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Published: September 15th 2009
(Currently listening to: Venetian Snares)
As I sat down to type this, just before I conjured the first sentence, a knock on my door. I open it: "安全调查！“ "Safety Inspection"? Uh, okay. I was about to become disaffected at the intrusion of personal rights to privacy and space, but then I watched as a random guy walked past me into the room, glanced around with arbitrary obligation, bent down to check that both Ethernet ports were not broken and walked politely past me out of the room.
Welcome to China. To me, this country's infrastructure and mentality seem to still be based on caring for the small jobs because they lay the foundation for big projects, the greater good. Which is great, but when everyone has so many small, odd jobs to care so much for, everything gets done half-assed and arbitrarily.
For example--I still don't have my student ID card, because they're doing every foreign student's at once, and will distribute them all at the same time. And because they were unaware that I'd already finalized my passport and acquired my residence permit visa number (although I went in last week expressly for the purpose of showing them that), mine will somehow be in some late batch of student ID cards made a few days after the rest. And to get my student food card, I had to go in the foreign student office to have them create and print out an "introduction," with my name (Chinese and English), passport number, and expected duration of stay at Sichuan University (with the trademark Red Stamp, of course, needed to authorize any document in China), then give that to a worker at "Student Campus Food Center," a one-window service counter on the other side of campus, to "introduce" myself and obtain my special card needed to buy meals at any on-campus canteen. I can't just use cash--how inefficient and disorganized would that be?!
But I finally have my 饭卡，and will receive my student ID next monday (apparently). This experience, to me, epitomizes Chinese-style bureaucracy. Welcome to China. Most everything gets done: somehow. Everything is just broken into unnecessarily small, unnecessarily complicated processes. Everything seems to get done, eventually, but no one really seems to know how or why.
To finalize my visa and residence permit, at the PSB, they made me (after waiting a week passport-less while they used it to prepare my documents) come between 2:30 and 4:30, because that's when foreign visas are done. To pay the fee, I had to leave the PSB, walk 4 minutes down the street to the ISBC Bank and pay it directly to the bank, because it saves the PSB the trouble of making deposits to the bank every day. ISBC gave me a receipt, which I returned to the other office's second floor and waited patiently for them to process. But it happened--it got done, somehow, and that's just the way it's done.
On a different note, classes started last week. Today was my seventh day of Chinese Chinese, I guess you could say. I'd say further that my Chinese vocabulary has increased about 1/8 in under 3 weeks. I can now call you a beautiful lass or a swindling cheat, or say such things as "absolute Truth," "pros and cons," "coup d'etat," "watching on helplessly," "carrot," "unfathomable," "rabbit," "diligence," "corn," "for sure," " 'playthang', ""once you've gone, there's no turning back," and "in the prime of one's life."
About an hour ago, I told my "Situations in China" teacher I wouldn't be attending because I have too many other classes. That course was boring and intimidating anyway, and was actually speaking the truth (其实，我说的话有真理）。Last week was the chance to sign up for supplementary classes, and I did so. I plan to take once-a-week badminton and Tai Chi courses, 2-credit offerings in "Sichuan Dialect" and "Fundamentals of Translation," as well as a Modern Chinese History course in English usually offered only to U. of Washington students, that their program has been gracious enough to allow me to take. As a direct exchange student, my only requirement is to remain full-time per the standards of my home university, meaning, 12 credits this semester. And, after dropping this undesirable "Situations in China" course, if I keep all the supplementary classes, I should still be at 19+ credits if everything transfers. So I feel relieved, not bad, about dropping this one original course.
I've accepted a job teaching English to 14-year-olds for at a specialized weekend school for 125RMB/hour, and it seems as if I'll start next Sunday. Of course, all plans are fundamentally subject to arbitrary change here. The text I'll be teaching from is called "Ququ YinYu" ("Fun Fun English"), and one of the last lessons is Aesop's fable about the mouse removing a thorn from the lion's paw.
I've established a schedule with a Master's student here to meet 2-3 times a week for 2-3 hours each time. At least have the time is just me reading my textbook aloud, with her correcting my pronunciation (sometimes every other word) or reminding me of forgotten words (as our lessons are 98%!i(MISSING)n Chinese characters). It's militantly diligent and effective. After half a week, my pronunciation (to borrow a good ol' English expression) has improved by leaps and bounds. The rest of the time, she reads aloud from her English texts, and I correct her speech sounds and spoken pace. It's weird, the difference in speech sounds determined by place of birth. How she has trouble pronouncing "asked" and absolutely can't say "spoil." And how the simple Chinese verb set for "to go out" is made of two syllables completely foreign to my tongue. Language is muscle memory and speech sounds. Only body language is necessary for survival.
Sunday I adventured Chengdu city by foot and by bus, locating first the major downtown shopping district, then the adjacent sidestreet boutiques, searching out those delicious, delicious Chinglish t-shirts. I found a few, even, but none that both fit and were reasonably-priced. I can be patient; I'm here for 4 more months. It'll happen.
The mannequins in some of those boutique windows were terrifying. See pictures of this and the rest of my wandering here: <
>
After that failed effort, I walked to TianFu Square, a public central park that's
literally dead-center. Chengdu is organized by two bisecting main roads, N-->S and L-->R, that meet at TianFu Square. There are 3 circular highways that circumspect the city in growing circumference. The highway system here is actually not too bad, as is the bus system, but taxis are too few, the smaller streets too, too crowded.
Anyway, the central square was beautifully and precisely rendered, and I enjoyed its unique architecture. Overlooking it is a perhaps 100-foot statue of Chairman Mao, perpetually saluting the People's Republic in flowing garb. Which seemed strange until I remembered that there's a statue of Abraham Lincoln sitting in a chair staring straight ahead at nothing in Washington, D.C.
After discerning that the People's Park was only a 5-minute walk west, I decided to go there too, and am glad that I did. Free entry, public gardens and walkways, playspace and small rides for children and verandas and MaJiang tables for old men. Live music performances with traditional song and instrument. Memorials to fallen soldiers of the Red Guard. A large man-made lake in the middle of the park and four distinct tea houses strewn around it. The weather has become suddenly chill here this week, perfect temperature to walk all day in thick shorts and a sweatshirt with rolled-up sleeves.
I was now quite far from bus routes, and after 20 minutes, managed to hail a cab back to campus. The taxi driver was the most memorable I've ever had, and I translated our conversation verbatim as soon as I returned to my room. I'll post it, along with some more funny t-shirts or something, later this week or next.
The American stereotype among students here from other countries is roughly what I predicted it to be: brash, outgoing, slightly ignorant, beefy, and somewhat polarizing. But I've also learned this stereotype is tentative and fragile. Just me being me has dispelled it for some. If I manage to dispel a couple stereotypes while here, that's reason enough to make the trip, maybe. Most all stereotypes are this way, fixed only until you actually meet new people, say, by talking to an unimaginable taxi driver in China.
I know there's other things I wanted to say but have forgotten, and this post is already too long. You can talk me up via e-mail, of course, and thanks to those who already have been for the support and lovely stories.
Ciao, Bom Noite,
-Tye
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Saili
Sally Lockhart
enlightening
You are learning so much about how we all relate to each other. I love it. Thank you for staying in touch so well. Miss you much, Tye. ~Mom