Out on the Town: A Chinese Party

In case it is unclear the print says "Spray the Fire," or in Chinese "Qi LinWenYi," "The Art of the Chinese Unicorn," I knew right away this party was for real.

Last night I had the honor of not only attending, but also participating in a Chinese party. Confused as to the difference between attending a party and participating in it? I was too until I attended a few hundred Chinese parties and began to adapt to the different form of celebration. At a Chinese party you will scarcely find a cocktail, nor will you find a casual atmosphere to sit back and chat with your friends. What you will find is a stage, a lot of glittery outfits, perhaps some pyrotechnics, and maybe even some sunflower seeds! Relaxation or letting go is not really the center of the Chinese party, at least from my perspective. It is a celebration, and so because of that I am sure that there is a certain feeling of relaxation that can be associated with it, but to me Chinese parties seem to revolve around performance.




In describing a Chinese party I would tend to say that it is more formal than an American party, and I guess my meaning is that in general they are more organized. Obviously there are different levels to parties, just like in the US. There are parties between small groups of friends, or there will be bigger parties at the school level, or city level or whatever. The more crusty the crowd, the more rigid party. Last week I partook in a city government party, which was remarkably rehearsed and structured, and was really more like a dramatic performance, though still termed a party. I have also gone to parties in my students classrooms that were done off the cuff, and very much relaxed, though due to the differences in cultures and celebration methods still not altogether relaxing for me. See, what all Chinese parties have in common is the value of watching individuals or groups perform in front of the larger group. It is actually a very lovely and interactive way of forming a better relationship with a circle of people. By performing in front of the group you are stripped bear in a sense, and showing a part of yourself to the group. The difficulty comes from the fact that often the participation is forced, especially of foreign guests, who get invited to parties thinking they will get to let their hair down and hang out in a relaxed out-of-class atmosphere with their students, and end up singing "Happy Birthday," or "Jingle Bells," in front of 6o some people.

The party that I attended last night was in the mid to upper ranges of formality. It was hosted by the school, so many leaders came, there was a lot of money involved in it, and it was very structured. Yet at the same time it was also run by the students, and meant for the incoming students to showoff a bit in front of their friends, so the performers were by no means professionals, leading to a much more relaxed atmosphere than say that city party I was discussing (I will blog that one too whenever I get the DVD of the performance sent to me, it was ridiculous). The Chinese party is nearly always broken up into various programs or performances. In smaller parties these "programs" could be somone singing a song, or playing a group game like charades or something. There maybe a time when everyone dances together, though group dance sessions in China I can only describe as awkward. It also might involve some kind of drinking contest, or eating contest based on the crowd. In more formal parties there will be no such games or drinking (Unless, of course, its by yourself in your room before the performance...) but the programs will usually consist of singing, dancing, or acting performances. In between each program hosts will appear on the stage in order to, depending on your perspective, help improve the atmosphere by enthusaistically firing up the crowd with beautiful words, or awkwardly move you from one program to the next with their over rehearsed and cliche-ridden dialogue. Either way, lets take a video tour of some of the highlights of last nights performance in order to allow you to better understand the workings of a Chinese party.

The performance last night started out with a bang, literally, as the hosts first came out to warmly greet the crowd there was a huge POP noise followed by a fifteen minute electrical blackout. It was stirring. The situation was really great for me as it helped to ease my nerves a bit. I was a little on edge on arrival at the scene, since the venue was outdoors, and there was probably at least a thousand students crowding around the stage to check out what was going on. The blackout might have eased my tensions, but not those of the leaders sitting next to me as they tried to show off the excellence of their department. But soon the electricity was restored and the hosts were able to take the stage once more in order to get things started. Since this party was hosted by the foriegn language department there were four hosts, two who would speak Chinese and two who would speak English. The two hosts on the right are the Chinese language hosts, while the two hosts on the left are the English language hosts. Lets take a look at how they set up the action...





I dont know about you, but that got me fired up. I was sure that they were going to show me the passion that explains their youth, as they strive to show their power, and this had me excited. Just like that this bash was underway, a blitzkrieg of fast paced programs that would only be interrupted every ten minutes by the hosts screaching the record to a halt with an almost identical scene to the one that you just viewed above. The lists of programs at this party was really quite good since it combined so many of the elements that make up modern China, there was a little bit of traditional culture, and alot of different performances that had a heavy influence from western culture. The first program involved a number of different students singing songs, all of which were Chinese songs, including this number...



We moved from traditional to very untraditional. There were two more programs, one being a comedy routine which I could not understand very well at all, and the other being another song. Then we moved on to the foreign teachers presentation. They know that the foreign teachers are usually pretty lame, so they put us early in the program to get us out of the way before the real awesomeness began, but they didn't know that this year the foreign contingent had an ace up our sleeves, in the form of our one-two punch from age to youth, leading with 70 year old canadian Helen who set them up with some quick wit, and followed by me as I knocked them down with my sterling vocals and nervous movements, listen for the falsetto!! （in between were Joe and Carolyn, a couple from NC who have been here for three years.

(I believe I have figured out the problem, so in order to check out my performance with look above, or click here)

You could see that there was a girl and a guy that came out to give me flowers during the song, which is a pretty common practice at most big parties, where models, or small children will come out and give balloons, flowers, or stuffed animals to the singers as they perform to show their approval. The guy coming up at the end I believe was meant to be a joke. After we got of stage I punched the kid in the face for stealing my thunder at the climax of my song. The clamour from our riotous performance had barely died down before the other foreign teachers came up to perform, two from Korea, a husband wife combo team that have two children came up and did an accapella number. Unfortunately I missed this program as I had to pee ridiculously bad while performing, and so as soon as I left the stage I went dashing for the nearest restroom. Upon returning to the scene I was treated to a unique spectacle. The schools two Japanese teachers, along with a visiting Japanese friend, went up and sang a famous Chinese song "Hou Lai," in Japanese with a group of Chinese students. This program I found to be particularly beautiful. The relations between the nations of China and Japan are stormy to say the least. There is a whole lot of historical and cultural baggage, and I have been told more times than I can count by Chinese friends that Chinese people dislike or hate the Japanese. So to see 3 Japanese citizens on stage with about 30 Chinese students singing a Chinese song translated into Japanese was the highlight of the evening and something I am thankful for.

It was there, upon completion of this beautiful and poetic scene, that the organizers of the party said, "F--- it... let's sex this party up!!" And the fiesta de awesome began, kicked off with a little picante flavor with some Latin dancing...

I don't know about you, but I was pretty blown away by that golden dress. But there was no time to take a breath for the amped fans as immediately following the Latin dance routine we were treated to the lyrical stylings of these students, don't let the military outfits fool you, these kids came to rock!!

Following the Military glam rock there was a series of performances I did not tape, incuding a sketch comedy routine, and a girl singing the Avril Levine song "Complicated." Avril Levine has become huge over here as she has delivered "punk" music in a nicely wrapped conformist package that the government can allow, and the general public can consume while contentedly exercising their "individualism." Upon completion of the English songs the hosts came back out to fire up the crowd, this time saying "well we just watched an English song, so why not show more of what we know about western culture," and thats when this was unleashed on everyone...

I too was wondering where my dogs were at yo...

And the sex-fest continued, as professionals took the stage...

At this point the party had reached a fevered pitch, the fire was pumping from the speakers, fireworks were going off around us, I was caught in a daze of strangely unarousing sex appeal, and just when you didn't think things couldn't get more awesome...

Wow...

The techno died down, the nunchuks, fire, and sex no longer leaped around the stage, and everyone gathered together in front of the applauding fans to say goodnight. A picture was taken of all of the performers and leaders together.

Then quickly, the leaders were wisked off stage to their awaiting black sedans with tinted windows, as they returned to the city and their expensive homes. The music turned off, all the lights turned on, (at which point I was embarrassed to realize the lady I was making out with was Helen. You know what I dream about Helen?... Nevermind)and the rest of us, teachers and students alike, stumbled home, a little hung over and disoriented, but still tingling with pleasure from another glorious night of celebration in the province of Shandong.