Lunch with Fenny

On our first day here, we checked into getting cell phone service. In the process, we met Fenny, an English teacher at Xiamen University. We made plans to have lunch today. She picked us up in front of our classroom in her car. Since few people have cars here and we take the bus, riding in a small vehicle was a new experience. Fenny zipped around the one-way campus roads as if there were no pedestrians and no other cars to worry about.

Fenny picked a first class restaurant on the beach not too far from campus. Brightly-lit fish tanks lined the walls throwing off a vibrant glow. A variation on this theme are buckets of various sea critters for sale at street markets.

Back to lunch. Fenny ordered a series of appetizers so that we could taste lots of novel foods. What fun! First came the green bean cakes, a gelatin type of dessert. Then came a citrus flavored, cold, tapioca soup. There were mixed interpretations amongst the critics - Calliope tasting a mango flavor. This was followed by a cold black seaweed jelly soup and some cooked greens. There are many varieties of cooked green leaves in Xiamen. And the way we say vegetarian seems to conjure up cooked green leaves in the minds of Xiamen restaurant staff. We have eaten a number of varieties of lettuce, mustard, and cabbage. But we may be eating wild, unkown greens as well.

Back to lunch. More dishes came out, but I was too busy eating to take more pictures. In my last food entry, I mentioned that in Xiamen, vegetarian eating was easy. In the last couple of days, it has gotten a bit trickier. I ordered spicy tofu two nights ago and got a tasty dish with pork bits scattered throughout. Fenny, who was born and raised in China, did all the ordering today. She empahasized and reiterated that many of the dishes should contain no meat and no seafood. But one came with bits of pork and another with bits of shrimp. We still had PLENTY of vegetarian food. And they were most apologetic. Apparently, it's not just a foreigner's inability to order properly. I suppose that's good news and bad news. The good news is that we order properly. The bad news is that it doesn't matter.

Fenny drove us back to campus. Leaving the restaurant, there was a traffic divider that prevented her from turning left. Or so I thought. There was no oncoming traffic in either direction, so what does it matter which side of the road you drive on? Cyclists routinely travel on the wrong side of the road here; we pass them on the bus every day. I have heard it said that in China, lane markers, traffic signals, road signs are taken as suggestions.

A tasty lunch, new foods, and a new friend. What a treat! Fenny insisted on paying for the meal. The Chinese people continue to impress me with their overwhelming hospitality.

Mandarin Study

Hilda and I study Mandarin every day from 9-11:30 AM. Our program is offered by the Overseas Education College of Xiamen University. Thus all of our classmates are all students from abroad. There is actually a word for “student studying abroad” in Mandarin – liúxuéshēng. I have learned enough of the pinyin, so that I know how to pronounce that word just by reading it – and let me tell you that it is not pronounced like it looks! So pat myself on the back. I can also tell a little bit about what it might mean, even if I didn’t know the word, because I’ve already learned that xué means to study and xuéshēng means student. So, sometimes, I can even apply logic to it. But by the time I do that, the rest of the class has learned another three words.

Our Classmates

Speaking of the rest of the class, as far as I can tell, they have ALL studied Chinese before. And, even if they hadn’t, most of them arrived with a home court advantage. The Thai students speak Thai, which has six tones, so intonating properly comes relatively easy to them. They seem to have no trouble rattling out full sentences without hesitating over the tones. I just found out that Japanese characters are very similar to Chinese characters! Actually, it’s more complex than that, but the bottom line is that the Japanese students could probably get the gist of a Chinese newspaper article without even knowing Chinese. How could I go through fifty years on this planet and not know that? I haven’t asked the Korean students about their language, but I think Korean shares a good portion of its vocabulary with Chinese. Then there’s Hilda. She knows a good chunk of Mandarin and is fluent with what she knows.

The upshot of all this is that I am constantly in a a fog as to what the teacher is saying. And everybody else seems to understand just fine. Generally, when I find myself in this situation, I just ask a lot of questions, until everything is cleared up. This strategy is not working that well this time round. We have two teachers. One teacher focuses on writing. The first week she explained new vocabulary, pronunciation, writing, and a wee bit of grammar - all in Mandarin! Then, at the end, she would say “Understand?” Well, no, I don’t know any Mandarin and I’m not even sure what page we are supposed to be on. She is so sweet that it’s hard to be critical. Just recently we worked out this kink. She explains everything in English now. Our other teacher focuses on listening and speaking. By the end of a class session with her, I have amassed, on the order of, thirty new vocabulary words. Even a young person, with a young brain primed for language learning, would have trouble integrating that much new material.

Our Teachers

Complain, complain. Despite my near constant fog, I am learning something. And everybody, including my classmates, is exceedingly patient with me. I still think the Chinese need to get their act together and get a phonetic alphabet, but until then, studying the characters is actually rather interesting. Here’s one for you. The Chinese characters for mother are 妈妈. 妈 is actually made up of two parts: 女 means female and 马 means horse. I will leave you to interpret this on your own.

Visit to a Local High School

Today, Hilda and I took advantage of a free afternoon to visit a local residential high school. Loren, an English teacher from the U.S., invited us and then generously escorted us to observe one of his classes in action. I was amazed to find out that Loren has learned almost no Mandarin during the 2 1/2 years he has spent here. Considering the difficulty we have had doing the simplest of things, I find this mind boggling. Perhaps his English-speaking, Chinese wife runs some interference for him. But, we couldn't hold back our curiosity as to how he handled the day-to-day activities of eating, buying, and getting around on his own. Loren responded by pointing to his cell phone. When he gets stuck, he calls a bilingual friend. For example, if he's at the store, he has a friend speak to the store clerk over the phone. Then his friend relays the answer to him in English. He also collects business cards from the establishments he frequents to use with taxi drivers. And a prerequisite for choosing a restaurant is that they have food you can point to or an English menu. So now you know.

The students at Loren's school attend class, until 4:30 each day and leave the classroom weighted down with five hours of homework on average! This leaves no time for after-school activities and creates a sleep-deprived student body. There are no competitive school sports. No one has time for it! Upon arrival in the classroom, some students lay their heads down on their desks, perhaps still groggy from the required rest period immediately before the class. It was a pleasure to watch each student get up before their peers to modestly present a short speech based upon several questions about an English song.

Afterwards, we toured the campus with May, a Chinese teacher of English. When we visited the gym, we saw teachers warming up for a badminton tournament. Badminton and ping pong are big here. The highlight of the tour was the "Garden of Natural Sciences" (that's my name for it, and remember, this is a school). There were a series of large rocks along a nicely landscaped path. Each rock showcased a theme, from bugs to volcanoes to maps. Quite unique. Our delightful guide, May, watches U.S. television to keep her excellent English in top-notch condition. We discussed "Grey's Anatomy" and "Desperate Housewives". The world is getting smaller and smaller.

We returned to the island of Xiamen via the school's scheduled bus for teachers and staff. This is one of the perqs the school offers, since it is set plop in the middle of new, mostly unfinished, residential,\high-rise, developments. The bus was plush and punctual. The bus driver tried to leave one minute early at 4:59pm, but several teachers came running on board at 5:00pm.

Calliope and I had dinner with Loren and some friends he gathered together -

• Apple, a Chinese woman who runs Apple Travel,
• her husband Choy (sp?) who is half Chinese and half Australian and who maintains the "What's On Xiamen" website,
• Choy's long-time friend and housemate, who was born and raised in Germany, but is now Australian,
• a Chinese man, who used to teach English at the same school with Loren, but is now helping develop markets for an export business

As usual, such eclectic mixes generate interesting conversations. My eyes were opened a bit more to some of the ramifications of China's one-child policy. More on that as I learn more.

Gulang Yu

It was a hot and non-blustery day. The humidity was sky-high and the crowds were fierce. After packing us all into a waiting area, they packed us on to the ferry for a ten minute ride. The constant haze that blurs the view of the sea was in full force as we approached the island of Gulang Yu. So as we got closer, we could actually see houses, parks, roads, and statues. Here is an imposing one; although, I didn't catch his name.

Calliope found a moment of tranquility beside a banyan tree whose roots were flooding down a rock face.

Down one of the many quaint side streets we came to another statue, but more fun was the graffiti, written in Chinese characters, of course. You can probably guess what it says.

So-and-so loves so-and-so.

Speaking of love, a famous doctor was born on Gulang Yu. She chose to stay to care for the sick and needy, even during China's terrible tragedies. She is honored with a monument consisting of a set of polished stones carved as if they are pages from a book of her famous quotes.

There are quite a few old European-style houses, in various states of disrepair. The island is famous for this part of its history, but admittedly, between the heat and the traveling gangs of Chinese tourists, it did not capture my imagination as I thought it would. Consider this an obligatory picture.

There were two bright spots at Shuzhuang Garden - the piano museum and the bonsai plants. The piano museum housed an impressive collection of pianos from the last two centuries. Many of them had these cool lamps built into the piano. Before electricity, this must have been a nice touch. Additionally, and given the circumstances in which we found ourselves, the museum was air conditioned! No photography was allowed in the museum, so I stole this shot from the AmoyMagic website. Near the exit from the piano museum was a lovely hill of bonsai ficus plants.

As we made our way around the island and back to the ferry dock, we walked through two tunnels. Talk about earth cooling! It felt exactly like air conditioning blowing out the tunnel entrances. Speaking of walking, I should mention that no cars or bicycles are allowed on the island. So, the primary mode of transportation is walking. We walked over to buy our return tickets, only to be drawn off-course by women in bright-colored costumes, drums, and fans. And they were about to perform! They loved having their pictures taken as they waited for their turn in the limelight.

Women, as well as a few men, wear the most outlandish English phrases on their shirts. They are generally grammatically incorrect. Some offer misspellings. And, for the most part, they are all humorous, or at least they make you think, until you break out laughing, because you have no idea what it all means. I don't believe I've seen a single shirt with Chinese characters, so I don't think this has some historical significance. One young man had the phrase "Girl sex" written all over his shirt. He did not seem to have a clue what it meant. One of the dancers carried her bag promoting a concert tour by The Minutemen, The Meat Puppets, The Descendents, and Angst. I thought this was just another odd set of English words, until Tom told me that they are all really well known thrash rock groups. It seems I, too, have no idea what the writing on some of these shirts means. One group of drummers wore purple. After the drummers drummed for a while, the dancers started their fan dancing. I loved the vibrancy of these older women. Why no young women? I hope the tradition doesn't die out.

Great Eats!

I am enjoying my culinary options immensely. Calliope has pressed the frontiers of our eating adventures and Hilda has shared her long-time favorites with us.

At the Hong Kong airport, Hilda found congee with duck eggs. The duck eggs were black on the outside and had a comforting, velvety, mouth-feel, when I bit into them. Shortly after arriving in Xiamen, we were introduced to stuffed buns - cooked vegetables enclosed in a moist, chewy, warm bread.

Quite delicious.

In the early morning, right outside our apartment, street vendors sell warm soy drink. Our first day here, Hilda poured this on her Reese's Pieces cereal, which she brought from home (one must have priorities of the suitcase!) But, we have spent precious little time preparing our own food; we have been exploring the local eateries.

One of the delights of ordering food at restaurants is that we often don't get what we attempt to order. One of the Xiamen University student cafeterias has English translations on the menu. So we tried "pumpkin browns". They were listed directly beneath "french fries", so I was thinking home-fried pumpkin slices. Instead, we were served little deep-fried gelatinous cakes with filling. Taro cakes were much the same. They also prepared "snow bubble" fruit drinks. We thought we'd be getting some form of bubble tea. They turned out to be milk/fruit smoothies. We tasted three varieties - cantaloupe, passion fruit, and dark plum. Mmmmm.

You'll notice that I haven't mentioned any hardships associated with being a vegetarian here in China. That's because it's easy! You can always add tofu to your soup or your noodles. And if I get tired of tofu, they have a tasty egg and tomato dish that I see on most menus. Actually I hear about it or see it at another table, since I don't know the characters for it.

The winner for the most-unique-concept-dish category is skewered, barbequed scallions. They were coated with oil as they cooked and brushed with spices.

There were many promising candidates for the I-can't-say-that-I've-ever-eaten-that-before category, but I'll give first place to stir-fried, shredded lotus root.

After a quick trip to the supermarket, I see there are even more unique choices available. Calliope bought Pringles potato chips - only they were blueberry flavored! I'll tackle the supermarket and sweets in another entry.

Apartment Living

China has a penchant for high-rises. The colossal amounts of concrete and steel that the country has required over the past couple of years are in evidence around Xiamen. Huge new complexes are under construction. In our area of Xiamen, skyscrapers are punctuated by well-maintained parks and lush plantings, which bring a more human dimension to towering skylines.

Our apartment is on the seventh floor. This presents an excellent opportunity to build up our leg muscles without additinal time dedicated to exercise. For those of you who know Hilda, you will be amazed to hear that she, too, has embraced the stair-climbing ethic. All the while, the elevator sits at home alone, stationary, with hopes of getting lucky with one of our neighbors.

At about 5:00am, I hear roosters awakening the city. As daylight creeps up, I hear a chorus of birds from the trees below. I have yet to see any of these charming singers, but I know they're out there, because they are loud enough to give the feeling of a rainforest (okay, not quite). During all this, there is the familiar sound of drink bottles clanging against each other, as though we are living next door to a bottling plant or a recycling facility. But as far as I can tell, we are not. It is another delightful sound. I looked outside this morning to see that the bottle clanking is a result of the trash collectors making room for more trash in their collectin boxes.

We enter our building through a side entrance that requires a key. Each apartment has a lockable outer door/gate and a lockable inner door. With all these locks, we feel very secure. Much to our chagrin, we found that all these locks can work against us. Yesterday, I left for a nearby internet cafe, locking the door behind me. Upon my return, I discovered that I had locked Hilda inside the apartment with no means of escape. Security can be a two way street.

We have a sweeping view over one end of an artificial lake just outside our building. Click the picture below to see the view at a higher resolution. Bordering the lake are several miles of park land. We stroll through the park to catch our bus at the terminal. The city flushes fish-filled water into the lake (perhaps from the ocean). Men with fishing poles can be seen night or day. Calliope discovered an exercise course at one corner of the lake, which even includes a see-saw.

Xiamen University Library

I love libraries and enjoy getting the flavor of a new library, so I headed over to the University library after registering. I needed an e-card to get in, but that wouldn't be available, until next week, so I endeavered to use sign-language with the security guard to see if he would let me in. I pulled out my brand-spanking new student ID passbook and attracted some passersby to assist me. They both spoke English and convinced the guard to let me in, under their supervision.

My rescuers, Eliza and her boyfriend, wished to assist me in all matters. They guided me to the social sciences section of the stacks. As I entered, I was assaulted by the vast amount of meaningless material in front of me.

Eliza pointed out a few books with English titles. We moved to the books on painting and drawing and then on to poetry. Eliza seemed willing to personally introduce me to each subject area, but I did not want to waste her time that way.

So, I asked to see the computer science section. I was curious, for example, to learn how the Chinese would explain programming, which essentially uses English words and looks somewhat meaningful to many English speakers. It was a small section. I noticed one book on programming in C. Chinese text surrounded sample programs. The comments inside the code were in Chinese. I didn't see any other programming books right off, so I tried to figure out what the rest of the books were. As it turned out, they were primarily dictionaries. Dictionaries of technical terms. Several shelves of them. So, my first hypothesis is that if you want to learn a technical discipline, first you learn English, then read English books with the aid of a dictionary.

I had a brilliant co-worker once who learned French by reading a C programmer's guide, written in French. By the time he worked his way through the book, he couldn't speak any French, but he was a fluent reader. So perhaps Chinese students in technical disciplines take a similar approach. Or, perhaps there is a technical library someplace.

It was 2pm and jetlag descended upon me like a ton of bricks. Eliza, perhaps sensing this, found us a table. Everywhere we had walked I noticed students here and there sound asleep at their tables. The library was well supplied with identical tables and small wooden chairs. As I sat down, I noticed that they did not seem accommodating to sleeping. No matter. Imitating many other library patrons, I slumped over the table and entered into a deep, if somewhat sticky, rest.

Ahhh, the comfort of a library.

Welcome to Xiamen

We are staying as guests at the apartment of Hilda's cousin, Jackson. Jackson lives in the Philippines and runs a business importing motorcycle parts. Not only did he very generously offer us the use of his apartment, but he flew into Xiamen from Manila to meet us at the airport and get us settled.

I consider this to be over-the-top courtesy from a host !!! It makes me uncomfortable. If Hilda weren't part of the equation, I would refuse an offer from anyone to fly from another country to pick us up at the airport. When I talk to Hilda about this extreme benevolence, she lights up and says "That's my family. That's what we do". For Hilda, in addition to being extremely generous, this is familiar and comforting, and it is the proper way to treat family.

Jackson showed us how to catch a bus to Xiamen University, where we will be studying. The toughest part about public buses in Xiamen is that it requires a 1 yuan coin to ride. How to stay stocked in such coins is not evident. I do notice on the bus that some riders appear to be using a pass, so there is hope.

In reality, the toughest part about riding the bus is that the routes and schedules are all written in Chinese characters. I am not on intimate terms with Chinese characters, and so they leave no mark on me - delible or indelibe. I simply don't remember them. I am very thankful that Jackson escorted us.

Hilda is also very thankful. She brought some gifts for Jackson and it was lively entertainment to watch him resist them. It took three visits over the course of three days, before he walked away with the gifts. On the second day, I thought they might come to blows, but it was essentially high drama, so there was nothing to worry about.

Right to Left: Jackson, Hilda, (friend) Greg

Connecting In and out of Hong Kong

Although we host an array of desktop computers at home, I have done no air travel with a laptop at my fingertips. Imagine my delight when I found wireless access and laptop work areas equipped with electrical outlets scattered around terminals at the Atlanta, Boston, New York, and Hong Kong airports (okay, call me behind-the-times). Hilda purchased U.S. airport wireless access for a nominal fee, but in the Hong Kong airport, wireless access is free, so I download all my email and let Calliope use the laptop.

As I jet around these airports, the beauty of internet telephony really hits me. I am traveling with my "home phone" and it will work anywhere in the world where I have a computer and broadband access. My home phone currently runs over the internet - a very small, lightweight, practically empty box with a USB connection. I plug it into a computer with either a headset or an actual telephone connected and, voila, my telephone is ready for use. The service costs $20/year. And that's anywhere in the world to anyone in the U.S. or Canada !!

But here we are in the Hong Kong airport considering whom to call back in the United States, and it won't cost us an extra penny. Although I am travel-weary, the novelty of such connectivty cuts through my jetlag fog and I get set up to call Tom. Thankfully, Calliope realizes that there is a twelve hour time difference and it's 3am at home. No phone calls, thank you very much. Maybe it's time for a short nap.

I do realize that there are many other methods to make that phone call. Pay-phones, cell phones, pre-paid phone cards, skype and skype phones, and many other VOIP possibilities. I have used most of these services and I can say first hand that they all have their advantages. But what I am excited about is that given the escalating ubiquity of WiFi, it is now quite easy to bring my exact home phone solution with me around the world, at an exhorbitantly low cost.

As I pull myself out from under the various technical details, I ponder that here in China, I can easily make a phone call halfway around the world using public wireless resources, but I must determine whether water from the tap is safe to drink or must be treated. Modernization arrives at its own pace, in fits and starts. Does it provide a glimpse into the societal priorities of its target audience? Or perhaps of its purveyors? More on that later, I'm sure.

A Pocket Chinese/English Dictionary

Before leaving the U.S., I picked out a handy, dandy pocket Chinese/English dictionary. With tens of thousands of words, helpful travel phrases, a description of Chinese grammar, and other tidbits, I figured I was set. My complacency was put to rest, the first time I looked up a word I wanted to translate.

I already knew that I would not be able to read the Chinese characters. Although they were a major unifying force for the various Chinese languages that use them, they are useless from a phonetic perspective. However, I was under the misguided notion that I would know what to do with the pinyin transliteration. Although pinyin is similar, there is not a true correspondence to English pronunciation. This is partially because Chinese sounds are just plain different than English sounds. But, unfortunately, it is also because pinyin uses many of the letters differently, especially the vowels. And it turns out there is another twist. Mandarin is a tonal language with four tones. That means any given syllable can be said four different ways and convey different meanings. And to top it all off, even with pinyin+tones, there are many, many homonyms in Chinese. For some reason, this last point does not trouble me at the moment. Possibly because I don’t know any of them yet.

Interestingly, my new handy, dandy pocket dictionary provided no pronunciation guide for pinyin. As with most items of interest, when I went online, I found any number of guides to pinyin pronunciation for English speakers. And they were not all the same. There are enough variations in English pronunciation, when you consider just the United States, never mind England, the Caribbean, India, or the rest of the world. Some guides took a standardized linguistic approach. But there still seemed to be some discrepancies.

The oddest discrepancy of the bunch has to do with the tones. Evidently it is very important that I use the tones, even exaggerate the tones, because otherwise, the Chinese don’t understand most English-speakers learning Mandarin. However, Chinese speakers of Mandarin can get away with not using the tones and still be understood. Is that some form of language racism? Or is it just “that’s not fair” whining from those of us who can’t hear the subtle differences in pronunciation?