Apologies for the long silence on this blog. Since the last post, I have completed the last semester at Mianyang Teachers’ College and closed my service in the Peace Corps in mid-July. After a few weeks of travel, I returned to Seattle and started work at the end of August. I never intended such a long break, as there were many noteworthy happenings in the Spring and Summer. Now is the time to pick up that slack.
I last left off recounting my experience in Xi’an during the Spring Festival holiday. Below are a few photos of what Mianyang looked like during the holiday this past February. A characteristic of so many Chinese cities are LED-lit buildings that light up the night sky and accentuate drab buildings into colorful panoramas. During the Spring festival, lanterns are hung everywhere, adorning the city with red. Combined it provided a wonderful place to walk in the evening.
April brought more nice weather and many more activities. At the beginning of the month, the new bike sharing service that is spreading through China made its debut on the campus. Each bike features a lock and a QR code. The bikes can be rented by the hour or paying a monthly fee, and when one is done using it, the bike can be left anywhere–and I do mean anywhere, even if it is some random place in the middle of the sidewalk or on the side of a busy street.
I had bag of chocolate chips from the US and used them to bake some wonderful cookies, and at the same time made banana oat muffins and lemon bars. I brought them all in for students to taste while I explained the process of how to bake cookies. Sweet homemade treats go over well here, and I’m glad to continue sharing with them about the goodies we make in America.
The nice spring weather has meant more activities outside, such as my continued participation in ultimate frisbee with a group for another college and exploring the city on my bike. There is a nice park downtown to enjoy, however in China, having a designated bike trail doesn’t necessarily mean I have that to myself. Sometimes the electric motorbikes ride in the same path. To keep the e-bikes out, apparently someone decided it would be a good idea to block the path, which also blocks the path for bicycles. I gave up and rode along the busy road for awhile because I was tired of dismounting my bike every 200 meters.
A group of international students from various countries visitied the campus and there were several big events. No one told myself or the other foreign teachers living here about this, except for one of my students who was gonig to be absent as she had volunteer duties all day. It turned out that 14 other students in her class also were volunteering for this event. I found out when the bell rang and only half of my students were present. Surprise! That’s life here.
Finally, I was asked to give a presentation about education in the USA to several other teachers from the English department. This event will soon have its own post, as it involved some collaboarative work between myself and two elementary level educators I know in the US. Stay tuned for that story.
Bike sharing
Ultimate frisbee with friends at another college
Chocolate chip cookies!
My baking extravaganza: banana oat muffins, chocolate chip cookies, and lemon bars.
The bike path at a park downtown
Not all bike paths are convenient for actually riding a bike
Beautiful Spring day
Umbellas in the rain while riding a bike
The hosts for the program with foreign student guests.
Cultural show at the program for foreign student guests
The presentation on Education in the USA to my English Department colleagues.
Not unlike other colleges throughout China, my college held a Sports Meet this past month. Colleges and Universities here do not have organized team sports to the degree which the United States does. In fact, this 2-day event reminded me how deeply embedded sports is into my own culture from a very early age all the way through adulthood. This meet, akin to a school track and field day, was a competition within the school rather than against other schools.
I would have loved to have participated in some actual sports, but the teachers here, at least at my college, did events such as tug-of-war. We all marched into the track, and then the teachers left for the basketball courts for their events. This was, however, at the same time as the students continued with the opening ceremony. So I was presented with a dilemma: Stand around and watch teachers compete in 3-legged races and maybe be involved in a tug-of-war, or watch the students perform in their opening ceremony.
I chose to watch the students, and I wasn’t disappointed.
Freshmen in the Foreign Language Department prepare to parade into the stadium.
With some of my students
With some of my students
Girls standing there looking beautiful.
Other departments parade into the stadium.
The Foreign Language Department’s performance
Kung Fu performance
Let’s exercise!
Freshmen in the Foreign Language Department
Posing with the freshmen.
Posing with some of the student performers.
Several departments gave performances, and the Foreign Language Department was one of them. Many of my freshmen students donned chearleader-like outfits bearing their mid-drift and danced around to a pop song waving pom-poms. More of my freshmen students participated in a coordinated calisthenics drill on the field together with students from other departments. There were several more performances, including Kung Fu.
Just being on the track with a crowd took me back to my days in high school running in track and cross country. My students were flabbergasted that I competed in 400, 800, and 1600 meters, as well as 5km races. That just doesn’t happen here. High school students in China are hyper-focused on studying and preparing for the college entrance examination, that they don’t have time for such regular sports, not to mention that females aren’t presented with the same opportunities as males in sporting.
The meet lasted two days, but I only attended the first day. I am hoping to coordinate some of my students together to learn about sports, but that hasn’t happened yet.
This opening ceremony took place on a Thursday, so all classes were cancelled for this event. As is typical here, they will be made up at the end of the semester, although we won’t know exactly which day until some day closer to the end of the semester.
Aliens. Robots. Environmental destruction. Pollution loving aliens. Secret agents. Witches. Killer friends. Dystopian futures. Birds engulfed in shadow. These are a few topics students at my college wrote about during the creative writing competition last month. I was honored to host Write On!, an international creative writing competition facilitated by Peace Corps Volunteers around the world. Much of the instruction for Chinese college English majors focuses on memorizing long lists of vocabulary and knowledge of grammar to score high on standardized tests, so this offers them an alternative way to use and improve their English skills.
The rules are simple: students are shown two writing prompts (different at each grade level) and given one hour to respond to one of them without the use of any aid such as cell phone or dictionary. Their entries are judged based on creativity and overall structure rather than on grammar and spelling. As a host I chose 10 entries from each grade level (in my case, University freshmen, sophomore, and junior), and those entries were judged at provincial and national level against other students from other Peace Corps sites. Those national winners were then judged at an international level from other Peace Corps sites across the globe.
Over 170 students from my college came and tapped into their creativity. I was thrilled—and a bit overwhelmed—at such a great turnout especially because many were not my students. Even more thrilling, one student was selected as the National and International winner for 3rd year university (junior) level.
The stacks of entries for the writing competition.
I first met Celina when I told her she was the Write On! National Winner for juniors (we hadn’t yet learned the result of the international judging). I only teach speaking and listening for freshmen and sophomores, so it came as a surprise when 31 juniors attended the competition.
We sat down for a chat in the space known as the “Bookend,” an ongoing project started some years ago by a previous Volunteer. The room features stacks of books in English and Chinese, and ranges from fiction and classics to dictionaries and textbooks all available for checkout. The Bookend also functions as a daily English Corner. As I talked with Celina, a group of 20 students were already engrossed in practicing pronunciation through tongue twisters.
With Celina (陈林）, a junior and winner in the Write On competition at the National and International level.
Celina said she hadn’t participated in Write On! last year, but was eager to this year after she heard about it. When she began her study in Mianyang, she wasn’t too interested in English. That changed over time, in part, to having a previous Peace Corps Volunteer as a teacher whom Celina still fondly remembers.
When I asked Celina about the thought process for her essay, she said she had considered a happy ending, but it wouldn’t have been interesting enough. When I read Celina’s essay, I was struck by the unique approach (She chose to write from this prompt: Every morning, a bird lands on your window and pecks at the glass. It is your alarm clock. One morning, it doesn’t appear. Instead, there is a note. What does it say? What happens next?). To me, her story is mysterious and haunting. Part of what drew me in to select her essay for the university 3rd year top 10 was the ending without a clear resolution, marked by two words: “Save me!”
Celina was quite surprised and humbled by the honor to be a national and international winner. Her face lit up with a bright smile as she softly spoke about her experience and future ambition. She told me she is seriously considering earning a graduate degree. She wants to pursue a career translation, and in fact, had perused the Bookend shelves for a translation textbook before our talk.
We parted ways after taking a photo together; she still seemed a little surprised. She wants to participate again next year, and I told her I would be happy to host another competition. Until then, she will be studying and preparing for the TEM-8, another big examination for English majors.
The second half of March was more pleasant–the rains returned after a long winter absence which fostered new green growth and flowers. I had some time to get out and ride my bike a few times to enjoy the springtime. At school, the semester continued on. We foreign teachers introduced our English Corner students to the game of Monopoly, which went over really well. One student, who at first didn’t know if she would enjoy the game, said, “Wow, I like it!” after immediately receiving rent after buying a property. There was time to enjoy dinner out with students, as well as inviting students to my apartment to cook some spare ribs. I’m not yet proficient in cooking Sichuan food, but I expanded my baking repertoire by trying out some banana oat mini muffins.
Also pictured here are photos of the Anshun Bridge from a brief visit to Chengdu from February.
Anshun Bridge, Chengdu
Anshun Bridge, Chengdu
Another bridge, lit up in Chengdu
Spring rain
A student showing me how to cook Sichuan food.
Wonderful beef and pork made by a student.
Dinner with students
Enjoying a coffee at a coffee shop in a new nearby mall.
December, yes, that’s right. It’s time to catch up after the semester break and traveling around (posts about that coming soon). It is now February 2017 and the spring semester has begun. Let’s first go back for a quick summary of the end of 2016.
In December I had the opportunity to go to a temple here in Mianyang with a group of students. It’s called the Holy Water temple, a buddhist temple adorned with many colorful statues. During the month I also had several opportunities to eat out with students, and of course we had our final exams. Mianyang is often covered by gray hazy days, clouds, and generally lacks sunlight in the winter. I would argue it feels like there is less light than Seattle in the winter. There was one morning, however, where I actually saw blue sky (see photos below for side-by-side comparison).
A soft rain fell on Monday morning. From my balcony I sipped coffee and stared at the gray sky, rejoicing in the moment. Damp earth below, slight breeze through the screen, a view of my city. A long list of tasks awaited my attention, but for that moment, I could be present.
Today is Friday, the morning sky is obscured by low-hanging haze, a mixture of clouds and other particles drifting in the air. Even though the sky remains gray, natural light fills my apartment, and for that I’m grateful.
It was only 8 days ago I packed up and said goodbye to my new friends, goodbye to Chengdu and hello to this new life in Mianyang. I’ve come so far in the past 10 weeks–I completed my pre-service training, took an oath, and now am an official Peace Corps Volunteer. Here I am, another life abroad, another round of service, this time in China.
This week I worked hard cleaning and preparing checking off tasks on my list, and exploring this city that is now my home. Mianyang is an hour north of Chengdu by high-speed rail and is Sichuan’s 2nd largest city. With a population over 4 million Mianyang is known as a electronics and science city.
I toured the campus at Mianyang Teachers College 绵阳师范学院 (Miányáng shīfàn xuéyuàn) with a few students and caught the tail end of a college entrepreneur competition, and the closing ceremony that included cultural show and awards. Tomorrow my work begins in a more official capacity, as I will attend a staff meeting and introduce myself to faculty.
There is a favorite phrase here in Peace Corps China, and other locations as well I imagine: It Depends. So many questions arise during pre-service training that are met with “it depends” said with both seriousness and irony. What will I teach? What will my school expect of me? Where will I be placed? What will the classrooms be like? How many students will I have? And so on.
Here I am, already a week into life at my site and there are still questions unanswered. Classes at Mianyang Teacher’s College start next week, although some of my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers (PCVs) have already taught their first lessons and some will not teach a class until October. I do not have my teaching schedule yet, while some others have known for a few weeks. I have a nice apartment in a high rise building with a lovely balcony view, but some of my fellow PCVs have less amenities.
What’s it like here? … It depends.
And because of that, I will continue to find joy in the mornings and be present to this new life. It won’t be easy, nor always constant, but I’m ready for the journey.
