play play play

好久好久没有写日记！
我刚才很忙。 忙着什么？ 玩玩哦。 哈哈！

So busy playing badminton and ping pong...
and I have to admit, I'm not too bad, especially at ping pong. I think it's because I've been tapping into some kind of supernatural source of energy, so it's as if my reflexes are on crack. Still though, I get my ass kicked far too often. But whatever, it's fun, and it's definitely giving me another reason to fall further in love with China. :)

Mmhmm, my maturity level has definitely regressed. 我和小孩子差不多一样的！
但，我认为我的学生们觉得这样比较好哦。

不过，有时后我担心他们觉得我太疯了。 哈哈

http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/educated-and-fearing-the-future-in-china/?ref=asia

Cool, I'm glad the NYT is up on this issue.

a familiar stranger

I bought my tickets to go home. I didn't expect the airlines to agree with my personal opinion that it's much more difficult to leave China than it is to come back. The only site that had tickets to Hawaii available was the gimmicky-sounding "cheapOairlines," and my airfare out of here was a good $500 more than the one coming back.

But whatever, I'll be back from July 29 to August 15, fahh real, yo.

I'm excited. Family, doggy, friends, Kam's wedding, the beach, tennis, spam musubi, toilets that flush down toilet paper, no spittle and baby shit on sidewalks...
At the same time though, I'm a little nervous.

I'm not going to belong. I won't understand the people I love. They won't understand me.
Like a 13,ooo year old Chinese migrant (see below), I'm an outsider everywhere I go.
Strangely, I don't feel lonely here, even though I'm more alone than ever (I prefer the term "independent," haha). But will the loneliness sink in once I'm in the company of a life that's no longer mine? The irony that rules my days is nodding is ugly head.

As the migrants in today's Dongguan know, losing your cell phone often means losing your friends. "The easiest thing in the world is to lose touch with someone," Leslie Change notes repeatedly in her book Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China. This quote knifed me every time because it kept reminding me of how my Verizon phone doesn't work this far up the Yangtze, and also of the fact that I've verbally spoken to only 4 friends in the whole time I've been here. Damn you, Facebook, for making "keeping in touch" far too easy to be taken for granted. But anyway, I wonder if "finding" your cell phone can also mean finding your friends? Or rather, if a working phone will translate into working friendships?


A vital wound made by Factory Girls:

"It is not a new story. The ache of the traveler returning home is a classic theme in Chinese literature. One of the first poem a school child learns, from the eighth century, is about a man who goes back to his village after a lifetime away, to find that he no longer belongs.

I left home as a youth, and as an old man returned,
My accent unchanged but my temples turned gray.
The children see me but don't know who I am,
Laughing, they ask where the stranger is from."



Shoot, if any little kid laughs and asks where I'm from, I will cry.

Humbled by Hessler

Peter Hessler is the pride and joy of Fuling, at least as far as my site mate and I are concerned. After reading his book, River Town, and comparing his experiences with my own, I couldn't help but wonder if such big disparities exist not so much because times have transformed this town, but that he and I just see the world entirely differently.

I tend to think books can change the world, that words set change into motion. But should change be the purpose of writing? After half a year of Peace Corps service, a humbling experience in and of itself, I can't say that I entirely disagree with Peter Hessler's opinion on this matter:

taken from http://urbanatomy.com/index.php/arts/why-i-write/2770-why-i-write-peter-hessler


Does writing change anything?
To be honest, I don’t care, not in the strictest sense. I’ve never been a political person; I tend to get bored when people talk about policy and big-picture things. I suppose that my time in the Peace Corps made me more realistic about a person’s impact, and more cynical about a certain type of idealism.

But Americans are attached to this idea, especially with regard to the developing world. You look at the books that sell well in the States, the best-selling books about poor places, and they tend to be about a foreigner who is trying to save people. You have Three Cups of Tea or Mountains Beyond Mountains. Individually these books can be great, and they tell important stories, but it concerns me a little that this approach tends to dominate the bestseller readership with regard to the developing world. The other main option is books about atrocities – child soldiers, or sex slaves, or things like that.

I wonder about the impact of these books, and I wonder about the vision they promote of the developing world. Americans seem to read these books and conclude: Thank God I was born in the good old U.S. of A. instead of in some crazy country like this. Or they think, We really need to fix these places. They conclude that if you’re going to live overseas, you need to be either a saint or insane. There’s no sense of normal life in a developing country – no sense that you might live in one of these places and have an enjoyable life, and make friends you respect and like. Obviously, there are some countries where it’s just not possible to live a normal life, because things are so troubled – but these places tend to dominate our perception of the world; they are represented disproportionately.

As a result there’s no real connection with the people, not in terms of understanding them and being able to put yourself in their shoes. These books don’t come out of a deep anthropological instinct. The basic interest is more along the lines of changing the world than understanding the world. But this has always been the classic American weakness beyond its borders. People want to get involved, and they want to change the world, but they don’t want to be patient. And they aren’t inclined to grant others the dignity of figuring out their own path.

One thing I liked about being in China was that I couldn’t over-estimate my significance, either as a teacher or as a writer. When I arrived with the Peace Corps, the country was clearly going its own way, and that’s still the case. Foreigners have some impact, but they aren’t guiding the country, and it’s not a playground for NGOs like so many parts of the world. The state-level stuff is of questionable value. When a head of state like Obama goes to Beijing, he’s performing certain rituals that are part of big-picture politics, but he’s not making a lot of earth-shattering decisions that will change China. In a sense, he has a lot less leeway than a migrant going to Dongguan looking for a factory job. So as a writer you’re best off sticking with that migrant or somebody like him; you should try to understand Chinese people. You try to figure out their stories and their motivations, and you try to write in an artful way. As far as I’m concerned, that’s enough. Good writing should enlighten and entertain, and it should have some quality of art. But it doesn’t have to change policy or raise funds for a cause. Plenty of other people are trying to change the world, often in heavy-handed ways that do as much harm as good.

But perhaps Jung Chang, author of the fantastic Wild Swans, gave the best answer:

Does writing change anything?
Yes, my life.

huo mai le (buried alive)

The HSK will be the end of me.
I500 MORE words to learn before November.
I thought I knew a lot more than I actually do, but after an assessment I realized that the characters I do know just pop up frequently. Bastard.

All this anticipated effort makes me wonder how much I'd really like to stay an additional year to study. Am I just afraid of going back? Already I dread Skype conferences because nobody understands me. I guess I didn't realize that the PC was going to make me a permanent misfit on both sides of the dateline.

But on the other hand, I'd like to stay because I'm determined to fit here. This is home now. Buried alive.

amusement parks

ethnicity on display:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/world/asia/24park.html

oh, geeez...

Lidu love, for real this time

Tomorrow is the big day. Will I survive the six hour bus ride??? My "laduzi" was SO bad today, I thought I was going to die. During each trip to the bathroom, I felt as if I was emptying out my guts into the toilet bowl. I called the Peace Corps doctor and practically begged to be allowed to take the Giardia medicine, but the doc refused, and told me I'd be better off using the rehydration salt pack. ICK. If my bowels come loose again tomorrow on the bus, I honestly don't know what the fuck I'm going to do. =(

This afternoon I felt better... well enough to get my hair washed. =P But because Ming Fa Xuan was closed today, Rach and I went to another shop across the school gate. Zhuang Jiaohao, the guy who did my hair, was, once again, a looker, and once again, took forever to do my hair. Turns out he went to massage school a few years ago, so when I asked for a massage, he gave me a half hour face, scalp, neck and shoulder massage - no extra charge, baby. Then he asked for my QQ number. Then when I bumped into him later in the evening, he tried to buy me a meat stick. LMAO. Too bad I had to tell him "no thanks, I have diarrhea." HAAAh.

I think moments like these are the reward of 4 months of trying in vain to be part of the Lidu community. After months of shallow greetings shared with nameless vendors, I finally feel connected. Finally, I have friends who are not also my students. Finally, I have crushes on men who do not currently reside in the US (yes, finally I've let go of the past). And finally, happiness isn't solely contingent on what I'm doing, but also partly on where I am, because my God, I love Lidu.

But too bad this little breakthrough is happening when I must leave for a month. Things change so fast here... restaurants come and go without warning (never got to say goodbye to the Muslim noodle man), and I worry that upon returning I will feel as lost as ever.

pretty much chinese

I spent this past week, my first week of vacation, in complete cultural immersion.
As much as possible, I tried to live as the person I look like: a Chinese college student.

I stopped all my reading, I nearly stopped frequenting my internet haunts, and as much as possible, I stopped speaking, and even thinking, in English. Instead, I filled my time with Chinese soap operas, QQ chat sessions, bumming around at Du Li's lotion shop, attempting to flirt in Chinese with the hair boys, downloading Lin Ju Jie songs, eating spicy dumpling soup with Huang's mom and son at her dumpling shop, and buying way too much crap that I don't need, if only to get a good conversation out of the vendor.

As hard as this little experiment was, it's been damn fun.
Something is definitely happening here. I can sense some kind of change in me, in my status here as an outsider. I think I am finally part of the community. I think I finally belong.
Whether or not I really do, I don't know, but I think what matters is that I feel like I belong.

Heck, I even catch myself thinking that I wouldn't mind being what everyone mistakes me for. But then, I wouldn't be me, and the real me can't go long without reading, Gmail, and the English language.

Happy Safe Night

Christmas Eve = Ping An Ye = 平安夜, the first character of which sounds like the first part of "apple" (苹果 = ping guo) which ultimately makes tonight Apple Night in China.

The foreign affairs office took us to the Taiji Hotel, Fuling's swankiest hotel, for a Christmas Eve dinner party that cost about a quarter of my monthly allowance. Good thing I didn't have to pay because I was too nervous to eat, and was thus only able to drink my money's worth. There were a bunch of performances, including my attempt at the hula...

Since it's freakin cold, I refused to wear anything but my nicest pair of pants and my nicest sweater, both of which are not very nice. So, perhaps because I was a raggedy-looking hula dancer, I was ushered backstage and shown a tiny green dress and told I could borrow it for my performance. HAH! One sway of the hip and people would be looking at my panties. I politely refused.

All night I was super nervous, but what calmed my nerves was the group that performed before me. I only got a backstage peek, but my site mate confirmed what I thought was a hallucination: they were doing an African dance. AND they painted their faces black. Omg, yeah, they did.

Thankfully the hula went smoothly. And I didn't have to paint my face brown.
I actually had a good time performing. My mind went blank the entire time. It really is a good feeling to be able to mentally kick back and let your mind perform for you. In that way, it's like playing tennis, which I haven't done in SIX MONTHS. That's the time it's been since I first arrived in China, since I last saw the ocean, since I last had my hair cut, since I last ate cheese, since I last pet my dog, since I last drove the truck, since I last used blogger freely, since I last was truly comfortable.

Tonight was fun, and it definitely was a distraction from the homesickness I assume I will have tomorrow, but the sentimentality attached to Christmas Eve is inescapable. There's no comparing a bubbly Chinese host who introduced my dance by asking me, in front of the 200 wealthiest Fuling residents, how the heck I can be American when I look Chinese, to a quiet evening at home, listening to Willie K sing "O Holy Night" and eating salmon with my parents. BUT that's not to say that I did not have a good time tonight. Truly, I did, even though I wish I was elsewhere.....

leapfrogging

An interesting article on globalization and development, inspired by the Climate Talks:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/20/weekinreview/20anand.html?ref=world
"For India and China, a Climate Clash With Their Own Destiny"
by Anan Giridharadas

On geopolitical issues like climate change, India and China are encouraged to balance their internal duties as developing countries with their external responsibilities as emerging giants. They are told to short-circuit history, to avoid tactics for growth that the West now sees as errors, to assume obligations that rich lands took on only when they became much wealthier.

At times, they resist this pressure. At times, they warm to it, as seen in China’s efforts to reassure the world that its ambitious nuclear-power-plant program meets sophisticated safety standards. And when they sell high-end technology or bid for the Olympics, India and China want their phase of history to be ignored. Then they want simply to “leapfrog.”

This pressure to get with the global program — whether delivered in climate talks or through the subtler cultural pressure of satellite television — can bring strange results. The leapfrogging dream can tempt countries to engage in kitsch development, to mimic modern ways without building structures to support them.

If getting with the global program means sacrificing growth for greenness, it involves similarly wrenching tradeoffs in other spheres. In developing countries, a new globalized (and essentially Western) vision of the parent-child relationship is coming, in which the purpose of each generation is to go its own way, leave ancestors to their devices, find one’s own truth.

But the idea can feel borrowed. It comes from places whose structures support it: places with nursing homes, social security, handicapped bathrooms. It arrives in places without that support. So the young agonize about their obligations to the old and the old languish, trapped between an old world that has gone and a new one that hasn’t set in. India’s leaders try to cope by criminalizing neglect of one’s parents.

I think my apartment is a good example. It's nice, modern, and brand spanking new. But it's already falling apart! The plumbing system isn't built to handle a Western-style bathtub and toilet. Why didn't they just give me a squatty potty? I'm sure part of the reason is because they were concerned about presenting a modern image to their modern volunteer.

half the sky

We sometimes hear people voice doubts about opposition to sex trafficking, genital cutting, or honor killings because of their supposed inevitability. What can our good intentions achieve against thousands of years of tradition?

Our response is China. A century ago, China was arguably the worst place in the world to be born female. Foot-binding, child marriage, concubinage, and female infanticide were embedded in traditional Chinese culture....

So was it cultural imperialism for Westerners to criticize foot-binding and female infanticide? Perhaps. But it was also the right thing to do. If we believe firmly in certain values, such as the equality of all human beings regardless of color or gender, then we should not be afraid to stand up for them; it would be feckless to defer to slavery, torture, foot-binding, honor killings or genital cutting just because we believe in respecting other faiths and cultures. One lesson of China is that we need not accept that discrimination is an intractable element of any society. If culture were immutable, China would still be impoverished and Sheryl would be stumbling along on three-inch feet....

Communism after the 1949 revolution was brutal in China..., but its single most positive legacy was the emancipation of women. After taking power, Mao brought women into the workforce and the Central Committee of the Communist Party, and he used his political capital to abolish child marriage, prostitution, and concubinage. It was Mao who proclaimed: "Women hold up half the sky."

There were some setbacks for women with the death of ideology and the rise of a market economy in the 1980s, and Chinese women still face challenges....

All that said, no country has made as much progress in improving the status of women as China has. Over the past one hundred years, it has become - at least in the cities - one of the best places to grow up female...

- Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, Half the Sky

For the most part, I agree with their assessment of the status of women in China. Even in such a place as rural as where I am, women certainly do hold up half, if not more, of the sky. Here in Lidu, it seems as if most of the shops and restaurants are run by women, and most of the teachers, perhaps even the students, are female (of course, that could be due to the demographic imbalance, which points to women, perhaps coerced into, choosing to abort baby girls so their one child can be a boy, which then ultimately shows that not all of traditional sexism has been uprooted). Of course, gender issues remain, and many of my girls are obsessed with losing weight and some of my female colleagues get pressured into doing whatever they can to "catch a husband." Not much different from America.

But the progress made is obvious, and the lesson, at least for me, is also obvious.

Why should I be afraid of being called imperialistic and self-righteous, of shoving my beliefs down the throats of others, so long as I don't choke those I seek to help? Why should I be afraid of offending tradition? Why should I be so concerned about being politically correct when I believe, without a doubt, that gender violence and inequality is wrong?

To be continued...
:)

hula! :S

Hah, it's 11pm on a Friday night and my feet are frozen and dirty, and my ankles are about ready to snap. Why? Because I spent all night trying to teach myself the hula. Why? Because I'm crazy, and because I don't know how to say 'no.'

Our department is taking Rach and me to a big Christmas party next Thursday at one of the hotels in Fuling. The cost: 400RMB per person. Yowwww. Thankfully, for us, it's free.

Ah, but nothing is ever really free, is it?
So Rach and I are being made to put on a performance. She's going to sing a Christmas song, and I, because of my fear of singing in public, chose to dance. HAH.

I suck at dancing, and have never in my life done the hula.
But thanks to some random video I found on the internet, I got half of Hanohano Lei Pikake down. Thankfully I'm far away enough from Hawaii ne to not have to worry about getting beaten up for making a mockery of the hula. I swear, I'm not doing it on purpose!

body language

HO brah, I wen hit one home run in da teaching department today!

I taught my last Oral English lesson of the semester, and it happened to be my best lesson yet, as well as the one that Sandy, my laobanr from the Peace Corps, came to observe.

The topic: body language.
The message: NO BE SHAME fo talk to foreigners cuz your English stay good enuff. and even if you dunno how fo express yourself in words, just let your body talk fo you, cuz there's a good chance da foreigner will get da gist of what you trying fo say.

You see, the main problem my students have is not bad English, but a lack of confidence in their ability to communicate.

On days like today, I have trouble thinking of any job that trumps teaching.

=)

for the aged

Breakfast: Walnut Milk Power For the Aged

Rachel convinced me to buy it yesterday, and despite the fact that one package is $5 (a fortune for me), I splurged because the only calcium I've been consuming lately has been in the form of chocolate... really bad chocolate, mind you. Unless there's calcium in coffee creamer? I've been having a lot of that.

This walnut milk isn't so bad, and it'll give me an excuse to play old lady. I'm just a little worried about drinking any kind of milk formula. Think there's melamine or whatever in my mug? Hopefully I'll survive. After all, they really respect their elders here. I don't think even the promises of capitalism would make them fuck up an elder's digestive system. Maybe an infant's, but not old person's. Thank you, Confucius.

snake oil

ymmm
haven't been this drunk since...??
thank you, aunty huang and site mate.
i suspect there was a dead snake lying at the bottom of this jiu vat. perhaps i will wake up with pretty skin? that's right, the best chinese alcohol is home to snakessssss. good for the spirit and the face.

dui ni de shenti HAO.

smile

"When you smile, the flowers open and the stars come out to shine."

:)

defending the American

I just got back from dinner with two of my students.
To be honest, I didn't even know who they were until one of them emailed me a couple of weeks ago. She wrote to say that she hoped I would be "happy everyday" and that she was having a difficult time studying for my midterm exam because she doesn't pay attention in class. She closed the email with: "I hope we can become very good friends!"

(Not the best way to make friends with your teacher, if you ask me!)

In an effort to overcome the tiny grudge I've secretly held against her since her electronic slight, I accepted her invitation to eat dinner with her and her friend. Of course, she turned out to be very sweet - and while not the best student, I can see how she could become a very good friend.

However, we did hit a rough spot tonight when she tried to tell me about the differences between Chinese and American restaurant cultures.

"When Chinese people go out to a restaurant, we usually try to get our own room so we can have privacy and no one will see us. But when you Americans go out to eat, you choose a table where everyone can see you."

I fired back with a fusillade of head shakes and a hearty, "NO! That's not true!"
If her English was a little better, and if anger hadn't had the effect of paralyzing my tongue, I might have asked if she had ever eaten at a restaurant in America, or at least have explained why I felt so insulted.

I criticize the American government so much in class that I worry what the Peace Corps would think if it knew, and there I was, getting all huffy puffy when she, a non-American, benignly attacks my country.

I hadn't realized how sensitive I was about America's reputation, especially the reputation of "the American people" - you know, those glorious human beings who don't honk their horns every two seconds when they drive? Those free-thinking individuals who, when they buy groceries or board buses, stand in orderly lines rather than push and shove and cut people off? Those wonderful people who don't leave wads of spit everywhere?

Its so easy to take things personally, especially when comparisons often come phrased with "our China" and "your America." And it's hard not to do it in reverse - to wrongly accuse ALL of China of having a honking, shoving and spitting problem.

Is this how nationalism is born?

acting the American

I had an uncharacteristically good week. Not that my weeks usually suck, but I typically end the week with wanting nothing more than to be left alone.

This sugar high I've been on helped me get through the mad storm of extra-curricular activities (AIDS day, tutoring, a radio interview, office hours and TWO English corners). And it allowed me to play the American: to be stereotypically outgoing and shameless.

Perhaps I am guiltily trying to overcompensate for not looking like an American, but I also have enough of the narcissist in me that actually enjoys the attention. Don't get me wrong, I most certainly wouldn't enjoy this kind of attention in America... but in a land where I am anonymous, it is nice to be recognized as American. Or at least as different.

I wonder why I'm finding it important to be treated as important? Does my self-identity really depend so much on how others identify me?

Emotional wreck!

Phew, what an emotional weekend!
I cried more in one weekend than I have since.... since.. the day I said goodbye to my family at the airport.

The first time I cried was because I was wallowing in self pity. Side effect of Giardia?
The second time was when I showed "Miracle on 34th Street" to my class and suddenly realized how much I'm going to miss celebrating Christmas with my parents.
The third time was when I saw (via Skype) my entire extended family at their annual Thanksgiving luncheon, and learned that my cousin is pregnant and realized I couldn't celebrate with her in person.
The fourth time was when I Skyped with my parents today and they showed me the Christmas tree they bought, and I started to think how lonely they might feel on Christmas day opening gifts by themselves.
The fifth time was tonight when my students dazzled me with their performances at the host/hostess competition, and I realized how incredibly happy and proud I am to be their teacher.

Yeah, I need to get a grip.

Omg, I teared up after reading this.

get a grip, get a grip

alive and kickin!

I'm back! Yeaw, had a bad case of Giardia, but it seems like that little fucker has finally had enough of my intestines.

My students are sweet. I am up to my ears in fruit, and Jocelyn, who is also my tutor, just gave me an ear full on how I ought to take better care of myself. Honestly, I didn't eat shit on purpose! I don't even know how it happened...