Journal: Chinese Speech Contest

For once I wasn't a judge, but instead a contestant in a speech competition. The Dalian Foreign Languages College held a Chinese speech contest for foreigners. Three of the foreign students from my college also attended. Although most of the foreign students are Korean and Japanese, in fact only one Korean student gave it a shot. As well as her and I, there was an American and another Australian to represent our school.

Mind you, we weren't lonely because we were accompanied by no less than three administrative staff, a driver for the van, and somebody's son. This is fairly typical for China, where the appropriate question is not "what's the fewest number of people we need", but rather "what's the greatest number who can be paid overtime". Not that they're rorting the system exactly, it just fits with a general pattern of employment where wages are lower but staff are more numerous compared to western countries. This is most obvious in restaurants and shops, where there almost seems to be more staff that customers. Government jobs are also renouned for being very secure, but very boring because there's so little to do. On the train once, I rode half a day with a government employee who was travelling to another city simply to develop a parcel. An hour after arriving, he would catch another train back home.

For the contest, we were told to just say something about Dalian. You can guess how ground-breaking most of the speeches were. Before I even got there, the two titles I heard about were "I Love Dalian" and "Dalian, My Second Home". Some people managed to make their speeches humourous as well as sentimental, which I'm sure the audience appreciated since there were 60 three minute speeches to sit through.

Realising that I didn't stand much chance of winning, I decided just to be honest rather than trying to impress the judges. I'm grateful to Tie Cheng and Wang Xin for correcting my draft, and to Li Qingtao who came to support me today. Translated into english, the speech went something like this:

Hello everybody. I've lived in the Dalian Development Zone for just over half a year, so I'm still not very familiar with the city. But today I'd like to talk about my general impression of the place. I haven't been to many cities, but I've already formed the opinion that no two are identical. The appearance, atmosphere, customs, or in other words the character of every city is different. So what about the Development Zone? The way I see it, the Development Zone is very young.

I'm from Australia. Our country is also very young, and for that reason, over the past 200 years Australia has welcomed many immigrants who have worked together to develop the country. The Development Zone is similar—it also has many foreigners, from Korea, Japan, Europe, and so on. But the majority of people come from all corners of China. I know a girl who works in a supermarket. She's from Hebei province. One of the attendants in a restaurant comes from Inner Mongolia. The person who cuts my hair comes from Heilongjiang province! These three have only been here for a few years. They miss their family sometimes, but their life here is happy and satisfying.

Every newcomer influences the character of the Development Zone. It's still so early, and impossible to guess what the place will be like in the end. But if you go out to eat, you can already enjoy the tastes from every part of China, like a hundred flowers blooming together and competing for favour. My favourite restaurant is called the "Really Real Xinjiang Barbecue City". This name is very interesting, and very suitable, because it is indeed authentic. But not everything in our city is "really real". For example, there are many stone carvings on the seaside, but in fact they are not made from stone! Look at me—I'm not very old. But the Development Zone is even younger, only 19 years of age. Like a 19-year-old teenager it wants to grow up faster and faster. Our city has a cultural and commercial district called "Five Colour City", which is decorated with huge statues, strange objects, and colourful murals. But these images do not belong to a particular culture, instead they have been drawn willy-nilly from many world cultures. It's attractive, but lacks any deep meaning. Can these things compare to the Cloud Ridge Caves of Shanxi province, or the Teracotta Army of Xi'an?

But architecture only represents a small part of a city's character. I invite you to visit the public square in the middle of Five Colour City on any evening, and witness old and young alike chatting, telling jokes, kicking jianzi, and all having a good time. The most important part of a city's character is of course people. Although our city is young, the people are very warm-hearted. I'm think the Development Zone will grow into a very unique place.

That's what I spoke today, apart from some accidental omissions. I was the very last speaker, because I was in a separate "society" category, as opposed to the student category. In fact, since there were only a handful of people enrolled in the society category, the organisers decided to hold that contest in the morning, but nobody told me. I was just talking about this phenomenon with a Japanese friend a few days ago—in China, all plans are subject to last minute changes. And yet, said my friend, somehow everything always works out in the end. I don't know if the judges even evaluated me, but perhaps the morning's results haven't been compiled yet (which is possible, since the afternoon's results weren't announced today), in which case there's a chance I might be included. It's hard to judge myself, and even harder to guess what the entrants in the society category were like, but compared to the students I was perhaps somewhere in the second quartile.

I said my speech was honest, in fact I'm almost convinced by it myself, but the truth is that I'm not quite as optimistic as the tone suggests. The Development Zone is a young city of economic migrants and characterless concrete buildings. I think it is likely to become at best a well-established city of economic migrants and characterless concrete buildings, and at worst a ghost town if the foreign investment bubble bursts. Message to would-be refugees from capitalism: if you are hoping to escape rampant consumerism, then stay away from this epicentre of China's burgeoning middle-class. In a comment on this article, Patrick says:

I feel like I'm seeing the genesis of more wasteful, mindless, crass consumerism than even us North Americans can manage! (and that is saying A LOT)

But not everyone has been seduced. On Thursday I had dinner (my first taste of dog!) with a Korean-Chinese guy who said to me, "A fellow doesn't need too much money". He worked in the field of building design for several years, but now he's gone into business for himself, managing one of the counters in the college dining hall. No doubt he's quite well off, but hardly likely to retire early doing that kind of work. However, all he says is that he likes talking to the students, and he doesn't have to worry about paying off a morgage on a restaurant.

Hey thats a decent speach. How long have you been learning chinese for now? What did dog taste like? I havn't eaten it yet, but have had many other exotic things since comming to china.

matt [] [homepage] 04.12.2003 , 01:04

I've been learning chinese for a long time! Before I came to China, I had already studied for 3 years, but that wasn't a full-time course, just one lesson each week. In my opinion, the lean dog meat I had tasted like lamb. It was nothing very special. I hear that cat meat is a little bit sour. Can anyone corroborate that?

Todd 04.12.2003 , 16:11

This has nothing to do with the related post, but shouldn't Oral English Activities be Verbal English Activities?

Jessica [] [homepage] 06.12.2003 , 06:46

It seems like the term "oral english" is more commonly used than "verbal english", at least in China. But thanks for the suggestion...I have now added "verbal english" to a list of keywords on the bottom of the page.

Todd 06.12.2003 , 14:52

Just so you know, if you *do* eat cat I expect you to do Alf impersonations and chase Charlotte around when you get home.

jen 06.12.2003 , 17:49

You only have to look at Charlotte to know that she would taste sour. Ha! I kill me!

Todd 06.12.2003 , 18:25

Don't make me laugh when Emma's asleep. No fair. Have you been getting my emails? Not that they have been all that bountiful (or interesting), but I since that other one I sent never turned up I've been a little paranoid about the process.

jen 07.12.2003 , 01:38

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