The Blur of the Beginning

     I could write about what I packed for this two and a half month experience, or what it feels like to travel for 24 hours straight, but the long and the short of it is that I am in Beijing, settling into my host family's home and about to finish up my first week of interning. Already it feels like I've been here for ages--the daily oppressiveness of jetlag, pollution, heat, and sheer deluge of people sharing the same space as me leave me exhausted and, possibly excepting the jetlag, show no signs of ever letting up. That said, I'm loving my work and the people I've met.

My room at my host family's house

     After nearly an entire day of traveling that took me through Los Angeles and South Korea, I got to my host family's home late Saturday night (or early Saturday morning, according to my internal clock). My ride from the airport, a friend's father, and I were initially skeptical of my living arrangements: my host family lives in an older apartment complex, run-down by most Western standards (peeling paint, dirty cement floors, flickering lights) but their apartment itself is neat and clean. My room is very small (approximately 7 by 8.5 feet) with very thin walls, has a desk and bed, and leads to a contained patio of sorts (though calling it a patio would be generous). The bed is basically a glorified cot with a sleeping pad, spring-less and with a piece of fabric that serves as the sheet. Also, the internet is spotty and intermittent...have I sold you on the place yet? In spite of obvious deterring factors, I have my own room, access to hot water, a space to practice violin, food, a short commute to work, and a very helpful host family. In other words, by no means am I wasting away in a crumbling shanty.

View from my room

The market by my host family's apartment complex

"Honey, I brought home a nice turtle and frog for dinner!"

With Kazumi

     Also, I have housemates! Before I came I had no idea that my host family has two apartments and regularly hosts foreigners, and so for the first few days of being here I kept running into new people. I first met Kazumi, a Japanese woman who is staying here for a week while taking Chinese classes. That we both speak Japanese and our mutual feeling of cluelessness quickly bonded us, and so the day after I arrived she invited me to go with her to the 798 district, which is an art district area in Beijing crammed with galleries and cafes. We must have visited tens of contemporary art galleries by the time we made it out of the area--the most memorable were an exhibit of pictures of icons (not, the description insisted, iconic pictures) and a highly disturbing series of works with motifs of jellyfish and bondage. Kazumi's side passion is singing jazz, so tonight we're going to go to a jazz club. As we only speak in Japanese, so far my time in Beijing has been an unlikely double-immersion experience, which has made for some entertaining language mix-ups. There are also two American guys, a Mexican man and an Israeli woman living in the apartment who I met over a series of days, each time surprised to discover a new housemate. 

     I'm not yet over jetlag, which has meant that everyday I have been waking up somewhere between 4 and 5 am. I then engage in battle with the internet connection as I try to Skype my family and friends, get dressed, do the exercise dance with the schoolchildren across from my balcony, practice violin, eat breakfast, and head out the door to fight my way onto the subway system. I'll clarify a few of these points:

     1) The exercise dance: every morning at the same time, the students of a school across from my apartment complex process outside in lines, forming a huge formation. As school officials supervise, a symphonic band soundtrack comes on over the loudspeakers, accompanying a narrator who keeps the beat ("One two three four, two two three four..."). [Here's someone's YouTube video of one such dance.] It's so cheesy and yet so regimented that I can't help but join in from afar. Also, this has been my only exercise since coming--with the air quality being so abominable, working out outside is out of the question.

     2) Breakfast: room temperature milk in a packet (see photo), an egg or rice, and a mini-Luna bar from my rations if I'm peckish.

Breakfast

     3) The subway: There is a word in Japanese for a full train during rush hour, man-in densha. What I didn't realize was that man-in densha is the lower end of the bell curve for train passenger density in China. Especially during rush hour, the lines extend up the stairs to the entryway, and there is a violent  rush of squeezing and pushing to get on the train--to the point that a fight briefly broke out in my subway car this morning (that was quickly resolved, don't worry!). 

     Anyway, I'm getting accustomed to the routine and as I said, really enjoying the people here. It's not quite the coffee-run internship--I've already written two stories so far on the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests and on China's closing of Tibet to foreign tourists. Also, today I accompanied Gloria, the bureau's reporter, to a speech she gave to the faculty of a local women's university. After her forty-five minute presentation on empowering and heightening global awareness in women, the first question of three questions she was asked was, "What does creative writing mean?" It was fascinating to hear her explain the concepts of fiction-writing, developing the narrative voice, and self-expression to these teachers, who struggled to grasp what she was talking about. I imagine they were shocked that students could spend their college careers majoring in such a thing.

After explaining the concept of a creative writing major

     Other things I'm trying to adjust to:

• The constant and blatant stares I get everywhere I go--having hundreds of eyes on you anytime you're in public takes some getting used to.
• The directness of the Chinese language and people--in huge contrast to the honorifics and "I humbly beseech you" speech patterns of Japanese, people here have no qualms telling you "don't want!", "get out", "not right!" 
• That the TV screens go black when foreign news reports on topics that are controversial to the Chinese government. This has happened at least three times this week, once when the BBC reporter was in the middle of the word Tiananmen.

     Anyway, I'm going to cut this off before it gets any longer than it already is. It's long overdue and still doesn't properly express how overwhelming and stimulating this experience is. 

In The News (I wrote these!):

Tiananmen Square Quietly Remembered 23 Years Later

China Forbids International Tourism to Tibet Indefinitely