Chinese Confession-Xi'an and a Certain Rectangular Place

I know it has been a while now since I have written anything of substance. Hopefully this will at least make up for some of the lack over the past couple of weeks. In all honesty, however, things have been getting increasingly busy and my time here in China is drawing rapidly to its close.

Right now I am actually writing this in a hostel in Beijing near the Lama Temple. We started our trip around China last Thursday, with the plan being to spend two days in Xi’an, five days in Beijing, and three days in Nanjing. Before leaving, however, we did have our midterm test for Chinese class. We went over review for it and it honestly seemed so easy that I didn’t feel that I really needed to study too hard before hand. Normally I would dismiss that as laziness, but in all actuality, I think it is quite the opposite. Preparing for a test in Chinese does not depend on how many hours you put in the few days before a test, as you cram and cram and cram and focus entirely on that one test. I find that the true preparation takes place everyday that I make the decision to go to class, to bring the language to life, go above and beyond what the minimum is, and most importantly – make it fun. I’ve been doing that the whole time I have been here in China, so I felt really well prepared for the test. And I think it went really well. Even the oral part, which normally is a challenge, was not too bad. It just came naturally. I told my teacher about being in France for two years. That gave me plenty to talk about for the entire time.

After the test, I packed and tried to finish a few things before we headed off to the Shanghai train station. We took an overnight train to Xi’an. We ended up taking a slower train (one that makes more stops), so it took us 16 hours to arrive there. It was fun though. This first part of the trip I spent with five other American classmates: Steve, Will, Mark, Monica, and Shelly. Although we speak English amongst ourselves (some just began Chinese this semester, so conversing is very difficult), I still am getting a fair amount of Mandarin practice in because I seem to be the best speaker amongst us. That means I get to be the one to buy the train tickets, ask directions, ask other questions, and help out in whatever ways possible. I don’t have a dictionary with me either, so I really have to work to come up with ways of saying things that can be understood and understand what is written on signs and such. It’s really good language practice, to say the least. I think my Chinese professor from home would be proud.

Xi’an itself is a pretty neat city. It has a lot of history, for those who are interested in that. It is home to the Terracotta Warriors (兵马俑), which are its most famous attraction. Those are a huge draw for people. The city itself has some other cool things like a HUGE city wall that goes all the way around the city and has been really well preserved. It also has some parks, gardens, and even a great mosque in the Muslim neighborhood. We certainly didn’t see everything there was to see in the two days we spent there, but we saw enough that we were ready to move on by the end.

As for my actual opinion of the place and its people, they are still quite friendly. They don’t see foreigners nearly as often as in Shanghai though, and that was pretty evident. We got a lot more stares than in Shanghai, and some people seemed to not be able to communicate with us very well. The cab drivers, in particular, were really bad at trying to understand us. We tried with three different cabs, and each time the drivers ended up kicking us out. I don’t know if it is because they couldn’t understand me (which is possible, but I am not so sure) or because they just didn’t want to have to deal with a foreigner. Maybe they’ve had bad experiences. But each time we got in and explain where we wanted to go, they said “I can’t! I don’t know!” and made us get out. I got really angry at the last one because I told him what street we wanted to go to and he said he could take us there. Just to make sure, I pulled out a map and pointed to the exact intersection, which was really easy to get to and was literally perhaps 10 blocks straight ahead. He wouldn’t even have to turn. I told him “there is a restaurant there and that is where we want to go” But once I showed it to him and told him this, he said he couldn’t and it didn’t know where it was and he kicked us out. I won’t lie. I was pretty angry about the whole thing, especially after being a cab driver in the US. Those were the easiest directions in the world, and I couldn’t have made them any clearer. But he didn’t even want to try to understand. That’s probably the first time I’ve really gotten mad at a Chinese person here, and hopefully it will be the last. I didn’t yell at him or lose my cool or anything, but I walked away rather annoyed. We were all extremely tired and hungry anyway, having just spent an hour looking for a place to eat, but finding none and having walked at least 10 miles already. Either way, I hate to paint a generalization, but I have to say that the cab drivers are not very dependable in Xi’an. So if anyone plans on going there, I will recommend trying to get a driver from the train station that is more specialized in taking tourists around. You generally have to pay them for the whole day, but they know the city and can take you where you want to go. You just have to negotiate a price.

Our hostel was pretty interesting though. It appeared to have been converted from a couple of the old, fancy traditional Chinese homes with courtyards and a bunch of rooms. Our hostel here in Beijing is probably nicer and more modern, but it is also a bit more mainstream and not quite as unique of an experience. It’s still better than I would expect elsewhere in the world for the price we pay (about $7 per night). I’m happy.

Beijing so far is also a pretty unique city. It’s pretty lively, mostly because the government here is so huge and so many people work for it. It does have a very different feel from Shanghai though. We saw Tiananmen square today and walked around it and some of the surrounding area, just getting a feel for the place and getting familiar with the surroundings. On the square itself, I really felt aware of the presence of the police and soldiers. The square is huge, and there was a pretty big crowd, especially for November, which is not a big tourist season. There were soldiers all around the place, some standing completely still at their stations at certain monuments. Others were walking around a bit more. There were also numerous police stationed at the entrances to the whole square, performing searches of the bags that people carry in. I only had my camera, so I was okay. Some others had bags but they didn’t get searched for some reason. There was also a police van driving around on the square itself the whole time.

It’s really difficult to describe, and perhaps it was just because we were more aware of what had happened there before, but the feeling was very strange. Chinese people are completely unaware of what happened. I have had a couple of my teachers here make mention of it during lectures, but they do seem to be a bit more hushed about it and don’t dwell on the topic too much. The intangible presence of the government just felt heavy, like I could feel it bearing down on my shoulders. I can’t explain it any other way. It was almost surreal seeing all of these Chinese people smiling and taking pictures and such, often coming up to us and wanting to take pictures with us just because we were foreigners. I find myself wondering if they felt the same thing that I did. As I was talking about it with Steve, my classmate, he mentioned how its pretty similar in places in DC in that there are military and police, and yet the feeling is so different there. Perhaps it’s a case of national pride. Perhaps it’s a trust issue. Maybe the Chinese on this square feel like Americans do at the tomb of the lost soldier or the Lincoln Memorial. Most of the police and soldiers didn’t even have weapons. It is as if their mere presence and the government buildings around are enough to keep things peaceful and orderly.

After a few days of being here in Beijing, it will be interesting to be able to compare it with Shanghai and Hong Kong, and possibly Shenzhen and Xi’an. They are all very unique and have completely different feelings. The pace of life, the way the people see us, interact with us, and respond to us, and even the cultures of the cities are all pretty unique. Beijing certainly doesn’t have the same modern, cosmopolitan, international feel that Shanghai does. But then again, Shanghai doesn’t quite have the same modern, cosmopolitan, and international feel that Hong Kong does. This place is definitely all about the government and seems destined to be the face that the Chinese government presents to the world. That, of course, will be displayed next summer when the Olympic Games finally arrive in China. What happens with the city after that point, however, is anyone’s guess.

Tomorrow morning we will be seeing the Great Wall, which should be a pretty amazing trip. It’s quite far out of the city though, and I am not quite sure how to get to the two places along the wall that people in my group want to go. We’ll be working those details out later tonight. In the meantime, I will save this and get on to experiencing Beijing!