Sleeping on a Train

My previous experience with trains (and btw, what all trains should look like)

By Juliana (okay, with a little help)

This weekend we went to someplace new for mama's friend's wedding.  The wedding was okay.  There were a few nice things about it like
1) They gave us candy
2) I got to play around with some other kids
3) We got to eat lots of good food.

Mama will probably tell you more about all that but I want to tell you about the Really Important Part: I SLEPT ON A TRAIN!!  I don't know if you know this about me, but kind of like every other toddler on the planet, I love trains.  Real, imagined, Thomas - they are all interesting.  Mama and Daddy were talking about riding on a train and it finally happened.

One night I took a bath, got in my jammies, and then instead of going to bed I put on my outside clothes and boot-shoes and got on a train!!!  Wouldn't it be great if every night were like that?  "It's bedtime...just kidding!  It's train time!!"  Anyway, first we got to ride in a taxi, which is pretty fun in itself. 

I was a little confused when we got to the train station because I couldn't see any trains.  Where were all the trains?  Inside was very big with lots of people, and I walked around and looked and looked for the trains, but some big rails were blocking us from the windows.  Why would they do that?  We walked and waited and I was starting to get pretty sleepy just sitting there (don't judge; I was bored and it was past bedtime), when finally they let us go through the big rails.  And there were some trains!

I'm really sorry to tell you this.  I'd like you to keep your childish innocence, but I feel an obligation to tell you the truth: these trains didn't look like Thomas at all.  Once I got over that disappointment, it was still pretty interesting because they were so big and long and there were people sitting on the train and sleeping on the train!  We climbed on and went into a little room with some small beds and a big window.  I looked out the window and said, "It's a train!  We're riding a train!" for a while because mama and daddy didn't seem to get it.  At least, they weren't nearly excited enough.  I just want them to experience life fully, you know?

Settled down for the night...I fit just right until Mama tried to squish in too

After a while it was just dark and boring outside so I settled down in the bed.  It was just about right...until mama said SHE was supposed to sleep here too!  What?  That's taking the sharing thing a little bit too far, don't you think.  This bed wasn't much wider than my crib, and she doesn't try to come and take that from me!  She put on my little green blanket (a nice touch) and I gave her 40% of the bunk.  Then we settled down to sleep.
I was pretty excited about sleeping on the train.  There was just one problem: when you are sleeping, you miss out on every other thing that is going on in life!!  I'm not the kind of person that wants to go through life missing out on all the great experiences.   So I laid down and thought about riding on a train.  And talked and sang about it too.  I had to pop up and look out the window to make sure I hadn't missed anything exciting in the past couple of minutes.

Sleeping so close to mama wasn't bad either.  I got to play with her hair and her face and her eyes and breathe in all her air and hug her shoulder and her neck and her face.  She closed her eyes and pretended to sleep but I know she wasn't because everytime I poked her face she said, "Go to SLEEP, Juliana."  She didn't sound like she was having as much fun as me (talk about someone who misses out all all of life's great experiences...).  She did giggle a little when I kissed her face for the tenth time, though.

Other than someone trying to steal all my joy, it was pretty fun.  Unfortunately, it was getting pretty late and I just...couldn't...keep my eyes...open.

No matter, approximately 2.5 hours later I woke up completely refreshed and ready to experience life again.  Mama was even less responsive this go around but I successfully evaded sleep for the remainder of the trip.  Mama actually looked a little relieved when we had to get off the train, even though it was only 4:30am.  And I was so cute that the other people in our little room didn't even complain about how much noise I was making.

Looking out the train window

After all that wedding stuff with lots of people wanting to touch me and take my picture, we got back on the train again!  This time it was still light outside and we didn't have to sleep for a long time.  I looked out the window and played with my toys and ate some hot dog and walked around.  The other people in our little room fell sound asleep while I was still singing and playing.  Mama and daddy could really learn something from them.

This time I slept on daddy's bed since he said he wasn't going to sleep anyway.  It's pretty hard to fall asleep on a train.  I finally fell asleep and what do you know - all of a sudden they were waking me up again saying we had to get off the train.  I was very confused and started crying.  They never wake me up!  We had to put on all our outside clothes and get off the train.  It was still dark and mama said it was the middle of the night.  We got in a taxi and went home.  I was happy and excited to be at home and I said, "It's playtime!!"  Mama said it was 2am and that meant it was bedtime.  I got all settled in my own bed.  It was more comfortable than the train bed and nobody was trying to share it with me.  It's not quite as fun as sleeping on a train, but then when you are on a train, who wants to sleep anyway?

Jesus was a two-year-old

By Kevin

This year at Christmas, I'm amazed by the fact that Jesus was once a two-year old. I see him running into a room and yelling, "I'm hiding," then screaming with delight when someone finds him. I find myself picturing Juliana playing with him like she plays with her little friends, running around in circles till he's dizzy, laughing his face off, then tripping over his feet and falling to the ground, crying for Mary to pick him up and hold him. I picture him spread-eagle, sleeping wedged between Mary and Joseph, while they struggle to find an inch of space to sleep.

I see him climbing into Joseph's lap, asking him to tell the story of the Exodus for the hundredth time (what did they do before picture books?). I picture Joseph laughing with Mary about the peculiar phrases he comes up with. "Daddy, I'm Exiting," he says in Aramaic as he tries to play the part of Moses in the Parting of the Red Sea, using a pile of rocks and a bowl of water as his toys. "He's trying to say he's leading the Exodus," they laugh, wondering if he meant it or it was a grammar mistake, after all he has been adding "ing" and "ly" to an awful lot of words lately. Could the Son of God have made Juliana's grammar mistakes as a two-year-old?

All the while he sings Psalms at the top of his lungs while he plays, then pauses, mid song, when he realizes he desperately needs a snack. And they beam with pride as they look at him and wonder just what he will become, just like we wonder with Juliana. I can see him excitedly mimicking the sounds of every donkey, chicken and cat he sees, then laughing when Mom and Dad remind him where he was born. I wonder if he wandered around seemingly unsupervised like the two-year-old in the shop downstairs did last winter, while her parents worked. Or maybe, when Joseph was working with wood and Mary was doing some chore, his grandparents followed closely behind him, forgetting the shame and doubts they had once had about her untimely pregnancy, wondering if her insistence that it was a miraculous conception may have been true.

I wonder if, perhaps, he was like Juliana was this morning -- giddy with uncontainable excitement -- when the Magi came to bring him strange gifts (after all, we don't really know how old he was at that time -- Could have been a newborn. Could have been two -- after all, Herod killed all the kids 2 and under after learning from the Magi that the King of the Jews had been born ). I picture how some Chinese two-year-olds look at a rare foreign face like they've seen a ghost. Would Jesus have been startled if those Magi from the East were Chinese? Persian? Blonde? Or would he have smiled and welcomed them like other two-year-olds, who haven't yet learned to divide people by race. (as a side note - The possibility that they could have been Chinese, which a teammate mentioned reading about, fascinates me. It's for another time, but in Brent Landau's book (which just went on my reading list) Revelation of the Magi: The Lost Tale of the Wise Men's Journey to Bethlehem a Harvard scholar apparently proposed that a recently-translated 8th century Syriac texts suggests they came from China.)


 But more than anything, I'm just as blown away that God would confine himself to the limits of a two-year-old's little body as I am amazed by the fact that he was once a newborn. Maybe it's because I never thought of him as a two-year old before. My mind has followed the Biblical narrative and hop-skipped through his life from the the baby in the manger, to the young boy him lagging behind in Jerusalem making his parents frantic. Then boom, he's about my brother's age, healing the blind and telling people that "blessed are the poor in spirit for they shall inherit the kingdom of God." Then, at my age, he takes the sin of the world upon himself on the cross and days later comes back to life.

I desperately want to fill in those gaps. Not just out of idle curiosity. But because He matters. For the same reason I want to know the stories of what Ruth was like before I knew her. Because those stories shaped who she is. Trying to imagine him at Juliana's age each step of the way is helping me to see all the holes of my knowledge of Him. I pray that He can fill my imagination to give me a fuller picture of who He really is through the eyes of our two-year-old.

Foreign Experts Once Again

It's only been 1.5 years since we were "foreign teachers" (although 2.5 years since I was actually in the classroom), but sometimes I forget how different our life is as foreign students.  Not just our daily activity, but also our status in China.  We certainly still get lots of attention as foreigners, but we live on a campus with close to 100 foreign students, half of whom look noticeably foreign.  People almost get used to us.  As foreign students, we have no prestige.  But as teachers, we actually carry a "Foreign Expert Card," which we sometimes literally use to "pull the foreigner card."

Yesterday we helped with a Christmas program for another university in Yinchuan, and we got a reminder of what it was like to be Foreign Experts again.  We don't know any foreign teachers at that university - there may not be any - but we had a few connections so our team decided to go help out.  This campus was only about a 25 minute bike ride away, but it was pretty far out on the edge of town.  Past long rows of greenhouses and mud sheds.  Past large fields of newly sprouting trees.  Past the fancy new buildings of other college campuses also sprouting up on the edge of town.  No neighborhoods, no shops, no restaurants - just one bus stop down the road and a few fruit sellers by the campus gate.  A group of mini-vans for hire waited on across the road since no taxis come out this way.  Their drivers were gathered around a bonfire, waiting for someone to come along and request their services.

This is not a top-level or even mid-level school.  The students are almost all from small Ningxia towns.  Many of them have probably never seen a foreigner before and most have never talked to one.  The word about the Christmas program spread and the original 70 students mushroomed into a couple hundred.  The teachers scrambled to move us into a new classroom - a large auditorium with stadium seating and giant screens connected to a computer in the front.  This campus was only a year or two old, and it was still looking quite new and fancy.  The teachers ushered us in, eager to show how much they were honored by our presence and wondrously amazed to find we could speak Chinese.  See what I mean?  Prestige.  Nobody treats students this way.

Our friends who were heading up the program talked about some different Christmas traditions and beliefs, interspersed with the whole group coming up to sing several Christmas carols.  When the students spotted our teammate's daughters (Juliana had stayed at home), a couple hundred cell phones whipped out and started snapping pictures.  Each time we came up to sing a Christmas song, the students clapped enthusiastically and took more pictures. 

After the formal presentation was over we moved to different corners of the room for question and answer.  The students shyly gathered around and awkwardly looking at each other hoping someone would talk.  A couple of brave boys came in a little closer and several girls linked arms for moral support. 

One of the brave boys shook my hand and said, "Nice to meet you!  You are very beautiful."  I had to laugh.  I almost forgot how people used to say that all the time.  I'm not being vain, they really did.  Guy and girl students, random grandmas and shopkeepers.  Usually at inappropriate times like when you are trying to have a serious conversation with them or trying to buy milk at the supermarket.  I would be more flattered but mostly they think I am beautiful because I look so foreign and because I have such white skin, which is enviable in China.  And because I have yellow hair and blue eyes.  I don't have either, by the way, but reality does little to sway preconceived notions.

In between awkward pauses the brave boys yell out mildly coherent questions.  They are supposed to be related to Christmas, but we give that up after a few minutes because really any question will be an accomplishment.  The usual questions proceed, in somewhat more garbled English than normal.  They also repeat their questions in Chinese, which is helpful when the English doesn't make a lot of sense.  When in doubt I just make up my own question to answer and they are happy since they don't understand most of what I respond anyway.

When the awkward silences start to build up, I try asking them questions instead.  Where are they from - that's usually easy enough to understand, what year are they -  freshmen, what do they do when they have free time - sleep, shop, one girl said "farm work.

Over in Kevin's group, the students are even more intimidated by the thought of trying to talk to two guys.  Kevin looms about two heads above the group.  The students are all too shy to ask questions, so their teacher starts ask questions for them.  "These students are not very good," she says, "Their English scores on the GaoKao (the huge standardized test to get into university) were around 30 out of 150pts."  Not exactly a motivating speech, but if the students even understood, they are probably used to hearing that type of thing.  The main education philosophy seems to include "learn through shame and scolding."  The students know this is not such a great school, but probably some of them are just happy to be going to any college.

I've missed students.  I miss their awkward shyness as they stand around forgetting every word of English they've ever learned but still desperately hoping you'll talk to them.  I miss how intimidated they are just by the foreign face.  They are so cute and so young at 20 going on 15.  I want to get to know them better, especially these students who have likely never been to a city bigger than Yinchuan.  I even miss their dumb questions like, "Can you use chopsticks?" (after I just told them this is my seventh year in China), their ever-repeated questions, "Do you like China?  Do you like Chinese food?", and of course the one that never will die, "How do I improve my oral English?"  I miss even that.

As the time ends and the students file out, they stop to mob us for photos.  Once the photo ops start it's hard to end them, with a dozen more students crowding around waiting to grab your arm and turn you toward the appropriate camera-phone wielding student.  I forgot what it was like to be all famous.  Tonight my picture will go up on twenty more qq or renren pages (kind of like Facebook), probably with some caption like, "My foreign friend!!  Did I mention we are very close?  Like best friends!  p.s. She knows Obama."`

On Gratitude and Growing Green Stuff

This Thanksgiving Day was not the greatest.  We weren't planning to celebrate until the weekend, since we still had class on Thursday, but it still seemed like the day should be a little special, since it was actual Thanksgiving.  I thought maybe I could at least do a little Thanksgiving craft with Juliana.

I picked up a few things around the house and was emptying the trash in Juliana's room when I saw it.  Nasty growing green stuff.  My eyes traveled along the edge of Juliana's windowsill and everywhere I looked the mold was sprouting up again. 

The window in her room is already not the best part of the house – the ridiculously thin inner windows aren't enough to keep out the cold and the landlord is unwilling to fix the broken outer windows, so we constructed our own window replacements with old window screens, thick plastic, tape, some wooden supports, and yes, chopsticks.  The room has been much warmer, but every day the windows cover with condensation...water which drips down into the old windowsill boards.  We re-varnished the boards a few months ago, but they are so cracked and warped that the moisture keeps soaking through,  The radiator is directly underneath the window, so we have our own mold breeding ground.  And it was certainly breeding again.

On Thanksgiving morning as I stood looking at the mold I felt frustrated and defeated.  I was pretty sure that no matter what we did, the mold would just come back.  Suddenly our apartment felt like a giant, toxic mold breeding factory.  The bathroom has no ventilation and is covered with water every time we shower, so it molds.  In the wintertime all the windows cover with condensation (or ice, when it's cold enough), and all the radiators are directly under the windowsills.  Even the kitchen windowsill, which is tile and generally stays pretty cold, manages to produce mold.  Our stupid little stove alcove is almost impossible to keep clean, so in the wintertime it forms frozen mold!

I grabbed my vinegar (the strongest cleaning supply I have around right now) and scoured Juliana's windowsill and then moved on to attack the kitchen.  As I cleaned I thought about what we could do.  Move!!  No, not really.  We have no place to move to, and anyway have already paid rent through July.  But this would mean we'd need to move Juliana out of her room.

Juliana has been coughing for the last two months.  I don't know if the mold is the cause, but I know it's not helping.  When I took her to the doctor the other day he said he though she had an infection and gave her antibiotics.  I hope it is an infection.  I would like it to be that easy to clear up!  But I know doctors like to give antibiotics for just about everything here, so I remain a bit skeptical.  Besides, if you only have to pay 60 cents to see the doctor, doesn't that make you a little leery of their medical advice?

As I spent my Thanksgiving morning cleaning up mold, I did not feel grateful.  I felt frustrated and overwhelmed and angry.  The kind of angry that spreads from one specific area to encompass every wrong recently experienced.

I was angry with this old building that is a mold machine.  I was angry with Chinese builders for not making better buildings that wouldn't turn into mold machines.  I was angry at the landlord for not having higher standards.

I was angry at the doctor for prescribing Juliana medicine that was banned in the US because of possible liver damage.  It's probably the third or fourth time that's happened to us.  I was angry at the whole Chinese medical system.

I was angry with all the people who keep telling us that Juliana is coughing because she's not wearing enough clothes or not drinking enough warm water or that we would dream of giving her cold milk and yogurt.  Doesn't anyone understand germs – and mold?

I was angry at the roaches who have taken us up on the “our home is your home” mentality though I'm quite sure we never extended that invitation.

Of course mold and roaches and poor construction and well-intentioned advice can happen in any country, but somehow this all seemed like CHINA'S FAULT.  This is what we call a “bad China day,” and I hadn't had one of those in a long time.

So here it was Thanksgiving and I was feeling less grateful than I had all year.  I knew I should feel grateful, but that wasn't helping.  Even in the midst of my terrible mood I could recognize that old familiar feeling: entitlement.

It's not enough to have a warm, mostly comfortable home nicer than most people in the world – one large enough that we had another room to move Juliana into – I want a better house.  It's not enough to have medical care when many people have none – I want the standard I am used to.  It's not enough to be surrounded by caring people who are concerned about Juliana – I want their concern to be scientifically accurate!  All these expectations seem entirely reasonable because I am American.  If I just lived in America I could have all these things (more or less), so even though I choose to live outside America I still feel like it is my due.

I can't think of much that is less conducive to gratitude than a sense of entitlement.  It’s pretty ugly, but I find it creeping in much more often than I would like.  For some reason it’s so much easier to recognize the things you don’t have.  This summer we heard several messages related to gratitude and generosity that have been on my mind ever since.  Erwin McManus said, “It is a life of gratitude that makes us whole, overwhelms us with love and moves us to live generous lives."  I really do think that gratitude and generosity are intimately linked.  When we become so busy looking at the small lacks in our own lives, we lose sight of the genuine needs of others.  Entitlement leads to bitterness and stinginess.  Gratitude leads to joy and generosity.

So I’m still working on the generosity thing, trying to keep my small problems, like mold, in perspective.  It may not be ideal or good for our health, but it’s not going to kill us like starvation or unclean water.  I may have spent the day cleaning up mold and rearranging the house, but I have a whole lot to be thankful for.  Like thankfully we got the house moved around before I sprained my ankle! :)

Thanksgiving jiaozi and noodles

By Kevin

She called at 3:30 to ask if we were home and if she could come to see Juliana. The woman we affectionately refer to as the “Bike Lady” (because I met her last year while riding my bike back from a supermarket in the old city 40 minutes away) wanted to bring some instructions for making Chinese medicine for Juliana's cough. She used to just show up at our door without any notice (like a typical Chinese person), but after coming a few times while we were out, she's started calling to make sure we'll be home. I almost said that we were busy because I knew Ayi was about to arrive and take Juliana outside to play. But this was the only day of the week we didn't have tutor time. I was looking forward to a little bit of a break in a busy week, but it was really the best time for her to come.

Twenty minutes later, just after Ayi arrived to watch Juliana and Ruth returned from class, The Bike Lady knocked on the door. We invited her in and she started playing with Juliana, excitedly recounting to Ayi the story of how we met. She marveled at how far along our Chinese has come since we met last spring. She laughed as Juliana sang and danced. “She is so clever,” she said as Juliana sang the words for “Are You Sleeping?” in English, Chinese and French. “It is difficult for adults to learn, but very easy for young children.”

Within twenty minutes, the conversation turned to food. The Bike Lady was asking if Juliana likes to eat Chinese food. “Of course,” we said. “We all love Chinese food.” She made up her mind. “Do you like noodles?” she asked. “Yes.” “Then I will cook you some noodles. I make some good noodles.” Before we could say no, she began making a list of things for Ayi to go and buy at the vegetable market, running down the list of things we had in our kitchen and things that were missing. “They usually don't have many vegetables at home,” Ayi said.

Then she wandered into the kitchen, spotted the dirty dishes leftover from lunch and went straight to work cleaning them. Ruth tried to get her to stop, because she was our guest, but the Bike Lady would have none of it. “We are all a family,” she said. “I want to help.”

We were overwhelmed by her generosity. I couldn't help but be reminded of the ways we are called to care for one another. And I was challenged. How often do we go out of our way to help those around us, even just with a simple thing like washing the dishes for them or offering to make them a meal? Even more, how often do we in turn let someone else serve us? How easy it is for us to get so busy and schedule our time so tightly that we have no room for hospitality. How easy it is for us to feel inconvenienced when someone shows up at our door and miss out on both the chance to bless them and give them an opportunity to bless us.

When Ayi returned, the Bike Lady started going through our cupboards, trying to find the right ingredients for the noodles she wanted to make. I pointed her to the salt, the vinegar and the soy sauce. “Do you have 酱?” she asked. Since 酱 generally means “sauce, I asked,”“What kind of 酱?” “ 酱”she replied. Clearly I was missing something. I told her I wasn't sure. She said it didn't matter. Then she shooed me out of the room and set to work on making the meal, making everything from scratch.

 She laughed at our miscommunication and smiled, “You have both made a lot of progress, but one day we will all be able to understand one another very well.”

With us, Ayi is generally not very talkative, but with the Bike Lady she opened right up, marveling at the way everybody adores Juliana and communication difficulties with us. She eagerly noted how she thought Juliana was “像洋娃娃 (“like a foreign doll”) - a phrase Chinese people often use to describe particularly cute babies.

In think I found out more about Ayi in 10 minutes than I had in the last six months.

The Bike Lady smiled as she placed huge bowls of noodles in front of us. We invited her to join us and she reluctantly agreed, constantly suggesting that Ruth hadn't eaten enough and marveling at Juliana's attempts to use chopsticks.

When the clock struck 6:40, she blew right back out the door. She'd made plans to visit another friend who also lives on campus. A day that began with the strong jolt of an earthquake (4.7 on the Richter scale -- thankfully no damage) ended with a whirlwind.

Perhaps inspired by the Bike Lady, yesterday, Ayi insisted that she make us jiaozi. I hesitated. I told her she didn't need to. It was too much trouble. But she insisted. “You don't eat enough Chinese food,” she said. So tonight, we'll celebrate American Thanksgiving in style with – what else? – Chinese dumplings Saturday with other foreigners in town, we'll eat 火鸡 – fire chicken – turkey). Tonight will be our little version of the first Thanksgiving, with the locals showing the outsiders what to eat. I am reminded that I need to cultivate a heart of gratitude. I need to be thankful for these blessings and so much more.

Single's Day Wedding

By Kevin

As we entered the church, the pastor was explaining that the bride and groom had selected a special day to get married. "Today is November 11," she said. "It is single's day."

Typically Single's Day -- 11-11, is a day that the single people of the world (or at least China) celebrate their singleness. This couple decided to redefine it as their wedding anniversary - a day when two singles would be single no more.

We hadn't planned on crashing their wedding. We were just trying to go to church. We didn't know that a wedding had been scheduled in place of the normal service. Still it was interesting. It's hard to blieve, but in this, our seventh year living in China, it was the first Chinese church wedding I've seen.

Much like an American wedding, the couple exchanged their vows by responding that they "yuan yi" (agree) to promises to cherish, love, respect, honor and not leave one another for the rest of their lives. After completing their vows and exchanging rings, the bride and groom held their hands up to show off their rings for a moment. They also lit candles, which the pastor explained represented two families that were coming together to create a third family. And, though they hesitated a moment when the pastor told the groom he could kiss the bride, they -- somewhat embarssingly -- obliged.

All-in-all, it was surprisingly westernized. The bride and groom wore Western wedding attire - albeit with a Chinese flair. The bride's gown, for instance, was draped with a thick layer of white fur near the neckline, perhaps because the temperatures outside were in the 40s. The man wore a suit with a red tie rather than a tux.

There were also a few other differences from a typical American wedding. For one, nobody other than the couple getting married and the pastor appeared to be wearing special clothing. Secondly, there was a huge archway of pink balloons strung up across the aisle. And all the children in the congregation stood along both sides of the aisle, undoubtedly to wish the couple success in child-bearing -- a must in any Chinese wedding. Some alternated between standing still and dancing back and forth with impatience. Also notable was the timing. As I mentioned: it was held during the normal church service. And, as is typical in a Chinese church service, prayers were filled with "A-mens" changted in unison after each phrase and the whole congregation concluded the service by reciting the Apostle's Creed. The videographer couldn't help but notice the foreigners standing in the back while scanning the crowd and made sure to spend a considerable amount of time with his camera aimed directly at us.

As the wedding came to an end, we made our way out of the building. At the door, gifts of watermelon seeds, peanuts and candies were shoved into our hands.

 

Our China-fabulous Kitchen

Our kitchen (the really nice cabinet on the right was one we added)

The other day our counter broke.  It wasn't the most secure structure - a couple of wooden cutting boards balanced on a thin metal frame, so we weren't super surprised.  We discovered the back of the frame was held up by an old (now bent) cardboard fireworks shell.  Kevin found some old mop handles to wedge against the frame and now our counter is once again fully operational.

Most of the rooms in our house, other than our bathroom which I already described, are pretty much like your average American room.  Sure, the outer windows in Juliana's room are actually made from heavy plastic, window frames, and a bunch of packing tape.  And some of the tiles in our bedroom are loose.  All the outlet boxes in the house are broken and falling out of the walls - but hidden behind furniture so Juliana can't get at them.  And when I sit in one spot on the living room couch, I smell the neighbor's cigarette smoke, even though there are no vents, holes, or windows nearby (It's not just in my head; Kevin smelled it too.  It really is a mystery.)

Our nice view from the kitchen window

But otherwise, our house is pretty “normal” until you get to the kitchen.  The kitchen is separated from the living room by a large sliding glass door and window.  The door is a little small, resulting in a number of banged head and elbows, but I'm still glad it's there.  During the wintertime we keep it closed all the time, since the kitchen is at least 10* colder than the living room.

The outer wall of the kitchen is all windows - from the sixth floor we have a great view out over the campus and most of the year we see the nearby mountains.  In wintertime the coal dust haze blocks our mountain view, but we couldn't see them anyway because our kitchen windows always freeze over.  On the inside.  Instead of a beautiful view we have beautiful new ice patterns every morning!

The inside of our icy windows

Probably the most interesting part of our kitchen is the stove area.  A small box of thin metal has been attached to the outside of the house to hold the single gas burner.  It is closed off by small sliding windows, useful in the winter since the temperature inside the stove attachment is about 10* colder than the rest of the kitchen.  We have the stove burner propped up on an overturned basin and an extra piece of tile so that you can actually reach the stove.  A small hole in the wall connects the burner to the large gas tank under the aforementioned rudely constructed counter.

The stove alcove when we moved in.  We have since propped up the stove and removed the newspaper that is so wisely surrounding the gas burner!

Chinese kitchens aren't equipped in quite the same way as American kitchens.  We have a one burner stove.  The sink and counter are about six inches shorter than you'd like, unless you are Juliana reaching for a cookie left out to cool.  The sink has no hot water.  Most Chinese cooking has no need for an oven, but we have a small one we brought from Weinan.  It is conveinently just big enough for a 9x13" pan.  Unfortunately even though I set it about 50* lower than directed, it still burns the top of anything I don't remember to cover.  We have a blender, a hand mixer, a crockpot, a rice cooker, and a toaster (that was hard to find!), and my little french-press mug, so we're pretty set.  We also have a refrigerator, it just doesn't fit in the kitchen so it's in the living room instead.

I think the green fabric (covering the gas tank and open storage area) makes the kitchen look kind of pretty!  And the cutting board counter tops don't really look too bad.

One thing we were very surprised to see in our kitchen was what appeared to be a dishwasher.  Who ever heard of a dishwasher in China?  Unfortunately it was only large enough for one meal worth of dishes, and more importantly, it was covered in mold.  It was quickly replaced by a dish drying rack.  Much more useful.

I have to laugh when I see magazines or tv shows about kitchen remodels.  The “before” kitchen always looks pretty darn nice - is it really necessary to spend thousands of dollars to "fix" it?  I have to laugh too, thinking, “What if we lived in America and taped plastic on our windows or fixed our counter with an old mop handle?  We would seem so trashy!”  But here, it just makes sense.  We congratulate our friends for their ingenious repairs.

Sure, we have a bare light bulb hanging from our ceiling and some of the wall tiles are missing.  It would be nice if the kitchen were warmer or a little bigger, but it's really not a big deal. A second burner would be handy, but I'm so used to having one that I'd probably have trouble using two at once.  I still think Kitchen-Aid mixers are beautiful, but a little hand mixer serves me just fine, and you'd be amazed what you can do with a spoon!  I'm glad we don't have room for more pans or gadgets or a whole knife collection (one large cleaver is as good as 6 fancy knives) - if we had the room, no doubt we'd find a way to fill it.

I certainly like American kitchens.  They are so pretty and large and functional.  When I first came to China I struggled with not having the standard I was used to and unknowingly expected.  But now I like my kitchen.  It reminds me of what is not necessary.  It reminds me that I have everything I need and then some.

When I was younger I wanted to be an interior designer and planned to marry an architect so we could have a really beautiful house.  Until a few years ago my big dream was to own a home.  When we decided to stay in China, I realized that might never happen.  And recently I've also realized I’m just fine with that.  I've got some bigger dreams now.

Strange

Yesterday toward the end of class I looked out the window. I do this a lot, but what was strange about this day was the Chinese girl standing about 6” from the window staring in at us. That wasn't too strange of itself, since we are foreigners and get plenty of stares. But ten minutes later when she was still standing staring at us, that was pretty weird. Our teacher saw her staring in the window and looked surprised but she kept on teaching. I kept giving her weird, “Why are you still staring at us?” looks. Usually after a few of these looks people will get embarrassed and move away, but this girl continued to stare with an impassive face.

When class ended the teacher whispered as I walked by, “Why was she staring? That was very strange.” I said we are foreigners so a lot of people want to look at us, but yes, that was strange. As I walked out of the building the girl was loitering by the door. The building manager (man who lives in the building, keeps an eye on things, and keeps it in good shape) was talking to her unhappily, I gather telling her to go away. The building man then came over to talk to one of the teachers nearby,  my past writing teacher Li Laoshi. He something about how this girl kept hanging around and he didn't know why.

When I walked outside to get my bike, the girl stood by the doorway staring at me. Li Laoshi came out and sternly asked her, “Are you looking for someone?” The girl didn't answer, just kept standing there. Getting more stern, Li Laoshi said, “If you aren't looking for someone then you need to leave!” The girl didn't respond, just kept standing there. I like Li Laoshi a lot, but when she gets stern, most people listen.

As I prepared to head off on my bike, the girl turned to me and finally asked, “Where are you from?” I told her America and then biked away. I'm used to staring, and I'm used to people asking where I'm from, but it was all still very strange. I couldn't decide if she was either not quite right in the head or if she was just a very simple country girl with no social graces and a large foreigner curiosity.

My First China Haircut

Today I got my haircut for the first time in China.  It's funny that I have lived in China for six years and never had my haircut here, but most of the time I've had long hair, so I hardly ever cut it.  Most years I cut it once in Thailand (an inexpensive salon where they gave great hairwash/head massages, spoke a bit of English, and then finished off with some really good tea) and once in America (either by my mom or in a salon if I was donating - free haircut!).

My first few years in China I was afraid of hair salons anyway.  I had no ability to communicate what I wanted in a hairstyle, and I had seen that popular Chinese hairstyles were not exactly (or at all) what I had in mind.  Short and poofy on the top with a few long strands at the base of the neck was very fashionable at the time.

Now that I have a short haircut I actually need to maintain it a little more.  After just 7-8 weeks, it was already starting to look shaggy.  I know several foreigners who go to a hair salon not far away, but I decided to try out the little hair salon at the bottom of our stairs.  For one reason, it takes about 1.5 minutes to get there.  For another reason, we know the girls in the salon.   Juliana often hears the loud dance music they like to play as we walk past and wants to go inside.  The girls are always happy to see her and her dance moves.

Walking outside our building last spring.  The hair salon is in the background, a converted apartment.

Toward the beginning of last year my tutor and I went to chat with the girls as part of a tutor activity.  I found out the two girls working there at the time were sisters.  The youngest was 16 and had just come to start working.  I don't remember everything they told us about their family, but I know it included several more siblings.  I think they were from a relatively rural area in another province, so they were probably glad for the opportunity to come work in the city.

I immediately liked the girls because they were so friendly, especially the younger one.  She laughed at my stumbling Chinese but spoke very slowly so I could understand what she was saying.  She had a "fresh from the country" innocent, excited sort of look and a ready smile.  In the past year, she has adapted more to city life - gotten a cooler hairstyle and been through several dyes, bought a new wardrobe of fashionable clothes, and of course aquired a fancy cell phone.  She doesn't look quite so young and innocent, but she is still very friendly and usually looks happy.

So today I headed downstairs for my first haircut.  We had just been learning different words related to hair and hairstyles in class and tutor time, so I was prepared.  Mostly I didn't use them, but I also didn't accidentally end up with a perm or a dye or anything.  I told her I wanted it to look about the same as my current hairstyle, just cut a little bit and held up fingers to show about 1/2".

Inside the hair salon last fall, pretending to cut my tutor's hair for a photo scavenger hunt.

First she washed my hair and massaged my scalp for a bit, always the best part, then she led me over to the chair.  The salon had similar equipment as an American salon except it was very small and a good deal more dingy.  Pictures of various popular hairstyles were strung from the ceilings and lined the walls.  An old couch and a couple of folding chairs served as a waiting area.

The haircut ended up being about 2" shorter than I had planned, definitely shorter than my summer haircut!  She used thinning shears on the whole thing, since a feathery look is popular.  My hairstylist this summer used a lot of feathering as well, though.  After a quick run through with the hairdryer she was done.  I tried to pay but realized I didn't have small enough change for my $1.50 haircut, so I ran upstairs to get a 10Y bill, again appreciating the convenience factor.  (My tutor said the average price for a  haircut ranges from 10-50 yuan, so mine was definitely a bargain. They may have given a slightly lower price since they know me).

The haircut

It's definitely short but I like it, and it may turn out to be even easier to take care of than before! And the price is really hard to beat!  I came back home and Juliana actually sat still for about 30 seconds while I gave her a haircut too!  No layers, thinning shears, or fancy stuff, but I think it's mostly straight.

Our New Neighborhood

 Kevin just took this picture from our window showing the four large apartment buildings under construction across the street.  I believe they were just starting construction on two of them last year when we moved in; I think the tallest two weren't yet started.  Construction is a daily sight in China no matter where you live; the only surprising thing about this picture is that I only spot one crane!

When Kevin picked up food from our favorite Dongbei (Northeastern) restaurant across the street, he said most of these old courtyard homes, like the one we were able to visit last spring, have been torn down.  I'm not surprised, since they were so old and increasingly surrounded by high-rises.  They weren't so nice inside, but I'm still sad to see them disappear, just as they are all over China.

Oh well, you can't live in China long without getting a new neighborhood!

The Chinese Driving Test (part two)

By Kevin

As I waited to take my Chinese driving examination, a roomful of test-takers stared at an endless loop of horrific deadly traffic accidents that was playing on a big-screen TV in the front of the room – the kind of things you might see on World's Wildest Police Videos or Driver's Ed class. In spite of what one might gather from watching Chinese people actually drive, the government takes its responsibility to ensure that driver's – at least in their head – know both rules of the road and the consequences for ignoring them.

While living in China, one of the things I miss about the States is being able to hop into a car and drive wherever I want to go. Now I can. It took three tries, but I now have permission to weave in and out of Chinese traffic behind the wheel of a car. I'm just not quite sure exactly when I'll get up the nerve to use it.

About half the foreigners I've told that I just got my Chinese driver's license think I'm crazy. “Why would you even want to drive in China. Driver's are insane,” they protest. And I agree. Chinese traffic is crazy. I have neither the money, nor a plan to buy a car. However, if we want to rent a car and drive out to the mountains for a day, now we won't have to worry about hiring a driver to bring us. We've heard rumors that China may soon phase out the English exam for foreigners, so we figured if I ever want to get a license, now is the time to do it.

Getting my driver's license in California was easy. I was 16. For a couple months, I took an after-school driver's ed class, studied the regulations in the DMV manual, went to the DMV armed with my birth certificate and passed a short written exam on the first try to get my driver's permit. A couple months later, after a behind-the-wheel class and nervous practice with my parents, I also passed the behind-the-wheel exam on the first try and became a licensed driver.

The process is a bit different in China, as one of our friends found out when it took him five trips all the way across town to the City's Vehicle Management Bureau（车管所 - chē guǎn suǒ) before he walked away with his license.

Unfortunately, the People's Republic of China didn't ratify the 1949 Geneva Convention on Road Traffic – an agreement allowing participating nations worldwide to honor foreign driver's licenses. So that means foreigners have to get a Chinese license in order to drive.

Thankfully, while the process certainly isn't easy for foreigners who already have a foreign driver's license, it's simpler than it is for Chinese people.

Our Chinese teacher, who just took her written driving exam, said the process for Chinese people is long. In addition to practical things like behind-the-wheel training and learning the rules of the road, she also had to spend four hours one afternoon at an intersection watching a traffic cop attempt to direct traffic. I say “attempt” because most drivers seem to whiz by, either blatantly ignoring or oblivious to the cop's somewhat difficult-to-decipher hand signals. She was surprised to find that foreigners were exempt from this step, in addition to being exempt from having to take a Chinese behind-the-wheel exam. Apparently the rules are different from city-to-city. Some foreigners we know have had to do a Chinese behind-the-wheel exam, but in Yinchuan, it isn't a requirement.

However, foreigners here do still have to jump through several extra hoops. First, there's the paperwork: first, you need an official government-translated copy of your passport and foreign driver's license. Naturally, the only place to get one of these is all the way on the other side of the city, far from where most of the foreigners live. And it take the better part of two whole afternoons to get the job done (one to drop it off, another when you return a few days later to pick it up).

Then there's the the local police clearance permit (居留证 -- jū liú zhèng). You have to go to your local neighborhood police station and pick up a paper certifying that you live where you say you live and how long you've been in China since you last left the country. The first time I went, the officer in charge of printing these out puffed away on a cigarette while he dug up all the right information in his computer, but then the station's Internet connection crashed, so he was unable to print out a copy. “Come back tomorrow.” He said. Naturally, the next day he wasn't there. Day three, a school official called on my behalf, but again he was out. It wasn't until my third trip to the Police Station that he was able to produce the small piece of paper, which he printed on the back of scrap paper. I glanced over the paper and asked if I could have an official red government “chop” on the paper, which is required when involved in any government-related activity. He sighed loudly and begrudgingly waked his supervisor, who was napping on his office couch, to ask for the key to another office. Naturally, they kept the official red stamp that marked it as a genuine government-approved document under lock and key at all times.

Then there was the health exam. In California, doctors aren't involved in the process of obtaining a driver's license. But in China, they want to make sure that you're healthy and able before entrusting the nation's roads to you. So I went with a teammate, who was also working on getting his license, to the local hospital. In the first exam, the doctor asked how tall my teammate was, wrote down what he said, then looked over at me, saw that I was a bit taller, and wrote my height as 185 cm – chopping 6 cm off of my actual height. He never actually measured either of us. Then we found our way to the next exam room: eyes. Chinese eye exam charts are designed for the illiterate. They're filled with the letter “E” placed facing four directions. You just tell the doctor which way it is pointing. The doctor decided that I could see clearly enough by asking me to read one letter covering my right eyes, then one covering my left. We also had to read a colored number on a small sheet to prove we weren't color-blind. Then we were done. Finally, we did a hearing test. The doctor, standing behind me, rang a small tuning fork next to each ear and I identified which ear it was closer to. We got the requisite approval stamps and it was finished. In and out in a relatively quick half-hour.
Filling out the paperwork needed for our applications was also tricky, because it's completely in Chinese and we don't have a class to teach us “government jargon Chinese 401.” Thankfully, we have a friend from Singapore who was able to help us navigate the forms and introduce us to the people he met during his five trips to the bureau (which, again, is all the way on the other side of town), who offered us – the only foreigners in the building – a bit of preferential treatment. When officials dragged their feet on allowing us to take the exam because it was getting a little close to the cutoff for the last test of the day, his guangxi lubed the wheels for us and got us in so we wouldn't have to make yet another long trip all the way across town just to take an exam.

After a short wait, we were able to take an English exam. From a bank of 1315 possible questions, the computer-based exam randomly selects 100. You have 45 minutes to take the exam. A passing grade is 90%.

As I reached the end of my first exam with 15 minutes to spare, I hurriedly looked back at each of my answers and decided I was certain about the answers on about 70, relatively certain on 10 and had narrowed it down to a 50-50 shot on the remaining 20 questions. I waited with my hand on the “submit” button for a few minutes before deciding there was no more second guessing.

The screen popped up. 89. Deflated, I could barely walk out of the room. My friend, who went through the whole process with me was celebrating. He'd scored 92.

Typically, after you pass your exam, you go to a cashier, pay a 10 RMB fee, then head over to the person who processed your paperwork when you first arrived at the bureau and 15-20 minutes later you walk out of the office with your driver's license. Unfortunately our Singaporean friend's guangxi wasn't quite strong enough to overcome a computer problem, which popped up as he went to his fee. So he had to come back the next day.

I crammed for a few more hours that night, finding the correct answers to a few questions I'd answered incorrectly, then went back with him.

This meant a long taxi ride across town, but I figured it'd be worth it if I was able to pass while the questions were fresh in my mind and share the cab ride with my friend.

I hit a new problem in my second trip to the bureau: they got me in too fast. While scores of Chinese people waited (it was a busy Friday) to take their exams, a friendly guard recognized me as the foreigner who failed by one point the day before and rushed me in. (I learned a new phrase to describe my anguish: 差一分 - chā yī fēn, witch means "short one point”). But in the rush to set up my exam, they forgot one thing: The foreigner needed to take the English version of the exam. I sat down, pushed the start button and saw a screen filled with mostly unfamiliar Chinese characters. I got the attention of the woman monitoring the room and explained my problem.

They rapidly grabbed my paperwork and spent the next 20 minutes trying to hunt for a translator. Our Singaporean friend had mentioned that he wound up taking the Chinese version of the test with the aid of a translator, who only translated two possible answers for each multiple-choice question, which greatly aided his ability to pass it, eliminating half of the answers. For some reason, they figured this might be easier than setting up another exam. But they couldn't find the translator. Finally, someone came back with some new paperwork and motioned me back into the testing room and sat me down. The test was already running. Three minutes had already ticked off the clock and one true/false question had been answered for me, but it was in English, so I breathed a sigh of relief and dove in. Only about 20-30 questions were repeats from the day before, but thankfully I was able to correct a couple of mistakes I'd made on the first exam. Again, I tallied up the questions I was certain I had right and those that were more questionable. Since there were again about 20 “iffy” questions, I held my breath as I hit the submit button.

Again, I walked out of the room looking at the floor. 89. Again. 差一分. I just laughed. “Can I take it again today?” I asked, remembering that our friend mentioned people taking it multiple times in the same day. “It's too late. Come back next week.” Arrghg. Next week? Naturally, it was a Friday and the office isn't open during the weekend.

So I came back. Again. The next Tuesday. After paying the 63 RMB fee for the exam, I sat down in the waiting room, where I ran into a former tutor who was also taking his written exam. Again, they started off by giving me the Chinese exam (though I made a point of asking for the English one), but I caught the mistake before hitting the start button, so it was easier for them to fix this time around. I hurried through. Again, only 20-30 questions were repeats from earlier exams. There was still a bit of guessing here and there, but when I reached the end, I felt relatively confident. I felt like only 11 questions were in the “iffy” category this time. Odds were that I'd guessed right on some of them. So I hit the “submit” button and pumped my fist when a “94” popped onto the screen.

I then went about the task of trying to sign my newly transliterated eight-character Chinese name – which I'd never written before – in a space designed for typical two and three-character names, so they could issue my license. The former tutor was surprised that I didn't have to complete additional steps like he did. He kept asking me, “Are you sure you can get it today?” I went back to the same place my friend had brought his paperwork and paid his fee, but hit a roadblock because the tutor didn't let me just follow in my friend's footsteps. He asked questions. An officer insisted that I still had more tests to take, but that if I went and talked to the supervisor, he'd sort things out. So we talked to the supervisor, who told me what I already knew: go, pay the 10 RMB for them to issue the actual license, then come back to the counter next to his with the receipt. When we did, the woman at the counter momentarily asked if I could come back the next day to pick up the newly printed driver's license, but the supervisor heard her and overruled her. “It will just take a few minutes for us to print it.” I breathed a sigh of relief sat down. Twenty minutes later, he handed me the license and I headed for home. Beats having to wait a month for it to come in the mail. Next step: finding a place to rent a car.

Here's my brand new driver's license (with a few bits of important info edited)

Progress

There are a lot of times in the midst of studying Chinese when it's hard to feel like we're making a lot of progress. Lately it seems like lots of our classes have been filled with confusing grammar rules and the fifth word that means almost exactly the same thing as the other four, except for one small contextual nuance that can't fully be explained. And the measure words – oh man, does Chinese have some measure words.

For about every fourth new vocabulary word, we learn a new measure words. English has different measure words too: a pair of pants, a cup of coffee, a slice of bread. But it's amazing how many times we can just say “a” or “the” or don't even have to use a measure word at all. Thank you, English. A few examples of Chinese measure words:

片 pian – for things that are flat, thin pieces (a pill, a large grassy area)

张 zhang – a measure word for flat objects (a table, a bed, a piece of paper)

支 zhi – for long, thin, inflexible objects (a pen); for troops; for songs; for wattage; and for the size or quality of yarn.

根 gen – for long, thin objects (a banana, a match, a piece of string)

There are different measure words for a pair of eyes and a pair of glasses, a letter, a book, a newspaper, a present, a tv, a road, a mountain, a piece of clothing, a class period...you get the idea. Usually to introduce how these myriad measure words are used, our book says something useful like, "a measure word."

As always, we feel the difficulty of both of Kevin and I trying to learn Chinese while also being parents. It's hard not to compare to someone who is able to spend 20 hours a week in class, meet with a tutor every day, and (novel thought) study every day too! I'm only in class 10 hours a week, meeting with a tutor 4-5 hours a week, and my study time is more often than not 2-5 snatches in between Juliana's suddenly urgent need for attention. She's just like a cat – as soon as she can sense I'm trying to focus, she does her best to put herself directly between me and my book. Sometimes I wonder if I'm really learning that much at all.

So it's helpful to look back every so often and be able to see progress! I sometimes forget how very, very little we knew starting off, even after 5 years living in China. I used to be able to answer a few, very basic questions before starting to flounder. Now I can carry on conversations for half an hour or an hour. Maybe not deep, eloquent conversations, but communicative ones all the same. Last week I called my Chinese friend from Yangzhou, and she was thrilled that we could talk in Chinese and I could understand her. Last weekend we spent the morning at the home of a random family Kevin and Juliana had met outside and only used a few words of English.

Juliana and her new little Chinese friend find words, Chinese or English, rather unnecessary.

I looked back at the first lesson in our reading book where we were reading this:

Reading Text: Lesson 1

Compared to last week when we read this:

Reading Text: Lesson 21

I could not write any Chinese before this year, and my writing is still not great. I don't practice it too much except in class and writing homework because it's probably the area I'll use least in the future. Even so, I can write (and even remember how to write) a whole lot more characters than before!

Notes from class

It's exciting to remember we are making progress.  Yay for us!

Heels over the edge

Ningxia man stands on the corner of a building for an hour, then gets rescued as he attempts to jump.

By Kevin

He stood with his heels hanging over the edge of the roof for more than an hour before jumping.

The young man, presumably a Ningxia University student, had sat down on the corner of the rooftop across from ours. He appeared to be trying to decide whether or not his grief was enough to propel him off of the five-story building. As rescue worker approached from one side, he became agitated and pushed off of the corner of the building. The rooftop rescue worker sprang to action and grabbed his arm a split second before he could complete his fall.

Heels hang over the corner of the five-story building.

A crowd of hundreds of teachers, students and children, which had gathered below, shrieked and ran towards the edge of the building. When they saw that the man had been hoisted back onto the roof, many cheered. The man had been saved.

It was the first time I'd witnessed a suicide attempt. I pray that it is my last, but recent statistics aren't very promising.

On average, someone in China attempts suicide every two minutes, according to China's Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, China's suicide rate is 22.23 people out of every 100,000, giving China one of the highest per capita rates of suicide in the world. It's also the biggest killer of people ages 15-34. In this nation of 1.3 billion people, about 2 million attempt suicide every year and 287,000 people kill themselves. Pressure to provide for aging parents, poor job prospects, broken relationships, failure and loss of face often lead people to despair.

We went outside a little before 5 p.m. We were planning to take advantage of the beautiful afternoon and bike over to buy her some new shoes in a nearby marketplace before grabbing some dinner. The plan changed when we saw a crowd gathered outside our building, gazing up at a man standing on the edge of the rooftop.

The shoes could wait. We quickly alerted our friends and teachers who live on campus and asked them to join us in prayer.

Police had just begun trying to clear the area. The first firetruck arrived a few minutes later, but the firefighters did little more than mull  about near the foot of the building.Twenty  minutes later, a firetruck carrying a giant inflatable cushion arrived. We held our breath during the 10 minutes it took them to set it up, praying that he wouldn't feel rushed to jump right away. As the air bag inflated, he moved along the edge of the roof to a place where he could avoid it if he jumped. He turned and stared out at the crowd. His hunched shoulders carrying the look of defeat.

Looking down from the top of a five-story apartment building

We still couldn't see any rescue workers on the roof, but he turned and looked like he was talking to somebody. The gates were locked. Nobody was going to be allowed on or off this area of campus. The crowd gathered. Children continued playing. Students smiled and giggled nervously. Elderly people wondered what had sent him to this point of despair. For the first time I spotted a few rescue workers on the roof, trying to persuade him to come down.

About 45 minutes after we arrived, he sat down on the edge. It seemed like a good sign. Better than standing on the corner with his feet over the edge, at least. Finally 50 minutes after our arrival, an ambulance from Ningxia People's Hospital arrived. Apparently rescuers wanted to bring him to the best hospital hospital halfway across town if he survived the fall, rather than the one just down the street (which may or may not have ambulances of its own).

A crowd gathers to see if the man jumps from the rooftop.

Just after the rescuer caught him, we met a student who told us that just last week, another Ning da student jumped off a building on another campus. She survived, but is completely paralyzed. I imagined his fate might have been the same had he completed his jump. Since it was at the corner of the building, he may have missed the landing pad.

After he was rescued, I couldn't help thinking about what a difficult road the man faces now. Not only will he have to deal with the consequences of dealing with his pain and the fact that he ultimately jumped, but now he'll face the likelihood that people will shun him and his family because of the huge loss of face that comes with such a public spectacle.