Back in the U.S.A.
It took me a while, but I am back from China.
I landed a few weeks ago, just in time to watch the start of the Summer Olympic Games in Beijing. (By the way, I don't know if you heard, the Olympics are going on in China this year.) As I sat watching part of the opening ceremonies from a bar stool somewhere in the Berkshires, I finally started to decompress and think about the last year of my life.
I think it goes without saying that my year exploring and living in another part of the world was a great experience for me. I was tested and challenged, attacked and humiliated, lauded and admired. I learned more in one year living in China than I could have ever learned in four years in a classroom.
And I saw and experienced things that were far beyond anything I could have imagined.
I guess one of the major themes that I came to understand about my time in China and how I relayed that to my friends and readers back home is this: Expect the unexpected -- or, perhaps more appropriately, don't expect anything at all.
The latter approach can be attributed to one of my fellow teachers, a friend named Natty Hussey. He, like me, is a MCLA graduate who went over to China for many of the same reasons. And many of his experiences were much like mine, irreplaceable and out of this world.
Perhaps I did have some expectations, however. I expected to be challenged and I expected to learn. Those kinds of expectations should not be ignored. Without the belief that experience leads to growth, most experiences hold no meaning.
So it was with these hopes in mind that I went to China. I wanted to learn, I wanted to grow, I wanted to experience the biggest story of our time, and I wanted to write about it.
As we have seen over the past few weeks with international attention focused on China and the Olympic games, the myth sometimes runs parallel to the reality, but sometimes it does not. The story is so big that no one person or news organization can cover it all. The truth is, China is forever fascinating. I tried my best to examine the little slice that I could from my post as a teacher in Baoding, and I believe I received a pretty good dose. But one year is not enough; neither are 10. Maybe a lifetime would cover it, but there are few willing to give all that is needed to complete the narrative.
During my year there, I witnessed moments that were immediately powerful and eternally important. The protests, the riots, the torch relay, the storms and the earthquake will forever mark 2007 and 2008 as one of the most turbulent and significant periods in China's history. I am simply grateful I lived to tell the story.
Ever since I returned, people have asked me to describe my time in China.
"How was it?" they ask.
"Great! Amazing!"
But it is not that simple.
I tell them that it is not very easy to put it into the words of a 30-minute conversation. If they truly are interested, they should go to China. I tell them to read "Wild Grass" by Ian Johnson, or "Oracle Bones" by Peter Hessler. I tell them that they should listen to and read everything they can about China (like this column). I tell them that product recalls, poverty, human rights abuses, government corruption and especially the Olympics only offer glimpses into the reality of China. I tell them that China is just like the United States, only different.
"How is it different?" they ask.
"Everything is more blatant," I reply.
"What do you mean?" they ask.
"Well," I say, "imagine a place where there are lots of people trying to live their lives, make money, raise families, work hard, pay bills, be entertained, and invest in their futures and the future of their country. Think of the types of people who read the news, watch television, eat, drink, talk with neighbors, complain about their government, and celebrate their opportunities. Envision a place where natural resources are used at an extreme pace to fuel an ever-growing economy, and where pollution and other environmental disasters are threatening the lives of millions."
I think it is pretty easy to imagine if you are from the United States or China because I have just described both.
"But then imagine all this on a much larger scale," I add. "Like four times larger. Add a billion to the image."
It should be obvious that if one were to add a billion people to the population of the United States, nearly everything would probably be much more intense. The United States is a country that values the individual who sacrifices, works hard and succeeds despite adversity. While nearly everyone is aspiring for the "American Dream," there are only so many individuals with different ideas on how to achieve this dream. Ideas are bound to overlap and with more and more people arriving on the scene every day, originality and creativity are getting squeezed out. That is why you can find a Wal-Mart in nearly every city selling the same stuff in the same layout.
Now, imagine that on the scale of China.
It is not exactly the same, yet. But the trends of demoralizing consumerism, exploitation of the land and the poor, and government control over its people are much more blatant in China than in the United States. But the need to stop these trends is exactly the same.
My time in China taught me many things, but one of the lessons was about home: I learned that in order to change the world, things at home have to change first.
The need is blatant.
Chris Gauthier is a recent Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts graduate who just spent a year in China teaching English at Hebei University. He wrote regular columns for The Advocate during his stay in China; this is his last one. To read all of his Advocate columns, visit blogtheberkshires.com.