It seems that we've had a string of pretty humorous cross-cultural interactions of late. I'm sure not complaining! This is good because it means a couple of things. First of all, it means that we have at least SOME cross-cultural interaction (rather than hiding inside and baking chocolate chip cookies every day to escape what can sometimes feel overwhelming as we try to learn and embrace a new language and culture). Secondly, it means that I haven't acculturated to the extent that I don't notice these "peculiarities" to a "normal" American! I'm at least somewhat aware (even if not acutely so) of some of the differences to what would seem normal to a person in the US. So here they are. A few of our favorite moments from the last few weeks....
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| Karis w/ one of her besties--Trapper! |
Sunday afternoons I try to go "a callin" on neighbors--visiting a family or two who live in our complex and bringing them some small gift, usually something I've baked. This seems to go over really well, and I think it's serving to deepen some already existing friendships and help develop newer ones. With so much of my time during the week spent grinding through a full school day with the kids, the weekends tend to be my best time to have a longer period of free time in case an "a callin" visit turns into more than just a quick hello at someone's front doorstep. Well, a few weeks ago it did get a bit extended. One of our favorite neighbors was so excited to have us drop in and our timing was perfect--she'd just finished frying up a "huo yu" (which literally means, "live fish"). I panicked a bit. I'm NOT a fish fan--at least not in China, where it is guaranteed to have bones all over (they even have a special tool at all the local hospitals for removing the bones that get stuck in your throat; most of my local friends have had the experience of going in for just such a procedure) and usually still has all the scales and face on it, too. And then the fact that she used the word "live" freaked me out as well. I kept hoping I had misunderstood her Chinese and maybe it was another word...But thankfully, although I was right in my translation of the word "live," it was only alive when it was brought to her. The killing and frying had already taken place. And even the face/head was removed. Not so much the tail, scales, or bones, but I had an incredible opportunity to grow in appreciation for Karis and her great attitude. She downed not just one piece of the bony fish, but happily agreed to a second when it was offered. (BTW, this was at about 4 pm--not my idea of a tea time snack and we were certainly not eating at a meal-time hour!) Following my daughter's lead, I managed to eat a second helping, using my fingers to reach into my mouth and pull out all the teeny-tiny bones that I kept accidentally chomping into in between trying to hold a conversation in NOT my native tongue. Whew! I was exhausted by the time we left. But incredibly thankful for such a go-getter daughter who smiled throughout the whole thing, in spite of the fact that she had the tail (which was pretty much all scales) for the second serving!
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| Cookie decorating--complete w/ headband in place! |
Karis and I made another weekend visit to a neighbor's home who also has an 11 year old daughter. I have just grown to love this sweet girl, and she seems to enjoy coming to our home (after she warms up a little at the rowdiness that 3 younger brothers bring into a home!). We stopped in on the neighbor to ask the daughter to come and help us decorate cookies. While we waited for Karis' friend to gather her things, the mom disappeared into a bedroom and returned within a minute, promptly brushing Karis' hair back (which was of course down and free-flowing, which is her usual style--one that takes hardly any maintenance in the mornings!) with her hands and then placing a head band with a large bow on it right on her. We were so tickled! I kept trying to imagine that happening at any of my friend's doorways in Dallas! Karis took the grooming and the hint at her need of an accessory all in stride, and even knew to keep the headband in place until her friend went home (when we were both a bit confused about if we should return the head band or not; we tried, and when the mom insisted we kept it, she stuck it back atop her head). Guess now we know that more accessories are better...
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| What we do for fun--can you find all 5 Josephs (including the cat)? |
The next day I saw the girl's mother as we both headed to the market stores at the same time. I'm not sure about the details, but this mother is supposedly somewhat well-known throughout the city, being some sort of TV personality. So she seems to be a bit of a strong personality, and definitely comes across as a really confident woman. When we started chatting about her daughter, I was so saddened when she immediately began to compare her precious 11 year old with her 4 year old younger sister. In Chinese culture, it's totally normal to compare kids and to have favorites (we're regularly asked which of our four kids is our favorite). But I didn't know that it is obviously the norm in the U culture as well, so I was shocked when the mother was explaining to me how great her 4 year old is because she has such an outgoing personality and loves to dance and sing, whereas her 11 year old is reserved and shy (and small for her age). This broke my heart, and I was completely frustrated by my lack of ability to go on and on about how precious I think the 11 year old is! I just didn't have the words in Chinese that I needed. I gave it all I could to pump her up, and then returned home with a new fervor to study more--to get those adjectives that I wanted to share what a gift that little girl is! Look out lady; I've got the vocab now and am armed and ready for another "bash your kid" session to be shot to pieces! And I'm thinking what a great opportunity to invest in a precious little girl who undoubtedly feels the favoritism in her home; I'm just not sure how that wouldn't be a major shaping influence on any child's life.
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| Table set and ready for guests--always! A sign of being hospitable... |
I'm finally figuring out how hospitality works in this culture. Or maybe I should say, "starting to figure out..." It's complicated and such a high value that it takes serious study in order to do it well and not offend. This past week we had a neighbor family give us a huge honor--they brought us some of their dinner! Just at dinner time, one of their kids showed up with a plate filled with spring rolls that they had made. They left the food and the plate with us and scooted back to their home for their own supper. I've heard that delivering whatever you're eating to good friends is a way of showing hospitality to close friends, so I was delighted to see that some of my times spent "a callin" and delivering banana bread and chocolate chip cookies was seemingly being reciprocated! Now I will confess that this prompted an additional purchase this week, too. I'm a little leery of how the whole "drop your dish off with the food on it" works, specifically in regard to returning the plate. I know in theory you are supposed to put something else that you've made on the dish and return it; but the problem is what if they don't do so? Or what if it takes a month to return? Not sure what the statute of limitations is on returning the plate, but I don't have that many to spare, and I'm kind of partial to my Corelle set that is all matching. So all that to say, I decided to purchase a "song-ing" (the Chinese word for deliver-ing) platter and bowl and make food delivery another part of my routine. We'll see how the neighbors like my western cooking! (I did eat a bite of the spring rolls--which I confess, I hate! The seaweed wrapper just does me in every time...and I ended up spitting the bite into the trash. Don't tell my kids, I just couldn't get it down.)
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| Boys lunch during one of the "sick days" |
I've mentioned before how crazy the ideas of what causes sickness are around here. Well, springs where we live are strange as far as the weather goes. It's still in the 30's most days, but then it can occasionally jump up into the 50's. These rapid changes in temperature are NOT okay with our Chinese neighbors--we are all destined for major illness!!! So even if it's up in the 50's, you're going to see people dressed in their full down (or fur) coats, along with all the cold-weather accessories you can imagine. Our good friends have two of their kids still in Chinese school, and we all kind of cracked up when they canceled school for 3 days (that just never happens here) because a quarter of the class was sick. The reason--they all needed to stay home and indoors because being out in the weather change was making the whole school get under the weather! No mention of washing hands or spreading germs, but it was all contingent upon the rapid fluctuation in the temperature being too much to endure! And even more funny was that at the same school where the sick germs were obviously circulating, another one of the kids (also with a good number of sickies in her class) had a party. One in which they were doing cooking together! Guess what they made? Fruit salad! When the fruit salad was prepared, the whole class enjoyed it--all out of one bowl, which is typical Chinese style of eating!
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| What we do for fun on long, cold winter days! |
When I went "a callin" this past weekend, the neighbors I visited shared that their two little kids were sick and they were about to head to the hospital. I expected the kids to be acting pretty puny, so I was surprised as I hurriedly downed my cup of tea (I wasn't sure if I needed to finish the whole thing in order to be polite!) and watched the little boy and girl bouncing around the room, giggling happily together. They had had fevers for the past two days, so the normal is to take your kid to the hospital and get an IV for them! How extreme does that seem for us? Eating and drinking normally, but a slight fever for a few days leads to a day or more in the hospital! My kids are thankful we haven't followed the traditional eastern ideas for medicine...
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| Bball in the COLD! |
Our weekends have been especially full as of late. Usually Kevin has baseball on Saturday afternoons, so he heads off with a carful of kids--literally up to 10 at a time in our smallish mini-van--along with another coach or two and a rear end filled with all the required equipment. The last few weekends the temps have been above freezing and there have been more kids than usual showing up, so they've moved to having their practices outside rather than the indoor, underground facility that has pillars scattered throughout, making the view from second base to the batter's box somewhat of a challenge. So last weekend I went along to help out; Kevin even let me borrow one of his gloves with his name stitched on it! :) I was shocked by a few things: 1) how cold it was once the sun had gone down a bit (you can see the snow still surrounding the turf field we use in the picture), and 2) how MOST of the kids who come have little to no coordination! It's amazing to see how most of the kids in the 6-8 year old bracket can't begin to catch or throw a ball to save their lives. Participation in regular sports here is such an anomaly that the kids just don't develop what we totally take for granted as being "normal" in the US. So I did a lot of running and chasing balls that were so far out of my reach I didn't have a chance to get to them! One of our neighbors is a 16 year old and he was explaining to us this past weekend how he has to study for a basketball test. We're still confused on the details, but it sounds like he has no basketball classes or instruction, yet somehow he has to take a test (we're still not sure if it's just a written exam or an actual skills test) in a few weeks! The Chinese educational system does love tests...
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| Kevin's extra clinic for adults--loving to act like kids! |
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| English lesson in session in our living room |
Before baseball practice Karis and Eli have discovered a new way to earn a few bucks. They are teaching English lessons to a neighbor! One of the moms that I've gotten to know has been asking me for months if we're sure we don't have time to have her son come over and just do school with my kids. Now, this young man doesn't speak a lick of English, so I was pretty sure that it might cramp my regular homeschool routine (which is all in English, except when the Chinese tutor comes in the afternoons four days a week). But I did finally tell her that Karis and Eli have been wanting to 1) teach, and 2) make some spending money, and she jumped at the chance! So 4 weeks ago the kids started preparing lessons, each of them teaching for a half-hour (so it's a total of an hour for their young friend). It's worked out so well! The kids have really surprised me with how responsible they've been, working during the week to prepare power point presentations to present new material, games for them to play to practice vocab, and even homework for him to take home and bring back the following week. His mom seems pleased and the little guys seems to love it also, and Karis and Eli each earn the equivalent of several dollars every week that they can spend at their discretion.
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| The start of the problem.... |
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| ...and the counter-flow solution. |
And the last crazy cultural moment was just this morning. I was sitting in my nook, the really small space off our master bedroom where I do my morning reading, when mayhem ensued below. People yelling (that I could hear our closed windows, eight floors above the commotion), horns blaring, dogs barking. I stopped my reading to check out the scene only to find that someone was obviously staging a protest right at our apartment complex's exit gate. Their car was parked there and they weren't budging! This happens pretty frequently when there's a dispute over payment that needs to be made before the security guard allows the vehicle to leave. Well this morning it had everyone backed up for quite a distance, right at the hour when people were trying to get to work. The solution? Move one of the somewhat portable flower fixtures so that the cars could squeeze through (if they went VERY slowly) to get to the other side of the guard house and go out the entrance of the complex. What a mess! Cars continued to blast their horns and even the older dancing ladies who meet in the courtyard daily to exercise through dance paused to observe what sort of fight might break out. I think we did avoid that this time, but the cars certainly passed slowly through those planters. Ahhh. Never a dull moment!
