I was teaching future English teachers. It was 1991. The massacre at Tiananmen Square in Beijing was so fresh that none of us, Chinese and non-Chinese alike, dared utter the word "Tiananmen" for fear of putting ourselves or someone else in danger. If I were to sum up the mind and heart of the Chinese it would be best said in the 1000 words of this photo...
To this day my heart swells up in my chest, an audible and involuntary groan escapes up my throat, and I feel sadness, admiration, disgust, and also a profound sense of "I will never ever be that brave!" Look at him! I cry every time.
When I look at that photo I think about the students and friends I knew in those days of silenced, but not dead, hope. None of them got to see this photo. It was one of those pictures that the government would have gone to lethal lengths to keep out of circulation. And they did. Back then it was easy. Not so easy today. Back then it would have been deadly in it's very power to incite hope and also a sense that injustice had been perpetrated. Instead, many of my students and friends were unsure that the Tiananmen massacre of a peaceful student demonstration had even occurred. The denial reminds me of that weird population of people who actually believe that the Holocaust didn't happen either. Only, my Chinese friends were being propagandized and hypnotised by their own government into an uneasy belief that nothing that terrible had come to pass.
I have much much more to say but want to save it for a more rainy day (as opposed to a partly cloudy with showers day). I am tempted to liken my having to move back in with my parents at age 40 to standing bravely in front of a string of weaponized military tanks. But I won't. That would be tacky. But I do want to talk about family.
The Chinese concept of "family" is profoundly different from our American concept of "family". My young students were so homesick. I read it every day in their journals. I would say that 80% of their writing spoke about family and their home.
Back then I was a curiosity of immense proportion, which you could never comprehend unless you had stood at the center of a crowd of Chinese a hundred deep because they all wanted to hear you, take a picture, or get a look at you. My novelty wore off quickly. While walking the streets of any Chinese city I felt curiously like one of those baby girl beauty-pageant princesses. Only I didn't feel like a princess so much as a freak show. People would stare at us to the point of, I kid you not, driving their cars and bicycles off the road. We, my fellow compatriots and I, developed a wicked sense of humor with regards to our freak-like status. I was one of, I think, 17 foreigners, in our city of 2.5 million, the capital of Jiangxi province. Our life was a public life. Our school made an admirable effort to protect our American sesibilities for secrecy and isolation.
So, of course, people in China have different rules of engagement. I was often asked questions considered rude, inappropriate, or generally off limits in America..."How old are you?", or, "How much money do you make?" There were also frequent statements made about my weight which nearly caused me to slap a few people if it were not for the fact that I remembered I was an American IN China. And that would look bad. Since I taught a "Western Cultures" course I had an academic obligation to address and illuminate our cultural differences. I was the "foreign expert" after all. Plus, I had a, as previously explained, oddly procured B.A. in Cultural Anthropology tucked under my belt that needed to be aired out and shown off.
One of my students' favorite curiosities was my relationship with my parents, and at 25 this American girl had oh so many other endeavors and topics in mind. Like world peace, democracy and communism, Jesus, not relying on plagiarism to pass your tests. All subjects that were in varying degrees off limits.
"Okay, my lovely students," for this is how I addressed my lovely students, "today we will begin a series on family and culture. Let's start by writing questions you have about Western concepts regarding family."
I commenced with writing down their expressed topics regarding family. To my disappointment, at first, they all wanted to know about MY family.
"Do you live with your parents?"
"Do you have sisters and brothers?"
"Why aren't you married?"
"How much money does your father make?"
"How will you take care of your parents if you live in another country?"
As the consummate flexible teacher that I was I slaked their voyeuristic curiosity, whilst embracing the opportunity to teach cultural differences and similarities.
So, it went something like this.
"An American woman or man is not dutifully obligated to live with their parents. I would never want to live with my parents...except for maybe a week." To which there were expressions ranging from shock to horror. "Not only do American adults not want to live with their parents, our parents do not want us to move in with them! Our parents raise us so that we become independent, able to live on our own." Gasps.
"But," they say, "isn't it lonely?"
"No. Americans like to be isolated, independent, lonely, and depressed. We prefer to hoard our belongings, and after working for years to own our own home we want it all to ourselves. Then, when we are too old to live in our home, rather than our children returning to take care of us they send us to a home with a hundred other people waiting to die." Shocked silence.
Let me just say, I too was shocked at the responses I gave. Americans sounded really infantile and selfish.
Sadly, I hear, Chinese culture and family are looking more and more like ours to the detriment of much of their inherent stability.
My current situation illustrates that one should never say never. Never. Forced by a situation out of my control I have lived with my parents now for, I think, two years. It could be longer than that, and my not really knowing is encouraging in that it hasn't felt like an eternity. Sometimes I fear I'll never get back on my feet. My parents, I think, secretly hope I'll stay even if I do.
Truth be told, I think I could live with my parents again. A parents-in-law apartment would be preferable...because, after all, I AM an independent blue-blooded American with tendencies for selfishness, isolation, and hoarding.
(this post is dedicated to my long-suffering, merciful, and good-humored parents)
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