After two long visits by two different computer technicians, my computer seems to be cooperating again so I'm back online. Yay!

Today in class, I had a bit of an embarrassin experience. Two boys from the evening class I taught last term came to join my graduate class this morning. And to be honest, I didn't even realise that they were not supposed to be in that class, I just registered them as 'my students' and didn't think about from which class.

Anyway, we were discussing manners and politeness in different cultures, and kept coming back to the Chinese concept of saving face. The students were unusually quiet for some reason. Finally, in the second hour, one of the girls stood up and loudly proclaimed: "I have to say this, we all deeply dislike outsiders coming to the class. We cannot take it, we really hate it."

I had no idea what she was talking about...

Then one of the boys said, "but Elina, you told me last time that I could come to your class". I know I haven't said that, as I know they don't like other students coming there, but he probably asked me what time my class is, and I have told him.

So here we are, talking about saving face, and I am there in front of them, in an embarrassing situation, feeling how tense and silent everyone is, trying to look at the floor, with me blushing and not knowing what to say. In the end, I just told them that it's their class and if they don't want outsiders then that's the way it'll be. But they wanted the other kids out straight away, which would have been very embarassing for them, so I asked the class whether we could let them stay until the end of the class, as we had just been speaking of politeness...

It probably doesn't sound too bad, but I could just feel how everyone was very, very unconfortable - and so was I. Lost faces, I can tell you... But the rest of the class was much more relaxed and they started talking again...

Anyway, it's holiday time now, we're off to Dalian tomorrow, going through Beijing. Let's see what's going to happen with the SARS situation, when a few hundred million people all get on the trains and cough in each other's faces... And we'll be right there in the middle of it, I'm not worried about myself, but I have to say that I am a little worried of the whole situation getting out of hand with the holiday travel. But let's hope for the best.

For all of the Finnish people, HAUSKAA VAPPUA!!! :)

Just a quick entry to let you all know that I'm still alive. My Internet connection is messed up, so I'm at Griselle's typing this. In the end, after a couple of visits to the wonderful university hospital, they figured out that I have kidney stones, which was what was causing the pain. After drinking mucky bown medicine a few times a day since then, I'm feeling lots better already.

Meanwhile, the weather has been changing just about every day. From 30C it dropped down to about 10C, and it rained for a couple of days. I profited of it, walking in the quiet, rainy streets... and afterwards, sitting inside listening to the sound of the rain, lighting up some candles and drinking hot tea...

But now, it's almost the time for the one-week May holiday, which will be a time for me and Griselle to head of to the north-east to the city of Dalian, by the sea. Will tell you more about it later. But now, I'll sign off and continue when I get my own connection back...

First the weather report: it's 30 degrees celcius and sunny. Like they say: there's no spring in Baoding, we've definitely jumped straight to summer now.

Today has been partly excellent, partly a little blahh. I've been a little ill in the past couple of days, nothing to keep me from doing what I normally do, teaching classes etc, just some infection and whoknowswhat, that has forced me to get a little more acquinted with the Chinese health care system. Yesterday I went to the No. 2 hospital to get some tests done, after which they gave me some antibiotics plus some other stuff (who knows what?!?) through an IV infusion, which is the way they prefer to do it here, get it directly into the circulation.

And today, I had to go to the university hospital for round 2, this time it took me 5 hours of IV drip drip dip...ugghh... And I have to go back tomorrow for some more. Eugh.

But on the other hand, the first part of the day today was just great, definitely one of those "I love Chinese people" -days. Funnily enough, before I got ill, I had arranged with a student of mine from last term, Wang Ke Qi (or Cathy) to take me to visit a traditional Chinese hospital on the outskirts of Baoding. So we went there first thing in the morning, to meet a wonderful Dr Li Ji Cun, an old gentleman with a definite sparkle in the eye. We hung around his office, watching the people come and go. As you can see from the picture, there is no privacy for the Chinese patient, the surgery's doors are always open and people come in with their troubles, and get examined while others are waiting for their turn.

The Chinese doctors do their diagnosis based on taking the patient's pulse from the wrist, looking at the tongue and the face, and asking the patient to describe the symptoms. As it happened that I was feeling a little ill, the doctor examined me and gave me his judgement: the flow of energy and blood is blocked, which is causing the pain. He prescribed some traditional medicine and told me not to take the antibiotics, as they are too strong and can do more harm than good. I actually tend to believe Dr Li more than the doctors at the "Western" hospitals here, but I'll go through the 3-day treatment they prescribed and then will start taking Dr Li's medication. So far no effect from the Western medicine, which by the way has cost me around 500 RMB so far, while the traditional pills were 3.50 RMB!!!

Cathy has been having some problems with her throat, which is how she knows Dr Li, who has been treating her. To show me how acupuncture works, he did a quick treatment on her, sticking the needle to two points on her throat (geeeez it goes deep!!) and one one both of her wrists. Just stuck the needle in, wriggled it around for a bit, and pulled it out. The whole thing took just a couple of minutes, but pretty much knocked Cathy out for a few minutes afterwards, she just about fainted... Apparently, there are 365 acupuncture points on the body, and these guys know exactly where all of them are.

While Dr Li was treating other patients we went to take a look at the adjoined temple, dedicated to a famous Song Dynasty doctor Liu Shou Zhen, who treated the emperor and lived right where the temple now is. People come to the temple to pray to Liu for good health by offering incense, money (fake and real), fruit, colourful paper etc etc. The temple area was an amazing place to be with a million things going on: fortune tellers, incense salespeople, old women praying, others building mountains of incense... There were lots of people around as it was the first day of the third months in the Chinese lunar calendar, which is an important day for praying. It was great to have Cathy around, as she was asking all the old people around for the meaning of the things there were doing. For example, there was a woman who after burning the incense collected all the greay ashes that were left. We found out that the reasons was that she would later mix them with water and drink it for her health. Another woman was rubbing the ashes to her leg, to make it better.

We stayed at the hospital until lunch time, when Dr Li invited to come over to his house to eat. He and his wife (who are both quite old but still working) prepared a great lunch of vegetables, fish, shrimps, bread, pork and soup. Not to forget then beer, of course.

These people were just absolutely wonderful, once again I was treated like a real guest of honour, this time by people who are a lot older then me and know more than I ever will... it's just amazing to me how they receive a little girl like me, and treat me like I was someone special. In a way it makes me feel a little unconfortable, but mostly it just makes me feel all warm and good, it's so great to see people like this, who are simply kind and warm. Makes me believe in humanity a little more :) In fact, I really don't think the same thing would easily happen in Finland, a foreign girl being taken to meet a doctor at a busy hospital, and being given so much time and even invited to eat at the doctors house afterwards, and heartily welcomed back any time (and meaning it). It's moments like this that make travelling worthwhile :)

Another sunny, summery day in Baoding. I just got back from spending a great time with a bunch (6) of my Phd students, we went to the Baoding Botanical Gardens (which in reality is really just a big park area with trees and plants planted a couple of years ago... it's a little bare right now but will surely be nice in a few more years), just walking around and lying down on the lawn, enjoying the day and being silly. The area of the gardens is huge, which means that even though hordes of people come there on the weekend, you can still mostly be on your own and enjoy the peace & quiet (- essential for the Finn in me...).

I really, truly enjoy being with these people, they are the ones who are my real friends here and make me feel at home. I have a few close friends in the younger students, but with them I always feel that I'm playing the role of an older sister a little, they look up to me somehow, but the PhDs treat me as an equal, though they are all older than me I am their teacher so I guess that sort of equals it out... Anyway, I feel like with them I can just relax and be me :) And I have to say I feel a lot better with them than with most of the foreigners, no matter how nice they are, too, but somehow it's much warmer and simpler with the Chinese.

The outing in the park was of course followed by a great lunch...which means it's time for a nap now, in the Chinese fashion...

But pictures, of course, check out the bold and the beautiful of Baoding!!

Today in Baoding it was nearly 30C, with the sun shining bright. It's amazing how quickly it has changed, from a cold, windy city into a bright summery one in just a couple of weeks. And everything is green, green, green - I never noticed how many trees there are in the city until now. From the big main roads to the small backstreets, everything seems to be lined up with trees, green or flowery. It all makes it very easy to like this place. But maybe I'll start complaining when it goes up to 40C. But right now it's all good & pretty, I'm really enjoying the sun: going bike riding around the city or just simply sitting out on the garden bench, studying Chinese in the morning... Here's a picture from the west of the city I took today while riding on my bike.

Yesterday Freaky Frank (remember the taxation bureau guy? Just don't tell him I call him that...) took me over to a private primary/middle school at the far East of Baoding, who have been interested in having me do some part-time teaching for them. The place was absolutely wonderful (I wish I'd taken my camera), away from the busy city, in the middle of fields, and just had a really good feel to it somehow. And the little kiddies were just sweet. I thought that I don't want to go on teaching after this term, but I'm really having a hard time thinking of having to leave China and somehow teaching a little longer doesn't even seem like a such a bad option after all... I've got some really good job opportunities lined up in Europe, but at the same time I feel like it isn't over for me yet in China... there is so much more in this country that I can discover.

At the school I also met a group of 5 people from Cote d'Ivoire who are here to study Chinese. It was so much fun to just talk to them in French and hear their lovely African accents. Even if being in Senegal wasn't always easy for me, it brought back some good, sunny memories. Will hopefully meet them again. All in all, going over there made me feel very good for some reason, even if I don't end up taking the job (it really is very far from Nong Da and I don't have that much time left here anyway, and the holiday is coming up and my teaching schedule will change after it...all these things). Although for that I had to put up with being stuck in the car with Freaky Frank for far too long...

But: China, China, China...

The Chinese concept of time is often very different from the 'Western' one...

(A mental sidestep: I find myself often using the word 'Western' now to cover everything European/American/Australian...whatnot. Even sometimes just about everything non-Chinese. Sometimes people get really confused when I answer their question of Western food or Western music with an attempt to explain that actually there are no such things at all, and that there are actually a lot of different cultures and tradition within the all-encompassin 'West'.)

...Whereas us northern Europeans (and many of those other 'westerners') plan the use of our time and our daily and weekly schedules well ahead, the Chinese hardly ever do. Back in Europe, I used to have a daily planner where I would write down my appointments, lunches with friends, and so on. And before the week even begins, you'd have two pages full of things to do. In China, nobody has a planner or a calendar. I asked my students in class and absolutely nobody had one. And why? Because there is no use for such a thing, as everything is usually decided last minute. As those Intercultural Communication people would say, the Chinese seem to tolerate uncertainty extremely well, while at the same time the laowais coming here feel often like banging their head on the wall and screaming out Chinese insults, as once again everything has changed last minute. So no use of planning on doing this or that English event next week at a certain time, someone will probably call you 5 minutes before to let you know that the plans have changed, no explanations needed.

In a way, I'm getting used to this now, but I have to admit that I still have a calendar at home where I mark my appointments, and I usually set them up with people a few days in advance... it's usually ok, as I'm a fussy laowai with a bizarre concept of time :) Three weeks ago we got a visiting professor from Switzerland who will stay here for 6 weeks, and as I was talking to him the other day he was telling me how hard he sometimes finds it that it's just plain impossible to plan things in advance. Oohh how well I understand him, but the best strategy is to just go with the flow and see what happens. At the same time, it gives us the possibility to change plans last minute, too, by just giving someone a call, which can sometimes be very useful...

This week people back home are getting ready to celebrate Easter, but here this one of the Western festivals is almost unheard of. I suppose it is less commercial in nature than those that have become popular in China, for example Christmas and Valentine's day. So, I'm planning to tell my students about it and take some choccies to class to buy them off, hehe.

But China, of course, has festivals and traditions of its own (practically every village has different ones!). One of the most important festivals culminated this past sunday: the festival of the dead or the grave-sweeping festival. On this day, people go to the cemeteries to pay their respects and offer gifts to those of their family who have passed away. They will also clear the area around the grave, of weeds for example. The spirits of the ancestors are offered fake money, paper folded in the shape of ancient Chinese currency (like little boats), white flowers and trees decorated with paper flowers - and food and alcohol are sprinkled over the graves. An even number of incence sticks is burned and offered. Sometimes some of this food is eaten by the attending family, as it's considered lucky. Unmarried girls are not allowed to take part in this ceremony, so it's performed by the men and married women of the family.

For the more important people, such as war heroes or goverment officials, a ritual of grave-sweeping is performed. People come to pay their respects, bringing flowers, and the ground around the grave is swept clean. I didn't go to the cemetary but apparently many students went to the 'cemetary of heroes' in Baoding, where famous people, war heroes etc are buried.

So, graves and spirits in both of our traditions this week...

Oh, and a couple of other pictures... Last week I spent an evening having dinner and playing Chinese games with some students, who then surprised me by giving me four big posters of calligraphy made specially for me by a friend of theirs. I was rather touched, as this bloke has never even met me, yet he wrote out these beautiful poems for me. If you have been working on your Chinese, you can spot out my name in them!

And no, don't ask me for a translation...

- Calligraphy one & two

Another girly weekend in Beijing with Griselle and Beth, going out and shopping... escaping the Chinese life for a couple of days. And now I can appreciate the quiet Baoding life more again ;)

Pictures speak more than words so check these out:

- Mao in front of the Tiananmen Square
- Beth & I in a bar in Sanlitun
- Dancing on the table again at Poacher's
- Flying kites in Ritan Park

and my personal favourite:
- Absolutely wicked trees in Ritan Park

Plus a couple of others in the same album.

The sandstorm early this week was rather big news nationally, sweeping over 11 states in the north and north-east of the country. On the TV news they showed footage from Beijing, where in the middle of the day it looked like someone had just pulled a curtain across the sky and the sun, dimming everything into a yellowy haze.

Yesterday in class we were talking about ideas of beauty, and how the Chinese ones differ from the European or Western ones. I've been wondering at the flat heads of many Chinese, especially men and boys. This is best visible on young kids, who have their heads shaven, and you can see how the back of their head is very oddly flat, and not round like it would normally be. I thought this is just some genetic difference in the shape of the skull, but when I mentioned it to a student, she laughed and said that this is how parents would shape their kids' heads as it's considered to be attractive. Children would be given hard, flat pillows, and some sort of frame to keep their head in place, and press it flat when they are still young and the skull can be shaped. To me, a person with different ideas of beauty and what looks good, the flat heads just look seriously strange.

From what I hear, appearances are extreme important in the Chinese society. For example, I was told that employers pay great attention to what the candidates for a job look like, if they are considered to have 'prosperous' or 'successful' looks, they are far more likely to be employed in a higher position than those unfortunate ones who just look common or even ugly. For a man, the desired looks would include a round face, well-proportioned facial features, a flat head (of course) and they should preferably be a little plump, if not even fat. When I tried to ask what would be the ideal looks for women, I was told this is more complicated... But I have noticed that they find different women beautiful than I do, sometimes a gorgeous student of mine will present a friend of hers to me as the "most beautiful girl in the class according to everyone". And somehow these "most beautiful girls" never seem that special to me, while I find some other apparently plain-looking ones to be really beautiful. And the Chinese always wonder at the ugly Chinese women who manage to become movie stars or singers in the West...

Finally, some new pictures are up, a couple taken on the train to Beijing last weekend and a couple of flowery, springy photos I took on campus this afternoon, while waiting for a student at the main gate. And something scary: The Invasion of the Giant Doves.