Life is getting a bit too normal.
Nothing particularly intersting is going on in my life right now. I know this may sound strange given that I am in a foreign country, and a particularyly foreign one at that, and living the life of an exchange student, but I must say that life here is not nearly as fun or active as it was in Singapore. I am still working, still going to school, still living the life of an outsider in a country I have not fully accepted.
On sunday I went for dinner with Max. He sent me a text message at around 7 pm and came over soon after. It turned out that he had just come from his economics class so he was in the area. As usual we talked mostly in English for a while on varying topics. At one point, he asked me if I had Chinese friends in the university. I instinctively answered "not many". He, probably knowing me better than I thought, then asked "not many or none at all". At this point I paused. It had not really occured to me that I didn't have any Chinese friends at my university. Of course I didn't. Of course I have not been speaking Chinese outside of class and a few other narrow circumstances, but I had just avoided thinking about it. At the time, however, I downplayed this fact and tried to get the conversation onto more agreable subjects. Towards closing time we started talking about economics. He had brought with him his course outline for what must have been his microeconomics course and I wanted to take a look at it. It was fun translating all of the different terms and jargon from Chinese to English with him. It also showed me that there was virtually nothing that this course covered that I did not cover in 3rd year honours micro at UBC and, furthermore, that this course was not mathematically rigorous. The other interesting thing was that economics is called "Western economics" (西经济学） as opposed to Marxist economics which is still manditory, but is just done as an obligation, not as an area of serioius study.
The next day, shamed by my lack of Chinese friends, I went to the library with Chris. I guess I hoped that I would be able to meet people there. In the event, I did not much like the library. I know it is unfair to compare it to the libraries at UBC or even NUS, but this place was just so institutional. The lights were hard on the eyes and the chairs were not particularly comfortable. Furthermore, as opposed to the carrals at UBC, all of the studying was done on big communal tables, which might not have been so bad if it were not for the books... The books were clearly the worst part of the whole experience. As the library is a crowded place, it can be hard to get a seat. Unfortunatly, this problem is exaserbated by people leaving their books on the table to save their seat when they leave for dinner or whatever else. It is even common practice, I am told, to leave books unattended, and thus to monopolise precious seating, for hours at a time. Like so many things here, if someone had just thought it through... During one study break I finally talked to a Chinese person, or rather she talked to Chris an myself. This girl apparantly had lived in East Africa for a year importing and selling second hand cars. Normally, this would be a very cool experience, but the only things she talked about from it were how white girls were somehow strange for going out with African guys and how African people are generally bad to begin with. When we asked her why this was the case, she talked, as most Chinese people do, about their culture blah blah blah... Come on, if she really believes this racist shit, why is she talking to Chris and me in the first place? The conversation did not go on much longer.
Not much happened on tuesday... I studied a bit, pretty much the same goes for today. The plus side, however, is that I have been studying and I now feel much more prepared for my lessons.
Now the only unaccomplished goal I am left with is finding Chinese friends. How do I go about finding friends who are worth talking to and won't just lecture me on "Chinese culture". Someone who is even remotely intelectually fulfilling to talk to... Someone who can talk to me about something other than practicing his oral English (yes, this is a very common topic of conversation with Chinese peopler here). Maybe it is too much to ask...
Marc
Nothing particularly intersting is going on in my life right now. I know this may sound strange given that I am in a foreign country, and a particularyly foreign one at that, and living the life of an exchange student, but I must say that life here is not nearly as fun or active as it was in Singapore. I am still working, still going to school, still living the life of an outsider in a country I have not fully accepted.
On sunday I went for dinner with Max. He sent me a text message at around 7 pm and came over soon after. It turned out that he had just come from his economics class so he was in the area. As usual we talked mostly in English for a while on varying topics. At one point, he asked me if I had Chinese friends in the university. I instinctively answered "not many". He, probably knowing me better than I thought, then asked "not many or none at all". At this point I paused. It had not really occured to me that I didn't have any Chinese friends at my university. Of course I didn't. Of course I have not been speaking Chinese outside of class and a few other narrow circumstances, but I had just avoided thinking about it. At the time, however, I downplayed this fact and tried to get the conversation onto more agreable subjects. Towards closing time we started talking about economics. He had brought with him his course outline for what must have been his microeconomics course and I wanted to take a look at it. It was fun translating all of the different terms and jargon from Chinese to English with him. It also showed me that there was virtually nothing that this course covered that I did not cover in 3rd year honours micro at UBC and, furthermore, that this course was not mathematically rigorous. The other interesting thing was that economics is called "Western economics" (西经济学） as opposed to Marxist economics which is still manditory, but is just done as an obligation, not as an area of serioius study.
The next day, shamed by my lack of Chinese friends, I went to the library with Chris. I guess I hoped that I would be able to meet people there. In the event, I did not much like the library. I know it is unfair to compare it to the libraries at UBC or even NUS, but this place was just so institutional. The lights were hard on the eyes and the chairs were not particularly comfortable. Furthermore, as opposed to the carrals at UBC, all of the studying was done on big communal tables, which might not have been so bad if it were not for the books... The books were clearly the worst part of the whole experience. As the library is a crowded place, it can be hard to get a seat. Unfortunatly, this problem is exaserbated by people leaving their books on the table to save their seat when they leave for dinner or whatever else. It is even common practice, I am told, to leave books unattended, and thus to monopolise precious seating, for hours at a time. Like so many things here, if someone had just thought it through... During one study break I finally talked to a Chinese person, or rather she talked to Chris an myself. This girl apparantly had lived in East Africa for a year importing and selling second hand cars. Normally, this would be a very cool experience, but the only things she talked about from it were how white girls were somehow strange for going out with African guys and how African people are generally bad to begin with. When we asked her why this was the case, she talked, as most Chinese people do, about their culture blah blah blah... Come on, if she really believes this racist shit, why is she talking to Chris and me in the first place? The conversation did not go on much longer.
Not much happened on tuesday... I studied a bit, pretty much the same goes for today. The plus side, however, is that I have been studying and I now feel much more prepared for my lessons.
Now the only unaccomplished goal I am left with is finding Chinese friends. How do I go about finding friends who are worth talking to and won't just lecture me on "Chinese culture". Someone who is even remotely intelectually fulfilling to talk to... Someone who can talk to me about something other than practicing his oral English (yes, this is a very common topic of conversation with Chinese peopler here). Maybe it is too much to ask...
Marc
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home