Don't Ask, Don't Tell

We told the international office that we don't need to keep seeing museums and monuments-- that we'd like to see things off the beaten path. They thought we would like to experience some authentic Chinese snack food.

Betty, a lovely young woman on the international office staff, conducted us to an area close to Tiannanmen Square in the heart of Beijing. The snack place she remembered had closed. We wandered awhile through narrow lanes where storefronts sold ice cream, trinkets, and shoes; and kids raced around on scooters. A man who did not have a shirt on upbraided us for not buying anything. "You are the rich. You must spend."

At length, we reached a snack food restaurant, and Betty asked us to pick out some eats. We chose a vegetable wrap and some orange juice. But the Chinese don't feel hospitable unless they have provided you with more food than you can possibly finish, so Betty chose additional dishes, none of which I recognized.

Always eager to practice my Chinese, I said, "Zhe xie shen ma (What's this?)" as I pointed to a plate containing a grooved and stringy white, green and black substance which was served with hot sauce. Betty's English is as well-developed as her Chinese hospitality. "Oh, "she said. "It is stomach. Of the ox."

A seasoned international guest, I refused my impulse to gag; but downed a few mouthfuls of ox with hot sauce. I suggest this policy when confronting new foods here: Don't ask what you're eating; and if you know, don't tell.

Practical use.

I persevere with Chinese. From what I am told, I butcher the language's tonal structure, but some people understand me. It's a question of motivation-- on the part of the native speakers, that is.
Money is a powerful motivator. I am more likely to be understood by merchants and restauranteurs than by other Chinese. A few days ago, I was able to communicate with a worker at the Chinese equivalent of Kinko's and succeeded faxing a recommendation to a school in America, on behalf of a graduate student. In such establishments, someone always speaks English, but we did the transaction entirely in Chinese. I am now capable of such profound statements as "Do you sell batteries?" "Which way is the exit?" and "Where are toilets?"

Like the Chinese, Americans vary in their ability, or perhaps willingness, to comprehend what is said by non-native speakers-- this case in English. Students regularly complain about the English of foreign born teachers, even though, in my opinion, their English is entirely comprehensible. In such instances, there is a tendency to side with the students because they are paying tuition. I think the matter is more complex. In a world gone global, communication is a two-way street, and people need to learn how to listen to a variety of accents and styles.














Above: Campus copy store, where they sell flash drives and I-pods in addition to sending faxes.

Below: This store clerk in Chengde had no English, but understood my request for batteries.

The gender of lions.
















How do you tell if a stone lion is male or female? It's simple. The female has a lion cub under her foot. The male has a world under his (see above) Prof. Guo Tao told us this when we visited the Eight Temples of Chengde.

This is an active Tibetan Buddhist worship community, not simply a monument. Worshipers burn incense and bow before Buddha, while Temple musicians play harps, drums, and flutes.

There was a cool breeze, so the climb to the top was tolerable. The stones are irregularly laid, and many are half broken, so I had to concentrate; however once I get absorbed in the task of climbing, I labored to the top. The view was glorious.

Below:

1-The Putzuozhongchen Temple with prayer flags flying
2- At the pinnacle
3- Worshipers and musicians

Holiday Weekend

The Dragon Boat Festival is a holiday weekend which ushers in the summer, much as the Memorial Day weekend in the US. It commemorates the self-sacrifice of the Buddhist statesmen and poet Qu Yuan, who drowned himself to protest the Zhou emperor's ill-advised foreign
policy.

































In Southern China, there are Dragon Boat races; here in the North many people make excursions into the mountains. We were taken to Chengde, a mountain community 150 miles North of Beijing for the holiday. The place was crowded with cars bearing Beijing license plates.
Constructed during the reign of Kangxi (1654-1722), the palace at Chengde provided a summer mountain retreat for the Qing Dynasty emperors, who sought to escape summer outbreaks of smallpox. Tibetan style temples were constructed to foster goodwill toward Northern allies.

The palace grounds are vast. Lotus grows in the lake, which is surrounded by willows. The deer which roam the grounds are extremely tame; in earlier days these gentle creature were raised to provide sport for the emperors. (above)

I managed to walk through the miniature waterfall (below), though it was slippery with moss.















This website has lots of information about the Dragon Boat Festival
http://www.c-c-c.org/chineseculture/festival/dragonboat/dragon.html

Standing Room Only

In China, church is no longer illegal, but it's still somewhat frowned on. A member of the Communist Party took us to church this past Sunday. I believe our visit gave this person an acceptable reason for going. There were several services; the one we attended was packed to overflowing. Those who could not be admitted sat in the courtyard on blue plastic stools and watched the proceedings on close-circuit television.














Above: The throng pours out of church.

Life's minor problems

The staff of the international office is very solicitous about helping us deal with minor catastrophes. But I don't like bothering them-- they've looked tired ever since the quarantine nightmare.

So when our toilet went on strike a few days ago, I decided to deal with it myself. Unfortunately, the term "plunger" was not in the pocket translator we carry around with us, so I looked it up online.
Here's what I found:

plunger ['plʌnʤɚ] ['plʌnʤə]
1. 名词 跳进（水中等）的人；跳水人；潜水者
2. 名词 （弄通堵塞管道用的）揣子
3. 名词 [机械] 活塞；柱塞；撞针杆
4. 名词 [口语] 鲁莽的人；（尤指）滥赌的赌徒；不顾一切的投机家

Your computer may not have the software for decoding Chinese, so if you're interested, you can follow the link to what I saw:

http://www.nciku.cn/search/en/detail/plunger/73308

I had no idea how to pronounce these words, nor which of them was applicable. So I found a picture (above) and took it with me to the campus store. The sales people laughed when they realized what I wanted, but they said, "Mei yao" i.e. "Don't have." Before we could arrange an excursion off campus, the toilet spontaneously recovered from its malaise.

Beijing Opera

This past weekend, we went to the Beijing Opera (above). The music utilizes a different scale from ours, and the singing sounds a bit screechy, but the instrumental parts are lovely, and the dancing and acting glorious. It's a lot like ballet. Beijing or Peking opera-- I hear it called both -- is performed at several theaters and is of course government subsidized.

We had very good seats near the front of the auditorium, where we were served tea, cakes and fruit-- a performance in and of itself. Before the opera begins, the actors apply their makeup publicly, in a little vestibule adjacent the auditorium. It's a very different practice from Western Theater, where actors enjoy the privacy of individual dressing rooms and any such observation by spectators is thought to detract from the atmosphere surrounding performance.































Above: an actor transforming himself into the "Monkey King."
Second Above: The Monkey King in performance.

Below: Actor, Musicians, and the tea ceremony performer