I got a lot of those "I'm a traditional girl" responses when I asked my students to complete a little assignment about their identity. On the front of a paper they had to draw a picture, write a poem, or story, and on the back they were required to explain why this image or writing related to their identity. Many of them wrote poems similar to the one I showed them "The Delight Song of Tsoai-Tsalee" that has about 20 sentences that start with "I am". Anyway, about 30 or so of my 250 students wrote I am a traditional girl.
The phrase raises a number of interesting implications regarding Chinese society. Traditional values are present in any society, but the word "traditional" is only used in societies which are still in the process of development. For example, there are "traditional" values in the US; conservatives, folk-town values etc... but the word "traditional" is rarely ever used to describe someone, especially if it's to describe yourself.
Modernity is indeed a difficult concept to define, but the usage of the term traditional I believe implies that there is a significant conflict between traditional and modern, and that this conflict is easily identifiable. People who use the word traditional to describe themselves distance themselves from what is modern; ideas, points of view, customs, culture etc... Whereas i
n the US, if you were to use the word conservative, which carries the same meaning as traditional, doesn't suggest a distancing from modernity.Who knows though? Maybe I'm missing something in the translation or I'm reading too much into it. I just found the wording interesting, and it's such an overused saying here.
I've become hooked to eating these GamBianMian noodles. It's exactly like a plate of spaghetti. They even have pieces of beef and tomatoes on top. It's just missing some Parmesan cheese shavings. Here's a picture of said noodles.
I get this stuff a few times a week now. There's a 24 hour joint downtown that I go to quite often after classes and schmooze with the staff while I eat. The dish is 6 kuai for a big plate, 5 for a small.
Blogspot's been blocked again for a while in China which is part of the reason for the delayed posting. It's been following this pattern for a while. Blocked for a month, unblocked for a month, blocked for another month. Luckily my student website's (http://www.xihuaonline.com been kicking since I got it onto a dedicated IP address.
The site's now got 60 articles, which I'm proud to say is a now a mild success for me, but more of a success for the students who write. I'll be putting up an article written by myself addressed to those who have written and shown such confidence in their writing (a trait very few students possess).
