Yes, China let me out

I’m back in the land of shorts and sandals, which no adult Chinese male, at least in Yangzhou, would be caught dead wearing. I’m groggy, but none the worse for wear, though it’s definitely the traveling part of traveling I hate most. Sadly, grace under pressure doesn’t belong on my modest list of strong suits.

Jianghai College arranged to have a driver pick me up at 9 a.m. Friday for the three- to four-hour drive to Shanghai Pudong airport, where I was to catch a 4:10 p.m. flight to Chicago. We were graciously accompanied by a teaching colleague, Fan Chun Xia. Xue Cai Ming, Lu Wen Juan and several other students with whom I’d grown close showed up at my dormitory to see me off.

The last few days had brought a whirlwind of late shopping and final farewells, which grew increasingly emotional until the thought of leaving had become difficult. I kept telling myself this was a good thing — better to have mixed feelings, to have met so many good people, to miss them, than to have been desperate to get out, thinking I had wasted a year.

I can’t see not going back at some point.

Anyway, a late start didn’t worry me. We had plenty of time. But I hadn’t built in the stop for a meal. I don’t care what you’re doing or where you’re going or why. In China, people stop at noon and 6, just about to the minute, for lunch and dinner. If you get injured seriously enough to require an ambulance there, I would suggest not doing so around noon or 6.

My mind started racing with worries about the early arrival time advised for international travelers, then worst-case scenarios. My old friend Panic stopped by. Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, contemplation, meditation, I needed them all.

After some rushing required to solve a problem paying for extra bags, I cut it a little close but made it. The rest was just waiting and losing sleep.

There’s so much I haven’t written about my experiences but still would like to write, so for the time being, the Rog-ect isn’t going anywhere.

Let me start this new chapter by recommending a couple of resources that have done a far better job than I of explaining and describing China. One is Middle Kingdom Life, a great guide to teaching in China and related topics, specifically geared toward expats. The other is “Serve The People: A Stir-Fried Journey Through China,” by Jen Lin-Liu, which I just started reading. In the first several pages, I found more accurate insights about Chinese cuisine and classrooms than I had expressed in a year of blogging, i.e., students taking cell-phone calls during class, Chinese chefs not measuring any incredients. Plus, it’s got recipes, including Yangzhou fried rice.

I’m diving into the recipes as soon as I do some grocery shopping. And get a wok and a new knife. And a stove, preferably gas. And a new home for the stove. And … well, all in good time.

The China Rog-ect awards a scholarship

Like so many of life’s stories, this one seemed potentially and deceptively simple at the start, only to turn into a saga.

The idea was to help a student named 薛彩明 — Xue Cài Míng — an oasis in the arid zone known as English and Trade 1001, a class of 32 freshmen who were about as easy to teach as getting turtles to pole dance. Not only was she one of the best English speakers, she busted her ass in class, worked part time at a nearby restaurant to pick up extra money, studied at all hours outside the classroom, all of which are extremely unusual for students here, and somehow managed to find the time to give me occasional Chinese lessons.

A couple of months ago, she’d told me excitedly that she might get a 1,500 RMB scholarship from Jianghai College, and that was the last I’d heard of it. When I asked her about it, she told me not to worry. From what she had told me about her upbringing, I knew the money would have meant a lot.

So, without knowing with any certainty what had happened, I decided to find a way to give her the money. The financial office at the college had no idea what I was getting at, and Han Lily, who is expecting, has been on bed rest. Instead, I turned to another friend and colleague, Fan Chun Xia, to find out how I could put 2,000 RMB in Xue Cài Míng’s college account toward her tuition.

I made clear I didn’t want to make a big deal about it, because gift-giving here can be complicated, and I doubted Xue Cài Míng would accept such a gift from me personally.

Naturally, Fan Chun Xia got back to me and informed me that everyone from the foreign languages dean to the college president was touched by my generosity, that a farewell party would be held in my honor and that a wad of cash in an envelope would be handed to a sure-to-be-mortified Xue Cài Míng.

Which is what happened. The dean had a chance to remind everyone there, including 60 freshmen, that he had pleaded with me unsuccessfully to stay another year (more on that to come). I even got to say a few words in Chinese, after which Fan Chun Xia translated my Chinese back into Chinese.

Indeed, Xue Cài Míng at first refused the first annual China Rog-ect Award For Currying Favor with the Foreign English Teacher, several times in fact, to the point that it got awkward. A couple of other teachers and the dean began to shift nervously in their seats, as if this might be some kind of potential loss-of-face moment that would require them to turn over the deed to Jianghai College to me. (Keep it!)

It all ended well (I think, I hope) after Xue Cài Míng cried during her speech, tried again to return the money, and finally relented after I repeatedly assured her how much it would mean to me to end my stay this way and that I just might give her a duck’s egg on the final exam if she persisted in rejecting this great China Rog-ect prize.*

Crisis averted, but there’s still time. Nine days left.

*Over the past several days, she seems to have come to terms with it, now referring to me as her American father, though she also seems determined to plough through the money by bringing me daily food and treats. I’ve now got enough to feed a family of four for a week with what I’m supposed to polish off in two days.

Odds and ends (零碎东西)?

The Chinese characters mean either “odds and ends” or “remnant fragment East West,” not sure which.

“Mental mistakes” in Chinese: Watching Game 6 of the NBA Finals on CCTV, as usual, I couldn’t decipher much of the Chinese commentators’ rapid-fire analysis. But at one point, I could have sworn I heard the words “mental mistake” after a Miami turnover. Nah, couldn’t be. A few minutes later, there, I heard it again.

“Mental mistake” is evidently Chinese for “mental mistake.”

It was great seeing Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kidd and the Dallas Mavericks win their first title, but enough with the Nowitzki-Bird comparisons, please. As the Mavs were clinching the title, they juxtaposed Dirk shots with footage of Larry Bird in Game 6 of the Celtics’ victory over Houston in the 1986 Finals, when Bird put up 29 points, 11 rebounds, 12 assists and three steals. Dirk finished with 12 assists for the entire series. He couldn’t touch Bird’s passing genius.

For that matter, let’s call a moratorium on Kobe-Jordan comparisons, Lebron-MJ, Lebron-anyone at this point. Stop it. Just stop it.

Upstaged on the bus, for once: One sweltering afternoon, I’m sitting in the bus, waiting for it to leave the Jianghai College lot, when on steps a man with a basket of large, gray, squawking birds. They looked sort of like a cross between gray geese and pelicans, or gray geese and egrets, or … I don’t know, they were gray.*

From that point on, no one noticed the Westerner aboard. Which was fine. Did I mention it was hot? About halfway along the 20-minute trip, it was impossible not to notice that the odor was getting stronger. (Having given up my seat, I was standing nearer the birds by that time.)

Then, I looked down and noticed a puddle of yellow fluid, like a thin, watery yolk, slowly emanating from the basket. I mean, like, what? Do these things lay fried eggs? Do birds take a piss? I’m sorry, I’m not exactly an ornithologist here.

I began to feel weak-kneed and got off at the next stop, where I immediately became the subject of stares again. Almost wish the birds had gotten off with me. Almost.

Trouble redefining a label, let alone a life: Heard from an long-lost friend awhile back. After a warm exchange of niceties, as proof you can pick up a conversation wherever you left off 30 or so years ago, he acidly noted in one missive: “Hey, brainiac, you are not an ‘out-of-work’ journalist, as your blog subhead reads. If you get paid at the university, which I assume you do, then you’re working.”

Good point. I changed it to “laid-off” journalist. Thanks, Mark. (I had already changed “sportswriter” to “journalist” because I didn’t want to be defined only by sports. As long as I’m consumed by what to call myself, I may never actually have to decide what to do next.)

The origin of The Rog-ect: Meant to explain this eons ago. It goes way back to an inside joke among sportswriters at The News & Observer that I liked to assign impossible projects, i.e., “Hey, can you give me something on the history of sports by 5? And I really think you can keep it under 20 inches.”

I’m not sure I was ever that bad. OK, maybe.

*Upon further reflection, I’m guessing those birds were cormorants, which have been used to fish in Chinese rivers for hundreds of years. Trained and tethered by the throat, which prevents them  from swallowing larger fish, the birds are capable of diving deep for their catches. When I saw this done on CCTV, a light went on. It’s being done now more for tourists.

Today’s expression: 正是不容易

正是不容易, or zhèngshì bù róngyì, is sort of the Chinese equivalent of “it’s about time,” as in 正是不容易 baseball commissioner Bud Selig took control of the Los Angeles Dodgers away from that idiot, Frank McCourt.

正是不容易, which translates to “(finally) it is not easy,” is usually used to expressed sarcastic understatement. Thanks to Han Lily for enhancing my Dodgers fan experience from a Chinese perspective.

The China Rog-ect is on the air

For those of you who simply cannot do without the sweet sound of my voice, I’m going to give podcasting a try. Or at least I hope this is a podcast. It’s a ‘cast of some kind, anyway.

Rog-ect podcast 1

The 15-minute tutor

Holes could easily be poked, I suspect, in any rationale for canceling classes for two or three weeks to meet with students individually for … 15 minutes each.

Even to me, at times, the idea didn’t seem to make much sense.

It was born out of a desire to try something different, a more intimate way of reaching all those blank faces. I could fill in the rationalizations later. In the end, they proved somewhat sound, if not entirely above skepticism.

Not much time, 15 minutes, so I had to move quickly. (Why 15? Seemed like a good number. Remember: I’m talking classes of 25 to 30 students. A normal two-hour class period allows enough time for eight individual sessions — any longer, and we’d never have finished. As it was, I had to use plenty of time outside of normal hours to get everyone in, and I did not have the time/patience/initiative to do all of the tutoring outside class hours.)

Clumsy but earnest kuàizi user

We Americans know kuàizi, or 筷子, as chopsticks. This shot was actually taken on a cell phone at a good Korean restaurant in Yangzhou. I find these metal Korean sticks, which are flatter and heavier, easier to handle than their thicker, plastic Chinese counterparts, as evidenced by the many oil stains in the crotch of various pairs of pants I’ve worn to Chinese restaurants. I hold kuàizi differently than the Chinese do — you can see here that I am sort of balancing them, while my regular companions grip them more firmly, even deftly crossing the ends to pick up pieces of food. My fingers just don’t feel strong enough to do that. Still, I’ve been growing more comfortable, at least to the point that restaurant managers seem less inclined to rush to my side with a spoon because the sight of me eating hurts their eyes.

Here’s a web site that shows how it’s done the way I’ve seen it done here.

Oh, and an etiquette tip for Westerners here. The tables were turned recently when I hosted a dinner for three Chinese companions at Pizza Hut, where I blissfully grabbed slice after slice and shoved them mouthward. I looked up at one point to see the other three struggling just to get one bite using only a fork. It was then that I realized, to my horror, that the Chinese do not pick up food with their hands. And because knives are generally used when preparing food, it didn’t occur to them to use the fork and knife to cut the slice into smaller pieces first.

Imagine going to work on a thick-crust slice of supreme with only a fork. No. Wish I had a picture of that.

Jay Chou, beer, bribes and other ESL teaching methods

Classroom tactics now tried: 429. At least it seems that way. In my oral English classes for freshmen, sophomores and juniors at Jianghai Polytechnic College — here, the class levels are referred to as grids one, two and three — I’ve settled into a routine of mixing my own ideas, stolen and otherwise, with the “Inside Out” series published specifically for Chinese courses by Macmillan of the U.K.

(It’s a tad outdated with its 1980s pop star references, and uncomfortable for an American teacher with its English idioms. Where I come from, only the Geico gekko “fancies a crisp.”)

Words of warning for fellow ESL novices: So many lesson plans, games and exercises can be found online that it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Don’t get me wrong. My bookmark lists keep growing, but it takes time to organize all of that stuff, let alone to find what you need for future classes. I’m still figuring out how to deal with this issue.

That said, allow me to summarize some of the desperation heaves I’ve hoisted, with occasionally amusing and useful results.

[picapp align=”right” wrap=”false” link=”term=Jay+Chou&iid=3516399″ src=”http://view2.picapp.com/pictures.photo/image/3516399/2008-beijing-pop-music/2008-beijing-pop-music.jpg?size=500&imageId=3516399″ width=”234″ height=”317″ /]Jay Chou: That’s the Anglicized name for Zhou Jiélún, the Chinese pop star who is beginning to show up on American radar. He’ll appear in the upcoming film “The Green Hornet.” To say he’s big in China is to fall short of an accurate description. When I played one of his hits, “Dào Xiang,” on my laptop in more than one class, all of the students — I mean every single one — sang as if it were the Chinese national anthem, revealing the visceral connection they have to an artist who belongs to them.

One of my students introduced “Dào Xiang” to me, and it is catchy. It really stuck in my head. So, I found some English translations, as awkward as you might imagine them, and went to work.

In “Dào Xiang” (稻香), or “Fragrance of Rice,” Jay Chou tells us essentially to stop complaining and appreciate what we have. The Chinese refrain, of course, rhymes:

hái jì de nǐ shuō jiā shì wéi yī de chéng bǎo

suí zhe dào xiāng hé liú jì xù bēn pǎo

wēi wēi xiào xiǎo shí hou de mèng wó zhī dào

bú yào kū ràng yíng huǒ chóng dái zhe nǐ táo pǎo

xiāng jiān de gē yáo yǒng yuǎn de yī kào

huí jiā ba huí dào zuì chū de měi hǎo

The English lyrics, not so much:

I still remember you said your home was the only castle
You continue to run along with the fragrance of rice and the flowing river
Smiling, the dreams when you were young, I know
Don’t cry, let the fireflies lead you to escape
Folk songs in the country, you can always rely on them
Just go home, go back to the happiness at the very start

As a way of getting Chinese students’ attention, it works better than translating American hits into Mandarin, though I’ve done that, too. The web site Chinese-Tools.com provides the lyrics to “Dào Xiang” in Chinese characters and pinyin, with English annotations and a free download of the song itself. Check it out. It’s a good tune.

Bribes: Some ESL manual must advise against going this route, but I was getting desperate to raise the interest level. A bag of treats, i.e., small stacks of Pringles and Oreos, or the Chinese brand equivalents for a couple of yuan apiece, is guaranteed to spice up any sort of language game. Believe me, games must be made part of your ESL arsenal here. Here’s hoping the bribes, er, prizes are tax-deductible.

Props: Yesterday, I cracked my first beer in class, a can of Shanshui with one of those old pop tops that actually comes off. I wanted to give the students an image of the word “hangover” (sù zuì) that would really stick with them.

The weather has turned cold, and many students are sneezing and sniffling. Hence, this teacher’s edition of show-and-tell, featuring a bag of remedies brought from America (NyQuil, Benadryl, Extra Strength Excedrin, Breathe Right nasal strips, Imodium A-D, Icy Hot patches, etc.) And the can of beer. And a brief explanation of America’s pill culture.

I also wanted to find out what the Chinese do for things like a cold, or găn mào. One student: Dress warmly, sleep a lot, drink a lot of water. Another: “Nothing.” (Where’s the instant gratification? The first student is a friend with a cold, so I corrupted her by handing over the bottle of NyQuil.) As for a hangover, one student’s response on what to do: “Go back out.”

The Breathe Right strips were very popular. I may need someone to send more.

Mock arguments: I’ve had more success lately getting notoriously reticent students to test their English by having teams face off over some made-up issue to which they can relate, such as snoring roommates and shopping for athletic shoes. (We pay the price on the tag. The Chinese negotiate.) Honestly, I couldn’t care less how well they spoke. It’s a major victory getting them to speak.

 

 

The singing cab driver

Now, this doesn’t happen every time you hail a cab in China, so I have to say it caught me by surprise. I was sitting up front in the small, blue VW sedan — that’s a taxi here, not the big yellow kind — about five minutes into the ride from downtown back to Jianghai College when the guy broke into song.

Quite good, actually. He had sort of a rich, baritone Chinese opera thing going on, in between hocking huge loogies out the window. (By the way, that’s considered socially acceptable, especially among men, but it’s a little tough to get used to.)

Wandering around Yangzhou with new friends

What better way to cool down following an afternoon spent in downtown Yangzhou’s heat and humidity than to wolf down a steaming hot bowl of noodles. Zhou can can (roughly, Joe ds-ahn ds-ahn), the student who was kind enough to treat me to dinner after the day’s journey, tried out a bit of his newly learned English when he remarked, “It is very hot.”

Yeah, Zhou can can, a scalding meal in a sweltering building at the end of a long, hot day will tend to do that to you. About three weeks in, and still baffled by this Chinese habit of dousing heat with more heat. Must start telling students that the English word for a cooked noodle is “Roger.”

Deng Hailong, Zhou can can and Shi jia jun (Davy)

The building behind me sits on the geographical center of Yangzhou. A few too many moon cakes seem to be showing around my geographical center.

Such a vase can tell the legend of an ancient Chinese dynasty, and … actually, I have no idea what this says or means.

Looking down from a bridge

Some canal.

Nice jugs

I have no idea who this couple is. They just wanted to meet and have their picture taken with a Westerner, still a somewhat exotic creature in China. They didn’t care about getting a copy of the photo. Just a nice way of being introduced to someone different. Happened more than once. A woman wanted me to pose a few times with her toddler.

Regardless of the figure on the tank, Zhou can can claimed this fish at a downtown pet shop sells for about 100,000 yuan, or in the $14,800 neighborhood. Awaiting confirmation.