>Oh Elise, Elise, Elise…whatever shall we do with you?

As usual, Monday morning she tells me that I am teaching a different class. Class 11 and 12 instead of my usual Class 3 and 4. I inform her calmly that I have already made plans for class 3 and 4. In addition to this, the students know me.

Yeah, the students being familiar with their foreign teacher may help the classroom. What a weird idea.

Anyways, what ensued as a yes-no match, with No winning out and Elise pouting and ranting about it in Chinese.

A bus ride to the New Campus later, Elise informs a foreign teacher that he wasted his time. You see, he’s supposed to teach a double class Tuesday morning. So he can go him.

Since she tells him this AFTER he got up, AFTER he took the bumpy twenty-minute bus ride over, he’s non-too-pleased. What ensues is another argument, at which point I interject.

“You know Elise, why don’t you just tell us this more in advance? It would be easier.”

I did this in full view of another Chinese teacher. Elise grew nervous and said, “My computer…it is broken.”

She lied. If the pathetic excuse did not betray her, then her body language did. She lied. That’s one perspective.

Another perspective: she was saving face. This is likely, seeing as how another Chinese was standing near her. Face is to be preserved at all times. Why, it’s not that Elise is scatter-brained, perhaps even incompetent.

Oh no. It’s that her computer is broken. Yes, the computer’s fault. An obvious lie to us, but to them…well, it saves them face, right?

A little strange for me to wrap my mind around. I see it as a lie, but she did not truly intend it as a lie. Just as a way of saving face?

>

Just a short note: I’ve been grading essays lately. I asked all my classes to do them, write a page expressing themselves.

One girl wrote a very sweet essay talking about her love for her boyfriend, including a pledge to always be by his side. It was very, very touching.

Otherwise, what I’ve been noticing quite a bit are lost talents. Many students tell me they love to draw/paint/write/etc., but since they came to college, they have not had a chance to do it.

You could say they have had a chance, they just haven’t taken it. They’ve opted out of their duty in favor of QQ, studying, and more QQ.

You could also say that the structure of Chinese universities tends to choke the creative drive out of young students, whose purpose of life is apparently to a) make money and b) take care of the parents in old age. Sure can’t do that as a painter, can you?

One more thing: what of not going to college? What of dropping out to pursue their calling? This happens in the West, but is it possible in China? In a third-world country where students are herded into school and expected to succeed under intense pressure from an early age?

It’s clear to me that many of them are in college because they are obligated, socially and culturally, to do so. And while they’re here, they put aside their interests in favor of their majors, due to aforementioned reasons.

>Molly’s toilet broke.

That’s okay, I told her. My window lock fell off when I touched it. My little oven does not close all the way. And my closet is not big enough to hold that body so the door just won’t close all the way. It’s okay.

But it did break, so she told [administrative person], who said someone would come over at 2 that afternoon.

Molly had plans that day, a life to live, but since [administrative person] told her they would be there at 2 to fix her toilet, she waited.

And waited.

And waited.

From 1:30 that Friday until 1:30 today, she has waited for them to come. No one has shown up. And no one from the office has said a word to her either.

Perhaps this is just a little lesson in self-reliance.

>

[Administrative person] sent an email the other day. I won’t quote the full email here, as I don’t dislike her, but her decision (if it is in fact her decision) boils down to this:

Our overtime will now come at the end of the semester.

This is a contract job. We agree to work a set number of hours each month for a basic salary. Any hours above that number are over the time we specified (overtime? Hmmm) and we receive a special hourly pay rate. Normally, this is tallied and added on to the basic salary the month following.

For example, I work 70 hours the month of March. 64 of those hours net me 4000 RMB. In February, I worked 76 hours, 12 over the set number. Multiply it by the overtime rate, add it on to March’s basic salary, and BAM, I can now afford large coffees with several espresso shots.

Seems simple? She doesn’t think so, which brings me to her reason: unknown.

She said she has trouble adding it up each month, and doing this will make it easy for her. For her. As random as it seemed, there might be a good reason for it.

One that’s as closely guarded as the end of the semester. As all information here is.

>Plastic surgery on your nose is a nose job. So what’s plastic surgery on your hand?

And so concludes columns Mom and Dad can be proud of.

I don’t know when I’ll leave China, but the columns end before that indefinite future date. I suppose this means I should offer some sort of closure. I will, later, but first, I have exciting news.

Let’s go back to September when I first arrived. In September, I had a conversation with our foreign affairs office.

Me: When will you hook up the cable TV?

Them: Next week.

On April 21, 2009, they hooked up the cable.

If you’re coming here to teach, you will learn patience, if you don’t already know it.

Chinese bureaucracy runs like a great red grapevine. The senior official decides on Monday afternoon, so he tells the guy below him. That guy tells the guy below him on Tuesday afternoon, who tells the guy below him on Wednesday morning, all in time for the woman working the office to tell you about an event that weekend. On Wednesday afternoon.

Notices seem last minute because they are — both for you and the woman giving it to you. Friends may do this too, for the same reason. One afternoon around 3:30 p.m., I asked June what she was doing for dinner. The usual, let’s meet at 5 p.m. Cool.

Shortly after 4 p.m., she called me to tell me her uncle is in town, and we’re having dinner with him and her brother. When we got to the restaurant, her brother suddenly had to leave and meet his classmates. Jesus rang, 100 minutes later, and asked me to join him for a big, special dinner. Something going on with him and the disciples. I politely declined, but such is the dance.

Another thing to be aware of: student loans. Whether you went in debt to finance a degree with job prospects or a humanities degree, it is unlikely that you will make enough in China to start paying back. That’s if you want to pay it back.

Attentive readers may be wondering where that closure is. Okay then.

Since this column appears at the end of the spring semester, I want to address all you new graduates.

Many of you believe you have your lives set. Some will start careers. Others will go on to professional school, law school, medical school, pharmacy school or graduate school. Among this group, there are a select few who actually want to go, with a clear idea of what they want to do and what their purpose is. Much fewer than you imagine.

And then there are others who will go simply because they have nothing else to do or their parents expect them to. While taking on a six-figure debt so Mommy and Daddy will have something to brag about isn’t the wisest choice, I can understand it all the same. I know full well what your parents want. They don’t want you to be what you want to be. They want you to be what they never were, and if they’re not open about it, then they secretly harbor this feeling, and it will come out in subtle ways.

I wish I could give you some great advice, but I can’t. Sorry. Everyone’s paths are different, but I can tell you part of what led me here. I had just finished a great semester one year ago. I was supposed to go to France and teach English for seven months, vastly improving my French language skills and then return to a great graduate program in the States.

It didn’t work out. I was devastated.

Now? I’m in a far better position. I do not regret not going to France, and I do not regret coming to China. If you’re looking for some kind of closure, then you’ll have to be satisfied with that.

I do not regret it.