Journey to the East

A Happy Mid-Autumn Festival to all of you! In China, like everywhere else I guess, there’s always a special kind of air you feel on holidays. Today there was an almost tangible sense of the holiday atmosphere in Ji’nan. Spirits seemed to run high all over the town, buoyed by incredibly blue skies and beautiful sunshine. The weather was too perfect today, so much so that I felt guilty staying inside (indeed, many of my Chinese friends told me when I talked to them today that they took this opportunity to get out and go to the zoo or to the park). And so, of course, I went out to seek what I could of the holiday.

And what does one do as an American on this traditional Chinese autumnal festival? You import your own American autumnal traditions, of course: We played football. Yep, we walked across the street to the large open parking lot in front of Hero Mountain and threw the football, which made for an incredible and pleasant September afternoon. I found it somehow appropriate that on this holiday, which is not unlike Thanksgiving Day in its sentiment, we marked the day the way that many Americans do on Thanksgiving at home: tossing around the pigskin.

All around the park, people were out doing the same as we were: enjoying a beautiful day. On the way to throw the ball, we passed various clusters of activity. Amateur opera troops had set up shop and were drawing crowds with their performances. Groups of people with colored scarves or flags were waving them around as they did line dancing to blaring Chinese Pop tunes. Kite-fliers were out in abundance. The roller-skating rink in the middle of the park was PACKED with skaters. People were flocking up the mountain, making an effort to get to the summit and gaze out. Something was going on almost EVERYWHERE today.

As afternoon began to fade in to evening, we all headed for  a favorite dumpling restaurant for a big holiday dinner. We weren’t the only ones with this idea, though. The restaurant was crowded and buzzing. Like us, many of the patrons were out enjoying a lively holiday meal. Again, in places so boisterous it’s hard not feel like the excitement of the celebration, or the “holiday spirit” if you will, is something you could literally feel or take hold of. At times like these I always feel like I’m (tangentially or not) sharing in some larger part of the Chinese experience. It’s a good feeling, like I’m very connected to the place where I am, and I’m always grateful for moments like these.

On the way home from dinner tonight, I caught a glimpse of the moon. As Mid-Autumn Festival is centered around the moon, moon-gazing is one of the many past-times you’re supposed to enjoy on this day (An aside: My roommate, Chris, told me that at his University Chinese class they were asked share– in Chinese of course– what folklore existed about the moon respective home countries. Lacking a better response, he apparently talked about werewolves, much to the amusement of his teacher. Later, when asked to explain how Americans feel when they look at the moon, Chris apparently responded– after a moment of trying to think of something to say– “Because we’ve sent a man up there, we look at the moon and feel very proud,” which apparently prompted the teacher to laugh and confirm that there was an American flag planted somewhere up there). So, of course I took a moment to take a good look. The moon tonight (fittingly) was round, bright and beautiful as it sat up above the top of Hero Mountain. The skies which had been so clear and blue during the day had deepened into an inky navy blue dotted with stars. Of course, wrapped up in the spirit of the day and also in a bit of nostalgia, I felt like this was the perfect end to the day.

Tomorrow we’ll go back to work and before too long will come my much awaited trip to the Three Gorges. All of this means that I’ll probably be M.I.A. for a while, but stick around as updates will surely come upon my return. Until next time!

So, today is Mid-Autumn Festival. Plans for later aren’t exactly  clear yet, but I think that some friends and I will get together to have dinner, eat mooncakes and possibly climb Hero Mountain. The story of Mid-Autumn Festival is best summarized on Wikipedia, and I won’t try to do it justice since all of the details of the myth are pretty intricate. Basically, it involves a beautiful woman living on a palace on the moon with a magical rabbit who makes her immortality pills as she awaits the arrival of her lover. Pretty nuts, right? In any case… in the spirit of the holiday, I thought I’d post some pictures of the main attraction of the Mid-Autumn Festival: Mooncakes.

Today, rain swept into Ji’nan. With it came an awakening: cold weather will soon be here. The drizzle was nothing terribly new (much of late July and August here were marked by overcast skies and buckets of rain). Unlike the showers of summer– which only made the air steamy, and the city feel like a greenhouse– the rain brought a chill with it. Suddenly, temperatures dropped into the low 60s and I found myself wearing long pants and a sweatshirt.

Is this the end of the warm weather I’ve been living with since nearly May? Last year, it was almost November before the seasons really turned. In this sense, there really wasn’t a long Autumn and vaguely warm weather lingered on until nearly Halloween. For the temperature to drop so dramatically now seems premature. To be sure, it would be nice to get away from the searing heat that has characterized this city over the past several months BUT, I can’t say that I’m looking forward to the full plunge back into winter (the last one here was perhaps the longest and coldest of my life). Nonetheless, as previously noted, Ji’nan is beginning to take note of the change of seasons, and it won’t be long now before the warmer days are really over for good.

The end of this week marks the start of a nice little vacation for Chinese National Day. As I mentioned before, I’ll be headed with some friends to take a cruise down the Yangtze River’s Three Gorges area starting in Wuhan and ending in Chongqing. We’re also trying to work in a side-trip to Chengdu (and possibly to the panda reserve there). Stay tuned as plans get more specific. I’ll be sure to fill in the pre-trip itinerary soon.

Last week, in my highest-level class (6th year English speakers), I closed with an activity called “Open Questions.” Every student is given a blank square of paper on which they are able to write any question that they’d like me to answer, and we in turn have a class discussion about it. Among the may questions given to me last week, this one stood out:

Do you wish you could eat mooncakes with your family on Mid-Autumn Festival this year?

And so, it’s that time again… Mid-Autumn Festival is coming up next week. Last year at around this time, I wrote a little blurb about the festival, which is still online here. To briefly recap, Mid-Autumn Festival is much like Thanksgiving in America: the focus is on being together with loved ones and eating mooncakes.  Sounds like a pretty good deal, right?  Appropriately, mooncakes have been back on the shelves in grocery stores for a good few weeks, baijiu sales are on the rise, and people have begun to ask me the question that always seems to get asked around holidays over here: Are you planning on going home to celebrate with your family?

It’s at this point that I usually have to explain that since my family is in the U.S. (where the holiday is not really celebrated) that this would be virtually impossible. This usually elicits a response of something like “Oh, that’s too bad,” from whoever I happen to be talking to. It does, however, bring up a more interesting point: I’ve never really celebrated this holiday before. Last year, I was traveling in Xi’an and spent the day sightseeing, so any real “celebration” was more or less lost on me. I admit, the concept of the holiday seems really nice, as it’s an opportunity to be with those who are close to you, and appreciate them and their company. In that sense, Mid-Autumn Festival seems to be a holiday with fairly little pretense, which is also welcoming. In fact, the holiday seems to lend itself to a sort of wistfulness about family, loved ones, and home– perhaps best expressed by the legendary poet Li Bai in his poem “静业思” (Jing Ye Si), “Thinking in the Quiet Night,” which I wrote about a while ago here. With all the talk of togetherness and celebration, I can’t help but think that it would be a lot of fun to observe the day in some way, no matter how small.

As for my plans? This year, the festival falls during the course of a pretty hectic work week (another holiday, Chinese National Day, follows very soon afterwards and as the schools will be closed for that day, Aston is forced to reschedule classes, sometimes on weekdays). So, unlike last year, I’ll be in Ji’nan for the festival, which means that I may get an actual opportunity to celebrate. It’s my hope that, true to the spirit of the holiday, my friends and I can use it as an opportunity to get together and appreciate each other’s company, but as of yet plans have not been made.

Big plans are on the horizon, however. As I mentioned earlier, National Day (which falls on October 1) is a BIG vacation opportunity since everyone is given a week off from work. I’ll be no exception. With my classes canceled for National Day Weekend, I find myself with a good 9 or 10 days to go somewhere. My group is heading south and west on a cruise of the Yangtze River in an area commonly referred to as the “Three Gorges.” We’ll be starting from the city of Wuhan, and then floating down-river towards Chongqing and (hopefully) Chengdu. In total, this means about five days on a boat. It should end up being a really interesting adventure. I’ll be sure to post updates as plans develop. Until then… stay tuned.

Here’s a look at my new apartment. On the whole, I’d say it’s a little more cozy (even if that means it’s a little smaller) than my previous apartment, and I definitely think it’s got a certain charm to it. These pictures come courtesy of my friends Mackenzie and Joanna (who actually lived here until the end of the semester when we moved in).

You can also see some more of their photos of the place where I now live here. Unfortunately, at this point I haven’t been able to get any good pictures of what the place looks like now that we’ve moved in (though, really, little has actually changed). Hopefully I’ll be able to give a better look at both the apartment and the neighborhood before too long.