Update

I've been neglecting this blog for many months now, and the reason is that in July I left China to move back to America. I'm living in Seattle now, and in the near future I hope to write a post or two to wrap up this blog and my experiences in China.

Sheep Skin Rafts

In a recent bit of desert-themed traveling with Nissa, we visited Shapotou, a place that could only be described as a "desert theme park" outside of the small city of Zhongwei, Ningxia province. Shapotou is an area of natural beauty where the desert meets the Yellow River, and naturally has been turned into a ticketed tourist attraction outfitted with a zip line, camel and horse riding, sand dune sledding, dune buggies, a ski lift, and sheep skin rafting. We opted for the sheep skin rafting, which is just as bizarre as the name implies:




So for 80 yuan (around $11) each we had a river-rafting experience that would probably give PETA a heart attack. We enjoyed it, but I have to say the little inflated arms were a bit creepy.

Your days are numbered, sheep...

Fun at the Park

Now that summer has arrived in Zhangye the weather has been beautiful (if sometimes overbearingly hot), and there are few better places to enjoy the outdoors in the city than Ganquan Park (entrance seen in the above picture). Before coming to China, I had a pretty predictable image of what a "park" is: shady trees, couples taking leisurely bike rides, picnic tables, excitable dogs, and quiet. Most Chinese cities have at least one park, but they tend to have a uniquely Chinese spin to them.

At our park, there is everything you might need for a relaxing day out in nature: whack-a-mole, shoot-the-balloon games, an artificial lake, paddle boats, artificial rock sculptures, a basketball game, archery, fishing, copies of the David and the Venus de Milo, lamb kebabs, men playing loud drinking games, music, a carousel, a haunted house, bumper cars, a small roller coaster, and a zoo. In other words, it's not really a place you go to listen to the chirping of the birds, but it's fun in it's own unique way (I wouldn't recommend the zoo though, which might be more accurately named the Prison for Animals). It's a nice place to have a cold beer and sit under the (artificial) shade, but not a place to walk your dog or take a bike ride. Dogs are not nearly as popular in China in the first place, and bikes are for getting around and carrying things like your groceries, your new computer, or your girlfriend. When I tell Chinese people that at home we put our bikes on our car, drive 15 minutes to the park, ride around the park for fun, and then drive home, they think that it's hilarious. In over two years in China, I have also never seen a Chinese person running for fun, even on the track on our campus.

But my favorite park activity is something that I had heard about in China, but not seen here until this year. It seems to be called buxing qiu in Chinese, or literally "walking ball." The idea is that you get inside a giant inflatable ball which is then sealed and put out to float around in a pool of water. You then have five minutes to walk, roll, or flop around in your giant tethered hamster ball, to the great amusement of onlookers (in this case the little girl's mother, who kept shouting "run! run!"). A couple of pictures:

Resources for Learning Chinese

For those learning Chinese out there, I thought I would mention some of the most useful resources I have found for learning the language.

Websites
ChinesePod
By far my favorite Chinese lessons. The lessons focus on spoken Chinese and are in podcast form, so they are meant to be downloaded and listened to on your computer or mp3 player. Each lesson focuses on a pre-recorded dialogue, which is listened to and then discussed and explained by the two hosts (one native English speaker and one native Chinese speaker). The lessons are divided into five levels, so they suit any level of Chinese learner, and the topics are a good mix of the practical and the interesting. I particularly like ChinesePod because the lessons are well-written and teach Chinese the way Chinese people actually speak it (I'm amazed by the number of Chinese learning materials that fail at this), the hosts are personable without being over-the-top, and they've created a community around the website. By this I mean there are discussions around each lesson on the website where users can leave comments and questions, and the hosts of the lessons and other employees will personally answer your questions. The lessons themselves are all free to download, but you need a paid subscription to get the extra materials (including the written transcript of the lesson dialogues). I'm familiar with some of the audio lessons you can buy at the store (Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone, etc.) and have not been particularly impressed with them.

www.nciku.com
My favorite online dictionary. I particularly like the example sentences and the great tool for looking up characters by drawing them.

www.dict.cn
Another online dictionary that is actually aimed at Chinese people learning English, but is also great for seeing the words you look up used in example sentences (all with English translations).

Adsotrans
A useful site for reading Chinese, in which you can copy and paste several sentences of Chinese text and have them "annotated," meaning that you can see the definition of each word or phrase when you hover the mouse pointer over it. Much quicker than looking up each word in the dictionary individually. The only downside is that for words that have multiple meanings, the site makes the best guess of the meaning relevant to the sentence and shows you only that definition, so if it guesses wrong you are going to have to look up the word in the dictionary anyway.

Books
Oxford Starter Chinese Dictionary
The first dictionary I used, which is great for the beginner as it includes examples and notes about how to use words, lots of information on measure words, and sections devoted to things like talking about "time" or "musical instruments" in Chinese. Apparently there is a new version called the Oxford Beginner's Chinese Dictionary, which I'm sure is worth checking out. The dictionary I use now is the confusingly named Pocket Oxford Chinese Dictionary, which is excellent but not at all pocket size. All of these dictionaries use simplified Chinese characters.

Reading and Writing Chinese
A great reference book for learning characters, as it does the best job of any book I've seen of actually explaining the logic and meaning behind the characters. Be sure to pick up the simplified character version for mainland China and the traditional character version for Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Intensive Spoken Chinese
The first textbook I used, and an excellent beginner's textbook for learning the spoken language (the characters are included as well, but not emphasized). The first book in a series, which is followed by The Most Common Chinese Radicals and Rapid Literacy in Chinese. The last two are also recommended, and the series is widely available for a low price in the foreign language bookstores of large Chinese cities.

New Practical Chinese Reader
A five-volume series of textbooks that I have encountered through my Peace Corps coworkers, who have been supplied with the books for their language training. I haven't had the chance to use the books much myself but I've liked what I've seen. I'm not sure that they are available in China, and I haven't been completely satisfied with any of the more advanced textbooks I have bought here.

Drive-by Photography

Today I wanted to simply post some photographs I took the other day of daily life in Zhangye, many taken during a couple of long bus rides through the city.

On the university campus, in front of the apartment building I live in.

Middle-schoolers in uniform and the not uncommon sight of a entire family on a motorbike.

The tuta, or "Earth Pagoda."

The bumpy and over-sized "bread taxis" that we have grown fond of.

The drum tower, right in the center of town.

Most locals now live in modern apartments but more traditional homes are still around.

Out of curiosity we took a bus to a village just outside of the city. A man in a small shop with an unusually large mustache waved us in, also out of curiosity, and we spent an hour or more drinking and snacking with some of the local farmers. They had many questions for us but I sometimes could not understand their thick dialect, so they resorted to writing them out on bits of paper and passing them to me.

Grounds for Divorce

I was talking to a teacher who I am giving private English lessons to yesterday, and she made an interesting comment about divorce in China that I had never heard--a common reason for separation is housework. Many young Chinese have never been taught to do housework their entire lives, and when it comes time to live the married life the husband and wife have so many fights about taking care of the home that it ends in divorce. With the one-child policy and the particularly overwhelming Chinese love for children, many of the so-called "Little Emperors" are now spoiled at home, and not made to help take care of the home. There is also so much competition and pressure to get into the best high school, the best college, and get the best job possible that most parents consider the duty of students to study--and do practically nothing else. Many of the college students at this school are getting a part-time job for the first time, and others will work for the first time when they get their first job after graduation. The student who is giving me Chinese lessons has an uncle visiting Zhangye shortly, and asked me to please not mention the lessons to him--he told her to give up her tutoring and spend all her time studying, and she told him she would. A good many of our students must also hide the fact that they have a boyfriend or girlfriend from their parents, because the parents would never allow them to be so distracted from their studies.

Before she started talking about divorce in our lesson, that teacher asked me something that, as a 25-year old, sounded a little strange: "Do you know how to do household chores?"

After the Earthquake

I haven't mentioned the earthquake on this blog since it happened, but I'm sure it goes without saying that everyone in Zhangye has been concerned about it and the awful devastation it has caused. Though a few cities in Gansu province did see some damage and even some casualties, we actually didn't feel it here and I've been following it only through news reports.

At the beginning of last week, there were three national days of mourning for the earthquake victims, including a three-minute moment of silence on Monday afternoon. All of the foreign teachers were summoned to take part in a gathering of students and faculty in front of the library during this time. It was both a solemn and slightly surreal experience. It was like any other moment of silence in that the crowd itself did not speak and stood with heads respectfully bowed. However, it was the loudest moment of silence I expect to ever witness--all across the country, horns blared in the cities, in the taxis, on the ships, and on the trains. CCTV broadcast footage from Beijing during those minutes, and our school had set up a TV and enormous speakers in front of library for the event. Two students simply held microphones up to the TV, meaning that while sirens went off in Zhangye, sirens in Beijing being broadcast on the television were amplified into our ears in an odd and highly distorted sound collage. I couldn't quite get my head around it, and from what I've been told it was simply a Chinese way of honoring and remembering the victims of the disaster. One could write an interesting paper just on the meaning and uses of noise in Chinese and Western culture. This was also the first time a national moment of grief was organized in China for anything other than the death of the country's leader, and in general the government response to the earthquake is praiseworthy.

The second incident that stands out in my mind is a recent donation drive to help with the earthquake relief effort. I wasn't on campus at the time, but the other foreign teachers were called by Miss Mao from the Foreign Affairs Office on short notice and told to meet at her office.
Once there, everyone was told they were to donate money to help the earthquake victims, and asked to write down the exact amount they were donating a pre-prepared list with all of our names on it. Once this was done, they were led outside where a donation rally was held in which Communist Party leaders and the bewildered foreigners placed their donations one-by-one into a box, to the cheers of a crowd of students. As each person approached the box, they proudly held up a sign with the amount of their donation, which was also displayed on an electronic screen. The foreign teachers had to oblige, but each hid their money and paper in their fist as they donated. One teacher had actually had to borrow money to donate, because he wasn't told it was a donation at all and didn't bring his wallet. They also were not told who was handling the donation (the Communist Party), or really much of anything about it. The event was filmed, and later shown on the local news, similar to other donation drives we have seen on television. Students have also been asked to donate blood and money in high-pressure situations. Just when you think you're no longer surprised by the differences between China's collectivism and the West's individualism, something comes along to remind you just how differently things are done here.

(There is also a good post about donating on Sinosplice)