As my days here are dwindling, I find myself in a state of confusion. Do I already miss China even though I haven’t left yet? What will I DO with myself when I don’t have 200 vocab words a day to memorize? What will my reaction to everything American be? Since United switched my flight from direct to DC to direct to Chicago and added an hour to my layover, how am I going to spend 4 hours at O’Hare jet-lagged out of my mind but still drifting somewhere between the wonders of China and the comforts of home? Since I have a lot of questions, and no answers, I figure I’d better just enjoy the days that I do have left in Beijing (side note: I started writing this post while I was still in China. I’m now at home…updates to come soon!).
Here goes Part 2…
This is my view out of ACC’s North gate in Beijing’s Chaoyang District when walking to lunch, the bank, the bus, and more. If you look closely, you can see the CCTV “Pants” building on the left (behind the white building), and the brown building in the distance is the CCTV building that infamously caught on fire and burned down last year during Chinese New Year just after completion. Strangely enough, the Chinese government seems to think that by censoring news about this incident, they can keep me from knowing what happened. Considering that the rust-crispy skeleton leftover from the disaster is just a hop and a skip down the street from me, I think they might have failed. One more game to play with this picture before moving on: one of these things is not like the other, one of these things does not belong. Can you guess what it is? The blue sky!! Even though on most days, China’s pollution is visibly severe, I’ve been lucky enough to be in Beijing for a period that’s included more blue-sky days than ever in the past ten years (so I really shouldn’t be complaining!!).
It might not look like much, but for me, this place has a lot of significance. Undeniably, one of the most important parts of the study abroad experience is FOOD, and the culture surrounding it, of course. My roommate and I have dubbed this dumpling stand, “zui xihuan de difang,” or in other words, our “favorite place.” We frequent it at least two or three times a week for their noodles, fried rice, dumplings, and my personal favorite, 炒饼 (chaobing), which is something that fundamentally does not exist in the US. If we arrive at 10:30am (yes, I know that’s disgustingly early to be eating lunch, but when you eat breakfast at 7:00am…) instead of the usual 11:30 or so, the owner always curiously inquires, “Why are you guys so early today?” I take that as a sign that we’ve become regulars.
While we’re on the topic of food, when I’m not eating at my favorite dumpling stand (or other restaurants in the neighborhood), I’m in cooking class learning how to concoct delicious Chinese dishes from scratch, like the one above, called 蒜薹肉丝 （suantai rousi). Though the green bits look like green beans, they are not, and since I’ve never seen such a vegetable in America, I can only believe mdbg.com (favorite online Chinese dictionary by the way) when they say it’s called “Carex dispalatha.” All I know is that when fried with bits of pork, it is delicious! By my own estimation, which is grounded in reality since I mostly clean and chop vegetables and thus watch my cooking teacher make magic with ginger, garlic, soy sauce, and vinegar, my own cooking ability, as far as Chinese dishes go (and in general for that matter…), is pretty sub-par. But I am looking forward to attempting (this being the key word with no guarantee of success) to re-create some of the tastiest dishes I’ve discovered in China when I’m back in the US (that is, the ones whose ingredients actually exist in the West).
When in Beijing, one must see opera! ACC arranged a trip for our whole program to an opera performance designed especially for foreigners (less singing and more moving). Though I had always been slightly put off by traditional Peking Opera’s exuberance, including high-pitched melodies, elaborate painted faces, and intricate costumes, after watching Chen Kaige’s film about Peking opera (and Chinese history, culture, and so much more), Farewell My Concubine, I learned to appreciate this old art form from a new perspective. Going to see a live performance opened my eyes to opera beyond the lavishness: the plot lines and dialogue really are quite witty and comical; opera isn’t boring in the least!
Over the summer, I got to experience the Beijing tradition of the morning walk and/or exercise in the park. Here are some elderly ladies practicing their fan dance. They would meet to practice every morning as early as 7:30am (and possibly earlier, but I cannot testify to that since I never made it out of bed early enough to verify!). While in the park, I also played the Chinese equivalent of hackey sack and ping pong, and witnessed a group of old men taking their birds for a walk (yes, their birds, in cages, for a…well, a walk). But the most fun I had exploring the park was with my host family’s grandfather, who took me to Chaoyang Park, which is one of Beijing’s biggest. An avid kite-flier and maker of his own kites, as well as an expert in Chinese yo-yo, the gleam in his eye and his fun-loving spirit revealed a whole new meaning to “walk in the park.” Though my kite-flying attempt failed miserably (I lasted about five seconds and it got caught in a tree) and my yo-yo skills were not up to par (think string tangled, yo-yo flying), he forgave me and patiently tried to teach me the basics. In the end, despite Grandpa’s best attempts to sharpen my skills, I enjoyed spectating much more than actual participation. It was refreshing to watch a young soul in action as he cultivated his favorite hobbies and passed on those traditions to his grandchildren. 
Traveling in China wouldn’t be the same without the experience of sleeper trains. Though I can testify that they weren’t always my preferred method of travel, I actually managed to sleep on the sleeper trains, unlike my experience on really long airplane rides. Somehow, both times that I traveled with ACC by sleeper train (first to Datong over the summer, then to Xi’an in the fall), I always ended up with a “middle” level berth. If you’re stuck in the middle like me, you really only have one choice of bodily position: lying down. The limited space makes it impossible to even really sit up; giving you no choice is one way to make you sleep! Turning off the lights on the entire train at 10pm is another effective way to accomplish that goal. Sometimes I wondered if the government was enforcing our bedtime and wake-up–patriotic “I love China!” songs blasted through the speakers next to my head at 7:30am the next morning. If you’d prefer not to succumb to the forced-sleep-by-lying-down and wish to attempt to defy the enforced curfew, you can do like me and invade your friend’s bottom bunk, which was always where we sat to play games (such as: switching our field director’s shoes with those of a classmate while they were both asleep, drawing tattoos on sleeping classmates in pen, waiting to see how long it took before our teacher noticed his stolen hat, etc.). The China sleeper train experience would remain incomplete if you didn’t have your cup of instant noodles and tons of snacks to keep you energized (or dehydrated, rather) for the six to twelve hours spent on the train. Getting dehydrated from all the salt and MSG in the cup o’noodles is practically a prerequisite for this kind of travel.
Thanksgiving. Oh, Thanksgiving. ACC is a thoroughly Chinese language and culture-focused study abroad program, except for on one day of the year: Thanksgiving. On Thanksgiving, ACC students collect delicious American recipes from home, gather friends to help with the execution, and spend a solid five hours cooking for themselves, their classmates, and their teachers. Above is a photo of preparations for making our stuffing. Somehow, earlier in the fall when I was more idealistic and thought that Thanksgiving would mainly be a great opportunity to give back to my program, teachers, and fellow students (and when I had not yet realized its potential to become a large headache), I volunteered to help coordinate the whole operation. Along with three of my classmates and the many teachers who were helping us, we ran around Beijing like chickens with our heads cut off searching desperately for Crisco, evaporated milk (which we never found), pre-made pie crust, cranberry sauce, and many other Western ingredients which stubbornly hid on the shelves of the imported goods stores that we scoured. Though it was quite the wild turkey chase (well, not literally, since turkeys aren’t native to China and we had to buy ours already prepared at a restaurant), thanks to the valiant and creative efforts of many students and perseverance of our teachers, we put not only turkey, gravy, and cranberry sauce on the table, but also had apple pie, pumpkin pie, cornbread, green beans, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, and more! Now that’s what I’d call success. In the end, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief and eat an American meal with my classmates, who knew how to enjoy it, and share a slice of American culture with my many teachers who had so graciously opened up China to me.
