HB: Grumbles, first day of class and other bits and pieces
I can feel a major Dummy Spit coming on .....>
Last night I had my emailed spammed and my LJ spammed with comments. I didn't reply to any of them which should be sign enough given that I usually try to reply to all comments. When I got back from class today, there were 8 more posts from the same person. Sometimes he replied to his owns posts - basically every single post I had left 'public' had been posted to once if not twice. Sometimes even three times. I also hate being told: "Go to my LJ, go and look at my post, look at my LJ". I've said before, I can be cajoled, persuaded and sweetly led, but I hate being told. :P
I like to at least leave episode reviews, movie reviews, book reviews public but I have to admit my heart absolutely sank when I saw the new rash of emails and posts. I'm still trying to figure out a polite way to deal with this but as is evident, I am feeling very frustrated. I've been a heavy user of LJ since February this year and this is the first time I have been so incredibly annoyed. I don't like being forced into a position when I'm going to have to say something rude, but I can feel it rapidly approaching.
Nonetheless, I am trying to remember the Chinese saying: "假如你生气时忍住一分钟，就不会有一百天的忧愁" which means: "If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will escape a hundred days of sorrow."
Sorry, I didn't mean to lose it like that.
First day of class
Yup, the first day of class! I walked into my class and there was only one spot at the back next to a really cute Japanese girl who was very friendly and had very good Chinese. Her name is 柴田真美 pronounced Chai Tian Zhen Mei in Chinese. I have no idea how you'd say it in Japanese. Japanese names are so long. Chinese names are usually two characters or three characters. Japanese names can be 3 up to 6 characters. There's one girl in my class whose name is 中山美千化 Zhong Shan Mei Qian Hua which is a real mouthful.
This is only the first week of class so there is likely to still be a lot of changing around by students as they move up and down levels. At this stage though, my class is made up entirely of Korean and Japanese students!!!! Our first class was conversation class and the teacher wanted each of us to volunteer to get up in front of the class and give the inevitable introduction to the class. He was getting frustrated because no one volunteered and he said:
"Oh come on, this class is comprised solely of Japanese and Koreans - there are only two countries here. Get up and speak for yourselves, it can't be that scary ... oh wait a moment ..... there's an Australian here .... Australian - put up your hand."
I cringed and put my hand up and he grilled me like usual. When he found out dad was Chinese he said: "So your Chinese should be really good if your dad's Chinese."
I said: "My mum's Vietnamese, I grew up in Australia - furthermore we spoke English at home."
"Doesn't matter, it should be in the blood," he said illogically and said. "All right Australia - you get up and introduce yourself."
Hahahahaha.
Our conversation teacher's only 26 and he's a scrawny little thing, there is no way you'd pick him for a teacher but he's very good. He's 26, a PhD and has a very sarcastic and funny manner about him. He doesn't put up with crap and will say stuff like: "How can a bunch of adults be so shy and mute? Why did you waste your money to come over? Come on, someone speak and get your money's worth."
Every Korean and Japanese student who got up, did the obligatory low bow, spoke and then did the low bow again. I don't bow but I have to say that last semester it was getting pretty contagious although Se Hyun reprimanded me for bowing sloppily - and like a guy :) Guys and girls bow differently.
Korean students always have a line in their introduction where they say: "My Chinese is not very good," which inevitably is just them feigning modesty because almost all Korean students will put in a request to be put UP one grade from the class in which they are originally placed. They have a belief that it will increase their abilities. I'm inclined to believe my former conversation teacher that says that learning a language is a gradual process. There are no short cuts and each level should be built on each level and a solid foundation is necessary. Jumping levels leads to shaky foundations.
After the third Korean student said: "My Chinese is not very good", the teacher said: "OK, enough already with the false modesty. If your Chinese is good it's good, if it's not then it's not. There's absolutely no point saying it." I found that hilarious given that all my other teachers had always sat through that platitude with a polite expression on their faces.
The mix of classmates is really interesting. There's a Japanese woman in her forties who's been living in China for quite a while and her Chinese is really good. There was one fairly nice and chatty Korean guy who's an English major. I chatted with him during the break and he said I could call him Kim since I have such trouble with Korean names. It's lazy of me given that Kim is one of the most common Korean names and I should try to learn his given name or at least his Chinese name, but Kim is just so nice and easy :)
There was one scowling, funky-looking Japanese guy with kind of narrow eyes, spiked hair and a goatee who slouched his way around looking cool. He had a very vicious-looking face but was actually quite funny when I spoke with him and he speaks the best English ever that I've heard in a Japanese. He was very cagey about his background but he must have studied in the US at some point or at least attended an International School in Japan.
One of his friends came in, a French guy named 'Valerie' which I have to admit I always thought was a girl's name and to my chagrin they asked me if I was American. My fault, a lot of Asians have trouble understanding the Australian accent because they tend to learn American English and sometimes if I see that people don't have very good English, I'll adopt a fake American accent just to make it easier for them to understand. As soon as he asked if I was American, I went eek and switched back to my real accent.
Then we had to get up again and tell a story. The teacher was getting a bit testy because no one moved. Eventually I got up and spoke up my experiences on Chinese trains since I'm such an expert now ;) The teacher freely admitted that apart from Henan (which is where he's from), he has never travelled anywhere else in China. He said he couldn't be bothered to put up with the long distances, planes were too expensive and he couldn't put up with the inconvenience and the dirtiness :)
As usual, all of them have pretty good reading and writing skills. We had to write our names on the board and I heard the teacher laugh when I wrote my name because my Chinese characters are so awkward and retarded-looking :) The flipside is they're good at reading but only a handful are any good at spoken Chinese, most are kind of halting and hesitant and a handful are almost completely mute which is really awkward during class.
Se Hyun's a bit like that. His reading, writing, grammar blows mine out of the water but everytime we walk out of school, if we talk to a taxi driver or a shop assistant, I have to translate. I'm so low-brow with my 'street Chinese' :)
I am going to work harder this semester and try to improve my formal Chinese.
Our reading teacher came next and she's in her late thirties. She was very Chinese-looking with her pony tail and a shirt that looked like my pyjamas. She seems very matter-of-fact and businesslike but very good. I think she was a little bit annoyed at the taciturn nature of our class and we pretty much have to be prodded before we reply although I did ask a few questions which seemed to surprise her as much as everyone's silence irritated her.
I caught a glimpse of our zonghe teacher. Late forties, early fifties - absolute dragon-lady. Eek. What is it with me and dragon lady zong he teachers????? I think I'm cursed!
The text is getting harder. A lot of the textbooks don't provide English definitions - only a Chinese definition. Therefore, not only do you not understand the word, but it's possible that there are some words in the definition that you'll have to look up as well. I think I'll have to bring a bigger dictionary to class with me. The really conscientious Japanese student at the back had two giant dictionaries with him which was kind of cute given that most Japanese students wield funky, state of the art Electronic Dictionaries.
I think I freaked him out because I thought the teacher said: "Student in the back row answer" so I turned around to stare at him. It turns out she said, student in front of the student in the back row so the poor guy in the backrow must have wondered why on earth I had turned and was staring at him so fixedly.
The other difference is that they don't run through the new words in class. You're expected to do that in your own time and then you launch into the text once you get to class.
The final difference is that they don't want you to look at the pinyin (romanised pronunciation) during class so I'll have to pre-study so that I know how to pronounce all the words. There is nothing worse than being called upon to read aloud in class and causing pain to everyone by fumbling and misreading every second word. Everyone is always very sympathetic but it's just painful.
The Japanese girls are cute in an anime way. They're almost a stereotype they're so cute with the way they cover their mouths and giggle silently, eyes peeping over their hands as their shoulders shake.
There seem to be some interesting personalities in the class, and some people have worked so it's not as 'green' and juvenile as my last class - last semester they were all still in uni or just fresh out of uni with the exception of Cynthia and Fenny.
I'm quite looking forward to the classes and I think I quite like the students I've seen so far. Who knows how it will all pan out though?
Beggars
There are a lot of beggars in Beijing. There are a lot in China full stop. I'm always most distressed by the children and the people who suffer from really serious deformities or disabilities. Sometimes I give to beggars but there are just so many that I'll usually only give money if it's sort of close to hand.
That being said, there is one beggar near the subway that always makes me feel troubled. I'm pretty certain she's a she. She's very short, squat ..... has a very disproportionate body. She could be anywhere from 18 to 40 - it's hard to tell her age and judging by the expression on her face, I think she's severely mentally impaired. She usually leans against a wall or sits on a step with her bowl for money in front of her. At her side is one of two people, an older man with a beard and a younger man with a moustache. All three are very ragged and dirty.
At first I was filled with disgust for the two men, thinking that it's really appalling that they are exploiting this handicapped person. The thing is, she's always there and I pass her everytime I go to the subway and sometimes they're helping her have a drink, or helping her to eat - spoonful by spoonful..... sometimes they're fanning her, helping her with her clothes. On many occasions, she's asleep, her head lying on their knee or against their shoulder. There is a great deal of tenderness in the way they look after her and I'm almost positive that they must be the same family as you can't feign that kind of affection and love.
So I started thinking .... yes they live off her begging and although I don't know the full circumstances - they do also look after her. Without them she'd probably be dead or exploited by people who wouldn't care about her so much. I also started thinking - they probably have no choice. For instance, if they had a 'proper' job, then how could they look after their daughter/sister. There's no way they'd have enough money to hire a nurse or a companion, so apart from them there's no one to look after her. By begging, she supports them all but I guess it means that they can be with her throughout the day. There isn't really another choice in a country like China that doesn't have any kind of social welfare or benefits.
When I walk past and I see them feeding her and wiping her mouth, I have to look away because I feel like I'm intruding on their privacy. It's a tough one.
Chinese people and Hong Kong people always tell me that these are professional beggars, that they probably make loads of money. I think that this is an excuse to make themselves feel better for not giving any money. I don't care how much money they make begging, it can't be be worth sitting out in the heat, the cold, the dirt - exposing yourself to danger. If they're by the roadside begging, I'm betting it's because they don't have any other choice open to them.
Sleeping Beauty
When I was working in the Shanghai office last year, because of the transaction, I frequently had to work on the weekend when no one else was working. At that time, the office was being renovated and the workmen used to go in on the weekend to do the work in order to cause the least amount of disturbance to the office.
I remember one Sunday afternoon I was working. I usually had my music playing but once, I heard a funny noise. I turned off the music. They didn't turn on air conditioning on the weekends so the office was really quiet. The noise sounded kind of machine-like, like drilling or some other kind of strange rumblng. I got up from my desk, walked towards the door.
There had been about a dozen workmen in the office earlier but I stared at the ground. There were 12 pairs of shoes and thongs all sitting in the doorway without owners. For a moment I seriously thought that they had spontaneously combusted. Then I realised that the loud drilling noise was getting louder and I walked closer and discovered all 12 workmen lying on the floor of the managing partner's office fast asleep. That's when I discovered the Chinese habit of the afternoon siesta!!
Walk around some parts of Shanghai or Beijing from about 2pm up until 5pm and you will find people fast asleep. By the side of the road, on steps, on the back of their motorbikes, under a tree. Yesterday I was on campus and I was walking back towards the South East Gate and I passed by three restaurants and the student canteen. Everywhere I looked, there were cooks, waiters and waitresses fast asleep. Some were lying across chairs, some sitting with their heads slumped on the table, some sitting with their heads falling back, some lying on the table, some lying on the floor.
It was a very Sleeping Beauty moment as you could have sworn that a magic spell had hit them and each person had just fallen asleep where he or she was sitting. You might remember when I took photos of my favourite dumpling place. That day, I witnessed the Big Sleep on a slightly smaller scale!
Anyway, I want to make a music post and then I have to get onto studying. Tomorrow's classes are zong he (comprehensive class) and listening.
Last night I had my emailed spammed and my LJ spammed with comments. I didn't reply to any of them which should be sign enough given that I usually try to reply to all comments. When I got back from class today, there were 8 more posts from the same person. Sometimes he replied to his owns posts - basically every single post I had left 'public' had been posted to once if not twice. Sometimes even three times. I also hate being told: "Go to my LJ, go and look at my post, look at my LJ". I've said before, I can be cajoled, persuaded and sweetly led, but I hate being told. :P
I like to at least leave episode reviews, movie reviews, book reviews public but I have to admit my heart absolutely sank when I saw the new rash of emails and posts. I'm still trying to figure out a polite way to deal with this but as is evident, I am feeling very frustrated. I've been a heavy user of LJ since February this year and this is the first time I have been so incredibly annoyed. I don't like being forced into a position when I'm going to have to say something rude, but I can feel it rapidly approaching.
Nonetheless, I am trying to remember the Chinese saying: "假如你生气时忍住一分钟，就不会有一百天的忧愁" which means: "If you are patient in one moment of anger, you will escape a hundred days of sorrow."
Sorry, I didn't mean to lose it like that.
First day of class
Yup, the first day of class! I walked into my class and there was only one spot at the back next to a really cute Japanese girl who was very friendly and had very good Chinese. Her name is 柴田真美 pronounced Chai Tian Zhen Mei in Chinese. I have no idea how you'd say it in Japanese. Japanese names are so long. Chinese names are usually two characters or three characters. Japanese names can be 3 up to 6 characters. There's one girl in my class whose name is 中山美千化 Zhong Shan Mei Qian Hua which is a real mouthful.
This is only the first week of class so there is likely to still be a lot of changing around by students as they move up and down levels. At this stage though, my class is made up entirely of Korean and Japanese students!!!! Our first class was conversation class and the teacher wanted each of us to volunteer to get up in front of the class and give the inevitable introduction to the class. He was getting frustrated because no one volunteered and he said:
"Oh come on, this class is comprised solely of Japanese and Koreans - there are only two countries here. Get up and speak for yourselves, it can't be that scary ... oh wait a moment ..... there's an Australian here .... Australian - put up your hand."
I cringed and put my hand up and he grilled me like usual. When he found out dad was Chinese he said: "So your Chinese should be really good if your dad's Chinese."
I said: "My mum's Vietnamese, I grew up in Australia - furthermore we spoke English at home."
"Doesn't matter, it should be in the blood," he said illogically and said. "All right Australia - you get up and introduce yourself."
Hahahahaha.
Our conversation teacher's only 26 and he's a scrawny little thing, there is no way you'd pick him for a teacher but he's very good. He's 26, a PhD and has a very sarcastic and funny manner about him. He doesn't put up with crap and will say stuff like: "How can a bunch of adults be so shy and mute? Why did you waste your money to come over? Come on, someone speak and get your money's worth."
Every Korean and Japanese student who got up, did the obligatory low bow, spoke and then did the low bow again. I don't bow but I have to say that last semester it was getting pretty contagious although Se Hyun reprimanded me for bowing sloppily - and like a guy :) Guys and girls bow differently.
Korean students always have a line in their introduction where they say: "My Chinese is not very good," which inevitably is just them feigning modesty because almost all Korean students will put in a request to be put UP one grade from the class in which they are originally placed. They have a belief that it will increase their abilities. I'm inclined to believe my former conversation teacher that says that learning a language is a gradual process. There are no short cuts and each level should be built on each level and a solid foundation is necessary. Jumping levels leads to shaky foundations.
After the third Korean student said: "My Chinese is not very good", the teacher said: "OK, enough already with the false modesty. If your Chinese is good it's good, if it's not then it's not. There's absolutely no point saying it." I found that hilarious given that all my other teachers had always sat through that platitude with a polite expression on their faces.
The mix of classmates is really interesting. There's a Japanese woman in her forties who's been living in China for quite a while and her Chinese is really good. There was one fairly nice and chatty Korean guy who's an English major. I chatted with him during the break and he said I could call him Kim since I have such trouble with Korean names. It's lazy of me given that Kim is one of the most common Korean names and I should try to learn his given name or at least his Chinese name, but Kim is just so nice and easy :)
There was one scowling, funky-looking Japanese guy with kind of narrow eyes, spiked hair and a goatee who slouched his way around looking cool. He had a very vicious-looking face but was actually quite funny when I spoke with him and he speaks the best English ever that I've heard in a Japanese. He was very cagey about his background but he must have studied in the US at some point or at least attended an International School in Japan.
One of his friends came in, a French guy named 'Valerie' which I have to admit I always thought was a girl's name and to my chagrin they asked me if I was American. My fault, a lot of Asians have trouble understanding the Australian accent because they tend to learn American English and sometimes if I see that people don't have very good English, I'll adopt a fake American accent just to make it easier for them to understand. As soon as he asked if I was American, I went eek and switched back to my real accent.
Then we had to get up again and tell a story. The teacher was getting a bit testy because no one moved. Eventually I got up and spoke up my experiences on Chinese trains since I'm such an expert now ;) The teacher freely admitted that apart from Henan (which is where he's from), he has never travelled anywhere else in China. He said he couldn't be bothered to put up with the long distances, planes were too expensive and he couldn't put up with the inconvenience and the dirtiness :)
As usual, all of them have pretty good reading and writing skills. We had to write our names on the board and I heard the teacher laugh when I wrote my name because my Chinese characters are so awkward and retarded-looking :) The flipside is they're good at reading but only a handful are any good at spoken Chinese, most are kind of halting and hesitant and a handful are almost completely mute which is really awkward during class.
Se Hyun's a bit like that. His reading, writing, grammar blows mine out of the water but everytime we walk out of school, if we talk to a taxi driver or a shop assistant, I have to translate. I'm so low-brow with my 'street Chinese' :)
I am going to work harder this semester and try to improve my formal Chinese.
Our reading teacher came next and she's in her late thirties. She was very Chinese-looking with her pony tail and a shirt that looked like my pyjamas. She seems very matter-of-fact and businesslike but very good. I think she was a little bit annoyed at the taciturn nature of our class and we pretty much have to be prodded before we reply although I did ask a few questions which seemed to surprise her as much as everyone's silence irritated her.
I caught a glimpse of our zonghe teacher. Late forties, early fifties - absolute dragon-lady. Eek. What is it with me and dragon lady zong he teachers????? I think I'm cursed!
The text is getting harder. A lot of the textbooks don't provide English definitions - only a Chinese definition. Therefore, not only do you not understand the word, but it's possible that there are some words in the definition that you'll have to look up as well. I think I'll have to bring a bigger dictionary to class with me. The really conscientious Japanese student at the back had two giant dictionaries with him which was kind of cute given that most Japanese students wield funky, state of the art Electronic Dictionaries.
I think I freaked him out because I thought the teacher said: "Student in the back row answer" so I turned around to stare at him. It turns out she said, student in front of the student in the back row so the poor guy in the backrow must have wondered why on earth I had turned and was staring at him so fixedly.
The other difference is that they don't run through the new words in class. You're expected to do that in your own time and then you launch into the text once you get to class.
The final difference is that they don't want you to look at the pinyin (romanised pronunciation) during class so I'll have to pre-study so that I know how to pronounce all the words. There is nothing worse than being called upon to read aloud in class and causing pain to everyone by fumbling and misreading every second word. Everyone is always very sympathetic but it's just painful.
The Japanese girls are cute in an anime way. They're almost a stereotype they're so cute with the way they cover their mouths and giggle silently, eyes peeping over their hands as their shoulders shake.
There seem to be some interesting personalities in the class, and some people have worked so it's not as 'green' and juvenile as my last class - last semester they were all still in uni or just fresh out of uni with the exception of Cynthia and Fenny.
I'm quite looking forward to the classes and I think I quite like the students I've seen so far. Who knows how it will all pan out though?
Beggars
There are a lot of beggars in Beijing. There are a lot in China full stop. I'm always most distressed by the children and the people who suffer from really serious deformities or disabilities. Sometimes I give to beggars but there are just so many that I'll usually only give money if it's sort of close to hand.
That being said, there is one beggar near the subway that always makes me feel troubled. I'm pretty certain she's a she. She's very short, squat ..... has a very disproportionate body. She could be anywhere from 18 to 40 - it's hard to tell her age and judging by the expression on her face, I think she's severely mentally impaired. She usually leans against a wall or sits on a step with her bowl for money in front of her. At her side is one of two people, an older man with a beard and a younger man with a moustache. All three are very ragged and dirty.
At first I was filled with disgust for the two men, thinking that it's really appalling that they are exploiting this handicapped person. The thing is, she's always there and I pass her everytime I go to the subway and sometimes they're helping her have a drink, or helping her to eat - spoonful by spoonful..... sometimes they're fanning her, helping her with her clothes. On many occasions, she's asleep, her head lying on their knee or against their shoulder. There is a great deal of tenderness in the way they look after her and I'm almost positive that they must be the same family as you can't feign that kind of affection and love.
So I started thinking .... yes they live off her begging and although I don't know the full circumstances - they do also look after her. Without them she'd probably be dead or exploited by people who wouldn't care about her so much. I also started thinking - they probably have no choice. For instance, if they had a 'proper' job, then how could they look after their daughter/sister. There's no way they'd have enough money to hire a nurse or a companion, so apart from them there's no one to look after her. By begging, she supports them all but I guess it means that they can be with her throughout the day. There isn't really another choice in a country like China that doesn't have any kind of social welfare or benefits.
When I walk past and I see them feeding her and wiping her mouth, I have to look away because I feel like I'm intruding on their privacy. It's a tough one.
Chinese people and Hong Kong people always tell me that these are professional beggars, that they probably make loads of money. I think that this is an excuse to make themselves feel better for not giving any money. I don't care how much money they make begging, it can't be be worth sitting out in the heat, the cold, the dirt - exposing yourself to danger. If they're by the roadside begging, I'm betting it's because they don't have any other choice open to them.
Sleeping Beauty
When I was working in the Shanghai office last year, because of the transaction, I frequently had to work on the weekend when no one else was working. At that time, the office was being renovated and the workmen used to go in on the weekend to do the work in order to cause the least amount of disturbance to the office.
I remember one Sunday afternoon I was working. I usually had my music playing but once, I heard a funny noise. I turned off the music. They didn't turn on air conditioning on the weekends so the office was really quiet. The noise sounded kind of machine-like, like drilling or some other kind of strange rumblng. I got up from my desk, walked towards the door.
There had been about a dozen workmen in the office earlier but I stared at the ground. There were 12 pairs of shoes and thongs all sitting in the doorway without owners. For a moment I seriously thought that they had spontaneously combusted. Then I realised that the loud drilling noise was getting louder and I walked closer and discovered all 12 workmen lying on the floor of the managing partner's office fast asleep. That's when I discovered the Chinese habit of the afternoon siesta!!
Walk around some parts of Shanghai or Beijing from about 2pm up until 5pm and you will find people fast asleep. By the side of the road, on steps, on the back of their motorbikes, under a tree. Yesterday I was on campus and I was walking back towards the South East Gate and I passed by three restaurants and the student canteen. Everywhere I looked, there were cooks, waiters and waitresses fast asleep. Some were lying across chairs, some sitting with their heads slumped on the table, some sitting with their heads falling back, some lying on the table, some lying on the floor.
It was a very Sleeping Beauty moment as you could have sworn that a magic spell had hit them and each person had just fallen asleep where he or she was sitting. You might remember when I took photos of my favourite dumpling place. That day, I witnessed the Big Sleep on a slightly smaller scale!
Anyway, I want to make a music post and then I have to get onto studying. Tomorrow's classes are zong he (comprehensive class) and listening.