Boy Children, Advertisements, and a Funny Song Story

1. My Mandarin teacher is from Taiwan, which means I am learning some of the cultural differences of how Mandarin is spoken on the Mainland vs. Taiwan. For example, where I lived, every baby was called ‘erzi’ (boy child) regardless of gender. In fact, when I tried to use the gender neutral ‘haizi’, I was corrected to just use erzi. So yesterday in class I had to use the word ‘child’ and I said ‘erzi’ as I had been taught. My teacher said, “No, that means boy, use ‘haizi.’” I said, “That’s interesting. I was corrected to say erzi where I lived.” My teacher, knowing I lived on the Mainland: “Yeah…I don’t like that.” It was a private, friendly exchange between me and my teacher, but it was one example of the way in which language can reflect culture. (I don’t need to go into details, do I?)

2. I’ve been watching a lot of rerun tv (Seinfeld: still funny!), and hence watching a lot of advertisements, something new again to me. And I’ve realized over the past two years that if I really need something, I’ll find it. Advertisements aren’t really necessary. Somehow, every product I actually NEED occurs to me all on my own. Amazing!

3. Since a few of you said you liked the song tradition, here is another little example of it, as well as an example of the cultural conflict that sometimes happened to us.

When T., V. and others did their summer teaching project in a little city a couple of hours away, I went to visit. When I was leaving to come back home, I decided to walk to the tiny long distance bus station instead of taking a taxi because it was only a mile or two away. The teachers they were training were treating them to dinner that night, but T. skipped the beginning of dinner to walk me to the bus station, and a couple of the teachers came with us to make sure we found it okay. We got there and my bus was leaving in ten minutes, so we started saying goodbye and the teachers were APPALLED that he was going to leave before my bus left the station. They kept saying, “Stay with her! Stay with her!” And of course I’m saying,”No, go to the dinner! We’re leaving in ten minutes, it’s no big deal!” We tried to explain it was no big deal for him to leave, but oh, these ladies were not having it. We finally convinced them, but when he got to the door, he turned back around and mouthed to me,”Are we okay?? I don’t know what to do here!”” I mouthed back, “Yes! Yes! GO! It’s fine!” It was sometimes really easy for us to get caught between what was culturally expected vs. what was comfortable for us.

The funny thing was, when they came back from the teaching project, some teachers sent a little Buddhist necklace as a gift for me, which was incredibly thoughtful and generous and kind and so indicative of how the Chinese are. But I also wondered if they did it as a sort of consolation, because in their eyes I didn’t get songed properly and was instead ‘deserted’ at the bus station. So now when I wear the necklace, it’s a cute reminder of that cultural moment in the bus station.