The Infantile Expert

This essay was written last semester for Asian Studies Senior Seminar.  I believe it holds true for China as well, so I decided to publish it here.

Playground Nearby Kansai Gaidai Dorms in Hirakatashi Japan

The Infantile Expert: Settling in Back Home After Study Abroad in Japan

In my previous abstract I talked about historical roots of culture and the effects of them imposed over a short period of time.  In this abstract I would like to speak more briefly about the similar effect that occurs to individuals who study and absorb culture over a short time in their lives.  In short, I will examine the paradox of the East Asian Studies student.

As the student travels from his or her home country to their country of focus, then back to their home country, after the initial culture shock he or she begins to settle into a role.  While abroad, the road is that of observer and inquisitor.  With child-like ignorance, the student blunders and attempts to absorb.  The process is ongoing.  Some say one must stay longer than one semester in order to move a degree beyond it.  Others say one must stay longer than a year in order to move beyond.  In truth, the student is trying to compensate for all the years they lived outside the culture in order to understand and navigate a world, even though realistically the student will always be a foreigner.

When the student returns the role is reversed.  Suddenly the student is an authority among his or her family and peers.  Having seen, breathed, and eaten things contemporaries don't know how to pronounce, the student becomes an expert.  Essays that might have been an a middle schooler's text book magically transform into advanced language study.  The student becomes a story teller, trying to spread the knowledge that they absorbed.

Certainly such experiences are important for well rounding students.  But what do they mean for the specialist?  What is it to specialize in a culture one did not grow up in?  This author can only speculate since this author is still on the first few baby steps of this journey.  It is the journey of trying to become a bridge.  How does one really 'settle' into being a bridge?  How can one settle into being half-way between worlds?  It is unsettling to realize that one may be a sage in one language and an infant in the other.  Possibly more unsettling is the knowledge that one may never really move beyond that role.  Yet there is something exotic and addictive to it as well.  There is something strange in the desire to not settle in back home, and instead return to childhood and adventure.

How the System Works

I believe previously I described the classes I am teaching as reading and conversation, but I don't think I've explained before the schools I am teaching at.  At Henan University, there are three different schools at which you can get a degree as an English major.  The first, where I teach conversation, is the Foreign Language College.  This school is particularly well known for teaching English and the students there received very high scores on their college entrance exam.  The second, where I teach reading, is Minsheng, which has the exact same curriculum and for the most part the same teachers as the Foreign Language School but the students received lower scores on their entrance exam and pay about two to three times as much as the Foreign Language School students.  The third school is the College of American and European Studies, where Eaaf teaches conversation, which is new and therefore has a less defined curriculum and has students with even lower scores and higher tuition fees.
I myself can only compare the Foreign Language School and the Minsheng students.  For the most part, I find the main difference to be personality.  The Foreign Language School students as a whole are quieter and the Minsheng students are more creative.
Their future on the other hand, at least when I talk to the Minsheng students I am friends with, is overshadowed by which level of school they were in.  I cannot imagine what it would be like to have one's future written by the score of a single test.  It frankly terrifies me.  I sincerely hope they do well in their careers in the future, because they are as a whole wonderful intelligent students.  But what I know is that on several occasions when with a friend from Minsheng, they will hesitate and point out how they did not go to the Foreign Language College, so maybe their dream of becoming a translator or English teacher will be more difficult...

Stories from Nanjing: Karma

I don't mind bugs.  I don't like to touch bugs.  I freak out if I think a bug will bite or sting me.  But if I am reasonably assured that the bug means me no harm, I am usually perfectly content watching it.
On Purple Gold Mountain, there are a number of big name tourist locations.  There is the Sun Yat Sen Memorial, and a UNESCO World Heritage Ming Dynasty tomb.  But after a long half day of walking, and of getting slightly lost going up and down, surrounded by seas and mountains of people (海人山人) I ended up in the area slightly to the East of the main attractions.  It was actually someplace that I had read was really worthwhile to visit but had given up on finding.  There were considerably fewer people.  And though I had wanted to see the Sun Yat Sen Memorial because of the historical significance of Sun Yat Sen, it was only when I got away from it that I started to enjoy myself.
I would have a conversation with a woman who picked up the trash around the food stands, which involved lots of writing and nodding.  People start conversations with you almost any time you are out in parks or other public areas and don't seem preoccupied with something.  It is something I like a lot more than in Japan, where people waited for some sort of formal connection to be made.
But before that, I visited a Buddhist temple there, in that Eastern part of Purple Gold Mountain.  Walking through gates to go further inside, I saw a bug on the ground flat on its back.  It was a beetle that had landed somehow and could not open its wings and fly.  I lowered my bag to it's legs and let it grab hold of it.  I walked farther inside the temple courtyard and assumed the beetle would just fly off.  It did not fly off, and when I checked fifteen minutes latter it remained firmly attached to my bag.  I adjusted my bag so that the beetle could walk onto the stone hand rail.  It crawled and climbed atop a stone lotus.  It stood there while I watched it, and until I walked away.