China's Redemption: From Fuyang To Beijing

It's all a quest to feel useful is it not? A desire to believe that things you do actually matter to someone. We may know that everything we do, every single action matters to God, but that isn't enough, He isn't tangible enough for us. So, we need that desire to be fulfilled in the natural and not in realms we can not see but know are there. On both trips to Mozambique, I did not go with a desire to feel helpful, but desire to see, touch, and breathe Africa. Luckily, through that desire, I think I was still helpful, I still did service, and people touched me and I touched them. Now, I am on a completely different type of trip, not studying abroad, not doing service, just working while receiving a new cultural experience. During my time in HK, I am sure that I have been somewhat useful, I have probably been helpful in ways I am unaware, but I haven't felt useful, at least not in the way I would like. There has been a great deal of good in this program, but other things have clouded the good, perhaps the negative has outweighed the good, perhaps hope comes after trouble and not before. Overall, this has been a great experience, but it has been clouded since December, sprinkled with many bright moments, just like a cloudy day when the sun peeks at you for only a minute until it is covered again. Fuyang, China was truly a bright moment.

Before I continue with my recent China adventure, I have a little secret. I have decided to learn how to play the Cello.

Ok, how many of you believe that? Alright, my ambition only goes so far. I haven't learn to play the Cello, these pictures are promotional photos taken by the institution I am working for, yes, yes, I am doing that here too (Not just me, most of the ETAs have). I am thinking about dropping Psychology and just becoming a model.

On April 17th, all 16 of us woke up early in the morning to catch a flight to Nanjing, China. Our program had set up a teaching and cultural interaction experience with college students in Nanjing and Fuyang. Entering China is always interesting for me, I never know if I am going to be given the third degree or not, well this time was no exception. I made it through the passport scrutiny section without any fuss, but then there was the last section, where they "Randomly" pull people out to have their bags scanned. Well out of a group of sixteen, who gets pulled out of line, myself and Shanita (Yeah, she is brown too). Another colleague was signalled as well, but she had so many bags that the guard decided not to bother. Anyway, I scanned my bags and the journal I bought in London back in 2005 has a medal clasp on it, so they wanted me to open my bag and show it to them. Once again, this was all done politely. Nonetheless, I had have the mind to teach incorrect English to all of their students, all the slang and curse words that they are not suppose to know ("Yes, women love to be called hoochies, it is a lovely term of endearment.") I have not stooped to such levels yet.

For the first two days we would all be in Nanjing, then the group would split up between the two cities, Nanjing being a big beautiful city, and Fuyang a big city, but more rural. During our first day, we visited a middle school for the children of Migrant Workers. We arrived at the school during the children's recess. They all stared as 16 strange faces walked through their play area towards the principle. We first watched these young ladies play jacks.

Then the principle spoke with us all about the school among other things. The children seemed bewildered to see my brown face as well as the faces of my none Asian colleagues. We also peeked into a nearby classroom and all the children began cheering and clapping once we entered as if we were people of importance. We didn't stay long, we just stared for a minute, said hello, then waved goodbye and left.

Later, we met with the organization that was sponsoring our stay in China as well as the American teachers who we would be working with. We received more info on our projects and the places we would be spending the next week. In addition, we learned about the Four Ts, all of which we were to keep our western opinions about to a bare minimum. The Four Ts are The Olympic Torch, Tibet, Taiwan, and Tienanmen Square. Luckily, I don't have strong opinions about any of these issues so I didn't feel too cheated. Let me quickly explain each T. Obviously the The Torch is referring to the recent protests that have plagued the Olympic torch relay. Those protests are tied to another T, Tibet, where the Chinese government has been under much international pressure for its tactics in dealing with the region. As many of you already know, Taiwan just as Tibet has been pushing for independence from China for a good while. Lastly, Tienanmen Square is a large area right outside of the Forbidden City, it has been the site of many protest one most notably was in 1989 when protesters were massacred. Now here is where it gets spooky, many mainland students that some of my colleagues have talked with, do not know about Tienanmen Square and you might not be able to access info on it via the Internet in China. We tried Wikipedia and the site seemed to work until we typed in this forbidden subject. Students have probably been taught and strongly believe that Taiwan and Tibet are parts of China and always will be. I, personally, don't care too much about that, and don't really know much about it either. Lastly, the Olympics is a big deal to everyone in China, the students are very excited and proud. So, the protest makes them very upset, some angry; many feel that those disrupting the Torch's journey are ruining all the joy that the Chinese people have invested in the upcoming event. With all of these subjects, we had to tread softly. Here is a picture of the Fuyang Group.


My group had a 10 hour late night train ride from Nanjing to Fuyang. We traveled in sleeper compartments, which were a little claustrophobic, but not too bad.



We arrived in Fuyang around 4:30am Sunday morning, we diligently dodged the taxi drivers that try to take you anywhere you want to go without using the meter, caught some more trustworthy taxes and headed for our Hotel. Our caretakers while in Fuyang were a pleasant couple from Texas (Don & Kate), who had been teaching at the Fuyang Teacher's College for about three years. Don is a retired lawyer and ex Navy man, and Kate is an ex nurse. So we had two quite capable individuals taking good care of us, not to mention Manie, one of the coordinators for my program and someone that makes us all feel much more comfortable when she is around, came along with us.

It was 5am when we arrived to our Hotel, I was very tired and desired some more sleep. After checking in and getting all of the keys distributed, Kate mentioned that she was going to Church later and that we were all welcomed if we were up for it. Now, we would need to leave at 7:30am, which meant at the time that I would only get one more hour of sleep. While everyone else quickly turned it down (except for one of my colleagues), I thought to myself, when am I going to get to go to a church in mainland china? So, I decided to go. The Entire service was in Mandarin of course, but Kate was prepared with her bilingual Bible and English Hymnal. If you have never tried to sing a hymn in English while everyone else is singing in another language, just find one of Bham's lovely Latino churches and try it out. The locals around us were very helpful, making sure we were on the right page, studying the correct scriptures. The songs they sang were beautiful. Just watching people worship was somehow satisfying. In China, I rarely get to feel some sense commonality with the people, but these are Christians, perhaps that is the most important commonality we have. I felt right at home, even though I spent an hour trying to guess which word was Jesus in Mandarin, I think I had it nailed down near the end.




After Church, we headed back to the Hotel to gather the rest of the group. Kate and Don had planned to take us into downtown. Our mission: to see some of the sites and dine at the local McDonalds. Below is a photo of us waiting on the bus and listening to Don.

China is notorious for staring at non-Asians. It gets to a point where you must wonder whether staring is considered rude in their culture. I've been to Cheng Du, Guangzhou, and Beijing, but the staring in Fuyang is on another level. The degree of curiosity is extraordinary. Fuyang is seriously not use to seeing foreigners; it is a rarity like Black Republicans (They don't really exist, it is all just legend). Seeing members of the African diaspora is a even greater rarity like catching Big Foot riding on Nessy's back. During our walking tour in downtown Fuyang, we stopped on a corner to wait for one of our colleagues who was purchasing some gifts. Apparently, we stayed in one spot a bit too long. Somehow, a few people staring at us and speaking in Mandarin to each other developed into a small crowd of 30 or more strangers. Some of the Tuk Tuk drivers passing by even pulled over, several cars either slowed down or stopped altogether to see why the crowd was developing. They all seemed to appear out of no where. Some of us tried to talk with them, we shook a couple of hands, and flashed a few smiles. Of course, many in the crowd were curious about where we were all from. Manie explained that we were all American, but too many that didn't make sense. During my time here I have learned many things, one being that many Chinese that I have encountered view America as a country of Caucasians and all other cultures are immigrants, and since our country consists of 212,000,000 million Whites I guess I can't blame them. However, when they are told that I am American it makes much more sense to them than other cultures. Truly, not trying to be comical in anyway, the NBA is huge in China now, not to mention that Hip Hop, R&B, and other America Brands are spread throughout the world. Thus, in some cases, many Chinese have been exposed to Black Culture, although it is a part that makes it difficult at times for individuals like myself to be seen on a level other than entertainment and crime, it has aided in spreading the messages that there are Blacks in America, and they are American. As for my Asian colleagues, it becomes a bit more difficult for them. Many people in that crowd that day, refused to believe that there is even such a thing as Asian-Americans. Perhaps, that brand of American has not made it to such circles. We stood around for a bit, and then did the only thing we thought we could. We took a group picture with all those on the corner. Sorry, I don't have that picture, but here is a nice shot.

At first, all of the stares gave me a creepy feeling, but seeing that it wasn't going away anytime soon, I decided to try and have fun with it. Not to mention, camera phones are everywhere, and people in Fuyang know how to use them. I had so many people run up and snap a picture of me that you would of thought I cut a platinum album. One time during that day, a few of us were standing in a small circle chatting, and suddenly I noticed a stranger had infiltrated our circle, and he just stood there looking and listening like he was a part of the group.

The following day (Monday) was our first work day. The eight of us were split up into two groups of four and my group would start work around lunch with a casual English corner. I am unsure what I am explaining in the following photo, but I used the map for pointing out places I have been and to explain my ethnicity. During one of my conversations, a student mentioned tha ther father liked African a lot, and that when he traveled to Europe he enjoyed taking pictures of the Africans there rather than the Europeans. I had no idea how to respond to that, so I smiled and said, "that is wonderful."

Lo and Behold, one of my first questions from some of these students was about Tibet and the Olympic Torch. Now, as I said earlier I don't have any strong opinions about these T subjects, and I don't know much about Tibet either, but I explained that there are three opinions in the US: some think Tibet should be free, others think that it is a part of China (I had no idea it was such a big chunk of China, look at a map), and then other's would say, "what now? Tibet? What the hell is that?" Then I smiled uncomfortably, and we moved on to more important things like dating and the differences between Chinese Women and American Women.


Besides informal discussion with students, we did teach classes on the pros and cons of the Internet. Many of the students we encountered had never used the Internet until they came to college.

For one activity,we put them in groups and had one side of the room create a web page about China, and the other side create a web page about the US. We were trying to demonstrate that credible information is not always on the Internet. It was very humorous seeing what the students thought about the US, moreover seeing what facts they knew, which turned out to be the most hilarious part of the class. For instance, consistently several groups would put down that the US had 51 or 55 states. Apparently, Harry Potter is an American story by an American author and New York, New York is the capital. On the other hand, it was impressive what some of the students did know about the US such as: Yellow Stone National Park, several major cities, many had heard of Birmingham, Alabama and the Civil Rights movement (there are Americans who know nothing about such things), which is far more than the Hong Kong students I have encountered know.










We ate lunch in the school cafeteria; the food was delicious even though the cafe was pretty dirty.

Often we ate food off the street. Here is a small market across from the college where we taught.

The students were very excited to see foreigners in their classroom. They got so excited that we had to always leave time at the end of class for pictures and further conversation. However, students would sometimes spend more time taking pictures of us, then taking pictures with us. See the two students below getting their camera phones ready.

We spent a good bit of time being grabbed by student after student wanting a picture with us. Don created a system, where the four of us just stood in one place and students simply took turns having their picture taken with us. We probably took well over a hundred pictures in this fashion, not to mention the ones we took one on one with students. As a result, smiling became my permanent facial expression. Here are some examples.









One of the funniest parts about standing out in Fuyang is that people like to hand you babies to hold.





Now, I like watching children, holding them, talking to them, I just don't like teaching them or being responsible for them in anyway. Children in China are usually interested in me, but sometimes the closer I get the more they frown.

Near the end of the week, we were scheduled to attend an evening english coroner, which would just be another night of each of us being surrounded by dozens of students shooting question after question at us. During my session, a young women with a little girl interrupted my crowd of college students. The little girl wanted to talk to me, so I kneeled down to speak with this adorable young lady. I said to her, "how are you." She responded so bashfully but quite clearly, "I am fine, how are you ." My heart never melted so quickly. I hadn't taken any pictures with my own camera all night, but I desperately wanted a picture with this princess.




That was not the end of the evening. A gentleman appraoched my circle of admirers and wanted to pull me away for a moment. Him and his friends were Hip Hop dancers: break dancing and popping. I was so shocked, because they were very good. At one point, I was forced to jump in the circle that had formed and dance as well, you know when a Black child is born the gods give him or her one of three talents: dancing, singing, or athleticism, and every once in awhile, a chosen one is born and given more than one of these talents. I was actual flattered by the guy, because he really wanted me to see his group. I felt like he was looking for my approval, not for me to say what he was doing was good or grade A, but he wanted to show me his appreciation for a part of my culture. I must admit, if this had happened in America with Americans, I may have had a problem. This guy has no opportunity other than entertainment, TV, and News to interact and learn about my culture, but Americans, do not have any excuse. In America, we will live 10 -20 miles from another culture or even go to school with them and know nothing about their culture but what is on TV. As the late great Notorious B.I.G (Christoher Wallace) once said, "they never thought Hip Hop would take it this far." It is amazing how far Hip Hop has come, considering that it was suppose to come in and go out like Disco. Needless to say the night was fantastic and unforgettable.


To be honest, a part from the wonderful sites I have seen, I haven't developed the best perception of the country. From the frustration of the langauge barrier and that body langauge and charade type gestures are useless, to the difficulty of going from the cleanliness of Hong Kong into the unknown filth (constant sounds of people spitting, even inside the church sanctuary) and the many scams that await foreigners; China has not made the best impression on me for many reasons. However, my time in Fuyang was suprisingly pleasant. The people we encountered were very polite (despite the staring). The students were fun and engaging with their many questions about our lives and opinions. Even people we encountered on the street usually would shoot us a big smile.

My time in Fuyang ended, so Sarah and I journeyed to Beijing, but didn't take as many pictures as one would expect. Here are some of the highlights.


The Temple of Heaven







I also went to see the Forbidden City, but I wasn't that impressed. Of course, I paid an important visit to the Great Wall.





It was about a two hour car ride to the Great Wall (There are four parts, we went to the third part), and a short, but steep hike up many stairs. I was shocked by the mere size and the length, and spent much of my time wondering how difficult it must of been to build something on such a unleveled terrain.
Seeing the wall was wonderful, but the best part was getting down. You see, the third part of the wall has something that the other three parts do not, a bob sleading slide.


Yeah, I did that, and almost ran over the woman in front of me because I was going too fast. We were suppose to spend three days sight seeing, but the first day was cut somewhat short because Sarah was sick. Even more strange, the third day I was so sick that I could not go anywhere. But, luckily we were staying at a wonderful place called Kelly's Courtyard, where our Host was extremely helpful. He asked if I would like to go to the Hospital, and that he would even drive us. I thought that that might be a good idea so I agreed. He was suppose to take us to the International Hospital, but we got dropped off at the non-international, non-English speaking hospital. First we wondered around until we found a desk that looked promising. Of course, the nurses didn't speak much English, but they knew another nurse that did. So we waited, and the nurse came out. I told him my symptoms and he told me that he thought that I just had a cold, and he tried to send me to the other hospital. Now, I don't know how he got cold out of the symptoms: fatigue, fever, loss of apetite, cough, and congested nasal passages. Irritated, we left for the pharmacy. The pharmacy was an adventure. The first pharmacy we mimed our way to some flu medicine, but it wasn't much help. On our last day, we went to another pharmacy, well I sat outside (because of my fatigue) while Sarah went in to investigate. In this store, communicating seemed a bit more difficult, somehow, I ended up with two boxes of medicine; one of which we had no idea how to take because it was in these strange small ketchup looking packages and the clerk claimed it was for fever, and the other medicine had strange pictures of leaves that looked like marijauna leaves all over the box, and the pills looked a funny brownish color, this one was suppose to be for cough (I actually took this one). Here is a picture of how my illness left me.


Things became more suspicious when Sarah and I returned to Hong Kong. While in Beijing, Sarah had these weird blisters on her hands and feet, not to mention that on one day she said that she felt like a truck had hit her. Then the next day I am down for the count. When we returned I was still sick, actually we were making our way through the HK airport and a woman working with the airport health department ran up to me, and took my tempature. The meter read 37.6 celsius which is 99.8 fahrenheight. She said while looking very concerned "oh, you have fever," and sent me off to infect the population. Later that night, Sarah was reading the news on the internet and ran across a couple of articles about an outbreak of a virus in Fuyang (which the govt was trying to hide at first), which is the place where we did all of our teaching. The virus is only deadly to children, and had claimed the lives of several by this time, but Sarah had some of the symptoms and I had some as well. My speculation is that I just had the flu, however something is very suspicious about the whole thing.

So, after a memorable time in Fuyang, the Great Wall and Beijing taxi scams, and contracting an infectious virus, I returned to Hong Kong releived. At the moment, students are busy with their final exams, so I don't have any work on campus. My program has made arrangements with two local primary schools, where I will spend the remainder of my time working, (yeah, I know, another primary school). I probably won't have much to do for the rest of my time here, but the Primary school is very pleasant, the staff is extremely helpful and open to us helping out. I know I have kept you waiting a long time for this update, and I hope it has filled your day with laughter and intrigue. Apparently, some of you are not praying for my health, because I have been sick more times in this one year than I was during my college years. Until I blog again.