Playing catch up

Considering the lack of blog entries during the month of November–due to the Great Firewall, I will try to summarize the month in the next couple of entries, and although it will be difficult to include everything that happened, I think it will be the most effective way to get you, the reader, caught up on my latest excursions and experiences.

 

As I said before in the ‘I have to thank Yusi’ post, China has slowly become my life. Many people have been asking me how I’m doing with the language and the food, to which I usually say, “Ok.” The truth is the adjustment has been more difficult than I anticipated in some aspects, but in others, it’s been a breeze. I’m used to the food, the stares and the routine, but I have yet to solidify any sort of routine for myself, and I think most of my problems are because of this failure. The problem is time, or lack there-of.

I don’t teach class at the same time everyday, so it’s difficult to schedule a specific time to do school work, exercise, or, most important, study Chinese. I think this is my biggest issue at the moment. I have a tutor who spends 3 hours per week with me, teaching me basics, but as soon as our class is over, I’m back into other activities. I thought having the blog blocked would give me more time and help me manage the time more effectively, but in fact, it’s been just the opposite. I feel like Im constantly playing catch-up on my extra-curricular activities due to my work schedule and all the time I devote to prepping and grading for my classes. In fact, since I’ve had the blog to write in the past few days, I’ve noticed my productivity improving. I’ve spent time writing, but I’ve also planned the next few weeks of lessons ahead of time, designed the Final Exam for my classes, and even did some research for vacation plans. But I still have not had th! e chance to study Chinese.

I have made some good friends here, but they all speak English. I think I’ve fallen into the tendency to seek out comfortable situations while giving up perfectly good opportunities to practice Chinese. This, coupled with the fact that I’m not devoting enough time to study, is detrimental to the learning process. So, to answer the question, I’m not doing well with Chinese, but now that I have the blog again, I feel better. It’s true that writing is a sort of therapy, and writing for an audience, especially for an egomaniac like me, is like psychotherapy with good drugs.

To the issue at hand

Since October 26th, the day of the last blog post before it went dormant, a lot has happened. I’ve visited the Great Wall, the Ran Zhuang tunnels, Lang Ya mountain, Beijing (three times!), and taught nearly 50 hours of classes. In that time, I’ve learned how to order a few more things at restaurants, learned how to get back to my home by taxi, and learned the days of the week. I’ve also discovered a Salsa-Music club in Beijing, a techno-club in Baoding and a snack stand that sells fried mushroom and tofu sandwiches at 2 a.m.

I’ll start from the beginning of the middle.

I first went to Beijing at the end of October (I believe it was on the 19th) for a job interview with a travel magazine company. I can’t remember the name of it, and frankly it’s not that important, but the company was a Mauritius-owned company that was starting a new section and Internet site about traveling in Beijing. I went to the interview to see what it was all about. They were looking for a journalist with some French-language ability and knowledge of Beijing, both of which I possess in a limited amount. The job sounded good, it was a part-time position and I would have had to spend 3 days per week in Beijing and write 6 articles and translate some French into English. But, considering my limited knowledge of Beijing, and the fact that I teach 4 days a week, I decided not to pursue the position. It would have been a pretty good job, in fact, and might have led to more in the future. I don’t regret my course of action, but I sometimes wonder what might have b! een…what do you think?

Beijing and the Wall

The next weekend, I went to Beijing for two days. I ended up running into Yusi at the train station (a VERY random encounter, considering there are thousands of people at the station), and he agreed to let me crash at his and his mother’s apartment (they rented a place for a short time in Beijing while a family member was staying there). I met some Americans, who helped me find my way as I was wondering the streets. To be honest, I liked getting lost in the big city. I hopped a bus and rode it to wherever it was going, and ended up near the Beijing Worker’s Stadium, which was being worked on by a bunch of construction workers climbing rafters and scaffolding made of bamboo. I also found a number of new hutongs (new to me at least) to explore–they are my favorite parts of Beijing.

That evening, Yusi and I got together with some foreign students, who I met during the trip to Inner Mongolia,and who were having a birthday party for one of their own. The party was going on at their campus, in a Muslim restaurant and it was to move to a bar somewhere in the city. Yusi and I had already eaten, so we met up with the group towards the end of their meal. At the restaurant, they were accompanied by a veritable United Nations, with students from Angola, Mauritius, Canada, Brazil, Costa Rica, Japan, and the birthday girl, Kimiko, is from Portugal. It was a thrill to be here with all these new faces, and it was even more thrilling to go out with them in Beijing.

Kimiko took us out to a dance club in the Sun Li Tun section of Beijing, but it was not just any dance club, it was a Latin dance club with live Salsa band. It was cool and rainy outside, but steaming hot inside. The place was pulsing with sexy dancers with sweat pouring down their faces as they moved to the sultry music. The band’s energy was infectious, and I soon found myself doing the Salsa with a girl from the group. I haven’t salsa-danced since my days in Texas, but the steps came back to me as the percussion pounded and the horns blasted. I was also encouraged by the attractive girl dancing with me. We did not join the dancers on the dance floor, that was reserved for those with a few more skills, but we watched as Chinese couples, black couples, mixed couples and others spin and salsa as the night evolved. Yusi had a great time, he said, and so did I.

I got up early the next day for a trip to the Great Wall. I decided to try the slightly less commercial, according to my guidebook, section of the wall at Mutianyu. It’s located 90 km north of Beijing, and to get there, I took a couple of busses. I wasn’t interested in taking a tour with a group, or hiring a taxi; I wanted to try to get there for as cheap as possible on my own. So I left the Beijing long distance bus station around 11 a.m. headed north on Bus 916 to Huairou. I took my shoes and socks off to let them dry during the journey and sat back and watched the scenery pass my window. During the trip, a student named Shawn sat next to me and we chatted about his hometown in Liaoning province, his school and his new radio. He was very proud of his radio, although this was the second one he’s gone through, and he was actually returning from returning the broken one he bought last week. He said he liked listening to the Voice of America, an English-language radi! o station that broadcasts throughout China, to practice his English. The VOA is a propaganda station started during the early Communist years in an effort to subvert the new government in China, but has since become a source for English-language learners throughout Asia. Shawn was wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt and jeans, and he constantly pushed up his glasses as they fell to the tip of his nose as he talked. He talked a lot.

An hour after getting on the bus, I arrived at my first destination, Huairou. Shawn was gone, and I was alone to find a way to the Wall. The guidebook told me to take a minibus, but all the minibus drivers were asleep. Taxi drivers offered me a ride, but I knew their prices would be too high. The city of Huairou was an oasis of modern buildings and old structures in the middle of crop fields at the edge of a mountain range (part of the Great Wall was somewhere in those mountains). Eventually, I met another man, named Richard, looking for a cheaper way to the Wall, and together, we found, and woke up, a minibus driver willing to take us there for 10 Yuan a piece, which I considered a real bargain (the taxi guy wanted 50!). So we hoped in, waited for a few more people to show up and a few minutes later commenced the trip to the Wall. It took about 45 minutes for us to get there and the hills were steep, but the views were amazing. My excitement and anticipation were gettin! g the best of me, and I gawked at every hill-top pagoda along the way hoping it was part of the Wall. Finally, after a number of turns and one windy road after another, we reached the Great Wall at Mutianyu parking lot.

There were a lot of tourist stands selling postcards and other souvenirs, but I was not interested in shopping at that moment. I was more interested in seeing the wall.

Richard and I decided to ascend the many steps (there were over 400) to the Wall up the side of a mountain. There were a few stops along the way, which Richard, a young, well-dressed Chinese man who had never been to the wall either, had to make a few times to catch his breath, but my adrenaline carried me to the top bursting with excitement. Richard joined me a little later. When I entered the guard tower, I couldn’t believe where I was, and when I finally emerged from the tower’s stairs, I was on top of the Great Wall of China.

It’s one of the most beautiful places on Earth. I can find no words to describe the views, the feeling, the mystery and the majesty of this place. It’s just so..BIG…and LONG…and I wanted to stay there forever.

I took many pictures, but they don’t tell the whole story. It’s magnificent. The views go on in all directions revealing jagged mountain peaks and distant villages. The wall climbs in both directions until it disappears into the distance, and, on this day, into the puffy snow-capped mountains to the north.

There’s a reason for the popularity of the Great Wall, it’s beyond any experience a human can imagine. It’s still hard to believe. Take my advice: see it before you die.