A Chinese Hospital

Yesterday, Elvia and I took the school van down to Chongqing to visit the Foreigners’ Hospital for my physical examination. While I already went through this whole procedure in the U.S., I had been warned by CIEE that I would probably have to do it again because often parts of it are not recognized by the Chinese government.

If I have anything to say about the Chinese system, it is certainly efficient. I had an ECG, an ultrasound (this was a new one), a blood test, an eye and ear exam, a chest x-ray, and a physical exam, all administered in under an hour. This hospital felt more like an assembly line than a patient care facility. I was herded into rooms with three or four other people, and often asked to take off my shirt in front of them. The blood test was performed at a window with a line ten or fifteen people deep, as if you were queuing up to buy concert tickets rather than have a needle stuck in you. This would not be a good place for the shy or modest, and there certainly was no such thing as patient-physician confidentiality.

Elvia, having forced uncomfortable foreigners through this process many a time, told me that because of this efficient and impersonal approach to medicine, China was abusing the use of antibiotics because they could easily be prescribed for anything and often bought over the counter. She also told me about a new phenomena where sick young people who do not have the time to stay at home, drink fluids, and rest, will instead come in to the hospital and for 200 kuai ($33) get an IV inserted in their arms to recover their fluids. Elvia thinks this practice is a scam, but apparently most Chinese young people swear by it if they can afford it. While this practice seems pretty crazy to me, with almost 2 billion people to care for how could the medical system not become a little impersonal?

My class was cancelled Thursday because of my hospital trip and all classes are cancelled Monday because it is a public holiday. So I’m heading into Chongqing this weekend to meet up with some other Americans and hopefully get some pizza!

Halloween comes early

This is a particularly long post, for which I apologize in advance, but I promise that it’s (most likely) worth it! Spoiler alert: it involves a haunted house.

The weather finally got a bit cooler here thanks to a healthy amount of rain. I decided to take advantage of this and wander to a park I had passed a few days ago on my way home from the supermarket. It had looked like a beacon of tranquility in a dusty and noisy city.

I knew immediately when I walked in I was going to love it there. There were several middle-aged women practicing tai chi, an older man dancing with a sword, and several little children getting martial arts lessons all within the first one hundred feet. Cliched, maybe, but this was the China I had been imagining. This park is not so much a sprawling Grant Park, but more of a forested recreational area built all over the side of a steep hill. I decided to venture up a set of stairs that disappeared upwards into the trees. There were less people following this path and I wanted a little more peace and quiet, and perhaps a little less being stared at.

So I climbed, and climbed, until finally I reached the top, only to find an oddly charming rundown amusement park. Covered bumper cars, rusted rail tracks, and lonely swings were all that was left of what had clearly been a lively children’s play center. With the rain, the pollution that surrounds everything in an eerie fog, and the sudden quiet, the abandoned rides would have made an excellent setting for a horror movie.

Someone must have read my thoughts because a little ways down the path I came upon a haunted house. Suddenly, three teenage Chinese girls came out of nowhere and knocked on the door. To my surprise, it opened. An old lady took the girls admission fees, and then glanced at me and beckoned me in. Since I still can’t upload photos, picture instead, if you will, something like this:

 So for the exorbitant price of 10 kuai ($1.50, three times what I usually pay for meals) I found myself walking into a rusted Chinese horror house with three very frightened Chinese teenagers. Whether because I was the foreigner and that meant I was brave, or simply that I was expendable, they quickly pulled me to the front of the group to lead the way. After the lights flickered out, the girl immediately behind me suddenly grabbed my hand. And so I found myself, walking into the dark, leading a gaggle of skittish sixteen-year-olds.

Now, I love the cheesiest of horror movies and haunted houses, but this one was particularly disappointing. You could clearly see what was about to pop out at you, and I was even able to distinguish the trip-laser that triggered the mechanical devices as you walked by. Some of these included a giant hot-pink skull whose eyes flashed, a witch who looked like she had last been dusted off during the Salem Witch Trials, and a doctor who was supposed to be some sort of Dr. Frankenstein, but instead looked to be performing a routine appendectomy.

But the Chinese girls loved it, and therefore, so did I. Because really, when else was I ever going to be in a situation like this? After it was over, approx. three minutes after it had begun, I thanked the girls for the experience and asked to take their picture, to which they shyly replied, “No problem!”, posed, giggled, and ran-off.

Follow-up pictures to come in about a week and a half when my camera connector gets here!

You're the teacher now

I had my first class today! A section of thirteen sophomore English majors. I wanted to focus mainly on introductions so they could get to know me and me them. With this in mind, I had a bunch of fun group games and activities lined up.

For the first, I explained to them what “pulling your leg” is. (One of many idioms the textbook wants me to teach.) I then told them they could ask me a question and I would answer with the truth or a lie. They then had to guess in groups whether I was “pulling their leg” or not. Every time they guessed correctly, their team got a point. They seemed to enjoy this, and one of the first questions I got was, “Are you married?” The next was (not quite in question form), “Well, you must have a boyfriend!” When I said,”I do!” they quickly decided, “That’s true!” and would not be convinced otherwise. They also thought I was 26, which I have decided to take as a compliment. The game wound down when one of the boys figured out he could get his team easy points and started asking me things like, “What is your name?” I may have some trouble with this one...

I quickly regained their attention with a PowerPoint with pictures of my house, school, family, etc. I have never, ever, held such rapturous attention from a group, and doubt I ever will again. I used it to explain all of the great things that come from Chicago (some of which I hadn’t even known until I looked it up the night before): Walt Disney, McDonald’s, the Ferris wheel, etc. Watch out New York, the conversion of China into Chicago-lovers has commenced.

Next I asked them to do an activity that involved interviewing a partner to find out three things they had in common and then presenting their interview to the class. I had already learned at this point to assign partners so they wouldn’t chat with their friends in Chinese. It turns out the learning curve for teaching ESL is very quick. Some groups used this activity to show off their senses of humor (or their sarcastic sides, it was hard to tell). One conversation went:

Student A: “Hello, where are you from?”

Student B: “I am from Anhui, where are you from?”

Student A: “Oh, I am not from Anhui, I am from Jiaxing. Look, we are both from China!”

Another pair went through several questions, answering with comically opposite answers until finally one asked, “What is your favorite fruit?”, and before his partner could answer shouted, “Mine too!” Not quite the intention of the activity, but bonus points for creativity.

As a final small group project, an idea from my dad that went really well and I hope to repeat everyday, I showed them a unique photograph and asked them to come up with a story behind it to present to the class. Here is today’s photo:

Many stories were simple, involving a man who wanted to learn to fly. One hilarious version included a tiger chasing a man at a picnic who had to jump over hay to save his family. I was impressed that this particular group even memorized their lines. There was an especially insightful description that made this activity particularly worthwhile and went beyond what I was expecting:

“The man named A’Gan, he is a little foolish but he has a wonderful goal. He practices running fast day by day and hopes one day he could become a spiderman to save the world. He lives in a not so peaceful world, where has lots of wars, fires, drugs and so on. Good for him.”

Here’s to a (mostly) successful first class!

Classes cancelled

I have learned that I am in charge of all of the freshmen and half of the sophomore English majors. Since all freshmen have military training for the first few weeks, I do not have to start those classes until October. I have three sophomore sections with 10, 15, and 20 students respectively, relatively small by Chinese standards. I am relieved by this because at orientation we had been told to expect 30-40 students. I have been given a book to base my curriculum off of that looks to be surprisingly useful. I only have to use the themes of each chapter, and can pick and choose between book activities and my own. The only downside is the text was written in Britain, so for certain things I will have to clarify what the real English term is.

Now, however, classes keep getting cancelled because of the heat. None of the classrooms have air-conditioning, so on top of being postponed all last week, classes have again been cancelled Monday with a forecast of 101 degrees. I am supposed to have classes Tuesday and Thursday, but we'll see what happens because the forecast doesn't have the temperature dropping below 95 until Friday. 

So it looks like a few more days to wander around, drink lemonade, and eat Chinese street pancakes. As you can probably tell by the frequency of postings on this blog, I'm ready to have something productive to do with my time. At least I'm getting all my law school applications filled out way in advance!

ADLUSTABLEAPEED

Best Chinglish encounter so far: there is a dial on my wall that says ADLUSTABLEAPEED. Below that it says ON/OFF. I was so baffled by this that I stared at it for twenty minutes, terrified if I tried it something involving “adlust” and/or “apeed” would abruptly shoot out from somewhere. I was incredibly proud of myself when I figured out it is the button to my fan, and was meant to read Adjustable Speed.

As an aside, my shower head is broken. This is in a way a relief; I thought I just couldn’t figure it out so fiddled with everything in my apartment for a few hours. For the foreseeable future I will be showering with the help of a bucket and a faucet next to the toilet that stands about a foot and a half off the ground. I am not sure the original intended use of this faucet, but I would guess somewhere along the lines of a bidet in Europe. Oh the things I do for you, China.

For all one of you wondering (Hi Mom!), the cockroach has been captured and disposed of. I pray he doesn’t have family somewhere on the sixth floor calling in reinforcements to avenge his death and try the weird food the waiguoren (foreigner) has in her refrigerator…

Picky-eaters Prohibited

Last night Elvia showed me around downtown Hechuan so I know the proper places to buy essentials. Everything here is amazingly cheap. Elvia would point at something and talk about how it was a little more expensive at this shop, but still reasonable. I would then look at the price and start jumping for joy. I bought a lemonade-tea concoction (so delicious, I have a feeling the ladies at this specific shop are going to get to know me very well) for only 2.50 yuan or FORTY CENTS. I stocked up on a giant thing of water, loads of toilet paper and garbage bags, and a towel all for approx. $8. My fancy dinner with Elvia’s friends, which included plenty of pi jiu (beer), was the wallet-emptying purchase of the night at a whopping $5. I think I’m going to like it here.

When Elvia told me about the restaurant we were going to she told me it was very famous in Hechuan for its ji rou (chicken). I could have found this place from half a mile away, as a few blocks from the place we started hearing lots of squawking. We walked in and I stared in the eyes of a dozen chickens, one of which I was about to consume. I saw the wash bin where a cook was de-feathering the chicken, and another block that I would prefer not to talk about for the sake of the vegetarians reading this blog (*cough* Chelsea and Anita *cough*).

The bowl that was brought out to us after we sat down is a very unique version of hot pot, and I was lucky that there were a delicious Chinese potato included because I could not quite bring myself to eat more than a few measly bites of chicken. This was not so much out of a sense of animal activism, but mainly because I was having a hard time distinguishing between meat and non-meat. At the end of the meal, a giant bowl of ‘soup’ was brought out. Or at least that’s what I thought it was. It turns out it was the chicken’s innards and private parts, as no part of the animal goes to waste in China. Congealed on top was what I was told was chicken blood, and the Hechuanese believe it is very good for you to eat this because it clears away all the dust from your system that has collected as a result of the construction. Honestly, it tasted better than some of things I have had-- kind of like a salty pudding. I think China is a good cure for picky eating, all American food is going to look safe compared to the guesswork involved over here.

I met some of Elvia’s third-year English students on the way back to my apartment. They were very friendly, spoke English amazingly well, and when I told them I was from Chicago one quickly lit up and shouted, “Chicago Bulls!” It turns out reverence for Michael Jordan extends all the way to China, which is great and means I have an instant in with my students. I’m planning on using this to my advantage and converting all of my students into massive fans of anything Chicago.

My hospital visit has been postponed until next week, as have classes as a result of the incredible heat-wave (102 degrees today), so I will have plenty of free time this weekend to do some exploring, reading, catching-up on things in the states, etc.

We're not in Shanghai anymore

I arrived in Hechuan last night and just got my internet up and running. Lots to share, so I apologize for the long post...

Hechuan is a pretty poor city. It is on the outskirts of Chongqing, one of the largest cities in China. Chongqing has been pegged as the next city to modernize to the standards of Beijing and Shanghai, although it is about ten-fifteen years behind. China views Chongqing as the gateway to connect Eastern China with the West and its resources. My "waiban" (foreign helper) explained to me that when you talk about Chongqing, you say it is Three H’s: Hot (both the heat and the women apparently), Hilly, and Humid. Chongqing’s nicknames include the “Mountain City” and one of the “Furnaces of China.” It was a sweltering 99 degrees when I got here yesterday and will apparently stay that way through September.

Hechuan itself is a mixture of farmlands and rapid development, as I can tell just from the view outside my bedroom window. Right below me is a house that hosts a chicken pen, cats, and a few other animals on its porch, and a few hundred meters beyond that are six different skyscrapers in various stages of construction. While I didn’t really notice the pollution in Shanghai, it is hard to miss here. I can only make out the outlines of most buildings and hills in the distance, and the sun seems to be in a perpetual haze.

My apartment, while still slightly cleaner than the Frisbee House, leaves a lot to be desired. There are lots of holes in the wall and tiles, and my washing machine looks like it was hit by a nuclear bomb (I kid you not, wait until I can post photos.) I have a TV that I can’t figure out since the remote control is in Chinese, and a welcoming party of one cockroach who has so far evaded the broom I keep swinging at him. Nothing that hopefully a bunch of throw rugs, wall hangings, and lysol can’t fix.

When I got out of the airport in Chongqing, I was met by my college’s waiban Elvia. She is a young teacher in the English department who volunteered a few years ago to help coordinate the foreign teachers in order to improve her English. She is wonderful, and informed me that once I got in we were going to dinner with some officials at the school to welcome me.

After dropping my luggage off, we met up with Mr. Deng, the head of human resources; the dean of the English department; Mr. Yan and his assistant, who as far as I can tell are in charge of the logistics of my stay with the Chinese government; an art teacher at the school; Justin, the other foreign teacher from Maryland, and his Chinese girlfriend.

As only half the table spoke varying degrees of English, most of the meal was in Chinese and involved lots of gesturing and toasting. I quickly learned it is a Chinese tradition to frequently toast other people at the table. As you do this you clink glasses (or bowls in our case) and try to lower your glass below theirs as a form of respect. Beer was flowing and after many of these toasts, Mr. Yan asked Elvia how to say something in English and then turned to me and pronounced, “Drunk!” while gesturing to his increasingly red face.

The food was delicious and plentiful. However, as has been the case for most of my stay in China, I didn’t know half of what I was putting in my mouth. I had been warned how spicy Sichuanese food is, and experienced this firsthand when I accidentally ate a peanut dish that had whole red peppers in it. My mouth felt like I had licked a fire poker and my eyes were watering for the next ten minutes to the amusement of the Chinese at the table. Mr. Deng took it upon himself after that to pick out all of the non-spicy food and put it on my plate. I think this was also in reaction to him observing my lack of chopstick skills. I felt obligated to try everything he put on my plate, so as a consequence I am 75% sure I ate chicken feet at one point.

Overall, the meal was wonderful and incredible welcoming. Even though I couldn’t understand most of the conversation, I did understand the congenial and humorous atmosphere. On to a Chinese hospital tomorrow for my physical examination...