Going to the chapel
It happened almost a week ago, but I did want to write about the wedding we attended last Wednesday. The story is like this:
One of Yau Neih's colleagues, Della, was getting married and, as is the custom, invited all her co-workers to the celebration. It was quite an unusual situation--we had a week and a half notice. A couple of the students had been told to escort us and one of them spread the word. The official invitation arrived two days before the wedding, but by then we had already put it on the calendar.
Actually, I should clarify here. We were invited to a wedding
banquet, not any sort of ceremony. From what we've been told, there is no ceremony as we have in the States, where vows are exchanged or stuff like that. Instead there is a whole day of events. The "wedding" starts off early, with events involving the bride's family at their home. What events actually occurred last Wednesday, I don't know. From what I've heard about other Chinese weddings, the mood seems to be quite light hearted. By the early afternoon, the couple head over to the groom's family home for more of the same. Late afternoon--suppertime in these parts-- is the time for the banquet, when all the friends and family are invited. This is where we came in.
A bit before four in the afternoon, we got all gussied up for the feast. We had asked our student informant about the dress code, and she said that we could dress up if we wanted to. I should have taken that "wanted to" to heart. We erred on the side of American culture. The ladies put on dresses and I dusted off my sport jacket and tie. We headed down to the entrance of our building and were soon met by our student escorts.
They were dressed in their everyday classroom garb. At first I was mortified. But then I figured, hey, I'm an old geezer now, I
should dress a bit classier than the students. Of course, when some of the other faculty members stopped and offered us a ride, none of
them were wearing ties, either. So once we were safely seated in the car, I removed my tie and stuffed it in my pocket. I am such a conformist.
The driver left us off at the hotel and we started towards what we thought was the entrance. We were a bit hesitant, because from a distance, Della didn't look like Della. I mean usually she wears her glasses and doesn't wear a white wedding gown. Fortunately one of Yau Neih's other colleagues came up behind us and helped us to get where we needed to go. (I should mention that in the process of hitching rides, we got separated from our student guides.) The happy couple and significant family members flanked the entrance, offering greetings, candy, peanuts and sunflower seeds. There was a lot of candy, peanuts and seeds offered that evening. It makes me wonder a bit, because one of our regular hikers always brings peanuts and sunflower seeds on our hikes. Is she eager to get married or something? But I digress. Once past the welcoming committee, we entered the restaurant. The place was packed, with people dining away. I wondered if maybe the relatives got invited to an earlier seating than the rest of us. I never found out. We were escorted up stairs where there were another two dining rooms awaiting us. If I threw a party this size in the states, I think I might have to sell off the house to pay for it. For all I know, maybe the parents did do just that. Anyway, there were about a dozen or more dishes, along with a few beverages. Everyone ate their fill and then, without ceremony, got up and left. Well, at one point the bridal couple did come up and offered a toast to the entire dining room. But otherwise it was just eat and run. Very strange to us Westerners, where we expect to at least see a kiss or two.
Anyway, we ate and we ran. One of our students had skeedaddled back to campus, the other accompanied us and another teacher to the couple's apartment. Whereas in the States we would hold the entertainment portion of the celebration in the banquet room, here in China the couple takes everybody back home. Well, actually, not
everybody, just those hearty souls who want to scope out the couple's wedding gifts and watch them make fools of themselves. You see, as the night wears on, the couple are expected to perform for their guests. It's kind of like "Truth or Dare" without the truth option. Failure to perform to the crowd's satisfaction usually involves a penalty of drinking a shot of alcohol. We had to wit an hour or so before the silliness began. We arrived at the apartment and were greeted with hot tea, candy, etc. We were able to check out the furnishings and look at their wedding album. Again, I was impressed. The apartment was somewhat small but they had some real nice stuff. And a gorgeous view of Qi Shan from their living room window. I would have been jealous, but I knew that in a few years they would be having a kid who would destroy all of it. (Well, maybe not the view...)
Eventually, however, the fun and games began. One of the teachers assumed the role of emcee and the couple amused us by trying to bite into an apple without using their hands and trying to pick up an ice cube with one chopstick apiece. The best schtick, however, was when Mr. Della (I never did learn the guy's name--remind me to blog sometime about how names get used here.) put on part of Della's wedding dress and Della put on his jacket and tie. (Guess I wouldn't have been the
only guy wearing a tie...) Thus attired they attempted to recreate for us their first meeting, their first date and the proposal. Mr. Della, especially, hammed it up. Even though I couldn't understand a word that was said, I had a good laugh with the rest of them.
It was about nine o'clock when the first round of games ended. We decided to leave, having got our cultural fill for the evening. A great time was had by all and hopefully it was the first of many happy days for the happy couple.
Rewrite
We were privy to a limited dramatic spectacle the other day. A few weeks back, a student of Yau Neih's had said that she and her classmates wanted to give a little performance--in English--for the upcoming Christmas show and asked if Yau Neih could provide a little Christmas skit for them to perform. Yau Neih brought the problem home and we kicked the idea around over lunch. Yau Neih finally settled on a basic plot and we all contributed some of the gags. Our premise was this: It's Christmas Eve and two children are waiting for Santa Claus. Although they've been told that nobody ever sees Santa Claus, they hope that by perseverance and clever concealment, they can not only catch a glimpse of, but also welcome their hero. Of course, it seems as everybody
but Santa decides to visit the home that evening. First a neighbor comes by with a gift basket. The neighbor is startled when the children burst out of hiding, shouting, "Santa Claus!" The next person to walk through the door is the children's older sister. She creeps into the quiet house with her boyfriend, hoping to share a quiet moment together. The sudden, exuberant appearance of her siblings scare off the boyfriend and spoil the whole mood. The final visitor is a burglar, who starts helping herself to some stocking stuffers. The children unknowingly frighten off this scoundrel as well. But finally, excitement takes its toll. The children drift off to sleep, and only then does Santa appear, leaving them their presents for Christmas.
Yau Neih wrote up a script for this and gave it to the student. The first progress report we got on their preparations was a bit later when the student asked if Yau Neih could show some of her classmates how to do the dance to "Edelweiss", a dance Yau Neih had taught at the English corner. Since we had never scripted a dance number into the skit, we new that somebody had been doing some rewriting. It seems the students had decided to tack on a dream sequence, where Santa and the evening's visitors danced in front of the Christmas tree. Yau Neih agreed to help out again, of course, and told them to come to the next English corner where she would teach that dance. She would also do another run through with them after the corner. So Tuesday arrived and when the dancing arrived, Yau Neih taught the "Edelweiss" dance, right after doing "La Raspa" aka "The Mexican Hat Dance". Once the dancing was over, Yau Neih and the bulk of the attendees went back to singing. The budding thespians, however, stayed on the other side of the room and practiced Edelweissing. For a moment, anyway. A minute or two later, I glanced over again and saw that they were La Raspa-ing instead. Sure enough, after the corner was over and I had taken the chairs back to their storage place I found out that a script rewrite had been made and that now the dream sequence would feature Santa and the cast getting down to Mexican music. As one partially of Austrian heritage, I suppose I should feel slighted, but truth to tell, I prefer "La Raspa" myself.
Anyway, this long winded narrative concludes with the performance a couple of days ago. We were invited to see a dress rehearsal of the skit and we were all eager to see the production of our little play. (I should mention as an aside that it will not be part of the Christmas show. They were told that they missed the application deadline or some such. But they put on the performance for us anyway, sweet kids that they are.) It was interesting to see just how our script was interpreted. For starters, we had envisioned a story with seven characters, told mostly in pantomime. The students had expanded the cast to twelve. There were the seven on stage performers, but there was also a narrator and four others who would actually recite the dialogue. The seven on stage would simply lip synch (or not, depending on their ability) to the script. It seemed a bit odd, but I have to admit it's a clever way to ensure good dialogue from a bunch of performers who are speaking a foreign language. The script itself seemed to have been expanded, with the voice actors explaining more of the action. The mimers' performance, in turn, was far more subdued than I had envisioned. Of course, my contributions were written with the vision of Loony Tunes and Buster Keaton in my mind's eye. I'm pretty sure that the kids didn't have those influences when growing up, so I couldn't expect them to evoke that same spirit in their performance. The next notable departure was the appearance of ol' Saint Nick. Again, what was envisioned while writing didn't match what appeared on stage. We had pictured Santa quietly and gently sneaking into the room to leave behind his presents for the children. The guy who played Santa, however, strode boldly on stage, pumping his fists into the air as if he was making a victory lap. It was an odd touch, but strangely enough, it worked.
I guess that would be my capsule summary of the performance: it worked. The secret, I've found, to enjoying disparate productions like a local talent show is to put aside my own expectations and enjoy what's being offered. The performance of our script had a flavor, a subtle humor that was mildly unsettling, but still enjoyable. It's a pity that they can't play to a wider audience, but I suppose that any performer that's truly eager for the footlights will find a way to get on stage.
I can't thank you enough
In the United States, many people are looking forward to a four day weekend. For my family here in China, we've got a five day one. Or a two day, depending on how you're defining weekend. We all have to
work from Monday through Friday, but starting on Wednesday evening, the week is filled with fun and festivities.
For Wednesday, we've been invited to a wedding banquet. One of Yau Neih's colleagues is getting married and is including all the
lao wai on campus in her celebration. It'll be our first wedding banquet here in China, so we're all looking forward to it, even if I do have to wear a tie. (Another China first!) On Thursday, life in China is business as usual, but we American expatriates are making the effort to celebrate Thanksgiving Day. We received two invitations to join with our countrymen in a turkey feast--one from the group in town and another from folks on a farm south of here. The farmers asked first, so that's where we're headed. On Friday afternoon we fly out to Kunming to meet with the fellow teachers in our agency. We generally have a Autumn retreat and they're scheduling it for Thanksgiving weekend. Friday night will just be dinner out, which, of course, is a treat. Saturday will require some meetings, of course, but the evening promises another Thanksgiving feast. Whether it's turkey or not, I don't know. On Sunday we'll have some more schmoozing and eating before we take a sleeper bus back home. We probably won't have the traditional leftovers, but we will try to squeeze in some traditional shopping. (Got to pick up those Western essentials when we can.)
Come Monday, we'll undoubtedly be looking forward to a good nap. (unless they managed to smooth and straighten all the roads in the past six months) If I'm lucky,
something blogworthy will have happened. If not, I may have to start doing reruns.
Fifteen minutes
Y'know, since I posted pictures of celebrities in my last post, maybe I should talk about my own turn as a celebrity. Well, maybe I shouldn't, but I can't think of anything else to write, so you're stuck with it. Anyway, last Saturday we did the regular hike thing. The only unusual thing about it was that some of us decided to climb all the way to the top of Qi Shan. Unlike my last
conquest of Qi Shan, there were plenty of other folks up there to share in the glory--a couple dozen at least. Anyway, while our group was sitting and enjoying some snacks, another group came over and asked to have their photo taken with me. It was a group of students from a local school for traditional Chinese medicine. Even though I had already posed for the regular group shots with our own group, I was glad to pose with these other folks, too. It only took a couple of minutes to pose and schmooze, mostly because our limited ability in each others' languages limited the schmoozing. They asked the typical questions: Where are you from? How long have you been in China? Can you speak Chinese? It was all a bit fun, but hardly novel.
Jump ahead to Saturday evening. I ventured over to the neighborhood English corner for the regular Saturday night session. The neighborhood corner is doing quite well this year. Either word has gotten around to the high school kids or their teachers are really pushing them to go. Whatever the cause, the place was packed and there were about a dozen of us who had spilled out onto the sidewalk. The topic was "weather". When the time came for everybody to converse with the people at their table, we formed a group right there outside. I had met a couple of the kids before and there was one student from the college, but the majority of the group were new to me. As was I to them. We did manage to discuss the topic for a little bit, but then someone asked, "Where are you from?" I answered, of course, not being a stickler for staying on topic. The discussion slowly eroded from there as we started talking less and less about weather and more and more about the foreigner in their midst. Soon, however, the corner was over and we all went our separate ways.
On the way back to campus I chatted a bit with Sherry, the lone college student in our group. She mentioned something along the lines that the middle school students enjoyed the chance to talk with a foreigner. I replied that I was glad I could oblige them. She then said that she had noticed that we tend to get asked the same questions again and again. I was tempted to reply, "Welcome to my world." But since she probably wouldn't have understood the metaphor, I simply agreed. Her comment did get me thinking, though. I imagine that our life here in the sticks of Yunnan is a bit like that of a celebrity. We don't make the big bucks, of course. (though Yau Neih's salary is quite good compared to local standards) Nor have we received any offers to appear on a game show or
The Love Boat. (This shows how out of it I am. Where do celebrities with fading careers end up these days?) But we do get noticed. I've had people come up out of the blue and say that they heard we shopped at such and such store or mention that they saw us dancing in the park. We also have a steady supply of people who want to talk to us, or at least get our photo.
The girls really don't care for it all. Me, I vacillate between enjoying the attention and wishing I could just become invisible. It's nice when people are genuinely happy to see you. But it's the most superficial of relationships. I get a sense that I'm performing, giving people a glimpse of that exotic land called America. It's a privilege to be able to do so, but it's nowhere near as satisfying as a real friendship. Thankfully we do have both. And by the end of next year it'll be over. After a brief stint of being the exotic world travelers offering a glimpse of China, we will once again become mundane.
Maybe we're related?
Whilst browsing I discovered a site that will match your face to a celebrity. (Thanks, Joel, for the link!) I have to say, that I did not expect these results:
The big pic is me. The little guys, left to right, top to bottom are: Bill Gates, Ricky Ponting, John Williams, John Denver, Linus Torvalds, Eugene Levy, William Rehnquist, and Kim Jong Il. (Missing from the list is Dalida, who ranks after John Denver, and Francesco Cura, who came after Linus Torvalds. I omitted them so I could include Rehnquist and Kim Jong Il, who are much funnier matches, in my opinion.)
Homeless, homeless are we
This past election got me to thinking about our home. Now, I know that one of our guidelines for internet use is to avoid controversial topics like politics, but since this is about
not voting, I think I'm okay. You see, despite many years of being a faithful voter, I decided that my participation in the electoral process was something that I was going to leave back in the States. I know that I
can cast my vote via absentee ballot, but I didn't know how well I could stay informed on the candidates and issues here in China. An even bigger reason is that it would mean cutting another tie with our home.
We're in an odd situation, living here in China. From the beginning we decided that our time here was going to be limited to two years. We wanted the experience, but we didn't feel a calling to spend a bigger chunk of our lives here. The problem is, one just can't put one's life on pause and slip out to live a different one. I suppose we
could have let our house sit furnished and vacant, and continued to pay for things that we weren't using, like utilities and auto insurance. But we didn't have the kind of money to do that. So we ended up vacating our house and renting it out. Of course, given our desire to return to our old way of life in two years, we ended up moving in body, but not in spirit. Our mail was now going to my sister-in-law's place in Renton, but we still thought of ourselves as residents of Seattle. Soon after moving out, we settled down in our apartment here in China. Now we had
three homes: the place we were actually staying, the place our mail was going to, and the blue house in Seattle. At times it was a bit confusing. (And then, of course, there was this summer that we spent in Tacoma. When asked where we were from, we didn't know if we should answer Seattle, Renton, China or Tacoma.)
The question is, does having three homes make us very rooted, or do they all cancel each other out and make us homeless? I mean, I take less interest in our Seattle neighborhood (and local politics) since I'm not there to deal with them. I also have a more detached attitude here in China, because I'm just a guest. When the bill comes due for the new stadium in town, I'll be back in the States. There are times when the concerns of one place or another tug at me--it's human nature to want to settle down, after all--but I can't really get caught up in it. I suppose the answer will come at the end of next summer when we return to the blue house. Will we feel that we've truly come home? Or will we find that we've left a part of ourselves back here and that are transplanted roots can't quite sink down to the depth they had before we left? I'm in no hurry to find out, but sometimes I wonder.
Transit rules
One thing I have to say about living in China--it is a learning experience. Not only do I discover facets of life here that I could never pick up from a book, but I also get new insights into life back home. Take this afternoon, for instance. Yau Neih and I were riding a bus to the north side of town. Soon after we got on, the bus stopped to pick up another rider. With some effort, an old lady climbed aboard. Right after her, a mid sized dog hopped on. The lady sat down, towards the front, the dog just stood in the aisle in the middle of the bus. I didn't know if the dog belonged to the woman or just decided to go for a ride. Either way, it seemed odd to me, since in Seattle animals must either be leashed or caged to ride the bus. Of course, I had to question that policy as we rolled onward. The dog stood quite placidly as we traveled, like any other commuter. But then the rationale behind Metro's policy became clear. On one of the stops the bus made, the dog got off. (The bus had stopped to let off some other passengers. The dog itself didn't signal for a stop.) The bus started off but then a cry went up from the old woman. The bus stopped again and she started yelling at the dog. The dog looked at her politely enough, but didn't return to the bus. So the poor woman had to get off the bus and herd the dog back on. This time she made the dog stand closer to her. So I then realized why leashes and stuff are required in Seattle--you just can't trust a dog to get off at the right stop.
(Oh, and another discovery was made while i was writing this post. Did you know that Metro Transit only has
two Frequently Asked Questions? I know riding the bus is hardly rocket science, but you'd thing people would have more curiosity than that.)
(Of course, that leads to a whole new speculation as to what standards are used to determine Frequently Asked Questions. I mean, if I got a bunch of friends to start barraging Metro with phone calls asking why they don't have inflight movies, would they update their website? Or would they just say that it's a dumb question and ignore us?)
Nothing to write about
There seemed to be a hiccup with Blogger for a couple of days last week and then right after that we had network problems that lasted a day and a half. So that's my excuse for not posting. Of course, even if everything had been working hunky-dory, I would not have anything to write about. Life has become incredibly routine. I can't say that it's boring, really, but it's nothing to write about. I mean, buying pig-bread is no longer an adventure. We haven't had any strange fellow following us. We haven't eaten anything exotic or discovered any new quirk about life in China. It's just a matter of going through the daily routines, chatting with folks, discovering a little thing here or there. Almost like life in the States. Probably the biggest challenge we faced this week (besides not getting blown up in
EV Nova) was getting Ga Dai's violin repaired. We discovered that the bridge was a bit off, so first we checked the web for more info. The page we found recommended letting an expert fix it. So on Thursday afternoon, we were able to ask one of the English teachers here if they could put us in touch with one of the music teachers on campus. Tonight she called us back, and the music teacher was able to readjust the bridge and swap a defective tuner from the E to the G string. All for the cost of a postcard from Tacoma. Boring. If my laptop had audio inputs, I could at least post an MP3 of the retuned violin in action. But it doesn't, so I didn't. Oh, well. I suppose I should enjoy the quiet while it lasts.
