What did I do today?

My morning started with an 8 am call about bagpipes. Mr. Wang is one of the older professors here-- a really interesting guy who’s been a professional dancer, taught P.E. , and now teaches English. He often joins Nina, Jane and I on expeditions (his wife is a Dr., and busy a lot) and has an awesome Labrador retriever. He also has a daughter living in Ireland whom he asked to send him a bagpipe. Apparently it got here this morning in pieces and, of course, the first thought is to call the Jewish American. It took me quite a while to convince him I had neither bagpipe assembling or playing experience.




I mooched around in the morning (I only have a morning class once a week, so I have nice lazy mornings—I usually watch some illegally downloaded tv and grade and answer emails), skyped with the t-dub, and then headed off to teach a make-up class (because the Chinese semester goes through the end of January, we have to teach some extra ones now). Actually I gave a brief lecture on revising and then they took an exam while I graded career research papers (52 students. Arghh.)

I found out yesterday that I was required to attend a dinner with the department bigwigs today (which kind of sucked, bc Nina and I had a massage date, but you don’t get to argue with the administration. And you certainly can’t argue when two older Chinese women are telling you you’re going—they’re like Jewish grandmothers x10). So I hung out in the teacher office and graded. One thing I love about our office (which is just a ton of desks and 2 computers) is that we have a teacher nap room. Seriously. There’s a smaller room off the big room with about 6 lounge chairs and blankies. The Chinese are a people serious about naps—they deplore this modern business life where you only get an hour for lunch—how can a person have a decent meal and rest?

The teacher’s office, by the way, is at the end of a long covered passage way—basically the academic building is a bunch of buildings linked by outdoor passages. Mike suspects that the buildings, like college buildings in America built post-1969, prevent rapid gathering. The Chinese always tell me the buildings are so confusing bc they were built by the French. Anyway, I was crossing one covered walkway and heard shouts from the one across the courtyard, 2 floors down. It was two of my business students from last year, very excited to see me. Catherine shouted: “You look beautiful—your eyes! Your hair!” I love my Chinese paparazzi.

Anyway, the dinner/banquet was delicious. The cold dishes were laid out on the lazy susan first. There was a very nice roast chicken (without, for once, it’s poor little head staring at me), an awesome sliced lamb with a dry spice mixture (cumin, coriander, salt, pepper), eel, candied lotus root, seaweed and mushrooms, wine soaked dates, some sort of tendon-y thing, cucumbers to be dipped in a hoisin like sauce…I’m missing a few. Then they started bringing the hot dishes—a thin soup with red beans and sweet pickled vegetables; stir fried beef; a Ningbo style fish, stewed with ginger, green onions and some pickled veg; a more Sichuan style fish with lots of vinegary red chilis; scallops in their shells with vermicelli in soy; skewered shrimp, wrapped in foil and baked in spiced sal;, a big basket of steamed potatoes, sweet potatoes, chestnuts and various root veggies we don’t have in America; another soup with taro and bok choy; an egg pancake; little things that looked like pierogies made out of slightly sweet, glutinous rice flour; a hairy crab marinated in chili paste apiece, and, as the meal started to wind down, noodle soup (traditional for the end to fill any hunger left by the preceding), fruit (cantaloupe, watermelon, oranges, sugar cane) and peking duck.



I’m sure I’m missing a few, not just bc of the mass, but bc the main point of a dinner like this is drinking. You get a big cup and a little cup. The waitress fills the both with wine and you refill your little one from your big one so you can “gambei” or “bottoms up.” This, by the way, is a terrible system, since you are asking increasingly drunk people to pour red wine steadily—I don’t think that tablecloth will ever recover. There are general toasts, when we all tap our glasses on the table before drinking, and then, every three minutes or so, someone toasts someone else at the table and they stand up and clink glasses. My kindness in working for NIT, swimming and singing prowess, gift giving ability and health were all toasted. (Like a number of the other women, I filled my big glass with apple juice, and mostly toasted with it). At one point the party secretary came in, whose job, as far as I can see, is pretty much to attend fancy dinners and drink with us (he was, I think attending several dinners at the hotel that night—he sat with us for about 30 minutes and then left). I’ve met him at several other functions and though he doesn’t speak a word of English, he and I always have a nice time toasting each other.



After dinner I walked back with a group of professors. Pang, who is the dean of the school, was walking with me and we were discussing culture shock when we passed a bunch of retirees ballroom dancing in a park. This is pretty common by the way, and one of the things I really enjoy about China—people just live life a lot more publicly. Anyway, somehow Pang decided that I needed to dance with Liang, the chair of the department (who was soused, by the way—his job as chair at these is to get drunk—no one would let him drive there bc they wanted him to drink. His nickname, he said, is Liang doesn’t fall down). He grabbed our bags and pushed us out amongst the retirees, all of whom, of course, gathered around to watch the white person make a fool of herself. We did a basic waltz like thing, but then this guy jumped in and started making dirty dancing like motions—so Liang and I finished off disco style. Then an old lady in pink pajamas (retirees go everywhere in their jammies, to show they can—I am so adopting this plan once I join the aarp) grabbed me and we did a sort of modified shag like dance that involved a lot of spinning around and twirls. Then all the retirees invited me to join them again tomorrow, and we three headed home .

And that’s what a day in china is like.