Goodbye and Thank You, China

Semester is over!

These past few hot and rainy weeks in Nanning, we've been preparing to leave. I have finished final exams, and most of our stuff--from lamps and cushions to blender and bikes--has new owners. Our friends will come to retrieve those things and say goodbye Friday morning before we head out to the airport.

Ten months we've been in China. It's the longest we've lived in one abode since launching our nomadic life 4 years ago. Life here has been charming and challenging. Sweet and soul-stretching. Exciting and unnerving.

campus lotus pond

If we were planning to stay here longer, I would embark on an immersion course in the language. The little bit of language study Dave and I did before coming wasn't nearly enough. At first it wasn't a problem. I am teaching in a university program that focuses on English, so we were surrounded by English-speaking Chinese people and ex-pats. Also, I made liberal use of my translation app.



You never know what you'll see when you're taking a stroll.

However, to be able to deeply connect to people--and to move around with ease--knowing more Chinese feels crucial. It got old relying on others to do some of the simplest things for us, like order take-out or buy a ticket to the movies.

Another challenge has been the food. While at first I fell in love with it, if I never see another dumpling, noodle or rice dish in my life I don't care! There is not enough variety in the diet for my taste. Well...there is variety if you're willing to eat mystery meat, duck feet, and organs. As Lee, Dave's 11-year-old tutee said, the Chinese eat everything.

Farmer's market butcher: you know it's fresh when...

We did enjoy our outings to the campus farmers market, a great place to buy fresh eggs, fruit and veggies at cheap prices. And we have found a few restaurants we like a lot...although our absolutely favorite one just closed down, perhaps a sign that our leave-taking is good timing.

The "egg lady" kindly posed for a picture.

Another sign may be the state of our apartment. It's a beautiful place with large rooms and bay windows (albeit barred) that look out over a lotus pond. And the ease of the 5-minute walk to class cannot be understated. However, Dave has named our bathroom "Little Shop of Horrors" because unidentified goop seeps from the ceiling down the walls. Sometimes we hear rats scurrying up there. And now when you run the water in the sink, it leaks onto the floor. Also, for months, water has been seeping through a wall in the office space. A maintenance crew came to look at it a few times, but apparently there is no remedy.

E-bike wackiness

This acceptance of things that my Western, middle-class culture might not endure has been part of the challenge and charm of China. There's a laid-back quality that's appealing. You even see it in the traffic. It might look chaotic, but generally people go quite slowly and weave around each other like a choreographed dance. That e-bike might be cutting off a bike or pedestrian, but everyone just sways one way or the other and doesn't change their pace. One move like that in California, and someone is likely to pull out a middle finger, if not a gun.

They take the afternoon siesta seriously here.

Today (Sunday) I was notified of a graduation ceremony Tuesday morning I'm required to attend. Two days notification of a major event would send many people I know into a tizzy. Here, two days is quite a bit of advance notice. I can't say I always go with the flow, but China has been teaching me to notice when I don't and what that says about me.

Popular in China!

Teaching in China has reached extremes of charm and challenge. The challenges have come with the bureaucratic minutia that I've alluded to in other entries and won't rehash here. Another challenge has been preparing lessons that build enough background knowledge of American culture so students can understand the material. In the course of teaching the book and film Wild, for example, I introduced the students to Adrienne Rich, Jerry Garcia, "therapist," Pacific Crest Trail, Minnesota, the term "beacon" as a light and a metaphor for a guidepost, and a few of Simon and Garfunkel's songs. There are always moments when I have to decide if I'm going to introduce a new term, drill down on one idea, or keep moving forward.

Whose name is whose?

For the most part, the students have been very patient with me! And I with them. We learn a lot from each other. And the notion that Chinese students are not "creative," I can now say with assurance, is bunk. They wrote some of the most wonderful poetry and memoir pieces. They created videos, sang songs, played music, and shared their visual art.

The student-created class magazine.

It's not that Chinese students aren't creative. It's that their middle school and high school years are drenched in study, with an eye to getting a good score on the gao kow, the 9-hour college entrance exam. Not many are encouraged in creative pursuits. But the human spirit being what it is, the students retain the impulse to create, to express their unique voices.

Students love these wacky phone apps!

Some admitted to me that they would like to pursue dancing, singing, acting and other arts but that their parents insisted they major in Economics or Engineering. I told these students that everyone has extra time: "Some play video games. Some play sports. You can use that time to write or dance or whatever it is you love." I gave the example of Khaled Hosseini who wrote The Kite Runner while working as a doctor, and William Carlos Williams who was also a doctor and a well-known poet.

One student last semester told me he wanted to be a filmmaker but his parents were making him become an accountant. After offering him the both/and spiel, I emphasized how lucky he is that today's technology makes filmmaking easier and cheaper than ever before. A few weeks ago, he sped up to me on his e-bike proclaiming, "Kate! Kate! I want to tell you, I'm making a movie! A full-length film. My friends and I wrote the screenplay." His eyes were alive with joy. If that's a mark I leave behind, what more could I ask?

Tina and me with smoothies, post-yoga.

China has left its mark on me, an impact that I probably won't fully process for a while. The biggest one has been my connection with Tina, our student assistant whom--as you know if you've been reading this blog--has become like a daughter to us. Leaving her is going to be rough. We have asked her to join us next month for a week in Bali. I'm praying her parents will allow it so we will squeeze out a bit more time together.

Dave and I would have loved to have traveled more in China while we were here. However, my breaks fell on Chinese holidays, which would mean traveling with crowds of millions. Also, there was the language issue as well as the fact that traveling in China is more expensive than traveling in S.E. Asia, which is deliriously cheap.

On my last break we slipped away for a few days to a resort in Malaysia.

Sepang, Malaysia

When we embarked on our experiment of living nomadically, I could not have foreseen all the incredible things we've experienced this year. Now we are headed for 2 months of travel in Indonesia and a month in Thailand, where I will run a writing retreat.

Thank you, China. I have a feeling we will return one day to explore more of what you have to offer.

 

 

Winding Down in China...and a Trip to Pattaya

Lotus pond at sunset. (One of Dave's masterpieces.)

Life continues here in China through that different set of eyes I grow when I know something is temporary.

Of course, everything is temporary.

But what I mean is this: I've decided not to renew my contract. We'll be leaving China in less than 2 months.

My gaze lingers a little bit longer on the lotus pond, on the grandpa doing tai chi, on the kids playing basketball, on the innumerable cute babies and glowing pregnant women. Have I mentioned there's a baby boom here?

Nanning at night

And the things that bother me are easier to let go. The occasional cockroach. The water leaking through the wall in the guest room. Not being able to access certain websites because my VPN's not working. The way a "simple" trip to the bank inevitably takes an hour, or two. Soon...not my problem!

In the larger scheme, those things don't really matter anyway. Nomadic life constantly schools me. It reminds me what matters most. For example:


Friends from China, Singapore, Russia, the U.S. and England.

People. And by that, I mean love.

It's incredible to think about how less than a year ago, I didn't even know these people were walking the Earth. And now we've shared many wonderful experiences, such as Dave's surprise birthday party. Paul and Mike played guitars. Daria, keyboard. Ricky, flute. And I debuted on ukulele, playing "Heart of Gold" while Tina (our Chinese "daughter") and her friend (my yoga student) Jennifer did a dance.

One of Dave's most treasured relationships here is with Lee, the 11-year-old he tutors twice a week.

Lee is whip-smart. He wants to go to university in America. Dave's pretty sure their relationship will continue. Of course that's how we feel about Tina, too. When I told her we were leaving, she broke out into tears. And then I did. It's going to be rough saying goodbye in July, but I will make sure it's more like "until we meet again." Because we will. I want to bring her to Mexico to visit us when she graduates. And if she gets married, I don't care where we are or what we are doing, we will be at her wedding.


Eating Korean food (bibimbop) in China, one of our favorite restaurants near campus.

One of our goals in coming to China was to explore S.E. Asia. Ten months in, and we've been fortunate to experience Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia.  My holidays and the incredibly cheap Air Asia flights have made it possible. Our most recent trip was to Pattaya, Thailand. We'd been warned about Pattaya's sleaze factor. However, Dave did the research and discovered an area just outside the main part of Pattaya called Jomtien, which turned out to be perfect for us.


Heaven = a foot massage on the beach.

Our hotel was in a gay area, which felt comfortable and fun. I loved the flamboyant greeting we received from a front desk clerk as we walked in.

One of the two pools at Agate Boutique Hotel that has rooms at about 35 bucks a night.

At the beach, we chatted with some guys from England who come regularly to Jomtien. I also noticed a young Russian couple; one of the guys had this tattoo on his chest: "Only God can judge me." Especially poignant given what has been happening to queer people in Chechnya.

We spent time wandering around Jomtien's charming streets, happening across some great finds, like Sketchbook Art Café...

...and street carts selling all kinds of treats.


fruit cart

We love Thai food. And like most of S.E. Asia, the tropical fruit is amazing. Dave went crazy for the pad see ew, a dish of thick noodles, veggies and a savory sauce. However, after all this time in China, I'm a bit noodled-and-riced out. Which was why I was thrilled by the many choices of relatively inexpensive and delicious Western food in Jomtien. I ate Caesar salads galore and vanilla soft-serves in waffle cones. We also found a place that made amazing meat and fruit pies.

 

Walking Street before things really get going.

One evening we ventured into downtown Pattaya. To get there, we braved a hop-on taxi: a truck where people pile onto bench seats in the truck-bed or hang off the back as overflow, which was what Dave had to do. Every time the truck jerked to a stop, I thought he might go flying off. Fortunately, he has a strong grip.

We spent a few hours moseying up and down infamous Walking Street, which is a raucous array of crazy sights and sounds. It's like Vegas on acid, without the overt gambling. We passed mostly bars, restaurants, bar girls, a few people in wild costumes, and the occasional guy trying to get us to see a Ping-Pong-vagina show. We'd heard there was some good live music on the strip, but at 8:30 p.m., no bands were yet playing. And we were ready to go back to the relative peace and quiet of Jomtien.

 

Dave dove the Hardeep WWII wreck.

One day we took a diving and snorkel tour to the Samae San islands, about 45 minutes south of Pattaya. The experience affirmed and intensified my love for Thailand.



snorkeling

Speaking of which...in September, I will be co-hosting a writing retreat on Koh Phangan. It's an incredible place, and that's no hyperbole. Neither is our title: Write Your Story in Paradise. I know "paradise" is a well-worn phrase, but The Sanctuary resort where we are holding the event fits the bill, in my humble opinion. The experience promises to be transformational. If you'd like to join us, check out our Facebook page.

In the meantime, I will do my best to relish our remaining time in China. We may have a lot of plans ahead of us, but this moment is where it's at. It's all we really have.

teaching yoga in China

China: Three Months In...and a visit to Hanoi.

Tina on our beautiful campus.

Living in China is not at all what I expected. I expected more struggle and confusion, more culture shock, more...difference.

Yes, of course, there are big differences. But they aren't hard to handle. The language, for example. I have not had the time (okay, discipline) to focus on learning it the way I'd like. The "having a job" thing takes up a lot of my living time. Still, we can jump in a cab and say the right phrase to get us home. Translator phone apps help. And we are learning tricks, like collecting business cards, taking pictures of the fronts of buildings, or having someone write down our destination in Chinese. Just show the card or picture to the cabbie, and you're off.

Dave is a master at "getting the gist" of what someone is saying. The other day, the paint guy delivered another batch for Dave's ongoing project of painting our apartment. When he came in, talking away in Chinese, Dave answered in English and showed him around. I couldn't help but laugh because, seriously, this is what it sounded like:

Paint man: xxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Dave: Yes, see, we are using the dark blue as the accent wall in the bedroom.
Paint man: xxxx xxxxx xxxxxx xx xxxxx!
Dave: I know, right?

This has been our experience with most people: they enjoy interacting with us. They love to stop and ask us questions (Where are you from? Do you like China?) and take pictures. Yes, sometimes all the attention is a bit unnerving. Like when strangers crowd around you, wrap their arms around your waist and take a selfie. And another and another...until you have to smile and say xie xie (thank you) and sidle away.

Sometimes I'm just standing somewhere talking with a friend, and out of the corner of my eye I see several people snapping our pictures. It's only fair, though. I often take pictures of charming strangers. No double-standards here.

I thought this attention was all about my whiteness...until I met an African American guy who has lived in China for 5 years and said it constantly happens to him, too. In a city of 8 million people where 7,999,900 have straight black hair and are of a smallish stature, a tall blonde or an even taller black guy with a bright white smile is a total trip.


Willie and me

This guy, by the way, is Willie, who teaches dance here and used to be in the San Jose Ballet company. Yes, we both lived in San Jose, California for a number of years and happened to meet in a café in Nanning, Guangxi.

How most of the Chinese people are so slender is a mystery to me, given the abundance of great, inexpensive food. Yesterday morning we rode our bikes to the campus open-air market. In addition to voluminous, fresh produce, you can buy lots of odds and ends. I picked up reading glasses.

We bought a pomello, my new favorite: pink and juicy and such a satisfying texture. Almost the size of a bowling ball and wrapped like a present in a lovely wax paper. Every one is a gift, for sure. We also picked up passion fruit (another new favorite), small creamy bananas, and a big bag of oranges for just a few bucks.

yum

We have not yet bought meat or fish there. Perhaps our western sensibilities just aren't ready to pick from the mountainous slabs of raw meat, or to face a woman pulling a fish from a bucket of water and clubbing it to death for our dinner. Usually we get already-cooked chicken and duck at the fantastic deli in the grocery story, where we also buy delectable noodles and dumplings.

Then there's Yann, a French guy who lives above us who cooks amazing soups, pastas and desserts and sells them at a reasonable price. I mean, really? We have a French chef delivering to our door?

The last months have been a whirlwind of activity, combined with the madness that is midterms. The bureaucratic wackiness involved in creating and administering the midterm is not something I want to re-experience by writing about it. Suffice it to say that it involved illogical and time-consuming procedures, and : a) I freaked out then b) I calmed down. After all, working for a California state university has prepared me for the bureaucracy of a Chinese university. Dave (bless his heart) stepped up to crunch numbers and deal with documents I felt like burning. And now it's clear to me what needs to be done, so the next go-around will be easier.

Other than that, the job has been mostly delightful. In contrast to what people had "warned" me about--that Chinese students are not creative--the students are writing inspired poetry, creating extraordinary video poetry interpretations, and taking lots of creative leaps. In the memoir class, they love to perform scenes from the book. Daily I am discovering how they learn and what they are capable of, and I plan to redesign my courses for next semester in hopes of becoming an even more effective teacher.

(The only thing I don't think I will get used to is calling students by their chosen English name--when they are Hamburger, Watermelon and Xylitol.)

The abundant social activities have included a big Halloween party right out our front door...

An American expat Thanksgiving potluck featuring a fruit turkey:

Made by our friend Fran, from Nashville

A student talent show:

That's Tina on the left.

And a faculty dinner that featured the most honest presentation of a cooked chicken I've ever seen:

Okay, so maybe not all of the food here is delicious. Boiled chicken ain't my thing. Neither are insects.

Centipedes on a stick and other delicacies at the night market.

You also see chicken feet and duck feet everywhere. For our student assistant's (Tina's) birthday, we took her to a restaurant of her choice. Because the menu had few pictures and no English, Tina ordered for us. They brought a big pot and set it on the hot plate in the center of the table. Inside were...duck feet. Tina's favorite. Oh dear. With my chopsticks, I extracted one from the pot. It slumped there, a sad little extremity. I watched Tina happily chew away, spitting out the bones and tiny toenails.

I took a few nibbles. It was delicious, albeit not very satisfying because there's not much meat on it. The little bones make it complicated, kind of equivalent to the labor of eating a pomegranate. The pot was filled with other delectable things: potatoes, tofu skin, tofu cubes, quail eggs, taro root. Next they brought out lotus root and a huge plate of seafood on ice also to be cooked in the savory broth: crab, shrimp, octopus, mussels, clams, and cockles. A side-dish was a Nanning specialty: tasty noodles with little snails. Yep, I even ate little snails. And liked it.
 

duck feet and tofu

Before this lunch, we'd taken Tina to buy a new bike, her birthday gift. When Tina's bike disappeared, we knew this was an opportunity to buy a useful and meaningful present for this young woman who has done so much for us. At first she refused, saying it was too expensive. But I pulled out all the stops, telling her the dollar was strong, it wasn't expensive for us, and we would be extremely sad if she said no.


the perfect choce

To get to what everyone calls Stolen Bike Street, Tina perched sidesaddle on the back of Dave's bike. I mentioned she looked so at ease on the book rack, even as Dave swerved in the traffic madness and hopped over speed bumps. That's when she told me that when she was young, her family was poor. They had no car, just a bike. Her mother did not like leaving her and her brother, who was an infant, at home. So she would put the baby in the basket, and Tina sat on the back of her mom's bike. (She added that her parents eventually started a profitable business and now have a car.)


The current-day version of the family-on-a-bike.
(This is in Vietnam, but you also see families like this in China.)

After the purchase of the bike and the eating of the duck feet, Tina told us she had something she wanted to say, launching into what seemed to be a prepared speech about how much we mean to her. She had barely begun when tears started streaming down my face. She thanked us for being so friendly, for never losing patience when she's trying to figure out something. She recounted the fun experiences we've had, and said, "You have taught me thing about life." She recalled when we went to the bank one day and it was so crowded that we decided to leave and come back another time. "You said when things are 'chaos'" (she remembered learning that word from Dave) "that it's better to go away and do something else." She also said she has learned from us to appreciate the small things in life. And she was especially touched when one day I told someone she was like our Chinese daughter. She really is. Truly, I love her with all my heart and am amazed China has given us the gift of her.

As if that's not enough, for my birthday, Tina made me the most amazing scrapbook that includes pictures of all our adventures.

This took place at Café Ukulele, where we'd gone for live music. The evening began to reveal itself as a surprise party for me. Paul sang my favorite song, "Into the Mystic", which he had just learned that afternoon. Two other teachers brought a cake, and everyone sang Happy Birthday.

Earlier that day, my students had also sung Happy Birthday to me in both English and Chinese. I had brought into class a huge cake that the school had delivered to me. Apparently the university does this for all the teachers on their birthdays. It was a beautiful cake, ringed on the top with fruit...and tomatoes. The taste was, well, strange. One of the teachers has dubbed these "disappointment cakes." Fortunately, it didn't go to waste. The students loved it.

Paul's birthday fell just a few days after mine, so we were soon back at his Café Ukulele for another evening of music. The place was packed in honor of this guy from Liverpool who has created a vibrant music scene in Nanning, incorporating Chinese and expat musicians into his show. I read a poem I wrote for him, and 5 cakes (no tomatoes in sight) were brought out.

Jim (Chinese), Paul (British), and Darya (Russian)

Dave's birthday gift to me was an overnight at a natural hot springs resort. Just a 30 minute taxi ride from our house, it boasts 100 pools, small and large, as well as saunas, mud baths, and fish-nibbling foot treatments. I soaked for five hours, napping in between on the stones. Later, Dave and I lay on warmed slabs of marble beneath an awning for another nap. That night I slept 10 hours. I guess I needed it. In fact, I have been sleeping a lot lately. As "easy" as living here is, it takes a different kind of energy to live and work in a completely different culture. My body and mind need regular recharging.

 

Jiuquwan Hot Springs. The big cold pool and small warm pools.

ahh....

This blog entry is already too long, and I haven't even written yet about our outing to Hanoi. So here's the quick and dirty: The bus ride was an adventure in and of itself, taking about 8 hours and involving some confusing transfers at the border. We thought we were getting into a shuttle to take us to another bus, so I agreed to sit on the hard console between the seats up front instead of one of the comfy seats in back. Soon we realized, though, I was in for hours with my face mashed up against the windshield and no seatbelt on while the driver passed on blind curves. My butt had just gone numb on the hard "seat," when Dave switched with me at the rest stop.

Fortunately, we made it, shaken if not stirred, and got right into the swing of things with a street food dinner.

Hanoi is known for its street food. For good reason. It was cheap and insanely delicious and festive, if you don't mind sitting on a tiny plastic chair. We went to a few restaurants, and nothing was as good as the street food.

Also cheap are spa treatments, so we treated ourselves to massages and pedicures, and I went to a hair salon. It's quite a contrast, the quiet solitude of the spas and the frantic activity outside: all the motorbikes and cars careening down the narrow streets amidst gaggles of pedestrians and people hawking every item you can imagine.


egg man in Hanoi

We stayed in the Old Quarter, which meant everything we wanted to experience was within walking distance, including beautiful Hoan Kiem lake.

 

The streets around the lake are closed off Friday through Sunday, so it's relaxing to walk around, people watch, and grab a drink at a sidewalk café. We lucked across some music, too.

Everywhere we went there were people dressed in beautiful clothes, posing for pictures. At the Temple of Literature, the site of the first university in Hanoi which is over 1000 years old, we caught college students celebrating their graduation.

 

One touristy thing we did was attend a water puppet show. The audience was filled with Western retirees. I suppose we are part of that target market. The stage is filled with water, the puppets manipulated by poles from behind a screen. Charming people, birds, fish, dragons, and water buffalo danced out the old stories, accompanied by very good musicians playing traditional tunes.

water puppets

I think this is the longest blog entry I've ever written. That's a testament to how full our lives have been. It's all so interesting, even the insects-on-a-stick and duck feet and ridiculous bureaucratic moments. And honestly, I feel like I'm just scratching the surface. All of our experiences are marinating in my mind, where I believe a new book is cooking away. Meantime, I am grateful for it all.

 

First Month in China

Flowering lotus pond and campus seen from our living room window.

I asked Dave what three things he'd tell people about our experience in China. He said:

1. It's more organized and less chaotic than anticipated.
2. The food is amazing.
3. And so are the people.

A month in, I agree. But the first week didn't quite feel like that. It was shocking to walk into our campus apartment and see cockroaches crawling over the dead carcasses of their brethren, a rotting hole under the kitchen sink, black crud on the floor of the bathroom, stains streaking the walls. Etcetera.

After cleaning like crazy people, we fell into bed that night--feeling like we'd dropped onto a concrete sidewalk. I missed my memory foam mattress like never before. The cushion-less wood furniture in the living room was just as unyielding.

With the help of some new friends, we were able to buy cushions and pads. And the Dean came over to show us how to use the washing machine--although he wasn't sure about a few settings and laughingly said he usually doesn't do the laundry.

Dave rustled up some light blue paint and transformed our living room. The bedroom will be next.



A man of action.

Once things were clean and comfy, I began to appreciate the spaciousness of our place. And it has two bedrooms--one of which we use as an office and guest room (hint, hint).

 

comfy

Living on campus is great. With its food courts and canteens, two farmers' markets, sports fields, basketball and tennis courts, many apartments and dorms, it's like a city within a city. Everyone who works for the university--students, faculty, and staff--lives here, including retired employees. There are people of all ages around, including elderly and children. And on campus are schools (from preschool through middle school) for the kids.

The Chinese love exercise. On my way to class in the mornings (a five-minute walk), I see retired people playing volleyball and badminton. There are big sports fields here where people play on the equipment, kick balls around, practice Kung Fu, walk, jog, stretch.

In the evenings, groups of (mostly women) gather to "square dance"--which is more like line dancing to a boom box that's blasting anything from traditional Chinese music to pop songs.

Dancing like mama.

Soon I'm going to join one of the dancing groups. People tell me the women will show you the steps. They may laugh, but it's all in good fun.

People also ride bikes and motorbikes everywhere, which adds to the feeling that China = movement. All motorbikes here, by law, are electric. This has the pleasant effect of keeping down air and noise pollution. Some days are hazy here, but for the most part, it's pretty clean and green.

campus

just outside campus

We are in Nanning, in the southeast--just 100 miles from the Vietnam border. Yes, there's an active vibe here--but also a laid-back one. I was surprised to discover that siesta isn't just for Spanish-speaking countries; it's a thing here, too. From noon to 2 p.m.-ish, campus offices close down as do many businesses. I'm beginning to get into the afternoon peace and quiet. I even nap now and then, not my usual forte.

I'm finding I need the rest. My body and mind are adjusting to my new job: teaching creative writing, literature, and yoga to college kids. For three years, "going to work" has meant editing books in my yoga pants. It's been an adjustment putting on real clothes and being "on" in the morning.

Class on the American Memoir

For the most part, the students are eager, kind, and thoughtful. "Class discussion" isn't what I'm used to; they don't like to talk unless called upon. However, when I structure discussion and activities using my bag of tricks (such as letting them write or talk out ideas with a partner before talking to the whole class), they get into it. They also love games and role playing.

With Charles, the son of our new French friends
who are here for the husband's postdoc.

My colleagues have been great, sharing information with us, showing us around and inviting us over. For mid-Autumn festival, we went to a mooncake-making party at the home of Li Ji (an administrative assistant) and Sophie (who runs a campus preschool).

Li Ji playing a song for the kids.

 

Weighing the dough and rolling into balls, mooncake-making preparation.

We were also invited to a mid-Autumn festival meal, where everyone participated in making pork dumplings. All the food was delicious--except the snake, which according to Dave was too spicy. I couldn't get past the fact that it still had the skin on. More suitable for boots than appetizers, if you ask me.

Soup, greens, two kinds of chicken, dumplings and snake.

After dinner, Peter made us tea at his special tea table. A connoisseur, he pulled out many little packets of tea, some of which had been aged for years. We sipped and compared ala wine tasting.

Everywhere we go, the food is fantastic (and cheap). We are especially fond of Nanning's dumplings and noodles.


Fat noodles with bits of fried pork.

 We're happy to have discovered a music scene. Paul (from Liverpool) and Ricky (from Singapore) play at an ex-pat bar on the weekends--and they have opened a café called the Ukulele Club, where they plan to run music and literary events.

At the Queen's Head.

Walking around the parks, you can hear lots of music, too. Much of it's from boom boxes, but sometimes you stumble across live instruments.

People's Park

One of the greatest joys for us has been getting to know Tina, our student assistant. She has helped us with so many things, from getting wifi and opening a bank account, to shopping for specific items, to translating labels so we can figure out if we bought, say, toothpaste or hemorrhoid cream!

 

We gave Tina one of the mooncakes we made.

She's extremely bright and capable. We've spent so much time with her that she's beginning to feel like our adopted daughter.

You've probably noticed that most of the Chinese people I've been talking about have English names. Many choose to use one with foreigners, a name that is similar to their Chinese name. I'm taking Mandarin lessons and hoping that once I learn to speak it well enough I'll be able to call them by their Chinese names. And maybe I'll have them use mine: 凱特 (Kǎi tè).

I feel like I have a million more things to say about China, even though it's been only a month. Stay tuned.