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Published: September 12th 2008
Straight lines!
Either morning exercise or the flag raising ceremony.Chinese schools begin each day with a flag raising ceremony if it’s a Monday and with morning exercise every other day. They walk out of their classrooms in straight lines, down to the soccer field, in straight lines, and get into formation on the field…in perfectly straight lines. Then they do the most ridiculous dance/exercise I’ve ever seen, aerobics style, to a funny recording that counts in Chinese (yi er san si wu liu qi ba jiu shi!) Then they file back in straight lines. Although faintly militaristic, their discipline is amazing for 13 - 15 year olds…remember how long it took us to form the number 2004 for high school pictures? I don’t think we walked in a straight line…EVER.
China has an odd obsession with Loony Tunes type Western classical music—think when Peppy la Pue falls in love with the cat (Romeo and Juliet, by Travinsky or Stravinsky or whoever). That’s one of the typical ring backs China mobile assigns to our phone numbers. At my school, during nap time (yes, we have nap time! Lunch: 11:50 - 1:00, Nap time: 1:00 - 2:00!) they play that doofy lullaby you imagine they’d play in Loony Tunes whenever there’s a baby sleeping…da da duhh, da da duhhh, daa daa daa daa daa daa daaaa. And then they play random classical music in between classes.
The other typical sound you’re likely to hear while walking down the street in China is the phlegm hurling, loogie hacking of Chinese men. It's the sound of the biggest loogie of your life, but it happens one hundred or more times a day. Chinese men spit any and everywhere. They’ll make the sound in doors, at dinner, and in the classroom. As polite as Chinese people are, their manners are very different—spitting your bones and unwanted parts of meat directly onto the dinner table is completely acceptable. And Chinese women water down red wine with sprite. That’s right. They put shui bi, or sprite, into their wine. I think that’s just rude. I saw this at a banquet for Teacher’s Day where the incessant toasting could make even a seasoned western drinker a bit tipsy, so I assume the alcohol makes them feel sick and they were avoiding the embarrassment of being red-faced and drunk at work. But I’m culturally (or physiologically) insensitive, so what do I know?
Speaking of fury, Walmarts in this country blow U.S. Walmarts out of the water. They’re all two floors and are staffed with an army of people to help you. I was in the cleaning aisle, looking for floor cleaner, when I looked around and saw no less than 11 Walmart employees in that aisle alone recommending products. It took a team of about 8 of them to help me find milk that wasn’t in juice-box size containers. They take customer service here by storm. On that note, Chinese people are one of the friendliest groups of people I’ve ever experienced. They’ll come up to you in the park and just listen to your English conversation out of curiosity, help you with directions, and tell you when to get off the bus if you show them the characters of the place to which you’re trying to go. When I was trying to find Kiki’s school, which is in the middle of the Chinese projects, I asked a PLA guy or cop, I couldn’t tell, if I was going the right way. He pointed and waved me on, and from there a string of walkie-talkie wielding policemen intercepted me at different points to show me the way. They walked me right into the school gates! I loved that!
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Mom again
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Manners
I don't know if it was a news item about getting ready for the Olympics or something to do with the increase of Chinese tourism abroad or whatever or even wherever I saw it but it was precisely about what you noted, that for an extremely polite and friendly culture, there were some things like spitting that wouldn't translate!