KTV

I remember when I was in middle school, someone who had a karaoke machine was presenting us with a novelty. Later in college, I remember going to a party where there was karaoke, with the theme of the party being something like, "Blast form the Past". Americans regard them as antiquated, do we not?

Not so here. Within the block of campus there are three karaoke bars that I know of. In China, karaoke is called KTV for short, and has been hybridized with the chic metropolitan club scene. The other Friday night I was passing by this particular one, Windsor KTV that is just acrossed the street, and notice they had men in sharp suits serving as bell boys, concierges, and bouncers. There were a couple of VIPs that night, given away by their stylish Audi and Corvette cars park out front. It's just weird to imagine all of this glitz focused around lip singing.

A lot of foreigners will go to a KTV bar to experience it the way the Chinese do, but a word of caution. Despite the cheesy connotation it has for Americans, KTV is often a front for drug trafficking or prostitution. In fact, most KTV places have female liaisons that accompany the male patrons everywhere in the club, liasons who will provide additional services for an extra fee. It is not by coincidence that two of the KTV bars in the block are attached to a hotel.

Yay or Nay

I imagine that some of you have been wondering what I think about China. True, I have been providing a lot of commentary about little interesting things I run into in my quotidian life, but I think that I have failed to summarize my generic reaction to the whole experience. Any relationship with China is a complicated one, because in truth we’re not talking about the dynamics between you and your honeymoon getaway. This is no island to been summarily experienced in a week, and really this isn’t even a country; it is a continent.

I think that Rob Gifford in his book China Road put is best. After just having had a conversation with a doctor who worked for the family planning department (i.e. she went around performing abortions for families who were having more children than they should) he was livid with indignation. Of that moment he said, “It’s one of those days when I am simply glad that I am leaving [China].” To be perfectly honest, I have had plenty of such days, and perhaps they have been more frequent because we have been going through our first pregnancy here.

However, Gifford also rants about the enamoring things of China, and there too I agree. There is something about being in this country that has an irresistible tidal effect. I noticed it most poignantly when I was walking through a random suburb. Even though the apartment buildings stand within one kilometer of the campus, I had never seen them before. Apartment complexes really seem to stretch in every direction with unnamed silence. It was a Friday evening, near dusk with a lot of people either coming home from work or heading out for weekend festivities. I passed so many faces that betrayed emotion normally less apparent with mixed expressions of relief, fatigue, and excited anticipation. The simple realization that each of them had life-stories contributing to their current state in tandem with the satisfaction that I was in some miniscule way a part of it, was at once gratifying.

This does not mean I am going to spend my and my family’s whole lives abroad. Even to come back to China, both Lacey and I have agreed that the situation would need to be dramatically different (having an income and a kitchen would be a great start). However when you come to China, it is difficult to be neutral about the encounter. With so much context behind the title “Chinese” it instills in me a feeling of privilege to be among them. Furthermore, the gargantuan magnanimity of everything continues to blow my mind, and when I think about the future of this land, the ends of my fingers itch, as if to grab at it. Contemplation of China in and of itself I have found to be a moving experience that fills me at times with angst, but also with both compassion and awe. You could say that my relationship with the Middle Kingdom is complicated, but I confess to world at large that I am falling in love with China.

Word Confusion II

Again, the disclaimer on this is that there may be some humor that is subject to the ‘you had to be there’ condition. But, it's a part of my China, which is validation enough.

This particular day in class, we were discussing different types of competitions— everything from academic decathlons to footraces. So while in the area of sports, skiing naturally came up. The professor was talking about the popularity of skiing in China (it really isn’t that popular), and then I became curious if water-skiing had much of a presence here, so I asked. I will relate the conversation as it seemed from my perspective.

Me: “So do many in China people water ski?

Teacher: “Only in the north really, where it is cold enough.” (That should have been a hint, but when you only get the gist of the statement, you tend to disregard incongruous statements as your own inability to understand).

Me: “Is that because not many people have boats? I mean, I imagine they’re expensive here.”

Teacher: “Boats?!”

NOTE: The word for boat in Chinese is chuán, which is certainly close enough my previous word confusion so as to be nostalgically frustrating.

Me: “Yeah, boats.” (I made sure I said the tone right)

Teacher: “How would you use a boat to water ski?”

Me: “How would…?! How else will you move on the water?

Teacher: “Are you sure you use a boat?”

Me: “Positive. Let me show you.”

I went to the marker board and proceeded to draw a boat with a line pulling a skier. Notwithstanding, the teacher stared at the picture with a perplexed look, and muttered something like, “What kind of a boat would cross snow…”

Teacher: “In China they don’t use boats to water ski. The have the two poles on both sides that they use to push along.”

I barked out a laugh, and an American classmate asked what was going on. I translated quickly, to which he replied in English, “Woman! How do you expect a man to move on the water without a boat?!”

At this point an Italian girl, Mariana, chimed in saying, “No, I understand what the teacher is saying. You don’t need a boat.”

Another Italian girl, Elena, exclaimed in animated Italian, “What do you mean you don’t need a boat? That’s ridiculous, honestly Mariana, what do you think they’re going to do, climb a mountain and go sailing down until they reach a lake and then…” At this Elena, with the whole class watching, did a demonstration of said hypothetical skier going down the mountain and then hitting the water with an expectant and eager learning forward on the skiis, like someone about to do a jump, and then proceeded to imitate someone then hitting the water and floundering.

During this whole discussion, the tone, volume, and incredulity had been increasing dramatically. We were all so confused and yet so defensive of our points that after Elena did this little enactment we all simply burst into outrageous laughter until we were literally crying. The raucousness died down and then the teacher said, “Well, this would all make so much more sense if we were talking about water skiing…”

I don’t need to detail my explosion of confirmation and ‘of courses’ that followed, but I did my best to make sure that the teacher understood that water skiing was what I was talking about the whole time.

This time the confusion was not because of tones, in fact the tones on each word are identical; it was the slight difference of vowel sounds. The translation for snow skiing is 滑雪, huáxǔe (Hwah-shweh). Húa literally means to slide, and xǔe is snow. The translation for water skiing is 滑水, huáshuǐ (Hwah-shway), which is literally to slide on water. Well, apparently I was not putting enough ‘-ay’ at the end of the word that what the teacher though I was saying those whole time was snow skiing.

Word Confusion I

One of the most common mistakes a newbie to the Spanish language is the attempt to say ‘I’m embarrassed’ by way of a cognate and end up saying ‘Estoy embarrazado(a)’ which means, ‘I’m pregnant’. While Chinese doesn’t have that same type of complication, the same sound like wo (said whoa) has the potential for four different inflections, and each is a different meaning altogether. As if that weren’t enough, the same inflection can have several different meanings too, an issue usually resolved by have the written character present as well. If you ever watch Chinese TV or movies, you’ll notice the show is always subtitled with the Chinese characters, and it’s not for the foreigners’ sake. It is so the Chinese can be sure what meaning is implied by a sound has diverse characterizations and definitions.

One of the more obvious mistakes that can be made at the beginning of one’s study of Chinese is the use of qíng wèn (ching [upward inflection] when [downward inflection]) which means, ‘Might I ask…’. Westerner are used to putting upward inflections on all question words, and so it would be easy to say both of those syllables with an upward inflection (qíngwén), but be warned that if you do so, you are actually asking ‘might I kiss…’

None of my blunders have been too embarrassing… yet, but they have been the cause for some good laughs. I’m not entirely sure how clearly the humor will come through in translation. There is a good chance that these will be ‘you had to be there’ scripts, but I am willing to take that chance.

So two days ago we using a grammar pattern to talk about what things we found satisfactory and unsatisfactory when we came to China. I said that I thought that Beijing noodles were very satisfactory, but that the dorm room beds were really unsatisfactory. I didn’t know that tones for the word bed, but I knew that the phonetic sound was chuang (ch-wong[said like WAND]); this was my attempt to use it.

Me: “I am unsatisfied with the dorm chuang.”

Teacher: “The chuang? What is wrong with the chuang?”

Me: “They are very… hard.”

Teacher: “Hard? Do you mean they are hard to use?”

Me: “No, as in they are not soft.”

Teacher: “Not soft… hmmm, that’s very confusing. I’ll talk to you during the break.”

Me: “Okay.”

15 minutes later

Teacher: “Okay Michael, what was it you didn’t like?”

Me: “The chuang.”

Teacher: “And why don’t you like them?”

Me: “Because they are very hard.”

Teacher: “… Michael, all of the chuang in China are hard. Do you mean to say that in the US you don’t have hard chuang?”

Me: “Well, I imagine that there are, but for the most part we have very soft chuang.”

Teacher: “Really?! How is that possible?”

Me: “Well, they make them more like a pillow.”

Teacher: “A pillow?! Then what do you do when it gets cold, or if there is too much of a breeze?”

At this outcry she points towards the large panel of windows on the south side of the classroom, and it clicks. Since I didn’t know the word very well I tried to say it with a neutral tone, but I was accidentally saying it as chuāng (straight toned, no inflection) which means window. Once I realized this I was able to circumvent the definition of a bed so that she understood what I was trying to say. The word for bed is chuáng, with an upward inflection. I’ll leave it up to you to go through the conversation again and replace all of the chuang words with either window or bed, whichever you prefer. We both had a good laugh, and it was one of those experiences that helped engrain the word into lasting remembrance.

No Secrets Here

In one of my classes we had a brief discussion about secrets (秘密 [mìmì]) that are the norms for our respective cultures. For Americans, this would be things like age, weight, family planning, etc. However, as my teacher said, “Chinese people don’t have secrets.”

This was never more apparent then our conversation in class today. Our chapter covers some ailments of the body, intended to be a lesson in case we would need to go to a doctor or the hospital. One of the phrases is 拉肚子 [lā dùzi], or diarrhea. For mature persons there is nothing wrong with learning such a word, but to my surprise the teacher begins going around the class room and asking each student to share when they have had diarrhea in China and why! No one was exempt, not even the cutsy little Korean girls that make the peace sign in photos. Hearing this topic broached by them made a few of my American classmates contort their faces in odd ways. Lacey somehow got away without answering the question, but the worst was when one Korean kid confessed that he has lā dùzi everyday.

None of the Asians (including Koreans and Indonesians) seemed to mind the topic at all. And perhaps this demonstrates a little unwillingness to embrace the culture, but these are secrets that I don’t ever really need to know about anyone. Oh well, TIC (This is China).

Holiday Landscaping

During the Cultural Revolution in China (1966-1976) Mao had people tearing out grass, pulling flowers, and decimating tress, more than anything because he didn’t like them, though he could mask this by labeling such things as being, “bourgeois”, which at the time meant it would be instantly shunned by those of his cult (i.e. practically the whole nation).

Of course a lot has changed since then, and the Chinese have had a few decades to reintroduce flora to the urban areas. However, the way they go about it is sometimes interesting. We recently had the Chinese National Holiday (like our 4^th of July) and public and private sectors alike dress up their buildings to celebrate it in a splash of color. So to make the dreary gray of our campus steps more exciting, they brought in plants. However, the steps have no place for natural planting, so what they did on the steps and everywhere else around campus was put the flowers in nice arrangements, but left them in their pots! It really is quite a pragmatic approach, because as of two days ago they cleaned them all up, a task made much easier when all they have to do is literally scoop everything up, no worries about uprooting or spilling dirt everywhere.

This type of landscaping is really the minimal show that you see; everywhere else they keep plants in the same pots they are bought in, but the scale and artistry increases dramatically. As you can see in this photo, a flora sculpture was created by a local radio station outside one of the larger parks in the city. The most impressive one that I have seen, and wished I could get a photo of had I not been in a taxi, was of a life size tree, and a larger-than-life girl picking an apple off of said tree… all made of potted flowers. Alas, the fall in Beijing is just about over and so every is cleaning up the vegetation before is completely loses color.

Insights into College in China - Grades

My fellow classmates from BYU-Idaho are scattered about different levels but there is a large handful of us in the same level only in different classes. A few weeks ago, we had our first test, and the resultant less-than satisfactory grades provided grounds for very interesting comparative discussion. Among the various sections on the exam there was a short essay that we had to compose. One classmate told me that when she noticed she had missed points on the essay she asked the teacher why this was, to which she was told that her composition was not as good as others’ in the class.

This subjectivity of grading has manifest in other ways. Every other day we have a small writing quiz to test our ability to write Chinese characters. I have friends in other classes that when they write traditional characters (versus the simplified characters used here in Mainland China) they get no points, but another friend was even encouraged by his professor to do so if he did not know the simplified form, and thereafter received full points. On these same quizzes I have incorrectly written up to three characters , which the professors noted by circling them, but was only docked 1 point!

The preoccupation with grades, at least in this language program, has been something unique to the American students. An Italian classmate commented to me the other day that despite tests scores and attendance at Capital Normal University, they ultimately return to their home institution where they are given language tests (something akin to CLEP tests) which serves as the only basis for their credits and grades. I think that the Chinese professors not only understand but accept this as the norm. Two American classmates were in a level above me and were doing poorly in their class, literally on the verge of failing, and approached the professor about changing classes. The response they received was, “Don’t worry, it’s not a big deal if you don’t do well on the tests and such, you’ll get Chinese slowly, it’s okay.” They objected by saying that their grades were poor, which in fact was important to them. The reply came, “Oh, if it’s about the grades then we should probably get you into another class.”

Grant you, this is the experience of only one university, and it is a unique situation because of the conglomeration of cultures constituting the attendants of the language program. However, as I continue to investigate aspects of education in China, you will see that this is not the only thing that deviates from Western standards of administering education.

The Power Over Weekend

This last week was a vacation for the country of China. The 1^st of October was their national holiday, this year celebrating 62 years of the People’s Republic of China. Instead of just taking off that Saturday, everyone gets the whole week off. However, I found out that the days of vacation were technically the 1^st through the 5^th, or through Wednesday. But since everyone wants to maximize the consecutive days off, the all-powerful China, switched the days of the week.

Okay, so that’s not exactly what they did, but not far off. Companies, schools, and government organizations got Thursday and Friday off, but then Saturday and Sunday were regular work/school days. This is not an isolated event; it happens several times a year in China. The only reason that the same didn’t happen to me is because we are an international college and so they observe the more common Western practices (LIKE A WEEKEND!!!). I think it would be fair to say that a company in the U.S. would have as much right to do this, but you can forget about schools or governments enforcing this on a mass level.

To the Western mind, this would be a disregard for sacred Sabbath days for many religions and at the very least one’s personal time to R&R, but I just read in a multi-generational Chinese memoir that after the founding of the P.R.C. it wasn’t until the early 60s that party officials (and probably many other professionals followed suit) were allowed to have Sundays off. The Great Leap Forward attempted to industrialized the people to the point of non-stop work. And as a result we have lost the exuberance of T.G.I.F. in the Orient.

Fall Treats

It’s fall time, and if you are found eating ice cream you may be stoned by glares. I was out on the street one evening to get some food on a stick, and across from my preferred vendor there was a cart with a bunch of sticks that looked like they had fruit on them and then had been dipped in melted sugar. However, this being China, one can never be completely sure what combination of sweet, sour, bitter, salty, or bland they might mix together. I asked what it was, knowing pretty well that even when they answered I probably wouldn’t understand anyway, but just as a gesture to communicate my skepticism. The man selling them replied something, and though I did not understand the tone was obviously incredulous, as if to say, “Duh!”

Though I did not buy any at that time, I went to WuMei (like Wal-Mart) and in the entrance they had them! This time I took advantage of the opportunity to try them. Indeed, they are sweet. The most common ones, and also my favorite are Hawthorn berries. They taste like apples but a little more tart and the size of a cherry tomato. Being sugar coated always helps, of course. As you can see they have other kinds as well: orange slices, hawthorns stuffed with walnuts, the also do some grapes, and a couple others that I have yet to figure out what they are.

Happy Fall everyone!

The Hospitals

DISCLAIMER: Long story ahead!!!

This already happened some while ago, but I had to wait for the happy ending before posting it. As Lacey had not been feeling well, the Lindeman family, consisting of Aaron, Leslie, and their little 18 month year old, James, had invited us over for the extended weekend to stay with them in their modern western apartment. So on Friday the 9^th of September, Aaron picked us up and took us to their place. The complex is appropriately named the Riverside Baroque Palace, for indeed it seemed palatial, though whether the functionality beneath the façade was as grand is the subject of another post.

When we walked in the doors, everything was made of what seemed to be giant slabs of marble. The right side of the entry way was an imitation gold-gilded grating, wrought in the shapes of vines and leaves. The same floral motif was in the corner of every slab of stone in the house, those of the floor inlaid with white and the walls with black to show the pattern. Every room had an individual thermostat control and the room was lit using hidden lights in the receded alcoves of the moldings.

We were placed in the guest bedroom, which also has its own private full bath. The king-sized bed was immensely comfortable, especially after the petrified pallets I’ve been sleeping on in the dorms. Perhaps the change that was most noticeable was that we could not hear a thing from inside the room; it was absolutely quite. Thus enjoying all of these comforts we felt we had regained some semblance of normalcy, which to a pregnant women is worth gold.

We stayed with them for the weekend, including Monday the 12 of September, which was the Mid Autumn Festival (中秋节 [Zhōngqiū jié]) so I did not have classes. The Lindemans had offered for Lacey to stay with them for the rest of the week until they left on vacation for Malaysia. With Lacey still feeling so unwell we took the offer, and I returned to campus for classes. We planned for me to come perhaps every other day and get her on Friday the 16^th of September to come back to campus. I should also mention a little about Leslie Lindeman. She was an OB/GYN nurse for 6 years, had been sick for 20 weeks with her first pregnancy, and is currently 6 months pregnant with her second baby, so she has been in a better position than anybody to empathize with how Lacey is feeling.

It was while I was back at campus and Lacey at the Lindeman’s that she had a particularly bad day. She had been throwing up a lot and on the verge of passing out the whole day. At one point when she had gone to get some food, she just laid down on the kitchen floor and didn’t move for hours. Leslie saw this and after having Lacey with them for a while realized that she was only getting about 300-400 calories of food a day, and at best half a liter of water. I get a call from her saying that in her professional and personal opinion she was quite concerned about Lacey and suggested we go to the doctor. Up until this point, we were very uncertain about where to draw the line regarding her health. Everyone keeps saying that pregnancy is hard and miserable and that often you just have to suffer through it until time heals you, which left us at a loss to determine when too much was actually too much. Apparently we had reached that point.

Leslie set up an appointment at Beijing Family United International Hospital for the very next day. Lacey, Leslie and myself went to the OB clinic. They ran all of the tests standard to a first prenatal checkup, which yielded several results. One, and most important, the baby was healthy. During the ultrasound we got to see its tiny body and see its heart beating. Second, and also important, according to the urinanalysis Lacey was not in extreme dehydration, though she did need fluids. Third, and very distributing was that Lacey had lost 22 lbs since getting pregnant. I think that just about anyone will tell you that such weight loss is not good at all for a pregnant woman. My sister, who was very sick during her first pregnancy, at the most lost 12 lbs.

The reaction of the doctor is very telling about China. There are several foreign doctors that work in the clinic, but it just so happened that the only doctor on call when we made the appointment was a 73-year-old Chinese woman. She had studied at Columbia medical school, so she supposedly had western training and goodness knows that in her tenure she’s probably seen it all. Upon discovering the huge weight loss, she was a little startled too, but did not do anything about it. So at the end of the checkup, I asked if we could possibly get some nausea medicine. The doctor said, “That’s not necessary, she just needs more food and water.” I retorted, “Every time she drinks or eats she throws up.” “Well then just make sure to drink and eat more.” She says. Explaining that such was not possible and that we would like some nausea medicine, the doctor obstinately refused, saying that it is bad for the baby.

The idea that medicine, practically of any kind, is bad for the baby dates back to traditional Chinese medicine. The Chinese are also more inclined to putting the needs of the baby before the health of the mother. Leslie, based on her experience in baby doctoring, was a little alarmed at this. She had her own checkup the next day with an American doctor, and explained Lacey’s condition and asked if there was some part of modern medicine that we were missing that would have led to the doctors reaction. Leslie’s doctor was frankly shocked and said that under those circumstances she would have had Lacey on an IV and with nausea medicine before leaving the clinic. We just lucked out by getting the only rock-stubborn doctor on the whole staff that refuses to give nausea medicine, and issue which is apparently going to be brought up with the board.

These discoveries are all good and well and the obvious correct choice was to see another doctor that would agree to getting Lacey on an IV, but when you have to figure out how to do so without insurance coverage, the situation gets messy. The estimated cost would be about $100 USD per hour with a potential stay of 24 hours to ensure healthy vitals. What this ended up leading us to was going to a Chinese hospital. Perhaps it goes without saying that the disparity between Western hospitals and Chinese is none too small. Have you ever heard those stories of people coming to China for cheap medicine? Well… there’s a reason it’s cheap. We had a member from our local church coming to help us translate and our situation was further improved because he already knew a doctor who worked at the hospital. So we arrived and began the line up.

Go to the basement to register. Go to this window to get your hospital card. Go up to the 6^th floor to see the doctor. We saw the doctor and after reviewing Lacey’s tests they said, “Well, it looks like nothing is wrong!” This time though, we were a little more insistent that something needed to be done. Thankfully they were swayable, and they prescribed a three-time treatment of IV liquids to rehydrate her. We asked how much it would be… the doctor said that for the first day, they would do two bags, so the two bags plus the syringe would be about 50 RMB (about $8 USD). We asked three times again just to be sure we had heard correctly. Comparing this to the international hospitals cost we were obviously satisfied and relieved.

The line up continued. Go back to the basement. Go to the pharmacy desk. (I think that the hospital system has undertones of the ration lines they always formed during the pre-communism invasions, and even thereafter.) At the pharmacy line, you buy your own IV bag and syringes, and then you are responsible to see that you get them to the right place for someone to plug you in. That took a little while but we found the IV sector, for lack of better phraseology. I was reminded of an airport terminal. There were rows and rows of chairs for people to sit in with the only distinguishing characteristic from and airport gate being that each chair had an IV bag post attached to it. For those in critical conditions they had cots and gurneys, but I assure you, they were not fickle about where those were placed. So we found an open seat out in the hall.

So that was what Lacey got to do for four hours that day. The next two days were two hours each. By the time she had finished the IV treatments her color had improved dramatically and her temperament got better as well. Though she continued to struggle with morning sickness, she is now at week 14 and coming out of the worst of it. Few people have the… opportunity (if that’s fair to say) to go to a hospital while overseas, and to have gone to a Chinese hospital is icing on the cake. The collection of war stories we will be able to tell this child are quickly mounting.

Torpedo Melon

Though there are many different fruits and vegetables here, I think this one merits particular mention because of the comment it elicited from Lacey. The fruit on the inside both looks and tastes like cantaloupe, but the texture is harder, almost like an apple. We had eaten it a couple of times courtesy of friends, and since Lacey had enjoyed it I thought I would get one. I dropped it off in our room and then went to go work on some homework while Lacey was napping. Pretty soon I get a text saying, “Did you buy a dinosaur egg?” For whatever reason it had me laughing for several minutes on end, but I replied with its actual name, “No, it’s a torpedo melon.”

Photos!

I finally have a live link for photos from Beijing! I am updating my Picasa album regularly with photos from Beijing. Check them out by clicking on the slideshow at right side of my blog or by going to Michael's Picasa Albums.

Animated Grades

With a people that does not really seem to understand sarcasm one may be inclined to think that the Chinese are all sobriety, but to this I would respond with the image of a middle-aged generation that carries around plushy teddy bear pencil pouches. Not that I saw exactly that, but what I did see in class reminded me of that.

My teacher is such a middle-aged woman who takes the class seriously and while she exercises some understanding of the difficulty of the language, she exhibits the stern expectation of good performance as often as not. I am also an adult student, and I try to act like it in the classroom. So in the midst of this context what I saw on my homework was astounding. Next to my grade was a distinctly Asian-animated smiley face, one which I think required more red ink than the corrections on my work. Thinking perhaps it was a manifestation of pity or patience at my character handwriting and trying to encourage me to keep my chin up, I dismissed the picture. To my surprise, when we got our second assignment back I had a cat face colored next to a scribbled “好” [hao3] meaning I had done a good job.

I checked with my American colleagues in other classes to see if they had experienced anything similar; one said she had not, but that when she saw her teacher’s lesson plans, the back was covered in an anime picture. I’m just waiting for the “Hello Kitty” sticker to show up on my test.

Niujie Mosque

Today my friend Sam took us to a mosque in the heart of the city. Turns out that Islam has been in China for a very long time, so long that there are some ethnicities that are known for being Muslim. This particular mosque was built in 996 AD, and has had various renovations and additions since then. What many of us were surprised at was that the architecture and motifs were all Chinese. Except for the Arabic
writings in parts of the buildings, and especially in the prayer hall, you would have thought is was just an ancient Chinese community.

I appreciated Sam sharing this part of his culture and religion with us. The exchange has been
very mutual; he has been asking so many questions about Latter-day Saint (LDS, or Mormon) beliefs and has come to believe that we about 90% in common, from a principle standpoint. He told me that in the Koran there is a prophecy from the Prophet Muhammad that speaks of Christian religions in the last days that will have much in common with Islam. Frankly, Sam has been searching for such a religion and such a people, but in the past four years he has been at this international school, meeting people from all around the world and of a plethora of sects, none ever came close to what he believed, until he met the Mormons.

Sam has expressed on several occasions the joy he has felt at finding people in Christendom that he can relate to, and though he is one of the more popular guys on the campus, he has lately chosen to spend most if not all of his time with the BYU-I students. He seems like the kind of person that will go far in life, and I'm glad that in this point of his searching he has found a positive representation of Christianity and Americanism in us.

As an afterthought, he is an avid fan of Lord of the Rings and Avatar, which means that aside from the all that I have already said, there is sufficient grounds for an automatic and zealous positive bias towards him in my book.

Pocari Sweat

In the week prior to us leaving from the States, Lacey had gotten quite dehydrated, a situation that was remedied by Powerade and Pedialyte (concentrated unflavored electrolyte solution). I actually packed a bottle of Pedialyte to make sure that we were prepared for any situation that could arise while here. Unsurprisingly, they have plenty of Gatorade here, so we are not at a lack there, however, it is not the preferred liquid-restoring beverage for athletes and students in Asia. It was in one of my classes that I saw a Korean classmate drinking out of a blue pop can, and the name of the drink was "Pocari Sweat". I couldn't help but laugh out loud, and with a quizzical look from my classmate I translated the word 'sweat' for him so that he could perhaps understand the humor. He justified the title by explaining that it was so named because it was an electrolyte drink that replaced the sweat one lost. I can objectively see the point, but it was a point in which I stood unconvinced that a literal marketing attempt would have sway amongst a Western audience.

Tender Mercies

The decision to come to China in the midst of a pregnancy was not an easy one, and sustaining that decision once we got here has been difficult. As of today, Lacey has literally not left our dorm room for a week and not for lack of want. Many pregnant women might understand the feeling of getting of the bed and moving to the next room as evoking feelings equivalent to being hit by a train, an experience that makes leaving the dorm and going on any extensive walk nothing short of fantasy.

Through the physical ordeals Lacey has been emotionally temperate, as always, but after now almost a month of miserable morning sickness she was sick of being sick. I was getting frustrated of being unable to find some sort of vegetable that had not been smothered in oil before being fried. Saturday evening, we were both at our outer limits and just didn't know what more we could do besides continue enduring it. I was approached by a girl from our BYU-Idaho group that evening who said that many of the students were going to fast (to understand more about fasting, see Fasting @ LDS.org) for her, an act which made us very grateful. But that was only the beginning.

On Sunday, Lacey wasn't even feeling up to going to church, which is saying something considering it is Lacey I'm talking about. Later during church I had several pregnant women coming up to me asking what food Lacey liked, because they were going to the American grocery stores in the city to get her whatever she wanted.  They also were passing around a sheet in Relief Society (See Relief Society @ LDS.org) for the sisters in the branch to volunteer for which days this week they would make and bring meals to Lacey, again, whatever she wanted.

Later that evening, Aaron and Leslie Lindeman paid us a visit. They had moved to Beijing when they were four months pregnant with their first child, and have lived here since. Leslie is again pregnant, now six months along with their second, so they have gone through everything we are going through. They brought us a whole crock pot of chicken noodle soup, which as simple as that sounds it something hard to get a hold of when you don't have a kitchen to cook things. They also brought homemade bread, silverware, plates, cups, and Tupperware.

The fact that they drove across the whole city to come visit us and provide some understanding for what we are experiencing along with the food, as simple as it was, was enough to leave both of us in tears of gratitude after they left. As if these angels hadn't already touched us enough, they have an extra bedroom with a king-sized pillow top bed and a private bathroom that they are letting us stay in for this coming three-day weekend. That thought alone has been enough to keep Lacey in tears for as often as she thinks about it.

May it be understood that having a family is a glorious thing and that blessings are never more manifest than when in pursuit of the family. But the 'glory' of it is certainly not prevalent, if even present, in this part of the journey. The question has been asked whether this is worth it and if this is really part of a plan of happiness. In firm contestation it is worth it and the looming brink of uncertainly will always be railed and abated for those who humbly trust in the plan that has been designed for our happiness and salvation. Ultimately, there can be no doubt that God is Father of all and He answers prayers… no matter
where in the world we are.

Mulan’s Luck

In the same-titled Disney movie, Mulan traverses ancient
China with the company of her cricket, a gift of good luck from her grandmother
prior to her matchmaking session. Now I seriously would have thought that
something like that would be an old tradition long lost. Not true.
 
I was returning from Zizhuyuan Park one day when I found a
really large underground mall. It goes three stories down, and has a lot of
little cubicle like shops that have niche specific items that you can't
normally find in the supermarket. There were dozens of plant shops, fishing
shops, etc. In one intersection of a couple of aisles there were several pet
stores, and one was specifically dedicated to birds. I was walking near said
store and there was this high-pitched sound like a fire alarm sound going off, and
I noticed the noise was certainly louder the closer to the bird store I was.
 
It wasn't until I practically had my ears pressed upon them
that I noticed these little wicker cages and lo and behold, crickets. They were
really large, about the size of my whole thumb, and unlike Mulan's these were a
brilliant green. They cost 30 RMB each (about 5 USD) which may not be a whole
lot, but much more than I would be willing to pay for a cricket, and I
certainly know that the amount of sleep lost with that incessant chirping
cannot possibly be lucky.

Iraqi Intelligence

One thing that I have always enjoyed about being abroad is
that so often, you meet people from cultures all over the world. This reality
is enhanced here at our school since the near 1000 students are all from other
countries. I have been making friends from the U.K., Italy, Korea, Russia, and
even Iraq. It is actually concerning the last that I want to address today.
 
My friend Sam Allamy is Iraqi through and through, but he
and his fellow Iraqis here at CNU are essentially part of an innovative effort
to bring China to Iraq and visa versa. He was attending a university in Iraq
studying Turkish, but then applied for and received a full package scholarship
(tuition, room, and stipend) to CNU, so he and his companions accepted and have
been in China since. They all received their bachelor degrees and then in a
stroke of genius, or perhaps just common sense, they approached a China
petroleum company and basically pitched, "We're Iraqi, our country has oil, we
speak Chinese, you interested?" Needless to say, they were.
 
After just a summer's work, the company encouraged them to
return to school and get master's degrees, meanwhile holding their jobs until
they finished. So Sam is in his first semesters of a master's program here and
still lived in the dorms on campus, which is how I met him. He actually thought
that he already knew may, insisting that if not me, someone that looks exactly
like me was here two years ago. In any case that was a good segue to introduce
myself.
 
During our first discourses, I avoided overtly talking about
the war because since Sam is pretty popular around here I imagined that the
subject had been repeated to the point of monotony. However, that didn't keep
my American colleagues from broaching the subject. It was through their
questions that I actually learned that Sam, and many Iraqis, appreciated the
presence of the US Military in Iraq. He acknowledge that there are plenty of
factions and subterfuges that the Iraqi government left alone would not have
the capability of containing, and so US presence has been and is still
something of a necessity. Furthermore, he said that in order to institute long
lasting change (no easy feat since the people we are talking about inculcating
change into have been culturally established for thousands of years) he thinks
that it could potentially be another decade or two before their feet would be
firmly enough underneath them.
 
I do not intend my platform to be political in nature,
however, part of my commitment as Explorer Michael is to share then smaller
more discrete facets of culture that I encounter and without out doubt Sam has
provided the most refreshing out-of-media-context perspective I have had.

Chinese Chess

This posting was prompted by the memory of Geri's Game, the
Pixar short film where the old man plays chess against himself. It seems
fitting that perhaps in a park here I would find some old men, maybe throw in a
Confucian beard, playing a pensive game of chess, but in fact the great legacy
of Ping Pong was what I found.

Friendly Fares

Dearest readers, I imagine that you have been in the thralls
of curiosity, anxiously awaiting the latest from yours truly. The amounts that
I have to share can hardly be contained within one post, and even in writing
one I am torn between providing a chronological update of our little family or
to straightaway delve into the ever-so-interesting cultural facets I have seen.
I think considering the long lapse since my last post, the former is more
appropriate.
 
The discovery of being pregnant was not a compromising idea
in and of itself, but morning sickness certainly brought me to the point of
wondering whether I was somehow letting my wife die. Not only that but I
seriously began to wonder if I should alter our plans to coming to China. Thankfully
there were in-laws on hand who helped guide me through what I can and cannot
due for Lacey and my own parents reminded me of the conviction I have had in
making this journey, one based in both personal ambition and divine
confirmation, primarily the latter which cannot be denied. All of that can be
summed up by a statement made by Lacey that, "I can be sick in the US, or sick
in China" a pragmatic notion that tipped the scales.
 
All of our flights with United Airlines, our first was from
Seattle at 7:16 AM on Wednesday, August 17, 2011, a departure that required us
to get up at 3 AM. The trip went smoothly from there to San Francisco, but the
planned flight to Beijing leaving at 11:14 AM went sickeningly awry. We had
boarded the plane and headed out to the runway when there was a mechanical
malfunction, requiring us to return to the gate and wait for an hour and a
half. The second approach to the runway presented another malfunction, and so a
second return. In summary it was 5 hours after our departure time before we
actually took off, all the while we had not left our seats. To the credit of
the airlines the attendants were as helpful as they could possibly be in
assisting a pregnant woman.
 
We arrived in Beijing at approximately 6:30 PM Thursday,
August 18, 2011 local time. My dear friend Victoria Wang had arranged a
rendezvous with the husband of her best friend, who picked us up and brought us
directly to the Capital Normal University International College campus. Please
to do not be disappointed that after all of that talk about the apartment
searching I ultimately opted to live in the dorms on CNU campus. Something
about it being more convenient for both Lacey and I, as well as preventing a
surely miserable towing of my morning sick wife around suburban Beijing for who
knows how long while I TRY to find an apartment, all made the decision easy.
 
So we're here, and we're safe. The list of cultural
insights, as well as some photo sharing is soon to come!

Foreign Expectations

Well, if going to China is not an adventurous enough undertaking, let me spice it up. My lovely wife, Lacey, and I are 7 weeks pregnant! This was not exactly on purpose, because it really would be quite cruel if I were to scheme, "Oooo, let's see if I can get my wife pregnant so that she can go through the worst part of first-trimester-morning-sickness-with-a-vengeance when we are going to be taking a twelve hour flight across the Pacific." Assuredly, I am not that mean, nevertheless that is exactly what is happening. Lacey is experiencing her first pregnancy in all it's up-heaved glory, but is being very brave as we are still going forth with our plans to go to China. We know a few people who have been pregnant in China before, so it is certainly possible to do, and though we are scared senseless at times we continue to go forward on faith.

This may certainly provide a new twist to the tales we have of our China experience. I think my readers are getting a real bargain, because this is really going to be a 360 experience of life abroad, exploiting so many facets of international living. China just got a little bit more foreign.

Sharing Your Apartment

As I mentioned in the post, "Where in Beijing?" I've been trying to solidify our apartment situation. Using the site mentioned in that same post (beijing.haozu.com) you have a lot of filter options in your search. One of them is to select a "Shared" apartment or to "Rent the Whole". You may wonder why anyone would want to share an apartment, but remember, this is the educational district of Beijing so there are host of students looking for cheap housing and will tolerate roommates. Being married, I was definitely in the market for an apartment all to ourselves, but even using the "Rent the Whole" option I began to get the feeling that the apartments were not completely for one family. The posts were titled "master bedroom rental" and even though it would be a two or three bedroom apartment, they only showed the picture of one bedroom. From these evidences I became convinced that the filter was bogus and that these real estate agents were putting up their apartments under random parameters.

As I selected those that I was sure would be "Rent the Whole" styled apartments, my friend Victoria Wang from Farmington, UT helped us do the translation on three-way calls with the respective brokers. Is was during one of these discussions that the broker revealed that they had another apartment available that was a three bedroom but that the owner had filled two of the rooms with personal storage items and them locked them, but that the rest of the apartment was available for rent. Victoria and I were both surprised to learn that this was really quite common amongst landlords, and that if I had found an apartment that was three bedroom with only the master bedroom available still would be reserved for only one family.

Happy day! This meant that so many more apartments from my searches were viable candidates for us to rent. However on a somber after note, we called on another apartment under all these conditions, and lo and behold, we would have to share it, so the filter of "Rent the Whole" is still bogus every once in a while.

Registering Your Trip

Many of you may know this already, but for a young adventurous student, it may be fresh knowledge. When you plan to travel abroad, the State Department of the United States Government can help provide you with timely information about the destined country, and if you register your trip with them it provides a registry of your address and contact information. This information is extremely important if there is a national crisis where you are residing. The State Department makes it their priority to get U.S. citizens out of dangerous situations as quickly as possible. For example, they evacuated 16,700 Americans out of Haiti after the big earthquake.

The current travel registry is called the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP).

For you students out there, when applying for a visa or registering your trip and you are asked for your local residency, provide the address and contact information of your university until you have additional information.

The Gilman Scholarship

One of the reasons that it is even possible for me to be going to Beijing this fall is the Gilman Scholarship. When I had tried to participate in a study abroad to China during 2010, I was intensively searching for scholarships to fund my travel. That year, I applied for the Boren Scholarship, a Federal Government award of up to $10,000 a semester in exchange for 2 years of public sector service (i.e. working for the State Department). At the time I was confident I might get it, but when I didn't, I went searching for others. So it was that last year I found the Gilman Scholarship, but regretfully I discovered after the application deadline.

Once I had decided that I would again try to study abroad in 2011, I had a better base of funding options available. I applied for the Boren Scholarship again, but since the award statistic is about 16% (1 in every 6 applicants gets the scholarship) I didn't get my hopes up. I did, however, apply for the Gilman Scholarship by the deadline. The maximum reward is $5,000 a semester, with a chance for a $3,000 increase if you are studying a critical language (as determined by the State Department). They also calculate in financial need and instead of service time afterwards, the agreement is that recipients become the marketing strategy of the program. Student outline a "follow-on" project that they will complete upon returning to the States, something that promotes studying abroad, their specific program, and funding through the Gilman Scholarship.

When applying for the Gilman, I had considerably greater hopes because the recipient ratio is almost 1:2. Thankfully, I was one of the recipients with a reward of $2,500, which in truth is making this opportunity possible for me.

What you'll be able to see on this blog in the future is part of my "follow-on" project. I agreed with Gilman that I will make little documentary vignettes of different encounters as an American student in Beijing. Some of these videos will cater specifically to attending to CNU, like "Where do I sign up for classes" and others will be more generic, like understanding the bus systems around the city. I'll be posting the videos as often as possible on my Explorer Michael's YouTube Channel.

The Gilman Scholarship is not just for studying in China, but applies to students everywhere that are going... everywhere! Please check it out at http://www.iie.org/Programs/Gilman-Scholarship-Program.

Where in Beijing?

Everything is arranged and paid for... expect where I'm going to live. The university was offering dorms to us international students, however, it was going to cost $410 USD/month per person to live there. Lacey and I have a hard time swallowing $820 USD a month as an acceptable rent price. I've been looking for apartments around the area that are suitable, and turns out that a reasonable place can be found for 2000 RMB (=$310 USD).

Since Beijing is a city of about 19 million people, saying that you will live in Beijing is vague at best, and if you were to tell that to a property broker, expect a quizzical look and barrage of questions.

Beijing is divided into 14 districts ( 区 qū) and 2 counties. We will be located in the district of Haidian ( 海淀 Hǎidiàn) which on this picture is the blue sector to the top-left of the central red sector. Haidian is the educational district of the city. I believe that Beijing has somewhere around 67 formal universities. Well, being equipped with the knowledge that I was going to need to look for an apartment in Haidian, I felt confident in the results of my search.

Turns out, Haidian is still ginormous. By itself, it has around 2.1 million people, and that was according to the 2000 census. It can be further broken down into 29 smaller districts, each of which may be colloquially referred to as a 'town' (no doubt an understatement). In my housing search I was then faced with finding which of those sectors was close to CNU, so that we could try and find an apartment close to campus. Turns out there are about five.

紫竹桥 Zǐzhúqiáo

航天桥 Hángtiānqiáo (Space Bridge)

车道沟 Chēdàogōu
万寿寺 Wànshòusì (Manjuji)
车公庄 Chēgōngzhuāng

The reason for knowing these is because when searching for a place to live, most housing boards are naturally going to whittle the search down to specific areas. A site that I've been using to search for housing is http://beijing.haozu.com/. I like it because the filters are clear and accurate, and practically every post I've seen is provided with pictures of the apartment and maps of the local area. If you are not very savvy on Mandarin, don't worry, it translates quite nicely through translate.google.com.

If you want to see where that campus of CNU is at, and thus the general vicinity where we will be living, click on the location link in the footer of this post. I tacked it to the right spot.
 

What am I doing in Beijing?

I have already received some questions from my friend, Herbert Nagamatsu. I feel foolish that I didn't answer some of these sooner.

Q: How long will you be there?

A: Four months. We leave the States on the 17 of August and fly back on the 19th of December.

Q: Will you be working there, teaching English, or doing anything else?

A: Lacey and I will both be attending Capital Normal University. I am going with Brigham Young University - Idaho. This is actually a pilot trip for them, so I'm excited to be in the first group to go. While at CNU, we will be taking intensive language classes. In addition to the language curriculum, we will have instruction in Chinese culture and literature. From what I know, we will be in language class four hours, five days a week.

In addition to schooling, I am going to be executing two projects simultaneously. I will be collecting data for a research project focusing on teacher-student communication at the university, research that I hope to present in 2012 at the Western Conference of the Association for Asian Studies (WCAAS) which will be hosted by BYU-Idaho. The second project is part of a scholarship I received from the Gilman International Scholarship program. I will be filming small documentary vignettes about the student life in Beijing, and other practical scripts like getting a taxi, ordering food, etc.

Thanks for the questions Herbert!

Questions and Misconceptions

While I'm in China, I will be carrying around a little notebook that I can fill with questions as they occur to me. In my past experiences, I had questions when I encountered something new, but it didn't take long before I took it for granted without discovering more of the why behind it. I'm determined to not let it happen this time and I want to extend this opportunity to you all as well.

If you have questions or have heard rumors of "They say in China that..." I want to hear what those are, then I'll don my Sherlock Holmes cap and do what I can to verify if those conceptions are true, and try to answer your questions. You can share your questions and conceptions with me by replying to this post, or you can email them to me at ExplorerMichael@gmail.com. Once I find out, I'll post the answers on the blog.

First Post

Time is disappearing as we get closer to our departure date for China. We are going to be leaving Des Moines, IA in our air-condition-less car on Monday, August 8^th and drive to Salt Lake City, UT. There we will say hi and bye to some friends and family, and drive to Rexburg. After making a deposit to our storage unit and some more hi’s and bye’s, we will drive to Spokane, WA and spend some time with the in-laws, who will graciously accompany us the remainder of the way to Seattle. The cheapest tickets to Beijing were out of Seattle, so we planned this road trip accordingly.

The fateful day is Wednesday, August 17, we board the planes, make a quick stop in San Fran then off to Beijing. The reality is definitely starting to hit. A feeling of nostalgia that has been creeping up on me and is none too pleasant is that of my first months in Argentina. When I was in the Missionary Training Center in Provo, UT, they do their best to inundate you with as much vocabulary and grammar as you can possibly retain… and then some. However, compared to the linguistic dexterity required when you arrive in the country… Well, it’s like trying to teach someone to swim by correspondence. At full throttle it took about 3 months to reach low-level fluency in Spanish, and Mandarin is significantly more challenging, so here’s hoping that 4 months in Beijing will prove sufficient time to see some of it come to conversational fruition.