K: Thanksgiving off?

We didn't intend to take Thursday off as it's not a holiday in China. We could have; our contract allows us to cancel classes (without having to reschedule) for Thanksgiving and Christmas. But if we cancel our classes for one day during a week, then one section is ahead of another, and that messes with the syllabus which messes with the material which messes with the exam which is the making of a migraine. So the other option is to reschedule the class which means trying to climb over that language barrier and synchronize personal as well as class schedules with the class monitor. It turns out to be more restful to stay the course and begin those classes with a cheerful, "Happy Thanksgiving, class!" The choral response of "Happy Thanksgiving, Teacher!" is almost worth it.

I thought you said you didn't intend to take the day off. We didn't; we planned to teach those 8:00am classes this morning, and go out for Beijing Duck for dinner tonight as has become our Chinese Thanksgiving day tradition. But nick went to bed queezy and woke up sick, and I wasn't actually feeling fabulous either, so I put on a pair of jeans instead of the usual fair (clue #1 that all is not as it should be) and took a sticky note to class instead of the lesson plan I had prepared (clue #2). My class caught on very quickly and got to work on the assignment I set them. I went to Nick's class to give them their day's assignment:

Call: "Good morning. Is this Nick's class?"

Choral Response: "Yes!"

Call: "Happy Thanksgiving!"

Response: "Happy Thanksgiving!"

Call: "My name is..."

Response: "Kim!"

Call: "I am Nick's..."

Response: "Wife!"

Commentary: Encounters like this make me believe that there are times the fish knows he lives in a glass bowl.

Call: "Nick is ill this morning."

Response: "Ahhhh," followed by a cacophony of get well wishes.

Call: "Please open your books and work through the material on pages 48-51 and 58-59. Nick said you would know what to do."

Response: Pages whisper. "Yes, teacher."

Some foreign teachers are annoyed by the "group think" phenomenon we inevitably encounter in the Chinese classroom, and agreed, it can be annoying when trying to initiate a riveting discussion on something or other and get the same answer in thirty different voices (if in any voice at all). But there are times that it is endearing, especially when their eyes and smiles prove the sentiment is genuine. We hope he gets well soon. Happy Thanksgiving, teacher.

And Happy Thanksgiving to you too. Enjoy your (scheduled) day off in good health.

K: Culture

1.) A noun meaning intellectual and artistic activity and the works produced by it. 2.) A noun meaning the sum total of ways of living built up by a group of human beings and transmitted from one generation to another. 3.) A verb meaning to grow (microorganisms or other living matter) in a specially prepared nutrient medium.

Since I can’t read the labels on the bags of “potting soil” that I buy for my plants, I’m sure there is some of the third definition going on somewhere in our apartment.

I realized yesterday that I forget that there are other definitions than the anthropological one (#2) for the word. Observing, misunderstanding, and adopting ways of living from a culture that could not be more foreign leaves little elbow room inside the word for other interpretations.

I forget that in my past life when the most foreign place I had spent a significant amount of time was Britain, when I studied literature at university, and lived in Denver where theatre/concert tickets were easy and affordable enough to come by (our favorite is still 2Pianos 4Hands), if someone had used the word culture I would have thought instantly of the first definition and tossed in a quote from some poet to solidify the argument.

Now, culture is a word so vast I will never plumb the depths of it and so dense my understanding will never light the whole cavern at once. Culture simultaneously excites and exhausts.

But there are moments when culture and culture collide, when the works produced by intellectual and artistic activity transcend the dimensions of one culture into the realm of humanity and up there without the interference of misplaced manners or a lamentable vocabulary, one can just employ the senses to enjoy well managed talent.

We had just such a restful evening yesterday. Beifang Minzu Daxue (our college) is fortunate enough to employ a couple from Russia/Kazakhstan, who are concert musicians, as teachers in the music department. Last night Olga accompanied three of her students in a concert for which they must have spent endless hours preparing. A couple of clarinets and a saxophone as well as the grand piano presented a sumptuous selection of celebrated classical pieces.

The evening reminded me that even in the grueling (but satisfying) work that is intercultural living there is culture to be had and enjoyed.

"For without culture or holiness, which are always the gift of a very few, a man may renounce wealth or any other external thing, but he cannot renounce hatred, envy, jealousy, revenge. Culture is the sanctity of the intellect." [William Butler Yeats]

N: Good for Me, Good for Everybody

My schedule has recently become less labor intensive. Our organization does an excellent job at keeping our teaching hours at a reasonable number, not so much that we go crazy and not have time for students, and not so little that we go crazy and not look like teachers. In order to help our school, I agreed to tweak our schedule so that I could complete an entire semester of teaching in nine weeks. You see, the seniors begin internships in week 10 or 11 but they still need credit for a complete semester of class. So we doubled my load for 9 weeks. I’m grading their final exams now. 

In about week 5 I decided to start a list of things that I wanted to do when I had completed teaching the seniors.  Some of the things on the list are sleeping past 6, watching a couple episodes of Alias (okay fine, the entire series), listening to music, reading something other than resources for lesson planning, hanging out with teammates big and small, and cooking (there is a whole other list for that).

Life will indeed be different now. Good different or bad different depending on who you talk to and when. No longer will I have an excuse for why I don’t pick up my dirty clothes and immediately put them in the hamper. Good for K. Bad for me. I was K’s alarm clock and now that I’m sleeping, her routines are out of whack. Good for me. Bad for K. I’ll be cooking again. Good for both of us.