Site Visit Week

What a week!

Where to begin? First, let me start off by stating how I am thrilled to work at Guiyang Xue Yuan!! My apprehensions of it being in the capital city were completely misguided.  Guiyang Xue Yuan (Guiyang University) is actually located in Londongbao, a "suburb" (for lack of a better work) of the city which is actually extremely rural.  It's located on a mountain and is surrounded by lush greenery, farmland, rice patties, cattle, markets, farmers, and, silly enough, even soldiers!  Within my neighborhood other schools are randomly scattered about, including a military training school, so any public places are bombarded with men and women in green camouflage, and (although I didn't see any evidence of this other than a sign above the school) a middle school for "international language"—and since it was written in English I assume this means that, once school starts, many young adults and teachers will also be wandering around Longdongbao with the ability to speak English. :)

My campus itself is beautiful and really quite modern.  It used to be a campus dedicated to science and math, and the future English teachers were located in a different district of Guiyang, so this is the first year that the two schools are combined.  They combined, incidentally enough, because Guiyang Xue Yuan wasn't actually a legit school that offered a degree.  Instead, students used to study for 3 years, and then, although they didn't have a valid degree, were eligible to teach in rural areas.  The officials of the school, however, decided it was in everyone's best interest to make Guiyang Xue Yuan a 4 year institution and, this year (what a fun year to enter teaching here!) the future English teachers will sit through their first graduation/diploma receiving ceremony. I'm so excited to be a part of this!

This week, I had the pleasure of meeting and befriending 5 fellow English teachers (all Chinese), whose English names are Tracey, Lisa, Ashley, Bill, and Hugo, as well as the Dean of my department, Ms. Li.  All 6 of them, in addition to everyone else I met on campus and in my community, were extremely welcoming.  Bill and Tracey were the most helpful, as Bill is the man in charge of making sure everything in my apartment runs and works smoothly, making sure I know my way around the area and the city, making sure I am well taken care of, etc.  Tracey also was wonderful, and one day came and picked me up (Kristen staid inside this day, thinking she perhaps was a little sick) and took me into Guiyang (which is a BEAUTIFUL city—no matter where you are, or how big the buildings, you can see mountains) and, in the center of the city, there is a huge mountain which we went to.  In this mountain wild monkeys roam around and (since there are so many people no matter where you go in this country) they are used to people and allow you to get close and feed them.  It was a blast, and Tracey kept linking my arm and saying how excited she is to be my friend.  Afterwards, some of the English faculty (the 6 mentioned plus Berney, who helps with our technology but doesn't actually speak English) took me to a beautiful minority restaurant and treated me to a great banquet, filled me in on the ins and outs of the school, and informed me that I'll be teaching both Oral English and American Culture through Film class (any suggestions on movies would be greatly appreciated, as I'm certainly not a movie junkie).  Additionally, I was asked to run the drama club and help direct upcoming plays, which I'm nervous but excited about!

The train rides both to Guiyang and back were both actually quite enjoyable and relaxing.  While it is true that the trains are filthy, I found myself so captivated by the window scenery that I didn't even care.  However, on the 24 hour train ride home (we had to take the very, very slow train back to Chengdu) I had my first encounter of harassment in China, which was perhaps the most frustrating moment I can think of in all of my memories…ever. In language class, we learned how to address these situations, so I certainly was prepared as far as telling off a pervert/sexual harasser/thief/etc. What language class (or experience itself) didn't prepare me for, however, was how to deal with harassment when it comes in the form of a 6 year old child. 

 Let me explain.

Right now, because of China's one-child-policy, many children are finding themselves being spoiled beyond imagination.  They don't know discipline, and it's common to see young children hitting their parents, telling their parents no, telling their parents off, etc. while their parents simply laugh, look the other way, or simply pretend like it's not happening.  China knows this, they acknowledge they have a problem, and they even refer to this generation of children as the "little prince and princess generation."  I see this everywhere, and while it's been a little baffling (especially when I saw my niece doing it to my host family), nothing has been so mind boggling as my incident on the train.

While sitting in the main isle of the train, listening to my ipod and reading a book (a borrowed book, mind you), a little boy came and sat on the chair across from me.  We smiled at each other and I tried making small talk ("what is your name?" "how old are you?") and, for the first 5 minutes, thought he was very cute.  However, after he noticed my ipod, this small punk decided it was a good idea to grab it away from me.  I indulged him for a moment, but after he started fooling around with it in manners that made me uncomfortable, I told him no and tried to take it back.  Wanting to keep an air of control, however, when the child decided to play a game of "keep away" from me, I chose to ignore him, keeping one eye carefully on him (and my ipod), while pretending to read my book.  My ignoring his bad behavior angered the mean-spirited child, however, and he then yanked my book out of my hands and threw it into a muddy puddle (it had been raining and leaked into the train)! Seeing as this wasn't my book, let alone the act in and of itself was ridiculously rude and poor-mannered, I scolded the child to the best of my ability, cleaned my book off, yanked back my Ipod, then went back to reading and listening to music.  But no, the punk snuck back over, grabbed my Ipod out of my hand, and threw it into the puddle, too! By this point, I was very angry, especially because there were MANY people around (including, I later found out, his mom) who were watching this spectacle and not saying or doing anything. I gathered up my things and then resorted into my cubby area and sat on my bed to continue reading.  Here, however, the child followed me.  He climbed up into my bed and kept trying to take my things.  I started scolding him in English, thinking maybe this would scare him, but all that did was make him more mad.  He kept shouting (literally) that he didn't understand me, and then (this is where my blood begins to boil) he pulled my hair.  I removed his hand, only to then have him lash out with his dirty fingernails and dig them into my arms, drawing blood in numerous areas! I told him he was hurting me and to stop right now, but then he started punching me.  If this had been an adult, I would have yelled for help, but it was a 6 year old child and honestly, I didn't know what to do! Train workers walked by, glanced in, saw this taking place, and turned the other cheek.  As a last result, in full out desperation, I loudly said "stop it, you're hurting me and if you touch me again I'll tell your mom" so that everyone around knew I was seriously angry.  This, however, did nothing to get anyone to come to my aid.  Instead, people pretended to not hear, and the child laughed and mocked me! I looked out, saw his mom, made angry eye contact, and all she did was look down and pretend to read the newspaper! In a fit of outrage I picked the child up, carried him into the aisle way, and yelled, "absolutely no!" shaking my finger angrily.  I have NEVER felt so helpless, so abused, and so un-real in my life! It was like people refused to acknowledge that I am actually human and that this child—emphasis on child—actually was hurting me!  It was outraging. 

On the other hand, let me point out that on the train ride down to Guiyang I had the complete opposite thing happen; people all over where anxious to talk to me, bought me food and drinks (which I watched them purchase and opened myself), and couldn't have been more helpful.  The incident with the child truly was a case of 1 bad egg in a dozen, but it definitely was enough to make the carton stink for a little while.

Today, back in Chengdu, my host family (bless them!) woke me up and announced "Fei Fei, today you will study cooking!" :) We went to the market, they made sure my bartering skills were up to par, and then we returned back home, where I helped make lunch and dinner for Li Xiao's aunt and brother.  It was a blast! The main entrée was fish head stew (yes, fish head stew), and I also learned to make 4 traditional Sichuan dishes of tofu, beans, eggplant, and tomato.  It was a lot of fun, fairly easy (or at least this time, where I had their assistance), and turned out great. :) In two years, I shall be a Chinese food-cooking expert!

Final bit of news: I now am site mate-less.  Kristen, my scheduled Peace Corps site mate, decided that she is unhappy in China, and we spent Thursday (the last day in Guiyang) calling Peace Corps officials and telling them she wants to go home.  Within a few days, Kristen will be on a flight back to the US.  She is the 4^th (that I know of) person to leave within this 1.5 months.  Anyways, now I am the only Peace Corps volunteer at Guiyang Xue Yuan, although I'm told there are 4 other foreign teachers, and it is rumored they, too, come from the US.

Anyways, I hope you all head a great week! Keep keeping in touch! As always, I love and miss you!