In less than 72 hours I’ll be back in the States and it’s hard to believe that my second year in China is over. In many ways this year was better than the first but in many ways it was also more difficult. But it was still one of the best experiences I’ve been lucky enough to have and it has change me in ways I don’t even realize yet. I’m leaving my home of the past two years with mixed feelings.
There were days I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else and couldn’t see my life back in the States, and there were days when I couldn’t wait to leave. I suspect people who leave their home country for an extended period of time have the same feeling.
Of course I missed the comforts of home but the frustration of not being able to buy hotdogs doesn’t compare to the events I missed out on. Missing the special days, my parents’ 40th wedding anniversary, a close friend’s engagement party, holidays, and birthdays were especially difficult. Missing these things, coupled with life sometimes making it difficult to keep in touch have made me worried about a disconnect.
When someone leaves for any amount of time relationships change. Sometimes they can cope with the distance and the time, but sometimes they don’t, and being someone who’s quite insecure in the strength of relationships, in all forms, it’s something I worry about. Will I feel a bit lost because of new inside jokes between friends? Will my niece and nephews still want to hang out with me after having been away for so long?
Will the connections that were once strong be able to cope with this transition? I think so, but I have to understand that I can’t just jump into my old life, especially since I’ll be moving back to D.C. and the desire to do so will be great. I have to accept that I’ve changed; my circle of friends and family has also changed. A balance will need to be found and it may take time. It’s going to take time for me to adjust to living back in the States and I can’t rush the readjustment process.
For better or worse China has become part of me, I will carry the experiences I’ve had here for the rest of my life. But it’s time for this chapter to come to an end and another to begin and I can’t wait to see what will happen next.
Just a quick post to reassure you all that yes I am still around. It's been a really busy week with the busyness continuing until we leave for Vietnam on Tuesday.
Yes, Tuesday, we were supposed to leave for Beijing on Wednesday with a flight to Ho Chi Minh City on Thursday but we got an email this morning letting us know that our flight on Thursday has been CANCELED. And trying to reschedule has been a mess because Thai Air is telling us we need to call USAirways and have them make the change since we used miles for the flight. And USAirways has told us they can't make the changes because their system can't save the needed changes. Trying to get it all settled has taken up a better part of the day.
We now have to make a third call to Thai Air to see if they can settle this for us. Keep your fingers crossed.
Last year at this time, Niels & I were in Beijing, he was taking the LSAT and I was treating myself to an ice coffee from Starbucks.
Today we're going to the Crowne Plaza for lunch with the other two foreign teachers for lunch. Then off to our very last English Corner. The big party's on Saturday, if you're in the neighborhood feel free to drop by.
I've been trying to write a post about some of the essays my students wrote for their final exam and I'm finding it really difficult because more than a handful have dealt with spousal or child abuse.
A couple essays talked about how brave and strong their Mom was because they worked, did all the housework, gave amazing emotional support to them and their siblings. But under all of it their Mom's lived in fear that one day their husband would go too far and not just beat them "badly" but kill her.
One student wrote how her father was on the verge of killing her Mom (with the neighbors watching but not doing much to get him off of her) so she took a steel rod to his head in order to protect her Mom. And you know what the neighbors response was? "You shouldn't have done that. You're a bad daughter." She wrote that agreed with them but was only trying to protect her Mom. I wrote in the margins of her paper that she was not a bad daughter and did the right thing.
Another student wrote about how her uncle beat her legs so badly with a bamboo rod that they bled and she had problems walking all because she didn't do her homework to his standards. This was after her burnt her homework to ash. She went on to say that she understood why he did what he did because he did want her to get spoiled. She was in elementary school at the time.
These essays, and the others like them make me want to tear my hair out. They also make me want to go out find these men and beat the holy living crap out of them.
Spousal and child abuse is still extremely common in China. There are no safety nets for abused women and children. None. Zero. It's seen as a family matter by the state, something not to get involved with. It's also seen as something to be expected. Women are still treated as second class citizens and things are especially bad for women living in the countryside.
I gave an end of semester talk to my students today and one of the things I talked about was self-respect and that no woman should allow herself to be beaten by her boyfriend/husband. If it happens leave, don't care what your parents and neighbors say, because no one deserves it, no one. I then told the young men that if they ever hit their girlfriend or wife I will come to China and beat the crap out of them.
I just hope they heard me.
*The title comes from a common Chinese saying a friend told me.
It's the end of May so I shouldn't at all be surprised that today's high is 89 and it's already 86 but feels like 88. But I am, it feels like August in D.C.. I guess it's a good prep for moving back to D.C. as well as our trip to Vietnam next month.
I could deal with the heat if there were a breeze or if we had ceiling fans or air conditioning in more than one room. I shouldn't complain, most people don't have AC and we're lucky enough to have it in one room, the bedroom thank goodness.
I'm not and never will be a hot weather person.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go melt now.
Blogharbor was down during the national mourning period as was Google Documents so I couldn't post, the Party had blocked Internet sites that were deemed too "fun". I had decided Monday afternoon, prior to finding out sites were down, I wouldn't say anything bad about China while blogging during this time as a of respect.
It was hard not to blog during those three days especially when a slew of bad events took place and I really needed to vent about them. Blogharbor's back up so I can commence my complaining. I started writing all of this up on Monday but things have been so busy that I've not gotten to finish it until now. Be prepared, it's long and it's a rant.
Niels & I have been having the
worst luck with taxis the past couple weeks. Two Saturdays ago we were
on our way to EM School, for movie night with some of the teachers, and
the driver decided to take us on a tour of perimeter of Zhengzhou. A ride that
should cost no more than 29 RMB cost us 40. When Niels confronted the driver he said that he went a "faster" way to save time. Wha...? His tour took us longer to get there.
Then last Tuesday, I spent 35 minutes waiting for a cab, for my weekly teaching gig at EM School. During that time
six cabs drove past me, acknowledged my existence and then drove on, I
wound up missing teaching that day because I couldn't get there.
This past Sunday,
I went with Niels to his Sunday gig and the driver's meter was
broken, but we didn't notice it until it was time to pay, the route he
took normally costs 29RMB but it cost us 45. We called the headmistress
of the school to be like "We're getting ripped off, again.
Can you please help?" She talked with the driver who gave her some lame
excuse on why it cost so much. Because she's so awesome she reimbursed
us immediately for the fare (normally we get reimbursed for cab fare
when we get paid at the end of the month) and because she was out of the office had one of her
teachers call and complain to the taxi company for us as well as write
them a complaint letter on our behalf. It's getting to the point of
ridiculousness, and puts me in a state of nervousness every time I now
get in a cab.
The letter writing campaign our friend has done on our behalf has had some positive results. I should clarify and say that she has a stake in us not getting ripped off as well. She reimburses us for our taxi fare so she's losing money because of it. The taxi driver who gave us a tour of the city is getting fined 2000 RMB (which is probably a month's salary) by the taxi company, we're getting reimbursed for the 40 RMB AND he's meeting us on Sunday to apologize. We're still waiting to hear the response from the company about the other driver, but we're guessing the same result will happen.
She's also taken to calling the cab company and having a driver meet us at our place. Once we get to her school, she has a teacher or two come out, pay the fare and make sure we we're ripped off. How awesome is she?!! We love working with her, not just because the kids at her school are great but because she cares for the well being of her teachers.
In addition to dealing with the taxi drivers who think it's cool to rip off the foreigners, there's been a rise in meanness by people at the university.
Wednesday afternoon, on the bus ride from the new campus back to the old at lunchtime, I was saving a seat for one of the other foreign teachers on the bus, because our schedules are so different the bus rides are usually the the only time we have to catch up. She didn't see me so went to the other bus. As she's approaching the buses one of teachers sitting in front of me pointed at her and started talking about how fat she was, this set me off into a rage. I shouted and the teacher turned around, made a face at me and said (in Chinese) "But she's so fat." I yelled at her (in English), "So what? You don't even know her! What the hell is your problem??" told her she was ignorant and then called her a witch. She either had no clue what I was saying or feigned the ability not to understand (a talent here) turned back around and continued talking with the teacher she was sitting with. (Did I mention that this woman is not thin?)
I was so mad I saw stars. I called Niels to vent to him I was so angry, in the process of venting I made sure to use the few words in Chinese I knew so the teacher knew I knew she was being rotten. You know how I know she could understand me? She kept turning around every time I mentioned my friend's name and when I said fat in Chinese. Niels taught me how to say rude, so I repeated it a few time to him, by saying "She's so rude." I swear I saw this awful woman squirm a few times.
As I got off the bus and was walking home we passed each other and she looked at me, so I said to her "Are you going to start talking about how fat I am, now?" (In English.) Told her she was rude (In Chinese) and then called her a stupid bitch (In English). I probably shouldn't have done that part because it just brought me down to her level, but it was either that or going over and slapping her, that's how mad I was.
I think some of the (English) teachers heard, and understood me, when I went off on the teacher on and off the bus, because in the afternoon they were a little squirrelly around me. Also a teacher who used to say hi to me and pretend to be nice to me has begun to ignore me. Do I care? No. Not once have the English teachers, as a whole, made me feel welcome, so I no longer worry what they think about me. They can suck it.
Then, while waiting for the classroom
to empty out so I could enter it for my 5pm class, two students walked
out, looked at me, looked at each other and then started laughing. I went after them and stared yelling at them asking if they thought it was funny to make fun of a teacher. They kept walking away as I was yelling, which made me even angrier. I knew they understood me even though they kept pretending not to understand. The amount of disrespect shown to the foreign teachers is unbelievable. They think we're not humans, but dancing monkeys, so we can be treated any which way they like.
After English Corner last night one of my writing students asked if he could talk with me in private, he said that there was something "bad" I had done and wanted to talk about it. He told me he had seen me yelling at the girls and couldn't understand why I was so mad because I'm, as he said, even tempered. I told him what had happened earlier in the day with my friend and how these girls were the straw that broke the camel's back, and he said understood why I had gotten so mad and if had happened to him he would have hit them. He also asked if maybe perhaps they were being curious. I talked with him about the difference between curiosity and meanness and he said he was sorry when people did these things to me and that it was wrong to treat people this way.
My conversation with him was so different from many I've had with other people about situations like this. They tend to make excuses for those making fun of us. He didn't, he came out and said people like that are bad and that he hoped these experiences didn't affect my time in China for the worse, because he and his classmates really enjoyed my class and are sad that I won't be returning in Fall. His words were all I needed to hear, and they made me feel better.
I was talking with one of the teachers about families and children the other day. It seems that Niels & I are getting the "When are you having a baby?" question a lot more recently, which sometimes annoys me, but then I realize I'm an anomaly to many people here so I just usually let it go, but more on that in a moment.
In discussing families and family planning differences between the States and China I asked my teacher friend if teachers who want to start a family need to get permission from the school leaders, I already had an idea of what she'd say but I wanted to get confirmation. Not surprisingly she said yes, teachers do. Then she went on to state that the school's was given a quota on how many teachers could be pregnant a year, and it's 10. The quota didn't surprise me, but the quota size did, considering there are probably over 300 teachers, so the quota coupled with the number of teachers doesn't seem to make the odds of a teacher being allowed to have a child high. But then I look out my kitchen window, wander around campus and it's baby central. I'm constantly amazed how many children there are under the age of 5 who live here. It's a little overwhelming and a little scary because it's just not isolated to campus but when I am out and about in the area it's like this as well. There are babies everywhere and I feel like they're taking over the city.
One of the big things we talked about was how the responsibility of raising a child doesn't fall to the parents, but to the grandparents. For many young children (this is also true of most of my students) their primary caregiver has never been Mom and Dad. It's something that I've not grown used to, which I attributed to a cultural difference. For me it's always been if you have a child it's your duty to raise them not someone else's. I'm all for Mom & Dad asking for help, god knows I'm going to need it. But there's a part of me that's bothered when all, not some, of the parental duties are given to someone else. But then when I hear how people often have children not because they want them but because their parents want grandchildren then I understand more. I don't agree with it, but I understand more why the duties fall the to grandparents.
She then asked when Niels & I are going to have kids. When asked this question, I always respond with "if" because we're still on the fence. We're so not in any financial situation to bring a child into the world right now. We really like it just being the two of us, enjoying each other's company. When I mentioned this my friend was really surprised, because but for many couples not having a child is not an option, they are coerced into it by family and cultural tradition, even if they can't really afford to have a child. She told me I was brave for waiting to have kids, I don't think I'm brave by any means but I am aware of my limitations. What I didn't tell her is that if one has a pregnancy scare and cries not tears of joy but tears of freaked outness, that is a telltale sign that you're not ready for kids.
I like talking with this teacher about cultural differences between China and the States, I get very honest answers from her and it really is a cultural exchange. Plus, she doesn't cringe and tell me that at 36 I'll be too old to start a family or think I'm a bad person if I don't have children. Conversations with her a breath of fresh air. (I had an acquaintance tell me that I better start RIGHT NOW because I'm already getting up there in years, at the ripe old age of 32. I'm always too flabbergasted at these sorts of interactions to come up with a sarcastic response.)
Things in Sichuan Province are pretty grim, and the weather situation isn't helping things.
Please go to the Red Cross' International Services site and give what you can. I've students who lost friends and family in this tragedy and they along with countless others could use all the help they can get.
A big thanks goes out to Jennifer for letting you all know in the blogworld that I'm OK. It's been a strange few days.
Saturday night the power went out on campus, it seems as if the engine for the campus' (coal) power plant exploded, and it didn't go back online until Monday morning. It was strange being with out electricity for such a long time, we were totally at a loss on what to do, not fully realizing how dependent we were on the Internet until we were without it for almost 35 hours.
We got a few updates from our foreign affairs person telling us the power would be back on Sunday afternoon, well that came & went and when we talked with one of the other foreigners around 8pm that night she said that there's no way that it'll be on tonight because the workers stop working at 6pm, What?? We've not had power, at this point, for over 19 hours, doesn't this situation constitute an instance where they should be working on it until it's fixed? Another instance of China just making me shake my head in confusion.
When the power came back on Niels and I were overjoyed that we could be connected to the outside world once again. So after going to lunch we sat down to watch an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (season 7) and as we're sitting there all happy we could once again get our geek on when I turned to him and said "Do you feel that?" He was all "It's just you... no... it's an earthquake." We jumped up, stood in the doorway between the living room & dining room to figure out a game plan, which was get out of the apartment... FAST. I grabbed the keys, and we ran out and stood in the big clearing in front of our apartment, with most of our neighbors for about 15 minutes until things settled down.
It was freaky, the first (and hopefully the last) earthquake I've experienced. We realized after the fact that we probably should have made our way to the clearing in front of the library, since the way the power lines are set up near our building we were surrounded by them and had the earthquake been worse we would have been in trouble. We made a note to ourselves to remember this in case there's a next time. (I hope there's not a next time)
Things in Sichuan Province are pretty bad so if you can please send some good thoughts that way, they really could use it.
The woman who runs the school I teach at Tuesday mornings is looking for a foreign teacher or two for her school. Details about the school can be found here. The school's great, she's an awesome boss and the teachers are wicked friendly. I wish I had known about it last year at this time when I was looking for new employment. Working at her school is one of the things I'm going to miss about living in China. You can also contact me if you're interested.
Yes, I know I'm linking to a lot of China related articles recently. But I'm trying to come to terms with my love/hate relationship with this country and reading articles is helping. Plus if I can share what I find to help give perspective on China's perspective then it's all good. Right?
Are you really surprised by this? Do you not realize that if you ban something when people stumble upon it they'll be clueless to its meaning, and when they get caught with it are befuddled why they're in trouble? And then a whole new set of problems is created for you in trying to explain the situation.
Also, if you want students living overseas to help bolster China's image you may want to let them know that throwing things at people or harassing them won't help.
figcookies
P.S. I'd appreciate it if you'd stop interfering in my email. I do like being able to read, write and send emails and you've been making things difficult for me the past month and a half. You know I'm leaving soon and never was a threat to your hegemony, so cut it out.
About
Figcookies resides in the DC area with her 2L husband. After many years of working on and off at a local university she recently got a teaching position at a DC charter school. In addition to teaching, she's trying to survive graduate school without going completely insane. During her free time figcookies likes to knit and kill zombies on the XBox 360
