Aye I Longwhite: An American-Chinese teenager’s adventure in the Middle Kingdom and beyond Read Online Free Page A
Chang Lin. It would be an understatement to say that the Chinese prefer subtlety. I felt like a puppy given a dog treat. If I had a tail, it would’ve been wagging.
--------------
Mr. Smith, my MakerSpace teacher, was my favorite. It helped that he was also a “foreign devil,” the affectionate term Chinese people call white people. But I really liked him because he was funny.
He was humorous in the way I was used to. Though most of his jokes and puns went over the heads of the other students, I smiled appreciatively, which in turn, made Mr. Smith like me back.
I learned early on that humor (or “humour” as my English teacher would correct) was not transferable across cultures. Only the barest, most superficial jokes made it through the otherwise impermeable humor wall between cultures. All my “quiet wit” was useless here, except for in Mr. Smith’s class. We basically had our own little secret language of inside jokes.
I also learned to my detriment that sarcasm, a poor-man’s form of humor, also didn’t work. My sarcastic “Oh really?” when someone said something patently obvious was often replied with a straight, “Yes, really.” Even worse, the person would look at me as if I were the idiot. I didn’t bother trying, “No shit Sherlock.” I tried to purge sarcasm out of my language, which is like asking a sailor to stop swearing. I had to change my whole way of thinking. I basically had to play it straight all the time. It was so boring.
Mr. Smith was a Brit. I’m not sure what made him so important to gain him entry into China, and he never explained it. At first, I didn’t know he was a Brit, just that his English accent was different from my American one. Frankly, the Aussie’s, Kiwi’s, and South African’s accents all were variations of British English, but woe be the fool who guesses the wrong one. So I didn’t bother guessing, and sure enough, Mr. Smith eventually slipped he was a Brit. One thing for sure though, the British accent makes a man sound smart to my American ears. Whenever Mr. Smith spoke, it sounded learned to me, maybe because all the shows on the extinct animals were hosted by Brits.
Mr. Smith had traveled the world before coming to MK and had done innumerable jobs on location to fund his travels. He was constantly sharing stories from his various adventures, often seemingly to be talking to himself, as the students generally ignored him for being a foreigner. Their respect for teachers I guess only went so far as Chinese teachers.
But I loved his stories and found the lessons easier to digest sugar-coated in a parable. One time, he inexplicable started on a story of when he was a whitewater rafting tour guide. We were learning about structural engineering, and we had a side project of building a bridge out of balsa wood. The other kids hated it because it wasn’t directly related to the MakerSpace objective and it required them to use their hands, but I loved it. I think the thought of the river rushing under the bridges brought up his story.
“When you are in whitewater rapids, you have to row as a team. You can mess around in the calm waters and it won’t really matter, but when you’re coming up to the rapids, everyone’s got to listen to the guide.” Ironically, nobody was listening to him, except me. “The guide will tell you the direction to row in so you enter the rapids at the right place, in the right angle, at the right speed. We all have to row hard and in synch up to that point. And then, do you know what we do when we enter the rapids?” he asked rhetorically.
I hazarded a guess, “You row really, really hard?”
He looked up, surprised somebody answered him. He smiled, “No, you pull in your oars.”
“Why?” I spluttered at this ridiculous idea.
Mr. Smith basked in my confusion. He finally had an audience. “For 3 reasons. First, you may lose your oar
--------------
Mr. Smith, my MakerSpace teacher, was my favorite. It helped that he was also a “foreign devil,” the affectionate term Chinese people call white people. But I really liked him because he was funny.
He was humorous in the way I was used to. Though most of his jokes and puns went over the heads of the other students, I smiled appreciatively, which in turn, made Mr. Smith like me back.
I learned early on that humor (or “humour” as my English teacher would correct) was not transferable across cultures. Only the barest, most superficial jokes made it through the otherwise impermeable humor wall between cultures. All my “quiet wit” was useless here, except for in Mr. Smith’s class. We basically had our own little secret language of inside jokes.
I also learned to my detriment that sarcasm, a poor-man’s form of humor, also didn’t work. My sarcastic “Oh really?” when someone said something patently obvious was often replied with a straight, “Yes, really.” Even worse, the person would look at me as if I were the idiot. I didn’t bother trying, “No shit Sherlock.” I tried to purge sarcasm out of my language, which is like asking a sailor to stop swearing. I had to change my whole way of thinking. I basically had to play it straight all the time. It was so boring.
Mr. Smith was a Brit. I’m not sure what made him so important to gain him entry into China, and he never explained it. At first, I didn’t know he was a Brit, just that his English accent was different from my American one. Frankly, the Aussie’s, Kiwi’s, and South African’s accents all were variations of British English, but woe be the fool who guesses the wrong one. So I didn’t bother guessing, and sure enough, Mr. Smith eventually slipped he was a Brit. One thing for sure though, the British accent makes a man sound smart to my American ears. Whenever Mr. Smith spoke, it sounded learned to me, maybe because all the shows on the extinct animals were hosted by Brits.
Mr. Smith had traveled the world before coming to MK and had done innumerable jobs on location to fund his travels. He was constantly sharing stories from his various adventures, often seemingly to be talking to himself, as the students generally ignored him for being a foreigner. Their respect for teachers I guess only went so far as Chinese teachers.
But I loved his stories and found the lessons easier to digest sugar-coated in a parable. One time, he inexplicable started on a story of when he was a whitewater rafting tour guide. We were learning about structural engineering, and we had a side project of building a bridge out of balsa wood. The other kids hated it because it wasn’t directly related to the MakerSpace objective and it required them to use their hands, but I loved it. I think the thought of the river rushing under the bridges brought up his story.
“When you are in whitewater rapids, you have to row as a team. You can mess around in the calm waters and it won’t really matter, but when you’re coming up to the rapids, everyone’s got to listen to the guide.” Ironically, nobody was listening to him, except me. “The guide will tell you the direction to row in so you enter the rapids at the right place, in the right angle, at the right speed. We all have to row hard and in synch up to that point. And then, do you know what we do when we enter the rapids?” he asked rhetorically.
I hazarded a guess, “You row really, really hard?”
He looked up, surprised somebody answered him. He smiled, “No, you pull in your oars.”
“Why?” I spluttered at this ridiculous idea.
Mr. Smith basked in my confusion. He finally had an audience. “For 3 reasons. First, you may lose your oar
Readers choose
Marta Perry
Kelly Favor
Yvette Hines
Peter Johnson
Edward Hogan
Charlaine Harris
William W. Johnstone, J. A. Johnstone
Mitchell Zuckoff
Patricia Hagan