Gold Star Students: A semester in summary

SUMMER VACATION IS HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! For those of us in Arcata, it looks a little like this:

In fact, just yesterday it decided to start raining on my way home from my single summer class.

Many other things aside, what this means is that it's now once again time to write our end of the semester blog of fun quotes from our professors. For no purpose other than to amuse myself, I shall put the quotes in the color of the notebook I wrote them down in all semester. Pointless, I know. Heads up, this post is ridiculously long. Sorry. I did, however, try to throw in as many pictures as I could in order to break it up a bit.

I lost my Bio 308 notebook after our move, but recently found it again. It doesn't have quotes from the entire class but here is what it does contain:

"Plants and people have a lot in common. The have sex almost identically."


"Ah. I got it. If that happens again, tell me to hit the button that says 'lamp'".
Spoken after having trouble with smart classroom technology.

Conversation between a student and the professor:
"Was the forest happier when it was getting burned all the time?"
"Well... define happier..."


"This is an estimate but, I'm telling you, Jamestown sucked."


"Look at all this logging. This was with a fricking ax!"

Another conversation between a student and the professor:
"Is marijuana considered an invasive plant?"
"I... I'm sure someone in here knows better than me."


"So, we paid farmers to do this- And by 'we', I mean the Smithsonian. I don't know if you want counted as a part of that."


"This is what the sea otter looks like. It is super cute."

I'd say he's right. 

Also, we had a guest lecturer who had a funny quote. She was coming in to talk about plants but covered some other subjects as well, leading her to make this comment about herself headline style, punctuating each word with her hand in the air:

"Botanist reads about whales on internet!"

The class was pretty funny, even if it didn't have many quotable moments. What was significant, for Brooke, Alana, and I... or perhaps just me, was how frequently our professor said the words: "You don't need to know this" before explaining something he felt like saying anyway. He said this so frequently that by the third week of school I began keeping a tally of how many times he said it in a single class. the first day I began recording he had spoken it three times by the end of our hour and a half long class. Obviously, I don't have tallied the times he said it before I started recording, and I lost my notebook part way through the semester and ended up taking notes all over the place but here is my grand total tally for the semester:

You don't need to know this: 42!

I started every Tuesday and Thursday this semester with a certain history class with a certain hilarious professor. Actual jokes he told aside, here are his funny quotes from that class:

"Really, the only thing you can say for sure about Taiwan is that it's an island."


"So, yeah, we destroyed him."


In reference to something he had to review.
"And I didn't like his thesis either. It was boring and stupid."


"You might be surprised to learn that there are students at this school who are conservative in view and vote republican."


"In event of an earthquake, we are supposed to duck and cover. As you can see, we don't really have that choice in this classroom. I guess I'll be okay but you guys are screwed."


"This is just incredible. I mean, how do you get the water buffalo up there?!... Buffalo wings."

This might be he exact picture he used in his slideshow...

"And then by the 17th, 18th century the Europeans thought they were all scientific 'n shit."

"His court was full of fortune tellers, prostitutes, historians and people like that."

In reference to Emperor Kangxi having himself painted as deities from various religions in order to appease the populous.

"And here is is as a Daoist, not to leave any ass uncovered."


"There were also military exams. You know, for jock."


"Yeah, I think that painting is beautiful. You see it in sushi restaurants a lot."

Pretty sure it's mandatory for all sushi restaurants to have a print of this.

"Take a look at that. See if you can spot the pornography. I'm serious! Shunga, it's called."

..............Couldn't bring myself to include a picture. But google image it if you're curious.

In reference to riots in the early 19th century in Japan.

"They arrested some writers... because, you know, writers are what causes this."

"I sure hope this professor gig works out for me so I don't have to turn to selling my body on the streets."

"The 19th century, it's the century of ridiculous facial hair."

These are actually Japanese renditions of Commodore Perry and his son
 and  not, in fact, Japanese men at all.

"But doesn't it look like Founder's Hall? It looks just like Founder's Hall!"

Gakuin University, Yokohama Japan. Did you do a double take?

"One of the main reasons that men wanted to get into government was so that they could rip people off."

"Don't know, I've never been to Korea. Don't speak Korean. I know, I fake it well. Don't know about Korea."

"Ironically, the people that let the Communists out of jail after the war was the Americans. And then they quickly tried to put them back in again."

In reference to Emperor Taisho:

"Personally, I think he looks kind of like a dip."

Clearly he'd look better with the feathered hat on.

In reference to a picture of the Modern Girl and Modern Boy in Japan in the 1920's.

"Here they are sitting at a table without a chaperon." *gasp*

No idea why my google search gave me this... but that's definitely not English or Japanese...

"They look like liberals, don't they? All smiling and happy."

A conversation between him and a student.

"Great idea. I love it."

"What? Oh, that was sarcasm."

A comment to the class as he was returning a quiz that many students must have done poorly on.
"When I write a true/false question I don't try to trip you up. The question will be totally ridiculous like 'The Meiji Emperor never died'."


"I sometimes pick up hitchhikers if they're young and alone."


"Later he joined the Communists, so Christians, Communists, whatever."


"I love satire. South Park is one of my favorite shows."


"The Japanese did more for Chinese nationalism than anyone in China ever did."


"Actually, Shanghai was a pretty rocking place in the 1920's."


"Cigarettes took of like- well, like some kind of addictive substance."


"The Republicans like to throw around 'class warfare'. Ha! They ain't seen nothin' yet."

A conversation between a student and him:
"I like watching modern Korean soap operas."
"Who doesn't?... No, seriously."


"Oh, but what do parents want for their daughters? To become a good wife for another family... You've seen Mulan, right?"

A comment made in response to the New Life rules put into place by Chiang Kai-shek in the 1930's:
"We're going to save China from Japan by improving hygiene? Really? Really?"


In reference to Chairman Mao Zedong:
"He will become one of the most famous people in China, up there with Confucius, Jet Li and Yao Ming."


"I think Chiang Kai-shek is a handsome looking man in his own way, but he's got a kind of strange looking face, doesn't he?"

Chiang Kai-shek, strange looking or handsome? Discuss!

"Stalin was a very suspicious man, probably paranoid. He didn't trust anybody. I don't think he trusted himself, to be honest."

Can we all just agree how wonderful it is that this even exists?

A conversation between a student and the professor:

"Is the Japanese dude blue?"

"Yes, he's blue because he's an inhuman monster. I believe that's what the message is."

"Look at this Nazi. He looks just like a Nazi, doesn't he? He's got Nazi-smile."


"Wang Jingwei was the Benedict Arnold of Chinese History, basically."


"Never trust a Nazi. That's a good rule of thumb for you."


"Churchill is British, so by definition he's a pompous ass... No, I'm just kidding. I have a lot of British friends."


"With the right materials, I could make an atom bomb. My sixth grade science project was how to make an atom bomb. In fact, you could make one by accident fairly easily."

In reference to Land Reform in China.
"Hey, I want that, too. Let's kill some landlords."

In reference to leaders of Korea.
"Especially now that we're into our third nutty Kim."

Spoken before 4/20.
"It's the highest place in the world... Except maybe Humboldt County this Friday."


"Fathers determine the sex of the child. But, it's tradition to blame women, so we do."

Somehow this had to do with a picture of a German beauty queen working in China...
"She's not that pretty."
"Well, I'm sure she has other talents."
*class laughs*
"Well, you k now these beauty queens- I didn't mean it like that."


"Because, you know, bikers are such kind and friendly people."


"Oh, the Communist Party doesn't like it? Well, then the youth are going to love it."


For whatever reason, my professor gives puts a gold star on your quiz if you get 100%. This has proven to be quite the motivator. Last semester I had this same professor for a class and received but three gold stars the whole semester. I was quite sad. This semester out of nine quizzes and one map quiz, I received 6 gold stars out of 10 possible. Well, actually one of them was red...

It's ridiculous how good one of these makes you feel.

Same professor, but second class of the day:

"New-fangled technology that you kids have."

Spoken by a man only on his forties.

"What's your major"

"Astrophysics."

"Oh, I started out as an astrophysics major."

"Am I looking into the future?"

"Plagiarism is bad, mmmkay?"

In a Mr. Mackey voice.

"Plagiarism is bad, mmmkay? Now, who can name this body part?"

"If I catch someone plagiarizing, I will give them an 'F' and refer them to... What are they the inquisition?"

"Working for California is like being in the sixth circle of hell."


"I'm actually a very humble person... Sometimes."


"You know what pirates are like. They're very multi-cultural!"

Google says this is a multi-cultural pirate...

"Which may make me a traitor but at least I'm a benevolent and humane traitor."


"They're not so interested in saving souls as they are finding new drinking partners."
In reference to Russians.

"That guy is so arrogant. Even more arrogant than me."


"They tried to present themselves as whatever would appeal to their people. Kind of like Mitt Romney."


"I expect the Huns to show up in Washington any day now."


"Well they're barbarians, right? They're not Chinese, ergo, they're barbarians."


"We'll just give them some gifts, pat them on the back, say we'll be friends forever and hope they'll go away."


"The model they're using in dealing with the barbarians- excuse me, the Europeans."


"It's always easier to get people to do what you want if you beat them first. Keep that in mind."


"The local bannermen just keep getting their asses handed to hem."


"The British attempted to invade Afghanistan, which, by the way, is where Empires go to die."


"It isn't true what they say. What doesn't kill you doesn't make you stronger. It leaves you crippled for life."


"Nothing like a good decapitation to remind people of law and order."

"That's okay, if we don't understand it we can just blow it up. It's worked so far. Everybody is afraid of us. We're crazy!"


"I wish my union had an army... Any volunteers?"


"Computer dating is the way to go, though. Computers never get it wrong."


"Any other other questions that I don't know the answer to?"


"You thought the Canadians were all nice and liked moose but they had Nazis, too."


"Anyway, the Long March was considered to be a success... even though they lost 80% of their people."

Of course this exists.

"You seem kind of like a videogame person. Congratulations for coming to class."
Some videogame had come out that weekend.

"This is pretty fascist, like the boyscouts."


"Yeah, Hitler had a lot of crazy ideas."


"This was an unplanned land war in Asia, which sounds even worse than a planned land war in Asia."


"The women were supposed to stay home and raise little Nazis."


"The Great Wall is, after all, China's great... wall."

I'm honestly surprised that it wasn't used as a runway sooner.

"Oh, that's different. Fourteen years old, you're already a man."
In reference to the Iranian army.

"Fortunately, I don't know very much about venereal disease, either."


"You can tell he's an American because he's smiling."
In reference to a picture of Comfort Women and a soldier.


"I prefer scotch. That's my way of lobotomizing myself."


"This is just a wild stab in the dark... Which is what you're going to get if you don't do it."


"And you don't have to set it in stone. In fact, I'd prefer you didn't... Cuz it's heavy? Stone? No?"
Referring to our thesis papers.

"I have perfect hindsight and I'm a historian and know everything."


"It was a surprise attack, which is not so much treacherous as it was intelligent."


"So, not only is Chiang Kai-shek at the table here- or he would be if there were a table. You know what I mean."


"He died of cancer even though there were a lot of people trying to kill him."


"Word to the wise: Don't get involved in a land war in Asia."


"It's a bad way to go. There aren't many good ways to go. Freezing to death. Might be the most pleasant."


"I want to live to 90, then get get shot by a jealous husband."

Not exactly a storybook ending...

"You've got to watch out for scientists. They can be amoral. They should all be forced to take philosophy and logic."


"That's what I've learned from studying history. People believe all kids of shit!"


"You've all heard of Cinderella?"


"Imagine a bunch of gossipy old mothers with powers over their neighbors. Just imagine!"


"Ah, I don't know anything about current events. My head is in the 1950s."


"Yeah, don't study history too much. It's bad for you."


"'Well, he was must talking from his heart.' - Which is what we used to call lying..."


"Oh, the aliens will invade long before that."


"Well, since we're playing ping-pong together, we may as well have some high level diplomacy as well."


"Here's Nixon using the world for ping-pong. I think it might be an exaggeration."

This magazine cost twenty cents at the time.

"So, we'll kill off Mao today."

"Aw."

"Yeah, I know. We'll miss him."

"This is the Mao-soleum."

Somewhere in there, I hear, is a very orange Mao.

"And he rode in a stagecoach around the rodeo to the cheers of this Houston crowd! They probably didn't know who he was. I'm just kidding, I have friends in Texas... I'm still kidding. I don't have friends... In Texas."

Why does everyone associate America with cowboy hats?

"The Chinese stock market is a bizarre creature. It exhibits strange characteristics."

"Nobody has a monopoly on hypocrisy."

"Students bring gifts to their teachers... Take note of that."

"Dammit, Jim, I'm a historian not an engineer!"

"I think they just wanted the biggest damn dam in the world."

"Is that why Indiana Jones is always finding Nazis?"

"Yes. Archaeology is full of Nazis."

"He hasn't been to class in two months. We can only assume he's been kidnapped and sold in Burma."

And lastly, he spoke the following in reference to conversations he has had in China at conferences:

"You study Chinese history?"

"Yeah! That's why I'm here, speaking to you in Chinese now."

In this class we had four quizzes and one map quiz. I received 4 out of 5 gold stars possible!

On my most important and final (I swear!) note, I managed to have perfect attendance this semester for the first time since my first semester of junior year of high school.

I've spent the last two semesters trying to have perfect attendance but it hadn't really been possible. Turns out your grades are better when you show up! I received two A's, an A-, a B- and a C+. Pretty proud.

Oh yeah, did I mention I walked?

A Life Lost and a Lesson Learned

Grandma,


I haven't seen you in person since, I believe, 1989 or 1990. All you ever really were to me was a voice over the phone. Here's what I do remember, though:


I remember my disappointment whenever a card arrived from you on a holiday with sticks of stale gum instead of money. And I remember being even more disappointed when the gum stopped coming. As a child I couldn't appreciate such a gesture but for several years now I've been planning on doing the same thing when Bry and Lia have kids.


I remember how it seemed like every phone call from you either ended or began with a lecture on cleaning and helping mom around the house. Maybe if I'd been a better daughter when I still lived at home we'd have had more chances to talk of other things.


I remember the toys for us that you lovingly made by hand. They weren't My Little Ponies or a brand new Tamagochi but even as a little girl I knew I wanted to save them for my own kids. 


I remember how years passed without seeing pictures of you and my complete surprise when I did. Mom looks so much like you and, since I know how much I resemble her, I know that someday I'll look just like you, too. 


I'd know your voice in an instant if I heard it calling out, "Kimberly! This is your mother!" over the answering machine again but I'll never hear it again. 


Grandma, I just moved. If I had known I'd never receive another, I wouldn't have thrown out all the cards from you I found littering my living room as we rushed to pack.


Grandma, we never spoke much in this lifetime... perhaps we'll speak more in the next. I'll always miss you.

Practicing to be a Grandma someday.

Farewell Apt. B

On the eve of my little sister graduating from high school and heading off for her first semester of college, I've never felt older.

Here you can find Bry and I just after our high school graduation, about a million years ago,
and Lia can be seen as the dorky little kid in red.

When did that dorky little girl, that refused to wear her hair any other way than in a low ponytail, grow into this:

Check out that hot rod behind her. 

My "little" sister is now 18. Don't go trying to jump her bones, though, or I will seriously mess you up.

Do you want this to be the last thing you see?
I didn't think so.

On the verge of moving out of the apartment that Bry and I have lived in since May 2008, I've never felt more grown up. As I was going through what it is that I want to keep or get rid of while I pack/got dressed for class one morning, I made an interesting discovery: I've gotten rid of nearly all of my non-work shirts. I used to be in possession of many interesting and and ridiculously large shirts.

It was large and soft and I loved it. It was also meant for a man
and I have NO idea where it came from...

Or there were these lovely things. Why do tie-dyes
refuse to go out of style???

One day, I magically turned into this overnight:

Just kidding, we're always like this.

My bad. I mean like this:

Do you see me there??? I'm practically in a suit!

With that, I leave the blog to Bry to say a final goodbye to Apt. B. We may end up missing having 1.5 bathrooms, and two extra closets, but we will never miss our pothead, Dubstep-at-4-in-the-morning loving neighbors.

We took this for Chelsea Jo Traynor, for her birthday, during one of our first nights in the apartment.
(Rest in peace, Chelsea.)

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince midnight premier in costume!
Rach is dressed as a wizard dressed as a Muggle and Sarah dressed
as an owl and passed out letters to other people in line.

Back when he was an ankle-biter... Oh, wait... he still is.

Every party needs a classy lady.

Pictured: two thirds of a love triangle.

PedoBear approves.

This photo is brought to you by Two Buck Chuck and the letter W.

No explanation required.

The green couch is perfect for napping.

Frankie as a kitten.

Playing on the couch we affectionately referred to as "The Rape Couch"
right up until we found out it was full of spiders.

Too many cat photos?
I spy with my little eye... a deer.

Figgy always has to help.

Speaking of things that do not belong in a kitchen...

Blow-up doll from hell?

Possibly my favorite Halloween costume so far.

A few days before the wedding, David catches up on some sleep.
As I said, the green couch is great for naps.

This is me hours before my wedding, chilling on Facebook.

My reaction when I heard David say thanks for the game
but "What are Tribbles?" :O

"Say dysfunctional!"

We attempted to teach Iris "Down by the Banks of the Hanky Panky"
like we played in sixth grade camp.

Three best friends all grown up. 

The little sister bonding with the Terror.

David photographed with the classy Christmas lights
and the shower curtain/living room blinds.

David's official graduation photo.  Notice the bowl
of cat food for the stray.  We have bleeding hearts...

Hahahahaha, I gave you wood.
(A nerdy Settlers of Catan joke.)

Our first Christmas tree.

Our stack of Christmas presents on the kitchen table
with the equally depressing Charlie Brown Christmas Tree.

This is an excellent example
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
of how ridiculously long we've been living here.

So long and thanks for all the fish, Apt B.

Culture Shock: Journey to the East

I know that anyone that has made the mistake of asking Bry or me about China has probably heard this story, but I have a new version. For a class, I was required to write about an experience with culture shock and analyze it a bit. This is the paper that I wrote. The end of it is kind of lame but the beginning of my story is fairly entertaining. And I do apologize that it's ridiculously long. I'll throw in some pictures to make it more palatable.

Culture Shock:

Journey to the East

           

I often say that my first six hours in China were the worst six hours in my entire life, followed by the best three months of my entire existence. It all began, however, before we had even stepped off the last plane, on August 29^th, 2008. I called the airline the day before our plane was scheduled to leave only to learn that our flight had been cancelled. My sister and I were booked free of charge on a flight leaving a day later. No big deal. When we arrived in San Francisco we had to go through extra special security saved for provoked peoples like ourselves who had had their plans pushed back a day. They put us through a bomb detection machine. It was like being in a wind tunnel. No big deal. The plane my sister and I took from San Francisco to Los Angeles was my first plane ride in memory. The plane from Los Angeles to Beijing was the longest wait of my life. A fourteen hour plane ride where all my sister and I could do was talk about what China might be like when we arrived. The plane was enormous. There were hundreds of us, albeit most of the other passengers were Chinese, all crammed into a giant tin can in the sky. I should have been terrified but I was just so excited that my face hurt from smiling. I couldn’t sleep I was so excited, although that was partly the fault of how little my chair would recline. I’d spent months being excited but nothing compared to actually being on the plane. The plane! To China!

Cell phones being allowed on a fourteen hour flight would only make things worse.

The seats were all blue and had Chinese writing on them. There was a screen ahead of us that, in between showing movies, told us our altitude, how fast we were flying, where we were around the globe and how cold it was outside at all times. The flight attendants were all Chinese but spoke fluent English. They were all women except for one ever-happy man. He was always smiling. It kept me smiling while the little Chinese children around me screamed. The women kept me happy by bringing me meal after meal. We were never hungry because they fed us dinner, a snack, and then breakfast. It was a fourteen hour flight after all. My sister and I were stuck in the center row, trapped between an elderly married couple. Why couldn’t they sit next to each other? My sister and I constantly had to wake them up so we could get to the restroom or stretch our legs. But it was no big deal. We were on the plane. Nothing compared to this excitement. When the plane landed they played “Beijing Huan Ying Ni” over the speaker. Beijing welcomes you! That was the official song of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Though I had watched the opening ceremony, I was unaware of that at the time.

           

Can you find our old man crush?

            Stepping down off the plane, I had my first cultural bump where I thought, “Well, that’s not quite what I was expecting.” I stepped out into the sunlight and saw… nothing. We had landed far away from the airport itself and all had to take buses to the airport in order to catch our connecting flights. Instead of seeing lots of other planes and buildings as I had expected I saw only empty land, and mountains in the distance. Isn’t Beijing supposed to be a huge city? My sister and I got on a bus and drove for what felt like forever. How was this airport so big? We were unaware at the time that Terminal 3, where we had just landed and were scheduled to  be spending only an hour, was the largest terminal in the entire world at the time. “Terminal 3 is larger than London Heathrow Airport's 5 terminals combined with another 17% to spare” (Beijing).

Looking forward to getting to return. They had the best useless crap to buy as souvenirs.

There was so much we didn’t know. I’d never taken a Chinese history class. I knew only the most basic of phrases in Mandarin. But I could read the signs! It took a moment to realize that they were in English. How convenient. Once my sister and I rode some sort of subway into the airport, made our way through customs and security, we attempted to claim our luggage but were told that it would be waiting for us at the next airport as it had just been transferred to the next plane for us. Aren’t the Chinese nice? We were given hand written directions to our gate and leisurely made our way there. We had ten minutes to spare. The gentlemen taking tickets checked ours and kindly let us know that we were at the wrong gate. What we had assumed was a Chinese character that we didn’t recognize was actually the number five. We were, in fact, fifty gates away from where we needed to be. No big deal. The plane would wait for us, right?

I Googled "plane waiting" and got this. Teehee.

We ran as fast as we could only to watch the doors shut in front of our face. Not the doors to the plane, of course, but the doors to the gate we had to go through to get onto a bus that would shuttle us to our plane. It left without us. We anxiously turned to the woman in uniform next to us and demanded, “When is the next bus coming?!” She informed us that there was no other bus. We explained our situation: that our bags were on that plane and that in an hour there was someone picking us up from the Xianyang airport. We had to be on that plane. She told us to follow her, and, like the scared nineteen year old American girls that we were, we followed with fear in our hearts for the first time during the trip. This was kind of a big deal. She talked to another woman and we were informed that they had booked us, free of charge, onto the next flight leaving for the Xianyang airport. It was leaving in hour. We would only be an hour late. Crisis averted! Surely the person picking us up would wait a mere hour for us, right?

We were given the options of Western or Chinese breakfasts
and decided to choose the more familiar of the two.

On our next plane, we were fed breakfast yet again. This plane was fairly small. It was even smaller than the one we had taken from San Francisco to Las Angeles but at least for this flight we could look out the windows. We were finally flying during the day. It was about seven or eight in the morning and, blissfully unaware of Chinese geography, we spent the entire hour long flight looking out our window in search of the Great Wall. What we didn’t know, and what would later make us feel foolish that we’d searched so long, was that the Great Wall is about an hour drive north of Beijing and we were flying west. None of this mattered at the moment, though, because we were on the plane! The wrong plane, I’ll give you that, but we were only an hour away from our destination. I wrote in my travel diary as my sister and I attempted to ignore stares. We were the only white people on this plane, and this was a small plane. Every passenger had noticed the identical blonde twins walk. No big deal. We were entirely used to this after nineteen years.

As you can see, I googled twins and these were the first four results.

Clearly we're the most important twins the internet has ever met.

After what was irrefutably the shortest hour of my life, we stepped off our plane and into the Xianyang airport. We found our luggage (Thank the gods!) and quickly ended up in the area where you stereotypically see people holding signs in the movies. There were people waiting for passengers but no one paid us any attention. We waited. Everyone left. We tried to find someone to talk to. Everyone in Beijing had spoken English but nobody seemed to here. No need to panic, we’d just give our teacher a quick phone call. We found a pay phone and searched our bags. We only had her number at HSU. No need to panic, we’d just make an international call home and get our mom to contact someone for us. We couldn’t figure out our prepaid phone cards to make an international call. We stood next to the phone, eerily calm, and attempted to devise our next move. We were then approached by a man who claimed to be something along the lines of the manager of the airport and spoke pretty fair English. He asked us if he could help get us a taxi. There were two men flanking him. Waiting. Smiling. We debated this. If we left the airport, even knowing where we were going, the man who was supposed to pick us up would never find us. But that probably didn’t matter. If we could just get to campus, we could probably find where we needed to be. No big deal.

Clearly, we were suffering from huge amounts of denial.

We allowed the men to take our bags and put them in their… van? Did China not have taxis? How strange. We climbed in and buckled our… There were no seatbelts. That’s fine. These guys probably knew how to not crash a car. Or van. No problem. The man driving never spoke but the other man in the front seat spoke some amusing broken English. We gave him the address of our school and then made small talk. The man driving pulled into a parking lot. The men got out of the van and transferred our bags into a car. We were told that the man that spoke no English knew where we were going and would take us there but that the man who knew English couldn’t fit in the car with all of our bags and would leave us at this point. Goodbye! Okay, no problem. The guy knew where he was going and it would probably take like five minutes, right?

It looked like this but ten years older.

We passed a bright green car. What did it say on the side? Did that say taxi written in plain English? So, China does have taxis. What were we driving in? We drove out of Xianyang and onto a freeway. We drove for forty minutes at least. We were unaware at the time that the Xi’an airport was actually in the next city over from our school. Bry and I sat silently in the back seat. We were calm. The road was wide, nearly devoid of all other vehicles, and we couldn’t read any of the signs. At last we found ourselves in a city again. The buildings grew taller and taller and our driver took us through many crowded back alleys were people played Frogger in front of dozens of cars.

Just so that we're clear here, the cars WILL NOT stop for you.

When the man finally pulled over and stopped his “cab”, we were on a small street, in the middle of the city, and saw no school. This isn’t where we’re supposed to be, we insisted. He pointed to his left and we saw the gate to our school. It was glorious, thirty foot tall gate that said the Xi’an International Studies University in characters and in English across the top. Relief washed over as we pulled our bags from the car. “Money?” it turns out, was the only English phrase the man knew. We paid him 200 yuan, a huge rip off we would later learn, and dragged our bags around campus for two hours before finally finding our hotel. Our teacher found us in our room. We hugged her and cried with yet more relief, and she took us out to lunch.

This is probably what we seemed like when our teacher finally found us.

Fair warning, everything after this is the part of my paper that was boring. You can, however, skim to the bottom for advice.

This long, rollercoaster of a story, is a perfect example of Carly Dodd’s model of culture shock, which we discussed in class. While I was experiencing all of these new things and feelings, I was only aware of how I felt in each moment, but I can now look back and break down each stage. Let’s start at the beginning of my experience. The first stage of Dodd’s culture shock model is Eager Expectation (Culture Shock). I had been feeling this the entire summer before ever stepping onto an airplane, but even on the first two airplanes I felt this. All I did during my free time was daydream about how amazing China was going to be. The things I’d see, touch, eat, smell. During the fourteen hour flight, however, I began transitioning into the Everything is Beautiful stage. The old people that were constantly in my way were no problem. The fact that I couldn’t fall asleep after being awake for some twenty plus hours was no problem. I ever so briefly dipped into the Everything is Awful stage when we missed our connecting flight in Beijing but that only lasted about ten minutes. Everything was back to being beautiful while we sat on the airplane.

In the Xianyang airport, my sister and I were up to our ears in Everything is Beautiful or else we would have realized how incredibly stupid we were to get into some stranger’s van. Van! I remember during the forty minute freeway ride thinking about how we might end up murdered and our parents would never know what happened to us, but I sat there smiling. We were in China. China! I was in denial. I was in more denial than I’d ever been in my entire life. It was as if someone had flipped a switch in my head and I couldn’t process what I was going through. For lack of space, I cut the end of my story brief but I will go into a little bit more detail now as I skimmed over my experience with Everything is Awful.

When we left the van and began dragging our bags over campus, we had no idea where we were going. We were surrounded by students but couldn’t seem to find anyone who spoke English. At last, one girl could help us. She was, in fact, a Spanish major. We spoke, the three of us, in our poor Spanish, in China, to try to figure out where we needed to be. She helped us drag our bags over campus as she took us first from the International School building to the hotel on campus where we would be living. We were under the impression at the time, though, that we were supposed to be living in dorms with other international students, and were convinced that we were in the wrong place. We paid the hotel the last of our money that we’d had converted in Las Angeles, in order to get our room keys. We dragged our bags up four flights of stairs and sat, utterly alone, on our hotel beds. We were looking through our phrase books, trying to learn how to ask to be returned to the airport, when our teacher knocked on our door. While we were coping with the Everything is Awful stage, we were using the methods of filter and flex, but were quickly transitioning to flight when our teacher found us. After our teacher found us, and we broke down in tears for a few minutes, we instantly transitioned to Everything is OK and very rarely encountered any other stage again during our entire three and a half month stay in China. I went through all four of Carly Dodd’s culture shock stages in about twenty four hours. After experiencing such intense, albeit brief, culture shock, my sister and I did all we could to attempt to view our surroundings with centricity (Co-Culture) but in only three months it is hard to let go of your outsider perspective. With all of our attempts, we only managed to do some minor deculturation of our American culture and acculturation of our Chinese surroundings. It was an intense three and a half months, to say the least.

Everyone, at one point or another, goes through culture shock. You may experience it on your first day starting at new school or job, but everyone will experience it. If you know in advance that you will be placed in a situation in which you will experience intense culture shock, as in the high of Everything is Beautiful will be extremely high and the low of Everything is Awful will be extremely low, then someone like me who has been there can give you some advice.

1.        Research where you’re going! If you’re going to a foreign country, don’t go entirely devoid of background information. Google some weather stats, read a book on the country’s history, learn some of the language. Anything and everything is more useful to you than going as a blank slate.
2.       Have a backup plan! If you’re going abroad, don’t go empty handed. Be prepared with phone numbers of people you can contact as well as a means in which to do so, so as to avoid sticky situations. (Like getting into a stranger's van.)
3.       Know the signs of culture shock! Again, if you’re going abroad, be prepared. Read up on the symptoms of culture shock. Just as necessary, I believe, is a very basic understanding of how you personally react to stressful situations. If you can recognize how far from your normal stress reaction you’ve wandered you can take action before you overwhelm yourself.