Public Speaking in China

It has been a busy month since I last wrote, and I can’t help but begin to feel sentimental about leaving China.  First, I have given three formal speeches in Chinese the past few weeks.  Fortunately, the first speech I gave was so painful and uncomfortable that I had nowhere to go but up. 

 

A student had asked me if I would be willing to discuss American college life with a few Chinese students.  I accepted without hesitation and she sent me an email telling me where to meet her.  Because of the rain and humid weather, I felt sick and congested for a good three weeks.  The week of the speech was no exception, so I was hoping to finish the speech as quickly as possible to get back home and rest.  I met her outside one of the school classrooms and asked her how many students she was expecting.  She told me she would be surprised if more than 10 students showed up.  Naturally, I was a bit surprised when I saw about 50 students and a photographer waiting for me behind the podium.  The informal discussion was so informal that it involved a microphone, podium, and photographer.  Even worse, I was exhausted and had absolutely no idea what I was going to speak about.  While I am quite comfortable giving impromptu speeches in English, I don’t have the same confidence in Chinese.  Despite some awkward moments, the speech was not a total failure and I learned to prepare a little more for my next speech in Chinese. 

 

Aside from giving speeches in Chinese, I have also been busy becoming friendly with the locals.  One incident especially sticks out.  I was buying train tickets to Nanjing a few weeks ago when a young Chinese man approached me.  Excited that he heard a white guy speak Chinese, he decided to start a conversation and asked me where I was from.  I told him I was American but he didn’t seem convinced.  He told me that I didn’t look American.  Because I meet so many Chinese people who claim they know what Americans do and don’t look like, I was getting ready to hear more of the same comments.  However, he surprised me by telling me that I looked Jewish.  Jewish?  How did he know anything about Jews?  More importantly, how did he know that I was Jewish?  The majority of Chinese cannot differentiate between different groups of non Asians.  In fact, most Americans could probably not look at someone and immediately know that he is Jewish.  For a Chinese person who has never met a Jewish person to immediately know is beyond impressive.  I have friends from Yemen and Syria who thought that I was either Syrian or Yemenite.  My friends from France all thought that I was France, and my friends from Latin America ask if I am from South America.  But my friend from a small village in Central China knows immediately that I am Jewish.  The irony is that he doesn’t know anything about Jews.  He asked me if we were centered in Iraq and whether we believe in Jesus or Mohamed. 

 

Consequently, I have been eating dinner with him quite often and will keep you updated on his story.  I have a few more topics I’ll write about in the next two weeks.  Stay posted

My Experience in a Chinese Hospital

Unfortunately, I was injured yesterday and had to be taken to a Chinese hospital.  I tripped while walking down the stairs and bumped my head against the wall.  When I got back up, the guard at our dorm was screaming hysterically.  Before I could calm her down, I realized that I my head was drenched in blood.  The guard put her hand on my head to stop bleeding, and then she walked me to the school clinic.  The clinic is closed on Sundays, so we called the ambulance and had a Chinese student accompany me to the nearest hospital.  Because I live in the Developmental Zone, most of the people in the area are relatively poor.  As a result, the hospital caters to that demographic. 

The ambulance couldn’t pull into the hospital because a bunch of illegal taxis were blocking the entrance.  After I entered the hospital and looked around, I was very surprised that there was no lobby or center.  Every room had some specific use and was filled with people.  I was quickly taken to a table nearby and sat for a few minutes until the nurse arrived.  She examined my head, which was still bleeding, and then left.  I noticed a group of 6 men sitting in front of me and working on a computer.  Surprisingly, I couldn’t tell if they were patients or doctors.   Half an hour later, I  was asked to stand and talk to one of the men in front of me.  I explained to him what had happened.  He gave me a slip of paper and told me to walk upstairs.  My Chinese friend helped me up the steep staircase, and we finally found the operating center.  We sat down in what felt like a warehouse basement, and a woman told us to wait a little while.  The people next to me had rather severe injuries.  For example, the woman next to me had a finger that was in two pieces.

When a nurse called me in, I handed her my slip and she told me to go to Room 2.  The doors to the operating rooms were all open, so I saw the other patients being operated on.  The surgeon walked in and immediately started cutting my hair.  I asked him if the needles had been used before, and he told me that his gloves were brand new.

Not knowing how serious my injury was, I chose to stay at the hospital and let them take care of me.  The surgeon put a very bright light over me and started examining me like I was a specimen.  He then stitched my wound and put a head cover on me.  Unfortunately, the head cover was about 5 sizes too small and quite painful.  The doctor told me that it was finished and that I should not wash my head for 8 days.  He then handed me a tissue to wash my face.  There was neither a sink or a mirror in the room.  I left the tissue there and went downstairs to pay. 

I did not bring my insurance card and had very little cash on me.  As I approached the cashier, I became more and more worried.  Ironically, the bill was only 43 Yuan- less than $7.

Everything felt alright until I got back home.  As soon as I walked into the dorm, the students all stared at me in shock.  I didn’t understand why they were all so gloomy until I saw myself in the mirror.  Wow.  My face and head were still full of blood, and now I was wearing an awkward white hat that was also full of blood.  Feel free to check out my pictures to see how I looked.

The doctor didn’t even wash my hair or face before he gave me stitches.  Moreover, he told me I couldn’t wash my head or take the hat off for 8 days. 

I immediately went to a better hospital in the city, and I was an attraction wherever I went.  Imagine a white guy calmly walking around town with a broken head and a bloody face.  The second doctor couldn’t believe my condition.  He told me the first doctor used silk stitches and didn’t even disinfect my wound before stitching me up.   After the second doctor took care of me, I returned home reflecting on my day.

I felt so lucky that I was able to go to a nice hospital and be taken care of properly.  Lucky that I could go to the best Doctor and not just the cheapest.  Most Chinese would love to go to a hospital like the first one that I went to.  However, most Chinese don’t even have that option.

 As I returned home, I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I learned from the whole experience.  Please check out the pictures.

Touring a Chinese Factory

As I mentioned earlier, my campus is located in the Minhang Developmental Zone and is surrounded by factories.  Naturally, I thought it would be a good idea to explore the area and tour some factories.  Unfortunately, I didn’t know anyone who had contacts in a factory and had to ask around.  So I asked everyone that I knew; including illegal taxi drivers. 

One of the drivers has friends that work in a textile factory and offered to show us around.  I invited an Israeli friend to come along with me and my Chinese classmate.  We waited about 45 minutes for the driver to finally arrive.  While we were waiting, we asked other drivers if they could take us around factories.  All told us it was illegal to sneak into a factory and the punishment was severe.  The longer I waited the more I worried about what I was getting myself into. 

Tired of waiting, we decided to find a driver to drop us off close to a factory.  My Chinese friend figured we could bribe someone to let us sneak into one of the factories.  Ironically, the next car that pulled up was of the driver originally going to take us.  We got in and he drove us to a textile factory about 5 minutes away.  He said that he wasn’t sure we would be allowed in, and he first went entered to talk with the manager.  While he was gone, we sneaked into the factory and talked with some of the workers.  The workers were almost all women and their ages varied from teens to late 40s.  Interestingly, not one was from Shanghai district, all were from rather far provinces and lived right behind the factory.  Also, the factory is considered to have better conditions than most others in China.  However, since the factories are worried about competitors stealing their ideas, I was not allowed to take any pictures. 

After 15 minutes of independently touring the factory, the driver introduced us to one of the managers.  She is a 48 year old woman from Shanghai and will be retiring in 2 years.  In China, the retirement age is 50 for women and 60 for men.   The manager gave us a tour of the entire factory and brought us into the management room to ask questions.  I asked about the workers’ wages and benefits.  The minimum wage for all workers in the Shanghai district is 840 Yuan per month.  This translates anywhere from $3-$5 a day.  In terms of benefits, each worker is covered by some sort of health insurance.  Interestingly, workers from outside Shanghai only started using insurance last year.  This reinforces my belief  that China’s insurance market is incredibly under developed.  According to recent statistics, the number of insurance companies working in China are less than 1/10 the number in Singapore.  Singapore has a population of over 2 million, while China’s population is over 1.3 billion. 

Finally, it was very eye-opening to meet with the workers.  Many of them had left their husbands, children, and entire families to earn extra money for the family.  I met a woman who left her children with her mother, and now only sees them once a year for a few weeks.  Fortunately, the conditions in the factory were safe and clean.  I wonder if these workers would be considered lucky to work in a nicer factory.

Chanukkha and 4-Star Bathrooms

Its been too long since I last wrote so get ready for a big update.  I had been traveling around China with friends and family for the past 3 weeks.  Since my website is blocked here in China, I had no way of updating the blog while my family was here.

My last few weeks studying in Beijing were really incredible for two reasons.  First, most students overnight decided to forget about the language pledge.  For the most part, we had been speaking Chinese to each other before and could never have complex conversations.  Many students tried to sound more Chinese and often used Chinese slang.   For example, I tried to become more colloquial and mimicked my roommate.  Unfortunately, my roommate mumbles and 60% of the time responds by saying Wa! or Ah!.  For a couple of weeks, I think I said Wa! or Ah!  at least twice in every conversation.  Once we started speaking English it was like we were completely different people.

The second factor was Chanukkha.  Being a Jew in Beijing is about as exciting as it sounds.  Small, temporary community.   Few events. Fewer synagogues. 

But then came Chanukkha.

 As the holiday approached, the few Jewish kids each contributed something to celebrate the holiday.  In the end, we had one menorah, 60 jelly-donuts (soufganiot), 6 bottles of beer, and 20 Chinese students wanting to celebrate.  We told the story of Chanukkha to our Chinese roommates and then taught everyone Israeli songs and dances.  We even did the full Hora.  Everything was going so great, but then we couldn’t find the menorah.  Someone must have thought it was junk and threw it out.  It didn’t matter.  We celebrated each night with whatever improvisational menorah we could use.  Every night we went to a room and proudly sang Hebrew songs, and every night a roommate asked why we were lighting fires and shouting in a foreign language.  It brought us much closer and deeply confused most of the Chinese roommates.

Some quick observations from my traveling.  First, many bathrooms by major tourist sites are rated on a 4-star scale.   As we left the Forbidden City, we had the privilege of using a 4-Star bathroom.  My friends from the states were expecting an above-average restroom.  Unfortunately, they were disappointed to find a simple bathroom with spit-cans on top of the urinals.  The spit-cans were old beer cans cut in half.  What really caught my attention was the sign in Chinese above each urinal.  The sign said “Take one step forward, take a big step toward civility.”  Its interesting to see how the government communicates to the masses in order to bring about change.  In the West we pursue sanitation and manners as goods in themselves, and our bathroom habits have no connection to politics.   Here it seems that sanitation and manners are pursued more to improve the country’s image.  Wherever you go in China, I am sure you will find a red poster with some slogan about building a more civilized society.  Its interesting that a civilization with almost 6000 years of history is trying to adopt a Western standard of civility, manners, and cleanliness. 

I’ll post more soon along with some pictures of the traveling.

The Underground City

Wanting to make the most of my last few weeks in Beijing, I decided to go check out some of the more touristy areas.  The most interesting place I saw was the Underground City.  The Underground City was built by Mao in the 60′s in case of a nuclear war with the Soviets.  In 2000 it was opened to foreign tourists, but Chinese nationals are not allowed in. 

We took the subway to Tiananmen to get there.  The surrounding area is very well developed and includes most of the government buildings.   However, you only have to walk a few minutes and it feels like you have passed through time.  Beijing’s traditonal alleys look as if they havent been touched since World War II.  Garbage is everywhere.  There is no running water or indoor plumbing.  Walls have collapsed in about half the buildings, and propoganda posters are everywhere. 

The government posters are visibly different in this part of town.  Even the language they use is more intense.  It makes sense that poorer areas tend to have more government slogans and propoganda. 

We finally find the entrance to the Underground City in this litte neighborhood.  The woman who opens the door is draped in military fatigues.  We buy our tickets and start descending into the city. 

She tells us we can take as many pictures as we want; until we get to the city.  Unfortunately, none of us were interested in taking pictures of the empty staircase.

What’s the first thing you see as you enter the city?  Take a guess.  Mao.  A huge poster of Chairman Mao.

The tourguide then leads us around the basic parts of the city: the hospital, school, restaurant, and movie theater.  I told her I was surprised that the government valued arts and entertainment so much.  She then told me that the movie theater was actually built to show government sponsored films.  I should have guessed.

She continued to leads us through narrow hallways decorated with military pictures and paraphenilia until we arrived at a silk market.  The silk market was packed with other foreigners all looking to buy cheap silk products.  The best part is that the goods are all tax free.  Only in China does the government turn a bomb shelter into a silk market. 

Beijing Subway

I realized this weekend that I haven’t seen enough of Beijing and only have a month left.  Plus, I almost always go out with friends and dont get a chance to really meet the locals.  So I decided to roam Beijing by myself with absolutely no idea of where I was going.
I ended up taking the subway until the very end of the red line.  It took me about an hour and a half to get there because the subway was so packed.  When I say packed, I mean packed for China.  Think of everytime you have ever felt crowded in a public area, and then triple the amount of people.  Now imagine all of them squeezed into a smaller space and you have an idea of what it feels like to ride the Beijing subway during rush hour. 

It was the first time that I felt like I could be seriously injured because of all the people.  My friends also rode the subway around the same time, and saw an older woman trampled by a mass of people.  When I squeezed myself into one of the cars, I got pushed into the back door and heard women yelling behind me.  It was complete chaos.  No one waited for others to get off the subway before getting on, it was a free-for-all.  Think survival of the fittest. 

There were guards standing outside the subway car directing people when and where to get on.  The guard told everyone to stand in line and would try to even the lines by moving people around.  When the subway car arrived, he would make sure that people were able to get off the car before everyone stormed in.  He also made sure that the cars don’t get too crowded.  I was pushing myself into one of the cars when I heard him yelling something at me.  All I heard was kuai…, which means fast or hurry.  I assumed he wanted me to push harder and get in the car before the doors close.  As I went for a final push, I felt someone grab my arms from behind me and pull me back.  I thought it was a rude person who wanted to get into the car.  I kept on pushing forward trying to free myself from this person’s grip. 

It turns out the guard was holding my arms because he didnt want me to get into the already crowded car.  In fact, he had asked me to quickly move away from the car becuase it was too crowded.  This is the subway on a regular weekend.  Imagine how packed it will be when the city is flooded with tourists and no one is allowed to drive their car. 

Are you excited for the 2008 Olympics?  Maybe they can add to the games by having a competition to see which subway car can pack the most people.

First Haircut in China

I went to get a haircut yesterday. My hair was a little longer than usual because I was worried about getting my hair cut in China.

My Chinese friend sent me to a top-notch place about 20 minutes from my dorm. There are almost no foreigners in the area, so I was treated like a celebrity as soon as I walked into the salon. The fact that I am white is one thing, but being able to speak Chinese only made them more excited.

Since every place in China seems to have at least 35 employees, I was immediately helped by a young girl who couldn’t stop giggling when she looked at me. They took my jacket and backpack, and then started shampooing my hair. After the shampoo, she massaged my entire upper body for about 15 minutes. A young guy then came and started cutting my hair. About halfway through the haircut, he sent one of the girls to shampoo my hair again.

The entire experience lasted close to an hour and was very relaxing. In the states this would cost at least $40, but in China it costs less than 3 US dollars.

I was really surprised that a haircut is the same in Beijing as in the West. They use the same equipment and it feels very similar to a Western salon. The sheets that they used are either L’oreal or from some salon in Germany. This is one of the more interesting aspects of globalization. The sheet was probably manufactured in China and is now being used in Chinese salons.

This is the 21st century. When you get a haircut in Beijing, you’ll wear a sheet that says “Berlin Hair Styles.”

Great Wall-Recap

The Great Wall was incredible, and very much one of the seven wonders of the world. However, sleeping on the wall was a little rough. The weather was in the low 40′s and it was very windy. This made it very hard to fall asleep.

I slept about 2 hours and spent the rest of the night wandering around the wall and staring at the stars. Walking around the wall in the middle of the night made me feel like I was put back in time. I kept on thinking about soldiers keeping guard on the wall hundreds of years ago. Overall, very cool experience.

After an exhuasting night on the wall, we all went down to our motel for an authentic Chinese breakfast. I was so cold and hungry that I just started eating the closest vegetarian dishes to me. Since I came late to dinner, I had been looking forward to this breakfast the entire night.

One dish had 3 pieces of tofu covered in some red sauce. My roommate confirmed it was tofu, and I put the whole piece in my mouth. Bad decision. I had just stuck one of the worst tasting things in my mouth and had to finish it to be polite. It was so bitter that tears started pouring from my eyes. I spent several minutes trying to swallow this tofu instead of chewing it. After a very painful five minutes, I discovered that the tofu was a delicacy and is eaten in very, very small doses. Apparently, you are supposed to dip your chopsticks in this tofu and have a small taste. Imagine someone eating a spoonful of horse radish and not knowing what it was. Here, I am that guy. Life in China.

Worlds Colliding

Update:  I have fallen in love with the really spicy dish that numbs your tongue when you eat it.  I had it 3 days in a row. 

On Friday I went to the Chabad House here.  We took a cab to get there, and I ended up talking to the cab driver about, surprise, politics.  Because I am not allowed to speak English on my program, I tell everyone I meet that I am French.  The cab driver liked France and really loved Chirac and Sarkozy.  He, like the other 1.4 billion people in China, is not very fond of Bush.  However, I was impressed at how much he knew about American politics.  He said he hoped Hillary would win in 2008.  When I asked what he thought of American girls, he responded by talking about Lewinsky.  Monica Lewinsky.  She was his proof that American girls are gorgeous.

We arrived after services and had to wash our hands as soon as we walked in.  While waiting in line to wash my hands I heard a guy speaking English with a strong French accent.  As soon as he turned around I realized that I knew him from somewhere.  It was “Frenchy,” my good friend’s best friend.  About two years ago, I passed a shabbat with Frenchy in Dallas at our friend Dani’s.  After 5 minutes of hugging and repeating “I can’t believe that YOU are in Beijing,” we sat down and enjoyed the meal.  It makes sense to run into people I know in Texas, the States, Israel, and even France; but I was not expecting to find someone I know in Beijing, China 8,000 miles away from home.  Being a white person in China, I feel like I automatically have a connection with other Westerners.  It as if we are our own subcommunity but haven’t met yet.  I also met a girl at Chabad who was telling me why she chose to live in China.  She says that she could never return to the states becuase China is too international.  I see what she means.  The expat community in China is quite diverse, and it is cool to have a shabbat dinner using 3 or 4 languages.

Blocked in China

My website has been blocked by the Chinese government.  I can’t access it while in China.  I’ll continue to update it through the states.  I can’t tell if I am happy or upset about this.  Check back soon.