Good news: I'm back in the honeymoon phase of China. Gosh, there are sooo many little things that happen every day that I want to share, but I always forget, and by the time I write it, I'm tired and my storytelling is sloppy. Sorry!
Well let's see, I got lost by myself for the first time a few days ago. It turns out I was on the right bus, but I was going in the wrong direction. Oops. I had heard back in the States that all Asians look the same. Well, I have been able to differentiate the facial features of the people I see somewhat regularly; however, I'm having the hardest time telling the PLACES in China apart from each other. They ALL look EXACTLY the same! And it is extremely unhelpful that I can't read ANYTHING here, like a street sign, advertisement, marquee, bus sign, or store name to give me any sort of clue. Am I in Lu Xiang, Ja Dao Ku, or Hao Mao? Or for that matter, am I even still in Wuchang? Or did I cross a bridge into Hankou or Hanyan? WHO KNOWS! If I were in America, I would ask directions...doesn't work that way in China. It's very odd too because typically I have an excellent photographic memory. I think I still do, but all the pictures look the same. Seriously, every store sells the same junk, and every restaurant serves the same food. More or less anyway.
I may have a hard time finding things that stand out to me, but I stick out like a sore thumb to the Chinese! Not only am I human giant here, but the blond hair and hot pink wardrobe don't help either. I have heard that a lot of teachers feel uncomfortable by all the staring, but I hadn't really noticed it being over the top... until yesterday. We were waiting at the bus stop outside campus, and there were a couple of people staring, which is not unusual. But they kept staring and saying things like "hello" and getting closer. There was one who spoke better English than the rest, and she was sort of like the translator for them. They asked where we were going, and then one girl got right up in my face and said "beautiful!" ...by far the creepiest compliment I've gotten from a presumably straight woman in my life. Then some of the guys started yelling "beautiful" too. Then they started swarming. I was literally a little bit scared. They wanted to hear what we had to say, even though they couldn't understand us, and the Only Important thing I have to say would have been illegal. Haha. It was just so weird how they all kept coming out of nowhere and there was this circle around us for no reason.
There's also this one guy annoys me. He's a Chinese guy with a baby boy, and when he sees us, he brings his baby over to see us as if we're a character at Disney World. I'm not talking he just comes our way.. no, I mean he is in my ATM space with this baby, and he points at us and says "I love you! I love you!" That's really weird to me. Think about it. There's a whole bunch of people around he could bother, but he comes to us. Why? Because we're white? Big deal. I'm not dressed in costume, I don't have my own cartoon, and for that matter, I really don't have an interest in entertaining strangers.
I guess it's easy to get a big head as an American in China. People notice us, they remember us, and they do favors for us. We have a good salary here, so within reason, we can buy just about anything we want. Then there's the little girls who come up to me at lunch and tell me I'm beautiful, and want to know all about me. I'm interesting here. For goodness sake, I'm not even six months out of college and I'm a "professor," and they call me an "English expert"!
The thing is, I am not nearly as important as they think I am. I appreciate it all, but seriously, it's unnecessary.
So that's my tidbit for today. I taught my students what a tidbit is the other day. Hahaha...
For Mari - It IS so!
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