'One World One Dream' is the 2008 Beijing Olympics slogan and it's plastered all over the city. You're lucky if you can take a picture at the Great Wall without the ginormous and tacky 'One World One Dream' obscuring the beautiful view. Most everyone around here unquestioningly believes in world peace, except for maybe the Cedarville foreign teachers. To us, the slogan is good fodder for jokes.
For all of us girls here, being white and having not-black hair and eyes attracts a lot of attention from Chinese men. Staring is not impolite in Chinese culture, and we've dubbed these unabashed gazers 'UCM's,' or 'Unidentified Chinese Males.' During our students' Chinese midterms this week several teachers took a girls' trip to Qingdao, which is north of Shanghai on the Yellow Sea. Traveling back to Beijing by train, we had several humorous experiences with UMC's. After introducing himself - thus no longer a UCM - and striking up a conversation, our new friend Alan (a big NBA fan), commented on our 'unusual' friendliness:
" You say 'hi' to many people.
So good.
'One World, One Dream!!' "
Anna, Melanie, Katie and I about died laughing because after making fun of it for 8+ months, the joke was finally on us.
0 visitors:
Post a Comment