| 18 June 2004 | 2004 6 18
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| 18 June 2004 | 2004618
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Dear Friends,
I recently started a chinese blog in order to improve my writing and keep in touch with my chinese friends. I've called it lai hua gan ma which basically means "What have you come to China for?" I don't know if it's a good name, but it's certainly a good question. I've tried to reply to it a few times before, but I'm still not really sure of the answer myself.
My main goal at the moment is to learn the language and culture of China. When I say that, I don't mean just enough language so that people understand what I say, or just enough culture so that I know how to behave at a banquet. I want to speak, read, and write well (I dare not say "fluently"). And I want to learn at least a respectable portion of the shared cultural knowledge that the average chinese person has gained from a lifetime of media, family life, and idle talk.
It is, in a way, the ultimate postmodernist makeover: adopting a completely new culture, and with it a different view of the world. I have no intention of abandoning my home culture, but to properly understand how chinese experience the world I have to aim for an "insider's view", judging chinese culture by its own standards rather than using my enculturated beliefs and values as a yardstick.
At a recent English Corner, one person asked me what I dislike about China, but I couldn't think of anything. That's not because China is perfect, it's just because I don't swan around the country actively looking for faults. In the case of cultural conflict, I assume that I'm the one who ought to change my habits, not chinese society. National policy is a separate issue. There are some aspects of chinese government policy that I don't agree with, but the same is true of Australian national policy (perhaps even more true, because I know more about it).
The name of my website, "The Kangaroo and the Dragon", refers to the cultural gap that I experience as a foreigner in China. As you read the articles there, I invite you to judge my progress in crossing that gap. I asked one of my friends a question about ettiquette the other day, it was: if I want to pour a glass of water for a guest in my home, but he insists that he doesn't want one, what should I do? The proper answer is that he is just being polite, and in most cases I should pour it for him anyway (he doesn't have to drink it). But my friend stressed that I don't need to worry too much about this—as a foreigner, people will be tolerant of any breach in manners. Of course that's reassuring to know while I'm at this point on the learning curve, but if I accept it as a final solution then I will have no chance of ever closing the cultural gap.
Not every foreigner in China thinks in this way. Some revel in the expat community, while I studiously avoid it. Some base their identity strongly on their status as laowai, whereas I sometimes wish I could don a mask and pass unnoticed through streets and markets. I have a friend who studied chinese for several years and speaks it very well, and he says that because of this some people treat him as if he's chinese. He doesn't like that. I don't think it's quite fair to say that he wants to be treated better than others, it's just that he thinks people should make an effort to treat him more like the way he would expect to be treated in his own country. I, on the other hand, will try every other trick I can think of to solve a problem before I play the "race card".
What is my website supposed to be, anyway? In my eyes, it's the continuing story of my adaption to chinese society. It's also a source of information on life and culture in China. In recent articles, I have begun including snipits of cultural trivia in boxes, but I see this as belonging to the former category (my adaption). For these boxes I try to choose the kind of specific cultural or linguistic details that would be difficult to find in a guidebook, and yet which every chinese person knows. These seemingly minor facts form the bulk of cultural knowledge, and they are exactly what I want to absorb.
The style of the website was influenced by sites such as Thor's China Journal and Chuck in China, which I eagerly devoured before leaving Australia. These are not blogs, and nor are they being updated any longer, but they remain on my links page because their content is still relevant today. Likewise, I hope that what I write now will still seem fresh and interesting to the person who stumbles upon my page next year while planning a trip to China. I did once receive an email from someone who said they had been reading through my stories for the past couple of hours. I was proud that things had come full circle in this way. At the same time, the website is also a part of the process of learning. I must admit that I've had to make corrections from time to time, especially those darn boxes.
Now, please nobody ask me just why I want to learn chinese language and culture. For that I can give no better answer than "because it's there".
Love Todd
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| I really enjoyed reading this. It is very smart, very open, and very civilised. |
| David [] [homepage] 19.06.2004 , 20:14 |
| organised and very to the point - very Todd! |
| onlooker 20.06.2004 , 13:12 |
| I am scanning your website now.Very nice website.I see your picture when you are a child.When I read the journal Crazy Chiese,I laugh out loudly.Now I am preparing for the tomorrow's Chinese exam. |
| zhang wei [] 21.06.2004 , 10:30 |
| Hi Todd, I'm not sure if it's chance, dumb luck, or perhaps something else that helped me stumble across your web site. I am currently enjoying the roller coaster ride of reviewing, deciphering and trying to make sense of my first job offers and the wonders of teaching ESL. I am considering an offer in Dalian and found your site while doing a google search. I've been reading now for about 2hrs. If you have time I would love to email you a few questions and learn some more about your experiences. I am aiming at arriving mid Aug / Sep so right now my spare time is filled with research! Finding your story, and reading about you life and experience in China has absolutely fuelled my desire to make this happen. Anyway would love to hear from you if you have time for an email. Fiona - Melbourne Australia (for a few mths more) |
| Fiona [] 21.06.2004 , 21:06 |
| Great comments about ettiquette and proud laowai, love the site, some interesting stuff! Dan - Dalian (NEUSOFT) |
| Dan [] [homepage] 16.09.2004 , 20:01 |
| very good. very smart. |
| linda [] 12.11.2004 , 16:00 |
| very interesting,hehe. |
| Scott [] 18.07.2005 , 19:39 |
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