meeting

There were about 60 people that came to the meeting this evening. I was expecting that many more or less. It would be unrealistic of me to expect all 60 students to continue coming and posting articles. I think maybe 25% will write an article, and even that number may be somewhat of a highball, but even if we only retain 10 or so students, that is a significant staff for the first year try (in my book at least)

I began the meeting with a short introduction of myself and a welcome to the newspaper, then handed it over to Esther who has become the unofficial student leader of the newspaper with help from my suggestions. She spoke about the newspaper in Chinese and explained why she enjoyed it, the basics of the publishing process and what would be happening in the future. Joy then gave a demonstration about how to publish articles on the website using the http://localhost I had stored on my computer.

It's back to class tomorrow, and next week there is a week vacation for Labor day, so I'm looking forward to getting through and over this hump.

I almost don't feel like posting this because it's quite short and on the side of irrelevant, but here it is. There's a picture of Esther giving her speech at the beginning.

sixth sense

With the TEM-4 next week, I decided to show The Sixth Sense to my sophomore classes. We had been working the past few weeks on how to write a descriptive narrative. A lot of activities focused on how to use our senses to vividly describe a scene, person, place etc... Anyway, the movie itself was just a reward for recently finishing their latest big assignment, and a break before the exam this Sunday morning.

I realized after watching the movie again that a lot of Shyamalan movies are interesting stories but have way too many plot holes when you get down to the specifics. One of the things that really bothered me was how the ghosts find these weird kids to communicate with. I can only imagine that there is some call center that ghosts and spirits call when they want to meet someone. The conversation would go something like this:

Tech support: Hi, you've reached the Ghost Outreach center, how can I direct your call?
Ghost: I'm looking for a medium.
Tech support: Okay, what's the nature of your inquiry?
Ghost: I'm a 13-year-old girl who was poisoned by her mother. I'm looking to pass a video tape of her putting paint thinner into my food.
Tech support: Great, and do you have any alarming symptoms or conditions we need to be aware of?
Ghost: Yes, I am extremely pale and will vomit up my food on cue.
Tech support: Not a problem. And what's your location?
Ghost: Central Philadelphia.
Tech support: Well the closest one in your area is a 10-year-old boy named Cole. I'll go ahead and reserve a time for you at 10:00 for next Thursday. Remember to cancel at least 24 hours in advance or you'll be charged in full. I'll be using the insurance card you have on file. Thanks for calling the Ghost Outreach center.

I mean it's a great movie, but the story, when you get right down to it, just doesn't make any sense. The students really liked it though, and it was fun watching them scream at the scary parts. I had the chance to show the movie during one of my nighttime classes that really set the mood perfectly. Some of the students covered their eyes whenever they expected a scary scene.

In other news, I've got the first meeting of XiHua Online, the new and updated version of the previous website I had started cwnutimes.com. The new one, www.xihuaonline.com is much neater and has a few new features that weren't on the old site. I've done everything I can in terms of promotion, and hopefully there will be a big turnout. I'm starting to hand over the reins of the newspaper to my two students YangLiu (Joy) and XieYingMei (Esther), who both will be leading the first meeting with as little of my assistance as possible. Besides, I know students feel more comfortable expressing themselves to other students, whether in Chinese or in English, so having the two student leaders will be a perfect way of making all involved feel comfortable coming, writing, and asking questions.

I'll be posting what happens then. Any thoughts, comments, or suggestions on the site http://www.xihuaonline.com, would be welcome. To the left is one of the various posters I made to post around the school.

posters

When I was living in Chile I collected lots of American movie posters in Spanish from movie rental places and theaters. I lost a bunch when I tried to pack them in my suitcase because they ended up too wrinkled and ripped, but they were still cool nonetheless. Anyway, when I was downtown today, I visited a few movie and music stores with posters plastered along the walls to inquire as to how much they were. At the end of the day, I had purchased a number of wickedly neat music posters with Chinese characters. The best ones I got are of a Justin Timberlake Futuresex/Lovesound album poster and a Babel poster both in Chinese.

One guy had literally hundreds of posters and was surprised to hear that I wanted to buy some. I grabbed about 15 and asked how much, but for some reason he didn't want any money. I insisted I give him some reimbursement, as many of the posters I wanted he had to climb up a ladder and pull them off the wall. I initially offered him 30 yuan (2 yuan each) but he said 20 was fine and I told him I'd be back later. I only had time to go through maybe half of the ones that he had.

Here's a picture of my new wall with some of the posters I purchased this afternoon. It resembles my college apartment wall where I had numbers of posters covering the wall of my bedroom.

Most of the Chinese pop music artists featured on the posters I've never heard of, some I have. Admittedly I'm not a fan of Chinese contemporary music, but it would be entirely elitist of me to judge it as I'm sure Chinese people harbor similar feelings regarding American popular music.

This post has little to nothing to do with the NBC show 'Heroes'

I'm absolutely uncanny when it comes to recognizing faces. Really. If I were on Heroes, that would be my ability. I would recognize a face from a crowd or something. It's not as useful as the Japanese guy's power to go through time and space, but anyway, I can recognize any student's face. If I have met someone before, I remember that person's face.

Last Wednesday, I showed a movie in my Advanced Oral English class. Next week is the TEM-4 exam that students need to pass in order to get a full diploma from the school. If students don't pass the exam, they graduate, but do not get the same certificate that a student that did pass the exam would receive. The students take the test for the first time when they are sophomores and if they don't pass it, they take it again as juniors. About 60-65% of my juniors are taking the test again. I managed to take a look at one of the test review books all the students have and view some of the questions. I'll post some examples after the exam once I can get one of the booklets from a student, but most of the questions were quite difficult, even for me. There's a vocabulary section, reading comprehension, and listening comprehension (a tape is played and questions are asked). Believe it or not, it's probably just about on par compared to the SATs.

I can't stand the TEM-4, the TEM-8, CET-4, CET-6 and any of the other frivolous exams that students take. I really can't stand them. For the students, the tests are of utmost importance. They spend every waking hour studying and reviewing questions from the books. I can't blame the students though. It's completely understandable that focus so hard to pass the exams. The problem really lies with the education system. There's too much rote memorization and too excessive of a burden to get good grades and good exam scores. The creative foundation and joy of learning is completely lost in the desire to pass the next state assessment. The sophomores here take a class called "Philosophy" in which they memorize word-for-word the texts of relevant philosophers in Chinese culture; notably Marx (Makesi) and Confucius (Kongzi). Ironically enough, Marx would have abhored the very class and education system that is supposedly based on his ideologies.

Anyway, I digress. I decided to show a movie in my oral English classes this week because many of my students are stressed out with regards to the upcoming test and I figured I'd give them a break for a week. As I recognize all of my students' faces, I noticed that there was a new student in my class; someone I had not seen before. Sometimes when I show movies in class, (very rarely, actually) students invite their friends to come and watch, which is perfectly fine with me as a teacher. So I went over and asked what the new student's name was and he responded "Jimmy". It turned out he was in my class but he had only come once prior to the class I was showing the movie (we are in the 6th week).

Jimmy's English is by far the worst of all my students. He's also shy and reserved; two not very choice qualities for English majors at a teaching university. After showing The Truman Show, I caught Jimmy before he left class and told him to sit down. I waited until all the students were gone and I could talk to him without other students observing the conversation. I then essentially gave Jimmy an ultimatum. I told him he could continue not coming to my class and I would fail him, or he could come one hour a week to my office and I would prepare another lesson where I would teach him one-on-one.

Jimmy chose the latter and said, "Thank you" before leaving.

I'm not sure yet whether this will pay off, but Jimmy clearly needs some special help, much moreso than any of my other students. If he's planning on being a teacher or using English in any sort of professional context, he's going to need someone to work with him on a personal level and rapidly improve his proficiency (which is impossible in classes of 45+). Our first meeting is next Thursday at 4:30.

all in a day's work

English signs from the Nanchong Unimart written by an 80-year-old Jewish grandmother.








How the grasses are mowed at my university.












"THE KING OF KILL INCESES"


















I needed a nail clipper, but I'll pick up a set up batteries while I'm at it.













What, me worry?

us declares war on one-handed-man

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=3026237

I wonder if this will affect the prices with my #1 source for DVDs in Chengdu, the one-handed-man. He gives me 8.5 for a DVD9 (usually haggled to 8.1-2). The last time I went to Chengdu was when my parents were here and there was a crackdown taking place. When I went to his normal alcove DVD shop, there was no one there. As I started to leave the computer center with my parents, the wife of the one-handed-man (I hate referring to him as that, but I'm afraid I don't know his real name, and that is clearly his most defining characteristic) whom I know found me and led me to a location outside of the computer area where the entire stash was. The prices were at 8.5 (standard) but he refused to bargain lower. I'm thinking of making a trip in the near future before (perhaps) the market gets shut down for good (dear God I hope not). Do I use too many parenthesis? (I think so).

No one beats the one-handed-man in terms of selection. Anybody I've taken there (now including a roster of around 15+ people) can attest to the quality and quantity of his goods. He's one of the few vendors that has actual rips of DVD shows as opposed to the poor quality compressed garbage they sell on the floor below. I remember one time when Ethan, Pierce, Ethan's friend, and I were purchasing DVDs when a police raid took place and the one-armed-man took a number of boxes to another location, shut off the lights, and ordered us to be quiet. It was an interesting experience despite the fact that nothing really exciting happened, ie there was no shootout over Butterfly Effect 2.

Piracy is indeed a way of life here and pervades the culture in realms well outside the DVD market in Chengdu. I have a couple "Polo" shirts from Beijing, a pair of "Converse" sneakers from Nanjing, and a couple "Tommy Hilfiger" button downs from Guangzhou. People will counterfeit anything that could potentially be counterfeited. You can read a previous entry here about 32 and 64 gigabyte pen drives from Shenzhen.

Cheating's apparently rampant in the school systems, though admittedly I haven't experienced any troubles with it. I've caught a couple students trying to exchange answers from one class to another (as I teach several of the same classes and sometimes use the same tests), but nothing similar to what I've heard from the other volunteers.

I think if you really try to police the DVD markets etc.. which to me seems like an impossible task in itself, you really only hurt the one-armed-man. He probably only makes a few yuan a DVD anyway and lives precariously from month to month in small apartment in a run down section of the city. Seems excessive to line the pockets of movie and music executives who probably spend the equivalent of the yearly salary of the one-armed-man in a single day at the course. And don't think that Congress is acting in the interests of the little guy from the US; this is just big business directing the agenda.

Btw, my mom purchased that exact same DVD pictured in the ABC article from "you know who" in Chengdu. There's a new-ish Chinese movie I want to get called Disciple about a heroine drug lord who decides to retire and pass on his drug empire. I can't remember the Chinese characters but it's men (as in door) something (there are only two characters). If anyone knows, let me know.

sports

I played basketball today for the first time since elementary school. I was asked by the head of the foreign language department and although I argued that I was awful at basketball, he responded, "We know all Americans are good at basketball". So I was pretty much obliged. He'll probably be a good contact to have down the road in any event.

So I went down to the old campus at 4:00 to meet the other players and maybe try to practice a bit before the game began at 4:30. I had watched countless numbers of basketball games and played that arcade game where you have to shoot the ball into a moving hoop, so I wasn't clueless as how to play. When it comes to sports I'm not a klutz either, really, though I wouldn't call myself an athlete, per se.

Anyway while I was standing looking for where the game was taking place, a few students came up to me and introduced themselves to me and I asked them where the basketball courts were. One of the students I met named "Yi" insisted on leading me to the courts and ensuring I got there safely, despite the fact that they were in eyeshot of where I was standing, but thanks a lot, Yi!

The game was the English department versus the PE department, rumored (well, not really rumored actually) to be the best team at the university. I hadn't expected to do well, and honestly I was quite worried about the game itself, but I went with a positive attitude and "had a try". We got seriously pwned and I'm not even sure the score at the end of the game, but I was satisfied that I scored a total of FOUR points (considering it'd been 15 years) and managed to finally get into a decent rhythm at the end of the game. There's another game on Friday I've been asked to participate in, as well as a speaking competition which I'm looking forward to for non-English majors. I like the speaking competitions for some reason.

Speaking generally about sports in China, the most popular ones are definitely basketball and ping pong, probably followed closely by badminton, volleyball, and soccer. There are moves to make American sports more popular in China, including interestingly enough women's ice hockey, but as this article indicates, it's not doing to well. Tennis is quite unpopular despite the similarity to the rest of the raquet sports, as are the rest of the dumb raquet games like squash and racquetball, the latter two both of which require you to be White and a member of a country club to play.

I've played soccer and ping pong with many of my students, some regulary, others not as frequently, but each time it's a great stress relief for the students. In all they take a total of 13 or 14 classes, a total of 26-28 classroom hours and many of them obviously need an outlet. The guys are the only ones to play basketball or soccer (at least that I have seen, though I'm sure girls play basketball quite well and quite often), where as guys and girls both play ping pong, badminton, and volleyball. I haven't heard sports referred to as specifically female or male, which is good considering I doubt China has ever experienced a Title-9 movement.

The English department has to win at least two games to advance to the next round of the tournament and so far we're 0-2. But there are a total of eight games, and according to Jackie, the self-described "fire output" of the team and a member of the "iron triangle" (including Jackie, James Liu, and a six-foot guard named Wang), there are worse teams than ours is and we have a good chance of winning at least two. Jackie's actually a very nice 25 year old from Xi'an who has an uncanny knowledge of Western culture and speaks nearly perfect idiomatic English. I had forgotten about him since I only met him a few times last semester, but I'll be getting in touch with him more now that I have his number. I'll post what happens this Friday at 4:30...

Picture 1: one of our players enjoys a festive pre-game cigarette

Picture 2: the players before the game

Picture 3: during the game

网吧

The ubiquity of the 网吧 (wang ba - literally internet bar in Chinese) is fascinating to say the least. The vast majority of them are open 24/7 and have deals with local restaurants to bring food to hungry internet users. I remember in Latin America there was nothing as sophisticated as I've seen here. The internet culture in Chile was limited to online photo blogs, chatting on MSN, and occasionally listening to music. Here in China, people often do all three simultaneously while playing games or watching movies. What's more, the male-female ratio seems to be about 50/50.

There seems to be stiff competition for internet users here at the XiHua campus and around Nanchong city as well. The prices are usually 2 yuan - 2.5 yuan (~$.25) an hour during non-peak hours and 3 yuan during peak times. Compared to Chile which was usually 600 pesos (~$1.25) an hour and comparatively had much more poorly maintained facilities and equipment. There are a total of 13 internet bars on the new campus alone, with countless ones downtown. It would be safe to say that there is at least one or two on each block.

Here in China, people treat coming to the internet bar as a hobby and many do it quite seriously, often spending upwards of seven or eight hours on the weekends. I was once kicked out of an internet bar because I wasn't going to pay a fee to stay for eight hours from the period of 12 AM - 8 AM.

Because the Chinese alphabet (if we could call it that) includes upwards of six thousand characters, computer users type a word in pinyin, the Romanicized version of the Chinese character, and then choose the character from a list that match the pinyin. It's interesting to watch sometimes as most typists are highly skilled hunt-and-peckers. No one is taught how to use a keyboard as a middle school student from the United States might, perhaps because typing skills are so radically different. I haven't asked my students, but I suspect they were taught very early on how to read pinyin and typing naturally followed.

At around 7:00-8:00, every internet bar on campus is packed and there's a line of people waiting to snag an empty seat once it becomes available. Towards 9:00, the crowd starts thinning and by 10:00 it's nearly empty. The dorms close at 10:30 on the weekdays and 11:00 on the weekends and repeatedly coming in after hours could mean disciplinary action or even a fine.

The whole internet phenomenon is significant for a number of reasons. Modernity could be defined in a number of ways (literacy, healthcare, rich-poor gap), but with respect to the internet bar, the knowledge and ability to use a computer is invaluable. The Chinese internet population is around 86 million according to most sources and is now second in the world. Though we generally consider the US the center of internet activity (and in most accounts it is), it's only a matter of time before China becomes not only a major communication/IT hub, but the leader in the internet field.

More on this later.

it's the mightiest