David goes to China

Final exam results

2007-07-04T09:18:00.000Z

Executive summary
Pass
Details
八十九 %, if I understand the results page correctly.
:-)

Final test

2007-04-29T14:09:00.000Z

Last exams for the module were this week. My conversation partner and I conversed haltingly in Mandarin for about 7 minutes; this was recorded for marking.
Then about 20 minutes of the teacher saying stuff in mandarain and us guessing what she said.
Not too bad and all done now.
I'm reasonably confident that I've passed these fairly artificial tests, but I can't figure out why my partner can understand me but the flunet Chinese speakers in Beijing pretended not to...

Penultimate exam session

2007-04-16T14:10:00.000Z

After the real world assessment in Beijing (result - failed miserably, I think) back to school.
I managed to fit in 2 or 3 hours of revision for the reading and writing exams, hampered only by my innate laziness and the warm weather.

The exam itself was technically a much better exam with a wider range of difficulty and it took pretty much the full 45 minutes before I ran out of answers/guesses.

Next week the final two exams - listening and speaking. It's a good job our teacher speaks muuuuch sloooower than the people do in Beijing otherwise none of us would stand a chance.

When is China?

2007-04-11T11:55:00.000Z

China is, of course, a contradiction. Western commentators say that it will be the dominant (economic) force in a few decades' time; I think they are right, but I'm not sure that ordinary Chinese either believe that, or believe that it will do the common people any good.

Currently (and bear in mind that I only visited Beijing and a little outside), it feels very much like the mixture you'd expect in a vast, (formerly?) totalitarian and insular, largely rural-agricultural state rushing forward into today and tomorrow. Some modern stuff (but not much ultra-modern apart from some architecture), slums (a lot being demolished), pollution, the occasional horse, lots and lots of manual workers (cleaning streets, digging holes by hand etc), lots of fresh produce sold by individuals and one-person service points (knife sharpening, bike fixing etc), high mobile phone onwership, clear generational differences (although with strong family ties).

It feels like a cross between Britain at the start of the Industrial Revolution and the Britain of the 1950s.

More miscellany

2007-04-11T11:53:00.000Z

Lots of stores like small or large department stores are actually a building with lots of stalls in them each operated by competitors. There are lots and lots and lots of sales assistants. In one place, there were just counters and counters each containing one mobile phone per foot and one sales assistant per yard. I was the only "customer". Each counter was, I think, a different business. This of course only applies to up-market(ish) and/or tourist places.
Supermarkets where ordinary people shop are a lot like supermarkets around the world.
Sales people like you to give them the right change if possible.
Entry to parks or other areas with any claim to beauty or fame costs something, perhaps 15p. It doesn't put the locals off. There is a bureaucracy - one person sells you the ticket, another a few feet away checks it. Same with the subway.
This system is operated in some shops (at random, obviously). In one shop I bought some items and went to the main exit/checkout to pay. Most of the items I was allowed to pay for. I then had to leave my paid for shopping and return to where I'd picked up a couple of the items. I showed the items to the sales assistant. She filled in a handwritten form/receipt for them and I offered her the 20p. She pointed me at a separate cashier 20 yds away, and kept the goods. I took my receipt to the cashier and was allowed to pay, then took my stamped receipt back to the sales assistant who exchanged it for the goods and another receipt. I took the goods and my new receipt back to the checkout to prove I'd paid and collect the rest of my shopping. Sorted!
Lots of regular commuters had a special swipe card for the buses. They keep it in their handbag and wave it near a scanner on entry and on exit. Good idea.

Blog readers' whereabouts

2007-04-11T09:19:00.000Z

I suppose I didn't think about what to expect in terms of readership. I only set up the blog to avoid a) having to send multiple emails and b) choosing what to email to whom. So I told a few people who I thought might be interested and they can choose whether or not to read. Almost all of those based in Sheffield or at least UK.
Not quite sure how people come across blogs or choose to dip in, but above is what Blogger reports as the distribution of readers. Some people in China managed to read it, although I found that difficult at times; sadly no-on in Africa (the pin on the left of Africa is Tenerife), Australia or Russia was interested...

Blogging

2007-04-05T16:03:00.000Z

I've not written a personal blog before and I've found it a very interesting experience.
As I've already said, it makes me reflect more on my experiences.
I think a lot of (most/all?) bloggers must be extroverts, because it also feels quite exposed for someone like me who is personally shy and introvert.

The journey home

2007-04-05T16:00:00.000Z

By car from Yang's apartment. Passed an amusement park which appeared to be open before 8am - strange.
At the airport, it's an almost unintelligible lengthy 6 stage process to exit the country, involving filling in a number of forms.
While waiting for my flight I found a deserted area with wonderfully comfortable loungers - heaven!
Prices at the airport are suddenly Western - about £1 for a small bottle of water, as opposed to 6p in BJ. It's a little culture shock.
On the plane I watched 3 movies and was still well to the east of Moscow. (Two made me cry, but I cry easily. At least I didn't cry during the thriller.) Which reminds me - on the way to China I watched Casino Royale; doesn't Daniel Craig remind you of Pete Middleton (obviously a bit the worse for wear, but he has worked at SHU for a while now)? Or is it Gary Lineker?
By the second meal, I switched back to western cutlery. I hadn't used a knife and fork for all the time I was in China and I literally had difficulty knowing what to do with them. (I also find I have difficulty writing English, not that I'd been writing much Chinese.)
The plane was late into Paris and I just missed my connection there, so another 3 hour stopover in Gucci and Rolex land.
"<"Rant>
Air travel isn't any joy is it?
It takes for ever and is very uncomfortable; even in Business Class (which I wasn't), it's hours and hours sitting in a chair less comfortable than your own at home, watching videos and eating food which isn't as good as your own cooking. In cattle class it's a quite uncomfortable chair - like the ones in 6715 - for 10 hours...
"<"/Rant>
Sue picked me up at Manchester (thankyou, thankyou!) and I eventually got into a bed 24 sleepfree hours after I'd got out of one in Beijing.
It's nice to be home.
:-)

The last post...

2007-04-03T08:59:00.000Z

..from China at least.
I've had a wonderful final day. Couldn't find a kebab seller on the street so went to a back alley restaurant where there was no common spoken or written langauge to go on. Excellent food though.
Then I played table-tennis for a couple of hours in the sunshine (and wind).
A lovely finish to a great holiday/ethnographic research project.
See you all in the UK.
D
PS I'll put up some more pics when I'm back.

Toilets

2007-04-03T08:53:00.000Z

Public toliets are evry half mile or so in the main areas for the use of the general public; and the same in the hutongs (back alleys, communal courtyard housing) - for the locals.
They are generally clean but almost all are the squat type, apart from urinals obviously.
I've glad I got the point and shoot mechanism installed at the factory.

Miscellany

2007-04-03T04:43:00.000Z

A few percent of people wear smog masks.
On dusty days some women warp their heads completely around with a presumbaly see-through scarf, while cycling.
Shops, as foreign shops do, sell strange collections of stuff (who'd think that tobacco and sweets went with newspapers?)
Kite flying is very common
So are a lot of activites which would seem demented in the Wset - eg hitting yourself in the chest repeatedly
Please, sorry, excuse me; are all rare expressions here (in any language)
There is a very wide range of skin colours
Some people actually wear those red Chinese jackets with toggles on the front
Quite a lot of people, older men especially, wear Chairman Mao type hats.
Cylces don't have lights, at all, ever. And cars only turn theirs on when it's actually dark.

Last day :-(

2007-04-03T04:40:00.000Z

While you're still abed (it's about 4:30am UK time, 12:30pm here as I type), I'm enjoying my last day here. It's a beautiful warm sunny day. I'm off to find some warmed up meat-on-stick for lunch and see if I can persaude any more locals to play me at table tennis.

Tomorrow morning I leave Beijing :-(
Tomorrow evening I'll be home :-)

Up to the highest heights...

2007-04-03T04:37:00.000Z

I went to the telecomms towers, 400m high, and up to the viewing platform at 225m. Stunning views on a glorious day here.
I didn't feel any vertigo, strangely. I've had vertigo since a sudden onset about 20 years ago and my knees go weak in simulations even.
And I enjoyed cycling back into town on my well-oiled machine.

Breakdown

2007-04-03T04:29:00.000Z

See pictures of my (t)rusty steed at http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/obscuredavid/DavidGoesToChina

I cycled off this morning and after about an hour my steed ground to a halt. The chain had fallen apart. Fortunately this being BeiJing I was about 50 yards from a roadside bike fixer.
The chain is all encased. He took it all apart, fitted a new link oiled and re-assembled for 20p.

Far fewer graunching noises now.

Lazy day

2007-04-02T07:44:00.000Z

A sunny, windy day.
Today I cycled around the hutongs looking unsuccessfully for the entrance to BJ's underground nuclear bunker built in the free-love days of the 60's when Russia was threatening.
There are no maps at all of the hutongs, so it's a bit tricky.

Then I went to an Indian restuarant for lunch. I have a habit of trying foreign-foreign food wherever I go to see what it's like. I had a papadom (oily, covered with chopped onion and tomato), rogan josh (defintiely lamb - a good sign - slightly tinny tomatoey sauce with heavy ginger overtones. No onion, fresh tomato or other macro-ingredients) and a nan (very good). Along with a couple of Chinese beers - like a light lager. A fiver, which was quite expensive for a fairly posh place down a back alley.

In the afternoon, to a tea-house which served pots of tea and a designed-for-tourists shadow play.

Tea

2007-04-02T07:40:00.000Z

Isn't drunk as much as you might think, and little ceremony at home.
Each person has an individual cup with a lid. A batch of leaves go in and hot water from falsk. The tea is then drunk over a long period of time, topped up with water over a day or more before fresh leaves.
On the street, a lot of tea-houses and tea-shops simply sell leaf tea - don't go expecting a warm drink.

I would like to say...

2007-04-02T07:35:00.000Z

...but I can't.
It's difficult for me as someone who lives by talking and occasionally writing, persuading people with subtleties, not to be able to use much lanaguage at all, let alone subtlety.
My 150 words are not enough, and my pronunciation is apparently largely unintelligible.
This is part of my "out of comfort zone" experience.
Maybe writing this is a partial substitute.
But I may have to have a long chat with each reader indivually when I get back, to make up...

Comfort zone

2007-04-02T07:32:00.000Z

One of the points of a trip like this is to move outside my comfort zone, to have some of my views challenged and changed. For me this is usually a slow process, not a Damascene flash. I'll assimilate what I've experienced slowly over the next months.
One thing I've noticed is that I'm tolerant of the taste (decor, clothing, habits) of my hosts (defintiely not to my taste) , and much less tolerant in UK, even though people are clearly living out their version of their cultural identity just as truly, based on class, ethnicity, education, wealth etc.

Language

2007-04-02T07:30:00.000Z

I spent an hour with Yang this evening talking about language. We both learnt something, I'm just not quite sure what yet.

He told me that to Chinese people who don't speak English, all European langauges sound alike.

marinaded fish with ginger (hot) [unusual, normally meat]
mixture of lotus root, carrot, something made from pigs intestine (I think), nuts (cold) [served most evenings]
courgette, unnamed veg, egg, onion in gravy-like suce (hot)
brocolli relative, highly spiced (cold)
large white folded dough dumplings (cold)
tofu slices in mild gravy (hot)
1"x6" cylinders of thing which looks like sugar cane, tastes like a slightly sweet potato
thin rice porridge

All food is eaten at the same time. Chopsticks are used to take food directly from serving dishes to the mouth. Bones are discarded directly on to the table.

More on cycling

2007-04-02T07:13:00.000Z

It's difficult to convey adequately the scale of cycling here. There are probably more bikes than cars on the road, and there are a *lot* of cars.
About 15% of the bike are electric assisted, very few perol/moped/motorbikes.
At busy time s(ie most of the time) a bike is about as fast as a car (same as back home, really).
Theoretically in the centre, you need to aprk your bike in an authorise, supervised bike park and pay 2p for the privilege. In practice people park anywhere.
There are a lot of 3-wheelers with 3ftx4ft carry spaces behind them. They can carry beds, scaffolding, 3 or 4 people, 15ft lengths of steel piping, 6x4 sheet of glass, caged birds...
On ordinary bikes, I've seen 40 boxes of shoes, two bulging sacks of cabbages, all kinds of stuff.
BJers' are very accurate slow, close-formation cyclists and they need to be packed like a pelton of sardines with inefficient brakes (if any).
Overall BJ is OK to cycle in, even for a beginner, as long as you stick with the pack.

There is a Confucian element to the way the locals obey the lights and trafficpolicers, but it's overlaid with a more Taoist "go with the flow" where necessary.
(No Bhuddist overtones unless that's the nature of the innumerable ring roads.)

Frankie says...

2007-04-02T07:07:00.000Z

I've realised that I've now done all the things I *really* wanted to do in China -

stayed with local family
cycled around BJ
seen Tia'anmen Sq
seen Forbidden City
played table-tennis with locals
walked the Great Wall
eaten Peking Duck

*Now* I can relax.

And today I did - I got no deeds to do, no promises to keep...

Aren't holidays great?

Street food

2007-04-01T07:08:00.000Z

Street food is common, especially at night. Anything and everything kebabbed to order.
Today for lunch I had somethign which may or may not be called bian-jia (or similar).
Imagine a galette or crepe about 20" across, very thin.
Add an egg and smear it across the whole surface; cook for 20 seconds. Add chopped spring onion, 3 diff sauces, including chilli, then put 2 crispy sheets of pastry(?) inside it and fold it all up.
Delcicious.

Polo

2007-04-01T07:02:00.000Z

This morning I cycled to Marco Polo Bridge much againbst my hosts advice. They all felt it was madness to cycle that far (about 15km each way, if that).
It was tricky - the map, in Chinese only, didn't appear to match reality much. At one stage I ended up on a motorway for about half-a-mile (scary).
Eventually found the place - a lovely old bridge with hundreds of lions carved, one one each pillar and all different.
Sat on a bronze camel (apparaently they had camels) and had my photo taken.
Avoided the "We hate the Japanse garden" and the "We really hate the Japanese museum" next door and headed back to town.

Olympic unreadiness

2007-04-01T06:56:00.000Z

Beijing will no doubt have the stadia built and the necessary telecomms infrastructure, but it won't be ready for the Olympics. The road network will creak - heavily - under the burden.
But where they are really not ready is culturally.
The *tourist* apparatus here can't cope with foreigners, except at very big tourist sites. Even there only (some) tour guides speak other than mandarin, and hwakers can say "You look, you buy" or equivalent. Timetables, brochures almost exclusively in Chinese.
How much a country should adapt itself to my ignorance and expectations is, in my view, only a little. I'm not sure that view is shared by the peopel who will spend larges ums of money coming here to see the Olympics and the sights.
It feels as there will be a massive gap between expectation and delivery.

What a great wall!

2007-04-01T06:49:00.000Z

Today by bus to the Great Wall. I intended to catch a bus to a specific section, between 6:30 and 8:30 am, as advertised. It didn' materialise.
I took a different "Tourist Bus" to the Wall via Ming Tombs.
After about 4 hours, we had stopped at an abandoned "Amusement" Park for an hour and then at a waxworks. I jumped ship and got a taxi the rest of the way to the Wall.

The Wall is stunning, awesome, moving, immense, precipitous.

Out of season, as now, it was still very crowded, but I did manage to find some empty sections.
I walked along it, about 8m high and 4m wide; it doesn't follow valleys of ridge liens - it takes the most up and down route it can find. The 5km I walked were like going up and down to and from Whitby Abbey continously.

A experience full of wonder.

Going slow

2007-04-01T06:47:00.000Z

The average speed is about 8mph and I've discovered that it's close to zero effort to go at that speed, pedaaling very occassionaly. So after a week here, I've managed to slow down a little.

Wet play day

2007-04-01T06:42:00.000Z

Today was colder - I had to keep my trousers on. It drizzled a little too, but nothing like Sheffield rain, just enough to dampen the dust down.
Bike/ then subway to centre of city. Subway is great - fast efficient, frequent (and crowded obviously).
More shopping/mooching around - In enjoy mocching in strange places.
The subway to a prk where Japanses cherry trees were in blossom. Very pretty even in the damp weather. Plus a giant Tibetan prayer bell (I think).
Tomorrow I'm ging to stare at a wall for four hours.

House

2007-04-01T06:29:00.000Z

I'd done too much walking and my foot hurt- quite a bit. I needed to find a pharmacist. At the first one after a prolonged and fairly fuitless discussion (not many words in common) I ended up with some herbal remedy which didn't relieve the pain. So the next day I looked for one with medicines I'd heard of.
Eventually found some western painkillers.
So I'm walking around a foreign country with a walking stick and a baseball cap, slightly unshaven, munching Tylenol.

The

2007-03-30T04:21:00.000Z

Chinese doesn't have articles as such - no 'a' or 'the'.
So Chinese people speaking English have great difficulty knowing when to use 'the' especially.
I tried to find a simple rule and I'm struggling.

I will take the bus.
The bus goes from the station.
Buses go from the station.
The buses go from the station.
I like Chinese people.
I like the Chinese people.
Sunshine is good for you.

Summer palace

2007-03-30T04:15:00.000Z

After this morning early rain, I caught a bus to the centre and did some mooching and shopping.
Then anohter bus to the summer palace over an hour away.
I was pleased that I was able to convey clearly to the conductor where I wanted to go and apy.
My mistake became clear about an hour later when the conductor encouraged me to get off because I had clearly enunciated completely ther wrong destination.
She gave up after a while and I ended up at the Summer Palace - a huuge (did I mention that everything is big here?) park with many magnificent buildings. And lots of people, 99% at least Chinese. Nowhere here is empty.
A lovely lakeside spot to eat my lunchtime noodles.
Back via an Internet cafe to blog some of this.

Blogging

2007-03-30T04:11:00.000Z

It's interesting to me that I'm refelecting much more (a good thing) on my experience here because I'm blogging. Not all of my reflection are making it online, both because some of them are quite personal and because of access difficulties.

Personal habits

2007-03-30T04:07:00.000Z

Outside noisy hawking and spitting are common male and female esp older people.
Indoors farting is considered unremarkable.
Eating wet stuff with chopsticks invloves a lot of slurping and it is not consdiered necessary to close one's mouth or refrain from speech when eating.
Shoes are replaced with slippers on entry to the home. (Good job I brought mine)
Heaven knows what sins of etiquette I'm committing all day long.

Family life

2007-03-30T03:58:00.000Z

Yang is my host - he's a tour guide at a music musem.
I don't know the names of the other family members - it's consdered too tricky.
They are

mother-of
father-of
wife-of
baby-of

Father-of manages some maintenance activity at or near Tiananmen.

Mother-of is housewife

Wife-of is a nurse.

Baby-of is 4 months old. He seems to get the full-time attention of at least one adult whenever he is awake and often two. In the morning, father-of leaves at 8am baby arrives soon after with wife-of, or Yang who breakfast then go to work, leaving baby-of with mother-of.

In the evening, all the family eat together (to the accompianment of Chinese news in Chinese or English documentaries about China) except the rota'd babyminder who alternately raises the baby-of to hyper level 7 and then tries to soothe it to sleep with random whistling.

Then mother-of and wife-of take baby-of across to Yang's apartment for sleep. After about half-an-hour Yang and mother-of switch apartments. During that half-hour basketball may be watched on TV.

I miss...

2007-03-29T08:44:00.000Z

Taitai, bath, solitude - there's no peace or personal space here for anyone

I don't miss - TV, coffee (I've had about three cups in 10 days), alcohol (which is a surprise!)

Pics

2007-03-29T08:43:00.000Z

I've managed to upload a few, I think.
It's a painful process.

Decor

2007-03-29T08:39:00.000Z

Home is a battered apartment block from the outside.
Inside clean and white walls. Wood flooring (tiles in wet areas).
Dark highly polished matching wardrobes, sidebaord etc.
Three-piece bamboo/rattan suite. Chinese decorated cushions.
Fold-away dining table.

Talking to foreigners

2007-03-29T08:33:00.000Z

When I go to places like France or Spain I can pass for a native as long as I keep my mouth shut, so locals often come up and speak to me.
Here they take one lookk and assume the cruel truth that I would barely understand a word - so they don't bother.
I *have* had some limited success asking for stuff in shops, though.

Water

2007-03-29T08:30:00.000Z

Today it rained early in teh morning, which was a blessing to calm down the dust. Water is in short supply; toilets only flushed when necessary. Tap water isn't drinkable; there's akind of water-cooler in the living room which is really a boiler. This ised to fill up a big flask so that cha is always available, but I drink more cah than anyone.
Electricity is also conserved (cost?) - lights only on when it's *dark*.

Forbidden City

2007-03-29T08:24:00.000Z

BJ and everything in it is big. Tiananmen Sq and Forbidden City no exception.
Forbidden City is impressive in scale and decor - comparable to Bangkok's temples - perhaps not quite so special or perhaps I'm getting blase. (And some of the majopr buildings were closed for renovation for Plympic crowds next year.)
Went by taxi today and found I was more relaxed walkign around - when I cycle I always seem to be in a hurry to arrive.
Set my knees free again. I've only just ralised that *everyone* wears trousers - I should have known that. Maybe in the summer...

Table tennis

2007-03-28T03:20:00.000Z

Everywhere there are exercise machines, basketball courts, tabletennis tables. And people use them all the time.

I found some old men (the young ones are at work) playing pingpangqui in a park and joined in. We all had a good time.
Ended up not too disgraced and with a bit of a suntan.

Food

2007-03-28T03:17:00.000Z

I ate at a cake shop - strange I know.
Food at home is very fresh and different. Half a dozen dishes, mainly veg wiht one or two meat, plus rice or bread or noolde and usually a thickbrown rice broth which is quite tasteless, but very filling.
Breakfast is something breadlike - brioche, dry toast, flolded thick noodles, doughnuts (I'm using all these words loosely) again with brown rice broth.

Science and sport

2007-03-28T03:13:00.000Z

500 days to go to BJ Olympics - ribbon cutting etc.
I went out to the Museum of Science and technology. The bottom floors are like Eureka - aimed at kids but quite interesting. Half of it sponsored eg by Intel, so no mention of Motorola or AMD in "History of the chip". Full of one enormous school party.
Top floor very different. History of Sci in China. Astrolabes, gunpowder, clocks, maths. Nice.
Afterwards I went to their ciname - and enormous Imax setup which was spherical - you lie back in yr seat to watch it all aroundm you. Very immersing, especially the helicopter travel - it felt like you were really there as you could look all around.

The Internet

2007-03-28T03:07:00.000Z

The "use of high-speed internet" promised turned out to be something of an exageration.
The PC was nearly 10 years old, struggling to run WindowsMe, full of virsues and connetced to a dial-up through a firewall which won't even let me read my own blog.
It's laos inconveneitnetly located physically.
So I need to find other methods. Im writing this form an internet cafe via Terminal Server.
I can't upload pics - sorry.

On my own

2007-03-28T02:58:00.000Z

On Monday, Yang is at work and I get to go out on my own.
Back on the old clunker - I take out a spanner (having thought ahead this far) and raise the saddle about six inches. Joy! I can almost straighten my legs.
I'm wearing shorts, which attracts more attention than my foreignness.
I satrt off at a local park. At 10am on a Monday it's packed - nowhere in BJ is empty. People are variously playing volleyball, badminton, keepy-uppy or singing or partaking of organised tango lessons.

I cycle for about 1.5 hours up to the Nth of BJ and see the Olympic Nest. (BJ is biiig)

Back into town to find food. I stop at a random dumpling house, seats 50, 8 staff, no customers - it's about 2pm. They speak no English; about 5 of my 150 words are useful. I end up getting food (beef dumplings and a kind of rice broth, 30p) and am the caberet for the staff as I eat it. Everybody's happy.

Accidentally I end up in Tiananmen Sq on my way back. Whoa - that's one big sq.

Again I'm the only Caucasian - you only see westerners v close to the main tourist sights; and even then Chinese tourists vastly outnumber Ws.

Weather

2007-03-28T02:56:00.001Z

It's hot! probably about 18C
And dusty.
And sometimes windy.

Some sights

2007-03-28T02:53:00.000Z

Yang and I went to see the Temple of Heaven - big, many buildings, impressive and heard a recital of traditional music.
A Bhuddist temple - enormous standing Bhudda about 18m tall. I've seen bigger, but only lying down.
Hutongs - the old alleyways and courtyard style houses.
Drum tower - big solid tower with large drum to tell BJers the time. Measured by a large water clock. Drum beating demo.
And parks - BJ has lovely parks.

Cycle news

2007-03-28T02:47:00.000Z

Yang, who works as a tour guide in a musical museum. Has quite good English fortunately.
Unfortunately he's shy about using it, so we don't talk much.
He took me out on a bike ride of the city. I'm using and old clunker that weighs more than me and has roller brakes which, like the brakes on most bikes, barely work at all.
BJ has enormous number of cycles and most of them are in use most of the time. Very wide cylce lanes and cyclists cross junctions in packs - even the most rabid motorist (and the motorists don't appear to be rabid here) thinks twice before taking on the pack.

BJ is v flat, seesm almost to be downhill everywhere, except when the wind is against you.

Wander

2007-03-28T02:41:00.000Z

After a nap I took a wander around the local streets. I say a wander, but I was out for 3 hours. I didn't see another Caucasian in that time. I attracted some interest, but only a few people nudged their neighbours and pointed.
Saw some lovely streetlights.
Went down the backstreet, disused railway tracks etc. Ended up in a veg market which happened to be near home fortunately. BJ is quite N/S, E/W kind of city and the sun is relaibly S at midday, so I didn't find it too tricky.

Home

2007-03-28T02:35:00.000Z

Home is a small apartment in the Sth of BJ. Up a few flights of stairs, looks dilapidated outside, very clean and fine inside.
Consists of one lounge/dining room, one double bedroom, on single bedroom, a 5ftx5ft wetroom/toilet and a 5ftx9ft kitchen. Home to mother and father of host; he lives in same apartment block with wife and 4 month old baby. Only host (=Yang) speaks English, so my vast knowledge of Chinese is very handy.
I thought they had a parrot - there's a large rectangular box covered with red velvet - but it revealed itslef to be a television. Everything is kept with a cover - eevn the telephone ahs a cloth over it, the remote control is covered in plastic...

Travel

2007-03-28T02:29:00.000Z

The flight over was uneventful. Boring stopover in Paris cooped up in the international transfer Gucci shopping mall. Sat next to very uncommunicative French teenager who regretted choosing a window seat and isolating himself from the other 20 French teenagers I'm sure. Got a couple of hours sleep.
Then we're over China - the Great Wall through the portholes.
The plane also had a nosecam - the first plane I've been on with one - which was interesting in the air, v scary on landing.
My homestay host met me at the airport and took me home for a nap.

I may be some time...

2007-03-26T12:10:00.000Z

I've just spent an hour donwloading and installing remote desktop client on a handcranked machine connected via a wet peice of string through a fierce firewall so I can make this post. It may be my last for a while. Pictures are out fo the question. Apologies to all my fans - I may have to write this blog when I get back home...

Deadline approaches

2007-03-22T12:56:00.000Z

I can't remember the last time I was ill.

Now, with impeccable timing, I've had a throat infection for the last few days - the very few days in which I was planning to really learn Mandarin. Now I'll have to do it on the plane - good job it's a long flight.

Now I think about about a similar thing happened when I intended to learn Spanish on the Santander ferry; despite mirror-flat seas (I'm not a good sailor) I was ill from an infection all the way across. Thankfully the Spanish medics spoke English...

Running out of time

2007-03-12T10:40:00.000Z

I'm heading off to Beijing at the end of next week and my vocabulary is a modest 150 words or so, not all of it available to me in all the forms I might need.

I can translate all of it between English and Pinyin (not necessarily with the right tones) in both directions. I can read maybe 60% in characters and write about 40%.

When I'm listening I find it difficult to distinguish some of the starting consonant sounds, so I need a lot of context or familiar content to understand spoken Mandarin.

I can speak all the words I know with only occasional mispronunciations, but I'm sure that my accent is dire and my tone is often wrong.

Now I need to concentrate on standard phrases I'm going to need -

Please speak more slowly.
I don't understand.
Two beers, please.
Where's the toilet?

Coincidence

2007-03-02T18:34:00.000Z

I discovered this week that a colleague of mine will be visiting her family in Beijing with her husband while I'm there. Maybe we'll meet up. Small world!

Happy new year!

2007-02-20T10:40:00.000Z

The year of the pig is here, celebrated where I work with various events, including Chinese food (or, as they call it in China, food), beautiful calligraphy and a Lion Dance. The dance seemed overlong in a confined space but was good fun and culminated with a diving catch from the man in the business suit designated to catch the orange which the lion spit out.
My class, thankfully, were not made to sing.
Lesson this week on weather among other things.
I sent an email in Chinese to my host in Beijing, who replied with compliments about my writing - but that's down to Word's Chinese capabilities and a good dictionary as much any skill I may have.

Scraped through

2007-02-12T16:08:00.000Z

Got the results of our exams today. I'm far too modest (as those who know me will attest) to show the actual marks, but I passed all the three exams.
Since the year of the pig starts next weekend, we've been learning a Happy New Year song in class today.

Photos to go with this Blog

2007-02-08T13:01:00.000Z

Probably just my ignorance, but wouldn't it be better if this was better joined up? Not much to look at there yet, obviously.

David goes to China in pictures

Oral exam - again

2007-01-29T15:39:00.000Z

After the disaster of losing the recordings of our oral last time, we've done it again and taken a belt, braces and two pairs of trousers approach to the recordings so I'm very hopeful of not having to do it again, again. Our conversation wasn't as good as last time, but good enough I think.

Followed by an hour's lesson and more vocabulary to learn. Next week Yulan has threatened us with learning the characters - the part I find most difficult.

Characters are tricky

2007-01-26T13:12:00.000Z

Reading an article the other day about whether or not Chinese characters represent ideas or sounds made me think a bit. I've been helped by (dubious?) explanations of the origin of some characters that made it easier for me to remember their meanings. eg ren = person
symbol like a curved upside down V, supposedly like a person walking. Da = big, the same person with their arms stretched wide.

But actually I hadn't come across a single character which I could unambiguously understand as a picture of a concept until yesterday when I saw the characters for "lamb" and "meat" followed by a new character for me which I immediately understood - in context to be fair - two rectangles one above the other with a vertical line bisecting them and continuing above and below.

I find learning the pinyin (but not the tones) for new words relatively easy, but characters very difficult. The explanations help me to remember the shapes and practicing in the correct stroke order (which makes me feel like and certainly empathise with a five year old learning to write English) also helps.

I don't think in words except when I'm being consciously analytical. I do think quite quickly in concepts and images. I don't normally construct (English) phrases before I utter them. Sometimes what comes out of my mouth surprises me - and I don't mean last night's curry. I sometimes find my own witticisms very funny because I've never heard them until I say them.

When I read in French I don't translate into English, I just take in the meaning in French, as it were, until I hit an unfamiliar word, or a difficult piece of phrasing or grammar.
I'm getting that way a little with pinyin (albeit with a tiny vocabulary), but I recognise characters so slowly that I can't help but word for word translate into English when reading characters.

Visa

2007-01-16T12:25:00.000Z

Odered my visa from Chinese Visa Direct Limited. Very happy with the service. Visa arrived about a week after I sent them the form and cheque.

Writing exam

2007-01-16T12:24:00.000Z

We had a writing exam yesterday. After spending an hour or two revising at the weekend I wasn't overly confident, but it was actually considerably easier than I had expected. I think I've probably scored very highly on it, but we'll see...

Good news, bad news

2007-01-10T16:45:00.000Z

Good news: Yulan told us during our revision class that we'd all done well in the listening exam.
Bad news: The technicians have managed to lose all our recorded conversations for the speaking part of the exam and we have to do them again.

Monday's reading and writing revision made me think that I have

almost all of the vocabulary English to pinyin and pinyin to English BUT only about 40% of the tones for the pinyin
and about 70-80% of the vocabulary English to character/character to English

We'll see next Monday...

Exam 1 & 2

2006-12-05T09:21:00.000Z

Exams yesterday.
They seemed easy, but the marking may disabuse me of that notion. First off listening and picking what was said from a list, then 4 minutes of conversation with a partner. I'd written a script (not allowed to have it in the exam room though) and practised a bit with my partner. We did one take; not perfect, but good enough I'm pretty sure.
Now a break until January, when we have one revision lesson then a reading and writing exam - pinyin and characters.

It's getting easier?

2006-11-29T14:20:00.000Z

After my 2 hour lesson this week my head didn't hurt quite as much.
I know I'm very bad at tones, both listening and talking.
On the good side, I feel I'm getting a grasp of some vocabulary, although it may take me a little while to drag each word out of my memory. When I listen to a sentence in Chinese, I need to remember all the sounds and then play them back in my haed slowly to translate them. So anyhting longer than my short term memory (about 7 or eight syllables) is tricky.

Writing Chinese characters

2006-10-31T19:01:00.000Z

I put some serious effort into learning to write a handful of characters at the weekend. Half an hour is my idea of serious effort, which was enough to get 8 characters, more or less. Repetition once through a couple of times later in the day re-inforced and I still had them the next day, pretty much. It was very helpful to learn the stroke order, and to feel the kinesthesia of doing it. Perhaps I can do this writing stuff...

Chinese flashcard site

2006-10-26T08:24:00.000Z

Found a great site to help me learn Chinese characters -
http://flashcards.eur.com/hanzi-f.cfm?Lang=English&LangX=Hangeul&Mode=4
Great because it doesn't involve thinking. I just click the buttons and become magically infused with knowledge...

It's still difficult

2006-10-24T08:09:00.000Z

Another Chinese lesson yesterday. Two hours of trying to cram Mandarin into my head is too long and I'm not the only one; I see others in the class rubbing their foreheads and staring glassy-eyed into space after about 45 minutes.
How on earth do Chinese readers and writers memorise it all?
But we also learned the joys of Word (Sssssss!) in Chinese - and that is very very good.

Just starting out

2006-10-22T17:30:00.000Z

Starting this blog in October, as I'm thinking about my trip to Beijing in March and a select group of people may wish to follow my progress while I'm over there. Initially, this blog will be more about learning the language.

Hello
Thanks
What's your name?
I'm called David
I have two
daughters

I've made a start on learning Mandarin. It's really quite tricky; I'm starting (just) to get the hang of speaking and listening a few basic phrases, and reading pinyin, but reading and writing Chinese characters seems like alien stamp collecting in the dark...

I need to find a suitable set of Chinese characters to represent my name.

David goes to China

Final exam results

Final test

Penultimate exam session

When is China?

More miscellany

Blog readers' whereabouts

Blogging

The journey home

The last post...

Toilets

Miscellany

Last day :-(

Up to the highest heights...

Breakdown

Lazy day

Tea

I would like to say...

Comfort zone

Language

Menu

More on cycling

Frankie says...

Street food

Polo

Olympic unreadiness

What a great wall!

Going slow

Wet play day

House

The

Summer palace

Blogging

Personal habits

Family life

I miss...

Pics

Decor

Talking to foreigners

Water

Forbidden City

Table tennis

Food

Science and sport

The Internet

On my own

Weather

Some sights

Cycle news

Wander

Home

Travel

I may be some time...

Deadline approaches

Running out of time

Coincidence

Happy new year!

Scraped through

Photos to go with this Blog

Oral exam - again

Characters are tricky

Visa

Writing exam

Good news, bad news

Exam 1 & 2

It's getting easier?

Writing Chinese characters

Chinese flashcard site

It's still difficult

Just starting out