Nanjing 2018-2019, Blog Post 3

Looking back to October, I’d have to say my second month abroad included a whole lot of mixed feelings. Unfortunately, when we go abroad, we not only pack up our suitcases, memories, and belongings, but we also bring our expectations with us.

My first month in China was really, really good. It was about settling, beginning new friendships, and leaving old grievances behind. However, when I hit the second month, especially after our one week break during the state holiday week of October called “The Golden Week”, I came to realize I was unhappy in some aspects. But I’ll get to that only after I describe my holiday.

If you all, as readers, had one week with no classes, no obligations, and no idea what in the world to do to kill time (and were living abroad), what would be the best option? Traveling, of course. Due to the fact that I have connections in Guilin, China, I headed out of Nanjing as soon as classes ended for the one week holiday. I hadn’t been back in five years since I had visited every summer when I was little with my mom. So all I brought with me were memories, plans of eating 桂林米粉 (THE famous Guilin rice noodles), and an idea of what my visit was going to be like.

During my trip, I had the opportunity to visit family, take a trip to the countryside, and do lots of local things– such as eating, shopping, and cooking. Nothing actually significant happened, but I did have one big epiphany- the way I grew up in the US was a whole lot different than the people I met in Guilin did. Perhaps when I was little I didn’t have a good gauge on social situations, customs, or what local norms were. But now, I do, and I felt a taste of the privilege of the way I was raised. People shared their stories with me: from working on railways to support their families to discussing governmental pay; my foster mom even shared that she had to help raise her own siblings in the 苦 (bitterness and bearing of hardships) of the Cultural Revolution.

Therefore, going back to Nanjing, I had a lot going on in my mind. I had the opportunity to see the real China for the first time as an adult, and had sensed the deepness of the Chinese spirit to persevere. Before I departed on the Golden Week break, I had made plans to join clubs in Nanjing Normal University’s other campus, Xianlin, where all the bachelor students are located. My own campus, located in the heart of downtown, is only for master’s students; our campus is literally dead, with no fun campus events to be found, ever. So I returned to the student life in Nanjing and my previous plans on forming good, deep relationships with some Chinese people and learning more about the culture where I was born.

So I began commuting to a few school clubs in Xianlin I had committed to because they seemed interesting and exciting. One in particular was an English club. I thought that if I could find some open-minded Chinese people that wanted to learn about my background, my past, and my American culture, we could be friends. I was wrong. My plans on joining that club backfired– I was ignored, excluded from conversation topics, and considered an outsider. Maybe it’s the way I look, because I am Chinese-American, that Chinese students didn’t find anything special to talk about with me. Or maybe it’s the way I was quiet, not wanting to butt into conversation topics I had no knowledge about. But that experience in Xianlin was not a pleasant one. My expectations for my year abroad versus the reality of the situation in front of me began catching up to me.

In the meantime, as Chinese classes really started rolling and oral presentations began being assigned, friend groups among foreigners started. In our small campus where I could walk from the back gate (where the canteen was) to the study room in my dorm building, there would hardly ever be a time where I wouldn’t stop for a conversation with someone I met along the way. Well, I was hardly ever by myself, since I ate lunch and dinner with the Italians, but it was an environment where most Westerners began to really know each other. A group of about thirty of us began having late night chats at a small drink store across our front gate deemed “老板’s” (laoban’s), and following that we had many a midnight adventure out on the town.

Throughout these social happenings, I began making some really good friends. I met a German girl that was half Chinese and half German raised in Germany, another American who lived in Maryland yet graduated from a university right near my house, and a lot of half-half mixed Europeans that had grown up with two cultures and languages. Now, all of these relationships were built off of conversations that happened in English. Back to the previously mentioned expectations versus reality, I had expected all relationships to be formed in Chinese; I was in China to improve my Chinese, after all. Yet, almost every friendship I formed was in my mother tongue. Even when my roommate and I had some pretty deep discussions, we were using English.

So my second month abroad wasn’t ideal. I dealt a lot with being separated– racially, culturally, and spiritually. I was a Chinese-American, born in China yet raised in the US. I couldn’t completely relate to any university-aged Chinese people I met, and they for sure didn’t express that they wanted to get to know me. On another level, I couldn’t completely relate to the Italians or any of the Europeans I began friendships with, because English was not their mother tongue and they could at least improve their language skills using English to communicate with other foreigners. And lastly, I felt torn apart by my goals. My mind, my spirit, told me I had come to China with a purpose– to learn Chinese, to make Chinese friends, and to learn more about myself. And that last point would be stretched out throughout the year abroad.