Study abroad in China
Stacey Ferris
Issue date: 10/2/09 Section: Opinion
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The New Yorkers and the LA-ers and any other Chinese-Americans from various parts of the country all got on pretty well. They knew city life, and most of them had grown up with Chinese parents. I, on the other hand, grew up in rural Georgia.
I had already spent a summer in China in 2007 so I knew what China was generally lik; that is I wasn't nervous to return.
The difference between then and now was that now I was totally on my own, no one else handled getting used to life in Beijing or did my paperwork and visas. Having been in China before, it was easy to get used to the food again, the squat toilets, the inability to line up, the crowds and the lack of etiquette.
Most people who visit China short-term live in the "tourist bubble, and they come away with a fairly positive impression of the country. That's wonderful. I did too, after my first summer.
This time, though, it was a full year, one summer through to another. All my classes were in Chinese, all my travel was arranged in Chinese, all my tutoring work was planned with Chinese speaking parents - which was great for my Chinese.
The biggest shock of being back is that I don't speak Chinese several times a day. Sometimes I feel a need to speak or translate a few sentences or just copy some portion of my notes in Chinese just so I can use it a little. It feels better that way.
A couple more oddities are that people tell me I'm much quieter and far more patient now. I'm much more concerned about cleanliness and orderliness. Having ridden a bike or walked a great deal nearly every day, I haven't felt quite right until I went to new gym and used one of those fancy machines for a while, just so I could be moving.
There was plenty of travel and excitement, but I didn't go to nearly as many places as I would have liked. I've seen the big cities and climbed some big mountains, seen water as blue and turquoise as nothing else in this world and water so dirty I didn't want to walk near it, been up to 13,500 ft, and down to 0 ft on opposite ends of China, eaten fish head and most parts of a duck and a few things I didn't recognize, changed clothes in a van in minute 20 degrees Centigrade weather and been forced by circumstance to use toilets so filthy I wouldn't close the door for disgust of touching the handle.
I would have liked to have gone down to south China in winter, but I stayed in Beijing, which was still interesting.
Chinese New Year in Beijing sounds like a war zone for two weeks what with the booming and popping and tat-tat-tat of every sort of fireworks known to man. Red fireworks paper littered the streets and people were busy blowing things up at all hours of the day and night. A skyscraper nearing completion caught fire from the fireworks and burned to its metal skeleton. Cartoonist's made funny images of alien spaceships zapping it, and then they were lambasted on the Internet for being unpatriotic and hateful.
In other news, a grassroots rebellion, "Charter 8," was signed by about 300 intellectuals demanding a freer government. Most of them are now under house arrest.
Graphic images of bloodied Chinese were broadcast during the latest Xinjiang riots. Security was seriously ramped up during the anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan "independence" as well as the 1989 Tiananmen anniversary.
First, we lost You Tube, then in April the blogging sites all went, and in June Facebook was blocked. Spring semester saw the removal of a lot of American movies from the Chinese streaming Web sites.
France was generally hated, Carrefour boycotted several times, and the taxi drivers in Chengdu kept going on strike, among other things. But I was American, and both Obama and Bush are popular in China.
Study abroad can only be survived with a big huge sense of humor and lots of patience. Lose those and it may soon be unbearable.
Still, I think everyone should visit China. It is so unique in food and culture and geography, but it's changing in so many ways both superficially and deeply in the hearts of the young generations.
Yet, I have found that despite these differences, at heart people are people are people and they don't really change all that much. Leaving my home country was eye-opening and has changed me deeply, but in many very good ways.
Despite the difficulties of getting through some days and weeks and months, I say to anyone out there who has the chance for long-term international travel, don't hesitate - Do It.
Stacey Ferris is a senior accounting major.
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