Journey to the East

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.

Today, my second semester at Aston officially came to a close. It passed, even more than the first, incredibly quickly. There is, I’m sure, some wholly appropriate metaphor I could use here, comparing my time here with the wind: the semester began in March as a frigid gust, and blew through the spring into the summer as a swiftly moving current of warm air. In any case, I’ve been here for a year now, and while in some cases that both seems like and is a very long time, I find myself often thinking that it seems precisely the opposite.

One of the interesting things about working for a school whose employees work, by and large, on six month contracts is that people come and go rather quickly. If you stay around for a year or so, you become one of the veteran staff members. I find myself going into the third term of working at Aston as one of the most experienced teachers in the city of Ji’nan. That’s an odd feeling for me. Suddenly, I’m one of the one who’s answering questions about where to go, what to do about lessons, who to call to ask certain questions and the like. A year’s worth of accumulated experience goes a long way, I’ve found, but it still doesn’t seem possible that I should be the one helping the new recruits find their footing in this city.

I’ll also have to be learning some new tricks myself. After a year out on the west end of Ji’nan, in an apartment complex on a street called DiKou Lu (堤口路), I’ll be moving tomorrow to a new neighborhood and a new apartment. The new place is on YingXiong Shan Lu (英雄山路) literally, “Hero Mountain Street,” so named because of it’s proximity to the aforementioned mountain.  It’s one I know well, as my friends Mackenzie and Joanna lived there up until this point. Now, I’ll live within close walking distance of a pretty attractive area of Ji’nan (the mountain is surrounded by a big park, the entrance of which is on my new street), as well as Ji’nan’s Culture Market (where one can buy lots of nice calligraphy, pottery, jewelry and antiques), the Provincial Sports Center (where all the local team’s home soccer matches are played), and a pretty good and diverse restaurant street with a large decorative archway. It will be a nice setting to live in, and I’m looking forward to setting up shop over there.

It’s not insignificant to me, and perhaps a little fitting, that my last night in this apartment comes one year to the day after I left the United States, and mere hours after completing my original year-long contract with Aston. My change in apartments, in a way, closes one chapter of my time here. The experiences, I think, bookend each other very nicely.  As my friend Chris put it: it is a break in continuity within greater continuity. I will remain in Ji’nan, but under different circumstances, which will allow for new and varied adventures and opportunities for exploration.

It also seems fitting that this should occur on the brink of Fall’s arrival, which is itself (even in East China) a season of great change. In Ji’nan, September’s imminent arrival marks the end of a brief “rainy season.” For much of August, the city was caught in a drizzle. Now (though the rain continues to fall every now and then), the city has dried somewhat, and the sweltering heat of summer has subsided. While it is by no means truly fall yet, you can feel a sense that soon, the long summer will be over. Slowly but surely, these signs are beginning to emerge: mooncakes have returned to display cases in grocery stores in anticipation of Mid-Autumn Festival, roasted sweet potato vendors are beginning to pop up again, fall clothing items are beginning to pop up in department stores, public schools have started their academic years, university students have returned to campus. Very soon, the season will have completely changed, and we’ll all be looking at another Ji’nan winter. From where I sit now it’s hard to imagine, but as I’ve learned in a year here change comes quickly. More to come soon.

Ok, so I’ve gotten kind of behind on the blog (No big surprise here, right?). An explanation is in order. It’s pretty simple, actually: As is often the case over here, the website just ceased to work, meaning I couldn’t log in to update. So here I am, much later, trying to fill in all of the blanks for about a month. I guess, I’ll go for the lightning review… Here goes nothing, then:

Summer is coming to an apex here in Ji’nan. For one thing, the temperatures continue to be blazing hot. Venture outside your apartment for any reason, and you’re sure to return sweating copiously (and I mean it. I have to take a change of shirts when I ride my bike in to work to avoid having to teach all day in a shirt that’s drenched with sweat). Inside my apartment, my air-conditioning unit runs constantly, keeping my room not unlike the inside of a refrigerator unit. Understandably, when it is so hot outside (and I’m not exaggerating when I say that it’s been well over 90 degrees on average) it’s hard to summon up the wherewithal to get out and do things. Despite this, however, I’ve been managing to continue to play in weekly pick-up soccer games. In fact, my foreign friends and I have become regulars. When it’s not blazing hot, it’s usually raining buckets. Ji’nan doesn’t have a monsoon season on the order of Southeast Asia (or anywhere close), but there is a “rainy season,” which is pretty much the entire month of August. Several times in the last month or so, I have walked outside to find my neighborhood completely flooded with rainwater. When it rains here it rains VERY hard. Runoff spills out into the streets. Gutters overflow… as (occasionally) do sewers. It’s unlike rain that I’ve encountered elsewhere because of it’s intensity. The storms come in short, violent bursts and drop tons of water on the city and then go just as quickly. In merely the span of fifteen or twenty minutes, streets will be covered in water.

It’s not really that surprising then, that everyone here seems to want to flock toward cooler climates. During the past several weeks of classes, my students have told me that they’ve all been to many of the various beaches in the area at places like Yantai, Rizhao, Weihai, and of course Qingdao. August seems to be summer vacation time for most Chinese people, and many of my classes were missing students over the past several weeks due to family beach trips. Foreign teachers are no exception to this rule. My friends and I have made two trips to Qingdao in a month (one that I described previously and another last week to get back to the beach and visit Qingdao’s “Beer Festival” which is basically the Chinese version of Oktoberfest… this will be described in detail in following entries, I promise). Each time, I’ve returned to Ji’nan feeling refreshed, so I am convinced that the ocean air does me quite a lot of good.

Summer will linger here for several more weeks. If last fall is any indication, it will be Halloween before the weather really turns here, and then the weather will turn abruptly. The arrival of fall brings a lot with it: new colleagues, new classes, cooler temperatures, and the opportunity to get out and travel again. I’ll get some time off for China’s National Day in October that I can use to take a trip (might head down to Sichuan province to see the very famous national panda reserve). I’m hoping that I’ll get a chance to take some trips further afield this fall (Inner Mongolia’s grasslands come to mind for one), but much depends on scheduling.

Now that the blog is operational again, I’ll get some pictures of Qingdao and Beer Fest posted ASAP. No more excuses. Until then, stay tuned.

So my very good friends, Kenzie and Joanna, are also doing the whole blog thing. They’ve got a pretty great website that is definitely worth checking out. It’s a good read, AND they’ve got TONS of pictures posted. Take a look. More on my own adventure to come. Stay tuned…

The weather outside is stifling. The A/C units in school are running full-blast all the time. By the time I get to school, I’m drenched with sweat and look like I’ve been swimming. Must be summer in East China. Must be time for a blog update. First, let me apologize for falling completely off the map for a while. Like the weather, which has grown stifling and lazy, I too have been going through some sort of writing doldrums. I simply wasn’t able to muster up the time (or maybe the effort) to set anything down to writing. So, as you can see, there’s been a bit of a lag here… sorry. That’s pretty much my fault.  This isn’t to say that there’s nothing going on. It’s been a busy time here: midterms, family visits, the World Cup, grading, etc.. Lots of things have been happening all at once. Suddenly, Ji’nan’s short but sweet spring became a hot, lazy summer. We’re now in the midst of July, which is very much high summer here in Ji’nan (actually it has been high summer for a while, summer being one of the longer seasons here).

Summer in Ji’nan is strange when you consider just how cold it was here during winer (which still seems like it was only a very short time ago). In January I would have never imagined that this city could be so hot. And yet, it is. While having to bundle up to spare yourself from frigid and icy winds and temperatures well below freezing in winter, I would have laughed at the idea that summer temperatures rarely dip below 90 degrees here. To call the heat oppressive is not an understatement.

But even though it can feel pretty unbearable, the warm weather has its selling points. Warm weather means that you can do things outside. Unlike in the winter when I was confined to the indoors, trying to keep out of the intense cold, summer lends itself to being outdoors. Now, it’s really easy to go take a bike ride, or a walk through the springs, or to sit outside near one of the springs and draw (I’ve only done this once or twice, but it was fun when I did). At least once a week, I’ve started to play soccer at a local university which has a full-sized, artificial turf field. We’ve had some really great pick-up games against the students who attend and it’s been a a really good way to get some exercise. It’s fun to be able to stay outdoors at night, too. It’s not an uncommon sight to walk out of the gates of my neighborhood to find some of the women who live here sitting out and playing cards together, or to find others in lawn chairs simply out chatting and enjoying a breeze every now and then. Often, I’m able to spend a good, warm night in Quancheng Square, relaxing and hanging out with friends. On nights like this we’ve chatted, played soccer in the square, attemped to fly kites, and watched the fountain displays that go off on either end of the square at night. This would have been unthinkable in January, but on a warm night in June or July it’s been great to be able to sit out and enjoy the outdoors.

Locals are out, too. On any given night, it’s not uncommon  to find lots of people out in the square doing any number of things: practicing calligraphy, ballroom dancing, in-line skating (this is VERY popular, especially with little kids who go zooming around lines of cones doing all kinds of crazy footwork), tai chi, playing with skip-its (SKIP-ITS?!?!?! Remember those? They advertised constantly on Saturday morning TV when I was a kid. They’re HUGE over here during these night-time congregations), line-dancing, playing hackey-sack, fishing, martial arts, etc. It’s fun just to sit and watch. As with almost everywhere in this city it seems amazing that there are so many people in one place, and that they are all in the midst of doing so many different things. There’s a tangible buzz in the square at night. It’s a nice feeling.

Eating outside is a big part of summer, too. Curbside restaurants have popped up everywhere. At dusk, tables and stools appear out of nowhere. Suddenly, sidewalks are filled with outdoor cafes and diners. People flock to these impromptu restaurants to eat Chinese style barbecue (lamb kebabs, mostly) and boiled peanuts and drink beer. The center of town is full of places just like this (one of the best being a place we call “the pool,” which is basically a restaurant next to a local swimming hole, where you can eat tasty, cheap food and watch the old men of the neighborhood swim laps). It’s become a favorite past-time of mine to go with friends to Old Ji’nan, find one of these places, and eat next to the canal there. Summer favorite foods like cold noodles, barbecue, crayfish boils and cold plum juice have replaced the heavier, warmer foods of winter, and with an abundance of fresh peaches, melons, and cherries to be bought at fruit stands, it’s easy to get a taste of summer through local produce.

Soon, we’ll be giving final exams and wrapping up yet another semester here. Soon, I’ll have been here for a year. One year. Doesn’t seem like it could even be. And yet… time here has gone so fast. There’s plenty more adventure yet to come, though, some of it almost immediately. After this weekend, a few friends and I are heading out to coastal town of Qingdao for a day or two to relax and check out the beach. Should be a fun trip. Stay tuned for reports on that, and more, later.

So, the match is over. It’s early. VERY early. Naturally, Aston’s foreign staff got together to watch. How could we not? There was so much riding on it: bragging rights, national pride, 6 months worth of build-up. We viewed the match at a local BBQ place. It was a nice setting: outside seating, bigscreen TV, grilled meat and beer at the ready. A very nice place to watch the game. There’s something about watching a sporting event outside that feels pretty stellar. China is an excellent place to do this, as there are a great number of restaurants with outdoor seating (or which are based entirely outdoors to begin with). There are problems, however, with watching such a late game in a public place. The game began at 2:30AM, and it began to take it’s toll on the staff of the place. The owner (who had only the night before agreed to let us watch the entire match at his restaurant) seemed a little perturbed that we insisted on calling his bluff and staying until the match was over at just past 4:30AM. Despite agreeing to let us watch the match– and reaffirming his commitment several times throughout– continually tried to get us to leave (first at halftime, then with ten minutes remaining, then with five, etc.). In the end, it worked. We got to see the game, and everyone had a pretty good time.

As for the game itself? At the end of a 1-1 draw, we Americans looked pretty cocky, our British co-workers dispirited. My own thoughts are that I’m proud that the US held it’s own with the English squad that was supposed to crush us. I also think that such expectations were wildly unrealistic to begin with. The US is no longer an international punching bag. We haven’t been for a while. Those who were surprised that the US played tough seem not to have been paying much attention. Those who think that this result means that the US suddenly could make a deep run into this tournament may not have been paying attention either: we always thought we could get to the knockout rounds of the tournament. We’re not overachieving. I also refuse to dismiss the whole tie as a result of a fluke goal. There was more to this game than that. In any case, I’m proud of the effort, and hopeful that the team will soon get a chance to continue to impress.

More on summer in Ji’nan will come later. There’s a lot going on here. Hopefully, I’ll have more in a bit. Stay tuned…

Sometimes, living in a foreign country, one feels a bit disconnected from the rest of the world. This is especially the case when news media (print, radio, televised or otherwise) is delivered in a language you are still a relative beginner at– while my Chinese is, no doubt, much improved I still wouldn’t presume to understand lots of what I hear on the radio or see on TV. Similarly, the news reflects concerns of domestic importance. Any news of things that are important within the United States have to be gleaned from reading American papers online or watching rebroadcasts of US TV shows. In essence, it’s a little hard to keep up. Even in an age of instant communication and previously unthought of connectedness, it’s hard to get the exact slant on things which are happening in the US with any kind of accuracy or insightful perspective.

Truly international events, however, are a different story. Take, for instance, the FIFA World Cup. Despite not having a team in the field this year (China’s men’s team is notoriously bad; I have seen grown men spit on the ground and declare their matches unwatchable), China is totally obsessed with international football’s largest event. I am prone to think that events like this, because of the magnitude of their scale and the global nature of their context, are somewhat magical. Surely this is what those who make money off of this event want me to think. I agree that, in some senses, talking about the  pageantry and passion of the World Cup is hackneyed and trite. However, it’s hard not to feel that way given the way China has fascinated itself with this tournament.

The buildup for the event has been going on forever. As early as the start of May, we began to see signs of growing anticipation here in Ji’nan. Restaurants started working the cup into their advertisements. Pepsi issued an ad featuring the most notable players in the game (Didier Drogba, Lionel Messi, Frank Lampard, Fernando Torres) which was put on a HUGE billboard near Quancheng Square. Stores have begun to offer team gear (replica jerseys, t-shirts, polos, jackets, etc.; I intend to buy one of the (high quality) knockoff US jerseys that are being sold for very cheap at one of the soccer shops) and people in the streets have been wearing lots of soccer themed gear. McDonald’s– ever the barometer for important events– began to offer collectable World Cup glasses, “South African BBQ” flavored chicken wings, World Cup themed kids’ meal toys, and 24 hours of continuous cup coverage on the flatscreen TVs in every restaurant. From a commercial standpoint, this is a big deal in China.

From the cynical perspective, it would be easy to say that that’s really all this is to most Chinese people: a money-maker for people who can use the cup for advertising. Several of my roommate’s adult students have stated this opinion: this tournament is only really important to people who can use it to sell food, merchandise, or airtime. This seems, however, to undercut the sincerity with which people seem to follow the sport here. My roommate, Chris, recently purchased a replica jersey for the Spanish squad which has attracted lots of attention from people when worn in public. These folks know their stuff, and they are VERY enthusiastic about the tournament. Even though China does not have a stake in this year’s cup, they are all VERY excited to see the sport played on it’s highest level, and each interested person we meet seems to have one team or another which they are choosing to follow. Barbeque joints in the area are setting up bigscreen TVs and putting out tables outdoors to accomodate lots of viewers. Last night we watched the opening match of the cup between South Africa and Mexico at one of these local places, and the excitement there was palpable. There was a sizable crowd, all seated pretty close to the TV. They watched intently. They cheered for goals. The groaned for botched plays. They were absolutely into the match. To say that this event only really matters from a financial point of view just seems to completely miss the point. People here really do seem to care about this stuff. A lot.

Even my students at Aston seem to have caught cup fever. I made a point to casually mention that I would be watching matches during my classes this weekend. Many of the students (mostly the boys) went absolutely berserk when they heard, and started excitedly spouting off times for the start of matches, asking me who I would support (as if there was a doubt I’d be pulling for my home country), and talking about random teams, players, and pieces of trivia. Cup fever is hitting even in the schools.

Of course, the Aston staff has its own particular reasons to care so much about the tournament this year. Our blend of staff here is pretty unique: Native English speakers from many different countries work at Aston. Primarily though, Aston employs people from two places: the US and the UK. As you can imagine, the announcement of the group pairings caused quite a stir in January when it was revealed that the US and England would not only be in the same group together, but would be the first matchup either team would face in the tournament. There’s been a persistent stream of trash-talking that has gone on ever since. One of my British co-workers has dubbed the event “Independence Day 2,” and we’ve all been trying to make our boldest displays of national pride lately (as an aside, the Brits here have been so dismissive of the US squad that if we win tonight, I think I will become the most obnoxious and boastful winner in the history of sporting events). So tonight, at 2:3o in the morning, we’ll all meet up at shaokao (Chinese BBQ) restaurant that has graciously agreed to stay open late enough for us to watch the game, and the months of casual harassment will come to a head.  Should be a lot of fun. More to report later.

Time to shake the dust off the blog again, I suppose. I got back from “Spring Break ‘10: Wild West China Edition,” last night VERY late. Unfortunately I was unable to update in real time during my trip like I hoped that I would be able to. So, as a result, all of my posts about my recent adventure will be retrospective… Luckily, I have plenty of stories and pictures to post and it’ll be a good read, I hope. In all it was a really exciting trip, and I can’t wait to share it with all of you… except that I have to. Just through the weekend. My return to Ji’nan means a return to classes and so I’ve got to get through a full weekend of teaching before I can really get down to sharing tales of far-flung adventures and epic train rides. So, just sit tight. Hopefully, by the time that Monday rolls around I’ll have some new stuff up. Until then, stay tuned…

So I’ll admit it, I’ve been a little lazy with this blog for a while. The root of my laziness is perhaps my own perception that I’ve not really done too much that’s noteworthy lately. This is a bit of a misperception on my part, perhaps. In any case… updates have been a little slow. Given some recent events, I feel like I owe everyone some sort of general status check.

By now, you’ve no doubt heard about the earthquake here. In the event that you perhaps haven’t, I’ll fill you in. About a week ago, there was a fairly huge earthquake out in Qinghai Province in what is Southwestern China. The epicenter of the quake was not far from Sichuan province, which was the center of the deadly quake of 2008. Here in eastern China, everyone is fine and somewhat removed from everything. Qinghai is a long way away from Ji’nan. While everyone I meet is no doubt touched by the scale of the tragedy, it is in a very distant sense. There have been numerous memorials, telecasts, fundraisers and gestures of solidarity for those who have fallen victim to the quake. However, aside from large, official displays of mourning (flags flown at half-mast are amongst the most prominent of these), life seems to continue to function as it always does here.

Most importantly to all of you reading this, I suppose, is that I’m OK. This now raises my “Earthquake in China” percentage to 2-for-2. It’s a strange thought to me: Must it be that every time that I come to China, the country suffers a devastating earthquake? (In fact, it feels almost like the realization of the leading man in Thomas Pynchon’s novel Gravity’s Rainbow who finds that there’s a direct link between places where he’s been and buildings which are blown up during air-raids in London during WWII). I hate to make it sounds like I’m making light of what is undoubtably a tragic event. But it seems like a very bizarre thing to me, especially given how close I was to the last earthquake and how strangely distant from me this one seems by comparison.

In every sense, life has continued to progress as it normally would.  The semester continues to progress. Classes continue to move forward. We’re rapidly approaching the mid-term for this semester (how can that be? We just started right?). Summer will be here before long, and it’s evident. The weather is getting much warmer, very quickly. Before long, I suspect that I will be sweating like crazy.

The activities that fill our time off are becoming more and more oriented towards being outdoors and enjoying this increase in temperature. Yesterday we played a game or two of American-style football at the University where we’ve played frisbee before. It was fun, considering I’ve not thrown a football or played a game of two hand touch in a VERY long time. The Chinese students, who gathered in pretty large numbers as spectators when we played frisbee, mostly found American style football baffling, I believe… or at least the confusion as to what was actually going on seemed to prevent any kind of crowd from gather to watch us play (which is what usually happens when we decide to play sports in public). Nonetheless, it felt good to be outside and active again.

We’re approaching the May holidays, and I have a pretty large-scale journey in front of me as I try to take full advantage of an 11 day vacation (see the post below for further details). Otherwise we continue to run along as normal here in Ji’nan, for which I’m quite thankful. I’ll continue with a few updates in the coming days, and will try to make some sort of huge update once I get back from my journey over the next few weeks. Keep tuned for more.