But hey, the steaks were delicious ...

(Steve)

The past two weeks with my new host family have been great. They spent two years living in Oklahoma, so they all have very good English. While this means I’ve had less of an opportunity to immerse myself in Chinese, it has also allowed for much more communication: we’ve already had conversations covering everything from politics to astrophysics. Erik, my host brother, loves astronomy and photography, and he just finished teaching me all about telescopes. Last week he gave me a twenty-minute tutorial on Chinese history for the past 3000 years. He’s also the first person who’s been able to explain Chinese politics to me – I still don’t get it, but for once I don’t think the language barrier is the problem; I think their system is just that complicated. Another favorite topic of conversation is college applications; I’ve had to explain the American system to my host parents, Chinese students, teachers – I even had to work on someone’s college essay, something I thought I was done with. I met that student, a friend of my host family’s, a few days later, and he admitted that the essay I’d worked on was drafted by his father. I’d done more of his application than he had!

I also feel that I’m having more interaction with the people at school. Erik’s English teacher had me talk about our trip to Beijing and participate in the discussion of Mark Twain’s “The Hundred Pound Note”. His geography teacher asked me to do a presentation on American geography, which went well given my lack of knowledge on the subject. The “English Corner” we do every day after lunch seems to have recovered from its post-Beijing slump (the first few days back, almost no one came), and one regular even invited us all to tea this Sunday afternoon. I’ve become good friends with a couple of Erik’s classmates, one of whom took Erik and I out to a steakhouse last week, where he treated me to a two-hour explanation of Chinese characters. Then we walked out without paying the bill, and the waitress had to run after us. But hey, the steaks were delicious.

With only a week left, I can’t help wondering what I’ve accomplished in my time here. Obviously, my goal of learning the language has failed miserably. Jill maintains that I understand more than I let on, and Tracy admitted to Candice that she and her friends speak faster when I’m around just in case, but there’s no way I could get by without a translator. Still, I’ve made progress, and I get a bit of a thrill every time I catch something someone’s saying. Besides, I think I’ve had enough other experiences to make up for it – the pandas alone would have made this trip worthwhile. When you add all of China’s natural beauty, all of its culture, its relics, and its incredible artwork, not to mention the incredible experience of submerging myself in an entirely alien culture, and when you top it off with all the wonderful people I’ve met along the way, I think this trip was a pretty good deal.

Beijing

(Ms. Arkin)

Beijing is a huge city with a tremendous amount of history. I know that is not a very sophisticated description, but I think I am forgetting my English vocabulary. Everywhere you look, there are apartment buildings. Mostly they are tall, high rise buildings or long rectangular buildings (look like the high rises tipped over on one side) that are set up in rows. The older ones are characterized by unpainted cement that has accumulated years of grime, and rusted iron cages in front of the windows. The newer buildings are obviously not as decrepit, but still look a little wilted. The ultra-new apartments are huge high rises often built in clusters of three or four identical structures. They are modern and clean looking. I was surprised that there was no laundry hanging anywhere in Beijing. The other cities have all been colorfully accessorized with clothing and sheets that hang just about everywhere (even in the rain).

If you look hard enough from the window of a moving vehicle, you can also see pockets of new wealth where they have built little communities of town homes or single family homes. The ones that I noticed were tastefully landscaped and tucked away behind fancy gates.

Something else that stands out in my mind about Beijing, besides it being enormous, is that the traffic is horrific. In fact, the traffic in Beijing almost makes route 128 during rush hour seem not so bad. Almost.

So, what did we do in this big, bustling, traffic jam of a city? The Great Wall…. The Forbidden City…. Tiananmen Square…. just to name a few. We also saw the Beijing Opera (yawn), the Temple of Heaven, the Lama Monastery and the list goes on. There is so much history in Beijing it is overwhelming. We had a very packed agenda for the four days we were there! Our guide, Da Li, was wonderful, except for the fact that he speedwalked. I think it amused him to make us walk a lot - he believed we should walk fast so we could see more places! He also had interesting things to say and I learned a lot from him without ever being bored.

We were fortunate to be in Beijing for the festivities that celebrated the “countdown to the 500 day countdown” to the 2008 Summer Olympics. We were there for days 504-501. Beijing is undergoing all sorts of cosmetic renovations in preparation for the games. Shopping malls, hotels, restaurants and even historical sites (like the Forbidden City) are all being spiffed up. It is also rumored that a public order will prohibit residents from driving their cars during the Olympic events. This will reduce both traffic and pollution.

We visited the Lama Monastery, which is a Buddhist temple. We have seen many Buddhist temples in China and I confess, with some hesitation and shame, that they are all starting to look the same. What stood out at this particular temple was not the architecture, the statues, or any of the elaborate artwork. Instead, it was a Tibetan monk (on vacation from Tibet) raucously carrying on a conversation via his state-of the-art cell phone. I thought, wait a minute, is this a commercial for Verizon or is there really a Tibetan monk, in full orange garb, with a techno ring tone? The other memory I have of this temple was “inviting” a statue of Buddha to leave the gift shop and come home with me. Da Li told us that was the proper terminology for the transaction. After giving money to the gift shop, I took the statue to be blessed by a monk who (after watching me put a donation in the donation box) told me to kneel while he recited a prayer. Then he sang something that, although I have no idea what it meant, sounded authentically devout. My Buddha is now supposed to bring me happiness and wealth.

The Great Wall was very steep. It was sad thinking about all of the workers that died constructing it. I wonder if they ever imagined that tens of thousands of visitors from all over the world would journey to see it every day. I don’t know what else to say about it. It looks like the pictures you see in books, except that it is steeper and packed with people (which made it kind of colorful). All along the wall there are salespeople hawking various souvenirs. They don’t have stands; they just walk around with armfuls of goods. I couldn’t resist buying a t-shirt that says (in both English and Chinese), “I climbed the Great Wall”.

The Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square were pretty much as I imagined them to be. Our guide did not offer much commentary as we walked across Tiananmen Square. The events that took place there were reduced to the words, “there was some social unrest here in 1989”.

What I found most remarkable about the Temple of Heaven, was not the Temple, but the park that surrounds it. It is literally a playground for Beijing’s senior citizens. There are jungle gyms and monkey bars and swingsets that are used by hundreds of men and women over the age of 50. It was kind of surreal. Our guide told us that citizens are being encouraged to retire early in order to create more jobs for young people. When the men and women retire, they come to this park to participate in dance groups, singing groups, etc. They also make friends and play games.

I guess my journal entry can’t be complete without some mention of food. Beijing is famous for duck. There are many duck restaurants and even duck boats. That makes two things in common with Boston. Anyhow, the duck was delicious. Quack. We waddled out of the restaurant with full tummies.

Another experience we had in Beijing was taking a pedicab tour through one area of the city (known as the Hutong). As part of the tour, we stopped at the home of an elderly couple and got to visit with them for a few minutes and see their home. From the outside, the home looks like a dilapidated shack. From the inside, it is a little better, but still sparse and lacking many of the comforts we take for granted. The couple is retired from working in the factories and now they spend their time relaxing and opening their home to tourists. Their home consists of a small outside courtyard, a living room, a bedroom that is basically an extension of the living room, a small kitchen and a fair amount of clutter. They also have birds, fish and turtles to keep them company and help provide a warm, homey feeling. For heat, they heat up water in the living room. Their bathroom is the public lavatory which is about 50 meters down the street. The woman laughed at our muffled gasps when she told us this, and then went on to explain that it doesn’t bother them, because that is the only way they know.

Chinese-speaking computers ... and the Blue Monster

(Ms. Arkin)

I have finally learned how to make this computer stop writing in Chinese characters. You probably know by now that my computer crashed and died. After about 48 hours of panic-stricken grief, full-blown crisis mode and being utterly consumed with trying to fix it, I gave up and accepted it. So now I am using a laptop from Hangzhou High School. It is a bit of a struggle because, although several people have switched it to English for me, it still has everything in Chinese. I have to rely on my basic knowledge of Microsoft to navigate which so far is working (thanks, Bill Gates).

It has gone from winter to summer without passing go. Today was 30 degrees Celsius which I believe translates to the high 80’s in Fahrenheit. Last week it was in the 30’s(Farenheit) and we were going to school bundled up in winter jackets and hats, barely able to feel our toes. When we went to Beijing, the weather was fabulously perfect. Everyone said it would be cold, but it was in the mid sixties with sunny blue skies. I think I might have had some influence on this. You see, the night before we left for Beijing, I went out and bought a new winter coat for the trip. Need I say more? I really like my coat though. It is purple and puffy and very warm and tumbly.

I am having trouble riding my bike. It is way too scary. I have reduced my bike riding to going back and forth to school (since the route is relatively simple). One day I took a ride to the grocery store around 6pm when the roads were really crowded. Bad idea. I didn’t even go into the store – I was too distraught. I turned around and went home, praying to avoid bloodshed and vowing never to ride the blue monster again. You see, in China there is a constant flow of bikes merging into the street from every direction. There are also cars bombing down these narrow, crowded streets with little to no patience for bicycles. The cars come up next to me, getting only a few inches from my body, and then accelerate in order to pass at full speed. I try to move to the right to make space for the cars on the left, but there never fails to be another biker buzzing by me on the right. How I have avoided an accident so far is beyond me. Also, while it is one thing to avoid being struck by an automobile or colliding with another bicycle, there are also a gazillion pedestrians that you have to dodge. And I haven’t even mentioned the electric scooters.

Speaking of bikes, as I was riding mine to school today, I was behind one of the many parents who use a bike to drop their child off at school. While in Dover, kids get strapped into the back seats of minivans and SUV’s, in China they hop on the backtrap of their parents bicycle (their legs hanging straight down – they don’t touch the ground yet) and go to school that way. Sometimes they read a book on the way.