During the week I get up at around 7. I usually have a few chores to do at home since I seem to be out for most of the rest of the time. I need to leave by 8.45 in order to get to my Chinese lesson on time. I catch a bus from round the corner, the journey takes just under an hour and then I have a ten-minute walk at the other end.
Our lesson is from 10 - 11.50 with a 10 minute break in the middle. There are about 10 of us in the class, although there are students joining or leaving the class every week. I'm the only Westerner. There are 3 Japanese and the rest are South Koreans. They see China as a very big future market and are learning for that reason. (Look at a map if you're not sure of the proximity.) When we chat it is usually in Chinese but with the Koreans I can usually resort to English if we get stuck. I've always found Korean students to be lots of fun, but the Japanese here are also more fun than ones that I've taught in the past. The actual lesson is very much to the book. And the book is a publication by one of the biggest foreign language universities in Beijing. The methodology is uninspired and the grammar explanations are obscure. But in fact that doesn't matter too much for me at the moment. My level in grammar and vocabulary is much higher than my level in pronunciation, speaking and listening, so I am concentrating on improving those rather than learning new things. The teacher is very nice although not as knowledgable and experienced as my teacher in London.
In the afternoons I usually go sight-seeing, sit chatting or get stuff that I need. Travelling into the city centre takes more than an hour, so quite a lot of time is taken up with that. And of course if I need to buy anything, that's time consuming because I have to find the right shop, right department, work out how to ask for it, etc.
In the evenings, I often go for a meal with whoever I spent the afternoon with or meet up with another friend. Last night I went to see a Beijing opera performance with Anna and her mother. If it's not too late when I get home, I try to fit in a bit of studying and writing a diary.
When I first arrived I went to visit the English language school that I had been in touch with from Britain, but I decided that it was too far away to work there - the journey back to the flat would be about 2 hours. However, yesterday evening I helped another teacher give a lecture to 400 students. Classes in China are typically much larger than in the UK and so the dynamic is very different. It was an interesting, useful experience, though not something that I want to do regularly.
So far, I have been with other people almost all of the time. Let me introduce you to the people who I know here. Firstly there is Anna, who some of you know. Here in Beijing she is a lawyer and it is her flat where I am staying. She is staying at her mother's flat, but I have another flat-mate, Wang Fei. She is the same age as me and is from Xi'an. She works as a rep in Beijing, selling UHT milk. Leyu and Li are 2 Chinese students who studied in Britain and visited my parents several times. Li's mother also came with them for a visit at the time of Li's graduation. They are in their mid 20s and have been going out for several years. They came back to Beijing earlier this year and they live with their respective parents here. Ariel is a friend of theirs from Taiwan who they got to know in Britain. She is spending the summer in Beijing, trying to get into English teaching. She is also keen to see some of the sights, and since she is not working at the moment, I have spent a lot of time with her. Ariel met Da Ping at one of the language schools. She is a librarian at one of the universities, but she and her husband are hoping to emigrate to Canada and so she is trying to improve her English this summer. Xia is another Chinese student who has stayed with my parents. She only returned from London at the beginning of this week. Andy and Sarah are a British couple who are working here as doctors. They have lived in Beijing for about 4 years, speak the language well and have many Chinese friends. Their 2 small children are growing up bi-lingual.
In addition to the above, there are countless other people who have chatted to me here. Often when I'm on the bus or tube, people come up and start talking to me. I even had someone who rushed over and asked to take a photo of me standing with his girlfriend. Westerners are fairly uncommon away from the main tourist sights. Often these conversations are in a mixture of Chinese and English. One old woman told me about a business trip to London with her husband 20 years ago. Yesterday morning I spent my bus journey chatting to the vice-editor of a publishing house. I feel a little like a VIP. On the one hand, it's lovely that people speak to me, and it's good language practice. On the other hand, after a time it would be very wearing to get attention wherever you go. On the bus for example, I'm talking to one person, but the whole of the rest of the bus is listening. When I walk down the street, most people walk by as normal, but there are also a good number who stare.
Although I get a lot of attention here, I feel completely safe. There doesn't seem to be any danger in travelling around alone in the evening. From what I can judge, I would say it's much safer than London. The Chinese tell you that there are pickpockets but even though I stick out so much, I would say that that is also less of a problem than in London.
Overall my time here is a cross between the experience of living and working here and of being a tourist. Living in a normal flat in a normal area; having a lot of contact with Chinese people; travelling around by public transport; having a daily routine and the opportunity to give a lecture all mean that it is more like living here than the average tourist experience. On the other hand, the sight-seeing and the amount of free time that I have are closer to a tourist experience than if I was living and working here.
Being here for a time reminds me of many of the aspects of living abroad which I experienced in Hungary. One of the things that I like about living abroad is that basic activities are often a challenge rather than a banal chore. Shopping and washing clothes are good examples. There is a sense of achievement from successfully doing these which you do not have in Britain where they are easy or straightforward. In Hungary we could be delighted by finding a shop which was selling loo paper. Here I bought a plug adapter so I could charge my mobile. Constant language input is another aspect of the experience. When I'm out and about I find myself attempting to read every notice in the street, eavesdropping on every conversation on the tube, rehearsing everything I have to say. When I get home I have to force myself to read something in English in order to switch off. A more negative aspect of spending time with native speakers are all the decisions which are made for me. Sometimes I'm not consulted, and sometimes I'm not even told what the decision is. By the time I left Hungary, I could usually at least follow the discussion, even if I wasn't quick enough to contribute. But I'm not at that level here so I often just have to go with the flow. It's good for keeping oneself flexible and adaptable.