The law of diminishing returns

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I'm not sure if this phrase is particularly applicable to both my ambivalence towards this here medium of communication, along with my apparent linguistic ineptness, but I will leave it to those two old codgers Malthus and Ricardo to decide. I am starting to lose faith in the claims by our Chinese tutors that this language is 'easy' and 'just takes time'. I mean, admittedly I can string a few sentences together, but in a similar manner to the way Winston Churchill spoke French, with brute force and a total disregard for niceties such as pronunciation. To remember the Romanized translation (pinyin) without one of the four tones is hard enough. Adding one of these, coupled with the fact that a rather unaccommodating Chinese character needs to be firstly memorized for reading purposes, and then written time and time again, leads me to conclude that I will bring up any offspring I manage to impose upon this world speaking Mandarin as their mother tongue with the knowledge that English can be learned seemingly effortlessly (Dutch people being my main rationale). I have hit a plateau in a way not expressed since Kurt Kobain warned of 'a bucket and a mop and an illustrated book about birds'. In hindsight I can tell you that this the bucket is empty, the mop is broken, and the illustrated book has text in incomprehensible Chinese. A disaster on several levels. I can learn as much vocabulary as possible, but fluency is ambitious considering 70% of Chinese colloquial speak is classical allusions that make absolutely no sense to someone 1) foreign 2) not born in the Tang dynasty 3) from no particular linguistic stock. Alas, one must march on and persevere, and I must say that the Chinese are overly sympathetic to our plight so generally try to egg you on with encouragement that I am quite sure I would not be so generous with if a foreigner spoke English as badly. The only foreigners I have seen who are grappling with moderate fluency have been living here or studying the language for over 4 years, so considering October was the start of my formal Chinese education I don't think I should be overly disheartened. One day I will be good. One day I will be good. One day I will be good. So my tutor says.

I haven't re-read my last post since I published it so please forgive me for anything I accidentally repeat. There are a few things of note that I have been casting my attention to (apart from studying - it goes without saying that is by far and away the most 'important'), mainly the newly opened beer garden. After initial disappointment when I first arrived to Beijing at the lack of open aired drinking establishments I once remembered, what I didn't take into account was the fact that it was cold, and the Chinese don't like the cold. So as it has rapidly become blisteringly hot, the Chinese men are reassuming their natural dispositions of cigarette in mouth, beer in hand, food on table (and floor), T-shirts comfortably lifted over protruding bellies, drunkenly chatting. The women however seem to spend much of their summer discovering techniques to defy a suntan. Umbrellas, hats, I have even seen full face masks. So, with the natural order restored, many more places catering for some outdoor beer consumption have sprung up. Therefore, apart from the rather unfortunate 2 weeks the beer garden was closed for sanitary reasons, I particularly enjoy drinking 50p pints and eating deliciously unhealthy kebab sticks by the dozen, surrounding by like minded people. When we did break the mould and headed somewhere more fancy I have had two notable music experiences since I have been here. The first was to see the American band Ratatat at what can only be described as the most overcrowded venue without any air conditioning I have ever been to. In the EU this would have been shut down for healthy safety reasons at the door itself, due to the two rather unsavoury looking bouncers, never mind the sardine can of the venue's inners. However, the gig itself was memorable once every punter accepted that it was pretty much a pool party of sweat. What made it even more memorable was the sneaking in for free. You can take the Manc out of Manchester but you can never take the Manchester out of the Manc. Another highlight of recent was the largest ever outdoor electronic festival in the art district of Beijing. Some people believe that the area is a bit try hard but being a big fan of Berlin I really like it, especially with 2000 aficionados dancing their heads off. A good day all round except the cancellation of the much anticipated after party due to some overzealous Western party pooper effectively ending his own, and everyone else's night of debauchery.

Much time has been spent enjoying films which can be bought for about 90p (in genuine packaging) from a DVD shop under my favourite pizza establishment with the purchase of every episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm for a paltry sum of 150 yuan being a particular steal. Feeling as awkward as Larry David I sauntered over to the British Ambassador's garden party for an Oxbridge event. Feeling rather suave on the journey there, I soon realised that without khaki pants, brown deck shoes, and a college tie I was attired like an obviously non-public school alien. Nevertheless, I met a few interesting people and tried to drop some hints to the man himself about the possibility of becoming the next Her Majesty's Ambassador to the People's Republic of China, which he rightly laughed off. Moreover, it was interesting to discover what different lines of work British expats were in, though 'import/export' is a tad vague for future job prospects.

More to follow

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