What I learned from China

Well, I haven't posted in months, and I am back in the US, but I can't in good conscience go without sharing a few of the more important takeaways I got from my experience living in Nanjing, China.

Some of the things I learned were completely intended. I lived in China, so I grew closer and more privy to the culture. I learned how to rent an apartment, open a bank account, and start a phone plan in China. I was studying and working there, so I learned a lot of Chinese -- professional terms, literary devices, cultural references, and the like. I also learned things about Chinese politics, society, and economy. On top of these, I went to some astounding places and ate some even more astounding food. If I had learned only these things mentioned above, I would have fulfilled my goals of attending Flagship capstone -- I would be content.

But the reality is that I learned a lot more than just a few practical skills and a little abstract knowledge. The first invaluable pieces of knowledge that I gained were about myself. Before living in Nanjing, I saw myself as a classic "engineering personality" -- someone that loves math and science, but shuns the humanities or struggles to appreciate art and literature. Other than my music, there were few artistic trivialities that could hold my attention; I had no interest in politics; and I certainly wasn't a writer by any stretch of the imagination. My personal bias was quickly changed, however. After just a few short weeks of writing narratives, persuasive essays, and book reports in Chinese for my writing class, I finally realized the expression and joy that could come out of writing, especially when I felt that my execution was particularly articulate. I read a significant amount of classic Chinese literature, and thoroughly enjoyed that. I tried my hardest to like Chinese music, and, to my surprise, I actually found some really good songs. I even started to understand why people got so involved in political discussions -- though I am still far from wanting to debate politics in my spare time. This discovery of a love for more humanities than just classical music was quite significant to me.

In the course of my time in Nanjing, I also further confirmed that I am, as my parents so lovingly put it, a "quiet extrovert." A few pieces of evidence pointed toward this conclusion, including Chinese friends and coworkers finding it difficult to believe that I considered myself "reserved." Maybe it was just me trying to practice my Chinese as much as possible, but a few people actually mentioned that I seemed "outgoing." I definitely would not describe myself in those terms, but I think it proves my parents' point.

Lastly, I learned a lot about people. Up until the program started and I moved to China, I had lived in Utah and extremely Utah-esque societies for my whole life. I always had a sneaking suspicion that there was a world of difference between my experience and the outside world, and -- simply put -- I was right. In China, nearly every person I met had a vastly different background from me, whether it be social, political, religious, economic, or all of the above. The part that I didn't quite guess right was how well I would get along with all these different people. I forged many strong -- and hopefully long-lasting -- relationships with the people I met in China, whether it was with other students and teachers from the US, coworkers from Ericsson, classmates from engineering classes or orchestra, or even the aides in the Flagship office that had absolutely no distinguishable commonalities with me. I learned that, as God's children together in this mortal life, we can look past differences and thrive upon each others' similarities and uniquenesses -- and that knowledge may very well be the one most important thing that I acquired while abroad.

This is it for the blog for the time being. Living in China was an amazing experience, and I am glad to be back.

-小强

Home

Spring Travels

Happy belated Chinese New Year! I realize that the Lantern Festival is already over a week behind us, and that it has almost been a month since the Spring Festival itself, but I have been so busy traveling that I have not had the chance to write about it. Since New Year this year for me has been full of travel and exciting experiences, I'm going to share where I went, what I did, and some thoughts I have been having thinking back on one of the greatest winter breaks I've ever had. Here we go!

Over the break, I went to two places, the first of which was Taiwan. I served a two-year mission in Taiwan, so it will always be a very special place in my heart. On top of that, this was my first time returning after the mission, so this was a particularly special experience. I was there for twelve days total, and my schedule was stuffed to the rafters. I spent two full days in Taipei, which included visiting the Taipei Temple, the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall, a traditional market, a night market, exploring the city, hiking, and a short trip to the iconic Jiufen. From there, I made my way to Taichung, where I went to another two night markets, the Taichung Grand Theater, the Rainbow Village, my friend's university, and attended church. Next on the list was Chiayi and a little bit of Tainan. Here, I went to the Minhsiung Haunted House, a pineapple cake factory, the Hinoki Village, Chiayi Park, Southern National Palace Museum, and the old capital. In Kaohsiung, I spent some time in the sun at Qijin and Xiziwan, and then went and hit up the Maolin Scenic Area. My last stop was Hengchun and Kending, so I spent a lot of time at the beach and other tourist areas.

The instant I got off the plane in Taiwan, I could feel a difference from being in the Mainland. It was almost tangible, it felt so different. The accents, the food, the traffic, the people -- everything was similar to China, yet so incredibly distinct. Part of it may have been that I was finally away from the prying eyes of the Chinese government, but I think what really made feel the contrast was how Westernized Taiwan was. In Taipei especially, nearly everyone spoke English -- and they spoke it well. People seemed to drive faster, probably because the roads were relatively wide. People in the cities did not seem that surprised to see a foreigner walking around their streets, and every sign had at least some English on it. This pseudo-Western quality, along with the nostalgia of returning the land where I served my mission, made me feel at home.

I also have to mention how my friends in Taiwan made me feel. It was wonderful to see everyone again after these three years or so. I can't express enough gratitude toward those that provided housing for me, paid for a meal, or even took the time out of their busy New Year schedule to come and say hello. That said, the thing that moved me the most was seeing the active Church members that I met during my mission. It was a delight to see all of my friends, of course, but it was those who had stayed true to their belief in the Gospel and their faith in Christ that truly inspired me. I am immeasurably excited to go back and visit again!

The second place I went over the break was Beijing. Let's just say, there is a lot to do in Beijing because it's huge. Every day I was there, I walked nearly ten miles just visiting tourist sites. I went to Wangfujing, Sanlitun, the Great Wall, the Summer Palace, the Temple of Heaven, the Forbidden City, Jingshan Park, the National Museum, Beijing University, and 798 Art Zone, all within just a few days. I also ate some delicious famous Beijing food: donkey meat, bean curd noodles, and, of course, Peking Duck. I have to say, there are a lot of people in Beijing, but other than being super squished on the subways, it actually wasn't too bad. Maybe I was there at a good time, or maybe the people there have just become so accustomed to living with millions of their closest friends that they know how to handle it.

Beijing got me thinking on a very different track than Taiwan. Since Beijing is the capital of China, there was vast amount of nationalist propaganda just about everywhere you go. I normally didn't pay much heed to this kind of thing, but the National Museum grabbed my attention. Some of the exhibits there helped me to realize that whether or not Communism is "right," despite all the hardships new China has been through since it came into existence, and despite what the outside world thinks of China, the people that worked to build this country all devoted their lives to a cause that they saw to be worth their while. Whether brainwashed or guided, misled or inspired, China and its people have come a long way since its revolution. And I find it amazing.

Until next time,
-小强

A Strait and Narrow Path

One of the impressions I had of China before I came here was that laws are very strictly enforced. I knew that anything politically charged and against the Chinese Communist Party was thoroughly policed, and I knew that the death sentence was still a big thing. Upon arriving in China, however, it became obvious that traffic laws had somehow slipped through the net of enforcement. From day one, going from the Shanghai airport to the Shanghai train station, I quickly learned that drivers rarely used signals or yielded to each other, and they will do just about anything to get to their destination a few seconds faster -- I had entered a land where offensive driving was king.

Until recently, I didn't understand why China could enforce some things (especially things related to politics) and not others. I just figured that the government didn't want anyone talking bad about them because they were Communists. While I was partly correct, I have since learned that there is much more that goes into this phenomenon that just a government decision.

First of all, China is huge. Not only does it control a land mass larger than the United States, it also has one billion more people to manage. With such a spread, the power-house of a central government has no choice but to be strict. Beijing can't have people out in Xinjiang or Guangdong starting revolts because it will immediately throw the surrounding areas into turmoil, and because these places are so far away from Beijing, the most effective choice from a governing standpoint is to have hefty consequences in place. At the same time, there is only so much a central government can do as far as enforcement, and how traffic laws are obeyed is a relatively negligible problem, so enforcement is a little lax there.

This kind of situation makes me think of Chinese classrooms. The average Chinese elementary school class has about forty students to one teacher, so it's easy for things to get hectic really fast. Therefore, Chinese teachers have to assert their dominance by yelling a lot and asserting harsh punishments -- some of the time, that is. There are always going to be a few students goofing around in the back of the classroom, and if the teacher constantly has their hands tied trying to get them to pay attention, nothing will ever get taught. I'm not sure if teachers learned from the government, or the government from teachers, or if this is just human nature, but there is certainly a strong connection between the two instances.

Second of all, a lot of Chinese roads are simply not designed very well. Sometimes the design flaws exist just because the roads are old and weren't originally designed for large vehicles. This is the case with most neighborhoods, especially traditional neighborhoods like where I'm living right now. However, other roads were built in just the past few years, but they still have issues. This isn't because Chinese people aren't smart. I assume it mostly stems from the fact that Chinese engineering and construction is often more concerned with speed than quality. I imagine that if the Chinese were in charge of working on I-15, it would have been done on time, but it would likely need more work in the near future.

Lastly, parking lots are not really a thing here. Garages are also a rarity. As a result, the millions of cars owned by the billions of Chinese people are mostly parked on the roads. This is mainly an issue on smaller streets, such as the ones near my current apartment. Every road in my area is lined with cars, leaving barely enough room for one car to squeeze past. This makes walking extremely frustrating, as you have to stop and let cars past frequently. Parking on these streets is usually illegal, but nobody gets ticketed for it, so it becomes acceptable.

In short, don't come to China expecting to see smooth-flowing traffic. The number of red lights being run on a consistent basis is terrifying, and tasks as simple as making the six-minute walk home from campus turn into huge headaches. In fact, I had an interesting bit of insight the other day: one other reason that the strait and narrow path that Christ spoke of is so difficult to walk just might be because there is a little blue truck completely blocking the road in front of you while electric scooters honk at you from the back. Hopefully the traffic conditions will be a bit better once we reach our eternal destination.

-小强

Chinese traffic law enforcement in a nutshell.

Racism in China

As you may have gathered, China is a very interesting place. Whether it's the things that the average human being does in a day, how schools work, or the role of the government in society, almost everything is very different than in the US. One of those differences that I have been noticing a lot more recently is racism.

There are 56 Chinese ethnic groups living within the Chinese borders, and the majority of the people are considered of the Han ethnicity, making the other 55 groups minorities. Other than that, there are basically no foreign ethnic groups in China. The government and the people of China also agree that there is no racism extant in China whatsoever. These two facts alone show that the fundamental qualities of the Chinese societal makeup are completely different than almost every other country on earth. These facts also mean that racism in China is different than anywhere else in the world.

While the Chinese do not admit to any racism in their country, they will admit to some form of regionalism. According to the people I've spoken to about this, the least welcome people in China are generally those from the Henan province. This is because there are lots of people from Henan, and they tend to have fairly obvious accents. However, according to my roommate who is from Henan, as long as your accent isn't too thick, nobody really cares where you are from. I can definitely agree with that, because one of the most discriminated groups in the country (in my mind) is migrant workers, who are usually identifiable by their non-standard accents. These migrant workers have very low pay and next to no benefits, no thanks to the Chinese residency laws. They are looked down upon by most city dwellers, and they are sometimes even forced to leave the city for various "safety reasons." There are lots of problems surrounding migrant workers, and discrimination is definitely one of them.

Other than regionalism, we should also address the relationship between the Han ethnicity and the minorities. This relationship is comparable to the current one between Americans of European descent and the American Indians. The Chinese government gives these minority groups lots of benefits to make sure that they don't fall behind the Hans. While this looks good on the surface, a lot of the measures taken by the government are insufficient, and nobody really knows what is going on underneath.

Lastly, many Chinese people may be led to believe that there is no racism in China because they are Chinese. As a foreigner in China, I see a lot of things that the average Chinese person does not see. As one of the relatively few white people in the country, I get lots of stares, lots of giggles, lots of English thrown at me, and lots of unapproved pictures taken of me. While I don't mind very much, these happenings are just the kind of things that many Americans now call micro-aggressions or even provocations. I'm sure there are many unsuspecting foreigners every day that are very perturbed by how Chinese people act around them.

In the end, whether it's called racism, regionalism, or any other kind or level of discrimination, there really is no place in the world that is completely free of it. However, 2 Nephi 26:33 states: "and he inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile." We may never see a perfectly equal situation here on earth, but God and Christ love us all equally; we can be confident about that.

-小强

Here I am as the token white guy on the front page of China Daily's English Business column. I feel pretty cool.

A Chinese Thanksgiving

One of the most iconic scenes from the movie "A Christmas Story" has got to be when the family ends up eating duck at a Chinese restaurant on Christmas because the Bumpas's dogs ate their turkey. I got to have a similar experience here this past week, only it was a Chinese Thanksgiving instead of Christmas. I'll have to report on Christmas next month.

My Chinese Thanksgiving was split into two parts. I'll start with the part that happened on Thanksgiving day. My first thing that I was grateful for that day was that I only had one class at 1:00 PM, and I had already finished all my homework for the week, so I had a lot of free time to relax and enjoy the holiday. I slept in, watched some TV, read my book, went to my class, and chatted with the other Flagship students all day. In the evening, I went to celebrate with some friends. We got together and headed to the most American restaurant we could find: a burger place called Momentum. It was a little more expensive than eating at the cafeteria for 10 RMB, but I indulged and got the "Hell Spicy Burger." (It wasn't very spicy, unfortunately. I had to add Tabasco sauce.) We sat, ate, and talked for a solid two hours, and it felt great. We even went around the table and said what we were thankful for like true Americans. Even though there was no turkey -- or any poultry at all, for that matter -- it still felt much more like home than China usually does.

The second part of Thanksgiving was on Saturday. Our branch is awesome, and they set up two activities. The first activity was Turkey Bowl in the morning. Even though I am not at all a football player, I headed out to the Nanjing Foreign Language School and played with them. It felt really good to actually be outside exercising; it's been a little chilly lately, but it was a beautiful day. The second activity was the real showstopper. The Relief Society worked with the Nanjing University cafeteria and cooked 13 turkeys, buckets full of mashed potatoes and more than three gallons of gravy. They naturally invited the whole ward, and the ward members invited a lot of people as well, so we had upwards of 150 people there. As is tradition, we stuffed ourselves with food, and then we had a little variety show and spiritual thought. Although the food was plentiful and delicious, I think my favorite part of it all was seeing everyone getting along, members and non-members alike. It was especially great to see a lot of my non-member Flagship classmates there with us. It was a time that will remain in my memory forever.

In conclusion, even though I wasn't in the US to celebrate one of the most American holidays there is, and even though I didn't have roast duck at a Chinese restaurant, this year's Thanksgiving  is certainly one to be thankful for.

-小强

I forgot to take pictures at the Thanksgiving activity, so here are some cool clouds.

More Student Life: Midterms

I mentioned before that Chinese students have an incredibly hard test that they have to take to get into college. That test is one of the many differences between the Chinese and American education systems. This week, I experienced yet another one of those differences, but this time it was first hand.

Midterms at American universities (or at least at BYU) can be a big hassle. They generally occur more than the one time that the term implies, and they make things even more busy than they already are. They also tend to conglomerate together into little one or two week periods, making time management seem impossible for a while. However, most teachers usually give at least a three-day window to take their test, cramming happens, and everything eventually blows over. Such is not the case for Chinese universities.

First of all, midterms at Chinese universities truly are midterms -- they occur at week 9 out of the 18 total. They also happen only once per semester. Unfortunately, these tests do all happen at the same time no matter what you do, and the weight they pull a lot of weight on the grade side of things. Because of this, all the students and teachers kind of freak out about midterms. Starting about a month ago, all of my professors suddenly brought up midterms and told us to start preparing. My American classmates seemed pretty calm about the ordeal (because they didn't know what was coming), and my Chinese classmates started reviewing almost immediately. Both groups of people were right to do as they did in their own respects. Of course, the Chinese students were right to study, first of all because it's a good idea, and second of all because the tests are very hard. The American students were only partially right. On the one hand, the tests that the Flagship Center administered weren't very hard, and on the other hand, there wasn't much that we Americans could do to be in any way prepared for what the Nanjing University professors were going to throw at us.

My testing experience was like this: Last week, I had two tests for my Flagship Center classes. I had to prepare a fair amount for them, but they were pretty simple, so I wasn't to worried. This week, I had four more Flagship Center tests, and on top of that, I had my Signals and Systems midterm. The four Flagship tests, once again, were a little time consuming, but in no way hard. The Signals and Systems test, however, was another story. I prepared for that test for about two weeks, logging probably more than ten hours of pure practice problems and formula memorization. I got to the test and found that I could do almost all of the problems, but there simply was not enough time. Even though there were only five questions, they were either split into parts one through seven or chock full of different little tricks and brain teasers. I finished most of the test, but not all of it, and I definitely didn't have time to go back and check my answers. I'm scared to see my final score, to say the least.

Regardless of my grades, all is well. On Saturday, I went to a park by the Yangtze River with my roommate. It was pretty cool.

-小强

My roommate, Shengju, and me at the Yangtze River with a sweet pagoda in the background

Fortress Besieged

For one of my classes here at the Chinese Flagship Program, I'm required to read at least one Chinese novel. My tutor suggested I read a book called 《围城》-- "Fortress Besieged." It seems that most Chinese people have read this book, or at least heard about it, and the teacher of my class, who is a modern Chinese literature teacher here at NJU, was ecstatic when I told her I was reading it. Seems like I made a good choice. Anyway, I finished the book about a month ago, and I liked it a lot, so it is to this book which this post is dedicated.

First of all, here is a bit about the author. Qian Zhongshu was one of the leading professors of literature at Tsinghua University for a long time. He lived through some of the more notable events in modern Chinese history, such as World War II (or the "War Against Japan"), the beginning of New China, and the Cultural Revolution. He also studied in Europe with his wife (another famous Tsinghua professor) back in the 1930s. All of this experience went into the writing of "Fortress Besieged", his most famous book.

"Fortress Besieged" is primarily about a young man's love life. This young man's name is Fang Hongjian, and the story starts when he is on a boat headed back to China from studying abroad in Europe. Over the span of a few years, from his time on the boat to his time back in his home town, then on to his experience teaching at a newly opened university, Hongjian meets several young ladies that either want to marry him or that he wants to marry. His smooth talking generally keeps conflict at bay for a while, and then it all storms in at once, leading to some cringe-worthy confrontations and either Hongjian or the girl leaving the city where they met.

The above description probably sounds like a bad "Pride and Prejudice" knock-off, but the book is actually very well written. The author's intention in writing this book was to satirize Chinese culture and society from multiple angles, and he did just that. He pointed out the flaws in everything from the actions of Chinese intellectuals (which are, coincidentally, full of pride and prejudice) to family relationships. Qian Zhongshu is also a master of metaphors, and he uses metaphors from Asian and European culture for a more diverse effect.

In short, "Fortress Besieged" is definitely worth the read. I would highly recommend it!

-小强