Life in Beijing – Sprezzatura

I’ve devoted most of my entries to sightseeing in Beijing, but the defining moments of my experience here are just my daily activities. One of my favorite activities to do with UC friends was getting together to watch The Bachelorette. In one episode, a suitor used the term sprezzatura – an Italian term which he defined as finding romance in the ordinary and performing excellence with nonchalance. Though I’m here to study Chinese (Italian will come later), I’ve also found beauty and intrigue in the sprezzatura – appreciating the small things.

This is my class:

Top row: Pong, Tony, Kyle
Middle: Me, Melissa, Lu Laoshi (our speaking teacher)
Front: April, Yasmin, Xu Laoshi (our writing teacher), Alli, Annie

We also gave our teachers English names – Xu Laoshi is Emily and Lu Laoshi is Leonardo. (I approve of Emily as an English name, but I feel like Leo is a bit too esoteric.)

Classes here are so different than America. (Although I have a feeling that it’s a characteristic of study abroad classes rather than the norm at a Chinese university.) Beijing Normal University is a teacher’s college, so many of the teachers here are also students. (Xu Laoshi is only a year older than I am.) It’s also a graduation requirement to be proficient in English, so the students here are as eager to practice language with us as we are with them. Plus, the class material is more fun than America – we even had a lesson on how to order beer.

Though Lu Laoshi is a full-time teacher, he loves teaching Chinese and is willing to let the class go off on tangents if he feels it will help us learn. On day he read us a kid’s book, and another he taught us a famous Chinese poem. Our class on Friday was not as funny – we got into a big argument about gender equality because someone joked that women are supposed to be the housekeepers and bring sandwiches to their husbands. At least now I can say I believe in 平等 – equality. (I also know how to say that men are inferior to women 🙂 )

Then there’s my Chinese friends – Alexandra, who’s studying to be an engineer, and my  tutor Lena.

Alexandra is a sweetheart – she comes from a province of China that doesn’t eat pork, so we bonded right away. She and I are also a bit quirky when it comes to pop culture – we like movies like Inception and she teaches me youth slang. She’s only been studying English for 5 years, and she’s preparing for a big exam, so in exchange for helping me with Chinese I tutor her in English.

Lena is my favorite person that I’ve met in China. We practice Chinese a lot, but we usually discuss relationships and culture instead of what the book wants me to learn. We’ve also been out together a few times – to the movies, to get Mexican food and to go dancing in Sanlitun. I also got to meet her boyfriend and she’s helping me figure out my post-Beijing travel plans.

Here’s the churros I bought for her (she’d never tried them before):

And here’s Lena herself:

Here’s the tacos we split:

Seeing a movie in Beijing was really different. Lena got a discount so each ticket was only 20 kuai – $3 for 3D will never happen again. Outside we ran into a huangniu – literally yellow cow, which is their term for a scalper. Movie theaters sell popcorn here, but it’s not the salty, buttery kind we are used to – virtually all popcorn is kettle corn.

However, I had a great time seeing Transformers 3! Besides the fact that it is a Fine Hasbro Product, the visual effects were very well done. I could read about 60% of the subtitles, and understand about 35% of them. (Action movies say easy phrases, like “let’s go!” and “no!”)

Then there’s just fun times hanging out with my friends here, or relearning how to do chores and tasks in a new language.

Who knew ordering food could make someone feel so accomplished? This is where I get chicken sandwiches:

Here’s some of the street food I like:

On Friday I bought a train ticket all in Chinese, and I can now have basic conversation with people here. I feel like I’m not going to get enough out of it yet because my limited vocabulary dictates what we talk about, but I am excited to reach the point where I can learn more from the people around me.

We also went out to see Harry Potter at midnight and Xu Laoshi came with us! So much fun.

Going out to movies is fun, but I lucked out and found Hercules in Mandarin on the Chinese version of Youtube. It’s so great to watch (over and over and over), and I am learning a little from it. That counts as studying, right?

On Friday people from our program went to Friends Cafe, modeled after Central Perk in Friends. The decor is identical to the show…

At first we didn’t all fit into the main area, so they took us to another area called Joey’s Room:

So cool. The cafe plays episodes of the show on a tv (it was hard for us to leave), and allegedly the owner comes in sometimes dressed as Gunther. We had a great time taking pictures and hanging out. (I enjoyed my kiwi milkshake, but apparently the coffee was sub-par.)

 Speaking of friends, I had a mini reunion with Cece! She moved to Hangzhou after graduating Cal, but was in Beijing for the weekend for a work conference. I was so happy to see her again! Turns out, she knows one of the people in the advanced UC program, so we went out to get her some American food.

We also visited this really swanky club called Xiu – our mutual friend knows a lot of the classy places to go in Beijing. (It’s hard to tell from her shirt but we were unintentionally matching.) It was also so cool to hear her speak Chinese and be able to understand some of it.

Assuming I can get one more train ticket tomorrow, my post-program travels consist of visiting Huhehaote (Inner Mongolia), Shanghai (not pronounced SHANGhigh), Dalian (nicknamed the City of Romance, Oakland’s sister city and a hub of Russian and Japanese culture) and Qingdao (I cannot wait to visit all 6 of their beaches). I’m a little nervous to travel alone, but I know I’ll learn the most and have the most memorable experience that way. Counting down the days until travel and home!