Good Morning China!

[Original Blog Entry Monday December 30 by Letizia. Translated by Brendan. ]

It's four in the morning and we finally concede to the jetlag and surrender to Greenwich Mean Time: The girls are playing on their Nintendos in the other room, Brendan is studying the guide, and I'm writing my first post on the road. China has welcomed us with open arms. After 10 hours of half-light on the airplane, we landed in Beijing to the kind of beautiful sunlight that we haven't seen in Ireland since September. At the passport check we were waved through with wide smiles. We noticed a button on the policeman's kiosk that we could press in the event that we weren't satisfied with our treatment. Our suitcases arrived even before we did, and soon afterwards we were already in a taxi called by an airport official whose job seemed to entail helping passengers in whatever way necessary.

Brendan passed his first test in Chinese with flying colours, chatting with the taxi driver while the kids and I were giggling in the back. Once in the hotel, we colonized our room, opening the suitcases and taking out books, slippers, computer and the various other items that for the next months will constitute our home. They are exactly those things that differentiate between a normal holiday and what we are doing - vital for helping us at least feel as if we are not always in a hotel, but difficult to drag across four continents. I'm already thinking impatiently about the first parcel that we'll send home.

Despite the tiredness - for us it was 2 in the morning and none of us had slept on the plane - we headed out and reached Tiananmen Square by foot. Very quickly we realised that we were amongst the very few Westerners around. Locals looked at us with intense curiosity, especially at the girls, and more than once we were stopped in order to have our picture taken with complete strangers. Nina: "I feel like I'm Avril Lavigne!". When we got to the square, the souvenir vendors descended on us, and for the second time we saw the proof of Brendan's Chinese. Along with the language, he also acquired the ability to haggle, without which you can't survive here. From him we learned the magic words to free ourselves from the vendors. When nothing else works; no, no thank you, I don't want it, just say bu yao! with a certain authority, and they vanish. First they freeze, silent, and then they disappear. He assures me that we're not being rude, but I'm not convinced.

The cold at that point was too much, as was the tiredness, so we took shelter in a nearby subway station. Once inside, nobody was inclined to venture back out into the cold and so Brendan gave his final demonstration of his command of the language: with the map of the subway on the wall, in Chinese, he managed to get us back to the hotel, changing train along the way. Needless to say we were the only Westerners around. I don't know if I'll be able to compete with this when it's my turn to translate in South America.

Porquè quieres aprender l'espanol? Porquè el chino no me gusta.

I can't remember if the egg came first or the chicken did: if Brendan started to learn Chinese because he wanted to go to China or if he wants to go to China because he is learning Chinese. Trouble is he can't remember himself. About two years ago he started a course in the local school. After the first term, the course was cancelled because the subject was too difficult. In a class of 20 people, only 3 were disappointed, Brendan among them. He convinced the other two and the teacher, LiPing, to keep up the lessons privately and meet up in each other's houses. Since then, Tuesday became Chinese night, a much more sociable affair now that the lessons are held at home, involving great amounts of green tea and fortune cookies, (or scones, depending on the mood), and occasionally even music.

At the end of the first year one of the students gave up and Brendan said he only then realized 'how much he didn't know'. Finally learned the characters and the tones, (the same word has 5 different meanings depending on intonation going up, down, flat or no intonation at all: "Ma1 ma4 ma3 ma", meaning: "mother, to curse, horse, question mark"= Did mother curse the horse?), now he could start learning Chinese.

As well as the lessons with LiPing and Ian, the other brave scholar, Brendan used a Chinese course online for grinds: http://chinesepod.com.
level or like In the beginning he just used the free dialogues, then he subscribed for the script of the dialogues and the grammar. Last summer he used their premium package with one to one conversations over skype with a teacher. At present he has reached an intermediate level, or as LiPing more beautifully put it: "If you compare learning Chinese with climbing a mountain, you are halfway up." The experience is so intense anyway that to get it out of his system Brendan has started to blog about how difficult it is to climb that particular mountain: http://peelingmandarin.blogspot.com

As with English we'll get by in Oz and NZ (or will we?? See Glossary), and my esposo covers China, I was left with South America and Spanish. I have started a beginners course in the local school and then with the few braves that wanted to keep going we have continued with private lessons in each otter's houses. The class is a bit larger than the Chinese one, but not by much: Cheryl, Gillian, Sean, Mark, Jez, I, y Maria, nuestra profesora. I do my grinds through http://spanishsense.com. It's not like climbing the Kilimajaro, I'd rather compare it to the Inca Trail...

Listening to: Asian Dub Foundation, 1000 Mirrors