Rural China -- New Experiences, New Friends, Warm Hearts...and a Strange Translation!

Last weekend Bonita and I had a marvelous experience – again. But this experience was so unexpected that it made the marvel all that much more delicious.

We had been invited by a woman with whom I work to accompany her to the village she grew up in, which was in eastern China. She wanted to show it to us before it disappeared. Her name is Zhao Wenjing. It sounded like a nice trip, but we weren't expecting much in the way of pizzazz.

Zhao Wenjing -- Deputy Director, International Student Department, Shandong Shi Fan Daxue (Shandong Normal University)

Her village was disappearing because the Chinese government decided to build auto parts factories in a large area of our province, which happened to be on the land where her parents and five other villages of people lived. In China, the government owns all the land. Her citizens are allowed to build homes and farms, etc. on the land, with the understanding that they could be displaced at any time.

And they were. The government built a number of apartment (called flats here) complexes, for the villagers to purchase if they could afford them. The flats were built in the nearby village of Qingzhou (900,000 population). The government razed all the homes in the five villages, and compensated the farmers for the homes they had built. Wenjing’s father had been industrious and had built a large, lovely home, and was therefore compensated handsomely for his industry and labor. Others who hadn’t been so industrious were also compensated for the homes they had built, but it was not enough for them to purchase a flat. So they had to find alternate accommodations.

Wenjing told us many stories about her village, growing up and going to school there, how fortunate she had been to be able to attend our university and thus change the trajectory of her life. It was a wonderful, rich, learning experience for us.

Statue in the courtyard of Wenjing's former primary (elementary) school. Note the red scarves -- symbols of the Communist party.

We met her parents, Mr. Zhao Guofu and Cui Guixiang, and had a wonderful, warm time with them. They invited us to their new flat, which was a large-ish 115 square meters (~ 1,250 square feet). Wenjing’s mother taught Bonita and me how to make jiaozi (dumplings), which were then cooked and served for dinner, along with a lot of other delicious dishes.

Learning how to make dumplings!

Dining on dumplings we made at the Zhao residence, Qingzhou, Shandong Province, China

We had the opportunity to visit the farm her father had worked his entire adult life. The edge of the property line of the nearest new factory runs through the middle of their farm. The lovely home her father had built was now rubble, but a smaller abode, which is slated for destruction shortly, is still standing (above -- in the picture behind us, and below -- behind Wenjing and her father). We sat out front of their other "home" structure on the property as he peeled and served us delicious pears from his pear orchard. (Note the pears in Wenjing's and her father's hands -- huge!)

<-- Zhao razed family home -- the rubble behind Mr. Zhao's first car -- an electric car.

I had told Wenjing that we would be happy to teach a lesson at their local elementary school while visiting, and the offer was snapped up by the school. So Quillen laoshi and Quillen laoshi taught fifth and sixth grade classes for about an hour. After class was over, we were treated like celebrities. (Laoshi is Chinese for Teacher.) J

I taught the sixth grade class and Bonita taught the fifth graders. Aren't they too cute?

It was a wonderful, enriching experience for us. Several of the other China Teacher Program teachers expressed envy that we had been able to visit rural China – they had been trying to do that for several years.

One of the other CTP teachers uses Google Translate extensively in his and his wife’s jaunts around Jinan and beyond, particularly the voice translation portion. With that, he can speak into his phone, push translate, and it will translate what he said into written Chinese. It's a great assist to Weigou ren (outside people, aka foreigners) in China who speak little or no Chinese.

While out and about on the buses, he noticed that a mechanized Chinese voice always said certain phrases as they were nearing or leaving bus stops. He was able to emulate one of them – Dao le – in his translation software and learned it means “Arriving.” But there was another phrase which sounded as the bus left each stop, which he simply could not get a good translation on. He tried to say the same words he thought he was hearing into his translation software, but he continued to get some odd translations.

Today we were on an outing with other foreign teachers, and our friend thought to ask our Chinese guide what the phrase was. With the caveat that he was probably mis-pronouncing the phrase, he did his best to share it with her. She furrowed her brow and thought about it. She had him repeat it several times. Then sudden realization came: “Oh! What they are saying is: ‘The bus is leaving, please sit down or hold on tight.’”

The Pinyin (English-language letters that help with pronunciation of Chinese words) for the first half of the phrase (the part he had been trying to enter into Google translate) is:

Che liang qi bu (the second half of the phrase was: qing zuo wen fu hao) -- he couldn't recall the last half of the phrase, but our guide had ridden the bus enough that she recognized it.

What he was saying was:

Chi wai fu -- Which Google Translate interpreted as: Eat the foreign woman. Close, but not quite right... 😎 

Here are a few other pictures for your viewing pleasure:

Whenever we go places, we are celebrities of a sort. We are on many surreptitious photos and videos, and some of the folks even have the courage to ask us if they can take pictures with us, and we always say of course.  Today we visited an International Vegetable Exhibition (it was awesome). While there, we had one of the most heart-warming experiences of our entire China adventure. Bonita noticed a young man use sign language to tell someone he was with that he wanted to ask if he could take a picture with Bonita. She responded in sign, saying she would be delighted.  Oh my...he was beyond thrilled and signed back to the group he was with. They crowded around Bonita and loved, loved, loved having their picture taken with a Meiguo ren (foreigner) who could also sign.  Many pictures were taken, many smiles and very warm handshakes exchanged. At first I thought we had truly bettered international relations, but realized that what we really bettered was human relations. Bonita and the little girl in the front row were the only non-hearing-impaired individuals in the picture. The young man who wanted to ask Bonita to take a picture with him is in the back row with the NY Yankees hat on, as well as in the close-up.

Saturday we attended a world-famous Kite Festival in Weifang.  Here are some of the pictures from that:

And a couple pictures from Qingzhou, which we visited as part of our rural China trip: