Wherein our heroine travels to Hangzhou, China to teach English to an assortment of various students, thanks to an... interesting approach to organization. Let us hear a great cheer for intercultural communication.

Wednesday, June 30, 2004
2004 Conference of English for International Purposes

On Saturday, we were all supposed to present our conference talks. Actually, we were supposed to have presented the day before, but when our plane got delayed, we missed the whole first day of the conference, leading to much rescheduling and confusion. It ended up getting sorted out though, leaving us all to present on Saturday afternoon.

First, though, we went to listen to Eva's talk on intercultural communication, her specialty. She had a lot of information to cover, and since she really organized the conference with her former students in mind, I think she spent most of the time really talking to them, because they were all smiling and nodding, and the rest of us were trying to sort out where she was. After her talk, there was a coffee break, followed by another plenary by a Dr. Wu. Dr. Wu, it was reported to me later, talked about curriculum design and how teaching to the test affects students and teachers. I'm rather sorry I didn't go to his talk, as Lee reports he was brilliant, but I had to work on my own talk, since I hadn't done it on the plane.

After lunch, it was time for our American "expert" group to give our talks. We were in different rooms all over the building in two different time slots. My talk was scheduled for the second time slot, so during the first one, I had a pick of Gina's talk on popular American TV shows, Pat T.'s talk on small group facilitation, or Lee's talk on social achievement in middle and high school students. I figured Gina was stealing enough audience members from other people already, what with this being a media college and all, so I went up to the fourth floor. I ended up at Lee's talk because it was the room I found first, and it ended up being an interesting discussion. The room was full of big armchairs instead of desks or a meeting table, so it had a rather informal atmosphere. The Chinese teachers were eager to talk, so the session actually went over the allotted time.

I dashed upstairs to my assigned room on the 5th floor. The room turned out to be at the very end of the hall, so it was kind of hard to find, and there was no moderator or anyone there. I'm not sure if they forgot I was there, or if I wasn't considered important enough to need a moderator. I did end up with 5 Chinese teachers, but for the first 15 minutes, there was only me and Lee, who was returning the favor of attending my presentation. Things in China don't really run on time very often. I think my talk went pretty well. I was talking about teaching English wholistically, as opposed to the skills-based approach taken in most of Asia (and at MSU), and several of the teachers had questions at the end about how to implement this kind of approach in their own system. I think it went pretty well, because they all seemed interested and agreed with a lot of the points.

On Sunday, we had one plenary talk, which was supposed to be about the new TOEFL, but wasn't really. After that, we had a final panel discussion, where all the Michigan people went through a brief summary of what their talks had been about. This seemed to impress a lot of the people in the audience, because ever since the conference finished, Eva and her co-coordinator, Qian, have been getting lots of calls inviting us to other universities. The panel was followed by final remarks and the awarding of 3 lifetime professorships to Eva, Joan Morley, and Pat P. This was of course followed by an extended round of Asian group photos, and then we were finally herded over to a different building's cafeteria for a final banquet, which indeed offered us far, far too much food than we could possibly eat.

Sunday, June 27, 2004
Live from Hangzhou

Yay, internet connection! Yes, we really did finally get to China. We stayed overnight in Detroit, scheduled to leave around 11 the next morning. Of course, once we got into the airport and through security again, we found out the plane had been delayed again until 12:45pm, so we had a few hours to wait there anyway. Oooh, the excitement.

12 and a half hours (meaning 3 movies and half a book) later, we landed in Tokyo. Wierdly, we landed at a remote gate, so we got bussed in from one of the runways on the extreme edge of the airport land, so I got to see an entirely different side of Narita. When our bus got to the terminal, we went through security to get into the main part of the terminal, only to find that we had been rebooked onto a JAL flight to get to China, instead of continuing on Northwest. This meant we needed to be in Terminal 2, so off we went on another bus. After going through 2 more security checkpoints, we got onto the plane to Shanghai with 5 minutes to spare.

At this point, I had been awake for about 26 hours. Luckily, the flight was not very crowded, and we could all spread out and sleep. Amazingly, when we got to Shanghai, our luggage was all there! I do not attribute this miracle to Northwest at all, by the way. I give credit entirely to the Japanese people responsible for rebooking us over to JAL. We picked everything up off the conveyor belt, headed out the "Nothing to Declare" door, and ta-da!, found the people Eva had sent from the college. Also there were Lee's aunt and uncle, with their dog, because the dog loves Lee so much from when he took care of it when they first moved to Shanghai. He was kind of embarrassed, but they also gave him a cell phone and a bunch of food, so I think they were easily forgiven.

We all went to exchange money, and then lugged all the luggage to the van to go to Hangzhou. It was a 2 hour drive, so we arrived at about 1am. We had just enough time to get 5 hours of sleep before we had to be up for the conference and ready to present. But that, I think, will be another story.

Thursday, June 24, 2004
Plane Cancelled

I'm updating this from the airport in Detroit. We were supposed to be in the air 15 minutes ago, on our way to Tokyo and then to Shanghai. Instead, Northwest discovered an unrepairable fuel leak in one of the engines of our plane. Since there is no back-up plane, we will be staying in Detroit overnight in a free hotel, and supposedly leaving tomorrow around 11:45am. Yay, international travel!

Wednesday, June 23, 2004
Email Posting Test

This is an email to test the Blogger feature that claims I can post to
this blog via email. If it works, this would be a very handy thing,
seeing as China is so obnoxiously zealous in their internet censorship
practices, which will prevent me from seeing my own blog. I figure I
should test it while I'm still in the US. I leave tomorrow.

This also reminds me that I should mention how comments will be working
during my time abroad. I get the comments emailed to me, so I will be
able to read them, should anyone actually feel like writing anything,
but I won't be able to respond, so please don't be insulted. If you
have a question you want answered in the comment, I can email you back
directly, or you can just email me and bypass comments altogether. If
you bypass comments, though, no one else gets to read your wit and
insight.

Now, let's test. Did it work?

Tuesday, June 22, 2004
Trading Cultures in the Classroom

In looking for other books about teaching English in China, I found Trading Cultures in the Classroom: Two American Teachers in China by Lois & Siegmar Muehl. They went to teach English at an engineering college for two semesters in 1987-88. At first, I debated whether to get this book, since I was going to be teaching much younger students. Now, it turns out that this was a propitious choice, since we are teaching college students after all.

This book, unlike An Island of English, is much more a personal memoir from the teachers than it is an analysis of teaching techniques. The Muehls reflect some on their own lives in China and at the college, and a great deal on their relationship with the students in class, what they learn about their students' lives through their writing, and what the students' responses were to their teaching methods. It was an interesting read, which may or may not end up offering me a lot of relevant insight into what my time in China will be like, considering the time that has elapsed since then. For people simply looking for an interesting book about teaching experiences in other cultures, it would be a good one.

Sunday, June 20, 2004
Visa

I have a visa! My passport just got back to me, finally, after a near 2-month absence*, and it has a beautiful Chinese visa sticker on page 14. It is neat and compact, unlike my paper-folded-over-many-times-and-stapled-in Japanese visa; intricately multicolored in shades of turquoise, green, orange, and peach; and has an engraving of part of the Great Wall on it. I'd take a picture to show people, but that's probably illegal, and besides which, it would have my passport number on it. If anyone wants to see it, they'll have to see me in person.

*No, this is not the length of time it takes to get a visa. This is just the length of time it took our entire group's worth of passports and visa applications to be gathered and organized and taken to Chicago. One person sent hers in separately and got it back in one day. Things will be more organized next year. It's a learning experience.

Friday, June 18, 2004
An Island of English

In addition to my new Lonely Planet China book, I've been doing quite a bit of other reading in preparation for this trip. Being a well-raised middle-class intellectual, of course the first thing I do when embarking on a new activity is purchase books about it. I think I was the only person in our Council group in Chile whose preparatory research had been into the political situation of the 1980s instead of where the coolest mountains or beaches were. Other people wandered around Santiago comparing notes on the best place to stay in Viña del Mar for the music festival, while I interrupted them to point out that the reason that building there is called the "Ex-Congressional" building is because Pinochet moved the Congress to Viña to lessen their influence over the executive branch, before he eventually disbanded Congress altogether. Likewise, I went to Japan having read Importing Diversity: Inside Japan's JET Program, all about the history of the JET program, instead of finding out about all the tourist sites around Sendai. I'm hopeless, and I know it, so why fight it?

I will turn my print addiction to good use by offering some book reviews. My first one is for Danling Fu's An Island of English: Teaching ESL in Chinatown.

I found this book extremely interesting, both for its writing and its subject matter. The author was brought in as a consultant to improve the ESL program in a middle school in Chinatown. The book describes the steps she and the teachers took over the course of several years to make the program one that truly served its students needs. What makes the situation really interesting is that this school is an environment that is really halfway between teaching ESL and teaching EFL. Though the school is located in one of the largest cities in the US, these primarily immigrant students live and go to school in the heart of Chinatown, where, in the normal course of things, they are not called on to use English substantially outside of school. Most of their parents do not speak English, so they cannot get help at home, and many of them did not attend school regularly in China, because of the promise that someday soon, their parents would have enough money to bring them to America. This book shows what teachers can do in what is basically an EFL setting, but with all the advantages of having the wealth of resources to be found in an ESL environment.

The author is herself a Chinese immigrant who remembers her own problems with English acquisition, so she offers a lot of insight into the linguistic challenges facing the students. However, she does not insist that all the teachers in the ESL program be at all fluent in Chinese to understand these issues. Instead, she combines the ESL program with the Chinese Language Arts program, which is aimed at helping the students maintain fluency in their native language, and draws on the strengths of all the teachers, Chinese speakers and non-Chinese speakers. One of the main strengths of this book is that Fu is describing strategies that were actually implemented in the school, and discussing what worked, what didn't, and why, instead of presenting a lot of theory. Part of her point is that she had a lot of theory going in, and it was only through flexibility and change that she and the teachers got everything to work. I think this book offers a great deal of insight and hope for ESL and EFL teachers both, because it shows how a very high goal was realistically achieved.

Wednesday, June 16, 2004
New Stuff!

It's like Christmas all over again! Except I have to buy all the stuff for myself. That's not so good. But when the UPS man brought my new suitcase yesterday, I was so happy I gave him a cookie, just like Santa Claus. (Freshly baked, too. Mmmmmm.) I have new luggage!

My old rollaboard suitcase has served me valiantly and well, ever since it was called in to replace my old, larger suitcase that DELTA (Do Not Expect Luggage To Arrive) lost forever and ever on my very first trip home from college. *ahem* Not that I'm bitter. Anyway, my little green rollaboard went back and forth from NC to Iowa at least 4 times a year all during college, to Taiwan, Chile, Japan, Germany, back to Japan, and any number of smaller trips in cars, but alas, in coming back from Germany, where it was almost lost, the seams started to give way. I would really rather not go all the way to China only to have my luggage rip open, so I decided I had to get a new one.

After much consultation with my frequently traveling father, not to mention with anyone else who would listen to me obsess about it, I settled on the TPro 22" rollaboard from Travelpro. My dad swears by them because they got started making luggage for flight crews, who need durable luggage more than anyone. We'll see how this line of their luggage does for me. It's looks really big inside, so I think I might just be able to get everything I need for 5 weeks in China into it and my new backpack. If I manage that, I can even get them both on the plane with me, entrusting nothing to the whims of the airline baggage gods.

I also got a new Lonely Planet guidebook for China over the weekend. Looking at all the guidebooks in the bookstore reminded me of doing the same thing in a bookstore in downtown Santiago with Jessica, dreaming of all the places we could go. There's something magical about guidebooks. They contain so many possibilities. Of course, having now used a Lonely Planet guide for both Chile and Japan, some of the magic depends on the country's transportation system and whether or not you have to work while you're living there, but still, the possibilities are there.

Now all I need to get is my passport, which was sent out on its own to get a Chinese visa. I hope it comes back soon. Then I'll be ready to go!

Monday, June 14, 2004
Got Typhoid?

I have typhoid! Sort of. I mean, I have the live virus vaccine pills in my refrigerator, which is rather like having, in the sense of possessing, typhoid. It's a very odd vaccine to take, because I have to take 4 pills, one every other day, one hour before I eat. There are also lots of warnings about what to do if you think you've overdosed yourself on them. I've only got one to go, and I've done it all right, so I'm not worried. Once I'm through with these pills, I'll have (some) immunity to typhoid for 5 years. If you take the injection, it only lasts for 2 years.

While I was at the travel clinic, I also got my Hepatitis A shot. Fortunately, my Hep B and tetanus were up to date, so I didn't have to get them. I say fortunately, not because I hate getting shots, (really, I don't mind them at all anymore, despite what my mother might tell you about my younger years,) but because it's all so expensive. Could someone please explain to me why US health insurance will not cover preventative vaccines for travel purposes, when they would sure have to cover treatment if I got typhoid or Hepatitis A/B? If ever there was a sign that the health insurance industry in this country is run backwards... Although I never made use of it, I left the health center feeling very nostalgic for the universal health care system in Japan. There are most definitely advantages to living in a place where people go to the hospital for a cold because they can.

Friday, June 11, 2004
Change is in the Wind

As in most international travel, but it seems especially in China, everything is subject to change. It seems the brand new minister of education in Hangzhou did not think the students were well enough prepared to take their year-end exams, so she unilaterally extended the school year by two weeks. Those two weeks were supposed to be the first two weeks of the camp. She told Eva we would have to move the camp to August. At this point, we teachers had already had our plane tickets, paid for at our own expense, for a month. The minister relented slightly, and everyone on the Chinese end of things scrambled frantically to try to reorganize the dates of camp and tour. The new plan was for us to have the tour of China at the beginning of our stay, followed by a week of being "hosted," whatever that meant, at some other schools, then teach two weeks of camp and leave the third week to the Chinese teachers who were going to be assisting us as "shadows" during our stay.

That is where our schedule stood last week. Yesterday, though, at the next-to-last group meeting before we board planes to head East, Pat told us that everything had changed once again. The minister of education had gone back to insisting that we come in August, which is flatly impossible, so Eva told her we'd love to see her next summer, but it certainly wasn't happening now. No more will we be teaching elementary and middle school kids. We are back to the old 3-week camp schedule, followed by a tour, only this time our students will be university non-English majors, and we will be teaching at Zhejiang Media College, where the conference is going to be held. We have all been given titles of "Expert Foreign Instructors," and we will be housed in the faculty guest housing.

Since all of our previous lesson planning had been oriented toward teaching children, many of the teachers were justifiably dismayed at the change. Eva assured us that the plans we had sent her were perfect, since the language level of the university students is actually in many ways lower than the children's would have been. Our arts and crafts specialist remains unconvinced that young adults will be quite so enthusiastic at making little people out of wooden beads and yarn, though.

There is little doubt, in any case, that the five weeks in China will be interesting. We can hope that they will be interesting in a good way, but after all this confusion, one begins to be reminded that "May you live in interesting times" is said to be quite the potent curse.

Thursday, June 10, 2004
Introduction

What, yet another blog? Yes, another blog. This one, as you can see, is to be a record of my trip to China. While there's no particular reason not to write such a record on my Linguistic Life blog, it appealed to my aesthetic sense of organization to keep the experience recorded in its own place, with its own look, rather like a written scrapbook. So here 'tis.

Surely you have noticed the lovely design. I came up with the picture, found by Googling for pictures of Hangzhou, as well as the title. Mark came up with the waterfall for the sidebar, and basically wrestled the rest of the template into submission, and thence into working order, with some help from Will.

The new URL follows in the steps of my Japan blog, which used my name. In this case, though, "Wang Jinna" is my Chinese name, given to me by Scott Cook, who tried valiantly to teach me Chinese for the one semester I took it at Grinnell.

The purpose of my trip to China is, once again, to teach English. I found out about the opportunity by pure chance. Pat P., who works in the writing center at the ELC, is friends with Eva, the woman trying to get this English program started in China. Pat came by the TA office while I wasn't there to ask if any of the TAs would be interested in going to China, and Alison told me about it when I got back to the office. I tracked down Pat, got a flyer, gave her my email address, and I was signed up to go at the first meeting. Yay!

Originally, this program was intended to be a 3-week intensive English summer camp for elementary and middle school students in Hangzhou. The focus was to prepare the students for the upcoming 2008 summer Olympics by exposing them to other cultures and improving their English ability. Though we, the teachers, would not be paid for these three weeks of teaching, we would get a tour of China during the fourth week of our stay. We would be renting out one of the city schools for the camp, and living in a nearby hotel. A fifth week got added to the beginning of the China trip when Zhejiang Media College, where Eva is a guest professor for two months, decided they wanted to have an international English education conference. This now meant that the trip would be from June 23-July 30. Our schedule was set, so we arranged for plane tickets with a travel agent.

You may have noted from the tone of the preceding paragraph that this is not what is actually happening...