Like you, I have been watching and reading about the events in Japan. Just when you think they cannot get any worse, they do. The threat of radiation contamination is growing. My heart goes out to those unfortunate people in Japan.
I witnessed a side effect of the radiation threat here in Xi’an. On Thursday I walked over to Vanguard for my weekly grocery shopping. I needed some brown sugar so I headed for that aisle in the back of the store. It so happens that this is also the aisle where salt is located. A group of shoppers were there, each seizing several bags of salt. The store employees were opening up eight or nine boxes of salt to accommodate the people. I was oblivious to the pressing need for salt, so I grabbed my brown sugar and squeezed my way out of the crowd.
On the way home I stopped and bought a China Daily newspaper. One of the front-page articles explained the rush on salt. Word had gotten out that salt “can guard against radiation exposure, even though any fallout from a crippled Japanese nuclear power plant is unlikely to reach the country.” The article explained that the salt cure is a myth. Rumors are flying everywhere. Apparently drug stores and health food shops as far away as Russia’s Far East, British Columbia and Canada have reported shortages of iodine pills, despite health officials insisting that potassium iodide is not anti-radiation. Maybe this is a test to see if we will be ready if the real thing happens.
As you know, Japan and China have had their differences both in the past and also quite recently. I have been interested in my students’ reaction to the disaster in Japan. Last week I used the earthquake topic to get my Oral English students talking. I sensed a little sympathy towards the victims but not an outpouring of that feeling. Of course, China has their fair share of earthquakes as well. They can relate because Yunnan Province had a deadly earthquake the same day as Japan. Plus, they had a massive earthquake in Sichuan Province in 2008.
With that background in mind, I want to tell you about a rescue story that I read in an editorial of that same newspaper. The assistant editor-in-chief wrote: “We do know that some 20 Chinese owe their lives to Mitsuru Sato, a senior manager at a seafood company in Onagawa where they were working as trainees. One of the trainees, Yi Yanan, recalled that after the earthquake, the Chinese ran out of their dormitory, but Sato came and took them to higher ground at a nearby shrine. Only after seeing them all settled did Sato run back to fetch his wife and daughter. Unfortunately, he was too late; the tsunami soon inundated his home. “’I saw him standing on the rooftop when a wave engulfed him,’ Yi recalled. When night fell, the trainees didn’t know where to go, but their boss, Sato’s older brother, Hitoshi Sato spent several hours finding shelters for them.”
The reporter continued by saying that all of the 100 or so Chinese trainees working for the company survived the earthquake and tsunami, even though many of the town’s 10,000 people lost their lives. His last words were: “In any country, there are people who are selfish, but there are many more who are ready to help others in an emergency.” To this I add, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). I just finished reading O. Henry’s “The Last Leaf” with my writing classes. They were stirred by the act of total unselfishness Old Behrman performed for the young artist Johnsy. In this story from the newspaper, I see a modern-day version of that story, but the one in Japan is real.
I had a couple of students invite me to dinner on Thursday night. We met at The Village Café, which is close to the XISU campus and serves American food. They had never eaten American food before, so I tried to explain what some of the items on the menu were; for example, hamburger, tuna fish sandwich, steak sandwich, and grilled chicken sandwich. There were pictures on the adjoining page, which was rather helpful. Brenda ordered a steak sandwich, Felicia ordered a hamburger, and I ordered a tuna fish sandwich.
When the food came, they picked up their forks and ate a French fry. Then I explained that they needed to pick up their sandwich in their hands and eat it. They had never eaten with a fork nor had they eaten food with their hands. The Chinese believe chopsticks are more sanitary. They were a little hesitant, but I showed them how. I also taught them the word “messy”. They seemed to enjoy their meal, but I’m sure they would rather have Chinese food.
We had a wonderful chat. Brenda asked me to explain the difference between glare, gleam, glimmer, and glitter. Do you know how hard that is? She had a dictionary there, so I tried to use the sentences for a reference point, but it is so difficult to explain the slight nuances between similar words and when you would use one and when you would use another. Of course, a native speaker has no difficulty with them; however, it was an eye-opening experience for me.
Afterwards, Felicia started teaching me a few Chinese characters like the character for plant and how it shows up flower and grass but not tree because tree has the character for wood. After teaching me the Chinese word for river, jiang, she showed me how the “raindrop” character is in river, ocean, rain and snow. I loved it. It was such a pleasant evening for all of us. For Felicia it was her first time talking to a native speaker (except in class). My students are so shy about speaking because they do not know enough words to have a conversation. Some of the Chinese call it “deaf and dumb English.” They can read it and write it very well, but they cannot understand it or speak it at all well.
We had our quarterly high councilor speaker at church today. His name is Gary Latimer and he works for the Department of Justice and has been with the US Embassy in Beijing for the past five months. Both he and his wife speak Mandarin from their days as missionaries in Taiwan. They had planned to fly to Xi’an in person with embassy business but the meeting was cancelled so they spoke to us on Skype. It was such a great meeting!
As I was writing this email earlier today, I heard firecrackers going off in very close proximity to my apartment. I walked over to church and saw that the parking lot in front of the hotel where we meet was full of cars. Normally Sunday is a quiet day. I saw the evidence of the spent firecrackers and realized that there had been a wedding at our hotel that morning. I snuck past the waiting wedding party and walked across the foyer where two of the sisters were standing. After a few minutes, the handsome groom and the blushing bride walked by to get in a waiting car. More firecrackers.
No comments:
Post a Comment