acrobatics and more class

This past Monday, we went as a group to a Chinese acrobatics show. It was advertised as something "beautiful, novel, odd and thrilling," although I have to admit the most thrilling part (in a negative way) was when one of the acrobats actually almost fell off his equipment that was suspended from the ceiling--it could have ended very badly, but fortunately it didn't. In the lobby, they had a giant poster for the movie Australia with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, which I thought was rather interesting (especially the translations of their names--Hugh Jackman's translation means (syllable by syllable): to rest, heroism, subdue, and handsome. They also had a poster for a movie that had quite possibly the cutest puppy ever on it called "10 Promises to My Dog." Needless to say, I want to see that movie!!

The acrobatics show itself was rather lackluster. What I thought was that there was zero interaction between the sexes the entire show--when women were on the stage, ONLY women were on the stage, and the same for men. The women always did something having to do with flexibility (pulling legs over their heads, fitting 12 people on one bicycle, and so on), whereas the men always had these tribal drums and almost barbaric costumes on as they performed. The acrobatics were cool, but by the end I was kind of expecting it--just thinking, yeah THAT'S no big deal...when really it was I guess. One of the pictures is of one guy being pretty much catapulted backwards up onto a chaise suspended on a pole. The other is a man balancing on some sort of tube and board, holding a younger man doing the same on the table on the bottom guy's shoulders (it's really hard to explain..), as well as two women just hanging out onto the bottom guy.

Other than that, this week has been pretty predictable: going to class. I meet for 20 hours worth of class a week. Each session is 2 hours, and on Tuesday I have 3 straight classes, which means 6 straight hours--it's rough! I'm getting 16.5 credit hours for this though, 15 of which are going toward my major (which is half of the credit requirements for the major!!), so I can finish my Chinese major here. I'm taking Readings in Chinese, Spoken Chinese, Chinese Grammar Mistakes and Chinese Pronunciation, none of which are gripping classes, but they are definitely informative.

This week I learned that, among other things, Mao is revered for his skills calligraphy. We were doing a grammar exercise using an expression to reach the peak, the very best of a discipline. Among those who have reached this status were Shakespeare for his poetry, Beethoven for his music, and...Mao Zedong, for his calligraphy.

One thing I also found entertaining in my class is how apparent the generation gap is between some of my professors. Most are using Powerpoint in class, and it is very clear which ones grasp the concept and which ones don't. My older professors don't quite understand that the point of Powerpoint is to make a presentation, not to leave it in edit mode the entire time (that is, when they can figure out how to make the computer actually connect to the projector). It's not like this is unique to China (this has happened at Notre Dame many a time), but it's just fun to see technological problems solved in an entirely new language, when the "Start" button is the "开始" button, and "My Computer" is "我的电脑".

I've found that (not surprisingly), it's incredibly difficult to blend in around here (especially with my beacon of Westernness, my blonde hair). Obviously, walking around it's hard not to notice that I look different than everyone else. It's one thing to be aware of your own differences with those around you, but to be constantly made aware of them by other people is a whole different game. Staring at foreigners isn't considered taboo here, in fact it is quite the pastime for the locals. Most of the people on campus are used to international students, so my presence is not that much of a special occasion for them, but for others it apparently is. As a group of Westerners, they will watch us do everything and we always wonder what it is that fascinates them so--how we hold our chopsticks? how we eat? how we interact? I suppose it's nice to know we're providing so much food for thought for the locals, but it's definitely quite an experience knowing that we're pretty much constantly being watched.

This weekend, I'm planning to go exploring more around the city, so hopefully I'll have more to report then!