Shortly after arriving in Beijing, I joined a local gym on the 5th floor of the Jinma hotel and bought a hot pot whose operation required a hands-on demonstration by three Chinese sales people at Sunning Appliance store. I also attended the opening ceremonies at the International College of Beijing, my home university, and met a husband and wife artistic team with roots in Mongolia.
Extraordinary things happen every day here. At least every day happenings appear extraordinary to me, the Western outsider with just enough Chinese knowledge to be "dangerous." In other words, I can comprehend much of what is being said; I don't understand all that it means.
First off, the Jinma hotel is dubbed a five-star hotel and it sits just west of the Chinese Agricultural University East Campus. There is a Starbucks on the ground floor around the corner from the hotel, along with a Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Subway franchise, with turkey and bologna meat that appears to have been shaved or hacked from local farm animals. However, the Zhangbei fitness center is a picture of modernity. You enter the center from the back side of the hotel and emerge in a dark cavernous space on the 5th floor where two Chinese women receptionists without any English will welcome you, albeit reluctantly. Since I speak Chinese, I was able to register with my colleague, economist Enoch Cheng, without a problem.
A friendly, strikingly tall young man, Jiang Wen-leng ("Culture Dragon" Jiang), whose English name is Penny, sits down and explains all the gym services. There are frequent classes including Yoga, Latin Dance, spinning (which Penny teaches), and Pilates; body building equipment, and a sky-lit indoor pool (now out of order; it is being repaired, and I have since heard from an Irish colleague that people spit in it). I have been to the gym five or six times, adapting to an electronically compromised cross-trainer and the weight equipment.
Two young athletic coaches, Mr. Wang, who is about 25 and a graduate student (friendly with an easy laugh) and Mr. Liu Fei, have given me free training. Liu Fei, who is 29 years old and built tightly, like an acrobat, has repeatedly asked for my phone number and declared that I am "piaoliang" (beautiful). I believe the blond hair and fit build are inspirations fed by Western advertising. I have discussed the subtleties of Japanese body building technique and research on physiology with Mr. Liu, and even though I don't understand everything he says, he has assured me that he is available for personal coaching sessions (for a fee). We have also talked about democracy and the progress China is making in that direction; the first thing Liu told me is that China has too many people.
I appreciate this instant attention, even if it's coming from an uncertain place. Liu has already taught me new words, like "duan lian" (tough workout). I don't get to hear many personal compliments anymore in America, especialy compliments about my looks. In China, no one believes I am past a certain age (maybe in the future I won't tell them). I look at my photographs now and ask myself how I suddenly got here, tilting toward middle age. Even though my body is still in good shape and the muscle tone is decent, there is something in the flattening of disks and spine and the loss of winsome skinniness that diminishes me. Moreover, I frequently take pictures standing with my children, who are now grown and at the peak of their beauty. Nonetheless in China, some people believe I'm "hot."
Yesterday at the gym I relented and gave Liu my business card and told him I'd be happy to have dinner with him as a friend. Somewhat risky but he knows I'm a third degree blackbelt; he seems to have backed off from his original passion. He now realizes I am old enough to be his Mom.
At the opening reception of the International College of Beijing, which contained many speeches, including a nervously competent delivery by my student Claudia, I was entertained by a couple, Mr. Liu Ya-jiang (Liu "Asia river") and Ha Se Gao Wa, his wife. Both are incredibly talented. They sing, they paint, they philosophize. Ha Se Gao Wa sang Mongolian grassland and love songs with a carefree lilting acapella. Yi-jiang also has a gorgeous baritone voice with a catch that will make you cry.
Both in their 40s, the Lius have experienced the best and worst of Chinese contemporary life. Ha Se Gao Wa saw both her parents carted away during the Cultural Revolution for three years. She was about 3 years old when this happened and was cared for by her older sister while her parents labored in the countryside. Early in her life she became a movie actress and she thrives today on stories of love and peaceful reconciliation. When I ask about Chinese censorship (including censorship and repudiation of the imprisoned Nobel Prize winner Liu Shao-bo), she explains that negativity and harshness may foster reprisal in the government and that love and peace produce much more positive feedback. Husband Ya-jiang believes that the lack of stability in China for many years has produced a wariness regarding complete and uncensored freedoms. I sense they are patient and hope eventually things will loosen up. In the meantime, this couple drives a practically new SUV and enjoys a comparatively carefree artistic life.
Ha Se Gao Wa and her husband both know a smattering of English, and they immediately befriended me (I felt privileged, since there were about 30 faculty members at this first dinner). When I visited them in their own private quarters in our Guest house (they get some nicer suites on the 4th floor) Ya jiang showed me some images of his sketches and paintings. I was flabbergasted; my thought was as good as Wyeth, maybe better, and different. A graphic designer by trade, Ya-Jiang has his own successful graphics business, is friendly with Dr. Meng and appears to have some understanding, if not ties, to Party apparatus, although the exact nature of his relationship to the Community Party is not clear to me. He is a student of a Chinese painting master in Beijing. He is also quite familiar with the Wyeths of Chadds Ford (he mentioned the city, and I told him I lived nearby), both Andrew Wyeth and N.C., whose style and subject appear weirdly to intersect with Liu's across a century of time and space. Liu has spent months in the winter living with families in the Mongolian steppes. He produces complex portraiture of Mongolian women and farmers which I hope to preview in the States at some point.
The Lius have also "adopted" an 18 year old Mongolian girl, a dancer, someone they've known for years. They made a video of her at the age of 12 dancing gracefully with cups on top of her head (I will encourage him to release it to Youtube; it is so precious it should go 'viral'). The young girl did an authentic Mongolian dance for us combining minute seductive glances and shoulders invitations, along with simulated horseback riding. The dancer hopes to train at University and perhaps to go to New York. In addition, Ha Se Gao Wa and Ya-jing have a talented 15 year old son who is training with his father to become a painter or illustrator. The boy sings Michael Jackson songs in a faithful falsetto. The Lius have elected to home school him rather than place him in conventional Chinese secondary school.
I love spending time with this family because their language is truly Chinese. Liu, who seems to be fairly wealthy, with a home in the countryside of Beijing ("the air is clear there," he says) and in Guangzhou, for the winter season, is preparing an exhibition of his work. I suggested he start with an exhibition in the Brandywine (Wyeth) museum in Chadds Ford. He says he is at least three years from perfecting his work for the world to see. However, I sense such spirituality in his work so true to life (at least an elevated life) that I believe it is bound to be noticed in any country. He offers a glimpse of an untainted Mongolian life that probably should remain a secret. Perhaps his vision is too pure for a society already jaded by manufactured realism.
Short notes: Since I've been here I have also shopped in the very modern, spacious "Merry Mart" supermarket, taken the subways (crowded, but efficient), and met up with friend Ivy Lu, from China Monitor, a 23 year old woman who has spent exactly two weeks in America and speaks like a native. I have shopped with her in the monumental Wang Fu Jing, which has a dizzying Western style punctuated by enormous avenues and shopping malls leading to Tian An Men Square. I have also been to San Li Dun, to the Bookworm Store, to hear a lecture/debate by a Dutch woman novelist and, separately, a Dutch scientist who doesn't believe in Global Warming (we argued). And I have met many lovely people here on campus. My students are a blog in themselves. Soon I will post some photographs on Flickr, but for now, I will leave you with the news that I will be writing as a regular columnist for Caixin,probably the best investigative English language economics and news publication in China. I will start as an education columnist, but I have to do the research to find good stories in a society that still appears guarded and largely opaque to me. -- Arielle Emmett
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