Meeting an Old Friend:

I had a chance to meet up with my old professor and great friend last weekend for a quick night out on Beijing. John taught me Chinese my freshman year for a semester before he returned to Beijing to teach at a University in the city. This arranged meeting took place after weeks of phone and email tag and shuffling of schedules. Finally we had a time and date that seemed firm.

To give you a mental picture it’s a beautiful Saturday evening in Beijing. It’s been windy the night before and early into the morning hours so now the sky is beautifully clear. To my west you can see the beautiful ridgeline that boards Beijing and the setting orb that we call the sun. Around four John calls to tell me that he is coming to pick me up in front of my dorm.

I never got a clear answer and that’s because I never asked for it (really rude) as to why it took him an hour to find me but that’s life. I had a chance to survey the sky and take in the beauty of the setting sun. After the cursory handshake and entry into his car I gave him the customary gift (always give your host a gift in China) of some distinctly American things.

As a note to the reader in China gifts are expected anytime someone else is hosting you. Appropriate gifts are tea sets, chocolate, paintings, and anything that is distinctly your culture. Also of note is that the actual value of the object does not really matter it’s the act/thought that they respect. But do not give a clock watches are acceptable but not clocks. The reason is that the word clock uses a word in Chinese that is similar to death so giving it will be accepted as saying “go die”.

Back to the recanting:
John had me as a captive audience to practice his English and me my Chinese as we drove across Beijing visiting the Olympic pavilions, the Bell tower, cultural park and other local sights. All the sights were beautiful and I have the pictures to prove it but most of all I enjoyed the company of an old friend. Laoshi (teacher) as I refer to John allowed me gave me an opportunity to unwind and relax. A couple of things stuck in my mind from that night.

The first is that he asked me whether or not I was becoming a monk. That question which he delivered in Chinese gave me some raised eyebrows. Perhaps I misunderstood his question was my first thought but no I had heard the correct words. “No, no I am not becoming a monk, why do you ask?” came my reply. “Oh well you are at the monk university didn’t you know?” was his response. The monk university, what was he talking about was my first thought. I had been on campus nearly five weeks at this point and I still hadn’t seen a single monk.

After much confusion and stumbling (thanks to my Chinese not his English) I came to understand the original question. Tsinghua is the paramount Engineering and Physics university in China similar to our MIT or RPI. His question was directed towards the absolute disproportion of men to women. In a school of 34,000 I would guess that maybe 3,000 are women. So to answer his question no I was not becoming a monk.

The night ended eating what the Chinese consider a rare and expensive delicacy, Shark Fin soup. I am not going to go into detail about this because I don’t know enough to argue for or against it. I will say that there is controversy over this soup and by animal and conservation groups. As to the actual eating of the soup well its good but I wouldn’t pick it again. Its fish, oily, and too expensive. That night was a well need break from the mundane routine that four hours a day of class can provide. I was glad to be out and on the road with a good friend to keep me company.