Part of this is the uniqueness of Chinese logic and style of communication, which often prevent the clear expression of actual facts or direct opinions, or say, the exact time at which a given activity will commence. Chinese speeches can sometimes lack content on a really amazing level, instead mostly involving anecdotes or rhetorical questions. (Which from a Western perspective just sounds condescending. Why do they sound condescending, you ask? Right, you get it now.) I have Chinese relatives, so this 'problem' is old news.
A bigger thing is that while my Chinese is on some levels getting better, on some really basic levels it's not at all. All of the Chinese classes I've ever taken seem to really care about politics, economics, business, the news - and very few of the things that you encounter in real life. I talked to Alex today about how we can discuss the Chinese feudal land system and the Kyoto protocol, but neither of us can recall the word for paper clip. Food tray? Comfy boat shoes with a blue plaid pattern and rustproof eyelets? NO IDEA. And none of these things are ever, ever going to come up in a textbook.
When I bring this problem up with my teachers, some of them don't seem to get it. I think part of the problem might be that some students don't really care about sounding like a native or really learning Chinese, just using it for business or researching Tang dynasty poems or whatever. But guys, do you really want to wait until you're drunk at a business dinner in Beijing to discover that you don't know how to compliment your partner on his cuff-links? Because you don't know how to say cuff-links? Seriously.
Others of my teachers have suggested making Taiwanese friends. Ok, yes the point of being here is that it's much easier to pick up these things in a Chinese-speaking environment. But for heritage speakers, the reason that we're here is also that, despite having been in a Chinese environment for various amounts of time, Chinese is too hard to actually learn by osmosis. ABC'S HAVE TROUBLE WITH THESE THINGS TOO. So you can't really think that the thing I'm talking about is something solved by making Taiwanese friends alone.
I've gotten some good suggestions, including watching TV series or reading grade school textbooks. If you have any, or have a similar problem, I'd love to hear from you. Of course I will keep learning with my little nieces and Spongebob and cousins and street fliers etc., but it's still quite frustrating to spend 2 hours a day in my core class, and theoretically an equivalent amount of homework time, practicing communism words when I would rather be practicing useful ones. When I hear from my dad that a word I could not recall right away when playing with my niece (ant, a word that all toddlers know), is something he remembers me practicing when I was five...well that's just really annoying. So, I'm going to keep pushing ICLP to see what they can do to help.
Anyway that's my little language rant, which is probably not too far from the experience of any other Chinese student. Chinese is still in need of some serious textbook and teaching style revision, so if you're in a position to do something about that, please do.
Besides not being totally satisfied with my Chinese ability (while at the same time my English ability is going down the toilet), expressing myself in Chinese culture also has some serious obstacles. Some things are just not suitable to explaining in Chinese (like why I wanted to go to Yale and not Harvard -try explaining that to someone Chinese over the age of 50 and getting anything other than a weak smile of feigned understanding). My huge realization this weekend was that my personality is almost totally erased in Chinese (AHHHHHH).
My style of humor just does not exist in Chinese, a language that reserves the equivalent of sarcasm for people you really hate. Ok um my big thing is that I'm very sarcastic. RT might say snarky. Maybe you can think of a nicer word. I like to say things that are jokes as if they are not jokes and see if anyone notices. I make fun of everyone, every situation, every culture and organization and group. It's how I view the world, how I deal with things that suck, how I point out things that I think are true and worth thinking about. If you haven't noticed this about me then we just don't know each other very well. SOOO -- what do I do here? I don't know! After hanging out with some Taiwanese people I realized that a lot of the things I said that would be funny translated into English, were confusing or chalked up to some kind of language difficulty in Chinese. Deadpan humor just doesn't get across.
This is possibly one of the largest sources of the language gap that I have sensed in my dealings with Chinese vs. American friends and relatives, and I am just now putting it into words and wrapping my mind around it. So, questions: how do I deal with this realization? How essential is making jokes to my personality? (gut reaction: way essential. philosophical question: if a person's identity is something much deeper than "personality", is this the wrong question in the first place?). If humor is not essential, then what is? How can I express myself in Chinese and begin to understand Chinese humor or an acceptable substitute? If I can't, can I still live in a Chinese speaking environment for any length of time?
This line of questioning will either lead to a deep existential crisis or a better understanding of who I am and how that ought to relate to Chinese. The nice thing is, I finally have the time to think things like this through. And, when I feel frustrated, to give myself a break: slept through class Friday (first missed day of school! Usually at this point in the school year I have contracted some kind of death flu, leading to asthma, lack of breathing, near death etc.). Golden Horse film festival with Cat, Drey, Tracy and Paul. Most delicious Korean food ever with Brian, Lance, and Lance's Taiwanese friends. Hike to Qingtiangang at Yangminshan on Saturday, followed by mary jane's delicious authentic pizza and games with friends. Family time on Sunday, visited my grandma with my uncle and niece near Wulai, took a nap at my uncle's house in Wanhua and played with the kiddies briefly, Paranormal Activity 2 with my cousin and her friends. Today I ate for four straight hours (with Alex and Coleton: gym, bbq, shaved ice. with Alex Nick Andrew Julian: brownies. walking with Alex: pink fleshy guava and supermarket trip. at home: kimchi hotpot with fishballs and ramen, Oreos with peanut butter, and my newly discovered favorite yogurt juice drink).
Beautiful tree covered path leading to Qingtiangang (literally, I think, the hills that hold up the sky).
Climbing up through the grasslands was really relaxing.
Plus, it was holding up the sky, how cool is that?
Visit with grandma and my niece, Melody.
My Korean dinner.. if this doesn't look delicious to you, come visit and I'll show you :)
Food, friends, family + some hills that hold up the sky: perfect recipe to ease my frustrations, even when I have a disappeared personality.
Finally, guys, there's no way I can update on even 5% of the awesome things I get to see and do here. Literally everyday is at least one amazing adventure or weird cultural realization or at the very least post-worthy food experiment that I would want to text someone about if I weren't worried about waking you up. From now on I'm going to try going thematically instead. But first I want to you to see the plate I made at Yingge, a town famous for it's pottery (and ceramics? there is a difference), which they glazed and then sent all the way back to Taipei by rickshaw:
I MADE THIS PLATE. On a pottery wheel. After this guy showed us how:
In Yingge!:
My pottery making is not going to create anything worthy of being displayed in the Palace Museum anytime soon (my dad used to throw away my art projects, go figure), but it's really therapeutic and fun!
Anyway, in summary, life is good. Taiwan presents several dozen new, weird, surprising challenges, but about a million news ways to deal with them. When I rescue my personality from the Chinese language things will be even better.
<3 kt
