Markers of status















If a table is round, where is its head? Are Chinese banquet tables round because everyone is equal? Hardly. But an outsider will not understand how status is marked.

After a meeting with the Nanjing Education Department, we were invited to lunch. We got there early. We wondered if there was a special place for the host. Bonnie Zhang, one of Barry Jowett's staffers told us you could tell where the host was to sit by looking at the napkins. The host's place is the one where the napkin sticks straight up, higher "above the head of the" others. See picture above.

Suspicious photography
Sometimes, we can hear NPR. On a recent broadcast, they said the US Homeland Security people were encouraging citizens to report suspicious activities, such as persons taking photographs of objects and scenes lacking in interest or aesthetic value. But how can you determine what items are of interest? Lots of the things I photograph, the locals view as mundane.















The mop salesman (above) wondered why I wanted the picture of his bicycle; and today when we visited a rural school, people were mildly amused that I kept photographing rice paddies (below). I grew up in New York City, and no one grows rice there; nor do they grow it in Cincinnati or East Tennessee. To me, it was fascinating. Foreigners see a place differently from long term residents. So do artists. Last summer, when teachers from China visited ETSU, they snapped pictures of things the Kroger parking lot. I hope we don't start viewing such activity as possible terrorism. And I hope nobody bothers me for taking pictures of rice paddies.

To Screw in a Light Bulb

Fuz Maio is the site of Nanjing's ancient Confucian Temple and the home of the Kongzi Academy, with whom we are collaborating. This historic area is the Chinese equivalent of a national park or national landmark, and a great deal of attention goes into its maintenance. China is rich in people, and labor costs are low. Therefore, they use more people than we to accomplish an equivalent task.
They are meticulous in their attention to historic detail. In the above scene, they were painting a trash receptacle to look like a pair of ancient urns. Actually, they were repainting it-- someone told me they had decorated the same trash can six months earlier. Apparently, they want everything to look freshly painted. Three (very talented and artistic ) government employess addressed a task that might have been accomplished by one. A supervisor kept a watchful eye on the artists, and of course there were observers like me.
The problem is not unique to China. In the US as well, tasks grow in complexity depending on the number of participants.