Tea leaves garden

About a month ago I received a phone call from a graduate teacher of my school asking me to come to his son’s kindergarten Thanksgiving party. I told him Thanksgiving happened to fall on my birthday this year and that I would like nothing else than to see how Chinese kindergarteners celebrate Thanksgiving. I had never met him before but this type of invitation is not unusual. Last year I probably would have anxiously started to ask many questions in order to get a better idea of the stranger and then told him that I was too busy.

The Thanksgiving party ended up being postponed until mid-December and instead I went out with the graduate teacher Dan, his wife Melissa, and their son Gary for lunch yesterday afternoon. Whenever I am picked up in a car in Wuhan, I always feel like I am going on an adventure because for the most part, I walk or take a green shuttle bus with all the other university students to class in the morning, and during the weekend I will take a taxi or bus to farther destinations.

Gary was just as excited to leave the city for the afternoon, as he changed his seat position a few times during the car ride. When we reached the East lake, which I have been told is the largest enclosed lake within a Chinese city, Gary pointed to the lake and said, “太阳掉到水里了 (mandarin: tai yang diao dao shui li le!” which means “the sun fell into the water!” And he was right. The sun was so bright that afternoon that its reflection was glistening in the water.

His mother recently had read him a Chinese tale called “The Monkey and the moon,” which is a children’s tale about a monkey who mistakes the moon’s reflection for falling into the water. From then on, the day was filled with comparisons, which is what Gary had been learning to do in his classes. At the Chinese restaurant, Gary pointed out that his orange shoes matched the color of the fish in the pond, and the traveling keyboardist who went around performing for different guests reminded Dan of the strolling violinists on the river walk in San Antonio. Dan was very fond of America and his experience as a Fulbright scholar at the University of Missouri’s school of journalism.

After lunch Dan said he wanted to take me to a place his friend introduced him to when his wife was pregnant, a place that he was pretty sure I had never been to before. Dan turned off the main road onto a dirt road and rolled up the car’s tinted windows and told me that we were entering private property, but assured me that it was fine. Like most things in Wuhan, traffic rules are rarely followed. It is common for vehicles to go through red lights or drive on the wrong side of a 4-lane highway, so this was not out of the ordinary.

As we got farther away from the main road, fields of tea leaves started to appear and Gary exclaimed, “妈妈我在你的肚子里面 (ma ma wo zai ni de du zi li mian)!” or “Mom I am inside your stomach!” He had remembered a photograph of his mother pregnant with him, standing in front of the tea gardens. We got out of the car and walked along a dirt path as Gary went in and out of the rows of green tea leaves. Melissa pointed out a community of people. They were playing mahjong outside, farming the fields, and generally content in their peaceful environment. As we went out of the farmland, I told Dan that it was the most serene place I had been to in Wuhan and that I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to find it again. My impression of the place reminded Dan of a Chinese idiom 世外逃源 (shi wai tao yuan) meaning an isolated ideal world. The idiom is derived from a story that is told here:

http://www.confuciusinstitute.net/resources/576

I had never had so much attention before coming to China. I was overwhelmed by the amount of invitations to judge English-speaking contests, by eager students wanting to practice their oral English with the new foreigner, and I felt it was odd when I had students from other universities knocking on my apartment door inviting me to take part in their beloved English corner events. I always thought of myself as a trustful person and at times too trustful with strangers. Towards the end of my first year, I had developed more trust in people and didn’t have to know all the information before getting myself involved. I came back to Wuhan for a second year and for the most part I only see the kindness and curiosity that Wuhan people have towards foreigners. I go into situations with an open-mind and I try and commit to as many invitations as I can handle. I had never met Dan and his family before yesterday, but it is invitations like these that I may have missed in the beginning of my stay in Wuhan.

As we returned into the city again, Dan reminisced about his life in Missouri and remarked that the people had the same friendly attitude as Wuhaners. As we were weaving in and out of a horrible traffic jam, he said, “You know a lot of Chinese people want to live in America but Wuhan is my home. Besides, I wasn’t able to pass my drivers test.”

“You are very robust!"

Before coming to China, I had never heard the word robust used as often as I do here. My first week back in Wuhan, I remember it first being used by my coordinator Rainy, who called me at the Shanghai airport and her first words were, “Hi Meggie, yes, how are you? Your Phelps is a very robust man!”

Within the first week I was told that my most athletic student this year was Allen, named after the professional basketball player Allen Iverson. He was said to be very robust. Recently, I started to notice the use of the word as I saw more of my students out running on the track in preparation for the big sports meet. I have gotten quite used to people starring at me as I run around the track, mostly grandparents who are out with their grandchildren, but this week I felt a little bit more attention as my students were quite curious about their teacher’s athleticism.

A few students that I ran into said, “ah you are very robust!” In a typical Chinese fashion, once a word is thought to be the appropriate word for the context, they will stick to it. I didn’t care to ask why “robust” seemed to be the chosen adjective for anyone wearing athletic apparel, and it made me smile to think that I fell into the same category as Michael Phelps and Allen Iverson.

The second week of the sports unit was spent talking about marathons. The students were very interested in the fact that some of the NYC marathon runners chose to show their U.S. presidential preference by wearing “Obama” or “McCain” decals but most agreed that such an event should be for the athletes and not a forum for politics. I asked the students if the three-time gold medal winner Radcliffe was robust, and they all shouted “yes!”

I briefly mentioned to my students that I noticed “robust” being used often in speech, but the class fell silent and I moved on. It was not until break that Summer, a student of mine, said as I was taking a sip of water, “Meggie, we first discovered this word from the water bottle’s name that you are drinking now!” I looked down and she was right, the company’s name was “Robust” or 乐百氏! I took off the sticker and wore it as a wristband in excitement over the newfound knowledge of its origin. As Don Winter gave me an in-depth explanation of the PH levels of the different types of water bottle companies, I caught a glimpse of Harrison taking off his “robust” sticker and joining me in wearing the “robust” wrist band.

Later that day, I went running on the track and was called over by Casey, another student of mine. She had her hands full of books and was listening to BBC English. We talked briefly about the BBC English episode and just as I was heading away, she yelled out, “you are very robust!” I was still wearing the sticker from the morning class, and so I lifted up my sleeve and gave her a thumbs up, and once she recognized the label, she jumped up and yelled, “YES!”

Sports Meeting 运动会

One year ago, Wuhan University of Technology’s (WHUT) annual track and field weekend was cancelled because Ministry of Education officials were visiting the university in order to evaluate the school’s progress. As a “key” university, it is crucial for WHUT to pass all evaluations by the government in order for it to continue to receive funding. Initially, I was disappointed to hear that the events would be cancelled, but pleased to have both the basketball rims strung up with nets and a newly constructed track and field, free from dirt and dust. After the officials’ departure, the nets disappeared but the track and field remained intact. Since then, the track and field have been a source of constant activity and school spirit on campus.

Last weekend, I was pleased to attend WHUT’s annual three-day sports competition. I enjoy these types of events because I am able to see a multitude of WHUT teachers, administrators and students gather together on the track and field. In similar fashion to the Olympic opening ceremony, participants and prominent guests marched around the track field waving their nation’s flag as students and spectators cheered them on. You can view the procession here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38S7fngLp3I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNXJ1PpEvKU&feature=related


The weather was raining off and on and fortunately held off for the opening ceremony to began at 9:30 A.M. The opening ceremony consisted of 900 students performing tai chi and pre-school students performing a Chinese “friendship” song. A handful of my students participated in the track and field events and others joined the Foreign Language cheerleading squad and sat in the bleachers in the formation of a “V” for victory. Over 20 departments participated and it appeared that the management department had the most organized cheerleaders and best athletes.

Unfortunately, as soon as I started to take photographs, my camera lost its battery power. One of my students, Don Winter, who is an outgoing student who will tell me about his ambitious plans to fix the economic crisis during class breaks or will blurt out inappropriate comments during class that certain girls gained weight over a holiday break, took it upon himself to be my escort for the day and to subsequently ask every person who held a camera to send me his or her photographs. It turned out to be serendipitous as I was able to meet the organizers of the university’s photography association! Below are some of their photographs of the sports competition.

Leading up to the sports competition, I decided to focus two of my lessons on physical education in China and America. My favorite part of the lesson was teaching them the sport of lacrosse, about which they didn’t have any prior knowledge. I brought my lacrosse stick into the classroom. I remember that this particular stick was one of my biggest purchases in college and it involved copious amounts of research by my father. I told my students that it cost 90 dollars (630 Yuan), which shocked them especially after they initially thought the stick was used as a cleaning tool, face mask, and fishing stick.

In one of my classes, I decided to hold a competition at the end of class. I held a 1 v. 1 game and the final contestants were Monica and Eartha. I had the students choose which player they thought would win. I figured they would choose Monica because of all my female students she is the strongest student in the class. The students, however, overwhelming wanted Eartha, nicknamed the “Golden Mirror.” I didn’t know why they chose her just like I didn’t understand her popularity with the students. In class Eartha is one of the quietest students and sometimes I think she is moving in slow motion. But as soon as I said “go!” Eartha went into full motion trying all these different spin moves and bouncing all around while still keeping the yellow ball safe in the pocket of her stick. She was completely determined to cross that end line and my students knew it as they shouted intensely for her. Monica stayed by her side by shuffling her legs as Eartha maneuvered her way around the front of the classroom, but in the end Eartha won. As the whole class clapped in excitement for Eartha, she returned unassumingly back to her seat. She did it so effortlessly. She was golden that day.

Kindergarten students perform "friendship song" which is commonly learned in
Chinese primary school:
找朋友的歌:
找朋友, 找朋友, 找到一个好朋友
敬个礼, 握握手, 我们都嗜好朋友

Law student at the start of the 100m

太极 ／ Tàijí ／ Taiqi