Gu Bo and Pa Lan Ka from 'Learn Chinese Text Book No. 2'
Jan. 1
Harry dropped by. He said he and his girlfriend had a serious argument and agreed to defer their marriage. He thinks she crossed the line that’s proper between men and women; she had male colleague friends at work that he felt she was too close to. He’s going home to see her. I haven’t told him about Ren Ke Qi’s letters to me.
Jin Xin dropped by. She told me when she was 18 she studied acting, poetry and singing for three months in Beijing. Her older brother was a teacher at the school she attended. Her parents made her come home and study at a technical college in Tianjin. She graduated and for eight years operated machines. She finally found a way out, to get at least a little closer to art, by getting a job as a librarian in the School of Architecture. “Sometimes I want to sing, but there’s no place to do it.”
Jan. 2
AM
Qiu Jiang came by for help with his McGill application for graduate studies. He invited me to join his family for Spring Festival, February 16.
PM
Prof. Zhou Zu Shi and Peng Yi Gang came by. They wanted help polishing the English in a description of the Tianjin University Architectural and Design Research Group.
Eve
Write letter of recommendation for Lin Ning for her application to McGill.
A teacher sent me a flower bulb as a gift.
Jan. 3
Sunday. Walk in beautiful snowfall (rare) to photocopy letters of recommendation for Ca Chao. Students out playing with snow, taking pictures.
Type letter to Foreign Affairs Office asking for more courtesy at our front desk.
Jan. 4
AM
Teach 2nd year design.
PM
Teach English with teachers from the Architecture Department. Use BBC “Heart of Dragon” series.
EVE
Help students in Design Studio
Jan. 5
AM
Chinese with Chen Laoshi.
PM
Spent two hours with Zhou Zu Shi and another teacher, Mr. Bai, trying to get an old projector to work. Finally have to abort plan to show films tomorrow, instead will show video by Robert Stern “Spaces Within”.
Normally, one does not pursue an architectural career by moving to Newfoundland - at that time - Canada’s poorest province, and then moving to China where all best talent is trying very hard to go to the West! And why look for a wife and family in a world where it is so difficult to communicate? I know East and West will meet someday; I know East and West have gifts to exchange but that could be quite a stretch in a marriage. There’s a wonderful East-West synergy coming, someday. I want to contribute to that, but it’s difficult to translate these thoughts into everyday life. For the most part, so far, I converse with myself. Lack of sharing increases the loneliness. I lay on the floor in my room and listened to Glenn Gould playing Ballade OP.10. No.2 in D Major by Brahms. In the music, light breaks through a forest canopy and bubbles of light dance on the earthen floor. Brahms was 21 when he wrote that music. His musical father, Schumann, had gone mad.
EVE
Help in Studio. A student, Tang Ming Qing was very sad; she even shed a few tears. She can’t get her elevations looking right. I try to help her. Zhang Jin Yang’s elevations are also “chaotic”. We drew an axonometric and that helped a lot to see various relationships. Most of the students are doing well; better than last term. Seeing them progress lifts my spirits.
Jan. 6
I dreamed last night that Prof. Zhou Zu Shi had given me an affectionate fatherly hug. Then I was having a discussion with another man about inviting He Hong Yu to come to Tianjin University to give a presentation. He referred to her as my “so-called girlfriend”. My shoes filled with flames. I could see the fire through the cracks in the seams. The fire finally went out when I took off my shoes.
Chinese with Chen Laoshi.
She was telling me about the significance of the number 9 in China. I told her about its significance in other civilizations including Islam. She said she saw an Islamic “Church” in Chicago. It turned out to be the Baha’i Temple in Wilmette.
PM
I gave the last Architectural English class of the term before Spring Festival. I used Robert Stern’s “Places Within” about large enclosed spaces in America.
Lin Ning received notice she was accepted at Penn State.
Proof-read articles from Zhang Long for Building in China Magazine.
Chen Laoshi came by with pictures of her and her daughter standing in front of the Baha’i Temple in Chicago. I still don’t tell her I’m a Baha’i.
Eve: Visit with Prof. Jin Qi Min
We discuss my teaching activity for the coming term. He says I will teach 4th year. I am waiting to hear from the Foreign Affairs Office about whether or not I can stay another year. He said he would ask on my behalf.
January 7
Second year students are working very hard to get their designs done for the end of the term (at Spring Festival). Most of then have been up all night. Many are struggling with elevations. I too find them very difficult to design. Some students…I don’t know what to say.
Proof-read articles from Zhang Long for Building in China Magazine.
Harry dropped by with one ticket for a new Chinese movie called “Lao Jing” (The Old Well). Foreign teachers gathered for a birthday party in Room 402 for Elaine. Someone had made spaghetti.
January 8
Chinese with Chen Laoshi.
Xu Su Bin dropped by to show me her pictures of the train trip to Europe. Happy to see her. She is now a doctoral student and Peng Yi Gang is her advisor.
Eve: I went by myself to see the movie, “Old Well”. I barely understood a word, but caught the gist of it thanks to Harry’s previous brief explanation. I think I stood out at the theater more for being alone than for being the only foreigner.
Finish this round of proof-reading for Building in China Magazine.
January 9
Work on my CIDA Report. Approval of this report will give me my second year of funding.
Lin Ning dropped by with her pictures from the trip to Europe. They were well-taken and she showed them to me with enthusiasm. We discussed her university applications. She offered to take me to see Old Well. If I see it a second time I will understand more.
Eve: Help students in the Studio. I tried for two hours to help the girl who had been crying about her elevation. We didn’t make much progress.
January 11
AM
In Second year studio. Students arriving late because they had been up almost all night. During class, Prof. Qing Yuan asked me to step out into the corridor to discuss something. She said she has heard I was looking for a wife. I really don’t advertise this. How does everybody know? I think the smallest hints are snatched up and circulated widely. She said there was a woman, Dr. Zhang Xue Wei, 32, who spoke very good English, was born in the US and had spent a few years there as a child - her father is still there. She plays the piano, is beautiful and hasn’t married yet because she has great ability and her requirements for a husband are high. I expressed interest.
PM
We canceled our Teachers English Class to hear a lecture by Nie Lan Sheng about Japanese architecture. She grew up in occupied northeast China and learned Japanese as a child. She was now an important link between the Department and Japan…a collateral benefit of the Japanese Occupation.
Zhang Chi, my fellow teacher, was translating my 1987 paper called “The Future of Tradition”. He asked for clarification about the part concerning the historical split in the West between science and religion. He thinks it should be published.
Hong Yu called to say she wants to come to Tianjin for a couple of days. We agree on Friday and Saturday.
January 13
I spent all day and evening in the studio. This is their last day.
January 14
We collect all the student’s designs. The second year teachers, all four of us, meet to grade the work together. The criteria we agree on are: Architectural Idea, Drawing Ability, Plan Functionality, Degree of Autonomy (How much did the teacher help?). First we choose the strongest and the weakest and then organized the remainder in order of strength.
Tonight, after supper, I will meet the beautiful doctor. At 5:00pm, when we finished grading the student work, Qiang Yuan shot me a conspiratorial wave as she left.
I felt nervous, I couldn’t eat much in the dining hall. I changed, shaved (again), got on my best clothes, cleaned my glasses, prayed, heart pounding. Qiang Yuan called me on the phone from the lobby. I went down. She looked at my clothes and said I wasn’t wearing enough. She said the meeting place was not the doctor’s home. After the meeting I was supposed to walk her home; it would be cold, so I should wear more.
I ran back upstairs, put on more layers, and ran back down. As we were getting on our bicycles, Margaret John was coming into the Guest House. “Going to a party?” she said. “Sort of”, I said. We went to one of the apartment buildings on the Tian Da campus. On the way, Qiang Yuan explained that in China, if someone is divorced - she knew that I was - they must show proof of that before they can marry again. They are very serious; I am being told some of the ground rules. Last week Dennis Barry sent me a letter saying that just such a certificate had been issued for me. How timely; before Dennis wrote I never thought I would need it.
We are approaching the apartment door. I rub my hands together because they are cold. I don’t want to offer her a cold hand. A curtain across the corridor to the living room helps keep out the cold. The curtain draws back and there she is. Roundish face, short hair, a smile, tallish. Not what I expected. We all sit down. Qiang Yuan and I, Dr. Zhang Xue Wei, her mother, her friend (second opinion?) a disco dancing teacher and a husband fill every chair in the small living room. Her English is not as good as I thought, so we converse in a mixture of Chinese and English. Bright eyes and a smile. She looks like a very solid person, and gentle. There are a few awkward silences. She is an only child; she lives with her mother in the former British Concession near Chengdu Dao and Guizhou Lu. She studied Western medicine in college and is now studying Chinese medicine while teaching Pathology. Her exams start soon. She must have been eager to meet me if she took time out before her exams. Someone gave me a good billing. The meeting ended just before 9:00pm. It had been a good workout for my Chinese. She looks hard-working, trustworthy; she doesn’t look like an artist.
We leave. Everyone melts away expect Zhang Xue Wei, her friend, and I. They walk me back to my Guest House and we say goodbye. She didn’t need to be accompanied home. I said I’d like to meet her again. In the apartment we had exchanged addresses…it felt like signing a contract in front of everybody. We agree to meet next Sunday January 24 between 7 and 7:30pm.
We said what I call the “Chinese Goodbye”, an abrupt see you again with very little preamble. A Western goodbye tapers more.
We agreed to meet the day after her exams, and at my place, not hers. That means we will have time to talk. Back in my room, I look her name up in the dictionary. “Wei”, by itself, means, “minute, subtle, abstruse, profound”. “Wei Feng“, together, means “gentle breeze”. A poetic name. I have a cup of coffee even though it’s late; I can’t sleep anyway.
January 15
AM
Hongyu is at the door. She showed me her design for an experimental housing district on Juer Hutong (Chrysanthemum Lane) in Old Beijing near Jiao Dao Kou. It was referred to as ‘weifang gaizao’, or ‘dilapidated building renovation’, or urban renewal. She had shown me the site in Beijing on one of my visits last year we met some of the people who now live there.
She found a room at the hostel of a factory on campus and returned to Beijing the next day.
January 17
I wrote a letter to Hongyu about us being brother-sister friends.
January 18
Got most of the foreign teacher signatures on the letter I drafted about courtesy at the reception desk of our Guest House.
Zhang Chi (Cary) and I looked through the kindergarten designs to choose the best nine to be kept in the school archive. Our students were in four groups, each with one teacher, including me. Zhang Chi chose four of the nine from my group.
Jin Xin came by, sewed a patch in a hole of my jacket. We like each other. She chose a name for her daughter which has the image of putting up a sail early in the morning to catch the dawn breeze. She wants her daughter to persevere toward high goals.
January 19
Chinese lesson with Chen Laoshi.
PM I received a letter from the Vice-Chairman of the Department of Architecture at the Beijing Institute of Civil Engineering and Architecture, thanking me for the McGill Scholarship information.
A letter from Zhang Long in Beijing. She is looking for a place for me to stay while I work during the Spring Festival holiday at Building in China Magazine.
Eve:
Zhang Chi (Cary) came by for help with an application to the AA in London. The Architectural Association School of Architecture in London, commonly referred to as the AA, is the oldest independent school of architecture in the UK and one of the most prestigious and competitive in the world.
Lin Ning dropped in later for some help with a mail-out for another international Symposium next year in the Architecture Department at Tianjin University. She will buy tickets to “Old Well:” for us.
Zhang Xue Wei called. We will get together on Sunday. “Bring your work card”, I said, ”You need ID to get into the Guest House.” We are curious about each other.
January 20.
Chinese with Chen Laoshi.
Deliver letter re courtesy to the Foreign Affairs Office.
I received a letter and a tape from Kathleen Winter in St. John’s with a radio program of her short stories and two of her own songs. Beautiful!
Harry dropped by and borrowed some of my music tapes.
January 21
Eve: 2nd year students, Zhang Xiao Qin, Li Hong Di, Cheng Xue Qun, Zhang Jin Yang, and Tang Ming Qing came by to borrow books and tapes and to see my family photographs.
January 22
I went to the Foreign Affairs Office. Liu De Fu was not there. I was hoping to find out whether Tianjin University can be my “Host Work Unit” for the 1988-89 school year. Without a “host” I have no visa. I left her a note. I feel homeless.
January 23
PM went to see Lao Jing (Old Well) with Lin Ning. After that she treated me to a meal at the western restaurant on Chengdu Dao. She is showing gratitude for the help I have given her. Her English is so good; it’s a communication break for me, I can talk easily with someone!
January 24
Eve: Zhang Xue Wei, the doctor came by. Her father died of heart disease at the age of 39, when she was two years old. He was the Dean of the Medical College and her mother was Head Nurse at one of the associated hospitals. By the end of the visit, I already knew, somehow, this person was not going to be my wife. I feel disappointed. We agree to meet next week; I’m afraid I will run out of things to say to her. And now I have to undo this.
January 25
Zhang Chi (Cary) confirms that I will be teaching 2nd year next term with Prof. Nie Lan Sheng. I respect her very much; it is an honour to be teaching with her. She doesn’t speak English.
Margaret said teachers were never kept around for more than two years. My work from the fall of 1986 to the spring of 1988 would be two academic years.
Hongyu phoned inviting me to visit Beijing for a couple of days.
January 27
Four-stage, five-hour journey to see Hongyu in Being:
Get up at 5:00 am and take bus to railway station to catch 6:12 train to Beijing.
Take subway from Beijing Railway Station to Ji Shui Tan.
Take Bus 331 to Qinghua University south gate
Rent a bicycle to get to Xin Zhai, Hong Yu’s dormitory.
I call this process the “Four Earlies”. When I got there, around 10:00am, she was walking by with a thermos full of hot water she had fetched from a boiler at the bath-house nearby. As far as she is concerned her marriage is over; all that remains is the paper work for the divorce. We have lunch in the student dining hall. Hongyu lives in a dorm room with two bunk beds, one on each wall, and two small desks covered with “things”. A small electric heater boils water in a cup. She wants to talk. A pregnant friend, Zhang Hui, drops by, one month to go. Hong Yu looks a little envious. She drew a great sketch of her pregnant friend. I only had five hours sleep the night before; I lie down for a rest on one bed. The pregnant lady is tired; she lies down on another. Hong Yu works at one of the desks. Later we buy some vegetables on the way to dinner at Xiao Dong’s place near Andingmen. Xiao Dong is 32, two years older than Hong Yu and is married to a well-known writer, Zhang Qi. She does dubbing work for foreign films and a little acting. Their flat is quite comfortable. In the small kitchen, Hong Yu and Xiao Dong make supper and talk. In the living room, I explore the plants, photos and paintings. Hong Yu told me before we came that Xiao Dong was very beautiful; I agree. Two more friends arrive; Chen Xiao Xuan, editor of “Chinese Youth” a newspaper with circulation of 1.5 million, and Ma Xiao Dong, a journalist with the same paper. Her husband just left for the US to pursue a Ph.D. in economics. She is studying English and hopes she and their son can join her husband in September. My Chinese is a little better than her English. We swap words while Hongyu and Xiao Dong, like sisters, continue their work in the kitchen. They’ve known each other since they were little girls. During the Cultural Revolution they organized music and dance performances for children to sing the words of Chairman Mao. Hongyu still uses “Mao Zhu Xi Wan Sui” (lit: Mao Chairman 10,000 years) or “Long Live Chairman Mao”, as an expression of surprise or happiness when she finds something she lost. Supper was wonderful. I decline the plentiful cigarettes and Bai Jiu, an alcoholic beverage made from grain, between 40 and 60% alcohol by volume. His senses a little blunted, Chen Xiao Xuan accepted the challenge to peel an apple with an axe. He then led a parlour game; an association game. He named five items and we described what we associated with each item. After we made our choices he told us our associations were indicative of our attitudes to life, death, love, children, and family.
The following is his five items, lowed by my association, followed by what the item represents, My associations are supposed to indicate my relationship to what the items represent.
Item, Associations, and what the items represent:
The Sea, Bird, Life
A Black Wall, Stars, Death
A Cup of Coffee, Warm kitchen and a bright window with flowers, Love
A Kindergarten, Many happy children, Children
A Deep Well, Journey to the center of the earth, Family
He was surprised at my responses. He said he did the test many times and the responses he got (from Chinese people) indicated more fear and less hope.
After supper, I went with Chen Xiao Xuan on our bicycles to his place to stay the night. He lived on the west side of the East Third Ring Road just north of the new World Trade Center that was under construction on Jian Guo Men Wai Da Jie. Ten years later, the 3rd Ring Road would become an elevated expressway and his tall slab apartment building would be torn down for a large hotel. Chen Xiao Xuan was surprised I was not wearing long underwear. Although Canada was so much colder, we had well-heated homes, cars and public transportation. That night I slept on a fold-out deck chair.
January 28
For breakfast, we had boiled milk, bread and jam. I played my Bach tape for breakfast. Chen was recently divorced. He had a picture of his daughter on the desk. He gave me a copy of China Youth with an article about housing called “Our Space”.
We went back to Xiao Dong’s place. Hong Yu and I talk. It seems she is introducing me to her friends to let them check me out. They are very intelligent, talented, and yet I feel a little afraid for them. Not sure why. They certainly are different from he more innocent Tianjin students I work with. We have lunch. Xiao Dong is out. Hong talks of the pain she feels, uncertainties; she cries. She says her work with the people in the old neighbourhoods of Beijing, helping them have better housing, makes her happy.
She says my nose is too big.
Later we have coffee and juice at the Jianguo Hotel followed by a wordless goodbye at the Beijing Railway Station. Happy time on train reading an English book, V. S. Naipaul’s, “The Mimic Men”. Too late for supper at Foreign Expert Dining hall; eat peanuts and candy in my room.
January 29
Will Tianjin University be my “Receiving Work Unit” for the next academic year? I am a guest in China; to live here I need a host. I dread the possibility of a “No” answer. Does the Foreign Affairs Office (Foreign Affairs Office ) think I’m some kind of philanderer? Will the letter I composed and gave them about courtesy at the front desk of our Guest House be taken as interfering? I am plagued with doubts and angry with myself for my weakness.
When I visited her in her office Liu De Fu said, “Sit down, please”. The remaining Foreign Affairs staff all sat round to listen. Liu De Fu said, “You are welcome next academic year…you will be a researcher…all expenses paid by you.” I want to jump over and hug her. My heart flutters around the room like a light-crazed moth. This is what I had proposed and they have accepted it! “That’s good news”, I say.
She says, changing the subject, “I hear you have a girlfriend”. I panic for a moment wondering which one she is referring to. I say, ambiguously, “We are just getting to know each other.” Then she said, “I hear she was born in America.” Now I know she’s talking about Zhang Xue Wei. After a few more questions, she asked me, “What do you think?” I say I’m not sure. “We are continuing to see each other for now. I think I am more the romantic type and she is more the practical type.” “Maybe she’s a typical Chinese girl”, says Liu De Fu. She is all for me having a Chinese girlfriend; she is welcoming me into the larger Chinese family. Everyone knows I have been “introduced” to Zhang Xue Wei. I’m living in a fishbowl. My comments about Zhang Xue Wei will probably get back to her.
Liu De Fu asked if I would perform my humorous skit at the International Women’s Day Celebration. I said, “Of course”.
I left this meeting so happy; confirmation. I pushed aside the heavy winter quilted-blanket curtains at the front door of the Administration Building and stepped out into the light. As the symbolic main building of the campus, a grand staircase leads up to this entrance. At the bottom of these stairs in May, 1985, I got out of a taxi and looked for Liu De Fu. Now, almost three years later, she had asked me to stay. Between the door and the top of the stairs was a small terrace. I strode across it and descended the stairs triumphantly, like Rocky Balboa, my heart shouting gratitude to Heaven.
I went on my bicycle to the Hyatt to celebrate. I spent 70 yuan, a month’s salary for a local teacher. I had a 25 yuan meal, a bowl of onion soup, a serving of triple flavour ice-cream, and coffee. “Have another cup, Joe!” “Don’t mind if I do.” With the remaining money, at the little hotel bookstore, I bought a self-study collection of Chinese fables and anecdotes with book and tapes. It was one of the best parties I had ever been to.
Eve. Huo Guang came by to thank me for helping him with his “China Center in England” project. I hadn’t really helped him much.
January 30.
Tao Wei dropped by to borrow music tapes, practice English and talk about foreign schools. Lin Ning dropped by very worried about her chances at McGill. Like most students, she needs a scholarship if she is to study abroad.
January 31
Sunday
I meet Zhang Xue Wei downstairs and we go together to Culture Street to buy some Chinese Yo-yos…my idea. Although I am not hopeful about a long-term relationship, it feels untimely to just cut it off now. I take her to the Nankai Dining Hall for lunch followed by a visit to the Water Park and the Zoo. Once again, for the people in the zoo, I am more interesting than the animals, especially this time I am walking around with a Chinese woman. People are trying to guess what our relationship is. Everything we do is my plan, my idea; most of the conversation, I initiate. If I didn’t, I was afraid neither of us would speak. The language barrier is quite large.
Eve.
Feng Hai Xiang dropped off some books he had borrowed. Later Prof. Qiang Yuan came by to borrow books, and return books. She asked how it was going with Zhang Xue Wei. She offered help if I needed any. I told Qiang Yuan I had no strong feeling; I needed a little more time. Now I feel anxious; I should say these things to Zhang Xue Wei myself and not to “intermediaries”.
February 1
I finish my CIDA report and cover letter on my little typewriter; I get it photocopied; I mail it – at last. The likelihood of a second year of funding is stronger now that I have a valid “home-base” in China.
February 2
I try my hand at some ideas for Hongyu's Ju Er Hu Tong Project. I get a nice letter from her. She’s the easiest one to talk to………
February 3
Zhang Xue Wei came by to take me to her home for supper and meet her mother again; all in Chinese. She played some piano for me. The big poster of Minnie Mouse on her door alarmed my heart. The house is extremely neat and tidy, partly for my sake, I suppose, and because they are doctors. While they were together preparing supper in the kitchen they put on a Beethoven disco tape; poor Beethoven. Great supper.
I want to end the expectation that we’re headed for marriage. I’m not sure how. In a few days I am off to Beijing for a week to work at Building in China magazine. Zhang Xue Wei offers to see me off at the train station early in the morning. It means she will have to be at the front gate of Tianjin University at 5:00 am. “How do I turn this off?” While we were looking or a word in the dictionary I noticed a saying, “Qi Hu, Nan Xia” (Ride Tiger, Difficult Dismount). If you’re riding a tiger, it’s hard to get off.
February 4
The Canadian Department of Health recommended getting hepatitis shots for China. I needed a booster. I went to Dr. Sloan at Intertech. He doesn’t have hepatitis B vaccine but he does have hepatitis “A”. I paid 75 yuan and I have a sore rear end for several hours.
I get another 500 yuan from the bank on Jie Fang Road, in a special room for withdrawal of China’s exchangeable currency, Wai Hui Quan. I’m getting to know the people at the bank.
February 5
Catch early train to Beijing. Zhang Xue Wei sees me off. I don’t want her to. I now know I must do the painful act of turning her away. I catch the train at the Tianjin North Station; still dark out. Several trains coming and going. Most are diesel, but some belch white steam-coal clouds that engulf the black bridges straddling the tracks. Descending the staircase to my platform in the tight squeeze of hundreds of passengers, I glance down and see a child’s hand clutching her father’s.
A wonderful western breakfast at the Beijing Hotel. At the appointed time, a car from the China Building Technology Development Center (Zhong Guo Jian Zhu Ji Shu Fa Zhan Zhong Xin) arrived with Wang Tian Hui and Mei Hong who both work with Zhang Long at Building in China Magazine.
Left to right: Mei Hong, Zhang Long, Wang Tian Hui, Joe Carter
First they took me to the Teacher’s College (Shi Fan Xue Yuan) on the West Third Ring Road where I will stay at a little on-campus hotel. Building in China will cover the cost. I get settled in and then we head for their office at Bai Wan Zhuang. We get there in time for lunch. I eat at the staff canteen with Mei Hong. In the afternoon I finally get down to work on an article translated by Wang Tian Hui. Supper is with the magazine staff at Zhang Long’s home. I meet Li Rui Hua, Zhang Long’s husband. Sun Hua Sheng is also a guest.
Li Rui Hua is a structural engineer. In 1948, when I was one year old, he was in Montreal working at Dominion Bridge. He lived nearby in the district of Montreal called Lachine (China) and then went to U of T for a Master’s Degree. [Lachine, apparently from French la Chine (China), is often said to have been named in 1667, in mockery of its then owner Robert Cavelier de La Salle, who explored the interior of North America, trying to find a passage to Asia. When he returned without success, he and his men were derisively named les Chinois (Chinese). Wikipedia] In 1951 Li Rui Hua lived in China Town on Huron Street, south of College. I lived on the same section of the same street in 1971.
After the happy feast, Sun Hua Sheng escorted me back to my hotel, even though he lived in the south of Beijing. He invited me to concerts Sunday evening and Wednesday evening and to his home the following Sunday. Hong Yu called me and we agreed to meet at Qinghua on Sunday morning. Rear end still very sore from the Hepatitis shot.
February 6
Saturday
It’s still a six-day work week in China. I catch the bus to the China Building Technology Development Center and continue working on Wang Tian Hui’s article. Ye Yao Xian, the head of the center came by to welcome me. Lunch with Mei Hong in the staff dining hall.
I feel a little feverish and tired; is it the hepatitis injection? I started proof-reading another article, this one about a kindergarten in Chong Qing. They planned a jiaozi party tonight but I was too tired; so much hospitality!
Every day, slowly, I have made a deeper relationship with several people. There is a welcome here, an undiscovered home. I feel like a dry form immersed in a foreign sea, slowly being penetrated and expanded into a new shape.
I begin reading, again, Toward a New Psychology of Women, by Dr. Jean Miller-Baker .
February 7
Sunday morning
From the teacher’s college where I’m staying, it took three buses to get to the Qinghua University gate. I rented a bicycle there and went to see Hongyu. My work on her housing project was not of much interest to her. We went north by bicycle to visit Hongyu’s former room-mate, Zhang Hui, the pregnant one, and her husband. “How long do you want to stay in China?”, Hongyu asked. “I’d like to die here”, I replied.
Hong Yu decided she would join Sun Hua Sheng and I for dinner. He had invited me to supper and a concert after. In the city, on the crowded subway, we were leaning on the doors. The train accelerated and Hong Yu fell against me. She explained she and her husband will divorce in a couple of months, in April. They would have done it already but they agreed to let Hongyu first get her visa to go to the US for a year of study at UC Berkeley in California. It’s easier for a married person to get a visa approved; single people are less likely to come back to China.
Sun Hua Sheng said his wife was visiting her sick mother. He played some Ravel, Bach, and Chopin on the piano; then he made a very nice supper for us, The soup at the end of the meal had small, round, sweet-filled dumplings (yuan xiao) and some cubed hawthorn jelly pieces. He said this symbolized an important and welcome guest.
After supper, Hongyu went back to Qinghua, and Sun Hua Sheng and I went to the Beijing Music Hall for a concert of Beethoven and Respighi. After the concert he accompanied me all the way to my hotel, even though it was well out of his way. We were so engrossed in conversation we overshot our subway stop and had to double back.
February 8
At Building in China, Huang Hui, the architect came by. Thanks to her, I had been invited to the conference in Beijing last fall. She is the Director of one of the design divisions at the Beijing Institute of Architectural Design (BIAD); her division specializes in housing. She had an article for the magazine about a regeneration scheme she was working on at Xiao Hou Cang near Xi Zhi Men. Most of the residents will be rehoused on the site and the old hutong pattern will be kept to retain some memory of the old spaces. The original courtyard housing was one-storey; the new apartments are five-storey. Most of my conversation with her was in Chinese.
I work with Mei Hong on an article about housing called “Highrise or not Highrise”. Wang Tian Hui invited me to meet her brother, Wang Tian Xi, tomorrow evening for supper. He is a well-known Chinese architect who worked for I. M. Pei for two years, 1980-81.
On the way to lunch, Zhang Long said she has a small apartment in Beijing that she is not using; I could use it if I wanted. Gift falls from sky.
Sun Hua Sheng arranged a meeting for me with Ministry of Housing officials who might be interested in my housing research plan. They were some of the leading officials responsible for housing reform in China.
At 5:00 pm he arrived with Mr. Shi of the Institute of Information Research of the China Academy of Urban Planning and Design of the Ministry of Urban and Rural Construction; Miss Peng, a translator and editor from Planning Review, the other magazine I worked for; and a Mr. Xi, who looked nervous. I am invited to a supper meeting. A small van is waiting for us to take us to a hotel and private dining room. Two more people arrive: Mr. Wang Feng Wu, Director of the Institute of Information Research, and Ms. Xia Zong An, Vice-President of the China Academy of Urban Planning and Design.
I introduced myself, explained my CIDA housing research project. I welcomed their feedback on my proposed research plan. Mr. Wang had just come back from two years of studies in urban planning in Cardiff, Wales. Miss Peng did most of the translating. Sometimes I could speak some Chinese. Mr. Xi said nothing. They asked whether I would be based in Beijing for my year of research; that way it would be easier to cooperate.
February 9
At Building in China, we finish the Highrise article and another one called “Comprehensive Development”. The latter is an approach to urban development on large tracts of land that includes a high degree of government involvement in urban planning, financing, project management, design, coordinated infrastructure installation, construction, and property management . In the West, a project might occupy part of a block. In this approach, the site size was equivalent to several blocks of a western city. All aspects of development were vertically integrated under one authority.
After lunch we start to polish another article called “Nanjing Siming Mountain Resort. Wang Tian Hui, Mei Hong and I go to a late afternoon movie in the MURCEP theater. It was a comedy about western and Chinese soccer teams in the late Qing Dynasty. As soon as we got back to the office, her brother, Wang Tian Xi was there to take us to the Da Du restaurant for a big meal. We took the bus to his large apartment in a slab block just across the street from Guan Yuan Park. Wang Tian Hui was head of the Architectural Design Group at MURCEP. He showed me his oil pastels and photographs of an exhibit of his artwork that was held at I.M. Pei’s office in New York.
Wang Tian Hui insisted on escorting me on the bus all the way back to my hotel at Shi Fan Xue Yuan.
February 10
I proof-read an article concerning a survey of 800 Beijing residents about high-rise buildings. Started work on Sun Hua Sheng’s article called “Residing Patterns”. He came at 5:00 pm to take me to supper. He offered me a choice, Kentucky Fried Chicken at Qian Men or a meal at the Confucian restaurant at Liu Li Chang. I chose the latter. After that he took me to a performance of Swan Lake.
During the intermission he introduced me to Bai Shu Xiang, Deputy Director of the Central Ballet. She fed pigs during the Cultural Revolution; now Vice President of China Literature and Art Foundation and President of the China Dancers Association.
Bai Shu Xiang
Born in Xinbin county, Liaoning province, Bai was selected to study at Beijing Dance School - today's Beijing Dance Academy - in 1954, which was China's first professional dance school, established with the assistance of Russian teachers. It was the cradle of dance in China, and ballet was one of the school's main subjects. Bai was hungry to learn the art and received systematic training under the instruction of Russian dancers. Russian dancer and choreographer Pyotr Gusev, who was the school's artistic director from 1957 to 1960, had a strong influence on young students like Bai. "The Russian teachers were very strict about training. They paid attention to all the detailed movements," Bai said. "The training system and even the school system were built on the Russian model."
February 11
Every morning, across the Third Ring Road from the front gate of Shi Fan Xue Yuan, I catch the No. 26 bus to the Jian Zhu Yan Jiu Zhong Xin. This is the last day of work. Tomorrow, the Spring Festival Holiday begins. I spent all day working on Sun Hua Sheng’s article and got it done. Zhang Long gave me a book, an English translation of “Luo Tuo Xiangsi”, “The Rickshaw Boy”, by Lao She, the tragic story of the trials of a rickshaw puller in Beijing.
Lao She was one of the most significant figures of 20th-century Chinese literature, and is best known for his novel Rickshaw Boy and the play Teahouse. Lao She fell victim to persecution at the outset of the Cultural Revolution in 1966, and it is widely believed that he died as a result of a beating by Red Guards.
Lao She
Wang Tian Hui gave me three books in English about Chinese poems. I met with some of the young people in the center who wanted to study English. One of them had studied at the Housing Research Center in Rotterdam for six months. Also there was Niu Wei Nai, Head of the Rural Planning Institute who has a son who did a Ph.D. in Edmonton, Canada and who is now doing Post-Doc work in the US; and a daughter who just left to study at Northwest University in Evanston, near Wilmette.
We talked about social history in the West and the Baby Boomers, compared Beijing and Tianjin, the meaning of “spiritual life”, the St. Clair-O’Connor Community in Toronto, and the importance of surrogate relationships in the face of the atomized extended family.
I phoned the Canadian Embassy trying to reach their clinic to get Hepatitis booster No. 3. No answer. The Australian Embassy had a clinic at Jian Guo Men; I could go there tomorrow morning first thing.
There was an evening banquet at the Dadu Hotel restaurant. Ye Yao Xian, the Head of the China Building Technology Development Center was the host. Zhang Long, Wang Tian Hui, and Mei Hong were there, as well as Mr. Kai. Ye Yao Xian would like my help to make contact with Canadian architects and institutions.
Zhang Long said it would be best for my research if I could cooperate with the Institute for Urban Housing at MURCEP. Once again Wang Tian Hui escorted me, back to my hotel. I have an excellent sense of direction and can find my way, but they have a heightened sense of responsibility to make sure I don’t get lost.
February 12
I check out of the hotel; I’m on my own. I head for the Australian clinic on the 9th floor in Bldg No. 1 at the Foreign Diplomatic Apartments at Jian Guo Men. For 130 yuan Foreign Exchange Certificates (FEC) I get my injection, but only after the doctor determined whether or not I was an American. They would not serve Americans. “Why? I asked. “Because they sue people” he said. There is currently a Hepatitis A epidemic in Shanghai that came from eating snails that lived in polluted water.
At the Beijing hotel I met Hongyu at the front door at 10:00am. She was wearing a long blue coat, white boots, and a long scarf. We went to Railway Station to get tickets for the evening train to Tianjin, and then went to the Foreign Club at Jian Guo Men for some lunch. We ordered a few dishes which turned out to be huge. Sitting with her I feel quite “Chinese”; I am in China, with her, looking out at the foreigners around us. We take doggie-bags of food with us to Tianjin. On the train we meet a Tianjin University student, Vincent, from Rwanda.
In my room at the Guest House we eat left-overs and Hongyu does some work she brought with her. There are no rooms for Hong Yu on campus so we went to Lin Ning’s home to ask for help. They have no phone. Lin Ning has a bed on campus at a dorm she never uses. We all went over there and Lin Ning got Hongyu settled in.
February 13
Hong Yu shows up early and we share an oatmeal breakfast. We are both homeless. She’s reading the stories of San Mao, a woman writer who moved to Taiwan as a child in 1948. She traveled extensively and married two foreigners, both of whom died. The first line of one of her books says, “What a pity, I married a foreigner.” She hanged herself in 1991.
San Mao
We head for the station so Hongyu can catch the 5:09pm train to Beijing. At the Tianjin University gate she said she forgot her drawings, and she would like to borrow “Toward a New Psychology of Women”. I race back, run up stairs, grab things and quickly return. Time now very tight. Hongyu hops on the back of my bicycle; a solid landing on the rack at the back as we move off, and a quick hand to my waist to steady herself. It feels very Chinese. We take my bicycle to her Buddhist artist friend’s place, and then switched to a bus. As we cross the street in the heavy traffic; she grabs my hand.
We miss the 5:09 by two minutes; so she bought a ticket for the 6:36. We have time to talk. I buy some oranges and we sit in the big waiting hall. Between loudspeaker announcements, I tell her about my religion and my beliefs. “Is that why you don’t drink and smoke?” she said. She holds my hand and says, “My religion is to love everybody and to try to help everybody. Sometimes I hurt people and that makes me very sad”. I told her about the Baha’i marriage law; the man and women are free to choose each other - no arranged marriage - but for the sake of family unity, all four parents must give consent. That didn’t please her, but she took it in.
February 14
Qiu Jiang came by to invite me to their home for the family New Year celebration. In the dining hall at supper, I am the only foreigner; the others are all travelers. Zhang Xue Wei called to invite me to her home for the Spring Festival. I told her I had already been invited somewhere else. I invite her to meet me tomorrow evening.
Write letter to a Tianjin University architecture graduate student, Liu Xiao Yu. I accept her invitation to visit her family in Beijing.
February 15
Buy oranges and fireworks for Spring Festival at Qiu Family home.
Long letter to Mom and Dad. Tell them about Hongyu.
Zhang Xue Wei came by. She had brought adhesive tape to wrap around the ends of the bamboo sticks for my Chinese yo-yo. The adhesive tape would protect me from splinters. She is cautious about everything; it would be nice to be in her hands if I was sick. After serving some tea, I said “Why haven’t you married yet?” She said there was no one suitable and it was difficult to meet people. I pause, I continue, “You and I are looking for a husband, a wife. I think you are a good person but I don’t think you and I should be married.” “Would I be rude to ask why?” she said. “I said you are so practical, careful; I am an artist, very idealistic…”; all of this in Chinese with several dips into the dictionary.
She gave me two paper cuts; a dragon and a fish. The fish expresses a wish for abundance and the dragon is the animal for the coming year. We then had a good talk and wished each other well in finding a marriage partner. We’ll probably never see each other again. At an appropriate time she said, “You need a rest”. That signaled the end of our visit. I ot her coat and saw her off in the lobby downstairs. On the way back to my room I began to cry, for hurting her, and for the loneliness of so many people who have so little access to each other. She is a good woman, could be a wonderful wife for someone and a good mother. Why is she at 31 years old not able to find someone? I expect she’s crying too.
February 16
Spring Festival Eve
Reading Lao She’s “Camel Xiangsi”. The main character’s hardship does not lead to catharsis. His hard work did not lead to good results. The story ends with greater hardship than it began.
Go to Qiu Jiang’s family home. His mother and his girlfriend, Mei Mei are sleeping. I chat with Qiu Jiang and his father, in Chinese. My Chinese is better than last year when I came here, but I’m still challenged by longer conversations. We stick paper-cuts on the windows. Qiu Jiang lapses into English so I can get a break from the effort. The ladies wake up and soon we eat. Mr. Qiu did most of the cooking. Mei Mei is at Qinghua with Qiu Jiang studying architecture. Her parents are in New Delhi working in the Chinese Embassy.
Fig. Plan of my Apartment in the Foreign Experts Building.
Supper was wonderful. I declined alcohol for toasts and they let me use orange juice. Mei Mei asked me why and I said it was because of my beliefs. She left it at that; and I left it at that.
After supper there was a five-hour television show with lots of singing, dancing, and skits. In one skit a man visits the Bureau of Efficiency and gets stuck between floors on the elevator. The authorities all pass the buck…no-one helps him. They agree to let him stay there and give him a menu. He orders soup but it is hard to reach so they use a water pistol to squirt it to him. They sell tickets to the public to come and see him.
About 10:00 pm I’m starting to fall asleep, but we have to be awake at midnight to welcome the new year. Qiu Jiang said “Why don’t you take a snap?” I said a nap would be wonderful; I explained the difference between “nap” and “snap”. Around 11:00 I woke up. Everyone was making jiaozi for the midnight meal. At midnight sharp, we, and everyone else in Tianjin, set off fireworks. Deafening noise and clouds of smoke; too bad the use of gunpowder didn’t end here. We continue making food together in the living room with the relentless variety show still on TV. We sit down to eat and all wish each other Happy New Year. The children offer a toast to show respect to the parents, and the parents offer a toast to the children.
February 17
Lin Ning came by to wish me a Happy New Year. We talked about the problem “older” single people have finding spouses. She said it was a sad and serious problem. She knew people in that situation. She talked about her family. They are living on noodles and eggs; they haven’t been able to buy fish or meat for three months. A fish costs 5 yuan. Her sister is just out of the hospital with appendicitis and feels weak from malnutrition. Her mother’s teeth are hurting. Her father works so hard and earns so little. Their washing machine is broken, so they wash everything by hand. She is responsible to keep the coal heating-stove going. Something is wrong with the electrical system in their apartment. She says she doesn’t want to have a family; it’s too much trouble.
When she left I felt suffocated; breaking off with Zhang Xue Wei, reading Camel Xiangsi, and then hearing Lin Ning’s story. Lin Ning she said there’s no difference between Camel Xiangsi’s time and now.
PM
Work on my CIDA project, making a plan for Year Two of my grant.
I received a letter from Mom and Dad in Spain, and a package with all my mail from my St. John’s mailbox - kind friends there check on it for me. The only mail I get now in St. John’s is bank statements and VISA credit card statements. My Canadian bank account is down to $100 dollars and I have $200 dollars in the Bank of China. After I pay my March 1 rent, I will be down to almost nothing. I don’t know if or when my CIDA funding for Year Two will come through. Cathy has not taken any action yet to settle the outstanding money left from the sale of our house almost a year ago in April 1987.
I called Maureen Anderson in Montreal to give her information about Lin Ning’s application. She said it has been awarded to someone else, but Lin Ning is second choice. If the person first in line doesn’t want it, then it goes to Lin Ning. It was offered last year to Qiu Kang and he turned it down because he had been offered an even better scholarship at UBC.
February 18
I went to Lin Ning’s place to tell her about the phone call to McGill. When I left, Lin Ning followed me out and said she will pay for the long-distance phone call.
Zhang Chi (Cary) invited me to have supper with his wife at his parent’s home. His mother was almost always out of site cooking and serving. Their apartment had two rooms and a small kitchen. We ate at a table set up in the bedroom. The other room was a living room and study. His father taught foreign history especially the history of France and the room was book-lined. The bookshelves had been tied to the walls before the Tang Shan earthquake in 1976, so they did not collapse and get damaged. A lot of the evening was in Chinese. I had trouble with his parent’s Sichuan accent: all the standard Mandarin “sh” sounds are pronounced “s”.
Zhang Chi gave me some useful suggestions for my research. When I went home around 9:30pm on my bicycle, the streets were as crowded as rush hour, filled with people visiting each other.
February 19
I went with Qiu Kang and Mei Mei on our bicycles to tour the Sheraton, the Crystal Palace Hotel, and the Hyatt. I treated them to coffee and ice cream at the Hyatt. Qiu Jiang asked, referring to the long glass dish holding a banana split, said, “Why do foreigners eat ice cream out of ashtrays?”
February 21
I took the train to Beijing to visit Liu Xiao Yi and her family. On the train I sat across from an 84-year old woman from Detroit who was traveling with a young man from Tianjin. They were looking for ways to invest money. The old woman asked whether I had a girlfriend in China. I said. “Yes”. The young man warned me to be very careful, “You could get her into a lot of trouble and you might get deported!”
Liu Xiao Yi was waiting for me at the railway station. We went to her home at Beijing Gong Ye Xue Yuan. The had two rooms in a converted office building. On the way we met Zhang Chong Pu, her husband, on a bicycle with their little son, Bao Dan, on the back. They were off to the market to buy vegetables. Three families shared a common kitchen and a bathroom. The kitchen had no windows and no exhaust; the walls were black with soot. We made jiaozi.
February 22
For breakfast we ate leftover jiaozi, heated up in a little toaster oven. We all go out together “to see the world”. We get on the bus to go the Friendship Store - with my big nose I can get them in. They are both designers and want to see the interiors. I hold Bao Dan up to look out the bus window. The other passengers on the bus are staring at the foreigner holding a Chinese baby. Bao Dan and I like each other. At the Friendship Store I took care of Bao Dan while Mama and Papa looked around. Bao Dan and I tap our knuckles on large ceramic pots with small trees, lined up in the lobby. We make music together, and then talk to some mannequins that are strangely mute.
Zhang Chong Pu bemoaned the lack of opportunity in China. “Life would be much better in the US or Japan.”
That night Liu Xiao Yi and Bao Dan slept together in the bedroom. Zhang Chong Pu and I slept in the living room; he on a bed by the door and I on the sofa. I asked them why don’t sleep in the same room. When the baby has to pee, Liu Xiao Yi gets up to help him. “If we slept together, my husband’s sleep will be disturbed”. I described the situation in the West where a lot of little children had their own room; and were well wrapped with diapers. Diapers in China were a simple piece of cloth. The baby’s mid-night pee time is anticipated; the baby is held over a chamber pot while the parent whistles. When the job is done everyone goes back to sleep.
February 23
I helped Liu Xiao Yi with her application to a western university; translating, typing, and filling out forms. Zhang Chong Pu was a good cook. He chopped everything up into bite-sized pieces and then expertly flash fried them in a big wok. With a flick of his wrist, all the contents of the wok flew up in the air, left the wok, and landed again. Not a piece was lost.
In the evening I went with Liu Xiao Yi by bicycle to the nearby Friendship Hotel to, as she said, “look at foreigners”.
February 24
I headed back to Tianjin. Liu Xiao Yi saw me off at the subway station. “All the family happy with you together”, she said. “If someone asks why you stay with us, I will say your mother is Chinese.”
When I got back to the Guest House, as I was coming in the lobby, Lady Dai, the receptionist, was on the phone. “Oh, he just came in the door”, she said. It was a call for me. Hongyu was in Tianjin. She had been on the same train as me, but was slow to come to the Guest House because she spent time at the station buying a return ticket to Beijing.
We have a long talk. She tells me she and her husband are discussing where to put their belongings when they separate. Dave and Marcie Landingham, a teacher couple in 402 put Hongyu up for the night.
February 25
We go to the Post Office to pick up a Christmas present from Tom, my brother, and Marcie, his wife. Home-made jam, a home-made candle, a home-made card, all wrapped in yellow paper decorated with potato-stamp stars. Hong Yu slowly looked through it all, very interested. In a card, Tom, a keen mountain climber and trekker, said he was always glad to get back to his “base camp”. He said he imagined me building my base camp inside myself. “Ultimately the only good place for one, but very hard work”. As she read his note, I started crying. I went to the bathroom to mop my face, but the tears won’t stop. I’m almost 40 and my life - there’s not much to show.
Later I take her to catch the 5:09 to Beijing. Hongyu said she would like to take me toAnhui to see the beautiful Ming Dynasty villages she researched and lived in for her Master’s thesis. She would like to introduce me to rural China. She said I never teach her any English. She hasn’t noticed I am constantly preparing my words so that she can always understand them. She has a constant English environment attuned to her level of comprehension. When she’s with me, she’s learning English. When she is with me, she forgets I’m a foreigner; when I am with her, I forget she’s Chinese.
February 26
PM
Went to the bank. My account is now down to US$34.00. I took out 500 yuan on my VISA card. My assets are negative unless CIDA and or Cathy come through.
The worker at the bank offered to me give her pen when I admired it. I swapped instead.
Eve. Work on my CIDA project. If I get the funding, I need a more detailed one-year plan, including a list of places, people, and projects to visit.
Qin Feng Xia at the Planning Review Magazine phoned and asked me to review 100 pages of translated material by March10. Ouch! I will try.
I revise my skit for the 3-8 celebration. “3-8” means March 8, the day of the International Women’s Day.
I phoned Huang Hui in Beijing - all in Chinese - to say I was interested in meeting Age and Franz when they came to Beijing. She will help me get a room at the same hotel.
February 27
The second term begins. Meet with the second year teachers. The first of two projects for the term will be a railway station; the second, an art center.
February 29
First class after Spring Festival with second year. Zhang Chi (Cary) gave a half hour talk. He said architecture was like a bridge between dreams and the practical. Wang Yue dropped by to get my Concession Housing Quick Research Drawings. They will be copied for use in a book about Tianjin architecture.
Shan Bing Rong from Planning Review delivered the 100 pages of English proof-reading. She said someone will pick it up on March 10. It’s a huge job.
March 1
Chinese with Chen Laoshi. It feels good to be back at this routine with her after the Spring Festival break. I begin learning to read a little; in addition to speaking.
I got information about railway station design from a Japanese book in the library and made copies for the students.
A new record: in my Chinese world, in one hour, I brought my pants to the dry cleaner, bought a new watch strap and battery for my watch, and a new typewriter ribbon. My self-sufficiency is increasing.
March 2
Begin the 19-day Baha’i fast. I’m probably the only Baha’i in Tianjin. Actually, I have no way of knowing. I pray in the morning and in the evening. I have no Baha’i community life.
PM For Architectural English class I showed two films; “People Between” and “Vancouver: An Introduction by Arthur Erickson”.
After class Lin Ning helped me find the bicycle registration office so I could renew my bike license. We found the right office after two false leads; even for local people getting some simple things done is sometimes difficult. I had been depressed by recent struggles and the unknowns; a few hours with her, when it is so easy to communicate, lifted my spirits.
March 3
Teach Design 2nd year. I have 12 students, a big group. Zhang Chi said a Chinese version of the proceedings from last year’s international conference is being prepared including a translation of my paper.
Sun Hua Sheng sent me a ticket to the Royal Winnipeg Ballet in Beijing tomorrow night. I feel torn, but I’m too busy to go.
Fig. Letter from Sun Hua Sheng
The floor of my room is covered with piles of materials I’m trying to sort out, looking for a clear structure for my research about housing for CIDA.
March 4-5-6
All day work on CIDA. Start to write. Need something to show for next Tuesday in Beijing.
Rehearse skit for International Women’s Day.
March 7
Second year Railway Station design. Zhang Chi (Cary) and I have a consultation with students; put notes on wall for all to see. After class, talk with Zhang Chi about his application to study abroad, and we talk about my research. He was especially interested in the relationship between economic development and the spiritual education of children (implications of honesty, trustworthiness).
PM
International Women’s Day celebration in the Children’s Park. My performance was No. 4 in a variety show. I was nervous; and not prepared enough. I had to read a bit from my script. The “jokes” depended on knowing a little English, so many in the audience had difficulty. I could hear isolated laughter.
Fig. Program of Event
I received a letter from Hongyu. She told her parents about us. She said they hope she can do some significant service in China, or elsewhere……they are not worried about her marrying a foreigner.
EVE
Begin correcting the 100 pages of text for Planning Review. Finished 10 pages. Huang Hui said she will meet us in Beijing at the Fang Yuan Hotel at 2:30pm. She and I are communicating in Chinese. The Dutch architects, Age and Franz Van der Werf, have arrived from Holland. Zhang Qin Nan, Head of the China Society of Architects, has invited us for supper.
Age and Franz have experience applying a participatory concept for housing in which the dwellings are separated into ‘supports’ and ‘infill’. They are affiliated with the Architecture Research Foundation (Stichting Architecten Research or SAR). There is a fixed structural mechanical and electrical part, and a more flexible part including interior dividing partitions and some parts of the exterior facade. The occupants could arrange the latter to suit their needs. Age and Franz were hoping to get a demonstration project going in China.
In ‘Supports’ and in his subsequent and prolific work, Habraken was critical of mass housing which he saw as professionally controlled, anonymous, socially inappropriate and unresponsive to change. His proposal was to differentiate clearly between what he called 'Supports' and 'Infill' and associate with each discrete decision-making responsibilities. Families would be responsible for deciding house plans while housing authorities, with producers and communities, the layout and design of supports.
This differentiation, he argued, would enable the industry to take full advantage of the cost benefits of standardization, without the uniformity that gives much housing its institutional form. As testimony to the freshness and currency of his ideas, he offered a basis for understanding stakeholder participation in the design and production of housing, and an insight into new partnerships between people, authorities, manufacturers and architects.
March 8
4:00 am Breakfast
5:00 Tianjin local bus to train station.
6:00 At the Tianjin train station buy ticket to Beijing. Standing ticket only. After I got on the train I managed to get a soft seat to keep working on the 100 pages.
8:00 At the Beijing train station, I got in line to buy my return ticket to Tianjin for tomorrow morning. Many people jumping the queue. I cry out for all to hear, “Pai dui shi shen me yi si?” (Lining up is what meaning?)
Take the 104 bus to the Beijing Hotel to meet Hongyu and we walk up Wang Fu Jing to the Fang Yuan Hotel. On the way she picked up money at a post office; it was payment for the article she had written for China Youth Magazine about her trip to Tibet.
At the hotel, Age came down and brought us to their room. Franz was in bed wearing a big hat. He had a cold. I was happy to see them; it felt like we picked up just where we left off in Nanjing at the IYSH conference last year and the follow-up visit at the conference in Beijing. They explained that if the Chinese side does not request the SAR concept in a potential Chinese-Dutch cooperation, then the Dutch government will not financially contribute to the project. There will be a meeting this afternoon to talk about it. I showed them my housing research proposal. Franz offered me a room in his home for a month if I wanted to go to Holland to learn more about SAR.
For the first time, I initiated a lunch; I was the host. At the restaurant in the hotel, ahead of time, I chose a set meal for five people; Age, Franz, Hong Yu and I, and Sun Hua Sheng. At lunch, Sun Hua Sheng told them about an old neighbourhood regeneration project he was working on in Suzhou.
I sensed a little distance between Huang Hui and Hong Yu; didn’t know why. They were both interested in old city regeneration, but their ideas about how to do it, and their personalities, were quite different.
On the way to the afternoon meeting, in the car, Huang Hui warned me about Chinese girls who want to marry foreigners as a way to get out of China.
After the PM meeting, with no conclusion yet, there was a banquet at the roast duck restaurant at He Ping Men. The head of BIAD was there; she asked me to teach the students well because many Tianjin University graduates came to her work unit. The Chief Architect of BIAD, Song Rong, was also there. I sat beside him at the banquet at the conference last October in Beijing. He was pleased that I remembered he was from Sichuan. Age proposed a toast to the women because today was International Women's Day. I ate so much I had to undo the button of my pants. Another man beside me guessed I was 27 years old. I’m 40.
Later back at the hotel, I met Hongyu. She had drawings of her Ju Er Hu Tong project with her. I was nervous about her being in my room. I pictured the police breaking down the door taking Hongyu to prison and me to the airport. Hongyu laughed. “Huang Hui was meeting Age and Franz in their room; don’t worry.”
March 9
Walk to Beijing Hotel for an early breakfast and take the train back to Tianjin. It’s sunny and warm; the smell of heat coming.
Hongyu said when she goes to her parent’s place she takes over the cooking because hers is the best. She gave me a picture of herself in a dress she had made herself. She’s a bundle of talents. She had shown me pictures of living conditions in the hutong areas where they were planning a regeneration scheme. Her pictures were full of sympathy and sharp observation. In the midst of the hard conditions, you could see a new refrigerator, an electric fan……would there ever be money for home ownership?
In Tianjin, at the north station, there was chaotic pushing and shoving to get on the No. 1 bus.
PM
For Architectural English, I gave a talk about St. John’s with slides. The lecture went well. I mentioned principles of cooperation and mutual support and used the illustration of a group of hungry people with stiff arms who could eat only by feeding each other.
So sunny and warm, no long underwear, no winter jacket. Lin Ning invited me to lunch on Sunday, a thank you for phoning McGill.
Back in my room, I put a chair out on the balcony and sat in the sun like a lazy cat.
March 10
I am sick with the flu. I try to work on the 100 pages; I was supposed to finish today. The English they gave me is not very good; my head is splitting. These are the days of the fast. Xiao Wen, one of my 3rd year students comes by; I help proof-read her transcript of an article. Kept blowing my nose. Toilet not working; no water, they’re repairing the plumbing.
EVE
I re-read Hongyu’s and my papers from the 1987 Vernacular Housing Conference. Similar concerns expressed in both about relationship between man and man, and between man and nature.
Mar.ch 11
I finished a third of the 100 pages. Someone is coming from Beijing to pick it up today or tomorrow.
AM
Class with Chen Laoshi
She had written about 200 characters on little cards. I could only recognize a third of them. Disappointing, but it’s a start.
PM
Xu Su Bin dropped in. Over the Spring Festival holiday she got married! She gave me a bag of “Happiness” candy, a traditional celebration gift a new couple passes out to their friends.
Xu Su Bin, Lan Jian, and Zhang Chi (Cary) are among the few people left at Tianjin University among the group I first met in 1985. Loneliness increases as that group melts away.
EVE
I continue to struggle with the 100 pages. The English is not very good; I have to guess at the meaning sometimes and the articles, about the economic development of the Shanghai region, are long-winded. [Note from 2021: Once again, I was immersed in something I did not see. Included in the 100 pages of text, was a description of an unfolding national enterprise. The leaders of China were going to transform the farmer’s fields on the east side of the Pu River in Shanghai into a financial hub of modern China, into the most populous district of the city. Note from 2021: In 1988 this seemed unbelievable. By the year 2000, its skyscrapers were visible from the historic Bund and becoming Shanghai’s new skyline.
March 12
I worked on the Planning Review 100 pages non-stop from 8:00am till 2:00pm and just got it done when Peng Han Mei arrived from Beijing to pick it up.
Prof. Zhou Zu Shi came by to discuss plans for classes for Architectural English for this semester. We decide to use half of the time for videos and half for lectures.
Eat Double-Happiness wedding candy.
March 13
Lin Ning came by for lunch. First we mailed the films I had borrowed, back to the Canadian Embassy. We had tacos at the Hyatt; she really liked it. Then we had a long walk and talk until 4:00 pm. She feels discouraged about ever getting into a western university.
Shirley Temple is on TV. I haven’t see English TV since I came to China except for one glimpse at China’s English channel, CCTV 9, in Beijing. Sometimes in my room I watch a dubbed movie in which they have not completely turned off the original soundtrack; I strain, under the overlay of Chinese, to hear a few words of English.
March 14
Teach 2nd Year Design.
PM. I wrote a letter to Elizabeth Rochester about: the struggle to understand and be understood; the problems of others around me; the uncertainty about my finances; a feeling of inadequacy when I am teaching; the vagueness of my career path; the lack of family life; the stampede of talent out of China and the loss of my friends; the distance from my parents and friends in Canada; and the absence of people my age - thanks to the Cultural Revolution most of my Chinese peers never made it to university; …sometimes I feel discouraged. “Oh God, Guide me, protect me!”
EVE
Help students with design of railway station. What do I know about the design of railway stations? Muddle through.
March 15
Do some proof-reading for Zhang Long; one article is about Housing Reform in Yantai and another is about some beautiful traditional housing in Zhejiang province. The English in these articles is much easier to correct and I am learning much that is useful for my research project.
He Jian Qing called to say she had a two-month break coming up and she would like to translate my thoughts about St. John’s into Chinese. She would like to publish a book that compares St. John’s with Zhangzhou near Xiamen. They both have about the same population. After two months she will go to work at the China Building Technology Development Center where Zhang Long edits “Building in China”. She said we shouldn’t tell anyone about her project because someone might steal the idea and publish it. I thought if we told people we might find support and resources to complete the project; I kept that thought to myself.
March 16
AM
Chinese with Chen Laoshi
PM
The Architectural English Class today was based on an Ekistics article, “Gyn-Ecology”, about the differences between male and female perceptions of space. In the article, girls used boxes to make circular social spaces; boys made towers and defensive walls to play war.
Supper-time in the Dining Hall with the other foreign teachers. I mentioned I haven’t been joining them for breakfast or lunch lately because I have been fasting during the daytime. No-one asked me why.
EVE
I went to the studio to help the students with the railway station design. I didn’t have to be an expert on railway stations to help them; in fact, I can.
March 17
AM Second year design. Their designs are starting to take shape. Prof. Nie invited me to her family home for dinner. All in Chinese. It’s difficult, but I like her very much..…must try.
PM A letter came from CIDA saying the second installment of my Year 1 funding was on its way to my bank account in St. John’s!!! Thank you, God! Thank you!!!!
Now I have Tianjin University as a home base and enough money to last a year.
Took another trip to Bank of China on Jiefang Lu to take out another 500 yuan with my VISA card.
Make appointment to show William and James, the African students, around the Architecture library.
He Jian Qing gave me a photograph of her with her family.
March 18
Do three “earlies”; early up, early bus, early train to Beijing. Hongyu helped me to buy a coat at the so-called “Silk Market”, a crowded open-air narrow street of private vendors just east of the Jian Guo Hotel. I rested at Qinghua while she went to a meeting about the Ju Er Hu Tong (Chrysanthemum Lane) regeneration scheme. Some municipal government officials will be there to look at their proposals. Later, she said the meeting was a success. [Note from 2021: We lived there for eleven years, 1991 to 2003.] We go to Tianjin. Margaret John was going to be away that night so she let Hongyu use her room.
March 19 Saturday
Hong Yu and I talk about the possibility of marriage. I said if we had a child it could be called “Dong Xi”, a mix of East and West. In Chinese, “Dong” means “East” and “Xi” means “West”. Hongyu was eating when I said that and she choked on her food. She said, “Dong Xi” in Chinese means “something”; it’s neither east nor west. In China, adults sometimes called their child a “Xiao Dong Xi”, a “Little Something”, but it’s not a name.
I took some photographs of us.
Joe Carter and He Hongyu
Chinese Yoyo in my living room in the Foreign Experts Building
Hongyu with a monk in Tibet
We took the bus to visit her Tianjin artist friends, Wang Ti and Yen____. I recorded some English for Wang Ti to help in her studies. Yen handed me a pot made in the Han Dynasty. I held it and flew around time. He drew characters on the floor with chalk and then erased them with a wet rag. They both pressed their palms together to say hello and goodbye, like a prayer.
Hong Yu stayed with them - they live close to the railway station - and I headed back to Tian Da. For some reason the buses were not running. A group of us waited almost half an hour. I asked what was wrong? No-one knew and some people gave up waiting. The person I talked to asked me what minority I belonged to. I told him I was a Canadian.
I decided to walk. It was getting dark; I started to jog. Running through narrow streets, dim light, knots of people come and go, police are watching a man siphon gas from a truck and a little crowd gathers, farmers are moving mountains of hay in a parade of carts and horses, I pass them and reach the Guest House just before the 10:00 pm lock-up.
March 20 Sunday
He Jian Qing and her advisor come by to discuss the book idea. I agreed to review my part and get it ready for translation. Hongyu arrived as they were leaving. Later she took the 5:09 train back to Beijing. An almost wordless, expressionless separation, what I call the “Chinese” goodbye.
At supper, Margaret John, said she was at a YM-YWCA party. Some of the older women, who spoke English when they were children, told her they understood my skit at the Women’s Day Celebration and enjoyed it. I wished I was more detached about wanting feedback.
Fig. A Letter from Qiang Yuan.
Qiu Jiang dropped by to tell me he has been accepted at McGill and at UBC. “Which one should I go to?”
March 21
The fast is over. Today is Naw Ruz (New Year); in Canada I would join my fellow Baha’is in a wonderful celebration.
Teach 2nd year design. Professor Jin Qi Min is going to Peru. He was invited by the adobe housing experts who attended the vernacular housing conference last year.
PM Preview some videos from a series called “Architecture at the Crossroads” to prepare for Arch English class.
He Jian Qing phoned to say the Tianjin University press agreed to publish our book and wants to print an English version as well…..maybe sell it in Canada?
March 22
AM Study Chinese with Chen Lao shi
PM Take William and James, students from Africa, on a tour of English books in the Architectural Library.
March 23
AM Study Chinese with Chen Laoshi
Hongyu and her husband count their marriage as finished and are planning what to do with their possessions. They are postponing their legal separation until she gets a visa to go to the United States to study this summer. Her parents know and accept that the marriage is over; and she often reminds me it’s over. However, they are still legally married, and however much Hongyu says that’s a technically, it troubles me. I am definitely attracted to her, but hold back from fear of breaking a law. My respect for laws - ones that Hongyu regards only as a form - really bothers her.
PM
Architectural English
I used a video from the 1986 BBC series “Architecture at a Crossroads”. The first part is entitled “Doubts and Reassurances”, first of ten programs on contemporary architecture. It’s about disenchantment with modern architecture, and a look at how some young architects are reacting against modernist sterility. Team Zoo from Tokyo, Arquitectonica from Miami and Helmut Jahn from Chicago. The students enjoyed it very much. I stopped several times to explain things.
After class Lin Ning asked me about a letter she received from McGill saying she had been accepted into their Graduate Program. She thought it might mean she had been awarded the Clifford Wong Scholarship. I had to tell her it did not mean that; she was disappointed. Her hopes had been up for a while. I tried to offer her some consolation but she cut me off with a “I don’t see any point in discussing it”, and drive off on her bicycle.
I picked up the photocopying that I had left to be done in a shop at Liu Li Tan(r). It included a copy of my part of the book about St. John’s and Zhangzhou.
March 24
AM
Second Year Railway Station Design
EVE
I often watch the 7:00 PM news, but I can’t understand much.
Dai Laoshi, the intimidating lady at the front desk of our Guest House, the one who’s behavior precipitated the letter about courtesy, told me I should marry a Chinese girl and that He Hongyu was very good. Everybody knows everything.
March 25
News item on BBC radio about a Wall Street broker who was caught using insider information to do illegal trading. He was earning a million dollars per week until he was caught. His life had been full of private jets, servants, large homes, etc. Now he was living on a prison farm in California earning 17 dollars per week. Oddly, the report referred to this change as “reduced circumstances”.
Liu Heng Chen dropped by wanting help with the English synopsis of his thesis project, a commercial center in Suzhou.
March 26-27
A letter came from Liu Xiao Yi with a description and photographs of a “strong candidate” to be my wife. She looks attractive, 34 years old, single, and an interior designer. I have to say, “No thank you”.
Fang Yuan, a young teacher, asked me if I could take his fourth year students on an architectural tour tomorrow afternoon.
EVE
Liu Xiao Yi sent me a letter inviting me to go to Beijing to meet an artist friend of hers, Lin Xiao.
I finished a hand-written draft of my CIDA research plan for July 1988 to June 1989. Now I have to type it and get it translated so I can share it with contacts in China.
March 30
AM
Chinese with Chen laoshi
PM
I gave a short talk about context and design for Fang Yuan’s students. I first asked everyone to draw a map of Tianjin. Through the process we become aware of landmarks and our image of the city. I showed them some examples, in Tianjin and elsewhere, of building designs that attempt a dialogue with the immediate physical, historical, or cultural context. Then we got on our bicycles and went to look at the Crystal Palace and Sheraton Hotels, recent Tianjin modern architecture. Normally, they would not let a group of Chinese students walk in, but with me leading the group - a big-nose foreigner - we are allowed.
EVE
Type my CIDA report and prepare for Arch. English class tomorrow.
My 1987 income was CAN$ 8500.00; below the Canadian poverty line.
Liu Xiao Yi phoned to invite me to meet her artist friend tomorrow; we agree to meet at lunch time, April 1.
March 31
AM
Second Year Design
PM
I received a beautiful letter about Hongyu from Mom and Dad in Spain. They are very accepting of the idea that I might find a wife in China.
EVE
I went downstairs to tell Wu Shi Fu, the guard at our door, that I was going to Beijing early tomorrow, so when I ask him to open the gate, he will not be surprised. Every night a collapsible metal grating is drawn across the doors and padlocked. When I go back up to my room, Hongyu phoned to say she will not be at her dormitory; she is at her parent’s place. We arrange to meet at the Beijing Hotel at 9:00 am.
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