I feel like I’ve had one long day since I left my house punctuated with bouts of sleeping that don’t last long enough. I guess I am just as susceptible to jetlag as anyone else (even though I’ve at least mentally convinced myself that I will not succumb. I call it will power. Others call it denial.).
We had breakfast at a bakery before we went back to the school for more presentations on music. Eating breakfast is almost more of an adventure than dinner. At least at dinner I can understand what meat is in a dish and the basic method of preparation. Breakfast is just shooting blinding in the dark and hoping I like whatever pastry/gruel I’m eating. Alas, today was a least than fortunate morning in that regard.
Today’s music history and demonstrations started with video clips of traditional Taiwanese nose flutes. Yes, nose flutes. Vertical nose flutes are completely unique to the aboriginal tribes of Taiwan, though horizontal flutes can be found other places at well. I’m not entirely sure I’d ever want to try someone else’s nose flute…
A graduate student came in and played the Pipa for us. It’s a stringed instrument very similar to the Sitar (Middle East) or the Lute (Europe). I think it might be my favorite Asian instrument (I still like the Southern style of music better). Strings are better than wind or brass, not that I’ve really seen a brass Asian instrument yet.
The other instrument we saw was the Zen, another with strings. It’s more a flat board on legs with many strings that you pluck/strum/vibrate. If you’ve seen Hero with Jet Li there’s an old man playing a Zen in one of the fight scenes (in a courtyard while it’s raining). We got to try it ourselves. I was first since everyone always looks like a deer in the headlights the moment you ask someone to put themselves on the spot.
For lunch, we met some graduate students from the University who were going to be our language partners. We found this idea to be rather stupid, even though we really liked the people. We’re only going to be here another day after all and not see them again after this afternoon. But whatever.
We went to a restaurant called Ding Tai Feng (they have a couple of branches in America) that apparently is famous for its dumplings. It was quite crowded and we had to wait a bit before we could get a table. The food was worth it though. There is a type of dumplings that are very good and if you get a chance should try them. They’ve got “soup” in them. A normal rounded dumpling with some sort of filling but also flavored broth. It’s amazingly good.
I got to practice some of my Chinese with the grad student sitting next to me and the professor at our table. I wish more people would just talk Chinese continuously to us like that. It really helps it come back. My Chinese is a little worse than it was this summer, tone and pronunciation wise, but I think that’ll be helped soon enough. I know more words so the range of discussion I can hold is greater, even if I sound like an American. Meh, that’s probably not so bad considering I am.
After lunch we went to an Art/Calligraphy lecture. All the lectures have been very interesting so far and this was no different, even though I’m not much of an art connoisseur.
Chinese writing is probably older than 3,000 years (the earliest dated piece of writing is already pretty well thought out) and has gone through some evolution through the years. Characters are based on pictures and there is/were five major scripts (only one of which I have any capability reading): seal, clerical, standard, running, and cursive. Only standard and running are commonly used for writing.
What I got most from that lecture was what makes a good calligrapher. I know it’s hard-I had a class in it over the summer, but it still didn’t explain why some people were so impressed with some calligraphers that they were nearly considered gods. She never said it explicitly but I gathered that the impressiveness is in how well an artist can get the nuisances right. The skill it takes to make the very small adjustments in a perfect stroke is rare to find. Also, because characters have a definitive pattern in the way which they must be written you can follow the artist stroke by stroke and compare different strokes of the same kind to each other. This allows you to judge whether the artist was in a hurry, calm, etc. Basically you can get to know the artist.
Professor Bien arranged for us to hang out with some of our language partners from lunch in the evening for karaoke. We had free time in which we all clung to our beds and then met them to go to wherever we went.
The Chinese take karaoke very seriously. We went to a spot that could’ve been a hotel with the multiple floors, chandeliers, glass doors etc. It might have been a hotel that was converted later on. You also get a party room for your own and can order drinks and snacks. The book that displayed the songs you could choose was enormous but the section for English songs was itty bitty. Most of them were rather old (Bob Dylan, Scorpions, and things I remember from the 90’s) but there was also an obscene amount of Britney Spears. Some of the songs were pirated and we always knew which songs was legit vs. not by the music video that would play the words of the song. If it was pirated it always ended up being some vaguely creepy Australian white women in a shirt that was too short looking off into the distance or swiveling around. Sometimes there’d be a guy around too.
I think most of us sang at least part of one song and after we made it back to rooms we pretty much went straight to bed. I think it’s going to be a trend.
Monday, January 26, 2009
January 19, 2009: Taipei
This day was possibly the longest I’ve had ever, even longer than the 3 in 1 day I had yesterday. Our director, Gloria Bien, is attempting to keep us from having a chance to sleep and give in to jet lag. She was wildly successful today.
But before I get into the long and short (though there’s nothing brief in it) about what we did today, allow me to explain what this trip is in more detail as well as who’s with me.
Including our director, there’s a total of 13 (Go Colgate!) of us on this study group. There’s me, Tram (my roommate), Clarissa, Georgia, Becky, Tina, Ellie, Lauren, Ned, Eric, Geoff, and Gary. Thirteen people may not sound like a lot, but when you move in a pack, it’s cumbersome and terribly awkward being a giant group of foreigners. I like them all thus far, though I’m sure everyone will get on everyone’s nerves at some point during the semester. It’s only inevitable with the nature of this trip (small, rather exclusive). Tram’s pretty cool to room with. We verbally abuse each other on an hourly basis but it’s fun- like a game of one man up. It keeps you on your feet having to think up a contextually appropriate insulting response.
Way to go Colgate for diversity. Of all of us, we have four people with some kind of Asian descent, the brown West Indian (me), and an African American. Sadly none of us are blond. A real shame in my opinion. We’ve already run into the phenomena of Chinese people assuming that Geoff, Gary, Tram, Ellie, and Georgia understand/are Chinese. They can’t decide if they like it or not. I don’t think I’ll run into this probably. Go European heritage!
Chinese New Year’s is on the 26th or 27th so all the students are currently on vacation. We can’t start our classes in Beijing until a little while after New Year’s so our study abroad will begin with a two week vacation trip in Taiwan and Hong Kong. I don’t really know yet what our schedule is while we’re here. After Hong Kong we’ll head to Beijing for most of the rest of the semester, though we have a trip planned to Shanghai and Hangzhou as well as a week off for Spring Break.
Last night we didn’t crash into bed as soon as we walked in, but it was pretty close. We unpacked just the tiniest bit and checked our emails. We had to be up in time to eat and move out to our lecture on Taiwanese and Chinese tradition musical instruments. You’d think that 3 hours would be a long time to listen to presentations, but it was all very interesting. The mini demonstrational concerts we received was definitely a help in keeping the interest there.
The first instrument that we saw was a giant stick-looking Pestel used to grind millet by the Thae. Apparently the aboriginals used it functionally for a while before realizing that the thumping could be turned into functional harvesting AND music. We got to handle several and try our hand at thumping in the front courtyard. Bluntly, cumulatively we have absolutely no musical talent.
Next was the Huqin, or erhu as I better know it. It’s a two stringed instrument that creates that is often played in a pentatonic scale (five notes) that most people associate with Chinese music. It’s got a round shaped sound box made of wood with one side cover with [snake] skin. The neck is typically made of cow bone. Wood in China means bamboo 99.99% of the time. Just so you know.
The two strings are played with a bow of horse hair. First crafted in the Tang Dynasty, this instrument has gone through some changes, but it mostly the same as it was in the beginning. The graduate student performing it for us explained that it can do nearly everything any other stringed instrument of comparable size can do, ex: violin. She then proceeded to play a concerto which sounded remarkably like a violin. It’s also amazing at imitating animal sounds. She had it twitter like song birds, bark like a sick dog, and whiney like a horse.
The Erhu is a great example that simplicity sometimes is best. With only two strings it manages to do everything you could really ever need an instrument to do-sound good, sound bad, and sound like an animal.
Another student demonstrated the Dizi (笛子), the Chinese traditional flute, in its different sizes. It started out as a bone flute not too long ago… only about 9,000 years ago. Unlike our flutes, one flute plays one key so players end up carrying a lot of different sized flutes, which they may switch mid-song if need be. The two main categories the flutes fall under are the Bandi and Qudi, northern and southern styles respectively. I like the Qudi much better. Northern style music is all this high, bright, fast, and borderline hysterical nonsense. Probably because life was/is rather difficult compared to the south. Southern style is slower, more methodical where you can actually hear notes that aren’t trying to make your ear drums bleed.
The whole thing was just awesome and now I’m inspired. Not inspired enough to go and learn one, but enough that I’ll buy a pirated CD of good classical music when I reach Beijing. Along with several dozen pirated movies. I’ll probably have a few of the new ones before you get to watch them in theaters.
We had lunch at some Vegetarian place. It was cool, but nothing terribly special remains in my mind other than what really ought to have been meat wasn’t. Or maybe it was. You never can believe what people tell you…
Following lunch we went back to the University where we were giving a briefing and tour of the Mandarin Training Center (MTC), one of the best learn-Chinese programs in Taiwan. Several high profile people are alumni including the current Australian Prime Minister. I would have been more impressed with someone like Will Smith. Who cares for foreign politics? Just kidding.
They explained their program and were super nice to us. To fully display how they help their students learn Chinese language and culture they included us in a make-certain-New Year’s-type-of-food workshop. Fangao and Anguiguo to be exact. Those names as much to me as they do to you I’m sure. Like every other candy, dessert, and food in general, Fangao and Anguguo are made of rice at the most basic level. Fangao is a thing you pour into a pink or red cup as full as possible. The top will “explode” when you bake it and the more it explodes, the better your future fortune and luck will be. Anguguo is a red sticky rice paste rolled around red bean paste and put into a flat mold shaped like a turtle. The turtle is supposed to symbolize longevity and fortune.
In addition to having no musical talent, none of us will be master chefs. All of our turtles ended up looking like it swallowed a fish that was too big for its stomach. We can’t even blame confusion since everything was first spoken in Chinese and then English. What I can blame mine on is exhaustion. Halfway through the wave of tired bowled me over like a dead fish (lovely metaphor right?) and all I could think about was sleep. But alas, we must continue to drag ourselves through this endless day.
Continuing on, we now leave to meet Dr. Steven Bradbury, an American who’s been teaching here in a Taiwanese university for the past 11 years. He specializes in poetry, but doesn’t teach it here since there’s no infrastructure to teach that sort of thing. Ironic considering the great poets of Ancient Asia. We went to Mei’s Tea bar and hung out there for several hours while he talked to us about various things about Taiwan and poetry.
After we finished at the tea bar, Professor Bradbury took us to the night market near the school. My experience there consisted of walking down the main street for about one minute, ducking into a diner (I refuse to use the word restaurant to describe most of the places I eat at. It doesn’t convey the right message) that had noodles for dinner with Bien and eventually the rest of the study group (who stumbled in later because we gravitate towards even when we actively try to avoid it) and heading back to the dorms. I plan to look at it again later when I’m not stumbling like a drunkard.
Soon I’ll put down some of my initial impressions of Taiwan, but since I’m (still) tired and this is already pretty long, I’m gonna call it a night.
But before I get into the long and short (though there’s nothing brief in it) about what we did today, allow me to explain what this trip is in more detail as well as who’s with me.
Including our director, there’s a total of 13 (Go Colgate!) of us on this study group. There’s me, Tram (my roommate), Clarissa, Georgia, Becky, Tina, Ellie, Lauren, Ned, Eric, Geoff, and Gary. Thirteen people may not sound like a lot, but when you move in a pack, it’s cumbersome and terribly awkward being a giant group of foreigners. I like them all thus far, though I’m sure everyone will get on everyone’s nerves at some point during the semester. It’s only inevitable with the nature of this trip (small, rather exclusive). Tram’s pretty cool to room with. We verbally abuse each other on an hourly basis but it’s fun- like a game of one man up. It keeps you on your feet having to think up a contextually appropriate insulting response.
Way to go Colgate for diversity. Of all of us, we have four people with some kind of Asian descent, the brown West Indian (me), and an African American. Sadly none of us are blond. A real shame in my opinion. We’ve already run into the phenomena of Chinese people assuming that Geoff, Gary, Tram, Ellie, and Georgia understand/are Chinese. They can’t decide if they like it or not. I don’t think I’ll run into this probably. Go European heritage!
Chinese New Year’s is on the 26th or 27th so all the students are currently on vacation. We can’t start our classes in Beijing until a little while after New Year’s so our study abroad will begin with a two week vacation trip in Taiwan and Hong Kong. I don’t really know yet what our schedule is while we’re here. After Hong Kong we’ll head to Beijing for most of the rest of the semester, though we have a trip planned to Shanghai and Hangzhou as well as a week off for Spring Break.
Last night we didn’t crash into bed as soon as we walked in, but it was pretty close. We unpacked just the tiniest bit and checked our emails. We had to be up in time to eat and move out to our lecture on Taiwanese and Chinese tradition musical instruments. You’d think that 3 hours would be a long time to listen to presentations, but it was all very interesting. The mini demonstrational concerts we received was definitely a help in keeping the interest there.
The first instrument that we saw was a giant stick-looking Pestel used to grind millet by the Thae. Apparently the aboriginals used it functionally for a while before realizing that the thumping could be turned into functional harvesting AND music. We got to handle several and try our hand at thumping in the front courtyard. Bluntly, cumulatively we have absolutely no musical talent.
Next was the Huqin, or erhu as I better know it. It’s a two stringed instrument that creates that is often played in a pentatonic scale (five notes) that most people associate with Chinese music. It’s got a round shaped sound box made of wood with one side cover with [snake] skin. The neck is typically made of cow bone. Wood in China means bamboo 99.99% of the time. Just so you know.
The two strings are played with a bow of horse hair. First crafted in the Tang Dynasty, this instrument has gone through some changes, but it mostly the same as it was in the beginning. The graduate student performing it for us explained that it can do nearly everything any other stringed instrument of comparable size can do, ex: violin. She then proceeded to play a concerto which sounded remarkably like a violin. It’s also amazing at imitating animal sounds. She had it twitter like song birds, bark like a sick dog, and whiney like a horse.
The Erhu is a great example that simplicity sometimes is best. With only two strings it manages to do everything you could really ever need an instrument to do-sound good, sound bad, and sound like an animal.
Another student demonstrated the Dizi (笛子), the Chinese traditional flute, in its different sizes. It started out as a bone flute not too long ago… only about 9,000 years ago. Unlike our flutes, one flute plays one key so players end up carrying a lot of different sized flutes, which they may switch mid-song if need be. The two main categories the flutes fall under are the Bandi and Qudi, northern and southern styles respectively. I like the Qudi much better. Northern style music is all this high, bright, fast, and borderline hysterical nonsense. Probably because life was/is rather difficult compared to the south. Southern style is slower, more methodical where you can actually hear notes that aren’t trying to make your ear drums bleed.
The whole thing was just awesome and now I’m inspired. Not inspired enough to go and learn one, but enough that I’ll buy a pirated CD of good classical music when I reach Beijing. Along with several dozen pirated movies. I’ll probably have a few of the new ones before you get to watch them in theaters.
We had lunch at some Vegetarian place. It was cool, but nothing terribly special remains in my mind other than what really ought to have been meat wasn’t. Or maybe it was. You never can believe what people tell you…
Following lunch we went back to the University where we were giving a briefing and tour of the Mandarin Training Center (MTC), one of the best learn-Chinese programs in Taiwan. Several high profile people are alumni including the current Australian Prime Minister. I would have been more impressed with someone like Will Smith. Who cares for foreign politics? Just kidding.
They explained their program and were super nice to us. To fully display how they help their students learn Chinese language and culture they included us in a make-certain-New Year’s-type-of-food workshop. Fangao and Anguiguo to be exact. Those names as much to me as they do to you I’m sure. Like every other candy, dessert, and food in general, Fangao and Anguguo are made of rice at the most basic level. Fangao is a thing you pour into a pink or red cup as full as possible. The top will “explode” when you bake it and the more it explodes, the better your future fortune and luck will be. Anguguo is a red sticky rice paste rolled around red bean paste and put into a flat mold shaped like a turtle. The turtle is supposed to symbolize longevity and fortune.
In addition to having no musical talent, none of us will be master chefs. All of our turtles ended up looking like it swallowed a fish that was too big for its stomach. We can’t even blame confusion since everything was first spoken in Chinese and then English. What I can blame mine on is exhaustion. Halfway through the wave of tired bowled me over like a dead fish (lovely metaphor right?) and all I could think about was sleep. But alas, we must continue to drag ourselves through this endless day.
Continuing on, we now leave to meet Dr. Steven Bradbury, an American who’s been teaching here in a Taiwanese university for the past 11 years. He specializes in poetry, but doesn’t teach it here since there’s no infrastructure to teach that sort of thing. Ironic considering the great poets of Ancient Asia. We went to Mei’s Tea bar and hung out there for several hours while he talked to us about various things about Taiwan and poetry.
After we finished at the tea bar, Professor Bradbury took us to the night market near the school. My experience there consisted of walking down the main street for about one minute, ducking into a diner (I refuse to use the word restaurant to describe most of the places I eat at. It doesn’t convey the right message) that had noodles for dinner with Bien and eventually the rest of the study group (who stumbled in later because we gravitate towards even when we actively try to avoid it) and heading back to the dorms. I plan to look at it again later when I’m not stumbling like a drunkard.
Soon I’ll put down some of my initial impressions of Taiwan, but since I’m (still) tired and this is already pretty long, I’m gonna call it a night.
January 17-19. (The 18th went the wayside with the time zone change): Various
I am back in China…kind of. If you ask Americans what Taiwan is, they’ll say a separate country. If you ask Taiwanese, they’ll also say it’s a different country. If you ask all of mainland China, Taiwan is China. Personally, I haven’t decided. China is an ambiguous place in general. The places within the defined borders are so vastly different from each other and people can’t always communicate with each other (even though technically, it’s all one country).
Anyway, the flight was obscenely long this time. Over the summer when I went, I had a direct flight from JFK to Beijing which totally only about 13 hours. This time I had a connection in Detroit (where I met up with four other classmates) to Osaka and then to our final destination of Taipai, Taiwan. In total it took us 27 hours of travel. It should have taken only 25, but for some reason I still don’t understand, we sat on the tarmac in Detroit for two hours. Once we got to Taipei we took a bus to National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU), the place where we’ll be staying for a while.
We don’t know much of where exactly we’ll be staying or doing yet, but we’ll spend two weeks (including Chinese New Year) in Taiwan, take a flight to Hong Kong and spend a few days there, before finally going to Beijing to start our classes.
China: Round 2!
Hi there, just a brief introduction. I'll be doing the journal thing again for my (and yours, but mostly mine) convenience. The format will be the same, but I expect that in the first two or 3 weeks there'll be a lot of stuff to talk about. After that it'll probably tail off as I get into the swing of daily life and classes. Don't be afraid of all the stuff I write in the beginning. Think of it more as a getting all the important details out of the way first.
You'll have to forgive me for lecturing on certain topics for a bit. I tend to use these journals not only to remember my impressions of places, but also the things I that I learn and find useful for later. So if I run on with a rather academic topic for a bit, feel free to skip over it.
I'll figure something out with pictures eventually and tell you when I do. Enjoy!
You'll have to forgive me for lecturing on certain topics for a bit. I tend to use these journals not only to remember my impressions of places, but also the things I that I learn and find useful for later. So if I run on with a rather academic topic for a bit, feel free to skip over it.
I'll figure something out with pictures eventually and tell you when I do. Enjoy!
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