9.30.2006 : 06:37

Next week is the week long celebration equivalent to the Forth of July, so I get the week off. But as is usual in most public university vacations we have make-up days and so this week I'm feeling the burn. It's Saturday morning and I'm about to go and teach for 4 hours. Awesome. So needless to say I haven't accomplished much this week.

I have been getting some positive feedback from the board and from email and so thank you for that. But don't be afraid of negative feedback. If the new design is causing physical pain or epileptic seizure let me know about it so I can at least put up a warning or something. Anyway, just wanted to let you all know that I'm still around and that I'm constantly haunted by the fact that the site has problems and unfinished content. I also want to thank my Mom and Dad for sending me a DS lite, I absolutely love it! But I must say it hasn't done a lot for my productivity.
_Nathan

9.27.2006 : 12:02

Ok, we're back on. I was hoping this would all go much less painfully. I should have done more testing. Anyway, welcome to the new Whereisnathan.com!

It' seems that we (I guess I mean 'me') have outgrown Blogger. I have always liked Blogger and thought it was a good simple service, but there are a few problems now: 1)China hates Google, Google owns Blogger, and 2)Blogger doesn't have quite enough liberty for using PHP. I want to thank Blogger for the years of good service, but it's time for me to find something else. So we are now in an interim phase, where I will be switching to (possibly) Wordpress. As a result you will notice there are no more comments, please feel free to continue to use the message board.

Everything else should be self-explanatory. Feel free to look around and expect a few changes in the near future. Thank you for your continued patience.
_Nathan

9.22.2006 : 12:17

While I'm busy breaking the website, Elizbeth was kind enough to donate this post. Enjoy.

  Last week I had my students fill out a survey covering topics they have already learned, topics they want to learn and their goals for themselves. Last semester I bumbled through some of the book and some topics of my own choosing and got a few of complaints, usually, "We already learned this!" as if they knew everything there was to know about it. The complaining irked me, so I decided that this time I would turn it around on them and make them choose the topics. This kind of move in unprecedented in the traditional Chinese classroom. I think this school is a little more open-minded, but usually the teacher will lecture and the students sleep/stare into space/secretly text message their friends. Since their other classes are so boring, foreign teachers often hear things like, "We want to play games!" or "Can we watch a film?" one, because we are generally more informal teachers and two, because we are suckers.

  The seventh question on the survey was "When you have completed this class, what would you like to be able to do? Be realistic." I added that last part because I didn't want them to fantasize that their English would be perfect or fluent, even though some of them still wrote this. Carol wrote, "I hope I can speak to everyone in fluent English." Carol is obviously an optimist, and refuses to conform to my harsh, realistic world. Not everyone felt this way though, because Pure (yes, that's her name) wrote, "To know about the foreign counties and can make at least a little progress in English." Others were very specific in their goals: Sky said, "I'd like to watch some English plays, for example: Friends." while Erica went the musical route with "I want to talk freely with foreigners and can sing My Heart Will Go On." It sounds like she is informing me of her ability to sing the worst song in the history of mankind, but I'm pretty sure she expects me to help her master the brilliant lyrics, "Near, far, wherever you are." They loved that song in '03 and they still love it. At least Americans have the sense to admit their mistake and move on. For a couple of students, the meaning of the question alluded them completely thanks to that tricky word "class," even though I explained the question beforehand. Angus informed me, "When I have completed this class, we have a new weekend then. I'd like to go to library to read some books and surf on the Internet, and then go to play basketball." while Sunny simply said, "I'd like to go shopping with my friend." Me too, Sunny, me too.

  Number eight on the survey was "Here you may write any other suggestions, advice or comments:" Amid all of the helpful advice to frequently include "small games" and films, I received some real gems of wisdom. Margaret offered that, "The form above are colorful enough, the eccential problem is that not everyone would like to be engaged into some activities. That means we are lack of practice, so create a reasonable active environment please." I feel like only Margaret gets it. Unless the activity is Text Messaging Your Friend, not everyone will like to be engaged into it; that is the eccential problem. Happy offered these nuggets: "Could we have a rest during class? If we needn't be forced to answer the question that we don't wanted to, that'll be better." Sure, just bring your little bamboo mat and feel free to take a snooze whilst I entertain your classmates with "small games." Tracy exposed her neurosis with, "When we are answering questions, I hope the teacher don't give markes, that will make us feel tense. You can give the markes after class." Lisa suggested that, "The class should be active and attack us." I got a lot of "the class should be active/vivid/interesting." March said, "I hope we communicate often, by e-mails or some other ways. We can make friends. Tell us something interesting you experience in China. We may help you." I may help you with your verb choice, March. Eleven (not the only one with this name) informed me, "You'd better tell us what is going to be discussed, so that we can prepare it before the class." They use "you'd better" all the time, thinking it is a suggestive phrase rather than a commanding one. And finally, Kinnel wrote, "Talk with us more and be close to us. After class, we can be together just like friends. Don't be talking or giving speech all the class yourself." I cannot read that last sentence with out adding, "girl!" to the end of it.

  The differences between college in the Western world and college here are astonishing. Can you magine asking your college professor, "Can we play games?" It is unthinkable, even if they do see our classes as entertainment. They are still 22 years old. I should not have to physically push the boys and girls together to talk during dialogues; I should not have to constantly ask them to be quiet; And I certainly should not be asked for a "rest" during class. If anyone needs a rest, its me.

Elizabeth

Delightful. Things could get ugly this weekend. But by Monday or Tuesday the dust should be settled and there shouldn't be any more major glitches in functionality. The feeds are going to be untouched, so when it doubt use them.
_Nathan

9.20.2006 : 16:07

Ok, I've got a lot of the updates finished and the rest I will attempt to finish this weekend. But before everything changes I thought I'd let people know about a few things. The main thing is that this blog is changing addresses slightly. So if you have ...com/blog/blog.html as the link for this site in the next week you need to change it to www.whereisnathan.com. I don't know why I didn't do this years ago. I've been trying to figure out something to do with the "main" page for ages, but I've had enough and I'm just losing it entirely. Also I will finally finish the Message board by adding a link back to ... well, anything else. There will be some other doodads and thinga'magigers that will also be added but you can find those as time goes on. The "friends" page never really developed so my "friends" will be thrown in with the rest of the things I want to link to. But for consideration's sake, I don't want to leave anybody out so if you would like me to link your blog, LJ, or Xanga go ahead and send me an email.

I will apologize once again for putting off chapter 3, but I made no promises so hold your horses my class load doubled this week.

In the meantime you can read about this guy. Thanks Jason. That's right, he lives in the same city as me. It seems I'm not the only bored one here.
_Nathan

9.09.2006 : 11:34

Chris, you are totally right that I have no excuse to not have chapter 3 finished. But let me make a peace offering by giving you a subject that is totally easy to flame.

Mark Roswell, known in China as "Da Shan" is a phenomenon. He's the only foreigner, perhaps in the the history of the human race, to seemingly perfect the Chinese language. His standard Chinese is better than most native Chinese speakers and he is by miles and miles the most famous foreigner in China. And yet, the rest of the world just have no idea.

This means a few things; (1) he is everywhere and (2) he seems like a huge jerk. I think I made it about 2 months before I was bombarded with Da Shan commercials, life size cutouts, and by students and random people on the street asking me "Do you know Da Shan?" Having been out of the country for a year and a half, upon my return Da Shan fever seems to have grown stronger or perhaps they just like his better in the east. But any trip to any super market or bookstore is now coupled with seeing a giant Da Shan display where they are selling his magic English learning machine (which appears to be a gloried electronic dictionary with mp3 capability). And even riding the bus (the ones with TVs) I often have to endure hearing Da Shan (in Chinese) give it 2 thumbs up, it's not like he's selling it or anything.

I, of course, do not know Mark Roswell and so to make judgments on his character would seem impractical and possibly immoral. But if I were forced to make a judgment I would say this guy is a total jerk. Da Shan rose to fame in the late 80's doing the Chinese equivalent of stand-up comedy (which is unbelievable on it's own), so in the last 20 years he has to have noticed that everybody is having a much harder time with Chinese than he had. In recent years perhaps he did notice and decided he would try to help by starting up some language learning TV shows on CCTV 9. I had a chance to catch a few of these shows while I was on the Road this summer and could not stop laughing. I do not know who this show if for? It's certainly not for the beginning Chinese learner as I couldn't understand half of what they were saying and yet the name of the show was "Travelling in Chinese." So is it for visitor's travelling in China? Because they aren't going to understand any of it either. I suppose it's aimed at graduate linguistic students who get to travel for a few weeks in between semesters.

The content isn't the annoying part of "Travelling in Chinese." The beef that most local Lao Wai have with Da Shan is that he sits on his high imperial throne of excellent Pǔ Tōng Hùa with this smirk that communicates nothing but total arrogance and sips delicately from his far too fancy tea cup and hands what he knows are impossible instructions for speaking the hardest language of the human race. Mark Ros may be a nice guy in real life, but when you are watching 大山 on TV you are first filled with unbridled jealousy immediately followed by immense discouragement at knowing you can never achieve his level. Seconds later you realize that he is laughing at you. That smirk on his face is actually aimed at every foreigner in China who has ever attempted to learn any amount of Chinese, it is the smirking challenge of the ultimate champion challenging the legions of would-be usurpers to his sovereignty, and you are left with no other emotional route except unmitigated hostility.

So there you have it. For all of you outside of Big Red, now you know who Mark Roswell is. Chris this is your cue to unless your full furry against the oppressor.
_Nathan

: 08:51

As I clicked through some blogs yesterday to catch up I heard Derek Webb's Mockingbird mentioned more than once. Now I always like the idea of artists releasing free music. And I always get intrigued when I hear an artist is releasing an album for free with an agenda. So I got it yesterday. My connection is pretty slow here at the best of times so while it was coming down I had a listen over on myspace. Upon hearing the title track "Mockingbird" I thought this was definitely good enough to continue downloading.

Now if I were going to create a controversial Christian album I don't suppose I could do any better, but maybe I wasn't paying very close attention or something because I actually wasn't expecting "Christian" music. I even read through the manifesto first and didn't really get the hint. Perhaps I should define my terms.

I think when most musicians put together an album they say "I've got some really good music here, maybe I'll even say something with it" and sometimes they do address some political, social or even philosophical issue and often times they don't by just saying something about love, lust, cartoons, cars, or shoes. But when I hear Christian music it sounds almost as if they said "I've got something I really want to say, perhaps I should put it to music." And as a result, musically it comes up wanting. Now this of course is only my personal definition, but growing up Christian this is always why I hated Christian music. It's not that I didn't respect what they were trying to do, but their music really just wasn't good. I will also readily admit that I haven't heard a whole lot of music that labels itself "Christian" since by the time I got to college I had developed a stigma and didn't even bother listening anymore.

Now back to Mockingbird, I did listen to the entire album in one sitting which isn't normal for me no matter what kind of music I'm listening to. And I did find the whole thing interesting even though it seems to get progressively more bland toward the end. But I'm disappointed to say that I'm back to the same old position again; I really respect what Mr. Webb is trying to do, but I just wish he would have spent a little more time on the actual musical quality. As for message, I'll chime right in with Brian and say I totally agree with what he's saying. I think he makes accurate statements that are profound and timely, but I wouldn't say the lyrics were incredible. Maybe I don't know what incredible is. Incredible or not, I think there is a something very important going on here and that is bringing up questions that I have never heard churches address. Questions that, up until now, I have only heard 20 somethings ask each other while the elders weren't around.

I suppose the only reason I'm making this observation is that I'm always looking for another Pedro the Lion. Pedro the Lion is the only band that I've ever loved who also had a Christian focused message. Again, I think the difference is music. David Bazan with Pedro the Lion wrote really good music first and then skillfully injected Christian undertones in his music rather than taking religious lectures (excellent or not) and putting them to a tune. To me this seems much more valuable since it becomes music for everybody rather than just music for church youth groups.

Ok, bottom line. I'm glad I downloaded "Mockingbird", but I'm glad I didn't pay money for it. I would love for every brother and sister I know to listen to it at least once, but it's not something I would offer to my non-Christian friends. And really that may be the point, this might be an album only for the faithful.


You can get Derek Webb's Mockingbird for free from www.freederekwebb.com.


(find the links)
_Nathan

9.08.2006 : 07:21

I feel I made a pretty fair effort last semester getting down 200+ characters or so up until I had to give finals and then everything got put on hold. During the summer I made a valiant effort to really make some progress, but since we were travelling it didn't really sink in like it should have. Now of course since we were travelling without a guide or a translator my spoken Chinese got plenty of exercise, but I didn't really build much more vocabulary. After arriving home a few weeks ago I was so exhausted I didn't feel like doing anything even resembling something constructive and didn't really leave the apartment for like 15 days strait. After 2 weeks of not saying, reading, or writing a single Chinese word I felt like I had regressed. For the last week or so I've been trying as best I can to help the new teachers in the area get settled. A few trips to the city to acquire cell phones (mobiles for Jason) and point out the major landmarks and stuff has helped me re-assess where I stand in Chinese language learning. The answer is I'm really pretty worthless. Now the newer teachers here (who have been here for like 3 weeks) are impressed because I can say anything. But I liked my knowledge of the language to having swan out into the ocean just far enough that I don't have the strength to go back and so I'm forced to continue toward a seemingly unreachable goal.

I'm not alone in this as it occurs to many teachers that come to China that learning the language might be advantageous, but in the beginning no one really points out the scope of the task at hand. So I know many other brave souls who are in the same struggle and probably go through similar cycles of learning and un-learning. So for those of you who are taking great pains to learn it, I want to point you to this article : http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html. Elizabeth pointed it out to me a while ago and I found it laugh out loud funny. For those of you not studying Chinese read it anyway and hear someone speak plainly about his frustrations. Mr. Moser says what I think many others (including myself) are afraid to say because we think if we admit that it's true we might lose our nerve and give up altogether. Or perhaps ever worse, lose face.
_Nathan

9.05.2006 : 15:28

Well, I blew it on getting my story posted on time again and this gave me an idea. It's going to take me a long time to tell you about everything that happened this summer (being the long winded guy I am) and this is kind of taking away from telling you about the stuff that's happening right now. So I'm going to tell you about the summer in a sub-blog with chapter installments so to keep the main channel open to more current events. You can find the second piece of the story either below this post or here or the link above called "Summer Travel" will take you to chapter 1 and you can find a link to chapter 2 at the bottom. I know in the web page design world you are supposed to have links all over the place so you can get anywhere from anywhere, but I think it just clutters stuff up and I really just forget most of the time.

In other news today is my birthday. I've been getting tons of eCards and instant message happy birthdays all day and I want to thank everyone who sent me one. As I was writing this post I found out that a friend of mine named Wu JiaLi has the same birthday so 生日快乐 to her!

I also started teaching this week. I wasn't scheduled to teach until Thursday, but our new teacher arrived a little late so I had to fill in yesterday. I must have really hit it off with the students last semester because I found out I subbing for one of my old classes and they were very glad to see me even though I had nothing prepared because I had be told 2 days before. But class went really well and they all told me they wanted me to be their teacher again. I told them they could call me anytime and we'd hang out even though I wouldn't be able to teach. For any other teachers in China reading this, this is what happens when you play guitar for your student; total adoration.

This post may sound rushed and sporadic, but that's because I spent most of the day changing the site around and I'm supposed to meet some other Lao Wai for dinner in a little while. So everybody have a Happy my Birthday!

p.s. thanks to this site, now I can put characters up without having to load .gifs
_Nathan