Above:The Baha'i House of Worship of Asia. Below:Life and times of your fellow World Citizen, Kolya

NFC Y12

Part II

Settling-in to Life at Baotou New Century Jianghai School

The New Century Jianghai schools are private boarding schools with elementary through high school grade levels. There are about 3 other such New Century Schools in China, so far, as well as an affiliated university. The one here in Baotou and the one in Shanghai only just opened this school year. Most of my classes were with the primary school kids where I taught together with Ann and Miss Hung and so it was all a pretty light work load. I'm also assisted at the Junior and Senior levels (by Jason and Mr. Zhang) because even the upper-classmen’s oral English levels are not good enough for me to be able to teach effectively without necessitating some translation every now and then.
In the first semester the school was still very small with only about 200 students but grew to about 1000 by its second year. The first year was in temporary quarters, the classrooms were being rented from another school and the offices and dorm rooms for some of the administrators and faculty (and me) were being rented from a floor of a hotel that stands next to the campus. The next year the school moved to a brand-new, newly built campus. It now (Fall 2003) provides actual apartments for the foreign teachers (and most of the other teachers) as opposed to the dormitory-like hotel room in which I sat when i typed the first version of these words. However, the building wasn't finished until after i left the school in August 2003.
Despite Baotou's winter's, from the start I was very much feeling that I wanted to stay at the Baotou New Century School through next year, at least, simply because I was immensely curious about what it was going to be like to be part of the school on its new campus, with all the brand new facilities—and more students and teachers. Also, the longer I stay here the more friends I make and the less it makes me want to move to a new city—although Old Man Winter might have it in his power to change my mind!—but only after a few more years at the earliest!
My colleagues in the dorm were impressed that I practice Taijiquan, it seemed, and James (the second in command) said one of his few English phrases, “very good”, when he discovered me practicing. I'm the only one at the school who practices Taiji, as far as I know. I practice the bear minimum of once right after getting up and once right before going to bed and almost never miss one of these 10 min or so sessions. I do also try to use the principles throughout the day, though, for example, when I'm standing around I try to remember to stand with all my weight on one leg or with a 70-30% weight distribution—if nothing else this helps to strengthen my legs more. And I try to remember to feel like my head is suspended from the heavens on a string, and that the foot with my weight on it feels like it’s firmly “rooted” in the earth. I naturally breath with my stomach muscles (as opposed to “chest breathing”), so I don’t even have to think about that . My Chinese is coming along very slowly but surely. I haven’t studied enough but being immersed in the language environment helps slow improvement even without much self study!
I was able to get 3 free meals a day at the cafeteria so I didn't need to buy food elsewhere (except when I might have wanted a snack or snack food in my room which was very seldom, since I didn’t often feel the urge to snack outside of these meals). Most of the food was pretty good and I liked a number of the dishes but I did greatly miss Indian cuisine that I was most recently blessed with for all of August 2001, when I was in Delhi last. And I also miss Middle Eastern, Italian, Mexican and some American food like good American pizza. The only meat I don’t mind sometimes eating is white meat—that has been brought up in a healthy environment—fish and fowl (but I'm completely happy with good veggie food which is easy to achieve in India), however, the Chinese, in general, like all kinds of meat, mostly sheep, pig, cow, chicken and fish (in Chinese the meat isn't hidden behind the extra terms of mutton, pork and beef but is simply called what it is [Although of course it was never planned or intentional for there to be separate words for meats and animals but is simply a result of the Norman conquest of Britain which introduced new vocabulary to the dining tables of the ruling class (the French speaking Normans). For more on this I recommend Bill Bryson’s MOTHER TONGUE—The English Language.]).
I was always happy with Chinese restaurant food in the West but I wasn’t sure whether I would like “the real deal” having already read about the Chinese love of meats before I arrived. And not only do they like meats here but that includes more areas then one is generally used to in the west (head, organs, feet/tails)… Now, I think it’s admirable to not let any parts of an animal go to waste, but since I'm not much of a meat eater, in the first place, I don’t think I’ll be able to bring myself to go for any of those chicken or duck heads or feet since it doesn’t seem like there’s much meat on them to start with. Furthermore, even though I don’t mind chicken I never really liked wings or thighs which involves nibbling around the bone and seems to be more mess and trouble then the little bit of meat on these body parts is worth. … Well, feel free to call me a squeamish, fussy and picky city kid of the fast-food generation (although except for Pizza and Sandwiches (American “Subs”) I don’t like fast food)! I was offered a few times for them to ask the cook to make special dishes for me but it would be too much trouble for the cooks to make something special for a single individual when there’s so many to cook for, so I always declined. There’s always still plenty of food that I like to eat for me to be full and satisfied. One of the phrases I’ve been taught is: “Wo chir bao le”—I'm full. It continues to come in handy as I'm often asked whether I’ve had enough by my fellow teachers with whom I eat, who I guess are all concerned that I get enough to eat. And it brings great joy to them when I (can) speak Chinese.
There isn’t anywhere in Baotou that always shows English movies but according to my Canadian friend, Brian, (and 10 year resident of Baotou) some movies are occasionally shown in the original with Chinese subtitles but one can never know which movies will be shown like this or in which movie theatre. Since I'm mostly out of luck as far as seeing movies on the big screen, one of my favorite things to do— watch movies— is reduced to the small screen (there are certain movies that I especially like to see on the big screen), for example, the upcoming Lord of the Rings movies. I’ve bought five VCDs so far—for US$1 a piece! [VCDs are different from DVDs in that DVDs can only be played on a computer if it has a DVD drive but VCDs can be played on a computer with a regular CD-ROM drive (of a certain minimum speed—which most are nowadays).] And recently Jason took me to a nearby VCD rental place (and book store) where one can rent new VCDs for just Y1 for one day—that’s just around $0.12! But admittedly the quality of VCDs is not generally that good, much of the time—but it’s still better than never being able to see these movies at all. The VCDs I bought are Final Fantasy(****:Kolya’s rating out of 5 stars), Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes(***), Tomb Raider(**) and Kiss of the Dragon(**) with Jet Li, and 15 Minutes(***1/2) with Robert Deniro. And so far I’ve also seen 3 others that we rented but for some reason Apes, Dragon, and Shanghai Noon wouldn't work on my computer (using the latest Windows Media Player and a regular CD-ROM player) but the others do (i.e. 3 don’t work out of 8). However these 3 do all work on Chinese media-playing software (also with normal CD-ROM drives) or actual VCD players. Final Fantasy is fun if you like sci-fi (and I do) also it's fun to watch because it's 100% computer graphics but very realistic—spectacle! Also I found the storyline quite interesting. It's too bad I can't see them on the big screen though. I went to the shop together with my new friend and fellow English teacher, Jason. Also he (and many of my colleagues here) are around my age, 22-29.
On my first free weekend (after every fortnight of classes) I was taken out to do some horse riding, and go-cart racing with Executive Principal Wang and the administrators and a couple of the faculty members, followed by lunch; one of those Chinese meals with much beer quaffing (except by me, of course) and revelry (which I am always happy to take part in). They've all been very accepting about the fact that I don't drink, though, which is great. The go-cart racing was extremely fun . I'm not sure how many cc the engines have (somewhere between 25 and 100?) but they go fast enough to be very fun. I got to have 2 goes with 3 or 4 laps each and enjoyed it immensely! Especially since, for me, it was free!
That weekend I also went to a Karaoke lounge with Principle Wang and the others (also quite a bit of fun) which is on the bottom floor of this hotel. There is a hallway with at least 3 lounges that are reached by going through the bar. I sung along to "Scarborough Fair" (Simon and Garfunkle) and "Country Roads" and "Old Lang Sine". Principal Wang also sung along to “Old Lang Sine” which I guess is one of the few English songs he knows—or likes? (at least of those on the Karaoke machine—which doesn’t have that many English tracks). Principle Wang and Mrs. Gao, a primary school teacher, (and a couple of the others) are great singers! Otherwise, they all sung along to Chinese pop which can sometimes be pretty schmaltzy sounding—at least at first. The Karaoke machine doesn't only project lyrics but also shows videos at the same time, usually of a romantic nature showing a beautiful woman standing around and/or walking a bit, looking somewhat seductive. Or else it shows a couple or at times the singer as in a music video a la MTV.
On Sunday, the final day of the three day vacation, I went with Jason to the main English Corner in Baotou at a nearby park called eight-one park (not 81 bashiyi, but 8, 1 bayi). It was quite late in the morning but there was still a crowd of locals there. If there had been any other foreigners there that morning then they had already left. Being in an English Corner, as a foreigner is not something for people who don’t like being in crowds because one is soon surrounded by people eager to speak and listen to some English conversation. Also the Chinese comfort-zone bubble is much smaller, meaning that people stand much closer. And can result, with some people, in a situation where the foreigner slowly, unconsciously inches backward and the Chinese person slowly, unconsciously inches forwards as the conversation progresses.
After the fourth or fifth attempt, I’ve finally settled on a Chinese name! For one thing, as far as business cards go it seems to me that it works better to have a Chinese name of 2-3 characters rather than trying to put my name in to Chinese characters—4-6 of them. Many foreigners who are planning to stay in China for some time adopt Chinese names. For one thing foreign names are often difficult for Chinese tongues to get around. In the same vein, it takes me a few tries to be able to reiterate a Chinese name, especially if they say it fast, and it’s harder for me to remember Chinese names unless I write them down or can repeat it enough times to myself before I have a chance to forget it. And so it helps one to fit in if one can decide on a Chinese name. On the other side of the coin, many Chinese people give themselves (or have foreign teachers give them) English names.
The teachers all helped come up with a number of possibilities over my first 3 ½ weeks here. But I finally settled on Shí Wénlóng 石文龙 (in Taiwan and other parts of the Chinese speaking world they still use the old Character for lóng/dragon which looks like this 儱 but without the vertical line at the left). 石(Shí) is a good family name because it sounds like the beginning of Schweppe and is also a traditional Chinese family name. Chinese Family names are traditionally one syllable because they are comprised of a single character. Given names can be one or two syllables—one or two characters. The search for a good name is also complicated by not only finding a name that sounds good (to both Chinese and English ears) but also by finding one whose characters have auspicious meanings and connotations. Shí is good not only because it’s similar to Schweppe (in as much as a single syllable name can be similar to a two to three syllable name) but also because it means solid and strong like rock or stone. Furthermore it’s simple and easy to write! 文 (Wén), the first character of what’s normally the given name denotes scholar, scholarly, literary, writing… this seems good since I like to write and in my mother’s mah-jongg oracle, which I’ve used at times, I’ve often been symbolized by the scholar card in the spreads. 龙 (Lóng) is the Chinese word for dragon and is apt in that I was born in the Chinese year of the dragon (in 76). And who can’t like Dragons after seeing Sean Connery’s dragon in the movie Dragonheart?! Although, of course, eastern dragons are substantially different than western ones. Interestingly, mythologically the Chinese consider themselves all to be sons and daughters of Lóng, one of the teachers told me. [I find it interesting as, Phillip Obah, an Australian Aborigine, and member of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahai's of Australia, noted that there are 3 (at least) cultures/continents that identify themselves with a snake (or snake like creature) Australia, South America (the winged serpent) and China (a Chinese Dragon—also, interestingly, capable of flight— is essentially a big snake with legs).] So there it is, I'm Mr. Rock-solid, Writer-Dragon:石文龙! By the way, for those of you not familiar with pinyin each of the words as marked by the “´” is a 2nd, or rising tone. The tone goes higher when pronounced—otherwise your saying something else entirely! [There are 4 tone sounds in Chinese which give a word (of the same pinyin spelling) a different meaning when it has a different tone.]