The End

Today was my first day back. I spent it reconnecting with my family and soaking up my home.

My son and husband cleaned the entire house before I got home, gave me flowers and chocolates and even cooked for me. I really am blessed to have two such wonderful guys in my life.

I ran about 4 miles this evening to the Mama Mia soundtrack (I should be sick of it by now but I'm not. I blame my friend Samantha who first hooked me on that movie). I could mouth the words while I pounded the pavement and no one thought I looked the least bit strange. Or at least they didn't stare at me from their cars as they zipped past on the busier roads with no sidewalks. After all, I'm just one of 270 or so million Americans here.

Most of the time, though, there were no cars or any people to see me at all. The gold, orange and red leaves are half on the ground and half in the trees. I filled my lungs with the smell of pine needles and that damp odor of fall in the Northwest.

Near my house is a long road with a horse pasture on one side and blackberry bushes on the other (My son and I had a blast picking those berries last September. He ate more than he put in his bucket).

I stopped there to just soak up the largeness of the blue sky and gaze at the horses waiting at the corner of their fence for their evening feed. Mt. Rainier was just behind them with a fresh covering of snow from the 'Pineapple Express' that hit before I arrived on Friday.

With this, my dear readers, I will close my blog since it is no longer October and I am no longer in China.

It was good to see such an astouding place and meet such incredible people. Very good. And like every other trip I've ever taken, it's good to be home. Very good.

Seeing the Sky Again

After seventeen hours of traveling, Mom and I made it home today. I fell into bed at 5pm tonight only to wake up 4 hours later and not feel sleepy. Jetlag is a stark reality at the moment.

We met many more interesting people including a German-born American that I spoke to in German on the plane. After floundering along in Chinese for so long, it was lovely to speak in a language that I have some grasp of. And after that he helped me haul all of our baggage off the circular area where all of the travelers huddle around and try to pick out their black non-descript bag from all of the others. He said the bags weren't heavy. My aching arms were really glad they felt so insignificant to him.

We asked him what business had brought him to Shanghai. He apparently works for an environmental firm in Denver that is testing the air quality in places around the world. Shanghai is "pretty bad" he told us while shaking his head. The measurements were comparable to Mexico City which is supposed to be one of the worst in the world. He said that my dry scratchy throat is probably a result of the pollution there.

I was so glad to see the deep blue sky in San Francisco and even think the ovecast in Tacoma looks lovely. I have always been something of an environmentalist but the air in China has really motivated me. Imagine, if you will, living in a soup of smog that sometimes hovers near the ground and leaves a film in your apartment that isn't dust. Imagine it first for 5 weeks and then stretch that out to years or even a lifetime for my friends who live there.

I learned from the German that we cleaned up Los Angeles when it was that bad. We've really got to do the same for the rest of the world, too. I say 'we' because I am so convinced that the earth is all connected at this point. What happens in Shanghai affects my corner of the Pacific.

I never want to see my bright clean Washington state become a place where I never see the sky. I also pray for that kind of beauty for the 1.3 billion Chinese in their own country.

It might mean giving up our cars. Trust me. It's worth it. Or don't trust me. Visit Shanghai yourself and you'll agree.

And that's my soap box for today.

Gratitude

There are so many people to be grateful for here.

At the top of my list right now is a teacher from Singapore named Wee Nee. She speaks both Mandarin and English and happened to be on the train with my mom and me on our way from Shanghai to Wuxi two weeks ago. She spoke flawless English to me for the first time on that trip (I'd seen her speaking in Mandarin to the other teachers at my bus stop and never knew that English was her first language). She helped us with our luggage that day and then included us in her return trip on the train back to Shanghai.

Today we rode together and somehow managed those hideous stairs at the train station. Mom waited at the top while Wee Nee and I hauled two pieces down the stairs. Then I sprinted back up to Mom, grabbed another piece of 10 ton luggage while Mom started to drag it down the steps. I then ran back up again to take Mom's bag so we could hustle to the train JUST IN TIME for it to leave.

We could not have carried our luggage or managed the Chinese language without her. She even had a cell phone that helped us find our agent here in Shanghai. What a wonder. Mom and I are pondering what we can do for her in return. I doubt there is anything. We'll just have to pay it forward somehow. In any case, my family owes their Christmas presents to her strong arms and luggage guarding abilities this year.

More on gratitude to come...

The 11 Best Things about China

So here they are:

1. Just the idea of being in a country so far and so different from my own.

2. Getting to teach people in their own culture and their own country. I haven't done this in a long time.

3. Watching people dance in the streets at night where they feel totally safe in a city twice the size of Seattle. We go out at night in Seattle but we are always aware that it is a risk. There is no such sense of danger here.

4. Seeing everyone be so helpful each other. People move from their seats on the bus for the elderly or for mothers with babies. And it's absolutely miserable to stand on those swaying, swerving things so it really is remarkable to give up your seat.

5. The near lack of road rage. Sure they drive like maniacs. But no one seems really up tight about it. It's just business as usual with no hard feelings.

6. How hard everyone tries to speak English. They may not be able to tell me what they need to but they always try (with the exception of the occasional taxi driver)
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7. My students themselves. They are delightful young men (and three young women). I have really enjoyed getting to know them and find out the things they love: basketball, singing karaoke style and listening to me mangle Chinese words.

8. Beijing. I loved seeing this city. I will remember the history and architecture forever.

9. The other teachers here. I felt like a colleague from the first day I started. Even on the days when they chattered away in Chinese they somehow made me feel included.

10. The Chinese I've learned. It's not nearly enough but when I look back I've learned so much during my stay. After all, now I can ask the clerk at the store where the garbage bags are. I certainly couldn't have done that before.

11. The food. OK, it's bizarre at times but I've grown to love it. Some of the flavors are divine. Plus, I can eat and eat and eat and never feel that bloated feeling that comes at Thanksgiving. And by the feel of my pants, I've lost at least 5 pounds. While eating all the time. Amazing.

That Wall

Last weekend, Mom and I took a taxi by ourselves to the Wuxi airport and got ourselves to Beijing. Taking that taxi was slightly frightening and I lost one yuan because the driver didn't think I could count. I decided that it wasn't worth fighting over less than 20 cents.

It was most certainly worth those 20cents to go to Beijing in spite of the fact that every single person I talked to said that two days wasn't enough time. They shook their heads sadly just thinking about me trying to see anything of the capital. This is one time I'm glad I didn't listen.

We saw the Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven, the Great Wall and Tian An Men Square. If I had to choose, I'd say that the Wall was my very favorite. There is some history behind my choice.

Way back in the beginning of September I began to picture what it would be like to be in China (I should have known to get my visa then). The picture was always my view from the Great Wall.

I missed a few things when I was visualizing, though. Actually being there was much colder than in my imagination. It was sunny but about 40 degrees Fahrenheit with a chilling wind that liked to slice through my jacket.

It was also steeper than I'd thought. I'd heard people talk about 'climbing' the Great Wall. I thought they were talking about climbing stairs or something to get to the walkway on top. Not so. They were talking about the fact that it wanders around really steep Eastern Washington-like hills and just being on the walkway puts you at an angle. In addition to the hills under the wall, the walkway itself is askew so that the water will run off and not leave rivers running along the wall.

The stones underfoot are slick. When they are dry. I kept picturing those soldiers trying to defend China by shooting arrows through those holes along the northern side. And they probably had other nasty things like ice. And rain. And arrows flying toward them. I'm sure it's not a job that I would have wanted.

Since I had none of those things to worry about, though, I could just relax and enjoy the feeling of being in the China of my imagination. It hasn't always been easy here. And I still have many pieces to put together before I leave in 3 days. It hasn't been easy on those I left behind either (they tell me all the time). But I'll always have That Wall.

(And, yes, I do have pictures, but, no, my computer will not allow you to see them. I'll have to try to trick it into letting you see them later. I'm getting tired and tomorrow's another big day.)

The Benefits of Learning Chinese

It takes discipline to learn any language but, for me, Chinese has been above and beyond a challenge. Over the past month I've learned more things than I can count but I still can't tell the taxi driver which way to go when he loses his way.


In spite of my failures, there are many reasons to love Mandarin. Let me count the ways:

1. Extra brain power just for trying to learn. It has to be increasing my mental abilities. I can't imagine that my thinking hasn't improved from all of this exercise. It's better than Sudoku and crossword puzzles could ever be.


2. Confidence from reading the characters. I honestly think it's insane to have that many characters in a written language. When I studied linguistics, I would just shake my head at the very idea. Still, there is a beauty to all of those lines and a sense of accomplshment that comes whenever I recognize them.


3. Leaping tall buildings by writing characters. If reading them is something to write home about, writing them is even better. I feel a little like superwoman when I write something and my friends here understand.


4. The crazy English spelling system. Those characters help me understand what it's like to learn to write English as a child or as an adult. Of course our alphabet has connections between sight and sound. But 100 or so sounds with around 1200 spellings isn't always enough of a connection.


5. Humility, humility, humilty. There is nothing so humbling as trying to say someone's name and watching them try not to laugh. Or better yet having your whole class snicker at you for your attempts. Every language teacher should remember that feeling.


6. The tones. I love the sing song tones. I don't love them when no one understands me but I do when I get it right. Or at least close enough to right that they're not laughing.


7. Facing my fears. I used to be so afraid of Chinese. So afraid that I wouldn't even try it. But I've found that, like anything else in life, if you take it one step at a time and believe that you can do it, progress happens.



8. The power of making a choice. I have so very many students who speak so very many languages. I wish I had the time and energy to learn them all. This used to stop me from really diving into anything but German, the language Frau Jones began teaching me in high school.
I'm so glad I've made an effort to dive into Mandarin. Even though it won't help me to speak with my Russian or Vietnamese students, it has benefited me and my classroom all the same.

And those, my English speaking friends, are the great things that can happen when you try to learn Chinese. Even if you're not a language teacher, you can still reap the mental exercise benefits.
If nothing else you should learn to write one character some day. You just might like that superwoman (or superman) feeling.