December Redux

So, it's that time of year again. Finishing up fall classes, dodging students' requests that we sing Christmas songs for hundreds of them at class parties, and trying not to miss home too much. I read US news articles about violence breaking out at Black Friday sales, about the tough economy making it hard for working families to buy gifts, about the never ending ridiculousness of American politics, and about snow and below freezing temperatures back home... and I still can't help but wish I was there! It's not quite in the way that I missed home last year, when the wound was still fresh and I would find myself fending off panic attacks and crying jags. This year, it's more of a dull ache, which usually produces a long sigh, typically followed by a cough, that reminds me not to breathe the air too deeply. Pacific Northwesterners: appreciate that lovely invisible air that surrounds you every moment of the day and fills your lungs with oxygen rich loveliness!

One upside to the dull ache however, is how easily it can be relieved with simple pleasures. Yesterday several of us visited the campus of one of our fellow volunteers, Judy, an older volunteer who has been a teacher of both French and German in the US and is always full of interesting anecdotes and surprising quirks. She lived in Germany for a time on a Fulbright Scholarship, so she still has friends and connections there. We started our visit with a lunch with the Chinese English teachers at her school, followed by sessions with eager English students during which we answered questions and discussed topics for conversation practice. The students were very sweet and excited to meet us, and our conversations were followed by lines of students asking the ubiquitous, "Can we take our picture with you?" to which we obliged several minutes of photo-taking. Afterward, Judy invited us back to her apartment in the campus hotel where she served us some amazing traditional German holiday treats including dark-chocolate coated marzipan, stollen (a spicy cookie-like treat with ground hazelnuts), lebukuchen (bread with dried fruits), and German tea. It was like Christmas in my mouth. Just sitting on a cozy couch and sipping some lovely licorice tea with our fellow volunteers gave me that warm fuzzy holiday feeling. Judy was also sweet enough to send us each off with a beautiful little handmade straw Christmas ornament from Germany and some Santa-shaped German chocolates. A big thanks to Judy and her generous friends in Germany for such holiday loveliness!

After a charming walk through the quaint communist-era factory village near her house (now partly deserted but still cozy in its dilapidation) we reached the more modern area where we needed to catch a bus back into the city. Being a Friday evening, many locals had the same idea, and so the three of us headed into the city smashed ourselves into the already packed bus, pinning ourselves between Chinese peasants and college students. So much for holiday loveliness, and back to daily life in China. We were in a hurry because we were scheduled to meet our waiban for a ride to a free evening Sichuan Opera performance provided by the Chongqing Foreign Experts Bureau (that's us, "Foreign Experts"- experts on our own foreignness). Of course the Friday traffic was unforgiving, we missed our ride but were able to make it to the theater before the performance began thanks to the miracles of Chongqing's newly expanded subway and monorail system. The performance was intended to be a holiday treat for all the foreign teachers in the city and while it was quite interesting to finally see a real Sichuan opera performance after more than a year and half here, it was a little less awe-inspiring than I had anticipated. The costumes were amazing, the tricks (mask changing, disappearing beards and fire breathing) were impressive, and the actors in the lead roles were definitely skilled, but it was a little cringe-inducing to see some of the near misses of the obviously amateur acrobats (one almost landed on the head of another during a tumbling routine, knocking his hat off), and less than stellar stage setup, which included flower arrangements that blocked views of the performances and props that looked shoddy especially compared to the elaborate costumes. But who am I to criticize a free performance (a rude and direct American who values honesty over politeness perhaps)?

Keeping ourselves busy is key to making sure our time here is productive and painless, so after the performance we enjoyed some shao kao (Chinese street bbq) with the new Mexican foreign teachers at our school, followed by a beer pong party at their house. The cups and table were smaller than the standard American version, but team USA (Richy and Jason) dominated the game against Mexican, Filipino, Chinese and British challengers alike. One of the great things about being an expat is being able have fun and make friends with people from all over the world. Today, we recover from our busy Friday night shenanigans as I scour the internet for acceptable Christmas cookie recipes that can be made without butter. We're looking forward to our last week of classes (best China Christmas present ever), and next weekend filled with more foreigner-fueled holiday excitement. Afterward, we begin our long winter break with a New Year's weekend trip to Harbin (brrr!) and our Indonesia adventure in mid-January. Then I get to see my Kimmie as a Chinese New Year present!

Happy Holidays!

~Katie

Thankfulness

Since the end of the sweltering Chongqing summer, time has flown by with unimaginable speed. I feel as though I missed the entire month of October, but was somehow able to slow down enough to have a Halloween party. It's like I woke up one day in China and actually had a normal life.

Let me recap October: My parents' visit came and went, leaving us with a refrigerator full of glorious cheeses, a bathroom full of organic toiletries and satiated with hugs from home. With them, we visited the beautiful Three Gorges on the Yangtze river by cruise ship during the week long national holiday, which was a spectacular trip. It also drove home the massive impact that the Three Gorges Dam project has had on the region in both good and bad ways (navigation and clean power vs. landslides and loss of livelihood). Given the physical challenges of schlepping around Chongqing, my parents passed the ultimate test: still sprightly enough to mount the 70+ stairs to our apartment after each outing (including Ciqikou, Dazu, Three Gorges Museum and Jie Fang Bei)! My dad earned himself bonus points by waking up early each morning and walking himself around the city (even all the way to Jie Fang Bei) with no Chinese and no map.

Richy and I also became uncle/aunt to a new baby girl at some point in there, although our internet wasn't working well enough to meet her over Skype until she was more than two weeks old.

As time flies by, I'm reflecting more and more on how this experience of living in China and being a Peace Corps volunteer has changed me. The one thing I can say definitively is that I have a new found appreciation for what it means to be thankful. In China, I try to say thank you, xie xie (谢谢), whenever someone treats me with kindness or respect, or does something that makes my life easier, even if they get paid to do it. In Chongqing, people usually respond with the phrase bu yong xie (不用谢) which literally means "don't use thanks," something I have always interpreted to be akin to saying "no problem" or "it's nothing." Today Richy and I thanked a repairman replacing our blown electrical meter switch, and a man watching him do the work told us in Chinese, "You don't need to say thanks, this guy is just doing his work. He's getting paid." Whether the man gets paid to do his work doesn't mean much to me, since I have known many situations in my life (and in China) where people don't do the things they are supposed to do, much to my consternation and inconvenience. I am thankful when people do things to help me, even, and maybe especially, if it is their job to it. I think it's okay to say to people "I'm happy that you exist and that the things you get paid to do also happen to my life better." So I have no intention of cutting down on my xie xie's to people whether they're working or not. There are worse things than being the weirdo foreigner who says "thank you" too much.

Since it is the month to be thankful, I'd like to reflect on all the things that make my life better (even if there is no conscious effort involved to help me). Part of what is humbling about my Peace Corps experience is that I have learned very well how much my privileges in life shape the way I experience the world. There are a lot of things I have that give me a leg up in life, even though I never asked for or earned them:

• First of all, I am thankful for being raised by two amazing, involved, and incredibly generous parents who encouraged me to trust myself and develop independence. I am also thankful that those two people have very different skill sets, which I have inherited and/or learned from each to make me a more capable and well-rounded person. I am also thankful that my dad has always had a job that kept us clothed, housed, well-fed and medically insured.
  
• I am thankful for an awesome partner to share this crazy life with, someone who challenges me and supports me and both forces me to stay ambitious but also keep my feet on the ground. Someone who offers me stability, flexibility and mutual respect. It also helps that he has given me some amazing in-laws (why can't we call them in-loves?) who feel as much a part of my family as my real family does.
• I am thankful for three beautiful, smart, caring and creative sisters and one handsome, intelligent and sometimes mysterious brother. All of whom I love and care and worry about more than words can express.
  
• I am thankful that I grew up with the privilege of speaking English, a skill that took no more effort than any other child learning their native language, but which gives me endless opportunities in life, travel and work. It also allows me access to a huge amount of information, virtually unparallelled in any other language.
  
• I am thankful to be healthy; thankful to have healthy parents and siblings, and six beautiful, healthy nieces and nephews.
• I am thankful that as much as the world is full of terrible things, it is also full of wonderful things that make the terrible things worth overcoming.
  
• I am thankful that on the days that living in China overwhelms me, that I can remember that I have the freedom and privilege to return to my home someday, and that I have a nationality and wealth that allows me to travel (almost) anywhere I want to.
• I am thankful that I have always been able to be in control of my reproductive decisions.
  
• I am thankful for my students who are genuinely interested in the knowledge I have to offer them.
• I am thankful that the home I look forward to returning to has beautiful clean air, rivers, evergreen trees, and safe, delicious food from around the world.
• I am thankful that I have never known what it's like to be hungry, what it's like to be homeless, or what it's like to be gravely ill.
  
• I am thankful to have had access to a world-class education, that taught me how to be a critical thinker, and gave me the tools to become my own teacher.
  
• I am thankful to have had the opportunity to choose my vocation in life.
  
• I am thankful to have things to look forward to in my future. 
• I am thankful for all the things I don't even know enough to be thankful for.
  

I know I need to be thankful for these things, because I know now more than ever what it means when you don't have them. I now have less than 8 months left of my Peace Corps service, which means I am about 2/3 of the way through my time here. It seems incredible to me that at this time next year, I will be with my family and friends, preparing to enjoy the holidays with them. Thinking about it gives me this overwhelmed feeling, like I can't believe how lucky I am to be alive in this body; how amazing it is to exist in this life I have the opportunity to live.

And, as I ponder this incredible feeling of thankfulness, I can turn my attention toward making it through this last set of holidays without my family, and look forward to a break from the concrete cold of our apartment this winter as we plan our way to the beautiful temples and beaches of Indonesia in January. (!!!)

Thankfully yours,
Katie

Who is the Peace Corps for?

A few articles I have read recently have me asking this question: one is by a returned Peace Corps volunteer who reflects on the impact her service had on her host community and the impact it had on her as a person (and from where I stole the name for this posting), and the other is about a Republican congressman from Colorado who wants funding for Peace Corps China revoked.

The Peace Corps has three simple stated goals, which we spent part of our pre-service training studying and memorizing:

1. Helping the people of interested countries meet their needs for trained men and women.
2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

As you can see, 2/3 of our role as Peace Corps volunteers in China is simply to promote better cross-cultural understandings between Americans and Chinese people. Only 1/3 of my job is actually providing China with a trained English teacher. Ironically, it's my students studying English who enforce my role as a cultural ambassador the most. Studying English, for many of them, is not something they chose to do and for many of them don't see how it will improve their future prospects much (although, to be fair, even American students rarely understand the importance of the subjects they study until they get out into the "real world"). Although the study of the English language generally seems incredibly boring to them, one highlight is that it gives them a window into the exotic realm of Western culture. If given half a chance, my students would spend hours of class time asking me about the meaning of lyrics from Lady Gaga and Britney Spears songs, whether Americans really do buy used cars (unthinkable for a middle class Chinese person), and why foreigners don't like to have their picture taken or talk about their age and salaries. This can be frustrating, since when I joined the Peace Corps, I didn't think I would spend so much of my time discussing such banal topics as the meaning of Britney Spears lyrics. It becomes even more frustrating when I read stories in the news about the dismal state of food safety in China or when a middle aged middle school English teacher (a smoker) tells me he had never before heard that smoking causes cancer. It makes me wonder whether teaching English to college students is really making a difference that matters in China. It's on those days that I become a cynic and think, maybe that Republican congressman is right, and I am just wasting my time here.

But then, I can look at it all from a different perspective. Education is one of those fields where the benefits rarely make themselves clear in the short term. Whether or not my students end up using their improved English skills to find a better job in the future (it is worth noting that the vast majority of my students are first generation college students from farming families in the countryside), I'd like to think that my simple presence in their lives expands their worldview in significant ways. I have blown students' minds by telling them such simple truths as "most Americans do not eat hamburgers everyday," "not all Americans are Christian," and that despite the fact that Americans generally prefer more open communication styles than Chinese people, we usually really don't like to be open about our personal lives. I know from my background in education that discussing these counterpoints to previously held beliefs and encouraging students to engage in genuine dialogue can help to improve critical thinking skills. Traditionally, Chinese education depends on rote memorization from lectures and textbooks, and unquestioningly accepting as fact anything that a teacher says is true. These learned behaviors also seem to translate to social and political life in China. My hope is that my students' development of critical thinking skills will help them to deal with the significant issues of corruption, food safety, public health, and environmental degradation facing China. I hope that by teaching them to question assumptions about Americans, it will also teach them to question assumptions in other areas of their lives.

There is also the thought of my future students, or if I am not lucky enough to find a job in teaching the future, my future friends and colleagues in the US who might someday ask me about my experiences in China. Goal three of the Peace Corps is to teach Americans about the people we met during our service. In addition to my Chinese language skills, I hope to be able to pass on a deeper and more respectful understanding of China. We seem to hear a lot about China in America, and truly the economic and political destinies of our two countries right now seem deeply intertwined. There is a lot of misunderstanding and mystery about China in the West and I hope to be able to shed some light on it when I return home, although that phase seems a little intangible to me right now. This blog could be considered an example of a "goal 3 activity."

Finally, there is the question of how the Peace Corps has changed me personally. I know I have become more resourceful and pragmatic. I have learned how to actively manage my health and well-being in a sometimes hostile environment. I have become tougher, more mature and less sensitive to social and physical discomforts. I have developed leadership skills and learned how to build community in difficult situations. I have learned basic oral and written communication skills in a second language. More personal benefits will likely become clear to me when we return home next summer, after I deal with the significant hurdle of "re-entry shock." Whatever the case, I am sure these skills will be invaluable in whatever the next stage of my life or career turns out to be. There is no doubt that compared to any one of my students, I have gained the most by being here. But is that what the Peace Corps is for? Is that why American taxpayer money supports the Peace Corps? Those are difficult questions to answer, but I guess I can be thankful for what it has done for me, and spend of the rest of my time here working as hard as I can trying to make a difference in the lives of the people I come in contact with, and try to spend the rest of my life sharing with others the lessons I have learned.

~ Katie

Summer in Southwest China

After our Haifeng Wetland trip and summer project, we returned to Chongqing for several days to prepare for the next leg of our summer journeys around Southwest China. It was just long enough in the oppressive heat to want to be somewhere else, preferably higher in elevation. We bought sleeper train tickets to Kunming, thinking we were so clever since we had been there before and would know exactly how to hop the buses to Lijiang, where we were planning to study Chinese for 10 days. Unfortunately we were not so clever as to double check the departure station for our train. Every other train we have taken from Chongqing has departed from the Chongqing North Station, but this train apparently only departed from the inner-city station of Cai Yuan Ba. Did our tickets say "Cai Yuan Ba" anywhere on them? No, just the simple city name of "Chongqing." So we were shocked to arrive at the north station 20 minutes early for our train, only to discover that our train was leaving from a station 30 minutes away (and much closer to our apartment). Our confusion and frustration was amplified when a sweet, well-meaning, deaf Chinese college student tried to help us communicate our predicament with the already annoyed train station staff.

Luckily in China, all train tickets are refundable (even if you've already missed your train), provided that you pay a fee equal to 20% of the ticket price. So 100 kuai in fees later, we had tickets for an early morning train to Kunming, this time aware of exactly which station it departed from. Also, luckily, a brand new metro line had just opened with a station 5 minutes from our house which would take us to the appropriate train station in record time and give us a chance to ride a giant escalator down a huge hill! So, after a hearty breakfast of baozi, we boarded our train for Kunming.

It's important to keep in mind that when you board public transportation in China, you must be prepared to face a barrage of questions that would be considered rude or too personal to ask in most Western countries. Richy and I had booked top bunk beds on three-tiered hard sleeper bunks, with the four bunks below us occupied by four friendly, chatty, middle-aged Chinese women. These are some of the questions that ensued during the several hours:

"Are you married?" "How old are you?" "Do you have children? Why not?" "Do you plan to have children?" "Why are you a volunteer?" "Can you not find a job in America that pays good money?" "Do you think you're fat?" "How old are your parents?" "Are your eyes blue or gold?" "How much do you weigh?" "How tall are you?" "Did you learn to sew and knit in America or China?" "How much money do you make in America?" "How much does a car cost in America?" "Do you have any American money that I can look at?" "Do you have a driver's license?" "How much money do your parents make?" "Do you have a romantic marriage or an arranged marriage?"

I guess our time on the train could have been considered day one of our language school, since we certainly got several hours practice in speaking and listening in Chinese. Richy and I developed a tag team pattern to give each other breaks from the endless conversation. I tried to answer the questions as honestly as possible while hinting at how uncomfortable most uninitiated foreigners would feel if questioned in the same way. "We're not accustomed to talking about this in America, but..." The fact of the matter is that Chinese people are curious about foreigners, and these questions are considered totally appropriate for Chinese people to ask each other, so if they meet a foreigner who speaks a little Chinese, why not go for it? After all, Peace Corps goal two is to educate host country nationals about Americans (and goal three is to educate all the readers back home about China...).

When we arrived in Lijiang, the air was pleasantly cool and the location of the school just north of the old town, nestled in the corner of Black Dragon Pool Park, was gorgeous. It was weird to feel the urge to wear long pants, sleeves and socks. We hadn't experienced cool, PNW-like weather since March! The night of our arrival, we were handed a written test in order to place us in our classes. The problem with written tests in Chinese is that the Peace Corps language program focuses primarily on listening and speaking, so even if we have decent conversational ability in Chinese, most Peace Corps volunteers can't read or write Chinese very well. Of the six of us volunteers, only Richy, Leo and I had spent any significant time studying characters, and Leo's Chinese was above and beyond all of us since he studied it in college. The three who hadn't studied characters got put in the lower class with the teacher who spoke English (even though some of their speaking and listening was better than mine) and Richy, Leo and I got put in the higher class with the Chinese teacher who spoke no English. She spent almost the entire first day of class (more than 4 hours) lecturing us about the culture and sights in Lijiang. I tried my best to follow along, but spent most of the time on my ipod's Chinese dictionary app translating everything she wrote on the board. We got used to her style (and she got used to ours) over the next several days and the classes became gradually more communicative and engaging. On several occasions we got frustrated with the generalizations and stereotypes she espoused about foreigners (many of her sentences began with "Nimen waiguoren..." or "You foreigners...") and ethnic minority groups in China. It was a delicate topic and Leo was the only one with the language skills to challenge her on the spot, which he did, which only led to her changing the subject rather than engaging in conversation. We spent the mornings in class, and the afternoons studying and exploring the charming, yet overpriced and overdeveloped tourist attractions of Lijiang.

By the time our classes were finished, we were more than ready to move on from Lijiang. Tim and Sara were supposed to be on their way, so we booked a hostel in the old town, run by a Naxi minority family and their friendly, outgoing matriarch, Mama Naxi. Earlier that week, we had wandered into her hostel seeking a place that could serve us decent priced Western food (which we got - with amazing burgers and sandwiches for only 15-20 kuai) only to find ourselves invited to her grandson's 19th birthday party complete with cake, fruit, singing, hugs and photos (lots and lots of photos). They were so friendly that we knew we had to return. As Richy said it best, "these are the kind of people who should be running hostels."

Unfortunately for Tim and Sara, although their flight from the US to China went without a hitch (they even got upgraded to business class!) they encountered a significant snag when they got to Shanghai and tried to board their plane to Lijiang: their reservations did not exist, even though the travel agency had already charged their card, which pushed them over their limit so their bank would not let them book new tickets. After more than 24 hours of panic and wrangling and figuring out how to use Chinese phones, they finally made it to Lijiang.

Since we had already thoroughly scoped out the city, we spent our last day in Lijiang showing Tim and Sara the significant sights, doing a little shopping to prepare for the trip Northward, and figuring out how to get to Shangrila. Our plan was to take buses from Yunnan up through Western Sichuan, staying in Tibetan towns along the way and visiting temples and doing some hikes to enjoy the scenery of the Eastern Himalayas. Little did we know that our plans were soon about to disintegrate.

We made it to Shangrila as planned. The city of Zhongdian (known as Gyalthang by local Tibetans) was renamed "Shangrila" in order to attract tourists after the fictional place name from the novel Lost Horizon, by James Hilton. While the inspiration for the book probably isn't far off the mark, the idea that the book is based on one, actual place has gotten a little out of hand, with some locals even claiming to be related to the book's fictional characters. Nonetheless, it was a quaint town wafting with the smell of incense and charcoal bbq. Our hostel was especially rustic - in a building with ancient mud brick walls, hard beds and heated with coal stove. We spent the first evening wandering the cobblestone streets of the old town and evaluated which restaurants might serve the best yak burgers, yak hotpot and yak butter tea for the best price. Sara and Tim generously treated us to a fantastic meal of pizza and burgers (something typically out of our price range on our stipend as Peace Corps volunteers).

On our second day there, we set out to walk to the other end of the city to see the Ganden Sumtseling Monastery, considered one of the four most important monasteries in Tibetan Buddhism. On our way there, we stopped by a farmer's market, where I was delighted to find local Tibetan women selling a variety of Yak milk cheeses, of which I bought myself a chunk of something mozzarella-like to nibble on (cheese is hard to find in Han Chinese areas of China, especially locally produced!). Also along the way was the bus station, so we decided to stop in and inquire about the bus schedule to the next town of Xiangcheng, which would also be the first Tibetan town in Sichuan provice (Shangrila is still in Yunnan province). The young woman at the information desk told us that the next bus would be leaving at 8:00 am the next morning and told us how much they cost. We weren't sure at that point if we wanted to leave the next day or later, so we told her we would come back later to buy our tickets. We then continued on to the monastery, a walk that became increasingly more difficult as we became easily exhausted in the thin air at over 11,000 feet. Even though I've been used to climbing at least five flights of stairs with no problems everyday in Chongqing, one flight of stairs left me out of breath in Shangrila. The monumental steps at the foot of the monastery required several rest stops on the way up.

The monastery was beautiful, peaceful and imposing, although half of it seemed to be under construction, and the sense of wonder was amplified by the dark clouds of an impending thunderstorm as hundreds of crows cawed and circled overhead. Richy and Sara made some small donations to the monks, which got them each a benevolent thump on the head and a bracelet of wooden Buddhist beads. The experience whet our appetite for further travels in Tibet and we decided on the way back that we should depart the next day for Xiangcheng.

On our return, we decided to take the local bus back into town and made our way back to the bus station to buy tickets for the next morning. This time, when we spoke to the woman about buying tickets, she quickly and curtly told us that we couldn't buy them. Were they already sold out? Confused, Richy inquired further and she told us that foreigners were no longer allowed in Xiangcheng. She didn't give us any explanation, but then told us that we could buy tickets if we wanted to, but that she couldn't guarantee that we would make it there. Our plans were dissolving before our eyes. Not knowing what else to do, we called the Peace Corps safety and security officer to see if there were any travel warnings for Western Sichuan. He said he had only heard rumors and asked to speak with the woman behind the counter. He confirmed what we had feared, no foreigners allowed in Western Sichuan, no reason given. He advised us not to try to buy tickets as it would only lead us to getting kicked off the bus or detained at the border. I guess we were lucky that we hadn't already bought tickets that morning.

We returned to the old town feeling depressed about not being able to continue our travels on the borderlands of Tibet. We decided that now was the time to try yak hotpot and yak butter tea, as it might be our last chance. So we settled down to Tibetan style hotpot in a local restaurant. The hotpot was rich and meaty, and included vegetables and dried tofu skin (my favorite) which was far and away better than most Sichuan style hot pot I've had. Tim and Sara weren't used to Chinese meat cuts yet, and found the meat a little gristly and bony by American standards, but still tasty. We finished up the meal with some sweet yak butter tea, which tasted to me a lot like chai, but also a little like Korean corn meal tea.

Upon returning to the hostel's wifi connection, we discovered the tragic event that occurred that afternoon in Western Sichuan that led to the area being closed to foreigners: the self-immolation of a Tibetan monk.

We then set our minds to deciding what we should do next: go back to Lijiang? Go to Dali? Emei Shan? Xishuangbanna? Kunming? We only had four days before we wanted to be back in Chengdu, so the options were limited by time and distance. We decided that Dali would be the best option, since it was cheaper than Lijiang, relaxing, and still cooler than Chengdu, Kunming or Chongqing. Unfortunately by the time we got back to the bus station the next morning, all tickets directly to Dali had been sold out, so we decided to take a chance: get the next tickets to Lijiang, so that hopefully by the time we got to Lijiang there would still be tickets left for the last bus of the day to Dali. Our gamble paid off, and six hours later we found ourselves on the last bus of the day to Dali.

Arriving in Dali around 10pm, we found our way to the Mama Naxi II hostel, run by a friendly young man by the name of Joker. Although we were exhausted from spending our entire day on a bus, an already tipsy Joker invited us out to join him and his friends for KTV (Chinese karaoke). We declined at first, but he persisted and finally Sara, Tim and I were lured into joining them (Richy got his way and stayed at the hostel to rest). The KTV joint was a particularly nice one, and we had a huge private room to ourselves where we were served Chinese beer (3.3% ABV), sunflower seeds, raisins, and salted sour plums. It was Sara and Tim's first KTV experience, and it had all the typical hallmarks: a smoke filled room, people screaming Chinese pop songs into microphones, and lots of Britney Spears, Lady Gaga and Michael Jackson to impress the English speakers.

We enjoyed the following day in the laid back atmosphere (and pleasing climate) of Dali, while also finding time to make arrangements for our bus to Kunming and then our train to Chengdu. After a 4 hour bus ride to Kunming, our night train to Chengdu was only supposed to be 11 hours, and unfortunately all the sleeper tickets had been sold out, so we ended up with hard seats. We knew it would be a little tough and tiring, especially for Tim and Sara's first ever train ride.

Unfortunately, not only did we not have sleeper beds for the train ride, but all the standing room on the train had also been sold out. In China, if there are no seats left on a train, they continue to sell standing-room tickets. For us, this meant the aisles on the train were full, the bathrooms were full, and moving up out of our seats was almost impossible. For Richy and I, this was a somewhat expected turn of events, but not so much for Sara and Tim. The second heartbreak of the train ride was that it ended up taking 18 hours to reach our destination instead of the 11 that was originally displayed on the ticket schedule. Again, late trains are pretty commonplace in China, so Richy and I were somewhat mentally prepared, but Tim and Sara were a bit shocked by the whole ordeal. Despite the discomfort, they earned some hardcore traveler stripes, and we made it safe and sound (if somewhat exhausted) to our hostel in Chengdu.

Chengdu's weather was warm, but nothing compared to the highs of up to 113 F that our comrades were experiencing in Chongqing, so we did our best to enjoy the outdoors and wander around. We spent a relaxing afternoon sipping tea in the People's Park, enjoyed some beloved Pete's Tex-Mex (they even have a Peace Corps discount!) and met up for drinks and a little dancing with some of our Peace Corps friends in town.

Our train to Chongqing redeemed the first trip for Sara and Tim, with the ultra-efficient 2 and 1/2 hour speed train leaving from the brand new Chengdu East train station (which to me, looked even nicer than the Beijing international airport). We sped by villages and rice paddies of the Sichuan basin in air-conditioned comfort. By the time of our arrival, the heat wave had broken, with temps back down into the upper 80's. We enjoyed a leisurely pace and the bargain prices of Chongqing, exploring the ancient town, visiting pandas, lions and monkeys at the city zoo, and introducing Tim and Sara to the oil and fire craziness that is a meal of Chongqing-style hotpot.

After seeing Sara and Tim to the early morning airport shuttle, and the bittersweet farewell (this next year is going to go by fast!) we returned to our apartment and surprisingly slept until the early afternoon. I guess I didn't realize how much this crazy summer had taken out of us. Now we begin to return to our normal life of grocery shopping, cleaning house and teaching classes, while looking forward to my parents' visit at the end of September!

Summer Project: Small Victories

Each summer in Peace Corps China, program managers from each province help organize teacher trainings and language camps for Chinese English teachers in K-12 settings. Peace Corps volunteers teach lessons on Western style teaching methodologies and help the trainees improve their oral English, so they can go back to their classrooms with fresh ideas and skills. It seems to be a good opportunity to try to instill some of our ideas about communicative teaching and cultural awareness into the younger generation, so hopefully they won't be so shocked when they meet foreign teachers in college for the first time (foreign teachers who ask them to do strange things like work in groups, speak without notes, avoid plagiarism, and think independently). Also it hopefully will provide non-college bound students more opportunities to acquire communicative English language skills which might translate into better job prospects when they test out or can no longer afford to attend school.

I had been looking forward to summer project ever since our winter in-service training session when volunteers from the china 15 group said that it had been one of the highlights of their service. I wish I would have realized at the time that, like most experiences in the Peace Corps so far, enriching experiences like these are generally hard won (but still worthwhile) and usually require a large investment of effort in what seem, on the surface, to be minor victories. In our favor, we have an amazing, supportive and motivated program manager, so our Chongqing project was planned far in advance, and we felt pretty lucky to have the extra time to organize ourselves, review curriculum and plan lessons. This is especially appreciated in light of the lead time we are usually afforded in China, as we usually only know about school events or teaching schedules a week in advance (at the most).

We were recruited into the group for teaching middle school teachers, and we decided to cut our workload and narrow our focus into 2 day blocks, so each pair of us could be "experts" in a certain topic such as reading, grammar, pronunciation, etc. Richy and I decided to focus on writing, since I had had success teaching it over the last two terms. We scoured the summer project curriculum for useful lessons on methodology and mined and modified our own lesson stockpiles to create two days of classes that we hoped would be useful for Chinese middle school teachers looking to supplement their curriculum and help engage their students in the process of learning English. We also wanted to introduce them to some basic theoretical frameworks to understand the methods of teaching English from a Western perspective.

As so often happens with "the best laid plans" in China, the actual execution of our summer project turned out to be significantly more challenging. The first obstacles were the expectations of the trainees. Not much information had been communicated beforehand, so some teachers were expecting a crash course in improving their oral English skills, while others assumed we would be showing them directly how to adapt lessons from their textbooks into Western style lessons.

Another problem was that several (especially older) teachers felt embarrassed engaging in some of the activities meant to model some of the methods of engagement in middle school classrooms. We were suddenly met with non participating trainees boasting a litany of excuses: "I can't see," "I can't write," "I can't speak English well," and "I'm too old to play games." We wondered how they could teach with such debilitating issues. Actually, there were just finding indirect ways to tell us that they weren't into our classes. Our frustrations were best summed up in the question "Why are we here if you don't want to learn what we have to offer?" An education official from Beijing came on the third day of the training and did her best mediate what she correctly identified as a "culture clash." Her comments reflected a deep understanding of both sides of the culture divide, and the way she addressed us directly and honestly was much appreciated. Although, later we all had to take a collective deep breath and soldier on, after the blow of realizing that our teaching wasn't exactly dazzling the audience.

We realized that the teachers in the training were experiencing similar reactions and emotions to what we had experienced in our first weeks in China. Expectations and reality were so different that the temptation to disengage was strong. You can imagine that if your entire worldview and methods of teaching were being challenged, that the concept of change and adaptation can be daunting and exhausting. Of course, from our perspective, we felt like we were already being pretty flexible. After all, we had already agreed to a 3 hour lunch break in the middle of a 4.5 hour day of teaching in order to accommodate the southern Chinese custom of napping in the middle of the day to avoid the heat.

As the days passed, we modified our lessons with each rotation, and it seemed that many of the trainees were starting to understand what we were trying to accomplish. By the final day, we met as a whole group to discuss and brainstorm what had been learned during our two weeks in Wulong. This is some of what they shared:

- How to encourage student confidence
- Teaching for multiple intelligences
- Classroom management
- American culture
- How to take student abilities in to account (differentiated instruction)
- Writing skills
- Independence, open mindedness
- How to write a haiku
- Confidence and bravery for speaking English in the classroom

By the end of the session, the list had more than 20 items. It was heartwarming to see the list unfold, and to see that lessons from each of the volunteers were mentioned. It was that small victory to end a challenging couple of weeks.

Throughout our time in Wulong, one of the middle school trainees had been designated as our translator, as her spoken English was clear and fluent. This meant that she attended every official dinner and trip, and acted as our tour guide when we visited the natural sites of Wulong including the natural bridges and Furong cave. To show our appreciation, we took up a collection to buy her a "thank you" gift. We presented her with a handmade thank you card and a small box of chocolates (a luxury in China) and her tearful response, although unexpected, was another small victory. Her response reminded me that although it might not seem like we made a big difference on the surface, the training had a personal impact on everyone there, and if even a fraction of them learned something meaningful from it to share with their future students, then the effort was worth it.

~Katie

Haifeng Wetland

Another item to add to the list of things I will never take for granted again (which already includes PNW weather in all forms, cheese, good beer, and clean tap water): camping. It had been more than a year since our last tent and campfire related adventure in the wilderness. When we took that trip to Umpqua hot springs last June, I didn't quite imagine how the memory of it would have to sustain me for so long in the misty concrete and jackhammer jungle of Chongqing.

About a month ago, my friend and language-exchange partner, Elle, invited Richy and I on a road trip. Excited at the prospect of a road trip, but fearful of steep accommodation prices, I recommended camping as a budget alternative, and she seemed happy with the idea. She also offered to pay for all the expenses of the trip, another example of the amazing feats of generosity Richy and I have been treated to as volunteers. After a few weeks of going back and forth about dates, possible destinations and whether there would be any guests other than Richy, Elle, her son Max, and I, we finally settled on a trip to Haifeng Wetland in Yunnan province, with stops on the way there and back at a couple of tourist sites in Guizhou province.

The trip began when Elle and Max pulled up at our building with their newer model, green Jeep SUV. It was spacious and comfy, with an ice cold AC, definitely a welcome reprieve from the over 100 degree humid heat that has been swamping Chongqing lately. Our first destination would be an "ancient town" on the outskirts of Guiyang.

In China, especially with second-tier tourist attractions that cater to a domestic rather than international crowd, the extent of "remodeling" can be a bit heart-wrenching. Qingyan ancient town was built about 700 years ago under the Ming dynasty, and remodeled under the Qing, but today the city walls stand bright, white and new, topped with gold tinted fiberglass figures of warriors, weapons and horses. The idyllic surrounding farmland is being turned into new "villa" style townhouses. When we arrived at the inn in the middle of the ancient city where we were supposed to stay the night, we found out they no longer accepted guests there because they preferred to sleep in the newer, less authentic lodgings outside the city walls. Fortunately, wandering the interior alleys of the town, you can still find some ancient architecture unscathed, while local school kids hunker under the shade of hundred year old trees to do their homework. We enjoyed some traditional bing fen (an icy unflavored jello-like substance mingled with rosewater, brown sugar, candied pears, sesame seeds and peanuts) in the shade of the trees before heading back out of the city to find the newer place to stay.

The next day, we embarked on our journey into Yunnan toward our camping destination of Haifeng wetland (not to be confused with the coastal wetland of the same name). Haifeng is an inland wetland in Zhanyi county, with salty blue water, shellfish, and gorgeous karst formations. The road out to the wetland was lined with farming villages, apple and peach orchards, and lush fields of tobacco and marigolds. The weather was perfect - sunny blue skies, a few puffy white clouds and a cool breeze strong enough to keep us cool and the mosquitoes at bay. We set up our camp, cooked up a dinner of pasta, canned fish and corn-on the cob (in typical Chinese generosity, our camp neighbors shared their potatoes, corn and tofu with us). After dark we built a campfire by the water where I showed Max how to make "real American" s'mores, and then Richy showed him the constellations.

The next morning, we woke up to find that some local dogs had come through the camp, mangling our tofu and stealing our corn. Richy and Elle had both heard the dogs in the night, and I think it had left Elle a little spooked. We enjoyed a hearty breakfast of bacon, potatoes and duck eggs, then took a walk to the edge of the wetland with Max, where Richy and Max enjoyed wading into the mud (unfortunately Richy's Chacos didn't survive the mud suction, and came out with broken straps). Upon returning, we realized that the dogs in the night and a rumor of impending rain had cut our camping trip short. Elle's tent was already packed. It all came to an end too soon, with only 16 hours of camping, but it was a glorious 16 hours.

Seven hours into our drive back to Chongqing, Elle pulled into the entrance for Hongfeng Lake, a reservoir in Guizhou, which Elle had apparently visited several years prior. The place had definitely seen better days, but we enjoyed a thrilling boat ride, some delicious food and cold beer. The next morning we toured a Disney-style version of a Dong minority village, and had our pictures taken in Dong minority clothing, complete with embossed aluminum headdresses. I don't think the concept of cultural appropriation has quite caught on in China.

All in all, with 26 hours of driving and 16 hours of camping, we definitely got to see more of the Chinese countryside and highway infrastructure than we're used to, and it was nice to have more time to spend with Elle and Max. Here's to hoping our next camping trip will be less than a year away and longer than 16 hours!

~ Katie

Best Waiban Trip Ever!

What we call "the waiban" is properly translated as the Office of International Cooperation at our school, formerly the Office of Foreign Affairs. They are the ones who deal with our visas, provide us with housing (and deal with any problems that arise with said housing) and generally make sure we're doing our jobs. This office is also in charge of the foreign students who come to study at our school (currently two students from a college near Busan in South Korea). Every term, the office takes us on one all-expense-paid outing to keep us happy and make sure we all get to enjoy some of our time in China.

Last term, the trip involved eating a big lunch of a freshly butchered (within earshot) pot of chicken soup with pickled vegetables (fresh and tasty but disturbing), followed by a trip to the driving range at a golf course outside the city. When we arrived, we found the driving range had recently been closed pending demolition to make way for more "villas" (aka. Western-style townhouses) so we ended up just hitting balls from the tee-off area of the course for several hours. This was followed by another large meal of traditional Sichuan-style food. We came home feeling tired and full, but it wasn't anything to write home about (until now).

This term our waiban liaison actually asked us what we wanted to do. She listed climbing a few mountains as options, or rafting in a river on the border between Chongqing and Guizhou province. We expressed preference for the river trip (climbing mountains in the heat and humidity is less appealing). Unfortunately that plan was nixed by the waiban director because of liability issues. Granted, I am sure Chinese river rafting trips are not heavy on the safety equipment. Instead, our liaison choose to buy us all a spot on a tour of Hei Shan Gu, or Black Mountain Valley. I had heard of other PCVs being taken there by their host families, and they seemed to like it, so I was reasonably excited about it. The tour can be done two ways: hiking the whole way, or hiking part way and taking a tram and a cable car at either end of the valley. Our group opted for the tram and cable car route. Despite the fact that Richy and I would have liked more exercise, one of the student assistants accompanying us had decided that four-inch platform suede heels with silver studs would be appropriate footwear for a nature trip.

The scenery was gorgeous, the air was clean, and although we were able to surmise from our tour guide's Chinese spiel that the area was famous for monkeys and red fleshed kiwi fruits, we didn't see either. It was rainy enough to keep the air cool, but not so rainy that we couldn't enjoy ourselves. The pine trees, mist and clear water reminded me of home, and the frequent rope bridges kept us entertained (including one built like an obstacle course specifically for entertainment). It was a perfect break from the jackhammers and hustle of Chongqing city.

But our trip wasn't over yet. After taking the tour bus back into the city, we caught a cab to enjoy dinner at a hotpot restaurant, an experience we have come to enjoy as long as it happens less than twice a month. Being almost all foreigners in attendance (two Koreans, three Americans and two Chinese), the dishes were all basic meat, tofu, and vegetables, with the exception of one plate of cow stomach lining which I think Miss Studded Platform Heels ordered. Quenching the burn with a pitcher of freshly made peanut milk, it was one of the more pleasant hotpot experiences we've had thus far. After dinner, we bid the Korean students and Miss Studded Platform Heels adieu (or rather, "annyeonghi gaseyo") as they boarded a bus back to their dorms on the new campus.

With a few hundred kuai leftover in the petty cash envelope, our liaison invited the rest of us to enjoy a massage at a nearby foot massage parlor. Richy and I still had yet to experience Chinese massage, so we readily agreed, while Carol (the other American teacher on the trip) declined since she goes to the same place to get foot massages weekly anyway, and she was ready to turn in for the night. So the three of us headed off to a place called something like "Foot Massage City." Our liaison said that less than a year ago, a 90 minute massage at this place was only 35 kuai (like $5) but that with a recent renovation the price had jumped to 68 kuai (more than $10). Nonetheless, it was said to be the best spot in town, so it was probably worth the higher price.

The massage room included three large recliners with tea, blankets, and a big screen tv on the wall. We settled in, and three women came in and washed our feet in buckets of hot tea. They dried us off, then came back a few minutes later, oiled up our feet and poked, prodded, and pulled on our toes for about 30 minutes. Next, they massaged our legs, then had us flip over as they mashed their elbows and knees into our thighs and backs. The liaison asked me if I wanted them to "use a special massage tool" on my back, as it was an option included in the price. She said she forgot the English name for it, so I suggested "Is it like a back roller?" and she said "Yeah, I think so." So I laid there, thinking they were going to come back with a back roller. Instead she came back with a little bowl with some sort of stick shaped object in it. Our liaison said, "Oh, by the way, you can't take a shower for six hours after you have this done." What were they going to do? Before I had a chance to think about it, the masseuse had pulled my shirt over my head and unhooked my bra. Oil was smeared all over my back and I was being repeatedly scraped by something. It didn't hurt any more than the gruff massaging, so I just relaxed and tried to enjoy the strange sensation. After a few minutes, she wiped off the excess oil, and came back with a hot grain filled pillow which she rolled all over my back. It was very nice. She hooked up my bra and pulled my shirt back down, and continued to massage my neck, face and hands. When 90 minutes was up, we gathered our things and headed home, thanking our liaison profusely for what turned out to be quite the awesome and relaxing trip.

It wasn't until I got home that I looked at my back and figured out what they did to me! Upon looking in the mirror, I realized the tingling that I had been feeling on my back since the massage was emanating from bright red, hickey-like marks. Turns out it was Gua Sha, sometimes called "spooning" or "coining" in English, the purpose of which is to cure ailments by "scraping bad wind" out of the body. Although it's folk medicine, its similar to acupuncture in that some Western medicine practitioners are starting to pick up on the practice, although its efficacy in actually treating anything are yet to be proven. It also follows along the same theory as the practice of "cupping" (glass cups heated on your back to suck up your skin, leaving distinctive red circles) which we saw a lot of at the bathhouses in Korea. I can imagine with all the tingling it might be eliciting some kind of immune response, but I'm no doctor. Either way, it looks pretty cool.
~ Katie

Cultural Re-revolution

There has been a lot in the local Chongqing news lately about Bo Xilai's efforts to bring back the "red songs" of the Mao era and generally spruce up the city with the Five Chongqings campaign (Translated as: Forest Chongqing, Livable Chongqing, Traffic-smooth Chongqing, Healthy Chongqing and Safe Chongqing). I see a lot of billboards and posters about the Five Chongqings and see the results of the campaign in thousands of trees (even some fully grown 2 ft diameter ones) being planted along roads and in newly reconstructed parts of the city, with the rapid completion of metro lines, and new outdoor police stations springing up on every street corner. But I haven't seen (or heard) any evidence of the return of the red songs. At least not until last weekend.

The past several weeks on campus, we have witnessed a quickened pace in the many construction projects on campus in the run-up to the big 60th Anniversary celebration of the college's founding. On the North Campus (where we live, but where no classes take place) they finished a new parking garage and installed a park with badminton courts on top, repaved all the pathways, installed new landscaping along the fences and tore down an old building to construct a new campus gate. On the New Campus (where we go everyday to teach our classes, and where we have a new dorm to sleep at occasionally) they installed giant countdown clocks for the May 18th Anniversary and the May 21st celebration, hung giant red lanterns and streamers along all the roads, turned an empty lot into giant park with a lake in the middle, began to turn a drainage ditch into a decorative pond, opened a fancy on-campus hotel, completed landscaping around our dorm building (despite the bottom floors being unfinished inside) and covered all the student dorm buildings with giant red banners. So needless to say, the fact that the 60th Anniversary celebration was coming was not a surprise.

What was a surprise, was being invited to the ceremony one early morning bus ride by the assistant director of the foreign relations office. I had feared the invitation because I was afraid they would ask us to give a speech in front of a giant crowd, but luckily there was no such obligation. She simply asked if we would attend that Friday evening, so we agreed. All classes were canceled for Friday, so Richy and I didn't arrive until early evening and were amazed by the thousands of students milling around campus. Usually the campus has a more somber, sleepy tone. It actually felt kind of like an American campus, where students were just lounging around, laughing, and generally enjoying the day. Of course the fact that they were all wearing matching t-shirts depending on their major was a big difference...

Around the time that the ceremony was set to begin, we wandered over to the field and found a red carpet catwalk lined with about 10 women in matching dresses standing at attention on either side. The carpet lead to rows of plastic stools, with a few executive style desks and chairs in the front. We didn't want to be presumptuous, and we didn't see anyone from the foreign relations office to guide us to our seats, so we sat down on the plastic stools (later we found out that some executive style seating had been reserved for us). The stage was set up with several giant screens, stage lights and spot lights, and real television cameras and sound booms were swinging about. The students in attendance had all been given multicolored light sabers. There was definitely an outdoor-concert vibe, and the elderly gentlemen seated in front of us kept holding up and taking photos with a banner that proclaimed they were the petroleum majors of '66, '67 and '68. I wondered what they were thinking about how their little petroleum college had changed since then (it merged with the polytechnic college 7 years ago to become the giant Chongqing University of Science and Technology - 20,000 students strong).


I was feeling sleepy and sticky in the 85 degree humidity, but when the announcers came to the stage in full formal attire and a giant spotlight, the students all started screaming with glee and waving their giant light sticks. Obviously, everything said was in Chinese, but I could pick out enough of what they were saying to know they were wishing the college a happy birthday and talking about how great and awesome everything was. The first act were the petroleum majors (generally considered the most impressive major at our college). About 50 students in matching red pants, shiny hardhats and suspenders poured onto the stage. The screens lit up with panoramas of oil derricks back lit by a sunset. It wasn't until they started singing and dancing (using their hardhats as props) that I realized that this was Bo Xilai's red song campaign manifest.



These are the fire safety majors.

I think they should have been theater majors.The petroleum majors, with their inspiring oil-themed backdrop.
It wouldn't be a red song campaign without Mao's face on Tiananmen.

This was the view of the concert space from earlier in the day. You can see why our expectations weren't too high.

~Katie

Summer Cometh

Springtime in Chongqing was short and sweet. Just two weeks ago, I was padding around the apartment in my fuzzy winter slippers and a cardigan. Now, I'm sleeping sans pajamas under the sarong my mom so kindly sent me from her trip to Hawaii (thanks mom!). The question now is: how long can we make it before the temptation to use the air conditioner becomes too strong? Our two weekends of "spring," as I would consider it, involved a day trip to Fuling on the 16th to plant trees as part of a public relations event for foreign students and teachers in Chongqing and then some Earth Day/Easter-ness with our Chinese people in Chongqing. For the Fuling trip (the same town that is the setting for Peter Hessler's Rivertown) we got matching t-shirts and hats, tromped through the mud and rain to dig a couple holes in the ground and put trees into them and take pictures (to be fair, there was close to 400 people there so I think at least a couple hundred trees got planted). We then took a tour of the famed zhacai (pickled mustard tuber) factory, which was about as interesting as factory tours can be. We did get a few packs of free zhacai for our effort. For Earth Day I gave my students an overview of the holiday and showed the film Erin Brockovich, which I am hoping will encourage them to think more about how they can advocate for environmental issues in China. I then colored Easter eggs with my nine year old tutoring buddy Max, who I tutor in English in exchange for his mom tutoring me in Chinese. I drew a bunny face on one, and he drew a monster rat on another. On Sunday, instead of a traditional Easter dinner, we had a vegan Easter meal with a couple of our Chinese artist friends, my vegan PCV friend Kim, and a few Chinese friends of hers. It was low key and we spent the afternoon chatting, doing an interview for the PCV Rice Paper publication with the two Chinese vegetarians in attendance, and working on the recycling craft projects that Kim and I have been working the past couple months (mostly knitting with plastic bags).

Yesterday, at 34 C (93 F), we participated in our college's sports day craziness, which involved an 8:00 am "free breakfast" of white sugar bread and boxed milk (which they seem to think is a "Western style breakfast") followed by a nationalistic opening ceremony (apparently not as spectacular as previous years) and then a somewhat confusing "relay" that involved six people running around cones holding hands. When asked what we would call that sport in English, we coined the term "amoeba relay" which only led to confusion when the English-Chinese electronic dictionaries were busted out. Yes, small organisms that live in fresh water. No, we can't really explain why that makes sense in English. At 10 am, with the sun rising hotly in the sky, we ran the first real relay of the day, a 20 person 50 meter dash in which 10 people lined up on either side of the 50 meter marks and passed the baton back and forth while running between them. It was harder standing in the sun waiting for the baton than it was to run the 50 meters. Richy and I quickly established ourselves as some of the strongest runners of the foreign language department team, which is another way of saying that foreign language teachers at our school are not the most athletic. The ruffians in the engineering and mathematics departments put us to shame.

We got a respite from the glaring sun with a banquet-style lunch at the nearby Sunny Block (Xi Jie) shopping area, which serves as kind of a miniature entertainment district to keep the college students in University Town entertained. We hadn't been out for this kind of meal for a few months, and such banquets are much more enjoyable when they are few and far between. It's easier to enjoy the abundance of oil and spicy dishes when you aren't recovering from eating them just a few days prior. We got back to campus with a few hours to spare before the next relay at 4:00 pm, so we went to our campus apartment to cool off and take a nap.

The 100 meter relay was a little more challenging physically, and also more formal, with starting blocks and numbered jerseys. Our team came in last in both the women's and the men's event (there's just no beating those petroleum engineers), but we were glad to have participated and be done with it.

The most interesting part of these school sports events is that it gives us a rare chance to socialize with the other teachers in our department, since being foreign teachers puts us in an awkward place in the school structure - not quite integrated with the foreign relations department, and not quite integrated with the foreign language department. We have our own office, just for the five of us foreign teachers, and we don't really get a chance to see any of the Chinese English teachers on a regular basis. The awkwardness of obligatory team sports gives us something to talk about. We met a teacher from the PE department who spoke English surprisingly well and told me how interested he was in history (Richy pointed out that PE teachers all over the world seem to have the same interests: history and sports), an English teacher who was apparently good friends with a previous PCV at our school who seemed interested in taking us out to dinner sometime, and two young foreign language teachers at our school who teach Spanish and Arabic respectively (and who at first assumed that I was German - I'm used to being mistaken for Russian, German is a new one). Richy pointed out how interesting it was to have an English conversation with a Chinese girl who kept slipping into Spanish accidentally.

We have also started with a new Chinese tutor two nights a week which is giving us a lot more speaking and conversation practice. Next week, after the Labor Day holiday, we'll start teaching an intensive course to teachers who will be doing visiting scholar programs abroad this summer and next school year. Then we'll be heading off to Wulong for our summer project in July, where the Chongqing 16s (that's the 16th group of China PCVs) will be teaching English teaching methods to a group of more than 300 elementary, middle, and high school teachers. We are also hoping to find some time this summer to do a two-week language intensive in another city before Richy's sister Sara, and her fiancee Tim, come to visit us in August.

Yangtze Riverside - Chongqing, China

Yangtze Riverside - Chongqing, China, a set on Flickr.

New pictures of Chongqing in the spring.

Stop the Bus

A few things that have become regular parts of our daily existence in China are extremely spicy foods and long bus rides. Unfortunately, sometimes these elements are combined and make for a disastrous combination, especially for the colon. [Warning: the contents of this blog posting may be unsuitable for sensitive individuals, those currently consuming food or those who wish to believe that visiting China someday will be an experience without occasional intestinal distress.]

Finishing up a weekends' trip to Yibin to visit friends, Richy and I headed to the bus station to pick up our tickets back to Chongqing. Our bus still wouldn't be leaving for about an hour, and since the trip is usually about 4 hours (give or take depending on traffic) we decided we'd better get something to eat beforehand to avoid the overpriced and questionable cleanliness of the pit stop snack stands. The only restaurant nearby was a typically small, family-run restaurant serving noodles and local dishes. We sat down and looked over the menu, noticing that they had a dish we often enjoyed in Chengdu, but rarely, if ever, see in Chongqing: hongyou chaoshou (red oil dumplings). Slightly spicy and slightly sweet, the red oil provides a nice contrast to the pork and green onions in the dumplings. What a pleasant coincidence that this restaurant would have them! The son/grandson of the women working the fully-exposed kitchen took our order and walked away.

To our disappointment, he soon returned, "Jintian meiyou." They didn't have any that day. Back to the menu. All of it was in hanzi (Chinese characters) and although we can recognize several dishes, the majority of the items on the menu were a mystery and we have a constant fear of accidentally ordering parts of animals we are not fond of eating (as has happened on occasion). I recognize niu rou mian (beef noodles) which, although it's not my favorite, tends to be relatively mildly spicy and edible. Richy orders the local specialty, dandan mian (spicy noodles with peanuts). When my order arrives, it confirms what I have begun to suspect about food in Yibin - it tends to be much spicier than the already quite spicy Sichuan-style fare in Chongqing and Chengdu. Gristly chunks of beef were floating in a totally opaque red broth, with puddles of bright orange chili oil collecting in the folds of the noodles. I took a deep breath and dug in. Although I have come to enjoy spicy food to a certain extent, in some cases, especially these types of noodle joints, you might as well be seasoning your food with pepper spray. Add a kick of hua jiao (Sichuan peppercorn) and your lips will be tingling (and burning!) for at least a half an hour to boot. I can understand adding a little kick to spice up a dish, but at a certain point, you can't even taste what you're eating anymore. It's all texture and sensation.

I finished most of my noodles, but had to leave the beef (almost all gristle) and broth behind. We quickly paid the bill (about $1.50 for the two of us). The heartburn started kicking in almost immediately, and I started looking for a milk tea or peanut milk to wash it down, which usually kills the burn. I bought an overpriced bottled milk tea (almost $1) from the elementary school-aged child manning the bus station snack counter and we hopped on our bus.

The driver was flying unusually fast down the highway, blaring his horn and aggressively passing other motorists. We were seated in the back of the bus per our assigned seats, so our passive-aggressive protests in English and Mandarin fell on the deaf ears of the noticeably-less annoyed passengers around us. Finally the traffic got heavier and he slowed down, giving us some time to sink back in our seats and have a bit of a nap. By the time we got to the customary halfway point pit stop two hours into the ride, my stomach was starting to churn and gurgle a bit, but when I used the restroom there was no urgency and things seemed to be generally operating as normal in my bowels.

Back on the bus, I drank a few more swigs of my milk tea and settled in for part two of our bus nap.  After about 40 minutes, just as the traffic was starting to thicken to a crawl, I woke up in a distinctive cold sweat. The gurgling had intensified and I could feel a slight burning sensation in my bowels. The line of tail lights up the hill in the distance was not a promising sign. I began mentally preparing myself for a long wait for a restroom. I tried to focus on the scenery, but the sky was beginning to darken and the windows were foggy from the outside, making it hard to distract myself. The entertainment selection on the TV screen was a manic Chinese variety show with a distinctive, rapid, zoom-in, zoom-out, zoom-in, zoom-out cinematography style that did nothing to quell my discomfort.

As 10, 20, then 30 minutes passed, my ability to keep my thoughts distracted from my bowels waned. Memories of childhood "incidents" began to flood my mind: wetting my pants as the flower girl my cousin's wedding - age 5; vomiting on the table after one too many ice creams at Old Country Buffet - age 10; puking on the school bus after over-indulging on the poorly-executed fruits of my labors from ethnic foods class - age 15. I was starting to imagine how I would remember the time I soiled myself on a Chinese bus - age 27. I informed Richy of my predicament and began to plan. "Richy, I may need to ask them to stop the bus. You need to make sure they won't leave me behind." and "Do you think we could just have them let us off in the next town and we can find another bus from there?" Richy shot me worried looks, and asked me if I was sure I couldn't hold it until Chongqing. I was taking deep breaths, squeezing the seat cushion as I endured waves of cramps from my bowels. I had goosebumps and chills, I could feel the sweat starting to bead in my hairline.

Finally, when we reached a toll booth about 30 kilometers from Chongqing, about an hour after I first awoke in my dreaded condition, I knew I had to act because I didn't think I could hold it in through another 40 minutes or so of traffic. I grabbed my purse and ran to the front of the bus to present my case in questionable grammar and diction:

"Fuwuyuan, wo you laduzi. Zhende li hai." (Attendant, I have diarrhea. Really serious.)
"Shenme? Laduzi ma?" (What? Diarrhea?)
"Dui. Wo xuyao yong cesuo. Wo keyi paobu." (Yeah, I need to use the toilet. I can run.)

The attendant shoots the bus driver a worried glance. The bus driver mumbles something about foreigners and pulls the bus over near the restroom.

The attendant tells me, "Kuai yidiar!" (Quickly!) and I manage to respond with, "Duibuqi, duibuqi, bu hao yisi!" (Sorry, sorry, how embarrassing!) as I jump out of the bus and run to the restroom.

In the bathroom, I bypassed a long line of middle aged women and jumped into the next available stall. I didn't have time to apologize. As I fumbled with my belt and my jeans, I could hear them mumble something about foreigners.

(I'll spare you the details of the following five minutes - it was not pleasant, but I imagine much more so than if it had happened in the back of a bus).

Upon returning to the bus in which 36 pairs of eyes, no doubt curious as to why their long bus journey had been suddenly halted, had just watched me bolt out of the bus and into the women's restroom on the side of the highway, I felt a surge of relief. I knew they would have been much more annoyed with the stench of a foreigner who can't handle the spice in the back of the bus. Still, I hear them mumbling something about foreigners.

For the rest of the ride, I sat more comfortably, but exhausted, and curious about the long term effects of ingesting (and holding) the Chinese culinary equivalent of pepper spray in my guts for those hours.

Moral of the story: even if you have learned to be capable of consuming the very spiciest of foods, it is most certainly not a good idea before a four hour bus ride. Although I hate to waste food, I probably would have done myself a favor by just pushing that bowl away or if I had simply swallowed my pride and told them "bu yao la jiao" (don't want chili pepper) when I had ordered it in the first place.

~ Katie

Pass the Salt!

I hear that people back home are buying up all supplies of potassium
iodide in case small amounts of radiation blow over to the US. In
similar panic-induced, illogical behavior, rumors have been going
around in China that if the seas are contaminated with radiation, that
salt production will stop. Never mind that most salt comes from mines, or
inland salt wells, not from the sea, or that even if the seas around here did
become radioactive, salt would probably not be the most important
thing to worry about. But if you've ever tasted a real Chinese dish in
China, you know that salt is considered pretty essential (along with
the oil, and the MSG, and if you're in Sichuan or Chongqing, the hua
jiao/la jiao combo).

Richy and I took a walk to the nearby E-ling park today to get some
exercise and see some blue sky on an usually clear day. We had a rare
horizon to horizon view of the city with virtually no fog. It was
peaceful. On the way home, we stopped at our local Yonghui grocery
store for some peanut butter. The store is usually packed and chaotic,
especially on the weekends, but today, instead of the crowds milling
through the aisles, they were strangely lined up from the back of the
store (where the spices and oil are shelved) all the way out the front
door. Essentially a wall of people had been built between the deli and
the produce section. The women and old ladies were a little aggressive
about their spots in line when we tried to pass through them for
regular browsing, and the grocery staff was flustered trying to keep
everyone orderly. Some people had whole empty baskets and carts as if
they were going to fill them with salt packages. I went ahead and
looked at the produce to see if there were any cheap apples (holding
back a little tear at the sight of imported Washington state apples
selling for more than 12 kuai/jin - that's $2/pound, whereas normal
Chinese apples are less than 1/2 that price), while Richy stood and
watched the line for a while, confirming that they were, in fact,
lining up like that just to buy some extra salt. They were.

The funny thing about it, is that people are causing a salt shortage
simply by freaking out about it. The salt shortage becomes a
self-fulfilling rumor. Despite the governments best efforts to assuage
fears, people do what people do: panic.

I can understand that watching the news about Japan gets your
adrenaline going. Watching people lose everything makes you think,
"What can I do? What should I be doing? Can I help someone? How can I
keep horrible stuff from happening to me?" When someone says "Buy
salt!" or "Buy potassium iodide!" it makes sense, it fulfills that
human need to do something. It's tangible, and when you get to the
store and there's a huge line, it makes sense to line up too.
Unfortunately it's not really the kind of thing that will really help
anyone, it just creates a new problem. It seems that the better
courses of action, donating to the Red Cross, preparing an emergency
kit, demanding stronger building codes or going over plans in case of
an earthquake or nuclear wind, don't carry the same kind of emotional
pull as standing in line as a community and enjoying some salt-less
self-pity.

Richy and I made our way to the checkout lines with our peanut butter,
some regular dairy butter and some yogurt. The lines were shorter than
I had ever seen them. Thanks salt shortage.

Restart!

Still recovering from our journey through Vietnam and southern China, our two week training in Chengdu was another shockingly emotional journey. After the excitement of seeing some of our friends from pre-service training that we hadn't seen in months, we started our first training session by hearing the terrible news from our country director that one of our fellow Chongqing volunteers had died (official Peace Corps statement here). We didn't know him well, but empathized with our fellow volunteers who did, unable to imagine what his family must have been going through. It was also a stark reminder of our own mortality, and how important it is to take care of each other and ourselves during our service. With that dark cloud hanging over the group, we kept up a brisk pace of training sessions, including language, TEFL training, safety and security, and health. Colds started going around, health issues started springing up, and people generally were feeling run down after all the sessions, particularly since many people were arriving at training after keeping intense vacation travel schedules (and it was hard to go to bed at a decent hour when there was so much socializing to be done with all our training pals). But despite it all, some of the sessions were really helpful and got us thinking more critically about how to improve our teaching for the upcoming term and how to create secondary projects that might have a lasting impact in our site communities. It was particularly exciting to have guest speaker Rob Gifford (NPR correspondent and author of China Road) come and talk to the group, and even more exciting when he showed up at the bar that evening to continue his discussions with volunteers. We ended our training with a touching candlelight memorial for Cannon, and after our goodbyes with friends from far flung sites, headed back to Chongqing exhausted, but ready to get back to work.

Our first week of classes started right away. I was pleased to be assigned all English-major writing classes, and Richy seemed content with his oral English workload. Starting with our usual introduction lessons, we have been working on streamlining our classroom rules and expectations to avoid some of the pitfalls we ran into last term - such as the several students who freaked out (channeling their frustration into incessant phone calls) when they didn't pass my oral English class, even though they had only attended a fraction of the classes. Luckily I found myself sitting next to the English department head one morning on the bus and he was able to explain to me the English department policies in more detail (we were provided an English translation of the policies at the beginning of the term, but they didn't make much sense at the time). Apparently if students miss more than 1/3 of classes for the term, I shouldn't allow them to take the final, because if I let them take the final, they have the right to a retake the following term. If I don't give them the final, they get a zero and have to retake the class. Although hopefully I won't have that problem with my writing classes this term, as English majors are much more engaged in their English classes (surprise, surprise) and have much fewer problems with attendance.

We are still waiting for word about the on-campus apartment situation, although it seems like something will definitely happen this term. In the meantime, I am planting up every container I can find and fit into our window-cages (our 5th floor apartment features cages around all the windows for security), keeping myself busy with craft projects, reading student papers, daydreaming about secondary projects (my students seem way more excited about cooking club than a resource room or anything else), and trying to keep the construction dust from building up on everything. We are ready to enjoy the Chongqing springtime as we know all too well that the sweltering Chongqing summer is on its way.

~ Katie

Last legs in Vietnam and a Happy New Year Homecoming

We arrived from a long, suffocating bus ride in Nha Trang 5 hours late due to traffic, only to be met with the disappointment of gray, drizzly skies over a beautiful beach and canceled hotel reservations. We were all running on our last nerves and it took considerable willpower not to freak out at the hotel desk lady who seemed to insinuate that the bus being late was something we could have foreseen or controlled. At last she found us a room for the night, one suspiciously cheaper than the one we originally booked (we later found out she had automatically booked us more expensive air-conditioned rooms the first time, although unnecessary without warm weather).

With the weather uncooperative for beach-side lounging, we decided instead to wander the town and sample its unusually cheap and delicious international food selection, particularly the Indian food and the gelato. On the second day, we decided we needed to take drastic measures in order to find some semblance of vacation-like fun and excitement under the overcast sky. Those drastic measures meant buying tickets from the hotel desk for a theme park situated on an island across the bay. It was a hard core tourist move and one we had hoped to avoid, but one that paid off in a day of hedonistic enjoyment. For about 15 dollars, we took a 3311 meter cable car to an island which has been turned into a resort/amusement park/water park and spent the entire day riding amusement park rides, playing arcade games and splashing around in the water park. Everything but the food was free and unlimited. It was a bit of a harrowing ride back after dark on the cable car as the winds picked up, but we kept ourselves occupied trying to come up with the most horrific disaster scenarios we could think of.

Thankfully we were finally rewarded the next day with beautiful blue skies and sunshine to enjoy the beach with - which we did despite the wind and the sand blowing in our faces. I managed to get myself a hearty sunburn across my back, but otherwise we were able to head off to Saigon proud of our vacation-y accomplishments.

We found Saigon much warmer and more alluring than Hanoi, with its street side iced coffee, expansive markets and interesting historical sites. We visited the Reunification Palace and the War Remnants Museum, which were both interesting contrasts to the Hanoi Hilton prison we visited previously, as they seemed to show the "American War" in a richer context and made more light of the lasting legacy of the conflict for Vietnamese people. We also enjoyed watching Vietnam's largest city prepare for Tet, the Lunar New Year. Yellow flowers and red lanterns were going up everywhere, while women stuffed fried tofu with minced pork in alleyways and men mounted ladders to scrub down the shop signs. On our last day in Saigon before catching our plane back to China, we regretted having to leave the warm weather, amazing food, and sassy shop ladies (who we found had a strange preoccupation with discussing marriage and baby-making) for the grit and grime of China.

But, China had a few tricks left up her sleeve. Even as our plane landed in Chongqing, we were dazzled by the array of New Year fireworks lighting up the night sky, and as we took the shuttle back into the city, we were even more dazzled by the transformation of the city streets. It seems that in our absence, every single tree in the city was covered with electric lights and lanterns and every roundabout became a spectacle of holiday displays. Between the bus stop and home, we bought ourselves some sparklers and firecrackers, and with our backpacks still strapped to our backs, rang in the year of the Rabbit (year of the Cat in Vietnam!) with our own little show in the apartment parking lot. As I sit writing this post, the sky around us on all sides is erupting with flashes, blasts and crackles of fireworks, while the neighborhood car (and motorbike) alarms sound from the vibrations. Xin Nian Kuai Le!