I finally get to make that lame Enya reference!
We accomplished a fair bit today. In the morning we taught the kids directions. I stole some ideas from when I was learning Chinese, and drew a map of a town on the board, including place names, which we had conveniently just taught them. Then, we taught them left and right; north, south, east, and west; directions; intersection, and traffic or stop light. Then we quizzed them, by either giving them directions from one place to another and having them tell us where they ended up, or by having them direct us from one specific place to another. It was a little bit of a struggle. There are a select group of students who clearly understood what was going on, but most of them took a little bit of encouragement and coaxing before they produced the right answer. We also had quite a few mixups with the proper grammar of certain sentences, but I feel as thought they learned a lot today.
We rested at usual after lunch and then went out to work. Today was a beautiful day; the sun was out for the first time since the third day we were here. Consequently, it was also quite hot, so we came equipped with water and sunscreen. We began to lay tiles at the larger worksite, and also started and completed digging the paths which will be covered with small stones. This was tough work, as the dirt was still heavy due to yesterday's downpour. We worked in teams: one person broke up dirt and the other shoveled it. I was surprised and a bit perturbed to learn that there no one has any spade shovels here, so we are using shovels that can't dig very well; they can only pick up loose dirt. After we completed digging out our pathways, we headed up to the smaller worksite and started shoveling stones into a wheelbarrow to be hauled down to the larger worksite. These stones will serve as a foundation. On top of this will be a layer of cement (or concrete; I sometimes get those confused). And on top of that we will place the best stones we have, as this will be the top layer and must be aesthetically pleasing. While we were shoveling stones, we spent a great deal of time digging through the stones and looking for the ideal ones which we will use as a top layer; they must be smooth, relatively round, and relatively flat. This process is very meticulous, and we were not even close to finished by the time we headed inside.
This post is short, but that is because most of the day was spent doing fairly monotonous work. We were all grateful for the sun, even though that meant that we sweated more than usual. Hopefully this is an omen of the good weather that is to come.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Day 11: We Work When We Can
When the rain arrived today, it came down with purpose, but not before we had completed some work.
Cherry and I continued teaching grammar for the entirety of our class time today. We organized a sort of simplified MadLibs, where each row of students wrote down a different part of the sentence: one row wrote a time (like now or yesterday), another wrote down a subject (like I), another wrote down a verb, and another wrote down a place. This lead to such wonderful sentences as "Ten thousand years ago, a hamster played computer games at the supermarket." The students task with a given set of words was to use them to write a coherent English sentence on the board, providing the correct tense and necessary articles and prepositions. Most of the time, with a little coaxing, the students understood this process, and with a few exceptions, they succeeded in their task. On our last trip to Tonglu, we had purchased some snack-size candy bars, and we provided all the students who wrote correct sentences with one.
After lunch, we decided to take advantage of the weather and start on some work for the park. This was the most physically grueling work we have performed thus far. Our task was to unload a big truck full of large, heavy, marble slabs that will provide the tiling for our park's walkways. We developed a streamlined technique, and though the work was tough, we were efficient. No sooner than ten minutes after we finished unloading, the clouds opened up. We had started on another mini-project (digging smaller pathways in which we will place pebbles for a contrasting aesthetic), but our short work on this was destroyed by the rain, and we ran inside, sopping wet. We rejoiced in the fact that we had chosen to work while we could, but I am at least somewhat discouraged that it rained at all today, making it the fourth day in a row.
After dinner, we took a walk (the rain had stopped) towards the peak of the mountain on whose side Gaoxiang rests, an area where I had yet to go. We were accompanied by Eric's uncle as well as a couple of students from our class. It was nice to get to know them a little bit in a more relaxed, non-classroom setting. By the time we returned, it had gotten dark, and we were all fairly tired.
So here is what we have done on the park so far, and what we will do next. We have cleared the land and leveled it by digging up dirt in the high places and dumping it in the low ones. We have dismantled one of the walls on the incline and built some steps; we have also built steps at the smaller worksite. Interesting Chinese cultural sidenote: stairs must always have an odd number of steps, because in China, to end on an even step means that you are at the top of the world, and we must symbolically admit that we can always improve. The steps are made of brick, and secured with mortar. Then we put down a thick (4-5 inch) layer of cement, which we made by mixing dirt, rock, and water in a mixer. This has now dried. The next step is to put down some concrete everywhere – a large task – and then to lay down the slabs we unloaded today in the appropriate areas.
Okay, now I'm off to bed. See you tomorrow.
Cherry and I continued teaching grammar for the entirety of our class time today. We organized a sort of simplified MadLibs, where each row of students wrote down a different part of the sentence: one row wrote a time (like now or yesterday), another wrote down a subject (like I), another wrote down a verb, and another wrote down a place. This lead to such wonderful sentences as "Ten thousand years ago, a hamster played computer games at the supermarket." The students task with a given set of words was to use them to write a coherent English sentence on the board, providing the correct tense and necessary articles and prepositions. Most of the time, with a little coaxing, the students understood this process, and with a few exceptions, they succeeded in their task. On our last trip to Tonglu, we had purchased some snack-size candy bars, and we provided all the students who wrote correct sentences with one.
After lunch, we decided to take advantage of the weather and start on some work for the park. This was the most physically grueling work we have performed thus far. Our task was to unload a big truck full of large, heavy, marble slabs that will provide the tiling for our park's walkways. We developed a streamlined technique, and though the work was tough, we were efficient. No sooner than ten minutes after we finished unloading, the clouds opened up. We had started on another mini-project (digging smaller pathways in which we will place pebbles for a contrasting aesthetic), but our short work on this was destroyed by the rain, and we ran inside, sopping wet. We rejoiced in the fact that we had chosen to work while we could, but I am at least somewhat discouraged that it rained at all today, making it the fourth day in a row.
After dinner, we took a walk (the rain had stopped) towards the peak of the mountain on whose side Gaoxiang rests, an area where I had yet to go. We were accompanied by Eric's uncle as well as a couple of students from our class. It was nice to get to know them a little bit in a more relaxed, non-classroom setting. By the time we returned, it had gotten dark, and we were all fairly tired.
So here is what we have done on the park so far, and what we will do next. We have cleared the land and leveled it by digging up dirt in the high places and dumping it in the low ones. We have dismantled one of the walls on the incline and built some steps; we have also built steps at the smaller worksite. Interesting Chinese cultural sidenote: stairs must always have an odd number of steps, because in China, to end on an even step means that you are at the top of the world, and we must symbolically admit that we can always improve. The steps are made of brick, and secured with mortar. Then we put down a thick (4-5 inch) layer of cement, which we made by mixing dirt, rock, and water in a mixer. This has now dried. The next step is to put down some concrete everywhere – a large task – and then to lay down the slabs we unloaded today in the appropriate areas.
Okay, now I'm off to bed. See you tomorrow.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Day 10: Maybe Tomorrow
It rained on and off all day long, which is an improvement from earlier days, but not yet enough to do much work. We will be doing some heavy lifting tomorrow though, and it looks like we'll finally get the weather we've been hoping for.
The day commenced, as usual, with English class at 7:30. We started with our skit, as promised, and it involved a bank, a police station, and a jail. I was the bank owner (as well as a corrections officer later), Tao Yuan was the thief, Cherry was the police officer, and Eric was Tao Yuan's roommate in jail. And of course, the skit was in simple English, even involving an exchange of pleasantries between Tao Yuan and I before he robbed me, and between Tao Yuan and Eric when they met in jail. Afterwards, the groups each performed their skits. Theirs were understandably less complex plot-wise than ours, but some of them were actually pretty good. I think my favorite moment of the morning was when one of the students, Tao Shan Shan, said during her group's skit, "That sounds great! We can kill two birds with one stone." We definitely are not teaching them idioms, but this is the same student who, when we asked them what vegetables they knew in English, came up with leek.
We spent the rest of the morning doing some grammar practice. They seemed relatively comfortable with the basic tenses, so I attempted an ill-conceived lesson in the subjunctive; it did not go well. We went back to the more basic grammar, and it soon became clear that only a few kids knew the material. So we wrote this on the board:
Last night, I ______.
Now, I ______.
Tomorrow, I ______.
On weekends, I usually ________.
This seemed an effective template to help them understand the different conjugations of verbs for different tenses. We also changed pronouns every once in a while.
The afternoon was again uneventful, but all of us are very hopeful that tomorrow will be different. At dinner, I tried a new food: bird egg. Now some of you who know me well know that I have a great fondness for hard-boiled eggs. But these are better. First of all, they are bite-size. And second of all, they are boiled in tea leaves, so they have a flavor of their own; it is not necessary to season them with sauce. This was a wonderful discovery.
I think that about does it for today, but I promise to have a more detailed update of our progress on the park tomorrow night. See you then.
The day commenced, as usual, with English class at 7:30. We started with our skit, as promised, and it involved a bank, a police station, and a jail. I was the bank owner (as well as a corrections officer later), Tao Yuan was the thief, Cherry was the police officer, and Eric was Tao Yuan's roommate in jail. And of course, the skit was in simple English, even involving an exchange of pleasantries between Tao Yuan and I before he robbed me, and between Tao Yuan and Eric when they met in jail. Afterwards, the groups each performed their skits. Theirs were understandably less complex plot-wise than ours, but some of them were actually pretty good. I think my favorite moment of the morning was when one of the students, Tao Shan Shan, said during her group's skit, "That sounds great! We can kill two birds with one stone." We definitely are not teaching them idioms, but this is the same student who, when we asked them what vegetables they knew in English, came up with leek.
We spent the rest of the morning doing some grammar practice. They seemed relatively comfortable with the basic tenses, so I attempted an ill-conceived lesson in the subjunctive; it did not go well. We went back to the more basic grammar, and it soon became clear that only a few kids knew the material. So we wrote this on the board:
Last night, I ______.
Now, I ______.
Tomorrow, I ______.
On weekends, I usually ________.
This seemed an effective template to help them understand the different conjugations of verbs for different tenses. We also changed pronouns every once in a while.
The afternoon was again uneventful, but all of us are very hopeful that tomorrow will be different. At dinner, I tried a new food: bird egg. Now some of you who know me well know that I have a great fondness for hard-boiled eggs. But these are better. First of all, they are bite-size. And second of all, they are boiled in tea leaves, so they have a flavor of their own; it is not necessary to season them with sauce. This was a wonderful discovery.
I think that about does it for today, but I promise to have a more detailed update of our progress on the park tomorrow night. See you then.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Day 9: At Least the Fog Is Pretty
Gaoxiang is a village on a mountainside, and on the rainy days, the fog rolls down into the valley; the result is a very picturesque scene. However, that is about the only bright side of the rotten weather we have been having recently.
Only the teaching continues unabated. This morning we began by providing some alternative answers to the question, "How are you?" The students have been replying, "I'm good," and we all know that's bad grammar, so I wrote something on the board that looked like this:
I couldn't help but think back to my days reading Gödel, Escher, Bach (part of this has to do with the fact that I just started the new Hofstadter book), and that this sort of setup could lead to an infinite loop of conversation. However, for the most part the kids understood to only ask the question once and leave the second sentence off the second time.
We then moved into new territory: place names. We started with things like post office and museum and moved onto things like police station and convenience store. By the time our list was done it was at least 30 in number and I still am confident we forgot at least one common item. But we drilled the names (with correct pronunciation) and translations into the children's heads for the rest of the day. We then split the kids into groups and will have them write skits involving at least 3 of the place names we learned. As an example, Eric, Tao Yuan, Cherry, and I will be performing our own skit tomorrow morning before the kids start writing. Today they only picked the places they would use.
After class was over, a journalist from Tonglu (a suburb of Hangzhou) stopped by to talk to us about the park, although at least a small portion of the discussion concerned the English teaching. We took her down to the park site, where the cement had thankfully dried before the rain started. While down there, I reflected with pride on how far we have progressed; I just hope the weather lets us complete what we set out to accomplish.
As we could do no work in the rain, we instead took another tourism-inspired trip into Tonglu, this time to visit the world's tenth biggest underground cave. The cave itself was beautiful, but there was too much artificial colored lighting for my taste. It was also quite wet down there.
After we returned and ate dinner, we stopped by two local businesses to pick out some marble tables and chairs for seating areas. The chairs themselves were somewhat unconventional by Western standards: they had no backs and were cylindrical like barrels. The first set actually looked like barrels, and were a little bit to small for one to sit comfortably. The other set was flared in the Greek style, and as a result had slightly more surface area for sitting. That set was slightly more expensive (100 kuai, or just under $20), but we decided it was worth it. There is still some debate as to how many sets we will get, but it looks like it will be somewhere in the vicinity of four. Afterwards, we walked down by the river, and on our way back up we saw a group of villagers socializing at one of the park sites; this was heartening to me, as I am glad that there will be people to use the tables and chairs.
I am hoping against hope that tomorrow will bring more favorable weather; I would think by now that there's no more rain left in the clouds. I guess we'll see if I'm right. Good night.
Only the teaching continues unabated. This morning we began by providing some alternative answers to the question, "How are you?" The students have been replying, "I'm good," and we all know that's bad grammar, so I wrote something on the board that looked like this:
Q: How are you?
A: I am well. How are you?
A: Fine, thank you. How are you?
A: I am okay. How are you?
I couldn't help but think back to my days reading Gödel, Escher, Bach (part of this has to do with the fact that I just started the new Hofstadter book), and that this sort of setup could lead to an infinite loop of conversation. However, for the most part the kids understood to only ask the question once and leave the second sentence off the second time.
We then moved into new territory: place names. We started with things like post office and museum and moved onto things like police station and convenience store. By the time our list was done it was at least 30 in number and I still am confident we forgot at least one common item. But we drilled the names (with correct pronunciation) and translations into the children's heads for the rest of the day. We then split the kids into groups and will have them write skits involving at least 3 of the place names we learned. As an example, Eric, Tao Yuan, Cherry, and I will be performing our own skit tomorrow morning before the kids start writing. Today they only picked the places they would use.
After class was over, a journalist from Tonglu (a suburb of Hangzhou) stopped by to talk to us about the park, although at least a small portion of the discussion concerned the English teaching. We took her down to the park site, where the cement had thankfully dried before the rain started. While down there, I reflected with pride on how far we have progressed; I just hope the weather lets us complete what we set out to accomplish.
As we could do no work in the rain, we instead took another tourism-inspired trip into Tonglu, this time to visit the world's tenth biggest underground cave. The cave itself was beautiful, but there was too much artificial colored lighting for my taste. It was also quite wet down there.
After we returned and ate dinner, we stopped by two local businesses to pick out some marble tables and chairs for seating areas. The chairs themselves were somewhat unconventional by Western standards: they had no backs and were cylindrical like barrels. The first set actually looked like barrels, and were a little bit to small for one to sit comfortably. The other set was flared in the Greek style, and as a result had slightly more surface area for sitting. That set was slightly more expensive (100 kuai, or just under $20), but we decided it was worth it. There is still some debate as to how many sets we will get, but it looks like it will be somewhere in the vicinity of four. Afterwards, we walked down by the river, and on our way back up we saw a group of villagers socializing at one of the park sites; this was heartening to me, as I am glad that there will be people to use the tables and chairs.
I am hoping against hope that tomorrow will bring more favorable weather; I would think by now that there's no more rain left in the clouds. I guess we'll see if I'm right. Good night.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Day 8: More Rain
No progress was made on the park today as it rained all day long. We taught English in the morning as usual, and Cherry and I continued reinforcing the food vocabulary that we have been teaching. We used a turn-based team style game to get the kids to list the vocabulary for different categories, such as meat and vegetables. At the end, the losing team had to come up with another skit to perform, again centered around ordering food in a restaurant.
This afternoon was relatively lazy when compared to our usual manual labor. We all took much-needed naps, and I read a fair bit. We ate dinner early. At dinner, we had some bai jiu (literally, white alcohol, but the Chinese use it to describe all liquor). It was a clear liquid, and it was 120 proof, or 60% alcohol (compared with standard American liquors like vodka, rum, and whiskey which are all 80 proof). The extra proof made a good bit of difference. We had to drink it very slowly, and eat more to compensate. On that front, I tried two new foods (well two new body parts) today: chicken neck and pig foot. Chicken neck is pretty bland (just like chicken foot), and also not very rewarding to eat, as it is mostly bone. Pig foot, on the other hand, is quite tasty, although as a general rule pork is my least favorite meat. One of our students, Feng Ji Chen, joined us for dinner, but as her English is still very much in the developmental phase, the conversation took place in Chinese. This brings me to another tidbit of Chinese culture: in China, and especially in rural China, most people leave their front doors open, and if someone wanders into your house during dinnertime, you are culturally obligated to feed them. This social idiosyncracy is not taken advantage of; I have only so far seen this student of ours and the principal come to the dinner table (on different evenings), and they both had reason to be there.
This next part concerns differences between Chinese and English and is a bit esoteric, so if that sort of thing does not interest you, feel free to skip this paragraph. Feng Ji Chen was offered a particular dish of food while we were eating, and her response was chi bu lai (chi means eat, bu means no, and lai means come, but all together it means I can't/won't eat it). I inquired as to why lai was used instead of liao; chi bu liao would mean I physically cannot eat any more. To my friends', and hosts', credit, they did not lose patience with me as I struggled to understand. By the end, my understanding has evolved to where I think that chi bu liao has a stricter definition (only physically unable to eat), while chi bu lai is slightly more flexible. It seems, however, that chi bu liao might have been acceptable in this instance. This has been part of a wider pattern that I have noticed, and it is one that has been pointed out to me by native speakers. Chinese is a language of much fewer and looser definitions than English. It is conventional wisdom that as one's English gets better, one begins to use more and more words to describe their actions, as they can become more and more specific. However, Chinese works slightly differently: as you learn more, you say less and more is implied by your speech. The language is not overly burdened with rigorous definitions, so phrases are not bound as tightly by the strictures of definitional nuance that often plague English, confusing foreigners. I don't think necessarily think that the Chinese way works better, although it has its conveniences; I merely think that perhaps both languages are a little extreme in their method at times.
Hopefully the weather will cooperate tomorrow, and we will be able to continue work. See you tomorrow night.
This afternoon was relatively lazy when compared to our usual manual labor. We all took much-needed naps, and I read a fair bit. We ate dinner early. At dinner, we had some bai jiu (literally, white alcohol, but the Chinese use it to describe all liquor). It was a clear liquid, and it was 120 proof, or 60% alcohol (compared with standard American liquors like vodka, rum, and whiskey which are all 80 proof). The extra proof made a good bit of difference. We had to drink it very slowly, and eat more to compensate. On that front, I tried two new foods (well two new body parts) today: chicken neck and pig foot. Chicken neck is pretty bland (just like chicken foot), and also not very rewarding to eat, as it is mostly bone. Pig foot, on the other hand, is quite tasty, although as a general rule pork is my least favorite meat. One of our students, Feng Ji Chen, joined us for dinner, but as her English is still very much in the developmental phase, the conversation took place in Chinese. This brings me to another tidbit of Chinese culture: in China, and especially in rural China, most people leave their front doors open, and if someone wanders into your house during dinnertime, you are culturally obligated to feed them. This social idiosyncracy is not taken advantage of; I have only so far seen this student of ours and the principal come to the dinner table (on different evenings), and they both had reason to be there.
This next part concerns differences between Chinese and English and is a bit esoteric, so if that sort of thing does not interest you, feel free to skip this paragraph. Feng Ji Chen was offered a particular dish of food while we were eating, and her response was chi bu lai (chi means eat, bu means no, and lai means come, but all together it means I can't/won't eat it). I inquired as to why lai was used instead of liao; chi bu liao would mean I physically cannot eat any more. To my friends', and hosts', credit, they did not lose patience with me as I struggled to understand. By the end, my understanding has evolved to where I think that chi bu liao has a stricter definition (only physically unable to eat), while chi bu lai is slightly more flexible. It seems, however, that chi bu liao might have been acceptable in this instance. This has been part of a wider pattern that I have noticed, and it is one that has been pointed out to me by native speakers. Chinese is a language of much fewer and looser definitions than English. It is conventional wisdom that as one's English gets better, one begins to use more and more words to describe their actions, as they can become more and more specific. However, Chinese works slightly differently: as you learn more, you say less and more is implied by your speech. The language is not overly burdened with rigorous definitions, so phrases are not bound as tightly by the strictures of definitional nuance that often plague English, confusing foreigners. I don't think necessarily think that the Chinese way works better, although it has its conveniences; I merely think that perhaps both languages are a little extreme in their method at times.
Hopefully the weather will cooperate tomorrow, and we will be able to continue work. See you tomorrow night.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Day 7: Yes, We Worked on the Sabbath
We got a lot done today. The morning started as planned, at 7:30, with English class. Today Cherry and I finished teaching the children food vocabulary, and then proceeded to teach them words that have to do with ordering food in a restaurant. Cherry explained each item to the children while I wrote the item on the board and drew a picture of it. This culminated in having the children separate into groups and write skits using the words they just learned. They then performed the skits for us. It was a sight to behold. Although pronunciation is still a real problem, they are eager to learn and seem to want to work. After all, they are in school on a Sunday in the summer. I am hopeful that they will improve greatly.
This afternoon we put down a layer of cement at both worksites. This involved a massive cement mixer and lots of stones, dirt, and water. We had more workers than ever before and the operation was like that of a beautiful machine. Everyone had a job, and every job fit together. Now at the end of the day, the designated areas in our park each have a smooth, dry(ing) layer of black cement sitting on top of them.
This post is perhaps a bit more brief than those before it, but I am more tired now than I have been at the end of days previous. I was hoping to finish The History of Love tonight, but perhaps I will delay that in favor of getting a good night's rest. If my mind doesn't need it, the soles of my feet certainly do. Good night.
This afternoon we put down a layer of cement at both worksites. This involved a massive cement mixer and lots of stones, dirt, and water. We had more workers than ever before and the operation was like that of a beautiful machine. Everyone had a job, and every job fit together. Now at the end of the day, the designated areas in our park each have a smooth, dry(ing) layer of black cement sitting on top of them.
This post is perhaps a bit more brief than those before it, but I am more tired now than I have been at the end of days previous. I was hoping to finish The History of Love tonight, but perhaps I will delay that in favor of getting a good night's rest. If my mind doesn't need it, the soles of my feet certainly do. Good night.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Day 6: Working Weekends
So today I got half of my wish from yesterday; it only rained for half the day today. In the morning we taught English to children at the local school. I neglected to mention in my last post that Tracey (the girl from Hangzhou) left last night because she has driving lessons this coming week. So there are only four of us in the house now. Tao Yuan and Eric taught the class of younger children, while Cherry and I handled the older kids, many of whom were 18. Their English was obviously not great, but I was generally impressed with their vocabulary. We started out very simply, as I wrote a dialogue on the board that went like this:
A: Hello.
B: Hello. What is your name?
A: My name is Joshua. What is your name?
B: My name is Cherry. How are you?
A: Fine, thank you. How are you?
B: Fine, thank you.
A: So what do you like to do?
B: I like to shop. And you?
A: I like to read.
B: That's great!
This was reconstructed from my very dim memory of learning French at a very young age. It was rather difficult to demonstrate in front of the class without laughing, the conversation was so bland. Of course we had the children practice, inserting their names and hobbies in the place of ours. Later we taught them the English words for various foods, and although my Chinese is much better than their English, I did not know the Chinese words for much of what they learned in English today.
We spent a good deal of time on pronunciation, particularly on the "th" sound that is rather difficult for Asians. Many of them were pronouncing "thank" "sank." But I must say that I was impressed with how eager to learn they were; there were no disruptions of the kind that I would normally expect in a high school classroom. For readers who have never been to China, municipal government is known for being incompetent and ineffective; likewise municipal services usually leave much to be desired. I have great respect for the principal of the school, whom as I mentioned, we met with yesterday. He seems genuinely interested in the childrens' well-being.
After a morning of classes, we ate lunch (no new exotic foods today), and then went out to start working. We were at the other worksite today, as construction as stopped on the first worksite until the necessary materials arrive (which they did at the end of the day). We were essentially leveling the ground in preparation for paving. In this manner, the rain of this morning and yesterday was useful; it provided us with an easy indicator of which areas were lower than the others. These we filled in with excess dirt from the high places. After our labor was finished, we took a walk to the other campsite, where we saw that the materials for cement had been delivered. Then, we decided to walk a little bit further to tour the river that runs through Gaoxiang. I had not yet been to this area of the town, and I am glad I got the opportunity. It was quite beautiful; it is difficult to impress upon you how green the fields are what with all the rain and humidity, but hopefully when I can upload pictures onto this site they will tell an adequate story.
I suppose that's all for today, and tomorrow should provide more of the same: half a day of teaching, and half a day of labor. I will report dutifully on both. Good night.
A: Hello.
B: Hello. What is your name?
A: My name is Joshua. What is your name?
B: My name is Cherry. How are you?
A: Fine, thank you. How are you?
B: Fine, thank you.
A: So what do you like to do?
B: I like to shop. And you?
A: I like to read.
B: That's great!
This was reconstructed from my very dim memory of learning French at a very young age. It was rather difficult to demonstrate in front of the class without laughing, the conversation was so bland. Of course we had the children practice, inserting their names and hobbies in the place of ours. Later we taught them the English words for various foods, and although my Chinese is much better than their English, I did not know the Chinese words for much of what they learned in English today.
We spent a good deal of time on pronunciation, particularly on the "th" sound that is rather difficult for Asians. Many of them were pronouncing "thank" "sank." But I must say that I was impressed with how eager to learn they were; there were no disruptions of the kind that I would normally expect in a high school classroom. For readers who have never been to China, municipal government is known for being incompetent and ineffective; likewise municipal services usually leave much to be desired. I have great respect for the principal of the school, whom as I mentioned, we met with yesterday. He seems genuinely interested in the childrens' well-being.
After a morning of classes, we ate lunch (no new exotic foods today), and then went out to start working. We were at the other worksite today, as construction as stopped on the first worksite until the necessary materials arrive (which they did at the end of the day). We were essentially leveling the ground in preparation for paving. In this manner, the rain of this morning and yesterday was useful; it provided us with an easy indicator of which areas were lower than the others. These we filled in with excess dirt from the high places. After our labor was finished, we took a walk to the other campsite, where we saw that the materials for cement had been delivered. Then, we decided to walk a little bit further to tour the river that runs through Gaoxiang. I had not yet been to this area of the town, and I am glad I got the opportunity. It was quite beautiful; it is difficult to impress upon you how green the fields are what with all the rain and humidity, but hopefully when I can upload pictures onto this site they will tell an adequate story.
I suppose that's all for today, and tomorrow should provide more of the same: half a day of teaching, and half a day of labor. I will report dutifully on both. Good night.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Day 5: Rain, Rain, Go Away
So as you can see I did not succeed in getting the pictures up. Oh well. When this is over I will put them up on Flickr, and then I can embed a slideshow on this site. Or you could just see me in person.
As you might have guessed from the title of this post, it rained today. All day long. Suffice to say we got zero work done. We met with the principal of the local primary school this morning, to discuss a schedule of teaching the children English and mathematics (incidentally, there is a sign near the school which is the only one in the area which I can read in its entirety; it says, "Happily go to school and peacefully return home."). From now on we will be doing a half day of labor on the park and a half day of teaching. Progress should remain swift though, as we will still have the few local workers on the job all day.
In the afternoon, we decided to go have fun in Tonglu, which is a suburb of Hangzhou. Tonglu is much larger than Gaoxiang, and I'm sure I am not the first American to go there, but I was more acutely aware of my race today than I think I have ever been. People stared unabashedly at me, and would stop what they were doing to look. It wasn't terribly bothersome, just a little bit jarring.
I learned a few things about Chinese culture today. First of all, if you wear a green hat in China, it means that your spouse is being unfaithful to you (I have no idea why; it is the equivalent of horns in the West). Also, you should never give a Chinese person a clock or a watch as a gift, because when they receive it it means that "their time has come" (i.e. to die). These I learned through conversation. I also went to Chinese karaoke for the first time today. You are put in a room with a large television and brought drinks, and you have a certain amount of time, during which you may select songs and sing to your heart's content. And yes, they do have American songs. I must confess that I felt a bit uncomfortable at first, but it was actually pretty fun. There were at least five songs in a row by the Backstreet Boys (not my choice, I swear). Then, we went out to dinner, and a very delicious meal consisting of a wide variety of meats and vegetables, including bamboo shoots, which I tried for the first time (I also ate salamander back in Gaoxiang, and that was quite good actually). Chinese dining is buffet style, and they have a turntable in the center onto which they place all the dishes which have been ordered (usually only one person orders the food), and then you spin it to get at the food you want. Quite efficient, although I still feel slightly awkward with chopsticks.
Work should resume tomorrow, provided that the weather cooperates with us. I added two new things to the site today: a reading list and a blog roll. I feel like this site is relatively bland and boring, so hopefully this makes it more worthwhile. I recommend everything that goes on there, unless I say otherwise.
I'm going to bed, but most of you should go make yourselves some lunch. See you tomorrow.
As you might have guessed from the title of this post, it rained today. All day long. Suffice to say we got zero work done. We met with the principal of the local primary school this morning, to discuss a schedule of teaching the children English and mathematics (incidentally, there is a sign near the school which is the only one in the area which I can read in its entirety; it says, "Happily go to school and peacefully return home."). From now on we will be doing a half day of labor on the park and a half day of teaching. Progress should remain swift though, as we will still have the few local workers on the job all day.
In the afternoon, we decided to go have fun in Tonglu, which is a suburb of Hangzhou. Tonglu is much larger than Gaoxiang, and I'm sure I am not the first American to go there, but I was more acutely aware of my race today than I think I have ever been. People stared unabashedly at me, and would stop what they were doing to look. It wasn't terribly bothersome, just a little bit jarring.
I learned a few things about Chinese culture today. First of all, if you wear a green hat in China, it means that your spouse is being unfaithful to you (I have no idea why; it is the equivalent of horns in the West). Also, you should never give a Chinese person a clock or a watch as a gift, because when they receive it it means that "their time has come" (i.e. to die). These I learned through conversation. I also went to Chinese karaoke for the first time today. You are put in a room with a large television and brought drinks, and you have a certain amount of time, during which you may select songs and sing to your heart's content. And yes, they do have American songs. I must confess that I felt a bit uncomfortable at first, but it was actually pretty fun. There were at least five songs in a row by the Backstreet Boys (not my choice, I swear). Then, we went out to dinner, and a very delicious meal consisting of a wide variety of meats and vegetables, including bamboo shoots, which I tried for the first time (I also ate salamander back in Gaoxiang, and that was quite good actually). Chinese dining is buffet style, and they have a turntable in the center onto which they place all the dishes which have been ordered (usually only one person orders the food), and then you spin it to get at the food you want. Quite efficient, although I still feel slightly awkward with chopsticks.
Work should resume tomorrow, provided that the weather cooperates with us. I added two new things to the site today: a reading list and a blog roll. I feel like this site is relatively bland and boring, so hopefully this makes it more worthwhile. I recommend everything that goes on there, unless I say otherwise.
I'm going to bed, but most of you should go make yourselves some lunch. See you tomorrow.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Day 4: Finally A Post!
Sorry to be away for so long; the internet here is not what you would call reliable. Anyway, we've been here for several days, and have already made some progress on turning some land into a park.
It is quite hot here, close to 110 during the day. This means a lot of sweating, and the need for lots of water. This is bad, because tap water in China is undrinkable (even by locals), so water must first be boiled before it can be drunk. I was told the food would be mediocre to bad, but in fact it has been pretty good, if eccentric. I tried chicken foot two days ago as well as snail. The former was rather tasteless and the latter quite good.
I am somewhat of a celebrity in Gao Xiang. It is only a town of 500 people, and I am the first white person who has ever set foot in the village. This just means that everyone stares at me. The locals are very friendly, but completely incomprehensible for me, and mostly incomprehensible for my native Chinese friends. I can speak to them, because everyone understands putonghua, but anything coming back that is more complicated than one sentence needs to be translated before I can understand it. However, I have found that I have an easier time understanding children, perhaps because they speak slightly slower. We went to a convenience store last night, and there were children inside, and of course they automatically turned their attention to me. I greeted them, and they pointed at me and said "Foreigner!" and laughed. I said to them, "I am from America," and one of the girls said "America!" and ran around telling the other children in the store. Then, one of the younger boys came up directly behind me and hit me. On the butt. He proceeded to do this four or five times before we could finally leave the store. This was possibly the weirdest experience of my life.
There are usually about 2 or 3 spectators at the worksite at any given moment, and they love to chat. Most of the time they ignore me, as I am a lot of work to talk to, but a woman today made an effort to converse with me. I should interject here and say that in small talk, food is to the Chinese what weather is to us. So of course she asked me about my diet in America. She was particularly interested in how much rice I usually consumed (and here I am eating lots and lots of rice). She also said something that I would roughly translate as, "If I were your mother I would be sad to see you involved in such hard labor." I wasn't sure how to respond to this, and so I didn't.
I apologize if this seems like a rushed post, but it's late and I'm tired, and a lot has happened. I will try to post more regularly, and thus you can get a fuller picture of my experience here. Speaking of pictures, after I post this I will try to upload some, and I don't know how successful I'll be. But in case I am, the shorter Chinese guy is Eric, one of my best friends from high school, the taller Chinese guy is a friend of Eric's from Carnegie Mellon, the taller Chinese girl is also from Carnegie Mellon, and the shorter Chinese girl lives in Hangzhou, and none of us know her that well. She is very nice, although it is difficult to communicate sometimes because here English is not that much better than my Chinese.
I think that's all for now, but I hope to have another post up tomorrow. Good night.
It is quite hot here, close to 110 during the day. This means a lot of sweating, and the need for lots of water. This is bad, because tap water in China is undrinkable (even by locals), so water must first be boiled before it can be drunk. I was told the food would be mediocre to bad, but in fact it has been pretty good, if eccentric. I tried chicken foot two days ago as well as snail. The former was rather tasteless and the latter quite good.
I am somewhat of a celebrity in Gao Xiang. It is only a town of 500 people, and I am the first white person who has ever set foot in the village. This just means that everyone stares at me. The locals are very friendly, but completely incomprehensible for me, and mostly incomprehensible for my native Chinese friends. I can speak to them, because everyone understands putonghua, but anything coming back that is more complicated than one sentence needs to be translated before I can understand it. However, I have found that I have an easier time understanding children, perhaps because they speak slightly slower. We went to a convenience store last night, and there were children inside, and of course they automatically turned their attention to me. I greeted them, and they pointed at me and said "Foreigner!" and laughed. I said to them, "I am from America," and one of the girls said "America!" and ran around telling the other children in the store. Then, one of the younger boys came up directly behind me and hit me. On the butt. He proceeded to do this four or five times before we could finally leave the store. This was possibly the weirdest experience of my life.
There are usually about 2 or 3 spectators at the worksite at any given moment, and they love to chat. Most of the time they ignore me, as I am a lot of work to talk to, but a woman today made an effort to converse with me. I should interject here and say that in small talk, food is to the Chinese what weather is to us. So of course she asked me about my diet in America. She was particularly interested in how much rice I usually consumed (and here I am eating lots and lots of rice). She also said something that I would roughly translate as, "If I were your mother I would be sad to see you involved in such hard labor." I wasn't sure how to respond to this, and so I didn't.
I apologize if this seems like a rushed post, but it's late and I'm tired, and a lot has happened. I will try to post more regularly, and thus you can get a fuller picture of my experience here. Speaking of pictures, after I post this I will try to upload some, and I don't know how successful I'll be. But in case I am, the shorter Chinese guy is Eric, one of my best friends from high school, the taller Chinese guy is a friend of Eric's from Carnegie Mellon, the taller Chinese girl is also from Carnegie Mellon, and the shorter Chinese girl lives in Hangzhou, and none of us know her that well. She is very nice, although it is difficult to communicate sometimes because here English is not that much better than my Chinese.
I think that's all for now, but I hope to have another post up tomorrow. Good night.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Arrived in Beijing
So I made it. I haven't slept in 24 hours, but I'm here, and about to go get some dinner. It's 87 degrees, and we have a ways south to go to my final destination (see below post). Fun.
Sorry this isn't more involved, but I'm really tired. Once we get to Gao Xiang it will become more exciting, and I'll probably be uploading photos to this site. I think that's all I've got.
Oh! Walter Cronkite died. That's a bummer.
Sorry this isn't more involved, but I'm really tired. Once we get to Gao Xiang it will become more exciting, and I'll probably be uploading photos to this site. I think that's all I've got.
Oh! Walter Cronkite died. That's a bummer.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Overview of Trip
I'd like to give you guys an overview of the trip that I'll be on, but first I'd like to give special thanks to Luke and Amy for posting such supportive comments yesterday (hmm... it's rather difficult to be sarcastic while typing).
So I will be in a small village called Gao Xiang which is in the province of Zhe Jiang on the coast of China. We are about an hour outside of a fairly sizable city called Hangzhou, and also a few hours south of Shanghai.
View Larger Map
This is where my friend Eric's father grew up. He has decided to commission the building of a park there, as a way to give back to the community he was part of. Eric and several of his friends (myself included) will be overseeing the operation, all the way from design through material purchase and construction to completion. We will also be teaching English and possibly remodeling some classrooms. I'm leaving this Friday (the 17th), and won't be returning until August 19th.
This is a very exciting opportunity for me, as it is a chance to be creative and get some experience contributing to the management of a project, and it is a good way for me to improve my Chinese. I am very grateful to Eric for allowing me this opportunity.
So I will be in a small village called Gao Xiang which is in the province of Zhe Jiang on the coast of China. We are about an hour outside of a fairly sizable city called Hangzhou, and also a few hours south of Shanghai.
View Larger Map
This is where my friend Eric's father grew up. He has decided to commission the building of a park there, as a way to give back to the community he was part of. Eric and several of his friends (myself included) will be overseeing the operation, all the way from design through material purchase and construction to completion. We will also be teaching English and possibly remodeling some classrooms. I'm leaving this Friday (the 17th), and won't be returning until August 19th.
This is a very exciting opportunity for me, as it is a chance to be creative and get some experience contributing to the management of a project, and it is a good way for me to improve my Chinese. I am very grateful to Eric for allowing me this opportunity.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Welcome to My Blog
So I haven't actually left for China yet, but I decided to set this up a few days early, and perhaps get into the swing of blogging daily. This blog will mainly be a catalog of my adventures in China (see title of blog), but I am not above using it as a soapbox to rant/link about/to other stuff. Enjoy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
