Post-mid-term: Progress with Chinese?

I actually wrote an entry detailing the schedule for my average day at IUP, but I realized that it was incredibly boring and decided not to inflict it upon the 1-3 people who read this blog.

Well, we took our mid-term at IUP on Friday--it took about 1.5-3 hours (depending on your own abilities & particular classes), and the teachers actually scrambled to finish grading it over lunch so that they could all meet with each of us in the afternoon to go over the results as well as discuss how the term was going.

The test was ridiculously easy--they really don't try to make it hard for you.  One of my teachers told me that she thinks of it as a good chance for students to review old material since we move so quickly, which I think is a healthy attitude towards testing.  There were basically three sections: one for my 聽力課(廣播1), my 思想與社會 textbook that covers two classes, and a take-home exam for my 小單班 (in which I read Chinese short stories) that I handed in the afternoon before.  I got 2 or 3 questions wrong across the majority of the test, but lost more points with the short paragraph we wrote for 思想與社會 and my essay questions for my 小單班.

I was talking with friends who feel that their Chinese has already improved immensely over the past month--really?  Actually, I don't have class with them, so it's a bit harder for me to see concrete differences in their Chinese.  But I feel slightly jealous because I don't feel that my Chinese has improved greatly by any stretch of the imagination.  At most I'm more aware of potential mistakes that I make with Chinese.  I can't really open my mouth without being highly aware of pitfalls lining my way down every sentence...

I think my goals are a bit different because I'm already quite experienced with speaking Mandarin and reading some form of Chinese characters (traditional when I was little, a lot of Japanese kanji in recent years).  If I'm really honest about it, my goal is probably to be like a native speaker.  In some ways, I do use Chinese as well as a native speaker would--I don't have huge issues with tones, my vocabulary is surprisingly expansive if I stop to think about it, and I can respond very naturally in casual conversations.  But I occasionally do strange little things with grammar, don't know a lot of vocabulary that would be common knowledge to anyone who'd grown up in a Chinese-speaking country, and I can't claim to be able to understand a work of modern Chinese literature in a very nuanced way.  I'm extremely self-conscious when I speak because I want to do so correctly, but without teachers to correct me, it's not that productive and simply stresses me out--I've given up on having my parents learn how to help me with Chinese.  Now when I talk with my dad on the phone, and I still sound awkward and have to search for words occasionally, I feel frustrated since IUP hasn't worked like some sort of miracle drug.  Isn't talking casually with your parents supposed to be relatively easy?  I suppose that being able to talk about issues with Chinese society in the classroom after reading a text is different from simply pulling something out on the spot in sometimes unexplored territory.

Unfortunately, I probably won't be taking more Chinese language classes for the next few years (I will be taking a Sinophone lit grad seminar this fall, but that's quite different).  I miss Japan, and next summer I'll probably be doing research in Tokyo and only coming to Beijing for a month to do a Chinese film class.  I'm even tempted to just do my annual family visit in Taipei and stay in Japan for the rest of the summer.  I'm starting to feel more fond of Beijing after exploring areas of it outside of Wudaokou, but it's been rough health-wise.  You can accuse me of being pampered, but at some point it would be nice to have a summer that felt more like an actual break in a city that's easier for me to live in.  But I envy those students who are staying on for another semester or the entire academic year.  They're going to make improvements in Chinese that I can't imagine for myself.  But even though I get greedy in a language-learning environment, when I sit back and take a breath, I realize that I'm going to be making improvements in a multitude of areas back at Yale, that would never be possible in Beijing.  It's always a trade-off...

Workload at IUP & health issues

To add to my previous entry: I'm actually in classes only with other heritage speakers--I'm told that wasn't done on purpose, and the teachers were actually rather amused to find that they had to correct a bunch of Southern accents all at once.  But even among heritage speakers, there are a lot of differences in background.  Some people grow up speaking Mandarin, while for others it's Cantonese or Shanghainese, and there's a wide range of how much exposure students have actually had to Chinese.

Otherwise, all I can say is that you shouldn't plan on coming to IUP if you're really excited about having a summer full of time to explore Beijing.  (I can see how you might be able to squeeze enough time out of an entire year?)  Advanced students often not only have 3 classes over 2 different textbooks, but also have a 4th class with extra work.  I'm reading a short story by 王朔 (Wang Shuo) called "空中小姐" for Monday, but it's about 40 pages in Word (with some spacing between dialogue)--it's also the third short story I've ever somewhat seriously attempted to read in Chinese.  Since this fourth class is only twice per week for me, I always forget about it as I'm caught up in finishing my daily homework, and then it comes around on Mon. & Wed. to kick me in the butt.  But basically, I've only been outside of Wudaokou once (798!!  A post on this later?) over the past 3-4 weeks, and I'm getting pretty familiar with all the cafes in the area.  If I'm on-task, I'm probably doing 3-5 hours of homework per day.

Unfortunately, I have to say that Beijing is tough on your health.  Most people I've talked to have had some sort of stomach problems, and everyday there are a few students who are absent.  While things are somewhat better now, I didn't go to class for two days this week since I had stomach problems for almost a week, ended up not eating enough as a result, and felt too weak & exhausted to actually do any work.  These problems seem to have also brought up my old respiratory issues from the aftermath of bronchitis.  Since I'm guessing the stomach issues were helped along by careless eating habits, sleep deprivation, and stress to begin with, all I can say is, it's important to manage your time wisely and remember to take care of yourself, too!  I appreciate the chance to spend the summer clearing my head by studying ~100 Chinese vocab. words per day, but the program is a lot of work, and it can start to wear down on you along with the pollution, heat, noise, & general chaos even just in Wudaokou.

On a more *positive* health-related note, I had to get a wisdom tooth pulled and went to Arrail Dentail after asking for advice from IUP--half the price of United Family Hospital's dental care, and very professional.  Everything went smoothly!  However, although someone will speak a bit of English, at the Zhongguancun branch the dentist and assistants seemed mainly comfortable with Chinese (they did have forms & instructions for after-care in English).  I didn't really mind since I got everything except for the very technical details about what exactly was happening, which I wouldn't have understood in English anyhow.

http://www.arrail-dental.com/en/

All right, I do have a lot more to say, but I deserve some sleep now!

Existing as a heritage speaker at IUP

I haven't been that great about keeping up with my blog, but I figure I'll have one post per week, slightly skewed?  Sorry!

Being at IUP at Tsinghua has been an interesting experience that definitely feels a lot different from being at IUC in Japan.

Class placement was slightly messy because of the recent self-quarantine procedures due to H1N1--because I arrived relatively late on June 14, I ended up taking a placement exam online, but it was in simplified characters, not traditional as I had requested (I'm guessing they didn't have time or forgot to prepare another version).  I was placed in two classes using 思想与社会, one of their core textbooks (one one-on-one class, one with two other students); a 广播1 radio broadcast class for more advanced students (with two other students); and a 小单班, a one-on-one class in which it's possible to address your specific language problems or work on a topic of your choice.

IUP is my first experience actually being with a big mix of students studying Chinese as a foreign language.  I have to admit that it has required an adjustment period--I consider myself something close to a native speaker, and I'm not used to studying Chinese as a foreign language.  At first I felt slightly irritated by constantly hearing incorrect grammar, tones, etc.  Even though it wasn't difficult for me to keep to the Chinese-only language pledge and also speak in Chinese outside of IUP when other people wanted to practice, I got tired of doing it.  Also, for the first couple days of the program, I was really frustrated with the classes that I'd been placed in because it seemed that my classmates couldn't express themselves in Chinese as well as I could.  Additionally, I knew 1/2~2/3 of the new vocabulary in my 思想与社会 textbook.  I more or less blamed the placement exam that was in the wrong writing system, as well as the phone interview, since I'm pretty certain that I do poorly with interviews regardless of language.  Another major source of stress was that on the first day, all four of my teachers asked whether or not I wanted to change my Taiwanese--or Southern--accent.  Even when I tried to make "sh" or "ng" sounds, it wasn't strong enough for them, and I was reduced to half my normal speaking speed.  Even though I wanted to try learning these differences & to show it in my speaking, I couldn't help being resentful of the entire Beijing/northern-oriented approach to learning "correct pronunciation" which seems to ignore the fact that probably over half of the Chinese-speaking population in the world does not speak in the same way.  I felt that my identity was being challenged, and that it was ridiculous for teachers to correct me when I already sounded like a native speaker, since many foreigners still have huge problems getting tones & basic grammar correct.

By now I've taken into consideration the fact that even some people who don't speak Chinese as quickly/fluently may have vocabulary that I don't have, or many have amazing experiences actually living & traveling in China.  I've realized that I have enough homework to work on, whether or not it's easier for me than for some other students with the same textbook.  The lessons in both textbooks seem to be getting somewhat more challenging, too.  As for my accent, it's become easier for me to speak at a more normal speed while curling my tongue, although I still speak more slowly than I would with a more Taiwanese accent.  Although I still have reservations, I'm willing for now to at least learn to differentiate better between different sounds in a sort of compromise, even if my pronunciation still doesn't have enough "r" in it to really sound "correct" to many teachers.  However, I have to say that I've given myself more pressure than IUP has--they really do give heritage speakers the choice and realize that it's not easy to change the way you've always spoken.

After the initial annoyance with the wrong test, being one of the only two students at the program (out of over 60) working with traditional characters hasn't been that bad either.  The textbooks have the text and instructions in traditional, but both traditional & simplified for new vocabulary.  I focus more on traditional characters when I'm reading, and I write my homework in traditional, but I get practice reading simplified as well in the textbook and in class, since the teachers usually only write simplified on the board.  Sometimes the teachers won't know how to write some words in traditional, but it's not like it's difficult for me to go home and learn how to do it myself after first writing down the simplified characters.

Will be writing more this weekend about the workload, impressions of Beijing, etc. so far.  :)