Shengliver's Garden

TO THOREAU

Shengliver’s Note: Time changes and people change. However, some human values, for example, kindness, generosity and sympathy, will never change. This letter was written back in the winter of 2005 – 2006 and was highly rated by an American epal. I have revised it and here it is to remind myself of the direction I should be following in my career and in my family life.

January 12, 2006

Dear Thoreau,

Thanks for sharing with me your life questions. These questions of yours are even hard for me, though I have gained some experience. My views are as follows.

It is WRONG of your dorm mates to skip classes for computer games or whatever entertainment they may find in the dorm. I know many college students do it, but it is absolutely wrong. I am sure they feel guilty when they are doing it. They are trying to deceive themselves. They should have plenty of time for fun after they look after their academic studies. Anyway what would be the meaning of life should all our time be spent playing games? I, as a student, occasionally skipped classes which I thought were of little importance. I had a course called THEORY OF CHINESE REVOLUTION AND CONSTRUCTION. I avoided lectures of this course many times but I did read the course book for the exam. However, I was serious about my major courses. I am happy to learn that you were able to resist the temptation. It was not easy and I hope you can keep it up.

Love and marriage is another big issue we all have to face up to. We are humans and it is human nature to fall in love, have sex and build up a family. It is our biological need and our sociological need as well. It is perfectly normal. Of course China is being transformed into a diverse society, which might see all kinds of options for us. Of course the majority will still get into a marriage. But some, I dare say, will choose alternative lifestyles. Some may stay single, some may marry a person of the same sex and some may marry but choose to have no offspring. This will happen sooner or later in China. It is the trend. But I don’t see why you should not end up in a marriage, following the mainstream.

The passion for my first love is still vivid in my memory. We fall in love as teenagers both for biological reasons and for aesthetic reasons. At the right age our human body will release the right hormones, which drive us into what is called LOVE. This can be simply a pure good-will feeling towards some person of the other sex. The person attracts us because she is pretty in appearance and/or in demeanour. But I am afraid that few of us, at such a young age and so green in the world, have the ability to tell what inner qualities the person has. Is she kind? Is she tolerant toward others? Is she eager to learn? At this stage what attracts us most is the superficial quality, a pretty face and a nice body shape for example.

Many young people make misjudgements at this stage. Some people tell me that many beautiful faces cover a heart as cold as ice, as poisonous as snake venom. Of course it does not mean that all beautiful women are this way. The truth is that a pretty face is not necessarily the proof of a beautiful heart.

After marriage, all the wishful thinking about our valued woman is put to the test of a daily routine, which can be boring and detrimental to the continuation of our pre-marriage romance. The perfect woman is gradually losing the lustre she used to have, for both partners have to face all the tedious tasks of a married life. Who should cook? Who should do the grocery shopping? Who takes care of the family money matters? Who has the say on the important questions this family has to tackle? And many others. A baby will put the marriage under greater strain, especially if both spouses have a full-time job. Most quarrels and strife take place in the two or three years after the baby is born.

You might say that the decision to choose a life-long partner is a once-and-for-all one. This is wrong, I am afraid. Of course the decision about whom to marry is of vital significance, but a happy marriage is not 100 percent guaranteed only by the so-called right decision. You might choose the right person, but you might ruin the relationship after marriage if you or the other fails to cultivate it. In other words, it takes both partners to make a successful marriage.

It matters very much to remember to make concessions to the other. We are not perfect creatures. We are born with all kinds of defects and weaknesses. If the couple are willing to make concessions to each other, the marriage is full of love. Otherwise quarrels would characterise it. It is easier said than done, especially when one holds the conviction that s/he is in the right.

Let’s come to my marriage. As you know, my wife and I were classmates in junior high school, so we share a lot in family backgrounds, values and beliefs. And we were attracted to each other when both of us started working in the early 1990s. We did have some differences on many questions but we have been able to respect each other. This respect has altered us both in such a way that we are used to each other. This process is not easy because we have found that it is also a learning process. We still hold our own ideas but I am sure we will fare well as along as we respect, tolerate and appreciate each other.

Learning mentioned, I would like to elaborate on this point. Probably it is my prejudice but I have found that many a Chinese female has no desire to learn, especially after she is married. If you find a woman has no interest in learning, more often than not, she is opinionated and prejudiced against anything and anybody not to her liking. Learning does not concern only book learning, but also the attitude towards those who are different from us. Such women are hardened, intolerant, ignorant and foolish and therefore make no good life companion. We, my wife and I, make an effort to encourage each other to learn. These days my wife reads a Chinese news digest and she is sometimes moved to tears by those touching stories printed in the newspaper. Since she can shed tears for those stories, I have confidence in her.

Of course it will be some years before you tie the knot, if you choose to marry. A word from me is that you would do good to your relationship by trying to encourage your dear spouse to learn. Of course she would do the same good by encouraging you to learn too.

Do not worry about your aunt and your uncle. They are doing fine. At least there are no signs that anything goes wrong with their relationship. Besides, their daughter is so cute. Her daughter and mine are good pals. I bet they will be able to survive those small differences if there are any. Let’s hope for the best.

I have made real progress with my spoken English. You may have read my blog entries about my speaking experiences on UC. I will not be lengthy here. Of course you are welcome to come over for a visit if you like in the vacation. My family will stay in the city for the Spring Festival. And if it is convenient for you, you may chat with me on the UC if you happen to have a UC ID. My English is far from perfect, but it sounds much better than it was. It will be even better.

It should be very convenient for you to enter the graduate school of your university. It is good enough. However, I see no reason why you should not apply for the program at Zhejiang University. You know the advantage well of studying in a new university and in a new city. Your experiences would be enriched. Anyway it is your decision. Wish you good luck.

Very nice hearing from you. Your letter reads well and please do not feel shame about it.

Stay warm.

Yours,

Shengliver

AF ENGLISH MOUTH ™

Shengliver’s Note: The English language has been functioning as a lingua franca in this global village. Knowing the language enables the knower to communicate with people from a different culture. The number of English learners has been on the increase the world over. Nowhere else in the world is the number greater than in China. Nothing is wrong with learning a foreign language. It is a personal endeavour. If you like it, you do it. If you use the right way, you learn it better. But things are more complicated than that in China. English language learning, on this ancient land, is being abused and misused, politicised and demonised. Recently one of my epals, Mr. Farmer, has been commenting on learning and teaching English in China in his Chinese blog. Some of his opinions should be heeded. Money cannot buy us quick fixes and we learn English not to beat the foreign devils. This entry, first written in 2007 for April Fool’s Day, is intended as a joke. Do not send in any money and do not send in any mail. If you like, laugh out loud.

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Hence our product. Our linguists studied all the English sounds meticulously and they found none of the English sounds exists in the Chinese system. Our physiologists put the Chinese mouth and the English speaking organ side by side and they found there were sharp differences between the two. The Chinese can’t speak the Londonish way simply because the mouth in Beijing differs from the mouth in London. Crazy English offers kind of a solution – they promise to train your mouth muscles the English way, but to be honest their solution is no solution at all. You spend the money and you still end up with the stupid work of repeating, repeating and repeating the English sounds, straining your Chinese speaking organs all along. It is uncomfortable and painful. How many Chinese learners have succeeded by following their methods? Very few.

Therefore, our physiologists and our IT experts collaborated closely with each other. The physiologists provided the IT experts with info about all the differences between the two-styled mouths. Then the computer engineers put all the info into a computing system. This system in turn automatically produced a model in the 3-D format on the screen. Actually this model would exactly fit the cavity of the mouth of a typical Londoner. Next, if you would like to learn a word, say “English”, you push a button on the screen and the Model moves exactly the way a Londoner moves his mouth when saying this word.

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A TIE

This entry features a Chinese teenager, Jiang Xianbo. Xianbo is one of my students. He comes from a county called Yunxi. I became his teacher at the beginning of the second semester of Grade One. He talks little and smiles are hardly found on his face. Little by little, as time went by, bits and pieces of his life story came out and completed the jigsaw.

A SCHOLARSHIP

The school runs several scholarships and grants to encourage the academically excellent and to assist those whose family have financial difficulties. Mr. Jiang lost his father when he was very young and his mother remarried. It is clear that his family have difficulty supporting him. He should get a scholarship or a grant, but he does not.

Last semester, a new scholarship was assigned to his class. It meant that one student would get it. His head teacher gave the scholarship to one of the boys who did well in exams. Jiang told me in the journal that he should have been the recipient of the scholarship because he found the money his mother gave him could not last him for the term. He had to use his money sparingly.

Even though the scholarship was not given to him, he did not complain. Even though the boy who was given the money spent it on birthday cakes and gifts, Xianbo did not hate him. “Life is hard for me, and I must hold on. My difficulties will only make me stronger and stronger,” he wrote.

RAIN

“Shengliver, I know you like rain very much. Why?” he asked me one day in the journal. He likes rain too. But the reason he gave made my heart miss a beat.

When Xianbo was a young boy, he lost his father. His mother raised him and his younger brother. It was a hard existence. And Xianbo cried a lot as a boy when stuck in a difficult situation. He came to like rain this way. One day he was running home and crying. And it started to rain. Tears tasted salty and the rain that poured on him made the tears less salty. “I like rain because it tastes sweet,” he said.

A TIE

The suit and tie is not the Chinese national costume. Many people in China do not wear a suit and tie. When Xianbo was very young, his father made a promise to him. Every year, the father left home to find jobs elsewhere in the country. Before the father set out on a new trip, he promised Xianbo that he would bring him a small tie as a gift for the Spring Festival.

Xianbo got excited for he had never owned a tie. He could not wait for the father to come back home sooner. The father normally returned just before the Spring Festival.

The father did come back earlier that year. When Xianbo heard the news that his father was coming home, he got happy. But his happiness turned to shock and grief. The father came home in a wooden box, carried by some people.

The father was buried. Xianbo did get the small tie the father had promised him. “I cannot remember what father looked like, but the tie will tie us for ever. When I meet with difficulties, the tie gives me hope and strength,” Xianbo wrote in the journal.

A CALL

Xianbo lives in the school and does not go home until holiday comes. He does not have a cellphone so he keeps in touch with his mother using the public phones installed on campus.

On Mother’s Day this year, he called his mother during the lunch break. He got through and started to talk with the mother. The talk had not gone for a while when the call was discontinued suddenly on the other end of the line. The last thing Xianbo heard was a cry from the mother.

A few days later, he called his stepfather. He told Xianbo that the mother was working on a mountainside when Xiao called. The mother missed her footing and fell down the mountainside. Luckily she was not seriously injured and she was recovering fast.

If we use an adjective to describe Xianbo’s life, it is bitter. However, the lad never gives up. Instead, he is growing stronger and maturer. Good luck, Xianbo.

BLACK WOLF

Shengliver’s Note: This entry is based on a Chinese story printed in Xinhua Daily Telegraph on May 18, 2009. The authors are Li Keyong and Chu Guoqiang.

Mr. Yuan Yusong never thought a dog would have such an impact on his attitude towards life.

After the 5/12 earthquake, which struck western Sichuan Province, Mr. Yuan and his seven co-workers were trapped in the mountains for 17 days before they were rescued. They had only 5 kilos of rice to live on for the 17 days. He will never forget the hellish days, the comrades and a dog called Black Wolf.

When Mr. Yuan first sighted the dog, he and his comrades were searching for a way out in the mountains.

It was the day after the quake, May 13^th, 2008. Mr. Yuan and his party, injured, hungry and tired, were trying to find their way out of the labyrinth of mountains.

Around 10 am, they met a team of miners, who were trapped in the mountains, too. The dog was trailing the miners. No one had any idea when and where the dog had started to follow them.

The two parties of people were indifferent to the new member. They did not welcome him; nor did they drive him off. The dog was a potential danger, they thought, although it did not look malicious at the moment. So the dog continued to trail them on their journey, keeping some distance from the humans.

Suddenly the dog stopped and barked wildly. The people got startled. They were wondering what was wrong when a strong aftershock came on. All of them stopped where they were and squatted down on the ground. When the aftershock was over, the people got friendlier to the dog. They realised that he could alarm them should another tremor strike.

Sometime in the afternoon, the dog barked again, this time vehemently, his two front paws stretched in front and his body tense. His human companions stopped at once and waited where they were. It was less than a minute before a stronger tremor struck. The mountains around were trembling and the ground was shaking. The path in front of them was swallowed instantly by a mixture of earth and rocks.

Mr. Yuan and his fellow survivors were now grateful to the dog for his alarm. The dog was black and large. So they gave him a name “Black Wolf”.

Black Wolf was a smart creature. It did not take him long to learn that “Black Wolf” was his name. He would come over when his name was called. When his human companions were eating, he would be given some cooked rice. He would lick all the rice grains off the bowl before he went away and lay down quietly in a corner.

Black Wolf had less to eat than the people. He could not eat uncooked rice and he could not eat the wild vegetables that his human friends picked and cooked. As a result, Black Wolf got weaker fast.

On the night of May 13^th, it was raining. It was cold but this group had nowhere to take shelter and got soaked through. The humans nestled together for warmth. In the beginning Black Wolf was lying away from the humans. Later on, slowly it moved up to the humans and curled up against the legs of his human pals.

On this cold night, Mr. Yuan was thinking about his family in his hometown. Were they still alive? What if he could not get out of the mountains? Fear and grief and helplessness gripped him. At this moment, he felt the body of Black Wolf next to his own, and warmth from the dog’s body warmed him up. He began to take Black Wolf, the dog, as a pal in the same boat.

On the 14^th, Black Wolf was no longer able to follow the group and they had to stop from time to time for him to catch up. Someone suggested having the dog killed for food. His idea met strong opposition from the others. Mr. Yuan turned to the man, looked him in the eye and said forcefully, “Black Wolf’s life is also a life!”

That night, they lit a fire and stayed around it. They let Black Wolf lie close to the fire for warmth. The dog was so weak that once it lay down it did not want to get up again. Mr. Yuan noticed that Black Wolf’s eyes were not as clear as before, with some tears in them.

On the fourth day after the quake, they came to a river around midday. In front of them rose a steep cliff, which was about 20 metres high. The stronger ones climbed up to the top of the cliff and tried to pull up the weaker ones one by one, using a rope. Black Wolf was tied up and pulled up too. It seemed that the dog knew what the humans were doing to him. He did not protest at all when the people were tying him up and then getting him up to the top of the cliff.

However, those who had reached the top found the path ahead had been blocked somewhere and therefore all of them had to retrace their way down the cliff. Black Wolf had to be lowered from the top of the cliff to the bottom. After the group started their journey again, the dog barely had any strength left to walk on. He managed to stumble a few steps but it was hard for him to keep his balance. Mr. Yuan felt the dog probably would not last long. Suddenly someone cried alarmingly, “Black Wolf has fallen down!” Mr. Yuan went over to the dog and cried, “Black Wolf! Black Wolf!” The dog opened his eyes a crack but closed them again. He probably wanted to lick Mr. Yuan’s face but the effort was in vain.

Mr. Yuan and his comrades could not help weeping for the loss of their companion where he was lying.

A funeral was done for Black Dog. His body was put in a trench, covered with earth and branches and then piled on with stones. It was a valley with few trees. It was cloudy and the wind was cold. The group of humans trapped in the mountains temporarily forgot their own trouble and stood around the dog’s tomb, silent and solemn.

The same day, a decision was made among the group of people that the stronger should continue their search for a way out and that Mr. Yuan and several others should stay behind with the injured and the elderly until help arrived.

Altogether eight people were left behind. They encouraged each other to hold on. They persuaded themselves to eat the wild vegetables, knowing that Black Wolf died of starvation. They did not part when they were in despair. They promised that they would die together if there was no way out. Luckily, 13 days later, the army’s rescue helicopter arrived before they perished.

A year has passed since then. Sitting comfortably in his temporary home, Mr. Yuan cannot hold back his tears when thinking of the dog. Mr. Yuan is now back at work in his construction company located in the town of Hanwang.  He says, “In the days of despair, I came to realise that each life has its dignity and value however fragile it might be. Black Wolf behaved as a buddy and he deserves our respect.”

DUANWU

Shengliver’s Note: This entry was written for the festival last year (2008). It has been quoted a lot by epals since then. I have revised it and made a couple of changes. Here it is for my readers.

WHAT IS DUANWU?

Duanwu is a traditional Chinese festival. Its English name is the Dragon Boat Festival. The Chinese name duan (first) wu (five) literally means the fifth day of a month. The festival falls on the fifth day of the fifth month in the Chinese calendar. In the Gregorian calendar, it is observed either in late May or in early June. The exact date of the festival in the Gregorian calendar varies from year to year. Duanwu is a national holiday in China.

QU YUAN

It is popularly believed that the Dragon Boat Festival is marked in memory of Qu Yuan. Mr. Qu (343?-315? BC) was a poet who lived in the Kingdom of Chu during the Warring States Period.

Mr. Qu was an official of the court of his kingdom. During that period of Chinese history, China was not a unified nation. On the land there were a number of kingdoms. Chu, located in the south central part of the land, was supposed to be the largest in area; Qin, located in what is Shaanxi today, the most powerful of the kingdoms.

The King of Chu would choose to make peace with its northern neighbour. Qin, however, was keen to invade Chu and annex it. The King of Qin coveted all the other kingdoms on the land. Mr. Qu Yuan was aware of Qin’s ambitions and he tried to advise his king to take precautions against the northern neighbour. But the King of Chu was surrounded by those officials who envied and resented Mr. Qu. They persuaded the King of Chu to follow the opposite course. And Mr. Qu, the honest and patriotic official, was banished from court and sent off to remote areas of the kingdom to the south of the Yangtze River.

His country fell into decline day by day, and yet Mr. Qu Yuan could not do anything. He was in anguish. His sorrow prompted him to create the great poem, Li Sao. Li Sao is widely acknowledged as the first Chinese poem of romanticism. In the poem, the poet wrote in the first person, which was a practice that had never been found among the Chinese poems written before Li Sao.

In grief and pain, Mr Qu Yuan drowned himself in a river called Miluojiang, which is in today’s northeast Hunan Province.

DRAGON BOAT RACES

On the festival, in south and central China, Dragon Boat races are held on a river or a lake. The races are related to the drowning of the poet.

Legend goes that when the local people heard of Mr. Qu’s drowning, they rushed out by boat in order to rescue him from the river. Today’s races are reminiscent of all the boats dashing across the water to where Mr. Qu was drowning on the fifth day of the fifth month over 2,000 years ago.

ZONGZI

A special food goes with a Chinese festival. Zongzi is to the Dragon Boat Festival what mooncakes are to Mid-autumn Day.

Zongzi is made of rice which is sticky and glutinous. People use this rice commonly for making rice wine. In ancient China, the Chinese people took advantage of its stickiness and used it in construction. It was mixed with sand and other building material to cement bricks and stones. In my hometown, a dike along the river Danjiang is thought to have been built this way and the dike still works well.

This rice is soaked in water before it is wrapped in some leaves, like bamboo leaves. In my hometown, folks use the leaf of a tree called wutong as the wrapping. Whatever wrapping is used, the leaf lends some of its flavour to the rice.

The wrapped zongzi in the shape of a pyramid or a triangle is cooked by boiling or steaming. It takes quite a while to have it well done.

Also garlic bulbs are boiled with zongzi. Most people eat zongzi with garlic cloves. Sticky rice is hard to digest and garlic helps digestion by stimulating the stomach to move more and faster.

People with stomach complaints should be wary of zongzi. It is hard to digest.

In Hubei and Hunan, people drop zongzi into rivers and lakes on the day. This practice is related to the death of Mr. Qu Yuan, too. After Mr. Qu died, people put the food in the river in the hope that the fish would eat the rice and stay away from the man’s body and thus his body would be left intact. Mr. Qu’s body is no longer there but the food is thrown into rivers year after year to show respect for him.

AIHAO

Duanwu would be no Duanwu without a herb called aihao in Chinese. Its English name is mugwort.

People get up early on the festival to go and collect this herb in the country. It is placed at the door and hung around the windows. The herb is thought to be able to drive away disease and pests.

Actually aihao is widely used in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and in home remedies for common complaints like skin trouble, coughing or digestive disorders.

I like the smell of the plant. It smells a bit bitter but it refreshes me. And I used to mix this herb up with chrysanthemums. The two herbs look quite like each other and both have a bitterish aroma.

THE HARVEST SEASON

The festival happens to be a time of harvest in many parts of China. In my hometown, in many years, the festival is when the farmers are busy harvesting their wheat and planting rice seedlings.

That’s the reason why I have no happy memories of the festival. My father and mother were not interested in cooking zongzi. As far as I can remember, my younger brother and I complained to our parents about not eating the food on the festival. Some neighbours prepared the food and it aroused our craving for it. One year stood out in my memory. At the persistent request from my brother and me, my parents cooked some porridge using sticky rice. The porridge was served with sugar. But it did not satisfy us kids. It was not zongzi.

One year my parents finally cooked the food. We kids tasted it. However, we came to a conclusion that zongzi was just so so and that pork was tastier.

I think my parents’ dislike of the food has something to do with the fact that the family have its very origins in north China. I chatted with some elderly folk in my village. They all believed that the whole village was started by four brothers who migrated here from north China probably in the Ming Dynasty.

One festival, also the harvest season, I was home with my parents. There was no zongzi for us. Instead there was hard work on the farm. My brother and I were woken up by our parents very early in the morning around 5. We had to go and help the parents in the fields. It was so early in the morning that I felt very chilly and had to wear a coat. But as the day progressed, the temperature rose sharply. Later on, when the sun was up and high, we had to remove the coat and put on a shirt. All the sweating in the sun! The memory of the early rising, the coldness and the fresh air is as fresh as if it had happened only yesterday.

This year’s festival happens to be a Sunday. But I will have to be working for the National Matriculation Test on the day. I will invigilate this big exam at my school.