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This second report is horribly late and I am finding it nearly as difficult as the first one to write, partially for the same reasons and also for some completely new ones. The first term at NDFZ has ended and I have found that my time off has provided numerous occasions on which to reflect on the last four months of my life. I have decided to use this second report in two ways: the first is to describe events that occurred in the last two months, and the second is to explore my life in China over the last five and a half months and provide the most effective mid-point reflection I can manage. It makes little sense to me to only evaluate myself and my experiences in China at the end of my time here because, at that point, it is too late to change anything I might want to change about the situation.
Events
December brought a whirlwind of events to Nanjing, and the Christmas season arrived with a bang. Christmas in China was surreal. About two weeks before the 25th, everything suddenly exploded with Christmas cheer - Lara and I dubbed it 'National Put Up Your Christmas Decorations Day,' a play on what we were told was National Turn on the Heat Day. That was a national event which we were not fortunate enough to experience, but that is beside the point. There were a few decorations here and there before that day, but when I stepped out of the elevator into the lobby of Xi Yuan and was assaulted on all sides by Santa Claus and glittery signs wishing me a MERRY CHRISTMAS, I knew that the season was in full swing. The larger-than-life Santa Claus right outside the front door of the dorm that exploded with a hearty 'Ni Hao!' whenever anyone passed was almost too much to handle. It was so strange to experience - Chinese men dressed as Santa Claus, public displays of Christmas cheer sponsored by Anheuser Busch, an
d decorations that literally said 'Merry X-Mas!' (as opposed to 'Merry Christmas!'). Christmas has never held particularly religious connotations for me personally, but to experience it in a way that was so incredibly devoid of that religious connotation was very interesting. And apparently there is no controversy in China over whether it should be 'Merry Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays'.
At this point, we took on the enormous task of teaching all of our students, as well as the other English teachers at NDFZ, Christmas carols. This was one of the most ambitious tasks we could have attempted, and I would not say that we escaped the mission unscathed. I nearly tore my hair out one night because I had a horrible medley of Christmas songs running through my head as I was trying to fall asleep. It was an effective lesson, however, and many of our students seemed to thoroughly enjoy learning the songs. Perhaps even more enjoyable for them was watching their English teacher sing in front of the whole class.
Celebrating Christmas outside school was fun, but still strange without any family around. We celebrated with some other English teachers from Nanjing (as well as Mr. Carl Damerow who came all the way from Macau for the occasion), and had a potluck complete with baked ham, mashed potatoes, deviled eggs, and mince pies. All in all, Christmas in China was much more successful than I was expecting it to be, but I must admit that being back home with a REAL tree, all my favorite holiday foods, and my family will be pretty great.
The next event on the calendar was the new year (the Western calendar one, not Lunar). According to Ms Fang, this year was the first year that NDFZ celebrated the new year with dragon dancing, and it was quite the sight. It was not just ONE round of dragon dancing, but one for each grade, and one also for the teachers. It was a lot of fun to watch our students having such a good time celebrating the new year, and it was even better to watch the head principal of the school dancing around with the other teachers!
The end of the term was extremely busy. Giving final exams and calculating grades was an enormous task to undertake. It was made more stressful by the fact that some of my students did not do as well in Spoken English as I know they can do. I was very upset about this and finally decided that the best way to deal with it was to hand in the grades as they were and work on fixing it for next term, I have spent quite a bit of time thinking about what worked and what did not work last term, and how to better arrange my classes.
We finished teaching 31 December and were on our way to Hong Kong on 3 January. We spent a few days in Macau before embarking on our trek throughout Southeast Asia. Macau was . . . surreal. The best way I can describe it is that, if you were coming from the West, it feels very Asian. Coming from China, however, meant that arriving in Macau felt like arriving in Southern Europe. At one point, I turned to Lara and said 'I feel like I am in Spain and there just happen to be a lot of Asian people here.' All the casinos, foreigners, and Portuguese architecture were quite the shock to someone who has spent the last five months in a place that looks more like the Soviet Union than the Iberian.
From Macau, we headed south. In the five and a half weeks off from school, I visited two SARs, four countries, one embalmed Communist leader, and the dog meat capitol of China. I also saw gorgeous beaches, was almost attacked by a lizard, saw lots of orangutans, sang Malay karaoke in the jungles of Borneo, spent 32 hours in the Bangkok airport (sleeping there twice!), saw the largest religious complex in the world, spent a night in Phnom Penh Cambodia by myself, got to spend two weeks traveling with Anne Salomon (fellow Grinnellian and English teacher extraordinaire), got violently ill in Chiang Mai Thailand, bought ridiculous souvenirs in Bangkok, and visited Ho Chi Minh.
After all of that, we dragged ourselves back to Nanjing (dragged because of exhaustion, not a lack of desire to return). We purposely timed it so we would have a few days to regroup before returning to NDFZ. It gave me some time to prepare for classes, write this report, sort out some of the things I spent so much time thinking about on vacation, and experience the tail-end of Lunar New Year. I had been warned about the New Year celebrations, but it was still a humbling experience. I mean, I love fireworks as much as the next person, but I like them from a reasonable distance, not from ten feet above my head. I found the experience to be another example that there are some aspects of the concept of 'public safety' that I often take for granted in the U.S. but that simply do not exist in China.
Reflections on Teaching
Teaching has been an incredibly overwhelming undertaking. There are many days on which I feel the frustrations far outweigh the benefits of trying to teach English to Chinese kids. The transition from life in the United States to life in China, in addition to the transition from life as a student to life as a teacher, meant that this school year started off a little bit rough. I did not quite know where to take my position as an authority figure in the classroom, and it took me a while to find my footing. I think that, by the time I finally figured out where I wanted to be and how I wanted to control my classroom, it was too late in some respects - my students had sensed that I was unsure of myself, and those who were uninterested in English class seized that opportunity to run wild in some ways.
I finally managed to gain some control over my more difficult classes by the end of the term, but it took a long time to win that back. It was not even until the last few weeks of school (when Lara and I combined our classes for some activities) that I realized that I could control my students relatively effectively, and by that point, I did not have much chance to utilize that control to actually TEACH my students anymore. I have therefore resolved to use that knowledge and the experiences of last term to start off this term with a much more firm position as a teacher and hopefully use that stronger position to do more interesting things with my students, to have more fun with them, and to feel better about my time in China.
One of the ways in which I plan to manage my classroom more effectively is to establish a routine. As much as it pains me in some ways to say this (given consistency's connection with being boring), one of the best ways to get my kids to pay attention to me and participate in class is to establish consistency. A routine is important to these kids, I think, and I hope it will help them settle down a bit and actually get in to Spoken English class.
I am excited to get a new batch of kids this semester as well. I had a great time getting to know some of my students from last semester, and I am looking forward to getting to know more of them. While there are many frustrating aspects of teaching English for a year, one of the perks of being here is definitely getting to know some really amazing kids. I find that some of my most memorable China moments come from interacting with my students outside the classroom, whether it is while they try to teach me Chinese words or while we are shopping for Christmas decorations together or as we help them prepare for speech competitions. For all those frustrating moments that go along with teaching there and some pretty great ones - getting ridiculous gifts from some of your most disruptive students, watching 60 kids laugh hysterically at Macaulay Culkin defeat the bad guys in Home Alone, or just the huge, excited grins (and the shy, reserved smiles) you get from your students outside the classroom.
Reflections on Life
I have come to realize lately that I did not REALLY think about what China was going to do to me. I was really excited about the opportunity to spend a year living and teaching in China, but I did not think very hard about how I would react to such a drastic change in my life, about what would happen to me both physically and emotionally. Had I really thought about these things more carefully before coming to Nanjing, I would have still come to China, but I think I would have been much better prepared for the emotional highs and lows that are a part of daily life here. That does not mean that I think they would not exist, but my adjustment may have happened faster and more smoothly.
There are other, more unforeseeable ways in which life in China is different than I expected. For instance, I thought that being immersed in Chinese culture and language would make learning Chinese relatively easy ('easy' is a term I use rather loosely here). I have found, however, that there is a fundamentally different way of teaching and learning Chinese, and I am not familiar with that method, nor is it one to which I find particularly easy to adapt. I have also come to realize that, when it comes to everyday interactions in Chinese, most Chinese people take one of two approaches. The first is to speak Chinese to everyone at a speed so fast that what little language skills I DO have are rendered completely useless. I find that these people rarely slow down even when they realize I cannot understand them. The second approach is to become wildly excited when I utilize my limited Chinese skills, and then assume that, since I can ask how much something costs or understand numbers, I must be able to unde
rstand anything they could possibly want to say to me. These people tend to realize that I do not know what they are talking about and laugh, sometimes slowing down (which is rarely helpful because my comprehension skills are so limited) and often giving up on me. There is a third, considerably smaller group of people who are extremely nice about what I find to be my unacceptably inadequate ability to communicate in Chinese and either try to use their very limited English skills with me, or keep any conversation simple and to-the-point.
I have decided that, during this second term in Nanjing, I am going to really work on this issue. I think my first course of action is to learn how to ask 'How do you say . . .?' in Chinese, and then utilize my exceptionally good pointing skills. That way, I can learn the words for things I use every day and can ask for them by name, rather than using the ever-popular point-and-grunt technique or going behind counters to get it myself. I also plan to continue taking classes in Chinese, and, if that is not effective, I want to - dare I even utter the words? - TEACH MYSELF. I do not know if I was being particularly naïve in thinking that moving to China would automatically help me make leaps and bounds in learning Chinese, but I have found it much harder than one would think it to be, living in a Chinese-speaking country and all.
One major personal issue I have slowly come to realize in the last month or so is this: part of the reason I wanted to come to China was to have something to do for the year after graduation, thereby making graduating from Grinnell a less terrifying experience. What I really failed to realize (or maybe admit to myself) was that, a year later, I was going to be in the same exact situation as I would have been had I not gotten this fellowship, except I would be trying to find a job from Asia, rather than from Iowa. I have come to realize quite quickly that, if I want to feel like I can really enjoy the second term in Nanjing, I need to keep sight of this issue, and do what I can to take care of it. Not knowing what I am going to do next year is a daunting thought, and the idea of trying to ease my anxiety from China is pretty discouraging, but if I can keep at myself to not get lazy about it, I think that my post-China plans could come together quite nicely, even from this far away.
China has taught me that sometimes actually taking control of my own life is the best way to relieve anxiety about the unknown. When you are 7000 miles away from not only future professional and educational prospects, but also your well-established support network, it becomes really important to deal with those things you can actually do something about, while accepting that it is neither possible nor is it necessary to solve every potential issue right now.
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