Journal: Language Exchange, The Great Game?

A slight cold coupled with another late night of lesson prep last Sunday wasn't an auspicious start to the week. Yet on Tuesday evening, with all the most critical tasks out of the way, I felt for the first time that I could affort to schedule some "extra-curricular" activities. Yes, the time had come for my debut in society.

As previously mentioned, there have been plenty of random men eager to make my acquaintance. But on one hand I find it hard to relate to the average married 30-something Chinese guy, and on the other hand I don't really understand what their expectations are. For the culturally naive, a more straightforward way of making friends and practising Chinese is the language exchange scene. There are many ways to meet potential partners:

The matchmaker. I had only been at the college a few days when one of the teachers heard about a student from another department who was interested in improving her English, and they arranged for me to meet her (despite my protests that I was still settling in!). At the time we just swapped contact details, but I said I'd call her once I was less busy. Her name is Tie Cheng.

The approach. I'm generally too shy to try this method myself. In a bookshop a few weeks ago, the girl behind me in the queue suddenly struck up a conversation with me. While we were talking, I examined some novelty books on the counter, tiny books only about an inch wide. That was a mistake, since no sooner had we made our purchases than this girl presented one of these books to me as a small gift. I refused it! But that's the custom, and after refusing once or twice more I accepted it. Even so, I wouldn't give her my phone number (pretending I couldn't remember it), but I wrote down hers and promised to call when I was less busy. By the way, the book is a collection of ancient jueju (four line poems), with English translations no less, so I must admit I'm quite taken with it. Her name is Nancy, and I did telephone her in the end.

The even more confident approach! Only last Saturday, I was eating in the student cafeteria and a girl sitting several tables away stood up, walked over, sat down in front of me, and a few sentences later came straight out with "I want to be your friend". Her name is Amanda.

The chance encounter. I sat next to a guy about my age on the bus back from Dalian proper, and we got talking. He suggested that we swap email addresses, which is far easier to agree to than swapping telephone numbers. His name is William.

The stalker. Actually, this is more like "the approach" really: a guy came up to me in the library and introduced himself as Jackie. But he already knew my name, and even knew the title of one of the textbooks that I teach from! Far from being coy, I invited him to meet me for lunch. I hope word doesn't go round that I'm easy!

In most cases, the next stage of the game is the first phone call. For this, the ball was usually in my court. And the question is, where to meet? Going out for a meal is a common Chinese pastime, and you can barely walk a block in this city without passing at least one restaurant of some form or other. On the other hand, cafes are much thinner on the ground, although there is a small and often empty coffee shop at the college library. Teahouses seem just as rare, and the only one I remember seeing was decorated in an old-world style that was completely at odds with the adjacent businesses. Perhaps I am not looking in the right places? As for bars, there are plenty around, but in China students don't usually frequent them.

In summary, choices are limited: I had a nice lunch with Tie Cheng for our first engagement last week, I met Amanda at the library coffee shop on Wednesday this week, then Tie Cheng in the same place on Thursday morning, and I had a cheap lunch with Jackie at the student cafeteria, also on Thursday.

It was very pleasant to just chat socially, and of course it was great to practise my Chinese at the same time. I think I can learn a lot about Dalian and Chinese culture from my new "informants". I may start making a list of questions to ask! I loved hearing about some Chinese legends from Tie Cheng and Amanda, such as the story of the "Butterfly Lovers", Liangshan Bo and Zhu Yingtai.

I had a very animated conversation with Jackie, who turned out to be the most enthusiastic of my new friends: he called on Thursday evening, and then again on Friday to tell me his new mobile phone number.