The Classroom Without a Doorknob: A Tale of Teaching in China

This morning when I arrived to teach the second of my two morning classes, I couldn’t figure out how to open the door. The knob was missing. I could hear the students talking inside, so I knocked. Then I could hear them attempting to open the door, and it became clear that they were locked in and I was locked out. Luckily, the room is question is not far from the Staff Room, a sort of departmental office, stacked high with mysterious bundles of papers and usually teeming with young teachers drinking tea, chatting, and keeping the Foreign Languages Department running. As soon as I reported my problem, one of them grabbed a pair of shears from a cubbyhole and led me back down the hallway. She inserted the shears where the doorknob shaft should go, wiggled them a bit, and the door popped open. "Sorry!" she called over her shoulder as she hurried back to her work.

And so it goes. Tomorrow I’ll be sure to have my own shears or a similar blunt tool in my book bag. Ruth and I have been reminiscing about last term, how chaotic it all was, how confused we were every day. You can’t go from the fourth floor of Building D to the fourth floor of C, even though the buildings are connected; you must go down to the third floor and then up again by another stairwell. The bus routes change on the first of every month, and you need to learn the number of your proper bus for that month – unless it happens to be a month when the bus routes remain the same. This information is probably clearly posted nearby. In Chinese. There are fifty or more students in each class, but it’s tough to get a solid count or take attendance because there are no class lists. Last term, we arrived in Lanzhou during the second week of teaching and hit the ground . . . well, "running" would be overstating it. Even a decent stunt roll would be giving us too much credit. We hit the ground with a thud. Now, we feel like, well, maybe not "old hands," but at least middle-aged hands. We no longer get lost returning to our own office. We know the way to the cafeteria, and have identified our favorite foods for breakfast, lunch and the occasional dinner. Best of all, we have a realistic set of expectations for our teaching lives. Chaos and confusion: a certainty. Short notice and the unforeseen: part of the way things work. Broken down facilities: the regular work environment. Joy: the immediate by-product of getting past the other stuff and working with the students.

On the second day of classes this term, the Deputy Dean stopped in the office. He came by to let me know that he and I would be team teaching my section of American Literature (news to me,) but in reality he would be too busy to join me until April. And that would be close to the end of the course because – here’s the next surprise – the graduating students will all leave after 12 weeks to do their student teaching. As I turns out, this includes all of my students, not just the literature class. So the 19 weeks of work I’ve prepared suddenly needs to be pared down and compressed into 12 weeks. I was already rolling my eyes over teaching all of American literature in 19 weeks; now, it’s just 12.

One week into the term, my lit. class has finished The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. This is to say, I have read my favorite passages aloud to them and we’ve discussed the story and its context. I’ve promised them no homework until after the Band 8 exam next weekend – the next hurdle in their lifelong series of high stakes tests. This one will determine their job and/or grad school prospects. The Ann Berthoff fans among you will be glad to hear that I began teaching them to use dialectical journals this morning. Ann Bradstreet writes, "Thy love is such I can no way repay," and a student responds, "Love doesn’t need to repay." Today’s journals are as varied and intriguing as the students who wrote them, and I’m sighing with relief. It was a leap of faith to thrust this task on young people whose academic lives have always depended on memorizing and re-iterating the ideas of others. But here they are responding to a text with thoughtfulness and sensitivity. I have only 11 more weeks with them, but it will be a rich time.

It was shaping up to be a pretty ordinary Sunday. Rae and I planned to worship at 10 A.M., and then I expected to stop at a supermarket on the way home and pick up a few groceries. I was looking forward to cooking dinner for a colleague and squeezing in a little lesson planning, maybe even a load of laundry. Just an ordinary Sunday.

After mass, we lingered in the lobby of the church to chat with our English-speaking friends Gao Wei and Wong An Ping, along with a small cluster of people we don’t know by name. Among them was a cute teenage girl in a blue sweatshirt who was being especially tolerant of my limping Chinese. Just as we were about to leave, someone tugged at my sleeve and said in English, "The Bishop would like to meet you." I turned and found myself facing a smiling clergyman wearing a suit coat, v-neck sweater, and dark striped shirt with a loosely fitting clerical collar. We shook hands, I bowed awkwardly, he smiled more broadly. Someone indicated that he would like to chat with us in his office, and we all trooped upstairs to the third floor of the church complex.

On that level, one wall of the corridor is all windows lined with flowering plants; the office doors line the other wall. The Bishop’s office was dimly lit and pleasantly cluttered. A large desk filled half of the room; Rae and I sat on a sofa so deep I wondered how I would ever get up again. The young girl in the blue sweatshirt sat beside me, a reassuring presence. Gao Wei and Wong An Ping had come along, apparently to interpret. The room got crowded. Other adults who came in took tiny plastic chairs from a stack near the door.* Tea was made, fruit and candy passed. The conversation lurched forward.

I had been concerned that our very conspicuous presence in the community might be causing some angst among the clergy. Every Sunday we receive communion. Although the clergy staff is large, they must all know by now that we never go into their confessional. They must wonder if we’re even Catholics; as you well know, we are not. I was not surprised when the talk turned, after we established our nationality, to our faith. The Bishop tactfully asked us (through our interpreters) if we understand that there are two branches of Christianity in China, Protestant and Catholic. We responded in the affirmative, and told him that we prefer the Catholic faith in China. OK, I am the first to admit, we equivocated. It was a half-truth. The Bishop seemed satisfied; I felt both guilty and relieved.

The Bishop (sorry, I truly didn’t get his name – but I will work on that! – in addition I don’t know if the parish itself has a name, or if Chinese churches have names at all . . . ) had one other thing on his mind. He wanted to recruit us to teach English in a middle school in Zhangye, a city about 12 hours northwest of here by train. I hope he understood our explanation that we are committed to the Amity Foundation and that they plan our teaching assignments. I will tuck an Amity brochure in my bag and give it to him next week; it was unclear whether he knows of the organization. In a conversation facilitated by good-hearted amateur interpreters, it’s impossible to tell how much anyone on either side comprehends!

Next, we were invited to lunch with the Bishop. We dined in a modest local restaurant owned by a parishioner; some women from the church joined us. Sweet Blue Sweatshirt drifted away; Gao Wei and Wong An Ping came along. One of the best things about Chinese people is their playfulness. Chinese adults are fabulously uninhibited in public. It’s a joy to be around them when they sing, dance, and clown spontaneously. So it was only a mild surprise when the Bishop inflated the wrapper from his chopsticks and exploded it with a "bang." We all tried to imitate his performance, but failed. If I ever have the privilege to lunch with an American bishop, I’ll watch to see if s/he tears off one end of the drinking straw wrapper and then blows into the straw to sail the wrapper across the room.

Our lunch was predictably abundant and delicious. There was, among many treats, a cold dish – medallions of lean, smokey-tasting meat.
Gao Wei asked, "Have you tried this? Do you like it?"
"Yes!" I said, "It’s delicious!"
"Glad you like it." he replied, "It’s donkey."

* I was not surprised to see child-size chairs in the Bishop’s office. One of my favorite things about this parish is the involvement of the children and youth, as acolytes, ushers, lay readers, and prayer leaders.