Alex

No words from me in two weeks, I know. I've found myself fascinatingly uninspired everytime I've sat down in front of the computer. Right now, however, I feel more inspired to write a text for my blog than I feel to do my homework ;)

Eight weeks in China now. My lessons started this Thursday. The level is way above my head, but I refuse to take an easier level. In this class I'll learn a lot, but probably get really bad results on my test, at least during the first semester. In a lower level I would get better results on my tests, but not learn as much. After two days of class, I was exhausted. The first real weekend (because until school start, every day was weekend) in several weeks was warmly welcomed. I think I might have a though week in front of me. But that is why I am here after all.

The stupidity of my university continues. They had us make a test a week ago, to see on what level our Chinese is. First of all, they didn't tell us about the test. A vague rumour reached my ears, and I went and asked a teacher about it. She said that they had put up a note about it. I kindly asked where this note was, and she told me that of course it was put up on the entrance door. Of course. No one have told us that they sometimes put up notes about important things that goes on at the university, such as tests, at the front door of this building. But of course we should have understood that. Of course. Well, I do not live in this building, and even though I pass it daily, I very seldom have any business in this place. I also don't have the habit of walking up to random front doors to read the notes put up, just in case it might concern me (well, nowadays I do). Anyways, reading the note, it said that the test would start at 8:30 A.M., but just in case, I asked he teacher. Just to make sure that the test acually would start at 8:30. She said that it definetely would start at 8:30. 8:30 is the magical word here. So me and my companions showed up to the classroom at the appointed hour, that is 8:30, just to find that the test had already been going on for half an hour. We were not surprised.

I could give you a zillion good examples of completely idiotic things the administration of this place do, but then I wold write page after page after page, and my fingrs would start to bleed, and there would be blood in the keyboard, and that would be really embarrassing, because I'm now using my room mates lap top. So I won't. I think you get the picture anyway.

I'm still living at the temporary guesthouse, sharing room with the wonderful German Juliane. The foreign students dormitory is still being under costruction, so they have us stay at this guesthouse. When I first arrived, they said that the real dormitory would be finished in four weeks. Then they said that it would be finished in November. Then they said it would be finished in December. I don't care much about that, because I don't intend to move into those dormitorys anyway. Me and three friends of mine are looking for our own appartment. It's usually quite easy to find an appartment, but it's a bit more difficult for us, since there is four of us. I don't think it will be long until we can move out of here though.

This dormitory is a bubble where the foreigners get stuck. I'm lucky, because I got to know some Chinese people when I was living at the hostel here in Wuhan. I broke the bubble before I even got to the university. Everytime I mention one of my Chinese aquaintances to some foreigner, she or he stare at me in amazed surprise and say: “You have Chinese friends?!“ Yes, it's a miracle! I'm in China and I know Chinese people! Amazing, truly amazing.

The university held som kind of opening ceremony for us last week. It was bound to be incredibly boring, and I tried desperately to talk my friends out of going at all, but instead they talked me into going, something I later regretted bitterly. There was some important persons at the university who held speaches. One man held a speach about how we have to make friends with the Chinese students, how we have to share our different cultures and learn from eachother. All I could think was: “You bastard!“. It was such a load of crap.

They don't want us to learn from eachother. Maybe they want the Chinese students to teach the foreigners about the Chinese culture and the Chinese way of thinking, but they don't want us to teach them anything. They don't want their Chinese youths to learn about the western way. They don't want their kids to know about anything else than what they decide that their kids should know about. I think that is why they are isolating us in our bubble, isolating the Chinese kids in a bigger bubble.

We are oil on water. We're in the middle of it, but we're floating on it. We can't sink in, mend, blend. To live in the university and study Chinese is the worst way of learning anything. Maybe our grammar will be better, but we won't understand anything as long as we stay in the bubble.

Alex

_{(Click on "Kommentarer" below to leave a comment.)}