THIS AND THAT

I think I’m supposed to talk about the wedding I went to on Saturday November 18th but it was a wedding. It was pretty standard as beautiful weddings go. I don’t really feel there’s much I can add to “The Bride was the most beautiful bride ever” and “The Groom looked like the luckiest man on the planet that he was.”

Granted, there were a few differences between a Western wedding and a Chinese wedding, none of which I saw but was told about. The first of which is that the groom pays for the wedding. The next is the ceremony itself. It begins in the morning when the groom pulls together a caravan of his friends and family to haul over the feast they’ve cooked for the bride’s family. While the groom is collecting his friends, family and food, the bride’s house is abuzz with activity too. Her home (her parent’s home; unmarried/divorced children live with their parents, regardless of age unless their careers take them away from their hometown) is filled with family, friends and children who prepare the home for the groom’s arrival. The children run about, hide the shoes the bride is to wear for the civil ceremony and then barricade the front door. When the groom’s caravan arrives, the groom must bribe the children to let his caravan into the house. He has the money tucked into a red envelope and gives it to the child who gets the door open.

Then, the caravan arrives, food in hand, and the groom and his men set about finding the bride’s shoes. If ever there were an appropriate metaphor for the kind of marriage I think I would have, it is “She’s lost her stuff again and he’s got to get it found.” Once the shoes are found (and the groomsmen properly paid for rendered services) the couple heads off in their caravan to the municipal building to get hitched. After the municipal stuff, the caravan arrives at the location of their reception where hundreds of guests await their arrival and the entertainment portion begins.

I was invited to the reception and it was lovely. In a room full of several hundred Chinese, I was the only foreigner there. I did not know the groom but the bride was my beautiful colleague. Consequently, everyone knew who I was by virtue of the fact that by simply making a New Yorker appear, she was infinitely more sophisticated. I knew I was in trouble when the groom’s father, happily sauced from all the toasting, stumbled by my table, took one look at me, got wide eyed and hollered, “Meigua ren!” Normally, the word used for a Westerner sounds like “”Lo-why.” In fact, once most people know that I’m American, they still call me “Lo-why.” To identify me by country is seen as a slightly more intimate and familiar; the first step to welcoming me into the fold. (After identifying me by country, the levels of intimacy following are “Miss Teacher” [in English] and then “Teacher” [in English] and finally some permutation of “Christina.” Ultimately, the most intimate is "Chris" and touching me. The men who are close with me are allowed to touch me when in private and the women are allowed to touch me in public.)

Within 20 minutes of my arrival, I had been singled out, hugged by everyone in the wedding party, toasted five times and pointed out to everyone. It was very sweet and very well intentioned but, as you may have noticed, I loathe being the center of attention especially when what’s going on has nothing to do with me. I was very happy sitting with my Chinese Angel, our colleagues and just hanging out, admiring how beautiful my beautiful colleague was in each of her multitude of costume changes. (The first dress she wears is her wedding dress. The next is a traditional Chinese gown; hers was snow-white with poppy flowers printed on it and a faux white fur wrap. The rest are a variety of party dresses.)

After we had been at the wedding for an hour, and I was in danger of being very drunk, my Chinese Angel had the good sense to pour me out of the building. We said our goodbyes, a few more “Meigua ren!”s were shouted and we were off.

From there, (the reception was held near the Bell Tower) my Chinese Angel walked me about to get some air until my head cleared and then we headed to the Big Goose Pagoda.

Frankly, I love the Big Goose Pagoda. It is tranquil and beautiful and everything you would hope a Buddhist sanctuary would be. Incense filled the air. Ancient chant was projected by one of the buildings in the compound.

And then there was an announcement in Chinese over the loudspeaker.

Around back from the pagoda (the front entrance to the pagoda faces South) is a massive (the largest in Asia) water fountain display (on the North side). They play music (a half hour’s worth of traditional Chinese music to Russian marches to Viennese waltzes) as the jets of water dance in time to the music. It is beautiful and apparently, even more so at night as they’ve got lights to go along with it too.

After the dancing water, we got dinner of pulled pork in thick flatbread and a huge bowl of dumpling soup. It was delicious and very spicy. Satiated and tired, my Chinese Angel poured me into a taxi and I headed home madly in love with my new country and my new Angel.

The next day, Sunday, is my usual day to tutor my handsome, nervous young student. My Brazilian Angel happened to be about (her computer is on the fritz and the least I can do is help her) checking her email. To my great pleasure, he managed to have an extended conversation with her even though he was clearly nervous. When we first met, he was unable to look me in the eye for being so nervous about his “lack of’ English. Now he’s having conversations with my friends.

With her presence, my student was definitely nervous and formal but once she left, it was really, really nice the way he loosened up. Nothing makes me happier than to know that my students who are raised with all these societal notions of who “I” am, who “they” are in respect to what “I” represent and the intimidating ideas said interaction implies are actually comfortable enough with me to let down their guard. As my student and I finished our lesson with an intense discussion about Islam, Muslim and the Muslim Quarter (he was having a hard time understanding that “Islam” is the religion and “Muslim” are the people though not “all people” are Muslim… to say nothing of the fact that all Muslims must speak Arabic to study the Koran. He has a Muslim friend and he had no idea his friend might speak Arabic.) we were both finished giddy.

Once he was gone, I met up with my Brazilian Angel and we both talked about how gorgeous my student is. It’s not just that he’s handsome as all get out and well dressed but that he has an honesty and earnestness that registers clearly on his face, making him all the more luminously beautiful. His eyes tell you more than his mouth ever could, Mandarin or English. She is unfazed by the age difference whereas I find it a pity that he’s too young and that I am too provincial to find the age difference a problem. Nevertheless, god never closes a door without opening a window, right?

My window appeared at long last, on Monday when Alpha Hottie made his reappearance at lunch. It had been a week since I had seen him at lunch. I tried to say hello to him but I couldn’t catch his eye (he was sitting at the table next to mine, facing me) which means either he’s got a serious case of the “shy” or he’s avoiding me. After about 5 minutes of glancing in his direction, I gave up on making eye contact to say “Hello” and I was promptly swarmed with emphatic students and my lunch mate.

I, being me, figured he had been avoiding me because, well, that’s what boys do with me. When my lunch mate asked what was going on with the two of us, I told her this. Bless her heart, she shook her head and said, “No.” My lunch mate then informed me that while I was with him on the motor scooter, he blushed while talking about me and that she thinks he going to be shy around me. “Simple words in English he might understand from me he might not understand from you because he is nervous.” She then glanced at him. “He is not shy but I think he is shy around you.”

Score one for the honkey! It looks like it’s time to break out my very worst Mandarin to help someone feel more comfortable.