_______________________________________________
---------------------Seeing Red----------------------
I was eating a deep-fried pineapple pie from McDonald’s when I saw him hit her.
Walking alone, hair blowing in the chill wind. Staring into the dark, thinking of another life.
When I say I saw him, I mean I heard him. The actual blow, no, I can’t say I saw that. I just turned my head after the crack, watched her reel, heard her shriek. The shouted words that spewed from his mouth carried all the venom of a snake’s bite… well, judging from tone, that is.
I had no idea what they meant, of course. Nor did I understand any of the signs around me, nor did I understand a zillion other little nuances of this strange and alien world.
I was an American in China, and though I had been so for several months, I was not, would never feel at home.
So I didn’t know why he had hit her, and I didn’t imagine that I could hope to understand it. But I remembered a girl I dated once, who had told me one night how her father beat her. Then she drank a bottle of vodka and vomited into a trash can while I held her hair.
She’d told me she wanted to marry me that night, before she passed out. Then she’d woken up, still drunk, and gone off to sleep with somebody else.
What a terrible thing, violence.
Menace in my eye, I shoved the half-eaten pie in the bag, crumpled it, threw it to the street. The man stared back at me, eyes betraying nothing. He puffed his chest a bit, posturing. Tough, I thought, like the men are taught to be here. He was young, younger than I’d imagined at first. Maybe 20. She was crying. Both of them were frail. Tiny. Enough to make me feel a giant.
I liked that.
The space between us closed quickly. Now his eyes flashed fear. I have to wonder how my face looked. I glanced to the girl, cringing, trembling there in the night wind. Blood trickled from a crease in her split lip. She was pretty, I thought. A tiny, pretty, delicate thing, like a butterfly.
A butterfly who had just been swatted mercilessly from the air by an angry child.
Never mind that the "man" in front of me was scarcely bigger than she. Never mind that he was starting to tremble, too, at the sight of my pale, angry, western, alien face. I didn’t see that. Never saw that.
I saw the abusive husband, the abusive father. The coward. The scum of the Earth.
Before I knew what I was doing, it was done. Too well done. A hand that knew how to throw a punch shot out before I could call it back. A heavy hand backed by a strong arm, a strong arm backed by a body so much bigger and thicker than most in this part of the world.
The force surprised me, hurt me. I felt his teeth carve into the flesh of my hand even as they caved from the blow. It was the crack, though, that split the night; the crack that left me stunned, mouth open and empty of words or breath.
I knew he was dead before she started screaming, before he started falling, before I even pulled back my hand. I watched his eyes roll backward as his head lolled on top of his broken neck, angling toward the ground that rushed to meet it.
I looked at my hand, my bloody fist. I looked at the pale skin drenched with red, and I knew.
There would be no escaping this.
The girl was on her knees now, sobbing over him, saying things I couldn't understand, feeling things I hadn't tried to understand. I could only look at her, shame forcing my eyes open, binding them to her in silent penance. And what an easy penance it probably was, I thought, compared to what was surely coming.
My lip trembled as I ground my ragged knuckles against my other palm, hiding from sight the life that bled from me, the hopes and dreams that fled before my very eyes, lost to me forever in that awful, red moment.
I shuddered as I drew my next full gasp of air, like an infant struggling for breath at the first of a new and difficult existence.
What a terrible thing.
_____________________________________________
Author's Note: Now,this is a work of fiction through and through, so don't get any ideas. However, for the record, I did see a guy hit a girl tonight while I was walking home, and when I started going towards him, he moved away very fast. It wasn't until after that I began to imagine the many possible pitfalls of confronting someone so far removed from my element. Good thing I have more sense than that, huh?
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
One Month Later
So yes, I’m aware that there is a lot I’ve neglected to say in the last little while, and while there is no excuse, my reasons are myriad.
Suffice it to say that things have been busy. Tumultuous. Fun. Difficult. Easy. Arduous. Heartwrenching. Heartwarming.
But enough of that. Essentially, I owe my current episode of writer’s block to five things:
Writer’s Block (hey, it happens).
Almost four uninterrupted weeks of cold, hard rain. No, I am not kidding, or exaggerating. I have not seen the sun in a damned month.
Saying yes when Chinese people ask me to do things with them.
Being absolutely brain-dead whenever I have time to myself.
And, of course, an understandable degree of moping about a certain notable absence.
That being said, tonight, after a reasonably amusing episode of KTV (that’s Karaoke TV, for the three of you reading) at which I got molested by an overzealous Chinese man… yeah, they do that here… no comment… well, I feel like I should write SOMETHING about the events that have transpired since I returned to Anqing (to say nothing of what transpired in Moscow).
Since I returned, I’ve taught four weeks of school. For two weeks, I had to take the classes all to myself, just like before. However, at last, Ray’s replacement joined me, and she’s been helpful relieving some of the workload, to say the least. So here’s the deal—I got paid, a LOT, for the extra work I did, which is excellent; my employers cater to my whimsy because of my willingness to help out in a tight spot; and I don’t have to eat alone now. Plus, the kids are a BREEZE to teach now, and I feel like I can actually make tangible progress with them. I’ve taken hold of the reins pretty hard in the classes so far this year, and they seem to be responding well to my brand of easy discipline. So, reading that, everything sounds great, right?
Well, the long and short of it is, I have very little to complain about, here. It’s an amazing experience that, so far, is getting better. Really, thinking of it now, I only have the one thing. I miss a lot of people, you know, and these days, as you may surmise, one in particular.
It won’t go away, that feeling, and really, why should it? Why would I want it to? It’s a call I should be answering. It’s something I should be beyond happy about.
And, come to think of it, I am.
At the moment, it just has its hurdles.
Good thing I get to jump over one of them next week, for a while. Then I can run free and easy, at least for a few days, till the next one comes along.
All right, now that that’s all out of the way, for the time being… Russia.
Cyrillic is a cool alphabet. It’s like code. I think if it had been Russian I was learning, I’d be damn well fluent by now. I thought it was THAT much easier. The metro was easy enough to navigate, I suppose, after a time, but stressful with luggage. And man, the cold. Everywhere, biting at your face and every other bit of uncovered flesh.
I felt it most keenly in the two or so mile walk we took to the Chinese Embassy to iron out some visa difficulties (and THERE’S a story I’m not willing to tell without a beer). Let’s just say it was a little nerve-wracking, and we almost didn’t make it back to China alive.
Well, we almost didn’t make it back to China, anyway.
After that our days were relaxing enough, taking in the Red Square (but still outside! My nose was half-dead at this point) and some of the other sights within the Kremlin. We went in a mall, ran from the police (lest they accost us and ask for passports that couldn’t be produced), and generally just explored. We even found Irish pubs, and ate at two of them!
(One night involved a pub crawl and a snowball fight. And an advertisement for Miller Midnight. What the hell?)
It was just one more amazing time to add to a growing list of ridiculousness that I am experiencing here. When I think about what I expected, from my life, a year or so ago… let’s just say that I’m now aware, more than ever, that we really don’t know what’s best for us. I’ve had plans before, sure, but the way things have turned out since I’ve been here… I couldn’t have drawn this up.
But I wouldn’t draw it any different.
Suffice it to say that things have been busy. Tumultuous. Fun. Difficult. Easy. Arduous. Heartwrenching. Heartwarming.
But enough of that. Essentially, I owe my current episode of writer’s block to five things:
Writer’s Block (hey, it happens).
Almost four uninterrupted weeks of cold, hard rain. No, I am not kidding, or exaggerating. I have not seen the sun in a damned month.
Saying yes when Chinese people ask me to do things with them.
Being absolutely brain-dead whenever I have time to myself.
And, of course, an understandable degree of moping about a certain notable absence.
That being said, tonight, after a reasonably amusing episode of KTV (that’s Karaoke TV, for the three of you reading) at which I got molested by an overzealous Chinese man… yeah, they do that here… no comment… well, I feel like I should write SOMETHING about the events that have transpired since I returned to Anqing (to say nothing of what transpired in Moscow).
Since I returned, I’ve taught four weeks of school. For two weeks, I had to take the classes all to myself, just like before. However, at last, Ray’s replacement joined me, and she’s been helpful relieving some of the workload, to say the least. So here’s the deal—I got paid, a LOT, for the extra work I did, which is excellent; my employers cater to my whimsy because of my willingness to help out in a tight spot; and I don’t have to eat alone now. Plus, the kids are a BREEZE to teach now, and I feel like I can actually make tangible progress with them. I’ve taken hold of the reins pretty hard in the classes so far this year, and they seem to be responding well to my brand of easy discipline. So, reading that, everything sounds great, right?
Well, the long and short of it is, I have very little to complain about, here. It’s an amazing experience that, so far, is getting better. Really, thinking of it now, I only have the one thing. I miss a lot of people, you know, and these days, as you may surmise, one in particular.
It won’t go away, that feeling, and really, why should it? Why would I want it to? It’s a call I should be answering. It’s something I should be beyond happy about.
And, come to think of it, I am.
At the moment, it just has its hurdles.
Good thing I get to jump over one of them next week, for a while. Then I can run free and easy, at least for a few days, till the next one comes along.
All right, now that that’s all out of the way, for the time being… Russia.
Cyrillic is a cool alphabet. It’s like code. I think if it had been Russian I was learning, I’d be damn well fluent by now. I thought it was THAT much easier. The metro was easy enough to navigate, I suppose, after a time, but stressful with luggage. And man, the cold. Everywhere, biting at your face and every other bit of uncovered flesh.
I felt it most keenly in the two or so mile walk we took to the Chinese Embassy to iron out some visa difficulties (and THERE’S a story I’m not willing to tell without a beer). Let’s just say it was a little nerve-wracking, and we almost didn’t make it back to China alive.
Well, we almost didn’t make it back to China, anyway.
After that our days were relaxing enough, taking in the Red Square (but still outside! My nose was half-dead at this point) and some of the other sights within the Kremlin. We went in a mall, ran from the police (lest they accost us and ask for passports that couldn’t be produced), and generally just explored. We even found Irish pubs, and ate at two of them!
(One night involved a pub crawl and a snowball fight. And an advertisement for Miller Midnight. What the hell?)
It was just one more amazing time to add to a growing list of ridiculousness that I am experiencing here. When I think about what I expected, from my life, a year or so ago… let’s just say that I’m now aware, more than ever, that we really don’t know what’s best for us. I’ve had plans before, sure, but the way things have turned out since I’ve been here… I couldn’t have drawn this up.
But I wouldn’t draw it any different.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
To Russia With Love (And Not Enough Time!)
There’s no time to waste. All we have IS time, and we don’t have much of it. Sure, we can lose more than time. There are things we like, people we enjoy being around, habits we don’t care to break. And circumstances can force you to live without those things. Painfully, in many cases. But we never really HAVE those things. We just have the time in which we can appreciate them.
Well, such was the moody brew in which I began to stew as the train bounced along its seemingly endless tracks through the snowy desolation of Siberia. I felt that time was short. I felt that soon, the ride would be over. Soon, I’d be teaching again. Soon, I’d be away from people I didn’t want to be away from. Soon enough, I’d be leaving China. Soon after, I’d have to embrace a future, or flee from it. After that, well… nothing is as far away as we’d sometimes like for it to be.
Needless to say, this is not what I should have been thinking. No, what I should have been thinking was how much I had absolutely loved the places I’d been the past few weeks (to say nothing of the company), and that I had several more days to enjoy both of those things. Still, I did succeed in cramming most of my nonsensical worries into a little black box and telling them to stay the hell away from me until February 9th, when I would (and have since) resumed classes in Anqing.
First, I have to tell you about the train, because the train was… well, it was awesome.
Now, there are many things our little Lonely Planet guidebook got wrong about the Trans-Siberian Train, and I won’t really go into them here, but as it only seems to explore things from the Moscow to Beijing side of the trip, I think we got the journey with a decidedly different flavor.
First off, the train is damn near deserted--although this probably had to do with season--and very few of the passengers are Russian. That's not surprising, considering no one really seemed to get on after Mongolia. In our entire carriage (with maybe 15 cabins, give or take a few) I believe we had less than a dozen people for most of the ride. And each of those cabins can hold four, folks. Yeah.
So we could spread ourselves out. Relax. Have some privacy. That was an unexpected perk. I mean, in China, trains are crowded, dirty, sweaty journeys where you’re basically doing your damndest to keep to yourself in the middle of 8 – 10 people.
Well not so for this train, and happily.
Now, there are only so many things you can do in a train cabin. Let’s have a list.
There’s reading.
Writing.
If you just said 'rithmetic, shame on you. No.
If you have a laptop, there are movies and games.
If you have a deck of cards, well, you better have at least one friend and some knowhow. And preferably alcohol.
There’s Uno.
Drinking. (Already alluded to.)
Eating (but only if you brought food).
Sleeping.
Exercise. Yep, it’s true; with careful examination of your various available grips and points of leverage, it’s quite possible to manipulate your own body weight in at least a hundred different ways. Nice. But no cardio (unless you’re a spy/adventurer on a high-speed inter-carriage foot chase, like myself).
Waiting.
Getting off.
Feeling nervous about getting off because none of the stops last long enough and you're worried the train will run away with all your things and leave you stranded in a frozen wasteland where you last approximately 7 hours before dying a horrible, frost-bitten death... ok, so that's probably just me.
Watching the windows.
And of course—did I say it already?—drinking. Yes, well, our few carriage-mates
were all Mongolian, and turns out they had a little something about drinking they wanted to show us.
It all began after two toilsome nights waiting to go through customs. Luckily we didn’t piss anyone off enough to get shaken down (I heard about this happening to several others). Anyway, after these two joyous evenings of nail biting while waiting for several unknown uniformed individuals to return our sacred, life-giving passports (both of which dragged out to about 4 or 5 am), the Mongolians came a-knocking the third night. I’ll admit, I was a little uneasy at first, but after a few beers it seemed as if we would become fast friends. Still, the night had already grown old, and none of us could last for long.
The next day was different. After lunch, in the midst of the movie Australia (don’t ask how I got it, it is China after all), there is a quiet knock at the door. Lo and behold, a Mongolian bearing gifts! No, wait, that’s not a gift. That’s bad.
That’s vodka.
As we settled into their car, they began pouring huge shots of straight liquor, which, you know, it seemed impolite to refuse. After the liquor came strange meats, strange vegetables, bread… more meat. More meat. More bread. Much more vodka. A veritable cocktail of strange was brewing inside me. Anyway. The remainder of THAT story need not leave the train. The end.
Soon enough the train ride ended, as I knew it must, and we stepped off into a frozen world with yet another alphabet that my idiot brain finds unintelligible. Well, it did at first, anyway. Turns out, Cyrillic, as you might imagine, is a LOT more intuitive than Chinese. Anyway, a brief and somewhat confusing subway ride later, we were lugging luggage up the street toward a quaint hostel, which was all too welcome because of the cold outside and the hot shower within.
Yeah, you know, showers seem a lot more valuable once you’ve been on a five-and-a-half day train where they don’t exist.
The hostel was extremely comfortable, but deserted. Guess tourist season for Russia is probably during a month when the ol’ air outside isn’t hanging out somewhere well below 0. Our host Alex was extremely generous, AND helpful--he directed us very ably on our journey to Moscow's Chinese Embassy and into the hair-raising adventure that followed there during the next couple of days. But that, as they say, is a story that will have to wait.
More later, I swear. Or I’m Genghis Khan.
...To be concluded.
Well, such was the moody brew in which I began to stew as the train bounced along its seemingly endless tracks through the snowy desolation of Siberia. I felt that time was short. I felt that soon, the ride would be over. Soon, I’d be teaching again. Soon, I’d be away from people I didn’t want to be away from. Soon enough, I’d be leaving China. Soon after, I’d have to embrace a future, or flee from it. After that, well… nothing is as far away as we’d sometimes like for it to be.
Needless to say, this is not what I should have been thinking. No, what I should have been thinking was how much I had absolutely loved the places I’d been the past few weeks (to say nothing of the company), and that I had several more days to enjoy both of those things. Still, I did succeed in cramming most of my nonsensical worries into a little black box and telling them to stay the hell away from me until February 9th, when I would (and have since) resumed classes in Anqing.
First, I have to tell you about the train, because the train was… well, it was awesome.
Now, there are many things our little Lonely Planet guidebook got wrong about the Trans-Siberian Train, and I won’t really go into them here, but as it only seems to explore things from the Moscow to Beijing side of the trip, I think we got the journey with a decidedly different flavor.
First off, the train is damn near deserted--although this probably had to do with season--and very few of the passengers are Russian. That's not surprising, considering no one really seemed to get on after Mongolia. In our entire carriage (with maybe 15 cabins, give or take a few) I believe we had less than a dozen people for most of the ride. And each of those cabins can hold four, folks. Yeah.
So we could spread ourselves out. Relax. Have some privacy. That was an unexpected perk. I mean, in China, trains are crowded, dirty, sweaty journeys where you’re basically doing your damndest to keep to yourself in the middle of 8 – 10 people.
Well not so for this train, and happily.
Now, there are only so many things you can do in a train cabin. Let’s have a list.
There’s reading.
Writing.
If you just said 'rithmetic, shame on you. No.
If you have a laptop, there are movies and games.
If you have a deck of cards, well, you better have at least one friend and some knowhow. And preferably alcohol.
There’s Uno.
Drinking. (Already alluded to.)
Eating (but only if you brought food).
Sleeping.
Exercise. Yep, it’s true; with careful examination of your various available grips and points of leverage, it’s quite possible to manipulate your own body weight in at least a hundred different ways. Nice. But no cardio (unless you’re a spy/adventurer on a high-speed inter-carriage foot chase, like myself).
Waiting.
Getting off.
Feeling nervous about getting off because none of the stops last long enough and you're worried the train will run away with all your things and leave you stranded in a frozen wasteland where you last approximately 7 hours before dying a horrible, frost-bitten death... ok, so that's probably just me.
Watching the windows.
And of course—did I say it already?—drinking. Yes, well, our few carriage-mates
were all Mongolian, and turns out they had a little something about drinking they wanted to show us.
It all began after two toilsome nights waiting to go through customs. Luckily we didn’t piss anyone off enough to get shaken down (I heard about this happening to several others). Anyway, after these two joyous evenings of nail biting while waiting for several unknown uniformed individuals to return our sacred, life-giving passports (both of which dragged out to about 4 or 5 am), the Mongolians came a-knocking the third night. I’ll admit, I was a little uneasy at first, but after a few beers it seemed as if we would become fast friends. Still, the night had already grown old, and none of us could last for long.
The next day was different. After lunch, in the midst of the movie Australia (don’t ask how I got it, it is China after all), there is a quiet knock at the door. Lo and behold, a Mongolian bearing gifts! No, wait, that’s not a gift. That’s bad.
That’s vodka.
As we settled into their car, they began pouring huge shots of straight liquor, which, you know, it seemed impolite to refuse. After the liquor came strange meats, strange vegetables, bread… more meat. More meat. More bread. Much more vodka. A veritable cocktail of strange was brewing inside me. Anyway. The remainder of THAT story need not leave the train. The end.
Soon enough the train ride ended, as I knew it must, and we stepped off into a frozen world with yet another alphabet that my idiot brain finds unintelligible. Well, it did at first, anyway. Turns out, Cyrillic, as you might imagine, is a LOT more intuitive than Chinese. Anyway, a brief and somewhat confusing subway ride later, we were lugging luggage up the street toward a quaint hostel, which was all too welcome because of the cold outside and the hot shower within.
Yeah, you know, showers seem a lot more valuable once you’ve been on a five-and-a-half day train where they don’t exist.
The hostel was extremely comfortable, but deserted. Guess tourist season for Russia is probably during a month when the ol’ air outside isn’t hanging out somewhere well below 0. Our host Alex was extremely generous, AND helpful--he directed us very ably on our journey to Moscow's Chinese Embassy and into the hair-raising adventure that followed there during the next couple of days. But that, as they say, is a story that will have to wait.
More later, I swear. Or I’m Genghis Khan.
...To be concluded.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
A Break in the Back-blog
Howdy folks.
You know, I'm sitting here, almost twelve hours on the nose from settling in on a five-day Trans-Siberian train trip, and I'm still struggling with a way to express to anyone just how much I have loved the last four weeks of my petty little existence. And it's only getting more exciting.
Now, I realize the tone of the last couple little notes I jotted down (yeah, they're there, so don't forget to read 'em, if you care to) was a bit mopey, and the one I'll eventually put up after this might have a little of that flavor too, but I just want all of you folks out there to know that I am indeed having the time of my life.
And I want you know that I'm going to hold off throwing anything else up on here until this great trip is good and done, bahahahaa! Sorry!
More to come after I jump over to Moscow and back!
You know, I'm sitting here, almost twelve hours on the nose from settling in on a five-day Trans-Siberian train trip, and I'm still struggling with a way to express to anyone just how much I have loved the last four weeks of my petty little existence. And it's only getting more exciting.
Now, I realize the tone of the last couple little notes I jotted down (yeah, they're there, so don't forget to read 'em, if you care to) was a bit mopey, and the one I'll eventually put up after this might have a little of that flavor too, but I just want all of you folks out there to know that I am indeed having the time of my life.
And I want you know that I'm going to hold off throwing anything else up on here until this great trip is good and done, bahahahaa! Sorry!
More to come after I jump over to Moscow and back!
And Now... Intermission. Please Enjoy the Catharsis and an Ice-Cold (Adult) Beverage
Ah, the holidays have come and gone once again—the holiday season in America, that is. For the Chinese, the holidays are just beginning, meaning that the semester break is upon us, and it is time to escape into the vast, waiting world.
In my head, all the pieces seem in place. It has all the look of a fantasy ready to be realized. So this should be a time of great excitement, yes? This time that I’ve been most looking toward since the moment I touched down in Beijing?
Of course, all is not always as it should be.
Despite all the best efforts of my friends in Anqing, western and Chinese alike, Christmas just never felt… like Christmas. Not this year. Like I’ve said, I just could not help but be reminded of all those who were so far away and so dearly missed, at that time of year above all others. The gloom that settled over me this Christmas was unlike anything I’ve ever felt. It wasn’t debilitating, it didn’t even dull my mood that much. But it hung a little heavier each day, with the tenacious fingers of a climber scrabbling for a hold when his life depends on finding it. Really, now, truly--unlike anything I’ve ever felt. Not loneliness. Not homesickness. And until these last days, I still didn’t have it shaken.
I do think some of it had to do with the commercial mockery of Christmas that I saw here. Not that it was in any way intentional on the part of the Chinese—in fact I found their efforts to understand the holiday quite charming. I just realized that the Christmas I saw them trying to celebrate was a reflection of the image we must be exporting from America and other parts of the world where Christians observe the holiday, and it saddens me. But there was certainly more to it than that.
Now, New Year’s day has passed, and my malaise manifested itself physically as a nasty malady for a few days. Since that’s been behind me, my mood has moved into slightly more thoughtful territory. With school done for a bit, and China and more at my beck and call (Yes, just so you know, I have now hiked the Great Wall; there will be pictures soon enough. Rest assured it was everything I hoped it could be and more, like much of the past three weeks has been, but I can’t talk about all that yet because it’s too damn cheerful for the tone of this filler essay on my bout with the moody blues.), I just can’t get my head right to have as good a time as I want to. It’s as if a switch has been thrown in my head, and where 2008 was mostly carefree, 2009 is careworn.
I just can’t stop thinking of what’s coming. Now that what I was so looking forward to has arrived, I can’t stop looking too far ahead. And I hate it.
With half the year done, I can see the end of my stay in China clear as daylight, and I wonder—have I done what I set out to do? Have I done enough?
Certainly, I have done much since I came here of which I can be proud, but am I pleased with it? With my effort? Am I pleased with myself, the challenges I’ve met and overcome, the things I’ve learned and done?
I think the answer to that is no. Not a resounding one, mind you. But still no.
Or perhaps, more appropriately, not yet.
Half over is only one way of looking at things. Yeah, I remember now.
I still have time.
(Just so you know, the day I jotted this down in my notebook I was in a foul mood, and once I finished, it seemed almost instantaneously erased. Writing is a funny thing. And—heaven help us—more is on the way, so sit tight, sports fans!)
In my head, all the pieces seem in place. It has all the look of a fantasy ready to be realized. So this should be a time of great excitement, yes? This time that I’ve been most looking toward since the moment I touched down in Beijing?
Of course, all is not always as it should be.
Despite all the best efforts of my friends in Anqing, western and Chinese alike, Christmas just never felt… like Christmas. Not this year. Like I’ve said, I just could not help but be reminded of all those who were so far away and so dearly missed, at that time of year above all others. The gloom that settled over me this Christmas was unlike anything I’ve ever felt. It wasn’t debilitating, it didn’t even dull my mood that much. But it hung a little heavier each day, with the tenacious fingers of a climber scrabbling for a hold when his life depends on finding it. Really, now, truly--unlike anything I’ve ever felt. Not loneliness. Not homesickness. And until these last days, I still didn’t have it shaken.
I do think some of it had to do with the commercial mockery of Christmas that I saw here. Not that it was in any way intentional on the part of the Chinese—in fact I found their efforts to understand the holiday quite charming. I just realized that the Christmas I saw them trying to celebrate was a reflection of the image we must be exporting from America and other parts of the world where Christians observe the holiday, and it saddens me. But there was certainly more to it than that.
Now, New Year’s day has passed, and my malaise manifested itself physically as a nasty malady for a few days. Since that’s been behind me, my mood has moved into slightly more thoughtful territory. With school done for a bit, and China and more at my beck and call (Yes, just so you know, I have now hiked the Great Wall; there will be pictures soon enough. Rest assured it was everything I hoped it could be and more, like much of the past three weeks has been, but I can’t talk about all that yet because it’s too damn cheerful for the tone of this filler essay on my bout with the moody blues.), I just can’t get my head right to have as good a time as I want to. It’s as if a switch has been thrown in my head, and where 2008 was mostly carefree, 2009 is careworn.
I just can’t stop thinking of what’s coming. Now that what I was so looking forward to has arrived, I can’t stop looking too far ahead. And I hate it.
With half the year done, I can see the end of my stay in China clear as daylight, and I wonder—have I done what I set out to do? Have I done enough?
Certainly, I have done much since I came here of which I can be proud, but am I pleased with it? With my effort? Am I pleased with myself, the challenges I’ve met and overcome, the things I’ve learned and done?
I think the answer to that is no. Not a resounding one, mind you. But still no.
Or perhaps, more appropriately, not yet.
Half over is only one way of looking at things. Yeah, I remember now.
I still have time.
(Just so you know, the day I jotted this down in my notebook I was in a foul mood, and once I finished, it seemed almost instantaneously erased. Writing is a funny thing. And—heaven help us—more is on the way, so sit tight, sports fans!)
It’s Thursday Night, And You Know What That Means… It’s Christmas Time
Wow. Christmas is (was, I know, I know—this is rather late, but please, bear with me) here. I mean that just the way it sounds, Christmas is HERE, in China, in Anqing, and boy is it strange, for so many reasons. The first and foremost of said reasons being that none of those folks with whom I would so dearly love to be at Christmas time seem to be HERE.
Now, that is not to say that I did not delight in Christmas dinner with my fast friends, the fellow foreign teachers from the other campus (bonus points for alliteration?) and the subsequent, radically awkward church service we attended (more on these later). But it does mean that the people I usually feel the need to be near at Christmas were all notably absent.
My first Christmas experience actually came several days before, when I agreed to be present at a private school’s Christmas function. It was not the school at which I teach, but seeing how they behaved, how they enthusiastically performed the few Christmas carols they knew, how they donned Santa caps (EVERYONE, and I mean EVERYONE, had a Santa hat)… all of it made me think about how much they recognized the commercial side of Christmas, and how little they knew of the real story behind it. But from the questions they asked, I also got the impression that they wanted to know more, from a purely informational standpoint.
I didn’t have the opportunity to do so at the time, but it set in my head what I would do for the coming week with my students. Yeah, you guessed it. Time to talk about Christmas. Real Christmas.
It made for a strange lesson, to be sure, drawing pictures of Santa’s face and Christmas trees on the board, then putting a cross next to them, and asking if any of them knew what it was. A few said “Jesu,” of course… but a precious few at that. It seemed to me that all most of them knew of Christmas had to do with trees and presents and the enigmatic “Christmas Father.” Needless to say, I did my best to supply them with a little… additional info… all the while bearing in mind I probably needed to keep it really impersonal to avoid getting chunked in the clink. Of course, as I fumbled about with a way to explain words like “commercial” (at one point resorting to running around the room and striking a pose with my water bottle whilst—yeah, I said it, whilst—yelling, “SO GOOD!”), I realized that I also had to explain concepts much more basic, like the idea of something being sacred, and the idea of celebrating peace.
Truth be told, I have no idea how much of it any of them were able to grasp. I’d like to believe a little, but in the end I think it mostly just made me feel better.
It was later that week, when the day finally came, that I and three other members of Anqing’s meager contingent of foreigners sought out Christmas dinner together (well, it was Chinese food, but like we always say, it’s the thought that counts). Addendum: I have since learned that Anqing’s food leaves much, much, MUCH to be desired. It was good to be with each other, though; very. And afterward came the reaaaally exciting part—when the married couple and I took a risk and found a Chinese church!
As for what we encountered there… well…
You know, rather than explain in words, I believe I’ll elect to have these pictures, and possibly this video, if it chooses to work, do all the talking.
Oh tannenbaum...
The Christmas Feast!
Not what we expected...
Quite a congregation... now if they would tithe...
Standing room only!
I leave you this time with an aside, as I’m sure you’re well aware that Christmas day has long since passed. Having been without either regular internet or adequate time (or focus, or discipline, or whatever you want to call it… it’s no secret that I’ve been rather happily distracted of late) since those days shortly following Christmas, I hope you will forgive me a brief backlog of entries (backblog?) that I must now dump on you post-haste, forthwith, heretofore, what have you. That is to say, sorry. But you’ll just have to deal with the last month in one big fat lump. And that should get us back up to speed.
But for now—zaijian! (Chinese for “toodles!”)
Author's Note: Title shamelessly (and probably sacrilegiously, sorry folks) lifted from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGOohBytKTU.
Yeah. It's Christmas time.
[The video was supposed to be here, but it's being finicky, so it might make it up later, or it might not. Bleh.]
Now, that is not to say that I did not delight in Christmas dinner with my fast friends, the fellow foreign teachers from the other campus (bonus points for alliteration?) and the subsequent, radically awkward church service we attended (more on these later). But it does mean that the people I usually feel the need to be near at Christmas were all notably absent.
My first Christmas experience actually came several days before, when I agreed to be present at a private school’s Christmas function. It was not the school at which I teach, but seeing how they behaved, how they enthusiastically performed the few Christmas carols they knew, how they donned Santa caps (EVERYONE, and I mean EVERYONE, had a Santa hat)… all of it made me think about how much they recognized the commercial side of Christmas, and how little they knew of the real story behind it. But from the questions they asked, I also got the impression that they wanted to know more, from a purely informational standpoint.
I didn’t have the opportunity to do so at the time, but it set in my head what I would do for the coming week with my students. Yeah, you guessed it. Time to talk about Christmas. Real Christmas.
It made for a strange lesson, to be sure, drawing pictures of Santa’s face and Christmas trees on the board, then putting a cross next to them, and asking if any of them knew what it was. A few said “Jesu,” of course… but a precious few at that. It seemed to me that all most of them knew of Christmas had to do with trees and presents and the enigmatic “Christmas Father.” Needless to say, I did my best to supply them with a little… additional info… all the while bearing in mind I probably needed to keep it really impersonal to avoid getting chunked in the clink. Of course, as I fumbled about with a way to explain words like “commercial” (at one point resorting to running around the room and striking a pose with my water bottle whilst—yeah, I said it, whilst—yelling, “SO GOOD!”), I realized that I also had to explain concepts much more basic, like the idea of something being sacred, and the idea of celebrating peace.
Truth be told, I have no idea how much of it any of them were able to grasp. I’d like to believe a little, but in the end I think it mostly just made me feel better.
It was later that week, when the day finally came, that I and three other members of Anqing’s meager contingent of foreigners sought out Christmas dinner together (well, it was Chinese food, but like we always say, it’s the thought that counts). Addendum: I have since learned that Anqing’s food leaves much, much, MUCH to be desired. It was good to be with each other, though; very. And afterward came the reaaaally exciting part—when the married couple and I took a risk and found a Chinese church!
As for what we encountered there… well…
You know, rather than explain in words, I believe I’ll elect to have these pictures, and possibly this video, if it chooses to work, do all the talking.
Oh tannenbaum...
The Christmas Feast!
Not what we expected...
Quite a congregation... now if they would tithe...
Standing room only!
I leave you this time with an aside, as I’m sure you’re well aware that Christmas day has long since passed. Having been without either regular internet or adequate time (or focus, or discipline, or whatever you want to call it… it’s no secret that I’ve been rather happily distracted of late) since those days shortly following Christmas, I hope you will forgive me a brief backlog of entries (backblog?) that I must now dump on you post-haste, forthwith, heretofore, what have you. That is to say, sorry. But you’ll just have to deal with the last month in one big fat lump. And that should get us back up to speed.
But for now—zaijian! (Chinese for “toodles!”)
Author's Note: Title shamelessly (and probably sacrilegiously, sorry folks) lifted from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGOohBytKTU.
Yeah. It's Christmas time.
[The video was supposed to be here, but it's being finicky, so it might make it up later, or it might not. Bleh.]
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