two lanes on a narrow curvy road tried to become 4 lanes, two lanes in one direction, and two lanes in the other direction. This caused problems for the big buses around the curves. One bus's wide mirrors ran into another bus's side. We stayed there for a good 20 minutes, watching a crowd of men argue and stuff.

We kept going stopping, letting people off, stopping letting people on to replace empty seats.

I slept the whole way, trying to sleep away the terrible, stuffy, hot, long, terrible, terrible ride!

A 3 hour trip by private car took us a freaking 7 hours!

I think the private car is worth the 50 RMB extra.

Strange Ice Cream

Have you ever had

green ice cream that was flavored green pea
vanilla ice cream filled with lentils
ice cream that was corn shaped and flavored
oatmeal ice cream?

There are so many flavors that come on sticks; although, finding ice cream that you scoop is difficult and I am still looking.

Today's Language Lesson: Dreams

In Chinese class today, my tutor asked me "What are your dreams?"

I told her, "My dreams were to live in Africa and China."

She asked, "What are your dreams after China?"

I paused and realized I have accomplished my dreams and have no more dreams.

So what will drive me to the next stage of life?

The American dream?

Ha!

I fear the American dream of getting caught up in the working world of responsibility, working towards retirement for a safe haven in old age.

Doesn't 35 seem long enough, a long enough life of accomplishments and satisfaction for all that I have done.

Pay to Sit Alone

I want to go to the all you can eat breakfast buffet that costs only 10 RMB ($1.46).

I am not hungry though. I just want to go be around people, to people watch, to knit, and to write. It is like coffee shopping in the USA. You are alone by yourself but are not really because there are people surrounding you, which is a sharp contrast to the silence of an empty apartment.

But is 10 RMB worth not eating? 10 RMB is kind of a lot of money. You can get 3 large bowls of noodles or 20 Chinese breads stuffed with meat or 10 large chunks longer than your hand of pineapple on a stick or 5 go's at having your shoes shined. You can get 3 meals for 10 RMB.

However, if I were to go to a bakery the nescafe drink would be 3 RMB and the cake would likely be around 4-5 RMB. Therefore, 10 RMB might actually be worth the all you can drink nescafe and juice de citron, along with the tasty crunchy vegetable salads and stir fries and all you can eat fried eggs.

I like Chinese breakfast because mostly it is savory and you get a healthy selection of slightly cooked vegetables.

I guess I will go around 9 am closer to lunch time.

The less furniture the better

I love my Chinese bed.

It is a simple bed, a thin 1/2 inch thick mattress laid upon a bed frame made up of wooden boards.

Why do people not like sleeping on the floor and enjoy being high?

My Chinese bed's hardness is like sleeping on the floor but with some padding.

My Chinese bed would be even better if I didn't have the extra furniture of the bed frame.

A Less Dedicated Pianist

Last semester, by the ping pong tables, I found piano rooms. Unfortunately, they were locked. By asking around, I learned that there is a woman who lives in a room in another building who has all of the keys to the doors.

Going through official channels, I wrote a letter to the dean of the music department, asking for permission to use the rooms. A fellow English teacher accompanied me and helped translate. We drank tea, sat in big chairs, and I listened to an old Chinese folk story about how music is a language that crosses language barriers. Then I was officially introduced to the key holder of the pianos.

Now I practice piano. My fingers are a bit slow and the rooms are a bit cold. The piano I have been using lately is really nice except for one sticking key that is quite important for the Shubert Impromptu No. 2 in E-Flat.

There are rows and rows of piano rooms, more piano rooms than Alabama A&M. There is always music coming out of this building and the rooms are not very soundproof. It is intimidating being in that music building. Listening to the other pianists, all I can say is WOW! Where in the world did these students learn how to play piano? I really doubt that their families owned pianos. However, I bet if a piano student was given the opportunity to practice piano, they would be 100% dedicated just like how our English students studied a ton while in middle and high school.

The attitude that hard work will bring success is extremely strong in our students and it shows in their work/study ethic.

My First Knitted Clothing

I finally finished my first piece of knitted clothing. It is a tank top made from Karen Baumer's pattern in stitch'N bitch by Debbie Stoller. I didn't want to deal with sleeves for my first attempt of knitting something the right size.

Am I happy with it?

Well, the yarn is a bit bulky therefore doesn't really compliment my body very well. It isn't form fitting nor is it tight fitting. However, I am pleased that it fits. Doing a ribbed pattern is great coz even if you make mistakes, it will likely fit. I am going to try the pattern again with smaller needles and without side seams, basically a large tube for the body. After my second tank top, then I might actually try something a little more complicated that is form fitted using things called pintucks.

April 15. Today I finished my second tank in a different color. I think I like it better.

My City

My city is a metropolitan area of a population of about 325,000. It is a tightly compact built city where you can walk anywhere important in 10-20 minutes; although, the best hot pot restaurant is on the outskirts and takes maybe 5 minutes by taxi. It is only a 20 minute bike ride to the edge of town where you will see the vast amount of tan, mud-barren, winter farmland that is sprouting its first greenery of spring. The streets are never empty except in the mornings. The city is not an early riser, yet it goes to bed early. At 9 pm the streets feel empty. On Sundays, you can barely move due to the crowds that take to the streets to shop in its many stores. Also, you do not want to do errands when school lets out for lunch. The streets become a critical mass of bikes. There are five bus routes (1 RMB, $0.16) and a ton of green taxis that charge 4 RMB ($0.66). It is a walkable city yet everyone loves to take a taxi. There is a church, a mosque, and a Buddhist temple. There are three fast food chicken places and several western restaurants where the pizzas are terrible.

It is a miniature Chinese city, a shrunken version of the bigger ones. It has all of the same stores, restaurants, and even has the same look. Maybe the uniqueness of my region comes with the homes built within the clay walls of the plateau, but that is the countryside. My city reminds me of all other Chinese cities except it is smaller, yet the number of people doesn't feel any less.

What if I get sick in China?

Today I had a tour of the local hospital.

The inpatient wing is totally new with lots of fancy machines and with a floor full of labs that test for many things even HIV; although, that particular lab was locked and empty of technicians. There is even an MRI; although, that fancy machine is in a half torn down building. The outpatient wing is an old run down building, but right beside it is a new building being built. As soon as the new building is finished, the hospital will ask to be inspected again and hopefully will get the highest ranking that a Chinese hospital can receive.

So I am not nervous about the facilities.

What makes me the most nervous about getting health care in a foreign country are communication, cultural differences, and the psychological effects of not knowing what is going on while in pain.

At least, I am not in Africa anymore where health care was a day or two car trip to the capital.

Spring the Season of Life

Walking home with chocolate covered sponge cake, I heard the chirping of a chick looking for its mother. Around the corner I met its adopted mother, a little girl in a bright pink jacket. Squeezed between both hands she had a bright orange chick and a bright pink one was poking its head out of her left hand pocket. This little girl had gathered a crowd of little boys who all wanted to see her new babies.

I wonder how long the chicks will survive.

Last week I saw a yellow baby chick sprawled dead upon the sidewalk at the bottom of the trash chute. Maybe these freshly born and freshly dyed ones are its replacement.

Wear Pants

The sun has warmed up the city and I wore a long skirt, ankle length to teach in today. It was a maroon skirt that I often would wear in Africa, similar to the khaki skirts that my African female students would wear. In my mind it is a very modest skirt.

Today my Chinese language tutor commented that often in middle and high schools, female teachers are not allowed to wear skirts and dresses. If a teacher wore a skirt to class, the students would love the teacher but the headmaster would scold the teacher. I was shocked.

My African side feels like skirts are the best way to be modest, but then my sitemate pointed out, "ummm... Jennifer have you seen the types of skirts and dresses women in China wear with their knee high boots?"

Teaching ONLY 4 hours a week

This semester I was assigned to teach 12 hours:

American Literature 3 hours Seniors
British Literature 3 hours Seniors
Movie Class 2 hours Seniors
English Speaking Culture 4 hours Freshmen.

Well now I am down to 4 hours a week.

My seniors are doing student teaching and are looking for jobs for like 1-2 months which means that I don't have to teach 8 hours of class.

What am I going to do?

Well I have started looking for Chinese tutors. I hope to have maybe 6 hours a week of Chinese. I am knitting a tank top, my first piece of knitted clothing. I will probably watch movies and TV shows. Do you have any suggestions? I should start biking and doing kung fu again. I heard about a TaeKwonDo class that is given downtown. I might look into that. I have also started reading every book in the Treehouse starting with the author's name beginning with letter A. I start a book, but if I don't like it I put it down. I am not forcing myself to read books I don't like. I am just dipping in them to see if I like them or not.

I lived in Africa. I am good at keeping myself occupied.

Chinese Female Athletes

Last night I went to the PE students' basketball championship.

At my college you can major in physical education. If you do you will study sports and have to play different sports. Each grade in the PE department forms a team, is coached by the their head teacher and plays in a tournament. Last night the girls' championship was between the seniors and juniors.

The girls were quick and strong. They hustled and were very aggressive. There was a lot of physical contact on the floor and a lot of fouls that took girls to the floor. I was shocked.

Their basketball skills though were not that great, a lot of passes going to nobody, a lot of panicked decision making, and a lot of open players who never got the ball. After 3 quarters the score was 24 to 26. The juniors were winning because they were able to score off of fast breaks. Offense was a bit all over the place. On the team of seniors it seemed like there was only one girl who actually ever was able to hit her shots.

Watching the Chinese students play, reminded me of myself, the quickness and hustle, giving it your all even if you lack the skills.

Next week is a teacher's basketball tournament. I wonder how the English department's female team will be. If I play and if Caitlin plays, we might have a chance. Caitlin is like super tall compared to everyone else. The problem is, if the other players aren't good, it will be hard for Caitlin and I to play well.

When I have played with the boys, having a point guard who looks at the court helps me score a lot. I do backdoors all day. But not having such an experienced player who looks makes it harder, coz then I will be the one having to look, passing it to an open player who probably can't shoot.

Oh well, it is about having fun, not about winning.

Tired of Chinese Food

Chinese food is so delicious and I am TIRED of it. My vocabulary is not big enough to get a good variety of food.

The campus is surrounded by the same types of food: various types of noodles, dumplings, and vegetable sandwiches. If I go to a restaurant that serves dishes, my vocabulary is limited to a variety of vegetables, the green ones, potatoes, and eggplant.

Thank goodness I am learning how to speak more Chinese or else I would never eat again. Can you believe that someone who had a 2 year diet of spaghetti and cans of tomato paste along with the bland local food in Africa would complain about Chinese food?

I have recently learned how to order
cucumber pork soup
sweet and sour pork
pork that comes with pancakes to make "burritos"
a crepe like tortilla fried with eggs and filled with lettuce and carrots.

I am eating again.

Plus I got my gas tank refilled and made a pork and green vegetable soup. Yum.

From the US to Home Sweet Home

It took 15 hours to fly from Atlanta to Shanghai.

It is incredible that we could be in the air for that long. Thank goodness the airplane was empty and I had a whole row to myself, a perfect bed for the surrealness of being on a dark airplane for 15 hours, watching personal movies on the screen in the headrest of the seat in front of me, knitting, and in a grogginess waking up for a drink or food.

The trip back to my city of Xifeng took forever.

Plane Huntsville to Atlanta 1 hr
Plane Atlanta to Shanghai 15 hours
Plane Shanghai to Xian 2.5 hours
Bus Xian to Xifeng 6 hrs

And that doesn't include all of the waiting time. I had to spend a night in Xian since I arrived at 8 pm.

Xian to Xifeng can be quick, 3 hours, if you spend $20 or can be slow, 6 hours, if you spend $10.

The cheap way is terrible! My site mate and I got to the bus station at like 9 am. When we asked for tickets, the ticket lady said no tickets and then a long flutter of incomprehensible Chinese.

Caitin and I were like ummm what are we going to do?

She went out the guarded gate where there were security people checking for tickets but because she is white she was able to go through without a ticket. I would have had a lot harder time sneaking through the security check.

When she got to the bus they said no more tickets just like the ticket lady. Then a guy approached her and said he can take her to Xifeng for 100 RMB. She agreed and returned to get me taking me to an empty van. I was like uh oh. We are going to have to wait forever till this 20 passenger van fills up.

At noon after waiting for 3 hours, the van finally got 10 passengers but as we were leaving the police stopped the van and started video taping. The driver gave us back our money and directed us to the previous bus that supposedly had no more tickets. There was plenty of room. It must have been some type of scam where scammers would buy all of the tickets and then try to get you to take the van. A bus ticket is only 65 RMB compared to the van price of 100 RMB.

So we left Xian at noon and got into COLD Xifeng at 4 pm.

I went to sleep which was probably a bad idea. I slept solid till 8 pm and then tried to keep sleeping but around 2 am couldn't sleep anymore. I read one of my books and started another book and then read all of the trashy magazines I brought for my sitemate. Around 5 am I washed all of the floors coz everything was covered with dust.

And now I am back into the swing of things, no longer jet lagged with already two weeks of teaching under my belt: English and American Literature and English Speaking Culture which is basically a history course.

It feels good to be back to China. I just want to learn how to speak more Chinese so I can order a variety of food rather than the boring noodles and dumplings that I eat almost everday.

What kind of knitter am I?

Well when I first started learning how to knit about 3 months ago in China, I knitted 5 ribbed hats and all of them didn't fit.

I gave up on hats and moved onto socks. I guess knitting all of those hats was actually useful since my first pair of socks was perfect, knee highs beautiful and perfect fitting. My second pair of ribbed mid-calf socks were a bit ill-fitting. My third and fourth pair of ribbed socks were perfect, perfect enough to give as a gift.

Next I moved onto felted bags. I knitted 2 in China and tried to felt them but failed. Was it the yarn, the Chinese washing machine? On the Chinese yarn labels it had 100% Chinese words + 5% Chinese words. How can a yarn mix be 100% of wool and 5% of something else? And what was that something else? All I know is there was something that kept my bags from being felted. Instead they were just stretched-out, stupid, useless bags.

On the way back to the US, I started another bag, uncomfortable bringing double pointed metal needles onto a plane to make socks. I was hoping that maybe a US washer would do the trick. Nope. Then I started another bag with the Chinese wool and ran out of yarn so I bought some American wool and used it. Wow. The American wool felted up just fine while the Chinese wool just stretched and was ugly.

So here in the states, I have knitted 5 bags in 3 weeks. Only one of them has turned out somewhat to my liking. I gave the practice bags to little girls who filled them with plastic peas, spoons, plates, bowls, and hamburgers. Now I am working on another one, modifying it to perfection.

So what kind of knitter am I?

In my opinion, I am an industrial knitter who just knits and knits and who doesn't really care about finishing a perfect product. I just want to finish it even if it doesn't turn out well. Then onto the next one. Eventually something turns out beautiful.

Patience Dies in the Land of Boredom

I have been abroad for about 2.5 years now and here I am back in the states for a month home leave.

What have I discovered?

I have absolutely no patience for interstate driving.
It is boring.
It is flat and smooth.

In Africa and China, taking a 6-10 hour bus trip in terrible hot and cramped conditions is fun compared to American interstate driving. Why?

Well because interstate driving is BORING! There is nothing to look at except except nothing: trees whizzing by, ground, cars, another exit full of the same ol same ol.

The only interesting thing I saw on my road trip from Cleveland to DC were the farmhouses and these circle like buildings with tall roofs and no windows.

At least in Africa and China there is always something exciting happening: from a bag of oranges being thrown into the window and then a foot hopping up onto the window and then a hand reaching in to pull the bag of oranges up top to the landscapes and the people. It is like being on an amusmant park ride full of bumps and turns and things to look at.

Misery is made interesting in Africa and China.
Misery is made boring in America.

Beat Down for $5

A Chinese massage is like having the shit beat out of you. It feels like when you wipe out on a surf board and get thrashed about by the waves and currents. It is like being put into a tumbler or placed in a bed with magic fingers except the fingers are going 100 miles per hour. It is like riding in an uncomfortable hard seat car going over a 1000 bumps at full speed.

And then a small pause in the earthquake to find the small pressure point of pain.

I must remember to breathe.

The strange warm glow must mean something right?
good or bad?
Beats me.

The Holidays

Christmas came and went.
New Year's Eve did too.

Having been an expat for 3 years now, the big American holidays have faded. Christmas in Africa felt like the Fourth of July, barbecuing chicken and fish on the outdoor grill and Christmas in China felt like an educational program.

Ever been to one of those talks given by someone who just got back from some exotic foreign country. You sit in the audience learning about another country by listening and looking at a slideshow of pictures and foreign artifacts that are probably just cheap tourist trinkets. At such talks you learn but the heart is far away. The words and pictures have little meaning to one's soul. It is purely curiosity.

Christmas this year was an educational program teaching students about caroling, Santa Claus, decorations, trees, elves, presents, the Christmas spirit. We showed movies, Home Alone and Elf.

We participated in cultural re-enactments by going Christmas caroling unable to sing over the hooting and hollering of the boys' dorms. Apparently in China to show appreciation, cheer while people perform rather than after. Thank goodness someone explained that to me as glass bottles were flying out of the windows. My brain was like, oh no we are going to get into TONS of trouble, organizing a march of students whose presence created such a commotion.

A caroler did say, "Tonight is the most memorable night of my life."

Maybe there was a bit of Christmas spirit, yet it has faded. I spent Christmas day in 4 hours of oral English final exams.

New Year's Eve, I went dancing. Midnight came and went without even a whisper.

It is strange how such important emotional traditions can just fade. I wonder what else will fade, the longer I stay away.

7 am Jams

I went to a Chinese funeral several months ago and now a Chinese funeral is happening right outside my second floor window.

The family mourners are dressed in white hats, sacks, and shoes.

It is a colorful occasion. People bring paper mache animals, towers, houses, cars, DVD players, TV's, clothes, shoes and big round paper floral arrangements that remind me of the flowers they give horses at horse races. They must burn enough goods so that the one in heaven will have a nice comfortable afterlife.

It isn't the gifts that make this particular funeral memorable.

No it is the music. There is a live band of traditional Chinese instruments right outside of my window including a singer with a microphone. Plus every instrument is hooked up to an amp.

At least this morning, the music started out relatively peaceful, a pretty funeral song with lots of somber horns. Umm... but just now the cymbals and the blasting toy like horn just started.

I wonder if this is going to last ALL day.
Today is my day off.

Teaching in China

In Chengdu during summer training, experienced volunteers and staff would tell us scenarios to prepare us to teach Chinese students. I got the impression that students were shy, would not volunteer answers, would not raise their hands, would not understand our American teaching methods of student centered learning rather than the Chinese way of teacher centered lectures.

What did I find?

Well students will not ask questions when I am standing in front of them on the stage at the blackboard. They will ask if I am walking around the classroom.

Students will not volunteer information individually unless I call on them directly and then most of them will answer in low voices. They will answer as a chorus, shouting out their answers when I ask a question. It is impossible to understand the 20 voices all answering the same question in a sporadic manner.

Students love to draw posters! We drew characters from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, from TS Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock", and made posters about slavery while studying Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Students have done wonderfully presenting poems to the class explaining the literary terms and the difficult meanings of poetry written in difficult language.

They love role plays and acting!

They had a blast making a board game about Oliver Twist, having a Pride and Prejudice cocktail party where they had to find a suitable fictional husband or wife, learning how to do dance moves from the Jazz age of The Great Gastby, learning poetry by singing the ballads of "Auld Lang Syne", and writing their own stories about why they are in the snowy woods of Robert Frost.

After the Chengdu training, I would have thought teaching Chinese students would be like pulling teeth; however, they are so creative. It is what makes 10 hours of being with them per week bearable. I would have gone crazy if I had to lecture for 10 hours a week.

A Few Days Late

Caitlin created a feast.
I was the errand girl/bus boy.

She cooked a pumpkin pie with a vegan pie crust, stuffing, a chicken, green bean casserole with homemade french onions, gravy, mashed potatoes and coffee. I went shopping for the drinks, the deep fried chickens, and made a cucumber salad. Plus I washed the dishes.

I am stuffed.

It was fun having a very American meal with six Chinese friends. It was the first time for some of them to use a fork. I didn't realize how different we Americans eat a meal. We pass dishes so that each person can serve themselves using a serving spoon instead of eating directly out of the dishes with chopsticks. We fill our plates instead of having a bowl full of rice and a bite size portion of food. We have salt and pepper on the table. We eat bread with our meals. We drink coffee and eat dessert instead of eating a piece of fruit.

The food was very American but it wouldn't have been Thanksgiving if it was just me and Caitlin eating the Western food. What made it like a holiday were the friends. Conversational music is what a holiday is all about. Now don't get me wrong the food also helped.

Turkey Day in China

Today I got a text from my students, "Hello Jen. Is today Thanksgiving Day?"

I knew Thanksgiving was coming up, but I had forgotten that it was today. Caitlin and I are going to cook a traditional Thanksgiving meal on Saturday for a couple of our Chinese friends. Living in another country, it is easy to forget the specific day of a holiday. Since we don't actually get any of our holidays off, holidays turn into weekend celebrations.

Tonight, we decided to go out to eat to celebrate. We went to the all you can eat buffet that is 30 RMB ($5). They have plenty of dishes to choose from, cold vegetable salads, hot dishes, soups, hot pot, plus appetizers like popcorn, dried kiwi, cake with sprinkles. Also, you can drink all the beer you want.

It was a disappointing meal.

My favorite tastes of the evening were the lime juice, the hot coffee, and the 5 different types of green vegetables that I could cook in my hot pot of boiling broth.

Other volunteers are celebrating Thanksgiving together; however, we are FAR from other Peace Corps volunteers (PCVs). The closest volunteer is 8 hours on a grueling bus ride and the PCVs in Gansu aren't even celebrating Thanksgiving there which means we would have to travel even further. It isn't worth it to have two days of hard travel for one day of eating celebration.

It is all right. I don't mind. I have celebrated Thanksgiving in different ways depending on the country. In Guinea I rode 5 hours by bike to Labe to celebrate a feast with the Fouta PCVs in the Peace Corps regional house. It felt more like the Fourth of July than a winter holiday as we barbecued meat on the outside grill. In Burkina Faso, I rode 2 hours by bike to the neighboring city of Kaya to celebrate with some PCVs. We cooked in three different houses and even had a HUGE turkey. Now in China, with Caitlin's microwave sized oven and her two gas burners, we will cook a feast of delicious treats.

It does feel like the holiday season here though. It is cold.

Food

Because of a recent gift, I have realized that I miss cheese and peanut butter. I didn't know I missed American peanut butter with its extra sugar . I knew I missed cheese. Every time I would go into Ouaga or Conakry, I would buy some cheese and my mouth would die from the flavor. Here in China at the nearby big cities that I can travel to, you can only find soft spreadable cheese.

At the end of January I am coming home to the tastes of the USA. I think I will live cheaply on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches along with ham and cheese. I only get like $12 per diem.

Living in China, I get a huge variety of food and don't miss food as much as I did in Africa. Here I can buy like 70 apples for $2. In Africa, one apple cost $1 and you could only buy them in the big city. The apples were imported from South Africa. Here students go out into the country and steal them off the trees.

At home, I hope to make dumplings for everyone. Dumplings are tastier than toe, an African staple.

Weeks without

Internet in my flat has been down.
I don't know when it will be back up.

My Flat

Sit, watch, listen, type
Cold impersonality
Human turned robot

Sleeping in till 8

I am a morning person and feel something is wrong. I am not waking up at 6 am these days.

In Africa I would wake up at the crack of dawn with the sun as it peered through my straw mat walls and mosquito net hung outside. School started at 7 am, so I had to be up. Even on the weekends I was up before 6 am. Sometimes I even had my hand-washed laundry up on the line and a pot of beans cooking on the stove by 7 am.

Here in China though, I am having trouble getting up. There is no sunlight and it is cold. I sleep inside with the morning light shut out by the curtains and anyways the sun doesn't rise very early here. It is only going to get worse. I doubt it will be as bad as Seattle though. And thank goodness the sun does come out everyday.

Tell a Story

If you were to play the game where one person starts a story and then the next person continues the story and so on, where would you begin? Where is the setting? Who is the story about? What conflicts would happen?

Tonight I played this game in the Treehouse, an English resource center, with Chinese freshmen and sophomores. They loved it. They hung onto each other's words, quiet until the next part of the story was told, bursting into laughter with each funny turn, sighing with compassion when things took a turn for the worse.

I started the first story with, there once was an American. I was hoping the story would continue into China with the American coming to visit. Instead the American turned into a fat president who was chased by a fat dog that was owned by a beautiful women ending with the police capturing the dog.

The next storyline was started by a student. A long long time ago, there was a monk in a temple. Whenever he hit the gong a tiger would appear. Then the tiger turned into a beautiful women who fell in love with him; however, it is forbidden for a monk to marry, to drink alcohol or to eat meat. Even with the pressure of his mother who was very angry at him for not marrying the woman, he did not give into temptation. It turns out this woman was a princess from heaven who rewarded him with a job in heaven where he lived happily ever after.

I would have never started a story with a monk or a temple. It is fascinating to me how different our stories are because of the different cultures we grew up in.

Homecoming Week

The college I am teaching at has about 10,000 students with an old campus and a new campus.

I am on the old campus and am happy that I don't have to commute the 30 minute bus ride to the new campus that is isolated on the outskirts of town. The old campus is right in the middle of "downtown" Qingyang. Everything I need and want is in walking distance, even the yarn store and the big outdoor market. Right outside the back gate there are a line of street vendors selling candied fruit on a stick and fried sandwiches filled with potatoes, eggs and whatever else you may choose from a smorgasbord of choices.

This week I haven't had to teach two days because there has been an old campus Sports Meet and Chorus Competition. On the old campus there are five departments: P.E., Chemistry, Physics, Music, and English. Each department recruited a team for the Sports Meet and students competed in Track and Field events hoping to bring glory to their department, competition in the name of friendship. And what do Caitlin and I do? We teach the English students a cheer:

u-g-l-y, you aint got no alibi, you ugly, yeah yeah, you ugly
m-a-m-a, we know how you got that way, your mama, yeah yeah, your mama
d-a-d-d-y, you dont even know that guy, your daddy, yeah, yeah, your daddy
c-u-t-e-, that’s the way you wanna be, like me, yeah, yeah, like me
c-o-u-s-i-n, thats the only place you’ve been, yeah, yeah, your cousin
n-a-s-t-y, thats why go home and cry, you nasty, yeah, yeah, you nasty
b-u-t-t, thats the way you look to me, butt ugly, yeah, yeah, butt ugly

Yep. It's a fun cheer maybe not so appropriate for a Sports Meet in the name of friendship. We rationalized though that most of the students wouldn't understand it anyways even though all students have been learning English since primary school.

Last night I went to the Chorus Competition. The auditorium was filled with students. Attendance was mandatory for Freshmen and Sophomores. Each department had a choir of about 100 students singing two songs from Chairmen Mao's era. In between each department's performance while students left and filled the stage, there were solo performances of singers and electric traditional instruments played to the background of that cheesy New age like electronic music that is created with a keyboard.

This week has been like homecoming week where any student who wants to gets to participate in singing and sports. It isn't just the elite athletes or the best singers who get to participate. No. It is anyone and everyone. Instead of a spirit of individualistic elitism, it is a spirit of community coming together to create well-rounded students. The college provides opportunities for students to study and learn academic subjects as well as opportunities for the spirit.

I live here.

I live on the second floor of teacher flats.

My living room is full of conveniences.

I would rather live in a terrace where this is my view.

A modern flat or something more simple?

I live in an on-campus teacher flat. It is roomy with many modern conveniences; although, these days I sit in my flat feeling cold. The heat won't be turned on till November. I need to buy more layers, a couple pairs of pants to wear under my pants and a couple pairs of shirts and vests to wear under my big sweaters. I really need to buy a jacket that stops the wind. I am busy knitting and crocheting hats, scarves and gloves. My next project will be socks.

I like this modern flat, but honestly I would rather live in the country, in a farming community with a well and no electricity. I would rather live in this home that is carved into the wall. Maybe I can buy one for my retirement.

Culture Shock

I didn't get much of a chance to be in the states after living in Africa for two years. Two weeks stateside isn't long enough to feel the culture shock between West Africa and Alabama.

One of the biggest culture shocks I have had living in China these past few months is men and women talk to each other. In Africa, men gathered in gossip groups with men. Women gathered with women. In China I find it weird seeing men and women having dinner together, find it weird to see young people going out in mixed gender groups. I find it strange to see men taking care of babies, taking little children out for walks, holding children as they pee into the street.

Actually though I don't talk to many men here in China. In Africa, I talked more to men than women because men spoke French while women only spoke local language. Here though I talk mostly with female students. The English department is saturated with females. There is like a 5:30 ratio of men:women in the English classes.

Other than this, there hasn't really been a big culture shock. I do find that I am really disconnected to US culture. It seems like a culture from long long ago.

I love sports

The skies were blue.
The wind was strong.
I went to the tan track.
Lanes had been carved into the hardened mud.

Groups of students had gathered for PE lessons in Kung Fu, volleyball, Tai Chi, gymnastics, and track and field. I found the English major sophomores who were going to learn Tai Chi. I moved energy along and against the wind. I was soft and slow.

Next week I am going to be the wind.
I will join the Kung Fu students.

American?

I am Chinese.

The Chinese say, "You look like Chinese."
Foreigners say, "Wow you speak English really well."

I just have to face the music that I am Chinese.