Fast Times in Jiaxing

Before I move to my planned topic, can I just say what's happening in Iran right now is both amazing and tragic?  Because it is.  Anyway, over the past few weeks I have determined that Chinese college students can, and often do, have exactly the same kind of fun American college students have way too much of.

Allow me to put this into perspective.  Chinese students live by the exam.  Tests are a major determinate of ones place in this society.  Their test scores are the biggest part of their grade (though not in MY classes) and their grades determine which schools they go to, which determines what kind of jobs they will be given  (For the other great determinate "guanxi"please await future posts).

Anyway, this is the time of year in which high schoolers have taken their college entrance exams, subsequently entering a depressive funk or...and here's where the fun comes in... celebrating!  Usually through travel or karaoke (In fact I ran into several of the former traveling in Leshan, Sichuan--I assume at least one of them had gotten good news).  Fun is a result of success, it is reward, unlike in the West where partying can usually happen on a whim.  

Though not usually under  quite as much pressure as high schoolers, Chinese college students are also very celebratory, something I witnessed first hand.  Two of my classes invited me out for after-term dinners.  It was the usual affair with circular tables and those little wheels in the middle upon which the various dishes are rotated.  Supposedly the occasions were in my honor, by I suspected that these dinners were a end-of-term tradition for every class unit, which tend to be very tightly-knit

The breakdown of fun is as follows:

It begins with dinner, which already tends to be a little wild.  Then comes the beer, which is consumed first via toasts, then more casually without the formality, and then in competitive shots (Please note that binge-drinking does not occur, at least it hasn't around me)

Sometimes it ends there, or sometimes the fun moves to KTV, the staple institution of Chinese karaoke culture.  The drinking stopped for us when we got there, and instead we sobered up with flavored drink.  Unfortunately this meant everyone was sober when I sang, and so they found out how bad I am at karaoke (but not singing in general--that I'm great at).  

While  some people sang somewhat-generic Chinese pop (or Backstreet Boys) the rest played this clever card game where the losers had to perform dares with one another.  The typical Chinese dare usual involves a romantic theme.  Consequently several proposals of marriage were made, one of which was from me.

Leb Wohl

Separation Anxiety

Classes are over. Exams are finished and grades completed.  Already I miss my students.  The 16 weeks we spent together was far too short.  

Exams were surprisingly good.  Once again I was amazed by their creativity.  We took class pictures and afterwards all of them wanted individual shots with there cameras.  Some of them cried...no they didn't, that was me.

Right now is the stage were I reminisce about our classes.  The fun and awkwardness.  The successes and epic fails.  There is so much I could've done better as a teacher, but hopefully they still learned something.  Well, according to the grades all but a few did.  No really, thanks to my bad marking system my students have gotten obscenely high grades.  Of course that hasn't stopped a few texting me to complain about 90s.  But I can't blame them for being perfectionists.  After all, I aspire (foolishly) to be one myself.

Enlightenment and Extortion on Putuoshan

One of the reasons I came to China was to experience a little bit of the religion. This was somewhat of a dubious goal since religion has more or less been marginalized since the Cultural Revolution. As, one of my Chinese friends told me "superstition," rather than the organized religion communist governments tends to oppose, is the opiate of the masses. This could range from typical burial rites on a family plot to various auspicious acts one can do (though certainly not required) to appease various deities providing such services as dream-free sleep, babies, or fortune.

Buddhism, a bastion of religious and philosophical thought, was once mighty in this country, easily fitting in with the two other giants, Daoism and Confucianism. But I would not describe China or many of her people Buddhist (exept Tibetans of course). To put this into perspective I recently went to one of the four "sacred" Buddhist mountains in China--an island of the coast of Zhejiang called Putuoshan. The island is devoted to Guanyin, a Buddhist goddess of mercy. There is an immense statue of her greeting the new arrivals who come on the ferry from Ningbo (which is the only way to get to the island). After paying a steep price for admission to the national park, you enter the land of tour groups and souveniers. Like so much in China, Putuo mountain is a tourist trap and without hostels or simple hole-in-the wall restaurants, it is a considerably expensive one.

But though its original identity has been obscured by commercialism, the island is still Buddhist. There are many monks. In fact I talked with one name Shi quite a bit (with some comprehension). The island and beaches are beautiful, and the temples are impressive and sacred-feeling. And most of the "tourists,"whether they are legitimitely Buddhist or just the superstious kind pay their respects by lighting their incense-burining sticks, bowing in all four directions, kneeling before the statues, and leaving an offering.

So there is a peace to Putuoshan. Yes, the same secularism and commercialism typical of China is evident, but it is still a holy place. Though I am not Buddhist I even felt compelled to bow now and again. My visit gave me renewed hope about finding more of the "spiritual China."

Leb wohl.