I don't recall enough details of my first few days in China to be specific, the sheer amount of new things simply overwhelmed all six senses to the point where it was difficult to focus on anything for very long. Basically, it was like being on another planet. I was hooked.

The original intention of my trip to China was to take Chinese lessons, which sounded like a good idea, until I realized that learning a language in a sterile classroom setting filled with other students who [quite literally] don't know what they're saying is just about the slowest way to achieve fluency, so I gave that up pretty fast.

Luckily, along came a kind soul who, although entirely unaware of her Great Deed, saved me from what could have been a rather boring summer. (While I was certainly not one for wasting the perfect opportunity to explore both myself and a foreign land, I was also not yet of the caliber and resolve that it would take to conquer china in 2000.) She was yet another of those people fated to stand around universities looking for foreign students willing to teach english to local kids, and when she asked me, I said yes.

So I went to China to learn Chinese, and what do I do? I quit school and start teaching English. Wonderful.

Actually, at the time it was wonderful, since I met lots of friends, got to know a lot more of Beijing than I would have otherwise, and besides, what the hell was I going to do in a country where I didn't even speak the language, anyway? Though now I'm deeply averse to the idea of teaching English, at the time it was certainly a means to an end: not only did I get to earn money, but every evening I also hung out with and learned Chinese from the local students at the college where I was teaching English summer classes to kids 7-17. Far cooler than sitting in a classroom for four hours a day listening to other people mispronounce things. (Actually, now that I think about it, even then much of my time was technically spent "sitting in a classroom . . . listening to other people mispronounce things," but at least it wasn't directly affecting my ability to learn something.)

My summer went by just like that. Long days of teaching rowdy but fun classes of students, and long evenings spent in the college dorm chatting with college students usually packed eight to a tiny room (but most had gone home for summer).

I went home with a new view of the world. One can step outside the door to that little sacred and protected place called home, pass the people you know and the stores you shop at, through the airport and over the country's borders, and arrive in a land far, far away, a land where your version of reality doesn't seem to mean anything. It's shocking, but it takes a good shock to wake people up (especially since most think they're already awake), plus It's a great feeling once you get used to the idea. I would never be satisfied with anything less again.

[29 may 05]