NYC & ASL

Just got back from NYC today, had a pretty awesome trip where we got to do some shopping, see two plays, go to 2 museums, see 2 old friends and my cousin and see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We went to see Avenue Q which Cam didn't really understand too much as it had a lot of cultural things in it and a lot of English that one would have to understand. It was a very liberal play with a lot of very cute jokes in it done about 3 "real people" and 5 or 6 puppets (people dressed in black walking around holding and talking for the puppets) who lived on a street in NYC. There were no scene changes so it was a fairly boring action play, you really just had to follow what they were singing about to enjoy. The second play we went to was much more enjoyable for Cam. I also enjoyed it a lot, it's called Blue Man's Group and it was very involved with very little English (in fact the couple of times that there was English to be understood it was almost completely unintelligible - which was the funny part). Cam and I were only a little bummed about the museums cause unfortunately we left the Met till the last day (Monday) and it's closed on Mondays. We went to the Guggenheim instead but aside from it's pretty awesome architecture there was not too much art to be seen inside (that was of any good anyways).

Today was my first day of ASL (American Sign Language). It was pretty cool, we learned the alphabet (which I already knew) and how to say "my name is" and little nuances like the fact that in ASL there is no articles or verb "to be". It reminds me a lot of Chinese, they said some of the "words" are very easy to see what they mean and others aren't, plus there's no future or past tense, and no articles or verb "to be" (all the same as Chinese). Plus we learned some differences in politeness, like how one shouldn't point at people in the "hearing world" but how it's not only okay but to be expected in the ASL world as it means "you". She also taught us how they sometimes do things like stomp on the floor (depending on the room it can sometimes make vibrations in the floor that the students notice) or flicker the lights to get student's attention. Which are again things that one wouldn't usually do in the hearing world. I found it really interesting and am looking forward to going to the next class!

Improvement

Sometimes it is shocking the rate of improvement you can see in other people. Dad's back to speaking at his normal rate and he's actually getting it! He's almost at a rate where dad can get everything he's saying. He's still a little slow but dad says things repetitively as a habit so he catches on when dad repeats things. I'm really proud of him! And it's amazing the rate at which I can actually see him getting better!

Few Poems

They
Rich, high in their own world
Blonde hair with small silver crowns in their hair
A 50 kuai beer
(30 kuai more than any bar and at least 40 kuai more than from a store)
to them is cheap
Would never imagine someone speaking anything other than English
never take something other than a car with chaeuffer
never imagine buying clothes other than Emporio Armani
never have a care for the world around them
never think of entering ...

I
Poor, low in a chair that looms over me
Brown raggedly curled hair, no crown
A 50 kuai meal
(cheaper than any bought here)
to me is expensive
Hates when locals speak any other than their own
Hates anything but local transit
Could care less the brand
Never thinks of anything but the world around
Likes to sometimes pretend about ...





That was a poem that I wrote while I was in a bar in Shanghai waiting for Cam to come back from his trip to southern Guangdong. The following I don't remember when I wrote. Probably while thinking too much as usual. Hope these are poems you haven't seen before as I wrote them quite a while ago but am just now recovering them from an old notebook.



As for I?
I have simply
created a world
which you can't see
from your side
of the grass.

Few Poems

Corruption and Intelligence

China is showing a bit of it's corruption in style. Apparently during the Opening of the Olympics there was a little girl "singing", only she wasn't singing. She was lipsinking to the real singer who was forced to hide behind the curtain due to her "ugliness". Also a couple of the Chinese gymnasts are underage, due to the fact that their "passports" have ages that are over the age limit they are allowed to perform. What people may not realize is that a Chinese passport rarely has their actual birthdate. First of all many Chinese people do not know their actual birthdates, as the birthdate they celebrate is from the lunar calendar not the solar one. Also it is very easy to get someone to put the "wrong date" on your passport, whether by mistake or on purpose. Finally there are a large number of seats at the Olympics that aren't full. Many sold out before the competitions even began but a lot of the people who originally bought the seats for much lowered prices aren't showing up for the events, therefore there are a lot of people standing in line outside the events that could sit in the seats but are being told that all the seats are sold out. This is typical China for ya!

As for intelligence, my dad read me a line in the paper today from a woman who was looking for an intelligent person and was told to lower her standards and try to date people who haven't finished their education. Unfortunately this didn't help her. I think this is very true, unfortuantely in the US the majority of people who don't finish their education really aren't educated, or very intelligent. However in many other countries (like China and India) there are way too many people who aren't educated who are extremely bright. This is due to the fact that school is paid for by the government through the end of high school in the US whereas in China one has to pay for every single year of education, from elementary school on. They have no free public schools, or schools paid for by taxes. Thus I have managed to find, on my trips and in my husband, a large number of extremely intelligent people who haven't finished middle school, forget high school.

Got a little stuck today

I got a little stuck today in some ways.

First of all biculturally, as usual. At work. First of all he can't figure out how to feed himself for lunch. At the salon his mother brings food to them every lunchtime and they all sit and eat the hot food together. As opposed to here in the US where most people take their own lunch to work and we have break rooms (thank god for those, I was missing them in China where my schools never had them). Second he's on QQ at work. For those of you wo don't know QQ is like AIM (American Instant Messaging) but in China instead of in America. This is a very common occurrance in China, in fact Cam talks to his mother and people from his Salon through QQ while they are at work almost every day. However, in the US chatting on-line is something that we try to avoid and that's almost banned in most places. So I just had a talk with him and told him he couldn't do it at work. Third the tendency for Chinese people at work is not really to think about what they're doing, just to do it. So they get super bored while they're working. I don't know how it is for a lot of Americans but for me I spend most of the tedious time during work thinking, either about how to do the work better or differently or about something else that I need to be doing. This leads to me bringing up ideas to my superiors (or whoever gave me the work for the day) which is a huge no-no in China. In fact in China one is not allowed to think up any new or different ways to do things and if they are allowed to think of them they sure aren't allowed to tell them to anyone else. Finally I came home with a Chinese book today and the first thing that he asked me was how much it cost. I took this as a bit offensive as it meant to me that he didn't care about where I got the book, or what I was going to do with it, or whether it was a good book, just how much it cost. However, he was just thinking as a typical businessman about how much profit one could make bringing a Chinese book over here and selling it. Bicultural relationships sure are interesting.

I was looking for a notebook today so I decided to go to Harris Teeter (our local grocery store) and look for one. However, once I got there the only thing I could think of while looking at which notebook to choose was the fact that none of them were made of 100% recyclable paper. This got me to thinking whether there were any places where I could buy 100% recyclable goods. I know you can get 100% recycled paper towels, kleenex, and toilet paper at a lot of grocery stores, but where could I buy a 100% recycled notebook? I know about The Green Office online but were there any stores like this in real life where you walked in and everything was made of 100% recycled materials? If so Carrboro would be an awesome place to open one. I was thinking about this so much that I managed to make it home without the peaches that my husband had requested. See where thinking gets you sometimes?

Scariest day of my life?

I suppose today is supposed to be one of those "scariest days of my life" kind of thing but so far it really isn't. I think it's more scary for my family. Today I'm having my wedding ceremony, and supposed to say my vows to Cam. I will probably be nervous as shnell actually doing it but right now the only thing that's bothering me is that my ring is off. I haven't taken it off since we had our Chinese ceremony (back in February) so I feel a little naked right now. My aunt said that this is pretty big for the family because it's a first for them, even though it's really a second for me and no where near as scary as not knowing what's going to happen for 2 days straight when you're supposed to do nothing but smile.

In the meantime we just got to watch the Opening of the Olympics on Cam's computer. He can only get a few channels on his computer but one is the Hunan TV station so we got to watch CCTV1 on that. Cam said that all of the other TV stations have taken a vacation for the Olympics as Chinese people have nothing more important than the Olympics to be watching right now. It's kind of like the earthquake, during that time when I was in China it didn't matter what channel you turned to it was all about the Earthquake. Gets a little boring watching TV but it's ok. Olympics is a pretty big deal. I wasn't up early enough to watch the very beginning but my parents said it was really awesome. If you get a chance record it tonight, I'm sure it will be well worth the footage. All I can say is I'm damned glad I'm not in Beijing. I bet it is absolutely insane there now.