« Transnationals and Transculturals | Main | History to see in China »
March 15, 2009
Every Westerner who visits China feels like Marco Polo.
There is no way to sum up the swirling, surreal, unalloyed alienness that is China. Yes, of course there are "Westernized" areas - especially in response to the 2008 Olympics - and funded primarily by the billions of ubiquitous knick-knacks we all buy at discount stores with that little "Made in China" sticker.
The progress is visible - and stunning.
For example, when I first arrived at the Beijing airport in February of 1999, there was one terminal - with one baggage carousel. The massive and glistening new system is designed to handle 19,200 pieces of luggage per hour.
The Beijing airport, shaped like a giant two-mile long medieval dragon rising from the dry plains to the east, is now the world's largest...
... larger than all the terminals at London's Heathrow combined.
Those of us from America or Europe think that we know what a city is, but upon arrival in China, our sense of scale is inverted. One Beijing term which tries to captures the urban scene is "Beijing blur". In the downtown core one sees a single massively nearly full block sized intricately designed building that is an astounding architectural monument. Then you might glance down the street and see another, and another, and another... They blur into the distance - in every direction.
Depending on the weather, the "blur" can get even more intense: when the prevailing wind from the northeast carries fine dust from the Gobi Desert and it combines with the industrial pollution, the sky is the same concrete gray color as most of the buildings. On these days there is an odd, disorienting sense of vertical urban infinity.
This sensation is only increased by the hundreds of building cranes across every horizon - and the rope and bamboo scaffolding holding the scrawny craftsmen as they do the fine tuning on these massive buildings - hundreds of feet up, with no safety equipment.
One China observer noted that China builds a new city the size of New York City – every six months!
And yet, it doesn't take long to step into the China of 500 years ago. Even downtown, you can walk or bike a few minutes and step beyond the modern patina cast over the city.
Back in 1999 I had lunch with some of my Chinese students at a tiny cafe about two blocks east of Tiananmen Square, the center of Beijing. I noticed that the Chinese staff and other customers were hushed as I came in. Through my students, I asked if this little lunch place saw many foreigners. After a short huddled and clearly embarrassed discussion, they let me know that I was the first one.
So what are your stories of encountering new and puzzling worlds? Send them here. We all want to hear them.
In April, I'll be starting a series on book recommendations - books related to language, teaching, travel or anything related to the ESL teaching & learning experience. So send in your travel stories soon.
My best to you,
Morf
Listen, read and speak. Make your new language your own.
About the author of this entry:
Morf has a B.A.from the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington and an MAT (Master's in Teaching English) from the University of Washington (Seattle). Morf spent about six years working for a Native American Tribal College, a few years teaching various humanities, English, writing and ESL courses with the community college system in Washington State (including one year as part of a faculty exchange program with The Beijing Foreign Language University). While in China, Morf was briefly a radio host for CRI (China Radio International) and did recordings for the "English can be enjoyable" book and tape series. Morf currently teaches English and writing for a local technical/vocational college with many international students. Morf prefers international and independent films, foods he can't pronounce, music no one else likes and riding his bicycle in unlikely and ridiculous situations.
Posted by mmorf at March 15, 2009 05:16 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.esl-lesson-plan.com/mt-tb.cgi/384
Comments
Really enjoy reading your observations and often share them with students and colleagues, citing your URL, name and article authorship. Thanks!
Posted by: Elisabeth at March 30, 2009 06:50 AM
Thanks Elisabeth -
You can tell your students and colleagues that I look forward to their comments or questions.
More later -
Morf
Posted by: Morf at March 30, 2009 10:19 PM
Wow--you are not kidding! We lived about 8-10 hours north of Beijing by train in a "small" city of 700,000 people. For about 6 months, we were the only caucasian foreigners in the city. We routinely cause bicycle accidents as people would ride past us, crane their necks to watch us, and crash.
But one of the most fascinating things was traveling with our students in the summer. We went to Inner Mongolia behind a steam engine and got caught in massive flooding. We went to Dalian and saw the beginnings of what I've heard is an extraordinary transformation in the city. Spent time in Shenyang riding bicycles (they used to say of SY that at rush hour, if you lifted your hand from your handlebar and put it down again, it would be on someone else's bike). Also went to Dandong and took the boat ride across the Yalu river to N Korea.
But the most memorable was visiting our Chinese tutor's village. Her father was a teacher (she was our student as well as our tutor) and she wanted him to meet us. We went in spring--10 hours by train, 2 hours by bus, 20 minutes walking to their house. She said that there had been one foreign visitor, once--a Japanese woman who was doing research for something. It was absolutely fascinating. Since we were the first foreign visitors, they would not allow us to do any work, even though we volunteered to help with some of the farm work. And people would come from miles around to walk past the courtyard and see if they could catch a glimpse of us.
Eleven years later, after we had moved to Hong Kong, we took our boys up to NE China to visit, and we went to the farm with our former tutor, now dear friend. The boys' favorite memories of China are of catching fish in the creek and feeding them to the dog, playing with "insect catching nets" made from a forked branch around which a spider web had been wound, and drinking the fresh, cool water that didn't have to be boiled.
Last summer, we visited my friend's in-laws in another village, where we got to see how the grapes are grown and the boys had the opportunity to learn some local Chinese games with the cousins who came to visit.
I am grateful that we and our boys have had the opportunity to see a part of China that not many people see.
Posted by: mom2twoboys at April 1, 2009 08:41 PM
I lived in China for five years. "My city" of 6-7 million was nothing like Beijing or Shanghai, though they are trying. They see it as progress. Most of my fellow ex-pats see it as losing their history and the "flavor of the city." There were still many old shops and neighborhoods when I first moved there. One of our favorite haunts was the Muslim district with all its Hui shao kao's. I hear it is slated for "revitalization" since it's not far from the city center. I worry for the people there. so many others in the city have already been displaced in the name of progress. And I don't see how they will be able to afford to keep their businesses going in the concrete, glass, and steel monstrosities going up in places where the mom & pop places used to be. Still I miss the city and it's people. The people there were wonderful. The city wasn't beautiful. China has a lot of places that are, but the people kept you there. Now that I live in Korea I really appreciate how welcoming and hospitable the Chinese are.
Posted by: Hui Qi at May 28, 2009 03:48 AM
