For the past five years, my mother has kept me in window clings. Every college dorm or old apartment window donned pumpkins at Halloween, Santa and snowmen at Christmas, and turkeys in between. Currently, chickens and bunnies on my kitchen window proclaim spring. It seems small, but my mom's window clings and the boxes they come in—full of local newspaper clips and American snacks—make me the grudging object of envy among fellow vagabonds. "Your mom is so cute," they always say. I know what they mean. My mom is the best.
She worries about me, but in a practical, hands-off way, shaking her head and saying prayers (and sending provisions) while I traipse around the world. She did contact a family friend who occasionally does business in China to ask him to check up on me when he's "in the neighborhood" of a country with 400 million people. Against all odds, she's convinced my father—whose words around this time last year were, "CHINA? Why on earth would anyone want to go to China?"—to spend ten days here with me before I go home next month.
I think my mom would be impressed with the women I've encountered this year: A Tibetan nun in India, who called me "teacher" but treated me like a daughter, pumping me full of rice, vegetables and cookies, insisting that I borrow her gloves for my eternally frigid hands, and grinding up my food poisoning medicine with concerned, motherly diligence; My student's mother, who keeps her cell-phone dictionary on hand solely to translate the names of the food she's sending me home with, who forecasts the weather for me and admonishes me to wear more clothes when it's chilly, who gave me a bottle of cough medicine and the classic Chinese prescription to "have a good rest" when I was sick.
In addition to my mother's care stretching across the Pacific, and all the willing proxies I've encountered abroad, so many women have filled a maternal role this year. My aunts sent me prayer-filled Christmas cards (and one pesky glitter-filled card, whose remnants are still being swept up) and the right words at just the right time. My sisters provided books, pictures and even a Christmas tree. My bosses are wide-eyed at the amount of mail I receive from someone as "distant" as my brother-in-law's grandmother.
No matter how independent we are, we always appreciate being taken care of. Window clings from America and flimsy black gloves from India remind me that good mothers are everywhere, and it's a good thing.
Happy Mother's Day!
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On the slowest trains in China, there are no trash receptacles, the squat toilet usually has a lifetime of stains, disguised only by the fresh ones on top of them, and, like pre-smoking-ban bars, there's no way to emerge from them without smelling like an ashtray. The next class of trains uses washable seat covers and offers a tin plate for accumulated trash. Finally, the luxurious new fast trains are more comfortable than airplanes, with adjustable seats, a free bottle of water, and music that, mercifully, isn't the annoying, easily downloadable tune that everyone uses as their cell phone ring-back.
Traveling to Qingdao and back last weekend, I experienced all three carriers, and was amused to note that the passengers don't really differ—they just behave differently depending on the setting. On slow trains, they spit sunflower seed shells on the table or the floor. Disgusting, maybe. But someone has decided riders on the slow train aren't civilized enough to use receptacles. The same seed devourers on the fast trains gingerly place their seeds in their own personal trash bag, supplied on the train.
Of course, in all three settings no one feels compelled to stand in a line when entering or departing. Crushed in the huddle for the train back to Beijing, I mused about my earliest lessons in "waiting your turn." I remembered my line buddy in kindergarten, a kid named Jeffery who picked his nose and was obsessed with singing "Take me out to the Ballgame." Fortunately, he moved away. But while he remained, I was trained to stand still next to him come hell or high water. I've seen the kids lined up in neat little rows at the primary school near my apartment, but as bodies swirled around me, pulling my backpack one way and my camera bag the other, leaving me stranded in the middle, I had to wonder if behind closed doors they don't give their kids lessons in throwing elbows as well as waiting patiently. There are some things I won't miss.
Chinese people have an uncanny ability to fall asleep instantly, almost anywhere. I admire and slightly resent them for this trait. I always notice babies and toddlers being lugged around in the most uncomfortable positions, bundled and resting on their mothers' arms, being jostled about through busses and train stations, or even hiking mountains. As I tried to contort myself a million different ways to sleep sitting up on the train home, I observed fellow passengers hunched over luggage in the aisle, or sitting on a stool with their head in a fellow traveler's lap, that traveler draped on top of the unconscious torso of their companion. I wondered sleepily about the benefits of sprawling out in car seats and strollers as a baby. Perhaps I was robbed of this basic instinct to become unconscious at will, regardless of spatial realities.
Our hostel in Qingdao was built in China's first observatory, an interesting, narrow building with a rooftop terrace and a huge telescope next to the bar (I shudder to think about the demoralizing things that telescope has suffered at the hands of intoxicated expats.) I traveled with Daisy, my student from last fall. Now, hostels are a scary concept for many people who haven't stayed in them—those of us who frequent them know they can be a blast, even if you do room with the occasional weirdo or the jerk who insists upon turning on the lights when they stumble in at two a.m., or stumble out at six. But for Chinese girls like Daisy, the fact that a foreign man slept in the bed next to her is almost too much to stomach. Even though he slept with his shirt off, she somehow hadn't noticed it was a guy until I told her later. A 28-year-old woman who took a day trip with us to Mount Laoshan was so shocked that she was sharing a room with some foreign men, she was thinking about staying at a different hotel.
The 2008 Olympic sailing competition was held in Qingdao, and it is rated one of the best places to live in China. While it doesn't escape the smoggy plague of most large cities (The Haier electronics factory is—proudly—stationed here) it is overall a pleasant city. Laoshan and the parks and streets within the city itself where covered with the pink and white blossoms of late spring. Dozens of couples taking wedding photos (formal photo shoots that happen with many matching costumes and cheesy poses, long before the wedding takes place) filled the parks and beaches. Germans occupied the city for a time, introducing beer and German architecture. The structures around the sea thus have a unique heritage, and one of the most popular beers in China is still brewed here.
The people were unbelievably friendly, which Daisy could not get over. She would ask someone for directions, and if they said our destination was five blocks down on the left, she would walk two blocks and check with someone else just to make sure we were still going the right direction. When we arrived at the turn, she would again ask, just to be sure, that we should turn left. Every time she spoke to someone, she would return to me wide-eyed and smiling. "These people are so nice!" She shook her head every time. I don't know if she ever needed directions—it was more of a social experiment, to see if 100% of the sampled population truly would answer her questions. After talking to an especially handsome man in a nice suit, she skipped over to me and remarked, "Ah! I am going to marry a man from this province!"
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"Ah, America! Bruce Lee! Wo ai meiguo. I love America!" This shirtless Chinese guy greeted me at the hostel front desk, where he had been doing his best to impress the cute receptionist with goofy antics and a mediocre body clad in moose-patterned boxer shorts. I acknowledged my undeniably close relationship with the great Bruce Lee, and fell into my bed dreaming of the beach.
A few freezing nights after the heat was turned off in my apartment weeks ago, I sat at my computer under layers of cotton in various forms—clothes, robe, blanket—and pointed my mouse at Sanya, China's southernmost city on its only tropical island. Last week, while my students participated in an intramural track meet at the university, I landed in Sanya for three days of sun, seafood, oogling fat Russian tourists, and Chinese women going to great lengths to keep the sun from darkening their precious skin while they enjoyed the beach view.
Dadonghai Beach must be the most tactfully developed place I've visited in China. Curvy boardwalks and stone passageways, outdoor barbeque restaurants and classy bars ringed the bay, offering an endless supply of seafood, fresh-squeezed juice, and cold beer on tap. (Cold beer! On tap! It does exist!) Adorable couples in matching Hawaiian-patterned shorts and shirts, clinging to each other under umbrellas to deflect the sun, did add a charmingly tacky twist that reminded me I hadn't left the country. (And then, of course, moose-boxer boy, who wore said boxers and a fanny-pack-inspired man purse when a few of us went out for a drink Thursday night.)
Perhaps it was because I traveled alone, but this was by far the most social experience I've had in a hostel. The crew assembled for a Friday night out included a couple of Indian-English guys spending nine months traveling in Asia, two Swedes and three Americans studying with different programs in Shanghai, another English teacher from Holland, and one of my Chinese roommates. I hate to generalize about entire nations… but they're small, so I don't feel too bad about it: Swedes and the Dutch are my favorite people to meet while traveling. They're impossibly nice and genuine, and always up for a good time.
For good or for bad, the chain-smoking hostel cook acted as our bar guide. "I'll take you to a place where the floor bounces," was the pitch he made to us after we'd downed a bottle of 100rmb Absolut playing drinking games at the hostel. The club, which did indeed have some sort of spring-loaded floor, was pretty normal—with Chinese characteristics. A remix of the "McDonalds, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Pizza Hut" round was worked in with a techno "Glory, Glory Halleluiah," followed by "Take me Home, Country Road." And then a slender, tan, scantily clad transvestite danced to Michael Jackson.
And then I ate a watermelon, and liked it. It's true what they say, I just hadn't had a good one yet.
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Our friend and colleague Mr. Lei is acutely aware of the fact that foreign teachers are a goldmine of the English language (if I do say so myself.) In addition to making chapter recordings and reading vocabulary for his classes in the Overseas Nursing department, Jason and I have been writing dialogues so his students can practice talking medically in casual conversation.
The instructions are to work the textbook symptoms and procedures into short, memorable dialogues. Want to learn about bacterial meningitis? Read about how "Friend 1" almost died when he was a kid!
Unit 44: Bacterial Meningitis
A conversation in which one friend tells another about the time he almost died from meningitis.
Friend 1: Hey, want to hear a crazy story? When I was younger, I almost died!
Friend 2: Really, how?
Friend 1: I had bacterial meningitis. It's a potentially fatal disease that can rapidly lead to death. First, I just had a cold. Then, suddenly, I had a really severe headache, drowsiness, delirium, irritability, restlessness, vomiting, and fever.
Friend 2: Oh, that sounds awful!
Friend 1: Yeah, that's not even the worst part. My parents knew something was really wrong when I resisted flexion of my neck, and I started to have convulsions. That's when they took me to the hospital.
Friend 2: You had convulsions? I don't believe you. You're making this up!
Friend 1: No, it's true! I received antibiotics intravenously for rapid effect. Nurses had to work really hard to save me. They kept the room as quiet as possible, put padded side rails on my bed so I didn't hurt myself during convulsions, and helped move my body around so I didn't aspirate on vomit or catch pneumonia.
Friend 2: Wow. I'm really glad you survived.
Friend 1: No kidding. For a while I was monitored for a slow pulse rate, irregular respirations, and increased blood pressure. But I recovered eventually.
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So, it's true that frozen dumplings make up at least 14% of my weekly meal count (yes, I used my GRE-refreshed elementary math skills to figure that out.) Instant oatmeal accounts for a full third of my intake—with various fruits or honey to shake it up each morning. But what do I put into my body the other half of the time?
Last week, my mother informed me, her 23-year-old baby, that all of her "adult children" made corned beef and cabbage for St. Patrick's Day. I have to take the exclusion with a grain of salt, because an uncle in his mid-thirties is still considered the baby in my dad's family, despite being by far the largest of ten siblings. His girth is cited whenever I'm indignant about the fact that my parents should, at some point, have to concede that I'm an adult now. Then again, they still file my taxes, answer my mail and pay for my health insurance. What is adulthood, anyway?
Still, this exclusion from the mythical adult-land where people cook real meals daily, combined with a desire to stop eating at restaurants so frequently (thanks in no small part to this story—more details and pictures—about recycling cooking oil from sewers being a common practice), has sparked an interest in cooking more of my own adult-grade meals.
One of the biggest issues I've encountered trying to cook for one is that it's almost never practical for me to have adequate ingredients on hand. If I buy vegetables without a specific recipe in mind for them, they're likely to sit neglected in my refrigerator while I make pb&j or boil a handful of dumplings. Thankfully, it's finally looking like spring up here—if spring is a snow storm followed by a gigantic dust storm followed by wind and rain—so fresh veggies are again on the street mere steps away.
I'm trying to build a repertoire of recipes I can file under "easy" in my mind, so I'm more likely to turn to them than a street vendor when hunger calls. Not surprisingly, the first winner involves a hearty scoop of peanut butter:
Peanut butter noodles – This was so delicious, and because it's an Asian dish, I didn't have to improvise on ingredients I can't find here. Peanut butter, honey, soy sauce, and hot chili paste!
A second dish that went well, and made more than enough to replace restaurant forays this week, is actually a version of a really common dish we ate in India, Aloo Gobi Masala. Fun fact, I learned the Chinese for "cumin" in assembling these ingredients. They call it "little fennel."
My student in India taught me how to make naan, or Indian bread. It was so easy when I cooked with her, but something went terribly wrong when I tried to make it myself yesterday. I ended up wasting most of my flour, making a doughy mess of my kitchen, and cooking something more along the lines of a bland pancake. Another hurdle for me is that mishaps like this make me want to swear off any interaction with a cutting board/rolling pin for a few days. Thankfully, I'll be working through Aloo Gobi leftovers for at least that long.
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Charles Dickens became one of my favorite authors sometime after I read A Tale of Two Cities in high school—this despite the fact that he couldn't create a plausible heroine for anything. I took my amour far enough to read David Copperfield, nearly 1000 pages of impoverished Victorian English glory. I have a new tutoring student whose English name is David. When my most recent tutoring acquisition, an audacious 14-year-old boy, asked me for a unique English name, I drafted a short list of movie and literary character names, and he chose Oliver. This adds a Dickensian twist (pun?) to my days, and makes me smile. Speaking of names, Oliver also has a huge pet mouse named "xiao jing," or "little king." I think it's adorable.
My former student Daisy, who first appeared in my stories as a meek character who seemed to be at the whims of the men in her life, has proven to be an especially strong woman (the anti-implausible Dickensian female!) determined to do something different with her life even as all of her friends and family pressure her to settle. She recently moved to Beijing to find a better job and continue to improve her English. It has improved greatly, but still has a touch of China that makes it musical to read.
Regarding her desire to leave China and pursue anything somewhere else, she sent me this line in an email: "I think it more like a dream than an aim. Life will become boring and hopeless if dream is considered as a luxury. For me, the aim or dreams like a kind of support. I just try my best to let them come true." I think she could have a career as a greeting card writer once she cleans up that grammar.
Lately her friends, like mine, have started to get married, and she's feeling the expectant stares and parental toungue-clicking. Her response to my suggestion that when she moves to America we can go out and find husbands together: "I smiled when you told me we can find our husband in America together, because that moment I felt life can be colorful." Life can be colorful. Write that down.
A friend and fellow Drake journalism grad, Alexa, is currently teaching English through a Fulbright Grant in Indonesia. She recently wrote an incredibly honest blog about the stress of planning the next step after an experience like this—essentially, you think you go abroad to find your calling, to "take a year off" and get it all figured out, but most of our species only end up more confused and with less direction by the end. I've been thinking of saying something really similar, and I invite you to check out what she has to say.
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This is the other piece I wrote for Contact Magazine while in India. It is a short profile of one of the most interesting men I've ever met. This man turned down an opportunity in his youth to study medicine in the U.S., instead choosing to join meager guerilla efforts to force the Chinese army out of Tibet. While the Dalai Lama, and thus the majority of Tibetans who follow him, champions a "Middle Way" policy in which Tibet remains part of China but is a fully functional autonomous region (free to elect their own representatives for deciding on local issues), Lhasang Tsering insists that the world is suffering as long as Tibet is occupied by China:
Lhasang Tsering runs one of the most successful bookshops in Mcleod Ganj. Yet, when he speaks, he keeps one eye trained in the direction of Tibet. An outspoken critic of the Tibetan government-in-exile's Middle Way policy, Tsering uses poetry to express the pain he feels for his homeland and its people, and his unwavering belief that Tibet must be a free, independent nation.
"What you call poems, I call my pain in words," he says. Those words reflect the pain of a lost home, a thwarted freedom struggle, and a feeling that no one is doing enough. On the wall behind his desk at The Bookworm is a plaque declaring, "The world without Tibet is not complete."
Another poster behind him reads, "I have something to live for. I have freedom to fight for." No, Tsering doesn't participate in demonstrations, marches, or hunger strikes. But he sits ready to fight if he is asked. "When freedom was a goal, I led the demonstrations. Now, I'm not interested in taking part in rituals," he says.
Tsering, the former president of the Tibetan Youth Congress, left government service because he disagreed with official policies. He sold his watch, a nice pair of shoes he received as a gift, and most of his clothing in order to purchase books for his first small store. "Books were the only things I knew and loved," he explains. Well-versed in what it takes to run a successful business, he says a business-oriented attitude is one of the flaws in the current negotiations with China.
"The matter of independence for Tibet is not like a game, or a business. Unlike this bookshop, which is a business where I try to make money, and I change something if I'm not, the Tibet issue should not be about winning and losing. In my humble view, winning and losing are important, but they are second to right and wrong. Always."
As he speaks he keeps his eyes on Tibet. It may be on the other side of the mountain, but he knows exactly which way home is.
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