Today was a really really fun day…it seems odd that I’m saying that when just 2 days ago I was so lonely and wanted to go home. But I’m really glad that I’ve had a change in attitude. I’m just afraid that as quickly as my attitude became happy, it could easily become sad again. But anyways, on to my day!
So..this morning was just very bad. And by very bad, I just mean really unhealthy. Me and Joanna (my roommate) woke up at 7am because we’re still both jetlagged and waking up/falling asleep at weird times. When we woke up, we were both SUPER DUPER hungry. I was super hungry because I didn’t eat dinner yesterday, because I was just so tired and not hungry. I don’t know why Joanna was hungry though..she ate dinner yesterday. But anyways, we were super hungry, and we went to go get breakfast. We also decided to go to the convenient store to get snacks for our room, just in case we get hungry at night or something. So we each bought one red bean bao and a yogurt drink, and then we bought tons of snacks for later. So we got back to the room and ate our bao and yogurt, but then we were super excited about our snacks and wanted to try them, so we opened up ALLLLL of them and ate one of each just to try it. Yeah, it was a very bad idea. EVERYTHING was loaded with sugar and fat, so it was just a terrible stomach ache afterwards…I seriously felt like throwing up, because I have never binge eaten so much sugar and fat in my life. I felt completely disgusting and I wanted to barf it all up. But we had to go to class afterwards, so we sort of walked it off going to class.
Class today focused on China’s rise in power, and how that has affected relations with other countries (like the US). For morning session, we watched the movie “China Rises.” The first part was on the Communist Party and how the party is dealing with the nationalism of the Chinese. On the one hand, the Chinese nationalism is a really great thing because it motivates everyone to work towards the common goal of glorifying their country. It keeps people united and creates a great sense of community among the nation. On the other hand, though, it sort of blinds people into not always doing what’s best for individuals but rather sacrificing themselves for the sake of their country. An obvious example of this is the young Chinese gymnasts, who are taken away from their family at an early age and trained excruciatingly hard for the sake of winning a gold medal for their country. Anyways, I think it’s really interesting how incredibly united the Chinese are with their nationalism. I love America, but I think the Chinese have a different love for their country. I love America in the sense that it is my home country and it is where I grew up; I love it as my home. But I feel like the Chinese love their country as if it is their /body/, like they make up the body of their country like we Christians make up the body of Christ. They all work together and sacrifice themselves for the sake of a fully functional and successful body, just as Christians are called to do as well. I don’t think this kind of love for their country is a bad thing though; I think it can be both good and bad like I mentioned before. I just think that it’s different, and most Americans can’t relate with the same degree of nationalism. But I also think the history that China faced plays a great part in creating that sense of nationalism, meaning that the US, Britain, and the other countries that humiliated China in the past kind of played a role in developing this nationalism. Yesterday we learned about the Opium War, the Treaty of Nanjing, the Sino-Japanese War, and other historical events in which we (by “we” I mean the countries opposing China) basically humiliated China by KILLING them in war or completely overtaking them with our military power. Because of this humiliation that China had to undergo for so long, it’s no wonder Chinese have such a pride in their country now. Their country is emerging as such a powerful force to be reckoned with, and with such a great shameful past in their minds, how could they NOT be proud of the growth of their country? If I were Chinese (not Chinese-American), I would definitely be proud of my country for not only being able to recover from our losses, but nearly overpowering or becoming equivalent in power to our humiliators (I know, it’s not a word). So in that sense, we kind of brought it upon ourselves that China is such a fast-growing and nationalistic country that we now view as such a threat. That’s what the afternoon session of class was about. Professor Ni Shixiong, a professor of international relations, came in to speak to us about China’s rise to power. He spoke about how China’s relations with different countries have changed and how China has done a good job of improving its relations after opening its doors in 1978. He emphasized, though, that China isn’t rising in power in order to threaten other countries although that’s how everyone is viewing it. Rather, China wants to rise to power to contribute to the world and develop peaceful relations with the world. I really liked that he emphasized this because before I came, in America, I felt like China is so badly portrayed as this communist power growing and expanding and threatening our democracy and our status as a world superpower. It definitely goes to show how the media is used as propaganda to make us believe that our country is always good and blame/fear the other country. An example of this is that a lot of people in China aren’t familiar and don’t know much about Tiananmen Square. I guess this is due to a lack of education about it, because the Chinese govt doesn’t want to lose face by teaching the Chinese about a time when they couldn’t handle political conflict. Dan (the program director) actually told us that one of the Chinese students he met was taught that the students of Tiananmen Square were portrayed as having brought their fate upon themselves, by fighting with the soldiers and striking back. But in America, we’re taught about the event with heavily-loaded words like “slaughter” and “massacre” making it seem like the Chinese were just overly brutal. So then we end up thinking the Chinese govt is unnecessarily brutal and doesn’t treat their members with justice like the US does. It’s weird. It just kind of shows how everything is seen through the subjectivity in our minds, so what ACTUALLY happens? How could we ever know what happens in reality, when everything we see, say, do, or hear is all being filtered by our experiences, beliefs, and opinions? I guess the only way to know what OBJECTIVELY happens is to be God. Too bad none of us will ever know.
Anyways, onto the rest of my day! That was a long tangent about politics. Probably the longest I’ve ever written or will ever write in my life. So anyways, all the girls went out to lunch together at this place off this street that we call “The Student Street” because it’s right next to our classroom building and it’s where a lot of Fudan students go for lunch. We were all supposed to go together (10 girls + 2 boys), but we lost the boys, so we went ourselves. Anyways, when we got there we had delicious food again (I seriously think I’m gaining weight, because the food here is so good)! And everyone wished me a happy birthday, and told me that because it was my birthday I had to pray for the meal and ask for the check in Mandarin. So here I am, this little Chinese-looking girl, shouting across the restaurant for the maidan (check) in a terrible American accent. It was pretty embarrassing…I’m pretty sure now that they just use the excuse that I’m the birthday girl to make me do things that they don’t want to. Anyways, after that we walked back to campus for afternoon class, and they surprised me with a cake! It was soooo good..it was chocolate mousse cake. But omgosh it was so rich and so fatty. It was delicious though J I was so surprised…I didn’t think they’d go buy me a cake! It was so sweet of them J And we gave some to our professor, and he wished me a happy birthday J He was the cutest little man..he was like this little Asian guy and his English was very good except that he stumbled with a few words…and at the end, he went around and shook each of our hands to say good bye to us. It was adorable. I don’t know why, but I love old Asian people. I absolutely ADORE my Japanese teacher at UCSD because he wears his pants up pretty high and tucks his shirt in, and wears these big old grandpa glasses. He’s just the cutest thing I’ve ever seen, and I would just pick him up and put him in my pocket if I could. BUT ANYWAYS. That was a weird digression about old Asian people. So after class, I don’t know why, but Dan gave us the rest of the day off. According to the schedule we were supposed to go visit some neighborhood, but for some reason he cancelled that and we just got the rest of the afternoon and evening off. SOOOOoooooo…..we went SHOPPING!!!!!! We went to a nearby shopping mall called Wanda Plaza, where there’s like department stores and a food mall and things like that. So we were shopping for a while…but I didn’t buy anything…amazingly. And then we ate dinner at Pizza Hut. I know I know, kind of stupid, but I didn’t pick it. And the Pizza Hut in China is a lot nicer than the Pizza Hut in America, so it wasn’t so bad. We had interesting pizza too. The crust was like shaped in little balls, and the balls were filled with cheese or shrimp. It was like the shrimp from har gow. It was really weird. I don’t know if I like Chinese pizza that much…but I don’t really like pizza in general, so no surprise there. Anyways, after that, we continued shopping for a little bit more (but I didn’t buy anything again!) and then just went back to the hotel. We got back around 9pm and I skyped with Wesley for a bit. Anyways…tomorrow is Joanna’s birthday so we get to celebrate her birthday tomorrow!!!! Haha I’m definitely going to make her do everything I don’t want to do for payback J
Isn’t it weird that Joanna’s my roommate, we go to the same school, we have the same major, we have almost the same last name (hers is Ng), and we have ALMOST the same birthday? It’s kinda scary how similar we are, because we like a lot of the same things and say a lot of the same things too. It’s creepy…she’s like my twin. Only, she’s 2 years older than me and from a different mom. But that’s besides the point. It’s almost eerie.
Anyways…I have a lot of reading to do, and I have to start journaling for class…and I’m SO incredibly tired. It’s really bad, because me and Joanna are still jetlagged so we get really tired really early. But yes, that’s enough blogging for now. That was quite a post.
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