Five day immersion in a suburban Chinese high school
Note: This is the first post in a series of posts that I will make about my time in SYA China. I tried spending a lot of time writing about all of my experiences in one post before realizing that I would take forever to post the entire blog post. I'm going to divide my posts up into certain aspects that I really enjoyed about my time in Beijing.
5 Day Immersion ("五日浸泡") is an optional program available to SYA students after November. Students who participate go to a school in the suburbs for five days, living in local dorms and attending local classes. Participating students cannot not contact anyone outside of the local school during their time there. I applied for this program in November, but they misplaced my application. I finally participated for the first time in March.
The experience was absolutely phenomenal. I will always remember my roommates/classmates along with the two-story cafeterias. I lived in a temporary dorm with 7 other classmates with the highest English marks in their class. I was glad that despite their high English scores, only 1 could really speak to me in English. My Chinese greatly improved because of the lack of English during my time there.
The first two days passed so slowly because I did not understand anything the teachers were saying. I felt pretty alone because I also did not really understand what my classmates/roommates were trying to say to me. Because I didn't understand much, I finished reading my first Chinese book, Chronicles of a Blood Merchant ("许三观卖血记") during the classes.
After a few days, I understood more of the lessons, so learning about the CCP version of Chinese history and math really interested me. The history teacher was interesting -- he kept emphasizing that despite what the textbooks said, Chiang Kai-shek (蒋介石) (who, before the CCP took over, tried to run a fascist-like government and escaped with his army to Taiwan) was not an entirely bad person. He still then proceeded to bash the Chiang Kai-shek in his lesson. The way the math teacher taught math was also foreign to me -- she used a microphone to project her lessons onto students who scribbled the answers to hypothetical problems. In a class size of 60 kids, the classes were impersonal and lecture-based.
No matter how much I tried, I could not understand the Chinese class because they covered traditional Chinese.
 |
| My deskmate/roommate was so adorable. Here, half of her table is covered in loads of textbooks. |
 |
| Couldn't ask for cooler roommates. |
The experience really made me appreciate America's education system. The students lived on campus and attended classes every day from 7:30 am to 10:30 pm. They were not allowed to bring any electronics including phones, computers, etc. They had computer class and a double free period once every two weeks. Two days a month, the students had a "weekend" where they could return home and relax. Even though the students lived such an intense lifestyle, I did not hear a single complaint from them, a huge contrast from the SYA students. They were grateful for the opportunity to attend the best high school in their area despite the harsh conditions. I realized how much I take my education for granted.
Aside from the food, my favorite part of staying there was playing basketball with my classmates. I was lucky enough to be there when there was a two-free-period block of time where the students could do whatever they wanted. A couple of my classmates and I wandered to the basketball court. The courts were all filled with guys playing pickup basketball, but I really wanted to play. We eventually got a basketball and a free court, and we all (hesitantly) played a few games. None of my classmates knew how to play, so the game was more of a wrestling match for the ball and a few halfhearted and self-conscious attempts at shooting the ball into the rim. The guys playing games around us stared since girls in the school never played pickup basketball. I loved it.
I got so attached to my classmates during my five days there that I returned a month later to visit them. I didn't have a chance to participate in the program a second time because SYA wanted to give other interested students the same opportunity. Even though I had travel restrictions placed on me at the time, I traveled alone on the HSR for 1.5 hours to the suburbs of Hebei to eat lunch with them. (Looking back on it, I could've gotten in huge trouble, but I don't regret it one bit.) I can't believe that my friends spent half of their two-day monthly break wandering around the city with me. I happened to go on the day that catkin (柳絮) fluff was everywhere, so we spent most of the day chatting indoors.
I really wish I could've participated a second time, but I am so grateful that I was able to do such a wonderful program at least once during my year.
0 comments:
Post a Comment