English in the Dark
It's a beautiful spring day today, and I saw no reason to spend any second of it inside, so all my classes convened on the campus' abundant expanses of green green grass, in all its softness and warmness.
My daytime classes were quite ordinary. The students are giving their final speeches, six per 90-minute period. Each student chooses one question from a list of 44, about topics ranging from whether they like dogs or cats to one thing they'd like to change about the government, gives a 1-5 minute speech, then answers classmates' questions. It's actually quite a useful model. The speeches inevitably lead to conversations, and students talk freely with each other, with little intervention by me, without realizing they're yakking in English.
My students gave speeches about their hometown, their families, their pets and, in the day's highlight, Yao Ming. What followed the Yao Ming speech was a spirited debate about whether or not he's handsome. Half the girls think he's a stud; half think he's a dog. The most important criteria -- being very "high" -- Yao meets. The others, such as shape of nose, slant of eyes, fullness of eyebrows and whiteness of skin, the debate rages on.
For my night class, which is comprised of non-English majors, we went to the far reaches of campus for an activity I called "English in the Dark." It's modeled after an activity Chris Borgmeier started at St. John's called "Sex in the Dark." Borgie's idea was to put together first-year Johnnies and Bennies, have each person submit a relationship/sex question for the opposite sex, turn out the lights and ask anonymous people the questions. Then, the person could answer in darkness, seemingly reducing the embarrassment he or she might feel in the light. A perfect model, I figured, for my painfully English-shy students.
I gave each student a sheet with the 44 conversation-starter questions, and split them into four groups, each group camped out on a patch of lawn. As luck would have it, we happened upon a part of campus where the university was burning its garbage in a ten-foot high bonfire. It smelled like summer camp, with Chinese characteristics.
Each group also got a lighter, which I named the English torch. One student would use the lighter to read a question off the list, and then hand the lighter to the next student, who would answer the question, then ask a different question for their neighbor. And around and around the circles the English torch -- and conversation -- would go.
Surprisingly, the English torches flickered out early, as the students recognized the concept as contrived and silly, and instead used their mobile phones for night vision. The English conversations, however, raged.
For almost two hours, I paced from group to group, without a word, listening in on whatever conversation was occurring. There was hardly a lull, and only the rare Chinese word spoken, and students actually telling each other, "Say that in English, please!" It was heaven.
I heard bits of conversation about students' admiration of Forrest Gump, their hatred of Zhuzhou City, their listing of "Braveheart" as their favorite movie because it's about a peasant uprising, their longing for simple village life, their desire to make China the strongest nation in the world. Everyone was talking, they weren't interrupting each other, laughter was frequent and raucous.
Inevitably, of course, "English in the Dark" morphed into "Sex in the Dark." One girl told the story of being busted three times in the past month, by the university police, for holding hands with her boyfriend. A boy told the story of being friends with so many girls whom, he noted frustratingly, "all have the boyfriend! People think I have so many chances, but no. I have no chances!"
What grabbed my attention most, however, was a conversation between the same girl who's been busted three times for hand-holding and a boy who's obviously, transparently homosexual, but of course must remain locked in a closet that couldn't be opened with a crowbar. The boy is a biotechnology major, quite brilliant and excellent in English. In one way, his outspokenness is his worst enemy, because he speaks, constantly, in a very high voice and with a lilt that IDs him quite conclusively.
"Do you have a boyfriend, I mean a girlfriend," the handholder asked the boy. Long awkward pause. "I mean, you're such a handsome boy, but I never see you around many girls. Why not?" Nervous, timid laughter from the boy. Long awkward pause. Laughter from the rest of the group.
"You know, I'm such an independence boy," he said in faltering voice. "I don't want the girl to limit my independence." "Plus," he added meekly, "I must study hard, and girlfriend will distract my study." It was sad to hear him, ordinarily so cool and confident, visibly shaken.
Fortunately, someone changed the subject soon, and the issue died. In one way, it was a triumph because it was pretty honest dialogue, and it seemed as if the girl asked not out of any malice, but with genuine curiosity and with an open mind.
Still, though, the implication was clear, however honest her intentions. It was too frank, the kind of conversation that just can't happen yet in this society, the kind that can lose a person enough face to damage him irreparably. The boy student will be fine, as he's got skin a foot thick and a way of shaking things off, but the conversation reminded me the world of difference between my world and theirs, where holding hands is a crime and revealing who you really are just can't happen for some people, even under the cover of darkness.
