Another (remarkable) profile and a class picture

Last day of class yesterday. I gave the students pens as gifts and thanked them. They have been my eyes and ears to understanding China. I know so much more. And so little. Here's one last profile that I like a lot:

---’s story: living in the city is the most important.

It is 9 o’clock in the morning on Pingshi Street in Nanjing. --- has just finished her job as a Chinese style breakfast seller, standing in the street for nearly three hours.. It is in deep winter now, and her cotton quilted coat is too old to resist the cold weather. She can’t help shivering the moment she stops moving. Since breakfast time is over, --- begins to pack up the unsold food into her tricycle, which is both her vehicle and her shop. Her red and bloated fingers are still agile enough to do all the packing. After she packs up, she wraps a thick scarf closely about her head and climbs onto the big tricycle to ride home.
It is 13 years since --- left Anhui Province and came to Nanjing.
--- was born in a small village in the north of Anhui, which now is famous for its beautiful countryside. Her parents are farmers who grow tea leaves, like most of the farmers in the village. When --- was very young, she began to help her parents pick the leaves.
“People usually think it’s hard for a girl to do farm work when she is very young,” --- says. “However, I didn’t feel anything uncomfortable then since other children help their parents do this too.”
When she was 8 years old, her parents sent her to a local rural primary school. “Ｍy Chinese teacher was nice and offered me his own books to read. I enjoyed reading but my school work wasn’t good enough.” In a rural school, only few top students can further their study in a university. --- wasn’t one of them, and she left school after she graduated from a local middle school.
“I don’t feel sorry for it,” she says. “I knew clearly I wasn’t going to be one of the top students no matter how hard I worked.” She lived at home for about half a year as a jobless teenager and then decided to look for opportunities in the city. She and two other young girls came to Nanjing by train in the spring of 1995.
“The train station then wasn’t as big and beautiful as it is now. but it was as crowded as it is today,”--- says.
There are still tens of thousands of farmers pouring into cities every day. According to government statistics, there are nearly 200 million migrant laborers now working in the cities.
--- and her two friends, with help from an acquaintance, quickly found jobs in a privately owned factory producing drygoods in a suburb of Nanjing. She lived with three other girls in a dormitory owned by the factory and the factory provided them with lunch and supper. Her first month’s salary was 600　yuan.
“I went to downtown and bought new clothes for myself. It was alive, clean, and beautiful, totally different than my home” --- admits that she was deeply attracted by this strange place then. “I had never seen so many beautiful clothes before.”
However, --- didn’t get many chances to visit downtown because of her hard work. She worked about 10 hours a day, six days a week. “I felt tired and missed the beautiful clothes a lot which I know I can’t afford.” One of her roommates started to wear more and more beautiful clothes, which no doubt were beyond her purchasing power. “She makes the same salary as us but her ‘boyfriend’ was rich.” The “boyfriend” --- mentioned is a married man who has taken this girl as his mistress. That was common then and even now. Beautiful poor girls always make money much easily than average-looking girls.
--- was not bad-looking when she was 20, as her photo shows, but she had no luck. Her first boy friend was a temporary worker in her factory who is also from a rural place. When --- realized that she would still be a farmer and a farmer’s wife if she married him, she broke up with this young man without hesitation. “I make little money in the suburb of the city, but I would like to stay in the city rather than be back to my hometown, a quiet but boring village,” --- says. “City life is interesting and beautiful even though I can not enjoy it now.I hope my child will grow up in the city, knowing how big and wonderful this world is.”
Ten years ago, --- was introduced to an old woman who was looking for a proper wife for her 30-year-old son. The old woman and her son lived on Pingshi Street, an old street in the inner city. They lived in an apartment in a small single-story house, no bigger than 40 square meters with little furniture in it. The young man was a blue collar worker and his mother had no work. Few city girls would like to marry him and be a hostess in such a small apartment. --- met with the young man in his apartment for first time. “He was shy and didn’t talk too much, but I think he’s a nice guy.Ｉ know I will get a permanent urban residence certificate after I marry him and that’s important to me.”
They married in 1998.Her dowry was only 5000 yuan which she deposited over three years. Her parents came to the city on the wedding day and went back home by train that night since there was no room for them to stay in her small house. Her factory was too far from her new house so she quit her job and looked for some temporary work close by.
--- was working as waiter in a small restaurant when she found herself pregnant in 2002. It was not the first time she got pregnant since she married. “In my home village, it is natural for young couple to have their own baby when the wife gets pregnant. But you know, raising a child in the city is rather difficult. I love children but my husband and I were not ready for a baby, so we chose to abort the first baby. By 2002, we were still poor, but I think maybe it’s the time. I was 27 and my husband was 35 then, we are no longer young.”
Her baby was born in winter of 2002. It was a healthy boy. --- lost her job in the restaurant and stayed at home to look after her baby until 2005, when her boy was 3 years old. Her husband’s salary was too little for this four-person family. As a thirty-year-old woman with no professional skills, --- found it was too difficult to find a job near her house. She decided to start a small business--a very small business. She bought a second-hand tricycle with 200 yuan and modified it into a mobile shop. She sells some simple food for breakfast to working people who have no time to cook for themselves. --- has to get up at 4 o’clock in the morning to prepare the food. This small business brings her family some income, about 2000 yuan a month, almost the same salary her husband earns at his factory.
“I know clearly that my life now is difficult, but it is in the city. Most people in the city have to try their best to survive, just as I did when I came to Nanjing in 1995. Now I’ve got my own family here: a healthy baby and a hard working husband. Maybe I’ll lead an easier life if I go back to my home village, but I　will always miss the vitality and beauty of city. Now I’m living in the city and that’s the most important.

Final assignments

I’ve asked students to write profiles as the final assignment for my writing class. Several students are writing about college graduates who can’t find jobs or are getting paid less than factory workers.
One writes:
“From 2001 to 2005, the number of college graduates in China has grown rapidly but the employment ratio has dropped.... It is estimated that raising a child from cradle to college costs 400,000 RMB while the average starting salary of the graduates is 1549 RMB per month. Students with master’s degrees earn an average of 2674 per month and those with doctorates earn an average of 2917. Some people suggest it is better for parents to spend their money on pension insurance than on their children.”

There is tremendous pressure on children, particularly now that most families have only one child, to succeed in school and earn enough money to support their parents, since few of them have pensions or health care. But the economic slowdown here is making it increasingly difficult to find jobs.


Another student profiled a migrant worker and concluded with this anecdote:
“It was time for lunch and I invited ---- to join me, but he refused. “My clothes are so dirty. If we have lunch together, you will be laughed at by others,”--- said shyly. “There is no choice as a worker.”
“Never mind, “ I said, “Nobody will do so.” He still disagreed. When I proposed that I go buy fast food so we can have lunch on the construction site together, he refused my offer. “Whether your family is rich or not, your money comes from your parents as a student,” he said.” I have earned money by myself on earth, so I should pay for the lunch.” He spoke to me like a parent, although he is three years younger than I. Finally, I had to give up my plan for us to have lunch together.
When we left the construction site and walked through the campus, it was very crowded, as usual. ---- looked uncomfortable, and walked carefully so that he wouldn’t knock into the students. “Walking on campus, I feel particularly self-conscious,” he said..” He seemed embarrassed..
“It does not matter,” I said. “You will open your own company, won’t you? At that time, college students may be working for you.” I smiled. ---- scratched his head, and laughed. The smile spread on his face, bright and warm.

Others are writing about programs for handicapped children, such as a treatment center for autism and a school for deaf-mute children. Another story in progress is about “fake” journalists, people who make a living as reporters even though they are not licensed by the government. Some are quite successful at breaking important stories, like illegal coal mining operations, yet at the same time are willing to take bribes to make money and to keep stories out of the news, as some “real” journalists do as well. (One student told me last week that executives of Sanlu, the company that sold milk tainted with melamine, offered a bribe to the owners of China’s most popular search engine to delete all links to stories about the scandal.)

Kunming Tea Shop

Lijiang: Yuelong Mountain, the legendary Dr. Ho prepares medicine for Marcus's cold, Nina with Shaman at Naxhi temple, Tiger Leaping Gorge

Tiger Leaping Gorge & The Chinese Tea Party

From Marcus:

Tiger Leaping Gorge, one of the deepest gorges in the world, near the mouth of the Yangtze River:
"The snow on the top of the glorious mountain gave the luster of mid-day to the objects below, when what to my wandering eyes should appear, but a miniature tiger and stuff."

Tea Party, tasting rare Pu'er tea in Kunming, some more than 20 years old!

"The taste of the tea was good, especially before a big meal. One tea tasted like freshly peeled oranges. I was invited to assist the people who were pouring tea and were making the tea. First you had to put tea leaves in a cup, and then you poured water in another cup, and then you poured it in the cup with the tea leaves. Then you strained it into a jar, and poured it into cups. And people were giving me all these gifts, like orange tea and pu'er tea, and a special basket of bamboo to store it in. When I grow up I'm going to become a master tea maker."

Marcus is now engrossed in a program on Chinese television on how to speak English, so I think this is all for now....

Critiques

My students have been writing critiques of plays and movies and, again, this has been a wonderful learning experience for me. Perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that "The Truman Show" is popular here, at least for those who download it from tudou.com.
I've also learned about some new plays, such as “Madame Bovary is Me.” Here's an excerpt from a student review.

The drama, in 15 acts, shows the dilemmas women face in modern life, mixed with the original plot of the novel "Madame Bovary." On the modern side, audiences can easily recognize caricatures of popular stars from actors/actresses' exaggerated performances. The 15 acts are performed in the form of TV talk shows. On the classical side, paragraphs of Flaubert's "Madame Bovary" are recited by performers between scenes, which brings audiences back to 19th century France.

Why does it link modern life with "Madame Bovary"?

"Everyone is Madame Bovary," playwright Edward Lam said in an interview published on a website promoting the play. "It doesn't matter whether you have read the novel or not. You can find such kind of woman everywhere now and 150 years ago, who are always filling their happiness and love with endless fantasy."

Lam gives the fantasy a more definite meaning in the drama--desire. "One day in 2006, I saw, in a subway station, countless ads were luring woman to go shopping. Modern society is eroding women. They love beauty by nature, but not all can achieve it. Once they have immersed themselves into the created dreams, they keep thinking it can become their everyday life. Ads and the media suggest beauty is every woman's right, but all are based on money. I hope women can understand they can gain their identity by other methods."

Lam attracts audiences with the imitations of popular stars and TV shows. The parodies are hilarious. For example, female stars like Chiling Lam, Jolin Tsai, Faye Wong, and popular TV shows like "Kangxi has come" and "Everybody Speaks Nonsense" are represented in this drama. Lam uses well-known figures and stories to represent the possible styles of a modern Madame Bovary.

Lam insists that modern media have a great influence on women. TV programs focus on female audiences. They cover everything women are concerned with, such as hairdressing, cuisine, housework, and stories about stars. Women have gradually relied more and more on the media. And the media, hand in hand with advertising, erode women’s values by creating a beautiful dream. In contrast, Lam has created absurd scenarios, where stars have common people's desire, weaknesses and sorrows. It serves as a mirror, from which women can recognize their common dilemmas beneath the shining surface produced by the media.

To some extent, dilemmas shown in "Madame Bovary is Me" are not just for women. Several female characters are acted by men.. It may hint that men and women are facing similar puzzles. Since all of us are living in a society full of temptation, the question "Am I lost in desire?" is not just for women.


Below is part of a critique of a film titled "The Equation of Love and Death":

"We are not attractive and no one cares about us,", said Lee Mi at the end of the film. Both Fang Wen and she are abandoned by the mainstream of the society, and their love is suspended under great pressure from their parents. Actually, the narrative perspective of the characters in the film demonstrates the fate of the poor and underprivileged in this changing society. Their anxiety about their status, their dreams and struggle to win social recognition and their pursuit of true love are all discouraged by cruel reality. In short, they can not control themselves and nobody cares about them, so they can only care about themselves, rescue themselves, or even exile themselves.
I think Lee Mi and Fang Wen’s story is a tragedy. On the one hand, the tragedy reflects the suffering of disillusioned people; on the other hand, the tragedy makes us respect their hopes. This movie warns us that there are some marginal groups whose upper mobility is cut off in our society.

And here's an excerpt from a critique of "XIAOWU":

Finally, it is the real relationship between people displayed through XiaoWu in the Fenyang town that shocked us most.
The silence and embarrassment when XiaoWu gave the gift to Xiaoyong, the secret war between XiaoWu and HuMeiMei on the street, his father’s request for XiaoWu to donate five thousand yuan to finance the marriage of the second brother, and the home warmth between senior police and XiaoWu. These never appeared in other Chinese films, but they are so real and met with what we see in real life. They always occur in many corners of society, and they are deep- rooted in social life, rooted in our social ways and habits. Once they were put on screen, we got unprecedented shock and experience.
Now, people are accustomed to classify JiaZhangke as one of the sixth generation directors born in the 90s such as ZhangXiaoshuai andJiangWen. Their style is different from the fifth generation, such as ZhangYimou and ChenKaige. The fifth generation directors put the ethnic customs and the imagery of ancient China into the international film word, with a nation-state knot(???).
The Sixth-generation directors follow traditional realism, but make a new interpretation of realism at the same time: they demonstrate the political enthusiasm in the producing; they pay attention to the theme of urban young people's political beliefs, ideals and the suspicion of so-called ultimate concern, the dissatisfaction and confusion in the future; the leading actors of films are often marginal in our lives.
The new generation directors describe young people’s lives with distinct personal insight and experience. They choose the flowing live tide(??) to reflect the main situation of the society, and strong youth soliloquy and personal tensile force(???) can be seen in the film.
XIAOWU is Jia’s classical work. It is full of reminiscence. It tells the story about common people’s lives and their emotion. It appropriately illuminates the style of the new generation in their early days.. So XIAOWU is the magnum opus of the sixth generation’s works.

In Tianjin (buying chop); Longmen Buddhas;Shaolin(rubbing Buddha, headache cure, turtle ride); with Prof Xu in Kaifeng; countryside; Great Wall