My best Chinese friend, ZXY, recently proposed what she described as a fun jaunt into An Ning, a small city outside Kunming where the college was first based. It seemed a friend of hers had a middle school there. In exchange for my giving a lecture to the students, they would show me around An Ning and take me out to dinner. This did not strike me as immediately appealing. For one thing, the sights I've glimpsed from bus windows while passing through An Ning have never made me yearn to see more. Secondly, I pointed out that it was unlikely middle school students, especially in a less developed place like An Ning, would be able to understand even my slowest speech. "Of course not," said ZXY. "I'll translate for you. The important thing is that they've never seen a foreigner before. They just want to look at you, hear authentic English spoken, and ask you some questions."
Having done middle school talks before, I know exactly what kinds of questions: "What is you favorite sport?" "What is your birthday?" "Can you eat rice noodles?" "Do you like China?"
I told ZXY I really wasn't interested. A few days later, she called back , sounding more desperate. The speech could be very short. It would be a great honor. I would have fun. An Ning is only a half hour outside the city and they would drive me both ways. I understood that for her to save face, I would have to accept. I said, "What kind of money are we talking about?"
"Oh, you want to be paid? I didn't think you cared about making money. You can just give your American holiday speech that you already have prepared."
I assured her that if I had to drag my body to An Ning and answer inane questions, I was definitely going to be paid, and for travel time as well. 100 yuan an hour is the going rate for a speech by a foreigner, so I said 300, counting for travel time.
A few days later, shortly after noon, we set off. Accompanying us was Teacher Shu, the professor who had been ZXY's assistant advisor in graduate school, plus his wife. It seems that both of them were alumna of the middle school we would be visiting. First we had lunch in Kunming with that couple, the school headmaster, and another school administrator. They proudly showed me a picture of the 1,500-student school and described its history. It seems that a few years ago, an area north of Kunming was flooded to create a reservoir. This displaced several villages, all of which were moved nearer to An Ning, to this area called Ba Jie. To sweeten the deal, the government allotted a large sum of money to build a new state-of-the-art middle school.
Getting to An Ning took more like an hour than a half hour, which I fully expected. During the drive, the headmaster tuned around and asked me to talk about how students could improve their English, particularly how to memorize vocabulary words. "Tell them how to study better," he urged. As a matter of fact, I hate the how-to-study-English topic and would never have accepted had I thought that was the focus. I said to him, "I thought I was talking about American holidays." He said, "Maybe you can adapt your talk a little."
"What will you do?" ZXY whispered.
"I have exactly four minutes of comments on how to study English," I told her. "Then I'm talking about American holidays."
To my surprise, we drove straight through downtown An Ning, out of An Ning, and into the countryside. When we got on a highway, I saw a sign saying Ba Jie 25 km and knew we weren't close at all.
Although I felt deceived about just how quick getting to the school would be, the countryside was lovely, and I told myself that this was a rare opportunity to explore a more rural part of the province. Nonetheless, it took more than hour to get from An Ning to Ba Jie and my knees were stiff when we finally got out of the car.
The school, somewhat outside the very unremarkable village of Ba Jie, bore a slight resemblance to a European chateau with a touch of Versailles. It opened just this year and everything is still clean and unmarred. In truth, the school is not only the best equipped of the three Chinese middle schools I've visited, it is actually more impressive than even the newest building at our college.
In the large auditorium, I counted more than 300 seats and many students were standing. ZXY sat next to me. Although the students were initially very excited, it soon became clear that except for the most basic greetings, they could not understand anything I said. I tried to to get the study skills part out of the way, but teachers kept pressing with variations on the same theme. "How to study grammar?" "How to improve listening?" I wanted to tell them that learning English had been very easy for me and really, they would be better served by asking ZXY those questions. I wanted to tell them that there is no easy solution to studying a foreign language; it is two small steps forward and one step back, over and over again. Finally, I decided I'd had enough and launched into brief description of American holidays.
Questions afterwards? A brave girl asked me when my birthday was. The mike got passed to a boy who asked how I came to China. Another student asked if I liked Chinese food. Someone asked me to comment on Chinese history. I replied, "It's long."
I could tell they didn't understand my answers and started answering in Chinese. Even though their listening ability left a lot to be desired, I must admit I was startled at how good their pronunciation was. I heard clear "th" sounds, a troublesome sound that eludes most of my students and a fair number of college's English teachers. The students got more and more excited, struggling to be the one to hold the mike and blurt forth, "Good afternoon, Teacher. How are you? What is your favorite...?" I realized then that this was not a conversation. This had become English karaoke. The real excitement wasn't about exchanging ideas, but rather about using a mike to amplify your courageous utterances in the supportive company of your friends.
I had first sat down by the mike at 4:00 and by 6:00, it was finally over. But no. It wasn't. Next, ZXY's advisor, Teacher Shu, had to give a speech. To the extent that I listened, his talk was about how, among his poor village classmates, he alone was able to study diligently enough to get a PhD. I whispered to ZXY, "Maybe I'm missing something, but this speech sounds really arrogant to me. Am I right?" She nodded.
Suddenly it hit me that this experience exemplified two important Chinese social constructs: guanxi and face. Westerners think guanxi equals bribery, and while it can include bribery, it's usually more subtle than that. ZXY's advisor had used guanxi to get her to persuade me to come. She had used her guanxi to make me reluctantly agree. This lecture was really about bringing glory and face to Teacher Shu in his hometown. He was the hero who returns home from distant lands bearing an exotic trophy; I was simply the trophy. Having a PhD *and* a foreigner speak at this village school also gave face to the school administrator and I have no doubt that the gift of face would end up being connected to future guanxi for Teacher Shu.
The boasting continued and I took out my Chinese flash cards to pass the time. "I've got to pee," whispered ZXY. "Let's go." We tiptoed out of the auditorium. In the setting sun, the surrounding mountains glowed a deep rose. The folds in their slopes were like draped fabric. The sky was luminous and for those few minutes, my resentment about being there faded.
The girls' restroom was astonishingly large and even more astonishingly clean. This is in marked contrast to the college's. Even though new toilets were recently put in here and wonder of wonders, doors added to each stall, the plumbing in our college, regularly fails, doors don't latch, and sometimes liquid from the restroom above drips ominously from the ceilings. ZXY and I took our time about returning to the auditorium.
As Teacher Shu's speech wound down, I began fantasizing about a beer. Before we could have dinner, however, I had to be photographed with the school administrators, the faculty, the county educational officials, ZXY's advisor, pretty much everyone except the students. Then we walked through the farmland to the village to what may have been the only real restaurant.
We sat at two round tables. Big bowls of boiled radish and boiled pumpkin arrived. ZXY waved away a bowl of meat. "Just because I'm vegetarian doesn't mean this has to be a vegetarian dinner," I told her. "They can eat meat."
"It was dog meat," she said. "I didn't think you could bear dog meat at your table."
"No problem," I assured her. "I don't even like dogs."
As more dishes covered the table, I was offered Coke, Sprite, or coconut milk. There was no mention of beer. My spirits plummeted. Then a vision of grace appeared: several bottles of the province's best red wine. I knew I'd be saved by endless rounds of toasting.
Sure enough, every person present toasted me, different combinations of people toasted me, and the group toasted me. By that time, I was feeling so affectionate towards them that I decided to get in the spirit of things. I toasted them for their remarkable school. I toasted the English department for their students' excellent pronunciation. I toasted ZXY's brilliant translation skills. I toasted our driver, international friendship, the great English language. I stopped just short of toasting the Communist Party. I started to think that coming to Ba Jie had, after all, been delightful.
It was 8:00 when I finally climbed into the car for the drive home. The stars were thicker than I'd ever seen in China and the moon was nearly full. I was tired, but also giddy and relieved that it was over.
Except it wasn't. In An Ning we parked the car and entered a tea house. More of Teacher Shu's former classmates poured into the tea house. I was too tired to make polite Chinese conversation and made little effort to speak English with a teenaged daughter who was supposed to practice her foreign language skills on me. In fact, I made little effort to stay awake.
We got back home shortly after 11:00. I hadn't been paid 300 yuan after all, but only 200. It was the hardest US$24 I have earned since I was a substitute teacher.
The real reward wasn't the money, that's for sure. The best part came the next day when Hesao came to clean. I told her I hadn't gone to An Ning after all, but rather a small town an hour away from there. When I told her it was named Ba Jie, a big grin split her face. "That's my hometown!" she exclaimed.
Ba Jie is the village that was once so poor that Hesao's 8-year old daughter died for lack of medical care. Ba Jie is the village where Hesao didn't attend even one year of school. How happy she was to hear about the fabulous middle school and the students' fine pronunciation. Her reaction made me feel the trip had been strangely worthwhile.
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