They think i'm here to teach!

Schools, caves and executuions

thegeordie — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 14:38:00 GMT

Schools, caves and executions.

I had a touch of reality the other day and it was a bit shocking. There was a crowd in the square outside of where I live and work. I asked my colleague what was going on. 'Its the criminals', she said 'but its finished now'. I had a vision of some punishment being meted out by a mob and suddenly thought, I don't want to be here.

It wasn't that dramatic, fortunately. The police had brought a load of 'criminals' to be paraded in front of the people of the town to demonstrate that crime doesn't pay. This didn't seem too bad until my colleague said 'and now they're all going to be shot'. I watched as two open backed lorries, full of armed soldiers and 'criminals' dressed in orange, drove off. Those guys were having their very last look at the world – they were all going to be executed that afternoon.

There are 68 offences that carry the death penalty in China including tax evasion and theft. I knew this and of course I knew about China's appalling human rights record but, like most travellers, I put those thoughts to one side when I had the opportunity to work here for a while. But that morning, I had a real feeling of shock as I stood and watched the lorries drive away. I have, like most of us who grew up in the West, had a very sheltered life when it comes to things like executions. Again like many people, I actively seek out new and exciting places to visit. But we should never forget what goes on beneath the surface of countries like China. By the time I had finished my lunch that day, all of those guys would have been shot. Lest we forget.

I had to go to a Government office in another area the other day to sort out my long stay visa. It was like a Chinese Milton Keynes. Purpose built, shiny and new, wide flat roads with no traffic – very weird. I had to go into some kind of police building and all along the corridor were photos of police with guns, usually wearing balaclavas, standing around loads of bodies. There’s nothing covert about police activity here! Actually there’s nothing covert about the police at all – I’ve never been in a place with so much police presence. I’m sitting upstairs in a coffee shop right now and out of the window I can see 3 police cars and four more have just driven past. Its not exactly threatening, they’re just there. Wearing uniforms of any kind, seems to be a hobby and a passion – I have no idea what most of them are – police, army, security??? but what they all have in common is that they don’t seem to fit! They all look too big across the shoulders and with sleeves that are way too long.

On another note, lots of people live in caves around here. I read a fact once that about 5 million people in China live in caves and I had visions of something very basic and uncomfortable. Tongchuan, where I'm living right now, is a town built along the bottom of a steep sided valley. The houses at the bottom are modern and mostly apartment blocks but one day I walked up one of the very steep paths going above the town. The houses all had ornate gates, mostly painted red with statues of lions and dragons but it wasn't until I was above the houses that I realised that these gates were almost up to the wall of the hillside. The actual living part of the house could only be inside the hill – in a cave.

I had a friend in India who lived in a cave – it was half way up a mountainside in the Himalayas and I didn't actually know it was a cave until I touched the walls inside – rock. I haven't been inside one of the cave here but I'm on the lookout for a suitable acquaintance. The hills, by the way are made of fairly soft sandstone so I guess its quite easy to dig yourself a cave.

The children I work with range in age from 5 to 18 but one thing they all have in common is that they have no social life. Someone said to me the other day that the children learn music or dance 'in their free time' – a bit of a contradiction in terms. School takes up all of their time. After a full day, they go back for 3 hours in the evening to do 'homework' and they often go in at the weekend too. Classes are usually around 80 students and the pressure on these students to achieve is enormous. The expectation is that they'll get 100%. One girl put it into a perspective for me when she pointed out that will 1.5billion people, there is so much competition for everything, you have to be the best.

But it's very much a 'fill the bucket' approach to education rather than lighting any spark. I was talking about Shakespeare with a teacher who told me that he never had time to discuss anything about the man and his contribution to literature or whatever, he only spent time learning sonnets.

I'm not a Christian but I was brought up in a Christian house and country so I do actually know what Christmas is all about. I now have to go to a Christmas party and tell the nativity story to about 200 children and sing a load of carols – thank goodness for my old fashioned girls school education where we has religious assembly every morning. I never realised that I knew so many carols. Happy Christmas.

November 09 first thoughs of Tongchuan

thegeordie — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 15:04:00 GMT

First thoughts after about a week here. mid November 2009

The window of my apartment in Tongchuan overlooks a large square with
small shops on two levels around 3 sides. Every morning I wake to the
sound of gentle traditional Chinese music and if I sit up and look out
of the window, I can see three of four groups of people doing
different exercises – there’s a large group doing some kind of
aerobics, there’s two groups doing Tai Chi, another group doing
something similar with swords and another group doing what looks like
a dance with a bat and a ball. But they are not batting the ball –
they put the bll on the bat and then wave it around so gracefully
that the ball never falls off – I didnt even realise it was a ball
until I watched them begin one day.

I’m in China and for those who thought I was hibernating again in
Voditsa, I’m not. I’m hibernating in central China for a change. Its
not snowing and actually its not even cold here but I’m told it will
be cold pretty soon so maybe I was right to bring my fur coat. I have
a job teaching English – more of that later – but as I only do that at
the weekend, I have loads of time to catch up on stuff like writing my
book(s) and getting my website stuff together and eating.

It appears that I am the only foreigner in this town – how does that keep happening to me?

It took me two days to get here – bus to Istanbul (I still love the
fact that it goes by the end of my road), flight to Abu Dabi, flight
to Beijing and another flight to Xian (terracotta warrior land) then a
long taxi ride to Tongchuan. My street here is called Limim Lu if you
want to look on google earth. The best thing about the journey, which
was quite hassle free, was that I got to see the latest Star Trek
movie on the flight to Beijing – I agree with all my trekkie friends –
its great.

Its a bit hard sitting down for two days – Saturday evening to Monday
evening – it was bits of sleep with airline food in between. As soon
as I arrived, in typical Chinese style, my hosts took me out to a
banquet. Great food of course but I could hardly keep my eyes open and sadly didn't appreciate it.I then slept for 10 hours.

I love China in the same way that I love India – its huge,
fascinating, constantly surprising and totally focused on food. Every other shop is about food and in one street I counted 15
restaurants all in a row … and they were all full. There’s great
markets selling everything you can imagine but I wonder who cooks
because everyone seems to be eating out. I think I probably wont use
my kitchen here because right outside my door is a buzzing little street
with restaurants and things that can only be described as eating
places plus loads of stalls selling strange things on sticks – skinned
frogs and stuff like that. I’m not very good with heads and eyes so
I’ll pass on the frogs but I’m working my way through everything else.
I’m going to learn how to make steamed bread and dumplings and I’ll
introduce them into St James Park next year! And of course its really
cheap – a big bowl of noodles and other things is about 4 Yuan – under
1euro.

I was ready to give up coffee (a waste of time here) black tea (tea is
made form all sorts of flowers and different leaves) and smoking
(failed on the tobacco) but I forgot that China is devoid of chocolate
and of course I haven’t seen anything remotely like cheese. But the
local supermarket sells everything from weird eggs coated in strange
mud (I tried one and made the mistake of smelling first!) to live
turtles – I might pass on those too. I’m probably going to get really
fat here but it’ll be fun. Of course I dont read chinese so ordering
things is interesting. Last night I randomly picked something off the
menu and I had to laugh when it came – I’m a bit out of practice with
chopsticks and what I got was a big plate of tiny diced bits of tofu
with peanuts in a rather lethal sauce. Eating peanuts and small diced
things with chopsticks took ages!

Breakfast is now is Dou Jiang – warm sweet soya milk and a sweet fried
bread roll with sesame (sorry but this is going to be all about food).
I’m going to have some Chinese lessons and we’re starting with menus.
I’m practicing the four tones first – its a bit like Bulgarian where
you have the put the emphasis on the right syllable or nobody
understands. But also like Voditsa, people here haven’t met anyone who
doesn’t speak Chinese so they just talk to me – there are people like
Baba Penka here!

Back to my comparison with India – there is a wonderful sense of a
huge place with a cultural history much longer than anything in Europe
and sense of personal pride in that history but little knowledge of
the outside world. But its also a massive emerging economy – actually
its big enough to have a massive internal economy that in one sense
doesn’t need the outside world. But I guess the differences are that
there is no sense of spirituality here and there is a lack of colour –
clothes are many variations of black and although it has wonderful
aromas (for want of a better word) your sense are not blasted by
colour and smell like they are in India. The other thing of course is
democracy – imagine all these people and they dont vote…......and dont
mention Tibet!

I was surprised to be able to get Radio 4 on the internet but Facebook
is a blocked site. That doesn't make much sense.

Clothes are totally western – they dont do bling here – not much
glitter around but they do pink and girly girly. But I also dont think
that anything I see will be in a size to fit me – i’m head and
shoulders taller than anyone and as for shoes, no chance.

I miss the clear blue skies of Bulgaria – I cant decide if its
actually pollution or just permanent fog. I mentioned it to my work
colleagues and they were surprised – of course you can see the sky!
But not much in the way of blue.

I’m looking for a Tai Chi teacher – maybe in exchange for English
lessons – I want to join the group in the square in the morning but I
need to practice first. Also in the square in the morning are a load
of old guys with huge calligraphy brushes – they write poetry on the
paving stones with water. Beautifully done and then they evaporate and
they’re gone.

I’ve kept the thoughts about my work till last as anyone who knows
will know that I have managed all my life to travel whilst avoiding
teaching English. Now I spend all (literally) of saturday and sunday
teaching children aged 5 -18– I guess i’ll survive -its only 4 months and there's plenty of food to explore.