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My teacher, my therapist

As I've said before, since my Chinese lessons have revolved more about having basic conversation instead of focusing on memorizing new words from a textbook, my classes need conversation topics.

I've started to use my lessons as small therapy sessions.  It was a good chance to practice my spoken Chinese but also vent my frustrations about work, my coworkers, about Beijing, personal life, etc.   Of course these aren't serious frustrations but more like longer rants that turn into funny stories and I seem to entertain my teacher.

I'll give you an example..

Recently my parents came to China as part of a tour and stayed in Beijing to visit with me.  I had taken some days off to spend with them but did still have to work one day while they were here.  I hesitantly had to leave my parents to their own devices but they assured me they would be fine and they would mostly rest (as they had already done 2 weeks of schedule filled touring in China before arriving to Beijing).  They said they might wander out for a coffee or to the shopping mall nearby but said they wouldn't venture far.  I had shown them the coffee shop and the shopping mall, it was supposed to be impossible to get lost.

I had a Chinese lesson after returning back to work once my parents had left and my teacher, Alice, asked me, in Chinese, 'David, how was your parents' visit?'

I sat back in my chair with a big sigh, shaking my head 'Oh Alice!...you wouldn't believe...'

At this point she knows she's in for a good story so she chuckles a little bit and waits for me to continue.

I told her how on the day I had to go to work I had given clear directions to my parents on how to get to the shopping mall and I recounted how, that evening, I had found out that they had basically followed none of my directions.

Direction 1: Go out the main building entrance, turn left
Actual: Go out a completely different and hard to find entrance and walk straight.  Walk the complete opposite direction of what I said.
Commetary:  Once they realized that nothing looked familiar they turned around, thankfully

Direction 2: Walk up to the main road and turn left
Actual: Eventually, walk up to the main road and enter building, wrong building
Commentary: Why would you enter that building?  I never said to enter this building.

Direction 3: DO NOT cross the main road
Actual: Crossed the main road
Commentary: That road is busy and dangerous which is why I told you not to cross it!  What are you trying to do to me?

In the end my parents managed to go to two different shopping malls before getting to the right one. Now, had that been the plan then no problem but that was absolutely not the plan and they supported the worrying that I was doing while at work.  I was fearing the headlines back home on TV or in the Globe and Mail ...

My Chinese teacher really enjoyed my rant but she thought maybe I didn't do everything I could have to prepare them.  She asked a few questions to confirm....

- Did they know where to go?  Yes
- Did you give them clear directions? Yes
- Was it far from your place?  No
- Do you tell them to use the subway?  Hell No.
- Did you show them the building?  Yes
- Did they have a phone? Yes, but it's on airplane mode because of roaming
- Did you ask them to find wifi and send SMS when they arrived?  Yes

'So David, they should have been ok'.

'Yes Alice.  Yes they should have.'

I'm probably going to be in a bit of trouble for writing this one...I Love you Mom and Dad!

Beijing Chinese Language Meetup

The new focus of my Chinese lessons has been in conversation.  I've struggled with hearing and understanding and being able to correctly respond back with full, useful, sentences.  Its been a new challenge since my previous learning method was more memorization and regurgitation.

About a week ago my teacher told me that my understanding of Chinese is good but then said

 '你说汉语说的不太好‘  - 'Your spoken Chinese is weak'

To improve I've been finding ways to practice my listening and speaking.  I try to use my Chinese more in the office with my colleagues but it can be difficult since I am not the only foreigner in the office.  Any meetings and discussions generally need to take place in English.  

The other day, after being called out by my best friend, I tried something new.  I joined a Beijing Chinese Language Meetup.  People who join are keen to practice their Chinese, help teach Chinese or even some Chinese people who like to practice speaking English.

They meet at a quiet bar not all that far from my house so it was convenient for me to join.  

I was speaking with two Chinese girls who, during their introduction, said they wanted to improve their English.  It only took a few minutes of them watching me struggle with understanding their Chinese and stumbling through my answers to tell me,

'Dave, I thought my English was pretty bad but when I listen to your Chinese I feel much better about my English.'

How nice.  well, as if that wasn't enough of a cut down, they followed with:

'I was always very nervous to speak English but speaking with you...with YOUUUU..and your horrible Chinese, I feel sooooo much more confident to speak English.'  

Just doing my part to better the world.

I'm not saying anything of use

These two girls across from me might seem nice and proper...they have fangs.  You can see the one on the left trying hard to hold back her laughter.  

Handsome

An alarming amount of males at the office have regular habits of telling me that I'm handsome.  The females don't generally come and say this but, for some reason, the guys seem to be very comfortable with it.

This happens on any day when I dress up a bit more than usual like if I'm making a presentation.  A couple weeks ago the comment was made just because I had gotten a haircut.  One of my coworkers that I've spent time with to improve his English came to me and said he noticed I got my haircut.  I confirmed it and mentioned my hair was getting a bit long and out of control so I had to trim it.  He nodded his head and with some stuttering and stammering said 'it's good. and you are just so handsome'.  

Don't get me wrong, I will take the compliment but it's just so unusual to get this attention and back home, most guys don't really say that to each other.  I still don't know how to respond to it, usually I just laugh and probably turn a bit red in the face.  I guess I need to get used to this.    

At least it's better than last year when one male coworker said to me.. 'Dave, your voice..it's so sexual.'

Writing an essay in Chinese

I've been studying with a new Chinese teacher for the past few months.  We are working hard at improving my practical Chinese skills instead of just memorizing new words.  I've asked her to assign me homework to force me to spend considerable time on my self-study.  It's easy to procrastinate when there are no specific objectives to learning.

My most recent homework was to write an essay in Chinese to describe what I did last Sunday.  She instructed me to be sure to use some of the new grammar we had just learnt.  In the following class I handed in my homework and felt pretty good about it. I knew there would be errors of course but I thought my overall work was solid.

She brought back the corrected text to the next class.  I met her in the morning, a few hours before my class and she said..

her: 'David, 我得告诉你凶讯‘   - 'I need to give you some bad news'

 me:  'shit'

her: '你的作业需要很很多错漏'  - Your homework has many mistakes

me: 'shit'

She handed it back to me when I came to class.  We've all joked about homework that has more corrections than actual original text.  In this case, it was true.

I had originally jotted down notes in English of what I wanted to say in Chinese before translating but not only does that let you examine my boring Sunday events but also makes my text look more significant.  I removed the English parts to highlight the ratio of text to corrections.

Note: The first sentence is 100% correct (all 9 syllables of it)

In the end, she told me not to worry.  All students do this poorly on their first essay since they are thinking like an English person and trying to directly translate English sentences.  To improve, in her words, I need to start thinking like a Chinese person.

Famous Canadians in China

Upon moving to China I joked around that I could become somewhat of a well known Canadian in Beijing.  I figured I would learn Mandarin (at least partially) and impress not only the people in my office but other local Chinese, suddenly be asked to be in TV shows or movies as the stereotypical tall foreigner, etc.

It seems my plan was doomed from the beginning as there are already some Canadians who have made a fairly large impact on the local population.

I sometimes get a chance to talk with the slightly older generation in Beijing, nothing too complicated but usually they are curious to ask me where I'm from.  I say 我是加拿大人 'Wo Shi Jianadaren', which means I am Canadian.  This always follows with 你知道白求恩吗？ 'Ni Zhidao Bai Qiuen ma?'  'Do you know Bai Qiuen?'  Of course, not being too well-versed in Canadian history, I didn't know who he was.  I had to search online to find out.

Henry Norman Bethune - 白求恩- Bai Qiuen - was a doctor from Ontario that had previous international recognition but his rise to fame in China was when he served Chinese villagers and soldiers alike during the second China-Japan war.  He brought modern, western medicine to the people of China and earned the respect and admiration of Chairman Mao himself.

Mao Zedong held him in such high regard that it became mandatory for future generations of students to memorize Mao's eulogy to Bai Qiuen after he died.  It also helped that he was believed strongly in Communism which would have matched with the Chairman's beliefs.

Hard to compete with that but he is a historical figure so I still thought I could have an impact from a more current generation.  Then...

Mark Henry Rowswell - 大山 - Da Shan 'Big Mountain'- also from Ontario, is considered one of the most famous Western personalities in Chinese media.  He picked up a few words in Mandarin while working in Canada to impress/shock his Chinese customers.  His interest in China grew as he took Chinese studies in University in Canada and then received a full scholarship to study Chinese at Peking University in Beijing.  He has appeared in many local commercials and is now doing comedy tours around China.  I was warned by my aunt before I came to China that I should know this guy because the Chinese people will talk about him.

So, okay, most famous Canadian is out the window but I could definitely be the most famous person from Regina. In a city of 200k+ people few, if any, would have lived in Beijing so I liked my odds.

As an aside, Reginans are used to getting strange looks from others when telling them where they're from. Whether it's due to the fact that they've never heard of it or that it sounds like something else when you hear it the first time..you usually get a 'what did you say?' reaction.  I have mostly changed my response to 'I live in the middle of Canada...No, not Toronto. No, not Vancouver'.

Back to the main topic, sometimes people will still push to hear the actual name of your city.  I rarely expect North Americans to know of Regina but when I say it to foreigners in Beijing more often than not they say 'Oh ya, Regina, I know that place.  In Saskatchewan right?'  

This catches me off guard every time, how could this many people possibly know about Regina?  I asked them how they knew about Regina.  No, it wasn't due to the Saskatchewan Roughriders being the 2013 Grey Cup champs.

'Well, I know this guy from Regina, Mitch Moxley, do you know him?'   I didn't know him personally but have some mutual friends who told me about him.

Mitch Moxley - 米高 - Mi Gao 'Tall Rice' -    A Regina native who spent six years in Beijing, traveled around China and other places in South East Asia.  He is a well established writer and has submitted many works to major publications such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Globe and Mail to name a few.  He also ended up publishing a couple of books and appeared in some local TV/film productions.  He now lives/works in New York.

This is my very stiff competition and I doubt I'll climb to the ranks of these guys by either my profession or my humble blog.  Instead I have focused on taking claim to the most famous Reginan in my office...that is, until another Reginan starts working there and then I'll have to find a new niche.

Staring

For the first little while I was in China I thought I was getting stared at because I was a foreigner and particularly foreign looking.  Also, although not towering over everyone because people in northern China are taller, I was above average height.

As time went on I realized that, yes, some of the staring was due to me being different than most of the people around me but that the Chinese people would also do the same to each other.  So, as opposed to back home where staring is considered impolite..here it's not.  It really just seems that a person in China will look at something or someone for as long as they want and only look away once they've satisfied their curiosity or viewing pleasure.  This happens a lot to me on the subway to/from work.  

In North America if someone is staring at you and you want them to stop you can usually look directly back at them and either they realize you have noticed their rudeness or they become embarrassed and avert their gaze.  

I try to mostly ignore it here but some days I'm not feeling so tolerant so I'll use the same tactic as I would at home.

For example,

some guy is looking me in awe and wonder, working his eyes up and down, checking my shoes, my extremely white legs, my shirt with English writing..etc looking something like this..

or this...

 or this....

And i'm not having it so I stare right back at him...I glare at him and aggressively move my eyes up and down so that i'm doing the exact same thing as he's doing in the attempt to make a point that I want him to stop. Looking more like Clint Eastwood....

He doesn't get my point and my staring doesn't offend him so we just end up being in a situation of two guys looking each other up and down and I'm not stopping until he does first.  These tend to go on for an uncomfortably long amount of time...and then more people start to stare.