The Daily Grind

It occurs to me I've been in China for almost a month and I've yet to write what I'm doing here and why I'm doing it. The truth is I'm not 100% sure of this even now but nonetheless here's some background info on my daily and what exactly it is I'm learning (in & out of class).

Though we keep pretty busy with small field trips and longer overnight excursions, I've settled into a more or less solid routine. Monday-Friday I have an "intensive" Mandarin class from 8-12, with a 30-minute taiji break thrown in for balance (pun). I use quotation marks around -intensive- because unlike similar programs in Beijing and Shanghai, we students are not forced to take a "language pledge" that precludes us from speaking English to fellow Americans. In this sense the language aspect of the program is less rigorous than other immersion programs. Rather the focus is on "experiential learning," a seemingly paradoxical concept uniting academic education and practical experience. So as we learn how to introduce ourselves, we're assigned to make friends. We learn how to order food, our homework is to dine alone. Etc.

The other aspect of the curriculum (for now) is a series of seminars addressing contemporary Chinese issues. Our first seminar was on Chinese history and religion-- thus the copious temple visits. Chinese history is one of the most absurdly expansive topics one might try to pack into a 2-week seminar, and our focus was more on modern and contemporary Chinese history than the earlier part of the multimillenial span Chinese culture enjoys. Our current seminar is on "social issues and humanities": we've gotten recent lectures on AIDS, family planning policies, traditional Chinese medicine, and the Chinese economy. Once again all monstrous topics condensed into (dense) 2-hr presentations. I've learned a lot obviously, but the main thing I've taken away from these seminar lectures is the unfathomable grandiosity in scale on which all social issues operate in China. The apparent contradictions not only from lecture to lecture (e.g. the disparity between a lecture on the atrocities of the Cultural Revolution vs. this Monday's lecture on family values when the 1950s-80s were characterized as a period of "stable happiness") but also WITHIN lectures makes each topic as unruly and difficult to grasp as it is fascinating and worthy of careful consideration.

China's social policies are still pretty staunchly relegated by an authoritarian government, but I'm surprised at how logical and practical some of their solutions to major social problems are. For instance you've probably heard of the "one family, one child" policy that prohibits a family from having more than one child except in special circumstances. Though this policy may bring to mind horror stories of forced sterilization, it must also be regarded as one of the only solutions to what could prove to be a major social and ecological hazard not only for China but also neighborhing countries, and eventually the rest of the world. The policies have become more lenient over the years, but through incentive programs I believe China is effectively addressing this critical issue. I'm also impressed at how China is dealing with its growing HIV/AIDS epidemic. Yesterday we received a lecture from a representative of an NGO called Family Health International; as Yunnan province is one of China's worst in terms of HIV/AIDS cases, she spoke specifically to the programs her institution is implementing in the region to address the spread of the virus. FHI gives clean needles to injected drug users; conducts meetings discussing the possible business advantages of protected sex with female sex works; and sets up information stations in public bathrooms and tea houses frequented by homosexual men. It's ironic (and really kind of tragic) that in a country like China where drug use is more harshly punished, prostitution is completely illegal and barely even acknowledged to exist by the government, and homosexuality is more roundly stigmatized, organizations like FHI are actively pursuing progressive means of HIV/AIDS prevention that are not really (or at least not widely) considered in the States.


Of course experiential learning means that every waking second is technically part of the curriculum. This past weekend we did an overnight at Stone Forest, a group of ancient (geologically speaking) clusters of sharp, fossilized rocks that once thrived as coral beneath a long gone ocean. It was cool to walk around during the day, I climbed some steep staircases and crossed some intense Indiana Jones-style stone bridges (none of which would pass US safety regulations) to get to a crowded but cool peak affording a nice view of neighboring mini-"forests". I went out again at night with a few friends, it was creepy seeing the shapes and shadows of the rocks by moonlight--definitely must have been an enchanted, ritually efficacious place in ancient (anthropologically speaking) times. We are one of the last groups to enjoy such an experience: Stone Forest has recently attained UNESCO world heritage site status, so in a few months all of the hotels in the vicinity will come down, presumably to make room for more of the overtly manicured "nature" that already characterizes the spot.


So that's WHAT I've been doing. WHY may take some more time to articulate. In the mean time, here's some other things to expect in the future:

-THE DAILY BREAD: I review the several foods I eat and love and pay next to nothing for

-Q&A: I answer questions about art, youth culture, drug smuggling, the weather, et al

-NOTHING FOR A WHILE... on Sunday I take off for Xishuangbanna, the subtropical southern region of Yunnan, where I'll have one week off to celebrate the 58th anniversary of the founding of the PRC, make field recordings of ethnic minority drummings, trek to sparsely populated jungle villages, peek over the Myanmar/Laos borders (shoutout to protesting monks), eat fried river moss, and of course do NOTHING FOR A WHILE.



-Josh