What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate

This morning, I went to a restaurant and asked for a bowl of rice and some tea. My emergent Chinese is mostly incomprehensible to the locals. I received spaghetti with vegetables and a bowl of warm milk.

Really tough communicating in this culture.

Not everyone involved with my coming here uses the English alphabet well. I understood I was to come to 'Nanning.' Only when I arrived at the wrong airport did I figure out that someone involved with the invitation got the spelling wrong by one letter-- I was supposed to be in Nanjing, hundreds of miles away. For a time, I was lost in a country where I don't speak the language and don't even know the alphabet. The airline people were very helpful, and I am now working at the Oxford Academy of English in Nanjing, a city of 7 million (see below.)

Morning commute

Cars do not dominate in this country. China is a nation of bicycles. One sees hundreds of them as people go to work. Many people walk, and you even see an occasional rikshaw, though they are rare. This is the morning commute in Nanjing, the city of 7 million people where I will be working.

In Transit

In the past month, I'd made so many preparations for this trip that I passed from excited anticipation to obsessive boredom. At last, I'm on my way. The Detroit Airport is very cosmopolitan. Travelers who loiter in the coffee shops on layover speak Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, and Indian languages which I do not recognize. A beautiful red monorail whizzes back and forth. The picture doesn't do it justice.

In an unfamiliar airport, it takes awhile to get one's bearings. I'm carrying a compact but heavy backpack and a "lightweight" computer, its case made bulky by all the peripherals and CD's I've stuffed in the bag. I hate to put these things down, even for an instant as the items they contain are essential and expensive. It was a challenge signing on to the Internet-- the airport system is not user friendly. Tokyo is the next stop on my itinerary. Negotiating airports does not get easier when one does not know the language, so the two hour layover in Japan should be an adventure.

The Beijing hotel where I overnight has confirmed pickup as has the director of the school where I'll be working.