(no subject)

Sep 13, 2006 13:13




Today's Wednesday and I'm in a wangba again. The way things are, I can use Teacher Order's research students' room to check my email (I'm having it all forwarded to a new Chinese address) and I can see this blog there too, but not the Guardian, Facebook is slow, and this blog seems to be read-only there. So to update, I come here to this wangba. I am amazed at the 网虫 or 'web insects' phenomenon. They actually have recognizable physical afflictions associated with their condition, mostly twitchy wrists, short, sharp nervous coughs, and an extremely taut musculature which pulls them forwards into the computer screen in a sort of frustrated clench. They don't smoke as much as they might, possibly because their hands are occupied... Occasionally one will be watching an interesting-looking film, but mostly they just splutter with tension and navigate through brightly coloured lands peopled with blob gobshites on tuk-tuks. After they've done that for eight hours, what do they do? I suppose they go home. I don't understand their lives, but their parents must be rich. And dissatisfied. I think that's why Teacher Order got a bit jumpy when Clear Logic investigated the silly games on my new mobile phone - tip of the feared iceberg, maybe.

I don't know what to tell you... hmm, so let's go for the default. I've never worked so hard before as I have to now. The 高级班 is hard - the standard is really high. We've lost a Slovak and two Russians already. I have more respect for people like bokane every day, so I do. Having said that, I do also speak up a lot in class, and I usually at least understand what the exercise is asking us to do, even if I don't have the vocab to do it. It's all grand. I'm definitely learning, anyway, and the teaching is great.

My Korean classmate Dazzle Upright is a brick, she's all for sitting all day and studying with me. Yesterday we studied pretty much all day and then gathered some others and went for a Korean meal. I'd never eaten Korean food before. Edinburgh classmate Outstanding Scholar was there too, which was nice - Korean food means metal chopsticks, and I didn't have to struggle with them alone! I hadn't expected so many Koreans, there are lots in the language school and they're really incredibly nice. They laugh a lot and wear baseball caps and often seem to be Catholic. I totally didn't realise Koreans were so Catholic.

In the library I went to look for a source of boiling water (a normal pursuit, nothing to do with castle defence or anything) and ended up in the basement level. I nearly burned myself on the source of boiling water and a more or less American voice said "careful, it's really hot". You occasionally come across Chinese students who've ended up with perfect Amerikansk despite never having left China. The student's Amerikansk was so good that I didn't immediately speak Chinese to him, and when I did it was all, like, gasp, you speak Chinese. I'm like, why would I be here if I couldn't speak any Chinese? Masochism? No, I didn't say that. Anyway, his name was Surpassing Kindness. He said he'd seen me the day before with a bunch of friends. The fact that he met me alone the next day suggests either slight trailery or an involuntary grasp of 缘分 yuan2fen4, the thing that makes strangers meet and 'human interest' coincidences happen. You (Uncle Sam finger) decide.

I hope the name-adulterating isn't peeving, by the way. I think it's important that non-Chinese speakers realise what amazing names their Chinese friends have, and just haven't been telling them. Of course, some names don't translate well. As A Rock is a good example. Slightly porny-sounding adjectives don't suit him.

What else... I don't think there's much else. I'm, er, in China. As are some of you. Cheers.

Previous post Next post
Up
[]