JISHOU, HUNAN — So, here I was back in China, after three weeks in the USA, and it seemed like I was stranded in Shanghai. (Or shanghaied.)

When I left China, I was pretty sure my flight to Changsha was just a few hours after my arrival in Pudong Airport. No shuttle bus trips, no worries. But I had no idea what flight I would take, since my foreign affairs officer had worked out the details.

So, as soon as I disembarked from United 835, I connected to China Mobile and sent him a message: “When is my flight?” His reply: “Bad news, it’s been canceled” Turns out I had to go to Shanghai Hongqiao Airport after all to catch a different flight. No biggie, I thought, Another 30 RMB bus fare with plenty of time to catch the domestic flight.

Puh-lenty of time.

Due to stormy weather around Changsha, my flight was delayed not one, not two, but five freaking hours! My 9 pm flight from Hongqiao Airport eventually left at 3 am!

At one point, I fell completely asleep across four chairs, only to wake scared shitless I had missed my flight. I hadn’t. There were still two hours to go.

I had booked a hotel in Changsha and told my friend F. to expect me around dinnertime. Instead, I sent her a message to say I had no idea when I would arrive. She (bless her heart) paid the hotel in advance so I would have definitely have place to sleep once I arrived.

March 8th, 2010 | Tags: air travel, China, jishou, New Year's, Spring Festival, travel | Category: China | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — You know the old saw, “If you don’t like the weather, just wait an hour?” Well, it’s true here, too.

At 3 pm, there was a light cloud cover and 86 degrees F. At dinner, one of my friends got a call from her boyfriend in Changsha, who told her the temperature had plummeted to the 60’s, it was raining, and a northerly wind was blowing hard. (The gusty wind also locked him out of his home: the wind slammed the door against the wall, pushing in the lock button, then slammed it shut … while he was outside and his keys inside.)

Sure enough, by the time we finished dinner at Will Long Cake (they do serve more than cake there; it’s like a Dairy Queen Brazier, but not as greasy), it was cold, gusty and starting to rain. Right now (10:30) it is pouring outside, and I just turned on the heater.

Of course, I shouldn’t complain. The Philippines just got clobbered again by another typhoon, the third in the last five weeks.

October 31st, 2009 | Tags: changeable, China, jishou, weather | Category: China, General stuff | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — It was only a matter of time before swine flu would penetrate into the Chinese heartland. Within a week of classes starting at the university, a student was diagnosed with H1N1.

Then another a day later. According to some (unverified) reports, perhaps eight more students may be infected as well.

Jishou University has four campuses. The first student diagnosed with H1N1 lives at the old campus, near downtown. The second lives here at the new campus. Their roommates are being monitored as we speak.
I haven’t heard any bad news from the other two campuses, medical and foreign languages.

Our students have had the fear of God (or something like it, since China is officially atheist) put into them at meetings earlier this week. Wash your hands. Cover your nose and mouth when you sneeze or cough. Throw your tissues away immediately. Don’t touch your eyes, nose or mouth. If you feel ill or feverish, go directly to the school clinic, do not pass go, do not collect $200.

My foreign affairs officer, Cyril Hu, called me to his office this morning to give me an oral thermometer (A mercury one! The USA has all but abolished those.) and two sheets of instructions (in Chinese!?) about what precautions to take against the swine flu.

Meanwhile, rumors and fears are bubbling through the student community. One girl texted me to say there were “several” people down with the flu. Another student on QQ told me she had heard the uni would ban any travel during the upcoming eight-day National Holiday break. Both rumors proved to be false.

September 9th, 2009 | Tags: China, H1N1, jishou, swine flu | Category: China, Commentary, Teaching | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — These Chinese holidays just sneak up on me, I swear. I knew about Mid-Autumn Festival and Spring Festival before I came here, but some others I learn about just a few days before, it seems.

Because of my temporarily sparse teaching schedule, getting a day off Thursday for Duan Wu — the Dragon Boat Festival — gave me almost a five-day holiday. Too bad I had not made any plans ahead of time.

But I managed to find things to do, and see.

First, a primer on Duan Wu. This traditional holiday has roots going back (like almost everything in China) thousands of years. Its origins are so ancient that there are different stories about the reason for the holiday.

Until recently, the national government had banned many traditional holidays as national days off, but in the last few years, the Party has reinstated several traditional holidays (another is QingMing — Tomb Sweeping Day) to give the hardworking Chinese public some respite.

There are two key customs associated with Duan Wu: dragon boat racing and zongze. One I did not see. The other I ate a lot of.

Dragon boats are long, seating at least 12 paddlers and many times more. Every town or city with a large enough navigable body of water sponsors boat races. I had planned to go to Yuanling, near Fenghuang, to see a traditional dragon boat race, but heavy rains forced the postponement of the race. Fenghuang did not cancel its race, but my friend and I decided not to brave both sloppy weather and the inevitable crowds there. The Yuanling races will be next month sometime.

May 29th, 2009 | Tags: Dragon Boat Festival, Duan Wu, jishou, night club, nightlife, zongze | Category: China, Commentary | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — OK, so I was only on screen for maybe 10 minutes — tops — sandwiched in between musical acts for a pre-Spring Festival concert extravaganza, but it was still a debut on provincial TV.

And, get this, all of my lines were in Chinese! I learned them on the spot, with patient coaching from a Hunan Economic TV director (and of course promptly forgot them all by the following day).

Here is the link to the on line version of the telecast last night. You will only be able to watch it if you are using Internet Explorer and only if you download a plugin for IE here. I have had no luck viewing the clip yet. Either it is not yet available, or my antiquated versions of Windows (2K Pro) and IE6 are not up to the task.

When you load the first link, this is what you will see. I have labeled the appropriate buttons to click on to see the video.

If any clever person can figure out how to capture this video stream and/or make it a YouTube video, let me know. I have people working on the task on this side of the world, too.

I have already chronicled the background behind how I ended up in this TV production, so I won’t go into great detail here. Briefly, I was pressed into service when ETV called the university looking for a westerner who could speak both English and Chinese well. I was the closest approximation, an American with next-to-no Chinese speaking ability. I agreed reluctantly, since I had made other plans for Jan. 1, the day of the shoot.

January 24th, 2009 | Tags: concert, FengHuang, Hunan ETV, Jiang Hongjie, jishou, Miao, Tujia, Xiangxi, Yoyo | Category: China, Commentary, Media | Comments (1)

JISHOU, HUNAN — My exams are marked, final grades are calculated, and I can now start my Winter Holiday! Phew!

The campus is pretty empty right now. University students have four weeks’ break, officially, but many left for home as soon as possible after their last examination. Left on campus are a few exchange students, assorted graduate students with work still to submit, and faculty.

In China, Spring Festival — celebrating the lunar New Year — is a big family affair, like Thanksgiving and Christmas are in the States. Imagine rolling Independence Day (fireworks), Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve into one holiday, and you can begin to understand what a festive occasion awaits us here.

With some time on my hands — finally — I can recap what has happened in the last several days since my last post.

When we last left our hero, he was recovering from a long day in Fenghuang shooting for a TV show….

The following day, I helped make and eat dumplings at the home of a freshman student, Fu Xiao, whose father is a local government official. Fu Xiao and her friend, Tian Fang, another of my students, helped me buy a space heater for my apartment, since the heat pump does a crappy job warming any room besides the bedroom. Xiao’s father gave me a gift of Xiangxi tea, grown in the mountains around here, which I swear is the best damned tea I have ever had. Sweet and fragrant. Aaahhh!

January 13th, 2009 | Tags: FengHuang, investment, jishou, Miao, New Year's, police, Tujia, Yoyo | Category: China | Leave a comment