Chinese Class

Those of you who followed me over here from "Amy's China Adventure" know that I spent 5 months in China last year. I'm not exaggerating when I say I had a life-changing experience. It's funny - before I went there, the word "China" didn't mean much to me. I pictured the stereotypes: People (a lot), pandas, pollution....you get the picture. Now when I hear "China", I think of all the friends I made, the places I saw and the fascinating culture I experienced. I'm eager to go back. At GW, I'm focusing on international business. I'm also involved with the International Business Club and I work for CIBER - the Center for International Business Education and Research. I think it's clear I don't want to work for a domestic business! Ideally, I'd combine my MBA with my experience/interest in China and do something that relates to China when I graduate. Perhaps work for a North American company that's looking to expand into China or one that already has a Chinese operation.

To that end, I'm still working on learning Chinese. I wish I had more time for it. Ironically, my course work is getting in the way of a lot of interesting stuff! (More on the insane work load in another entry.) However, I have started a Mandarin course at the International Language Institute only a few blocks from my apartment. It's every Wednesday evening from 6:15 to 8:45 pm. We have 10 weeks of classes and tonight I had my third class.

It's going well, though - again - I wish I had the time to reinforce the learning during the week. Alas, getting 5 to 6 hours sleep per night is not conducive to learning. I didn't have time to do my homework for this week's class, which was to practice writing 10 Chinese characters. That said, learning how to write characters is not my top priority. My learning objectives, in order of importance, are: (1) learning to speak and understand Chinese; (2) learning to read Chinese; (3) learning to use my pinyin computer program to derive characters (i.e., back to the reading/recognition objective); and (4) learning to write Chinese. I figure the chances of me sitting down and writing something in Chinese are slim - I'm much more likely to want to send an email in Chinese. Character writing would be an incredibly impressive skill to have, but it isn't a priority. It might take me an hour to learn to write a couple characters. In that hour, I could have learned to say 20 or so words. With virtually no free time, I have to economize on my learning. One more complaint about the writing component of the class - the teacher wants us to learning the traditional characters (of Taiwan), rather than simplified (of the mainland). "Simplified" - and there's nothing "simple" about them - are quite enough and they prevail in the PRC.

I like our teacher. She's a fairly young woman from Taiwan (which probably explains the characters). It's hard to tell her age, but then it often is with Chinese women. They often look younger than they are. She could be 25; she could be 35. It's hard to say. She focuses on oral Chinese in the first half, asking us questions and getting us to ask each other questions. There are only four people in our class, so there's a lot of personal attention. On the downside, I don't like that she corrects homework during class time. We just sit there while she corrects the homework. For me, that's a waste of time - time I paid for. She could correct the homework at home and return it the next class. I don't know..... maybe she's not getting paid for anything she does outside class time.

I think it's safe to say I'm the youngest in the class.... nice to be the youngest again, given that I'm on the "old" side in our MBA program. The other three students all have full-time jobs. They're all super nice people, which helps make the environment comfortable. Only one student hasn't been to China. One guy is actually Chinese, but grew up speaking Cantonese - he doesn't know Mandarin. He works for a tour company and he's led a number of tours to China. His pronunciation is the best; I'm sure it helps to know a related language.

Anyway, part of me wishes I had the whole summer to immerse myself in Chinese - but we're supposed to be doing an internship over the summer. One student in our MBA program has secured an internship in China.... I suppose that's a possibility. He's working for the Department of Energy, which isn't an option for me (not being a U.S. citizen and all - something I'm realizing is a huge disadvantage, particularly in these tough economic times). It was wonderful to have time over Christmas to do a bunch of ChinesePod lessons. Since returning to DC, I've done zero. This class is better than nothing, but fluency will require a much bigger commitment.

The Sound of Sirens

One thing I certainly didn't miss during my three weeks at home was the constant sound of sirens. There's no escaping it here. I'm a light sleeper, yet even I have become completely immune to sirens in the middle of the night. I think it has a lot to do with the large number of hospitals, particularly in the Foggy Bottom area. I hope it doesn't have much to do with DC's crime rate - after all, I live in the safest part of the city.

Of course, there are also the sirens of motorcades. I was at the corner of Pennsylvania and 22nd one day, and a particularly long motorcade went by. Someone later told me the exact number of cars in the presidential motorcade. I didn't count the cars in the one I saw, but it was long. It's possible I saw the president go by and didn't even realize it. One of the cool things about living in DC!

Added to the sirens are the airplanes and helicopters. I've never seen airplanes fly so low before - I guess this has to do with the close proximity of National Airport (and the Pentagon?). There were two choppers in the sky tonight as I walked to my Chinese class at the International Language Institute. It's amazing how quickly all this background noise becomes just another part of everyday life.

New Year's Resolution

I'm sitting in the Air Canada lounge in Toronto waiting for my flight back to DC (with thanks to my Dad for the lounge pass). Christmas holidays are over. It was a wonderful 3-week break. I'm headed back to DC to face Module 3 of the second semester.

I'm happy to be returning to life in DC, though I confess I'm less-than-enthusiastic about going back to school. The first semester was a lot more stressful than I anticipated. I don't know.... maybe I thought grad school would somehow be more laid back than undergrad. Not at all. And the module system doesn't help - I'm convinced some profs have just taken a 14-week course and compressed it into 7 weeks. I'm not the only one finding it very intense.

Academically, I did very well the first semester. Probably better than I have to do in an MBA program. Few firms hire strictly on GPA - it wouldn't make sense for something so practical as business. Of course, you can't fail out, but a perfect GPA plus no social life is not a recipe for success in business. I want to do well, but I could afford to slack off a little more. I did have a social life in the first semester, but not nearly as much as I expected. At times it was easy to forget that I live in DC.

For that reason, my New Year's resolution is to get outside Duques more often and experience all that DC has to offer (Duques is the name of the business building). While I hope to stay in DC (or at least the U.S.) after graduation, there's always the chance I won't be able to find work there - especially if the current "buy American, hire American" mentality remains. (Please, please economy, get well soon!) I'd hate to leave DC without having truly experienced life in the U.S. capital.

That's it for now.... back below the 49th parallel in a few hours!