The Learning Mind Stays The Fittest!

Children are wonderful! Their minds are so flexible, effortlessly learning and expanding in order to make as much sense of the confusing world around them as possible. Of course, as a species our survival dictated that our young learn as much and as quickly as possible to adapt to a dangerous world and live to pass on such skill to their own offspring. But on a social level, it is no less miraculous how kids represent the best and purest expression of what makes us so uniquely human!

I was thinking this today because I recall a specific trend in my writing workshops of a long time ago. See, I have this tendency when I write to not force feed the reader too much information. Perhaps I rely on this trick too much, but I've always found it more interesting to have my readers derive meaning from the context of a situation rather than to have to spell everything out. But this tendency has gotten me in trouble more often than not. Whether due to laziness or to this persistent need among workshoppers to find something--anything!--wrong with a particular story, I find that a lot of people like to be *told* rather than to *infer* the meaning a particular scene, passage, or even word.

Case in point: I wrote this story once that used quite a few Chinese phrases in it. I speak Chinese, and my fellow students in my workshop knew that I spoke Chinese. And in one particular scene in this fictional short piece I wrote in college, my Chinese character used the term "yang guizi" while berating a bunch of white guys bullying her. Wouldn't you know it, quite a few people in my class had an issue with my use of the term.

Now, for those who don't know what the term means, I'll spell it out right here unlike in that story. Yang guizi is a strongly derogatory term used by Mandarin speakers to insult or express displeasure at foreigners, and predominantly "white" foreigners at that. The term means "foreign devil." It really translates to "foreign ghost" -- but in Chinese culture, ghosts are far less passive and more insidious (i.e., demonic) than Western ghosts. Then of course there is the case of equating the white skin of Caucasians to that of ghosts as well, and the phrase becomes even more apt. So if you are reading this and you are what most of the world considers "white," ... now you know what it means if you ever hear this phrase while in a setting with lots of Chinese people. I jest, of course. It's considered quite rude, and most Chinese people would not care to use it lest they portray themselves as uncouth. But among less scrupulous individuals . . . . ?

Anyway, in this story my Chinese protagonist uses the term in a completely unconscious act of reflex against her attackers. And, no, I didn't have my narrative voice break through in that moment to explain for non-Chinese readers what it meant. I figured my character's anger, the exclamation mark at the end, and the ensuing circumstances of her current predicament in being bullied for being Chinese, would provide the adequate context needed to understand the spirit of her epithet if not the literal translation.

But what so many at my workshop said to me in their admonishment was: Hey, nimrod, why don't you explain what this girl is saying so that the rest of us can understand?! I'm paraphrasing, of course, but I think you get the gist. And to which I replied, more or less:

Oh really? You mean to tell me you couldn't figure it out for yourselves? Or are you just using purposeful ignorance in the place of true criticism? Because I really couldn't tell.

See no . . . monkey???

But this brings me back to my opening remarks. It has me pondering this recent realization: That somewhere during the transition from childhood to adult, some of us lose this ability to simply accept one's ignorance on certain matters, and therefore forget to exercise the ability to infer meaning from the context surrounding a confusing or inexplicable occurrence.

In other words: kids know they don't know everything, and so they actively seek enlightenment in other ways. Mostly by asking a billion questions a day, sure. But at least they demonstrate a questing, ever-learning mind. Adults, on the other hand, seem to operate on the assumption that they should know EVERYTHING by now ... and therefore do not have the patience to seek out for themselves the meaning of something new or foreign to their sphere of specialty knowledge.

I recently read a bedtime story to some cute and precocious grade schoolers I know. And although the book had some words or phrases that may have been a little too complex for their age range, they didn't interrupt me every few seconds wanting specifically to know the meaning of these things. I could see that they had accepted what they didn't know, and used the context of how the confusing words were being used with which to inform themselves instead. Nifty trick, hey!

More of us adults need to keep our minds learning like kids do so effortlessly. When you do, you accept that not everything is going to make sense. You accept that sometimes you may have to do a little more work in order to understand an experience outside of your comfort zone. Or, if dealing with a culture foreign to your own, to not flash your privilege and assume it is the *other's* responsibility to educate you.

So, the lesson here is: keep learning, kiddos! (A phrase my Mandarin professor used to say to us all the time in class. No, seriously.)

Chinese Sneak Attack

It happens in the most unsuspecting of places, this spontaneous attack of the old Chinese language skills I've acquired.

I was in J&R purchasing my next game, inFamous (see sidebar), for the PlayStation 3, when the cashier ran afoul of some technical glitch on her machine. Suddenly she started speaking rapid-fire Mandarin to her co-worker, and me not quite realizing I was doing it, tuned in to the conversation as I dug for my cash. Then the co-worker asked "well, how much did you ring it up for?" And immediately I replied in Mandarin: "six dollars and forty-nine cents." Whoa, just like that!

Now, it's been some 11 years since I've last used Chinese on a daily basis, and to be honest I've forgotten a lot. So I was as shocked as the cashiers to hear those words come out of my mouth, let me tell you. Both cashiers were suddenly all smiles. The woman still responded to me in broken English afterwards, but every now and then she peppered in some Chinese words as we concluded the transaction. I told her "hao le" when she counted out my change, then thanked her in Mandarin as I left.

As I walked towards the escalator, I heard the one cashier say to the other: "He said 'xie-xie,' but I don't think he was Chinese."

LOL!

Anyway, that was an interesting encounter. Makes me want to go and take remedial classes so that I can re-learn all the stuff I've lost -- like how to read and write.

NYC is a cool, diverse place to live, I tell ya!

Learning Chinese

As I've mentioned before, my father was hispanic and my mother was anglo-saxon/American. His family was from the Dominican Republic, while her family was from Scotland and England. My parents split when I was two, and at that time I had only learned rudimentary Spanish as a second language. Once my mother got her own place, however, my brothers and I spoke only English. I had to learn Spanish the hard way like everyone else -- through high school language class. But thanks to being exposed to it when I was a baby, the one advantage I had over everyone else was a natural authentic spanish accent that I didn't really have to work at, and a smattering knowledge of individual words like the words for "juice" and "dog".

What does this have to do with me learning Chinese? Well, you see, I hate Spanish and all things associated with the language and hispanic cultures. I was given crap all my life because I had a Spanish last name but yet could not speak the language or undersatnd the customs the way other hispanic people expected me to. So because of this I developed a negative stigma against the culture. To this day I refuse to learn more than the basic level of proficiency in Spanish because I vehemently do not identify with the culture.

However, I did want to learn another language. I'd been told so many stories about how naturally adept my mother had been at learning languages. She learned Spanish fluently over the course of one summer, according to my grandmother. I always entertained the idea that I had inherited her easy fluency with languages. I picked Chinese as the language I myself would chose to learn, rather than being something others expected me to learn simply because of my features and last name.

Let me put it another way: I felt I could only learn another language when it was a language no one on Earth would expect me to know. If my teacher or peers perceived me as somehow having an unfair advantage over a non-native speaker (as what happened with Spanish), I could not learn it. Additionally, I wanted a language that was so far out of left field that no one would expect it. I thrive in situations where people underestimate me. So naturally I wanted to learn something not too many people can learn easily.

This was one of the reasons I chose Mandarin. And yet it is only a superficial reason.

The other, real, reason I chose Mandarin was because of all the cultures on Earth, I've always identified most with Chinese people. That might seem strange for a mixed kid who grew up in the south Bronx ghetto to say, but it's true. From so early on that I can't remember why or when exactly, I've been fascinated with China. I used to read children's stories written by missionairies working in China. The stories were written by Westerners, but were about Chinese children and often took place during Imperial history (almost alway the Qing Dynasty, but I read a few from the Tang Dynasty as well). As a kid I found the culture so alien from anything I had ever seen before, that I used to think China was this mystical magical place. For me, the Far East was a real-life fairy tale!

For someone who hated his surroundings and the life he'd been born into, you can imagine why the allure of Asia had been so strong for me. As I entered puberty, it only grew more profound as I began reading histories and non-fictional accounts of China. I also read more serious Chinese folklore stories written by Chinese authors and poets throughout time. China felt like my home away from home, and yet I'd never been there.

In 1990 when I began high school, the Japan-o-phile invasion of manga and robotech anime cartoons had only just begun to take over hordes of dweebish American teens. And while I admit to being mildly susceptible to the allure of Nippon as well (particularly Samurai culture and coda), it did not even come close to the love affair I had with all things Chinese. Since I was a boy, naturally this chiefly developed into a keen interest (bordering on obsession) with all things kung-fu.

By the time I was 16, my main goal in life was to run away to China and seek out the legendary Shaolin mountain and study with the monks for the rest of my life. Say goodbye to my friends and family, and just disappear! That's how badly I wanted to be away from America and the materialism and senseless violence of the South Bronx ghetto mind in particular.

By the time I was 18, common sense won over and I realized that a more sensible plan was to go to college and study as much about Chinese culture as I could. I went to Middlebury College in Vermont primarily because it was a very strong private liberal arts college -- but also because it was one of the most esteemed and recognized leaders of undergrad language education in the entire nation. Not an insignificant accolade, I must say. Particular renowned were its Chinese language classes and instructors.

I started taking Chinese classes at a time when I did not yet know what my major would be. I came into Middlebury expecting to major in pre-med. Then this switched to Psychology. But when I realized how much fun I was having in Chinese language class--and that, in fact, I did indeed have a knack for learning the language--I came to an epiphany one restless night in January and decided to make my major Chinese Studies. And once I crossed that threshold, there was no turning back. I threw myself headlong into the endeavor of learning everything I could possibly learn about China. Not just its official language--but all aspects of this great culture and nation. Art, history, politics, economics, and, most of all, its literature. Although language study took up 60% of all my education time at Middlebury, my second love was studying Chinese literature. I devoured all of the classics, some of which I would later re-read in the original Wenyan -- the (classical) Chinese literary system of writing.

By sophomore year of college I was already taking advanced classes and preparing to study abroad in China during my junior year. However, plans unfortunately fell through due to financial reasons and also an oversight I had made in choosing my curriculum, which forced me to have to stay behind and take specific Middlebury-based classes or else risk getting kicked out of my major. It was a dark time for me because I had been so looking forward to studying at the Beijing Normal University and then, later, in the northern frigid city of Harbin. My friends ended up going, and I stayed behind. To this day it is my single most regret about my college education.

However, staying behind junior year turned out to have been a blessing. Because it allowed me to turn my studies towards modern Chinese literature and politics, a subject that I would find myself singularly attracted to. I also became engrossed in mainland China's dramatic film works, most of which had been banned by the Communist censors from being seen in the directors' own homeland. Had I gone to China, ironically, I never would have seen these movies during my junior year. Which would have been too bad as, due to these movies changing my world view forever, I was able to form the basis for the thesis I would have to write senior year in order to graduate.

Senior year, in addition to writing my 100-page thesis, I had now entered a super-advanced level of language study by this point. A level designed for only the serious Chinese major. This meant I was in classes with only 6 other students at all times, all of whom I'd been classmates with for almost my entire college career.

By this point we were studying Confucius and Lao Zi in the original script, conducting entire classroom discussions in Chinese, and writing out thousand-character essays every single week for each class! It was grueling, and my brain was mush--but I learned so much! I had long ago started dreaming in Chinese, but by senior year it had gotten to the point that I no longer remembered any Spanish. Whenever I tried to speak Spanish, the words would come out in Chinese first. It got so bad that it was sometimes difficult for me to even speak English, so immersed had I become in Mandarin.

I can't even wrap my head around that right now! Can you?

I ended up acing the thesis and graduating with honors. I had accomplished one of my main goals at college. Yet I knew enough to know that all my studies had only exposed me to the tip of the iceberg, so to speak, and that the next step was to actually move to China and basically "turn" Chinese! :)

Unfortunately, I could not leave the people I loved behind after all. Most importantly, Lisa. We were too much in love that I could not bare the thought of abandoning her to live out my selfish dream of being some kung-fu hermit living on a mountain top in central China. I faced reality, and realized that I had other dreams to follow. Like becoming a writer . . . and marrying Lisa. So far, I've realized one of those dreams already. And I'm working hard on realizing the other.

I regret now, however, that in the 10 years since graduating, I have not found any use at all for my Chinese language skills. I don't have Chinese family members to converse with, my friends from college are all over the globe and of sporadic contact, and I've allowed myself to be too distracted by other personal concerns over the years.

All of which are excuses for me admitting that I have drastically forgotten a lot of what I've learned. I can no longer read Chinese even half as good as I used to be able to do, and my writing skills are almost non-existent. However, I can still carry on conversations in Chinese, as the lingual part of the language was the part most ingrained in my brain after all.

And, you know what? I still have the occasional dream in Chinese to this day! So I guess that's a good sign.

Over the past year I've been thinking of taking up remedial Mandarin classes. It's going to make me feel like a dumbass paying money again for something I've already learned before, but I jut can't allow for all that I worked for to go down the drain. I also need to figure out some way to keep the knowledge active so that I don't lose it again.

And, of course, I desperately want to go to China. I keep seeing three-week excursions being offered here and there, and want so badly to go. Maybe someday I'll work up the funds and courage to do so.

And there you have it folks. Why it is that I know more Chinese than Spanish, and why I feel more of an affinity towards Chinese people and culture than I do my own father's culture.

Thanks to Cindy over at A Little Sweet, A Litte Sour for asking me to write this. I know it was a rather long read, but I hope I covered all the bases! :)