Adventures in China, two

Wednesday, December 7, 2011
5pm ish


A quick flashback to the trip itself, which I consider The Lost Decade. Flight out of Newark delayed by mechanical difficulties; some turbulence en route. The first 8 or 9 hours not too bad, 2 difficult hours, then had a nap and awoke excited about impending arrival. Got to Beijing late, and my connecting flight to Lanzhou had been cancelled anyway, even if I had been in time. The agent at the gate gave me a voucher for a free reschedule. Got through customs, found my bag, schlepped it all over to another terminal to talk to China Eastern, and was told “There might be a flight at 10. Check with me at 9pm.”

Sat on luggage for an hour or so, too tired to seek sustenance.

Flight out delayed by weather, left sometime after 10; actually slept for about an hour en route. Met Mr. Liang right outside baggage claim, and the driver brought us to Lanzhou by about 2am.

It was dark.

Bright spots: talked Chinglish with a five-year-old in Beijing airport; her big people, I think, did not shou Yingwen, but they were clearly proud that their little one had been watching the Zhongguo equivalent of Dora the Explorer. Met a young Chinese man who’d been in the States for 3 years and was returning home to Lanzhou to get a job. He bragged about Auburn football.

Okay, end of flashback. Today I had an excellent breakfast of tiny oranges and a Chinese bread and Starbucks instant (thank you goddess for Starbucks instant!!!), then class with my students from 10:40 to 12:20, mostly get-acquainted stuff and time for me to size them up (and, I’m sure, vice versa). They are writing homework for me, to turn in tomorrow, and tomorrow we will start a piece of reading. May also do the telephone scheduling activity, which they could write down as well. [Pairs of students sit back to back and make pretend phone calls to set up activities, so they have to know verbs, time expressions, phrases of acceptance or polite refusal; they end up with a week of lunch, dinner, movie, baseball, and dancing dates at specific times.]

After class I came home and vegged for a while; found that a neighbor’s net access is not password protected and got online to send mail. At about 3 I went out → this means I found my way home alone, and then to the supermarket (where I bought some taste-of-home Coke and Pringles) and to a restaurant and back home. A major triumph, considering how exceedingly difficult everything seemed yesterday.

At the restaurant I bought 4 delicious steamed, filled buns for about 50 cents. The hardest thing was ordering, since I don’t know the words for any kinds of foods, and the restaurant staff didn’t know any English. We got by with “I would like something to eat, not too expensive, not too large” and pointing. They asked if I taught at the daxue, and I said yes, I’d just arrived on Monday. “Thanks! See you later!”

I enjoyed walking around a bit. I haven’t seen any Westerners other than those in “our” building; we must be a sort of curiosity. I get lots of looks, but no one has spoken to me first. (Except for one nice fellow who saw me standing outside this morning, waiting for my student escort, and asked if I needed help.) The air seemed a little better today, but I wore a face mask, and I think I’ll continue to do so. Especially off the campus, where there is city traffic, the air is just plain bad. (And, the mask helps with breathing the cold air.)

Yes, it IS cold here, but it’s not Minnesota cold or Blacksburg-with-the-wind-blowing cold. And all the interior spaces are overheated, so I am moderating by (a) changing into a sleeveless top at home and (b) opening the door onto my enclosed balcony for brief periods. Also the air is very dry, indoors and out, so I’m using a lot of saline mist nasal spray and keeping a bowl of water sitting out, hopefully to evaporate.

They provided three large fluffy comforters, all of which I folded to sleep ON, not under, as the beds are very very hard. I only need one light cover, and so far the makeshift mattress has not been a problem. I will know that I’m truly rested when/if it becomes one.

It may not sound like a very active day, but I am one tired puppy! (Photos, some shopping, my living room.)

Adventures in China, one

Tuesday, December 6, 2011
9pm ish

It’s been less than 48 hours (I think) since I crawled out of bed at 5am to go to the airport, but much longer than that experientially. And so far, so good. All my problems have been bathroom-related, beginning with the lurching stomach I developed en route, which I categorized as a combination of end-of-term fatigue, jet lag, and excitement. Have been eating light meals and drinking lots of water. Also, I hate those squat-toilets. And I learned today that in China, even the familiar-looking thrones can’t have paper put in them.

The plumbers – who looked like plumbers all over the world and probably, though I didn’t see them from that angle, have The Crack – said that this problem started long before me, which made me feel a bit better. (Thank goodness I got suspicious early and went upstairs and asked my neighbor if I could use hers.) (Which was more complicated than you think, since she doesn’t speak any English and I don’t know the Chinese for “toilet” or “bathroom.” I do know “poop” but didn’t want to start saying that at our first meeting.) So as the plumbers left, I said “I didn’t know” and “Sorry!” in Chinese, two vastly useful phrases for any cultural travelers.

Also, the water guy brought me a big container of potable water today, one of those upside-down stand-around-the-water-cooler bottles, which is on a unit with a heater, since the Chinese like to drink hot water. (Students were between scandalized and amazed that I like to drink cold water : )

So now I am freshly pottied, showered and dried off, and I have a trash can, bath towel, and Kleenex from the underground “supermarket” a couple of blocks away.

None of these improvements – working toilet, drinking water, trashcan, second bath towel – would have been possible (well, at least not likely) without the help of four of my students. Two of them, Vivi and Carl, came over at 10 this morning to walk me around; they intended to take me to breakfast, but I didn’t want anything to eat, so we had a little tour and ended up at “our” building, where the department faculty gave me (bad) instant coffee, which I gratefully drank. I met for about 15 minutes with my whole class of 18 students, and we chatted. They were impressed that I know some Chinese and can write my Chinese name in characters, but what really blew them away was that I was writing with my left hand.

Carl and Vivi came back at about 4:30, I think, and made cell calls to get the water guy here (all in Chinese, none of which I understood except the word for “water”). They also waited with me for the plumbers and interpreted for them. (I had reported the plumbing problem earlier in the day to H. Xiao, the director of International Education.) Then they took me shopping and out to dinner and walked me back to my door. (I’m hoping that by the end of the week I can navigate solo from my apartment to the classroom, supermarket, and campus cafeteria.) (It’s not far, I’m just extremely braindead.)
While we waited for the water guy, we talked about Chinese characters; the students each wrote their names and told me what the Hanzi mean. Also we talked about different expressions: when someone doesn’t close a door behind him/herself, the Chinese say “Do you have a long tail?” rather than “Were you raised in a barn?” We talked about left-handedness; the Chinese think it’s a good thing, but it’s very rare. I told them about the European stigma against lefties (gauche, sinister, left-handed compliment).

Food: excellent and possibly way too spicy, both as advertised. Had “hot pot” for lunch, with mild, sweetish hot tea (“San Pow Cha”), while watching it snow outside, first snow of the season. Perfect. Dinner was a couldn’t-finish-it large plate of rice/veggies/mutton for about $1.15. Had bottled water, but before a student warned me about the cups of shui the server had brought, I had taken a sip. Stomach, beware.

Infrastructure: Apartment is spacious (2br plus a den, small kitchen, small bath, large central living area) but with cheap fittings, details. Can’t tell if the microwave works; I haven’t needed it, and the labels are all in – you guessed it. The tv doesn’t work, but I wouldn’t be able to understand it anyway, so mei wenti. All my appliances/electronics are working fine, and there is a possibility that I’ll have internet access at home by tomorrow. (Will definitely have it in the schoolroom.)

Roads are in good shape and relatively litter-free; they do drive on the right, and like ultra-friggin’ maniacs, worse than Boston or Atlanta. You have to be really careful not to be run over. What is this “yield” of which you speak?

An EPA badly needed; city air smells bad.

And so to bed – more soon. (Photo, the view out my kitchen window.)

*sigh*

never mind.

Holy Cow (rant)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/opinion/19shriver.html

Okay, so I just saw this in today's paper and it prompted me to write about it NOW -- quite a feat, as i haven't thought much about my blog since about the time classes started.

Today's NYT includes this op-ed, which explains that if we can't bring ourselves to stop killing animals en masse in order to eat them, we can at least use genetic engineering to make them less susceptible to pain. Holy leaping batshit. So now we can not think about the fact that we "engineered" many of these animals to begin with through selective breeding, not think about the conditions in which they live and die, (not to mention the horrific working conditions of the humans on the "killing floor" of meat plants), and be released to think even less about their nature as creatures, because regardless of what we do to them we can now say "oh, but they don't *feel* the pain"?

Yes, the writer of the piece is an ethicist; yes, many would agree that this is literally "have your cake and eat it too." But really, this idea highlights for me the arrogance we have achieved as a species (at least those of us in the West), not to mention our severed relationship with ol' Mother Nature and the rest of her children. I wish I could go back to my childhood days of eating sausage from a pig we'd raised and fed and appreciated, a pig who had a good life. At least that was an honest relationship.

Blood Pressure !

Man, there's so much crap out there to rage about, where does one start? First, with the tea-bagger/ birther / nutjob campaign of "disinformation" and "protest" about health care --- and then with the lack of balls the media and almost everyone else is exhibiting in responding to them.

Exhibit One: (from Salon's "say what?")

"People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless."

-- from Investor's Business Daily editorial on "death panels"

"I wouldn't be here today if it were not for the NHS [National Health Service]. I have received a large amount of high-quality treatment without which I would not have survived."

-- Stephen J. Hawking, who has motor neurone disease, was born in the UK, and has lived there his entire life

Ummm... And we should listen to uninformed people, why?

Exhibit Two: (from NYT's account of Sen. Arlen Specter's town hall in PA)

"It says plainly right there they want to limit the type of care elderly can get," said Laurel Tobias, an office manager from Lebanon, referring to a bill in the House. "They are talking about killing people."

Um.... Right where? In one of the several draft bills still circulating? Which she has read? Or "right there" in some unidentified document waved by the host on a right-wing tv show? Has Ms. Tobias ever seen a living will form? I made mine out the other day, prompted by all this discussion --- well, I'd been thinking about it for some time -- and one of the choices you can check basically says "use all the friggin' technology you can to keep me alive for as long as possible." Prompting people to think about these choices before their health is seriously compromised does not mean "coercing them to make a particular choice."

Exhibit Three: (from Salon; this meeting also reported in Charlottesville Daily Progress)

At the latest in a series of town hall meetings in Charlottesville, Rep. Tom Perriello heard both cheers and jeers for health care reform. Among his comments? "There are no 'death panels' in the bill, there just aren't," he said. "If one believes as a matter of faith that this is a secret strategy to get to rationing care, that is a legitimate position to take, but I can't refute it." (emphasis added)

Oh dear oh dear. We shouldn't decide policy issues (or much of anything in the public sphere) based on our "beliefs." Belief does not require evidence. Does not require facts. Does not require reason. That's why we say we "take things on faith." Okay, so some citizens, unfortunately, decide in the absence of any evidence or any thought to believe that reform will ration care --- what makes that "a legitimate position to take"? And surely Perriello means that it's not possible to refute any article of faith, since it's not subject to reason, but he comes off sounding like he condones their misguided beliefs. Wouldn't it have been better -- not politically better, but more honest -- to say "If people choose to believe as a matter of faith that this is a secret strategy to get to rationing care, those people can't be reasoned out of that belief. But their position is not supported by the facts." I myself would add something like "You dimwits shouldn't be disgracing Thomas Jefferson's town this way," but that would be optional.

And the hits just keep on coming.

UPDATE -- Glenn Greenwald's guest columnist, here:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/08/13/palin_grassley/index.html

p.s., thanks to Edwardses

It has been a dreadful and cabin-fevered last month or so, and I very much enjoyed visiting with almost the full complement of in-laws in Tennessee. Big public thank-you shout-out to Sue, Francis, Malindi, Michael, Kevin, Heather, Wil for being fun. And for reminding me to post photos ; )

Toe Promises

Okay, as promised,

here they are (only some of my MANY somewhat grotesque toe photos).

The two with the doctor are from the day the accident happened; the other, somewhat fuzzy one is from two weeks later and shows toe sans nail and plus stitches. Note how swole up this sucker is.

Enjoy! : )