Alright, Let's Talk Pollution:

Me 4 years ago in Qufu with sweet ass hair, contemplating the processes that had occured to transform this waterhole into a cesspool over the time I lived there. All that green and trash is covering water. I immediately tore off my clothes and went swimming.

Campus businesses start pumping the coal early in the morning to power their shops.

Yesterday I was walking down the street in Zaozhaung central just to get out of campus, which is becoming a bit claustrophobic as I meet more and mroe people. As I was walking down the street I looked up and saw a girl riding her bike, crying as she pedaled along. I felt terrible. Really, is there anything worse than seeing a lonely soul by themselves in public who are so overcome with grief or frustration that they cannot control their emotions? It seems to be a fairly habitual thing in NYC, as I have seen separate people on the same subway trip crying to themselves as they ride. Yet I can't help but feeling terrible everytime I see it. What could possibly have happened that would make their emotions so uncontrollable that they can't simply wait to get home and cry themselves to sleep as I do nearly every night(Oops, did I just let that out?)?

As I was pondering the misery of that poor girl I continued to look at on coming traffic and noticed something peculiar. Many people were covering their mouths and reaching for their eyes in pain. For a moment I was really concerned before I began to realize what was really happening. The local bike commuters were not having problems combatting their emotions, as I had originally thought, they were instead combatting a much more sinister foe, the particualte matter in the air itself. I often wear sunglasses during evening bike rides here also just to shield my eyes from all of the dirt and debris.

This episode got me thinking about the environment here, like a lot of things do. In the months leading up to the Olympics Americans were treated to thousands of news articles about the terrible environmental problems of China. I have been a little hesitant to talk about the environmental problems here. Too often when referring to the environmental issues of China people talk about it as though this country is singularly brazen and malignant in its actions. This ignores a few important facts.

One is that China and the US are ranked 1 and 2 in the world respectively in coal consumption, with the US trailing China by a relatively narrow margin. They are also ranked one and two in oil consumption, with the US being number one, consuming more than three times as much oil per day as China. It is pretty hypocritical for Americans to talk about China's voracious appetite for energy. The US got away with developing its country utilizing unlimited amounts of coal and oil simply because it did it first. Second, Many of the drastic problems that China is facing is more related to the population issue than their environmental policies, and it is simply childish and stupid to blame a largely agricultural based society for having a large population(Especially when they were encouraged by the Mao government in the 50's to have more children, saying, "the larger the population China has, the stronger it grows." That is a healthy vision). And Thirdly, many of the Chinese people, in some ways, are more environmentally conscience than Americans. This doesn't come from any innate sense of respect for the earth so much as it comes from the realities of economics. Poor families tend to conserve more because they understand limitations, and often conservative use of materials saves money. People here care about using very little water, turning off lights in a room they are not occupying, and fully utilizing all parts of animals for food, because it is the most economical way to live. I have literally talked with some people here for half an hour about the environmental problems of China, and then heard them say, "oh, you know what I miss so much about home, is being able to take, like, a 20 minutes shower without running out of hot water!!" At this point I fail to control the reflex to give them an open palmed slap to the face.

These misunderstandings aside, I think that it is important to discuss the environmental problems around here because the situation is pretty critical. Most of the focus in the western media has been on the large metropolis' of Shanghai and Beijing, since those are the regions with the most westerners, and also a region in which Beijing claimed to be having the first ever "green" Olympics. Everytime I heard that I wanted to laugh or cry or spit or something. Anyway, what I think is even more telling about the environmental situation here is the life in smaller towns. Large cities all around the world have problems with pollution, what is startling here is the obvious environmental degradation that is occurring even in the countrysides, where it even seems that the greens are a little less green and the water seems a little, well...

To be honest, this is Shanghai, the rest of the pics are all Qufu and Zaozhuang

There are so many clear examples, and so I will go over the major issues and just try to show some pictures to illustrate it. The most obvious problem that I see is the incredible accumulation of garbage that is everywhere. Littering is normal here and when there is as many people as there are here it can be devastating. Just yesterday I was riding on a bus back home after walking around town and saw a college student open up the window of the bus and toss out the wrapper of the chocolate she had just eaten. No one looks twice, because many people do it, there are no fines or even advertisements to prevent littering in the provincial areas. and it has its clear effects. Here are two pictures taken from the exact same field, one from a distance, the other up close and personal.

A street right beside the campus here, well outside of the city limits:

Everything that is not green or brown in the picture is all garbage, and the smell of this area convered in wet garbage is priceless. Here is a random street corner as I was walking to a friends house one evening.

and here is my personal favorite:

The sign on the tree says on it, "Disposing of garbage in this area is prohibited." This illustrates perfectly the success of the limited efforts at controlling littering in this area.

But garbage on the streets, while gross, is not the only form of pollution that I am confronted withon a daily basis. This last weekend while in Qufu I was discussing with the other American teachers apartment maintenance, and one of the biggest problems plaguing everyone trying to keep our floors clean. Dust accumulation happens at an uncanny rate here, all thanks to the fact that all of our campuses are powered by coal!

Isn't that gorgeous, our local coal fields at the University

Coal, what a wonderful thing, just looking at it you know that you are looking at something that is meant to make you sick. Not only does it power your college campus, but I also go down there when I don't have anything good to eat in my apartment, put it in a bowl, pour some milk in and have a delicious breakfast treat. My first year in China I was plagued by a cough that wouldn't go away, and would occasionally cough up balls of phlemb with specs of black in it(MMM). Three years later I can take solace in the fact that my body, like that of a smoker, has adjusted to the levels of coal dust in the air. I still, however, wake up and have to blow my nose almost every morning, and am amazed by how black the kleenex is after blowing. It is really mindlblowing to live in the countryside and still be concerned with air pollution. Yet I am reminded of the difficulties every morning when I wake up at 530 am to the sound of men shoveling coal into the back of their truck to use to power their restaurant for the day. It is even clearly visible, take a look of these pictures. One is taken the day after a rain storm cleaned the air a bit, and the second is taken on a random day this fall that I decided to climb the mountain:

The building in the lower right hand corner of the first picture is the same building as the large one in the middle of the second picture. The finger in the upper left hand corner of the second picture is reference to my incredible ineptitude in picture taking. Both days have a bit of sun, and you can see that neither is perfectly clear, yet the second picture is clearly murkier. Another look:

One more look directly at the campus:

And there are other issues also that I have mentioned before and will surely continue to mention, such as the water pollution that doesn't allow me to drink tap water here and has me eating worm medication, or the insane noise pollution that has me more annoyed than anything else.

I hope that people can see this and not just think, "Whoa China's pretty f$%#ed up." The problems that are occuring in China occur everywhere, and the methods by which China becomes polluted are learned from the countries that pioneered modern industrialization. The environmental difficulties in China are only more clear because it is a rapidly developing nation that is heavily overpopulated. I hope that the clear signs of environmental degradation in China can more be a wake up call for everyone to pay more attention to environmental issues rather than a catalyst for criticism of a country, a people, or a political system as it often seems to be when I read about it through certain media outlets.

Da Jing Xiao Guai (Much Ado About Nothing)

Whoa, it's been a while since I hit up the blog. Time to get used to doing this again. I had to take a break recently because life has gotten crazy with nothing in particular. Now, with no real aim in mind, allow me to chronicle what has been occurring in Shandong Zaozhaung recently, as it is, if nothing else, amusing.

You know alot of people might get busy with endless hours of work, or trying to care for their family. That isn't me. I am unmarried, have no children (That I know about, yeah!) and my official work hours are not excessive. Yet I still find myself racing around busy and tired most of the time. This is because of all of the different "very easy" chores that I am asked to do by co-workers, bosses, and students. (There is no more annoying phrase in the world than, "I think it is very easy for you." Even if it is easy for me, don't tell me that it is easy and make me feel guilty on the one hand, and fear failure on the other) Two random tasks are on my mind at the moment, so let me discuss those a bit:

To start, interviews: This is one of the weird things of living over here, my quasi-celebrity status that I have done absolutely nothing to deserve. Granted I do occasionally rock the stage with a stirring Chinese Pop performance or Backstreet boys song, but I think that more qualifies me for a brutal beating than celebrity. Over my years in China I have been interviewed more times than I can remember, by a number of different groups, from local television stations to school newspapers. This may seem to be an interesting experience, and it could be, if the interviews that I took part in were ever meant to be in depth, or even in the least bit different. But most of the creativity and depth of interviews can be taken out by censorship policies, along with the care that my hosts try to take to not offend me. Let me take you through a typical interview to give you an idea.

To start out the interviews people will usually get me excited, explaining that the purpose of the interview is to examine American and Chinese culture. I enjoy doing this and so I would love to have a good conversation with someone about similarities and important differences between the cultures, and perhaps even some common misunderstandings. I will usually allow myself a bit of hope, thinking that perhaps this time the interview might be different. Then after buttering me up they bring the first question:

"Do you like Chinese food?"

An awkward moment of silence follows as I try to wrap my mind around the complexity of the question. There are so many directions I could go with it, originally my inclination is to go with, "excuse me?" But at the last moment a better answer comes to me and I respond,

"Yes."

This is met with a series of nods and smiles and a follow up,

"What is your favorite Chinese food?"

"Well I'm not sure, I have been here a long time and I like a number of different things, its hard for me to pick one favorite."

This answer doesn't get the same enthusiastic response from my interviewers, they need facts, I am straddling the fence here on the issue, and they need to get to the heart of it. They try a new direction,

"What about Dumplings?"

"Yeah, I like dumplings, I don't know if they are my..." at this point my answer is already confirmed, my favorite Chinese food is dumplings. Its the funny thing about asking questions that are unimportant, the answers become unimportant also, and so none of us really care about the outcome, the important thing is that time or space is taken up in a news report somewhere.

Moving on,

"Do you like Chinese culture?" or "Do you like China?" This is such an interesting question, because it is so simple, and yet says so much. This is the million dollar question that is asked of thousands of foreigner visitors to China every year, and plastered around the CCTV networks on a weekly basis in what I can only assume is a move to boost moral. First of all, how on earth is a coherent and thoughtful person supposed to answer that question? Second, why is it necessary to constantly watch foreigners praise the country you love? China is so clearly an interesting, culturally rich, and beautiful country, it should not be necessary to look outside for fulfillment. I don't care how many Newsweek articles I see on the culture of humiliation in China, I still can't understand how watching people answer set-up puffball questions can help improve a self image. My response?

"Of course, I have been living here for a long time, met a lot of great friends, people are so friendly, it's a wonderful place!" Add me to the list of soundbites baby!

Next question: This one will usually vary depending on the reason I am being interviewed. If I am being interviewed by the school the question will undoubtedly be, "How can we students improve our English more quickly?" I won't get into the details of that answer right now but I will just say that, guaranteed, by the end of the interview everyone in the room is speaking fluent English.

If it is not the school I could be getting asked about a number of things, from my opinions of the party I just watched, to what I think about Chinese folk art. I was interviewed twice by local television stations in the preview to the Olympics as two different men's "foreign friend." (I have so many friends, isn't it great?) The only reason that I knew them is because I can speak Chinese, am foreign, and they had something to do with the organization of the Olympic games. So people were like, "well, foreigners are in the Olympics, and you know... you get it right?..." I went to a few dinner's with both of the gentlemen, even sang some songs together to consummate our friendship and have not heard from them since the Olympics ended. But really at the time we were tight! In those circumstances I was asked to describe my relationship to my close friends. Phenomenal nonsense would ensue, but it would be pleasing to the public, and thats what is important. In one interview I was told to pretend I was a student of Kung fu ( the man was one of the organizers of the Olympics Wushu events)and was literally filmed doing this move as proof of my kung fu prowess...

Don't let the video fool you, I filmed this in my apartment and thus had to give an extremely controlled and slowed down version of my move, but I can assure that if I were outdoors or in a dangerous situation the power of my scream and the force of my blow would increase dramatically. Anyone standing very still directly in front of me or anyone with very sensitive eardrums would be at my mercy.

The final question in an interview will then usually once again be a call for a soundbite praising the People's Republic. Before the Olympics it was typically, "What sort of a good wish do you have for the Olympic games?" Where the correct answer was usually, "Jia You Beijing!"(Fire it up Beijing!) Now in my most recent interview I was asked what I thought about the response of the Beijing Government in the wake of the devastating earthquake in Sichuan province. I love the way that in certain circumstances it is wrong to refer to tragedies for some sort of political or personal gain, and other times it is just so right.

So I have lost a taste for interviews as time has gone on, and in turn have become a worse interviewee. People don't like to print or film what I say anymore because I have trouble spitting out the responses everyone wants to hear. It is just so interesting that the only questions that I am asked that treat me like a full grown adult have correct answers.

Other things that have been keeping me busy in ways I have no interest in being involved in... Standardized tests!! Yippeee! I won't even get into how ridiculous I think the standardized tests are, I think there are many people who sympathize, but taking a standardized test in China has been so much more difficult than I would have imagined. There is no online paying system developed yet here, so just paying for the exam was a frustrating endeavor, where I was made to wait in endless lines at multiple banks beofre finally succeeding.

Then in order to take the exam I have to take a 4 hour bus trip to the largest city in the province and spend a night there. The four hour bus trip is a pain in itself, but the worst part is that the city I am travelling to is Jinan.

A friend of mine once compared Jinan to Detroit, and I enjoyed this comparison. Now I don't know much about the city of Detroit and so I am sorry to those who love the city if they find this comparison insulting, but I know that Detroit does have the reputation of a tough city, and I would definitely use the term "tough city" to describe Jinan. The best way I can describe my feelings about Jinan is that I feel as though it has an endless supply of broken down unused train tracks, and as I walk down the street there I feel 100% more likely to get randomly hit in the back of the head with a crowbar.

Jinan is always a trip of endless frustration, people yell at me from different directions, somtimes in order get me to be their friend, sometimes to teach in their school, sometimes to get their freidsn to chuckle. But most of the time in Jinan people are yelling at you purely because they want you endless supply of foreign money. People sell you bottles of water for double the price, you have to negotiate with cabbies in order for them to use the meeter. My blood pressure doubles when I am inside the city limits. But this time around I did see a couple of interesting things. One was upon my arrival to take the exam on Saturday morning...

While probably half of the people in this area were people 30 or older, there still was a huge number of students out there at 7:30 Am on a Saturday. There is considerably less drinking and partying that goes on among students on Chinese campuses, as their dormitories are basically on lockdown(Boys and girls live in separate dorms, and each dorm has a guard at the door). The combination of early curfews and sexual frustration must also lead to early morning hoops, or jogging, which is no doubt healthier for the body than a 12 pack of Genny Cream Ale, four slices of greasy pizza, and sexual frustration, which more characterized my college life.

I busted out of Jinan as quick as possible with only a slight pause for a short yet passionate embrace in the loving arms of Pizza Hut ( a little light on the cheese this time, but I'm still yours my lady) and took a quick detour back to my old stomping grounds, Qufu. Qufu is a very small town in Shandong province that is the hometown of Confucius. The town is interesting and maddening in many different ways, and I have a sort of love-hate relationship with it. But this weekend I was loving it since I was just blowing through town to visit friends. I was also able to hang with a group of Waiguos, which was a great release. There are times you just have to let your Waiguo hang out. Qufu has a relatively large group of foreign teachers, mostly recent grads from my alma mater, Skidmore. The teachers over there are very cool, and afforded me much hospitality in treating me to an evening in which I could actually act American. The night's festivities included drinking games, mixed drinks, a spontaneous outbreak of the Macarena (I have a video of this but in respect to the participants in said dance I will refrain from putting it on the internet) and SCORPION WINE.

This little gem is pure genius. Scorpion wine is a Chinese alcohol that is fermented with scorpions. I am not sure if you can see it in the picture but there is a small scorpion in the bottom of each bottle. So what do you get when you mix Baijiu with scorpion venom? An interesting concoction that tastes like a scorpion just stung you in the eyeball and has the properties to PREVENT CANCER. That's right, it is a cancer preventing hard alcohol. It's so simple, yet it took 5000 years of cultural history to produce. Any day now they will be coming up with vitamin filled cigarrettes. The box of this liquor is full of explanations of the health benefits of the alcohol and is interesting to read. I decided to take it at its word and drank the whole bottle, and from my scientific examination I found that the side-effects of cancer prevention feel an awful lot like a ridiculously bad hangover. Never would have known.

So now I am back in the Zhuang, with no more interviews, and no tests for another month. Thats the way I like it, giving me time to ponder the deepest questions of life, and continue to write meaningless blogs.

This weekend we have a sick Halloween party, where no doubt there will be some crazy, sexy costumes, and some vocal sweetness in the form of Mr. John's greatest hits. I can't wait.

For Your Listening Pleasure

I am a bit late on noticing this broadcast from NPR, but I think that it is an interesting one. It helps to explain the strange position that Chinese and Chinese Americans are forced to live in with relation to the culture and country of their heritage and the United States. Living a sort of life between cultures, in some ways similar to my life over here.

It is an interview with a Chinese activist who has left China due to persecution and a Chinese American who partook in the Olympic Torch Relay in SF. This is talking mostly about the lead up to the Olympics, but encompasses a number of topics that are important to Chinese, Chinese-Americans, and all Americans.

Random Madness of a Bygone Week

I haven't had a lot of time to be able to dedicate to the blog recently with work getting busier as the semester rolls on, but that doesn't mean that weird stuff hasn't been happening to me on a fairly regular basis. Some of it funny, some of it, at the very least, laughable. This won't be the most coherent of entries, but at least there are a few things that are worth sharing.


To start, I have reached one of those points in the year where I become so tired of hearing people yell at me that I start to become unreasonably impatient with it. There are so many cocky hot boys that love to increase their self-worth/testosterone flow by yelling at a young western male. There are also many more people that are genuine in their wish to get to know you. The two of them put together is a brutal mixture, because you are constantly asked to be in extrovert mode, even in the face of supreme ignorance, and I am not always the best example of patience and understanding. Last week by Friday I was at the end of my rope, and in the period of one hour of walking from the English department to my apartment, and then riding my bike off campus I got about 20 hello's (no exaggeration, but pretty standard), mostly from people I have never seen before in my life(this is dangerous, because if you respond too positively they will start talking with you all the way until you arrive at your house.), one girl jumping in front of me and saying in English, "Good morning, are you a foreigner?"


I responded with a "What do you think?" That I was proud I managed to make sound more cheery than sarcastic, she shot back,


"Great!" and then ran away.

I was tired and decided to go to town to get a bite to eat. I was listening to my MP3 player as I rode my bike off campus. Wearing the MP3 player is tough bc it helps me to ignore people talking about me, but it also attracts more comments, as owning an MP3 player is a sure fire sign that you are "very cool." I ran into a couple of hot boys as I was riding out and they were having a good time joking around( always a bad sign, if hot boys are sitting around joking, they are primed to scream at a foreigner as they go by, instantly getting another cheap laugh out of everybody) and two of them saw me, one screamed out "whow whow" in an imitation of our dorky American accent, and another boy went falsetto and said very loudly,


"oh, a-so-ah cool-ah!"

to which I quickly responded in one of my more witty moments, "FUCK YOU!"

The thing about f- you is that thanks to Hollywood everyone and their mom's around the world know the meaning, and so this drove the hot boys crazy as they screamed back in delirious anger,

"Ah-fuck-eh you to-ah!" (I have to include the ridiculous accent they used because it was comical, and also adds to the point of how ignorant they were/are)

The problem is as I rode away I was left to contemplate how stupid my reaction was, since these kids obviously now hate foreigners more than they did to begin with. Thanks to my quick temper, they may think in general that foreigners are arrogant or don't understand the Chinese in all of their depth and screaming. Such are the generalizations that people can jump to when they never see people of a different race for their entire life. Things you got to be careful when trying to build bridges between cultures, it is a hell of a lot easier to burn them than build them, the most dangerous thing is that sometimes it is even strangely more pleasing...


Besides temper tantrums and catcalls, I also saw some funny things this week, the first T-shirt one of my students was wearing

I really wish that is said "...bitch!" at the end of it. This chick knows what she wants! Another fun photo I took at the English department in between periods:

Now that is how you wash a window! They like to keep things interesting here at Zaozhuang U. by adding the excitement of possibly plummeting to your death to the simple task of window washing. This guy/gal has obviously climbed Mt. Tai.


I also this week got around to reading through the questionnaires that I give students in the beginning of the year, in which I ask them to tell me what they would most like to learn about this year during class. Most of the students write down relevant things about how they would like to learn more about American food culture, American sports, American University life, good ways of studying Oral (Practice, practice, practice,...Can't get enough of the "Oral" joke!!) etc... but there are always some gems among the questions that I'm sure any teacher can appreciate. My personal favorite this time around was one written by Li Guo Dong( I told them I didn't want their names) who got straight to the point:


-Commercial Law


-Chinese Literature


-Cultural critics


-Internet Information


I will have to see how I can work Commercial law and Chinese literature into my English classes. Maybe right in between the lessons where I teach them the proper use of the past tense, and how to use the word "the."


Some girls hit me with some hard hitting Q's though:


"Why is your hair so little?"

I especially like this question, because it is so closely associated to a question which I have often fielded in years passed from students, which is, "Why are you so hairy?" Apparently I can't win, but at least I know these girls have some serious goals for the academic year. People thought Katie Couric was tough.

Lastly, there have been some problems this week too, one is I recently had the pleasure of living with a full body rash...
This was the only picture that came out somewhat clearly, thank goodness that I strategically placed my hand in front of my unmentionables in order to keep this photo in the PG-13 rating. But needless to say, full body rashes SUCK! I have no idea how I got it, which is also nice, since I have no way of avoiding it in the future.

Next, I was hanging out at a friends house and they were telling me I should eat some sort of medicine that they were planning on eating. They were pretty serious about it, so I went online and checked out what it was that they were going to take. I can't remember the name of the drug but it turns out that it was a drug used to for killing parasitic worms such as tapeworms, ring worms, hookworms, pin worms... you get the idea. I was a little surprised by this and mentioned the surprise to my friends who responded,

"what, you've never been wormed before?"

I had to admit I was inexperienced, the only experience I have with worming is feeding my cat worm medication laced with tuna fish to get to her eat it. Little bugger just can't avoid the worms! But they insisted that they do it on a yearly basis, which I was somewhat intrigued to learn, because the water is infested with parasites here due to the waste produced by such an excess of people in such a small area. Everyone boils all the water before drinking, I buy all spring water, but still they take the medication because the parasites are still fairly prevalent. I did end up taking the medication out of precaution since I have been here for so long, though mine was not covered in delicious tuna fish. I was, however, treated to a story by my friends mother of how much better the new medication is than the old medication because at least now with the new medication you don't see all of the worms in your fecal matter the next morning. The old medication used to just kill the worm and let you pass it the next day, for all to see. She even showed me with her fingers the size of the worms that would be seen the next day in the toilet. Lovely.

So lets take a tally... let's see, in the past two weeks I have had a serious stomach virus, full body rash, and been de-wormed. Banner two weeks for JL, but I am becoming stronger with the passing of time, and hopefully, a bit luckier. Maybe next week I will discover some priceless jade pottery in the garbage around my apartment building or, even better, get a coupon for a personal pan pizza at the Pizza Hut in Xu Zhou(has anybody ever gotten worms at Pizza Hut?). I'm keeping my fingers crossed

China and Overpopulation

This is a pretty average day on a main street (Nanjing Road) in Shanghai

I am through the first month and a half of classes and slowly becoming wary of responding to the same questions over and over again. Too often the questions are ridiculous, such as asking me whether or not I like China(what do you expect me to say?), whether I like Chinese food or not(What other choice do I have, I live two hours away from the closest Pizza Hut), who my favorite pop star is(this question is only ridiculous because it should be obvious that it is JC Chasez), or how I communicate with people when I enter supermarkets to buy things. ("Yes, they speak in Chinese, and yes, I do speak to them in Chinese..." to which I get a response of giggles or cries of astonishment that make me momentarily dream of a flashback to the good ole' days of beating students with blunt instruments.)

Not all of the questions are bad ones (I guess as a teacher I should be saying there is no such thing as a bad question, but seriously, do you really think I haven't adjusted to Chinese food after THREE years??). Some of the questions, though repetitious, are worth answering and deal with important subjects. I am often asked a question that is very simple, but very important. This question gets at the heart of some of the difficulties foreigners face while living in China, and some of the differences between Chinese and American society that make it some times difficult to have successful exchanges. The question is, what were your first impressions upon arriving in China?

I love this question because the first things that one notices upon entering a country are often the most meaningful. Some people notice the character of the people, others the quality of facilities, things they can buy, etc. ... But no matter what it is, the first things that people notice in a new place are often the things that are most different from what they are accustomed to seeing in their native place. These differences are important to understand if one wishes to bridge the gap and create an atmosphere of understanding between the two different areas/cultures.

When I am asked this question I can immediately think of two things that struck me upon arriving in China. The first thing is the language, which is so obvious but absolutely killer because unlike in European countries or South American countries you really have no idea what anything says at all. I had a friend in Qufu that once bought a bottle of dish soap thinking that it was a bottle of water. Language and the difficulty of communicating is a very "in your face" problem that I have to continue to deal with into my fourth year in China, but the language difference, at the very least, was something I had anticipated upon arrival. What I never really could have imagined that totally blew me away right as I got off the plane in Beijing was the sheer volume of people that were everywhere in China.

Average day on the Great Wall

China and overpopulation have become synonymous to the point of cliche, and there is no shortage of photos in National Geographic and other publications of really crowded areas in India and China. I knew all of this before coming over, but the experience of living in an overpopulated country is something that exceeded all of my expectations, and has had a powerful influence over so many different aspects of life, for me and everyone living here.

Better understanding the problem of overpopulation in China is important for many different reasons. One, it can help a person to better understand the reason for some of the difficulties one can experience living in China. The fact is that living in China can often be stressful, but many of the problems that China has are rooted in their struggle to cope with such an enormous mass of people in such a small area. Problems ranging from the trivial, lack of fixed lines while trying to get onto a train, to the severe, extreme environmental pollution that has an adverse affect on the health of millions, can all be traced back to the problem of overpopulation. Two, the current situation in China should serve as a warning to all areas around the world of the dangers and difficulties that we will all face if nations continue to expand their economies, technologies, and populations, without considering the consequences that those actions have on our surrounding environment.

Here are some stats to allow everyone to better digest the overpopulation of China, taken from a great text on Chinese history that explains the situation in China much more succinctly and clearly that I am capable;

"The inhabited part of China is roughly half as large as the inhabited part of the United States, yet it supports five times as many people. This is made possible only by crowding some 2,000 human beings onto each square mile of cultivated earth in the valleys and floodplains. The United States has some 570, 000 square miles under cultivation and could greatly increase this area; China has perhaps 450,000 square miles of cultivated land (less than one half acre of food-producing soil per person), with little prospect of increasing this area by more than a small fraction, even if it is used more intensively. In short, China must feed about 23 % of the world's population from about 7 % of the world's arable land." (China, A New History. Fairbank, John. Harvard University Press. 1998)

In other words, in China, since much of China is covered by either desert or mountainous regions that are unlivable, it is like they are cramming 5 times the population of the United States into a little over 1/3 of the land.
This is a picture that my friend took at Mount Tai( Damn you Mt. Tai!!) when I had asked if there were many people there that day she had responded enthusiastically, "not at all!!" So this crowd counts as a small group of people here.

There is no reason for me to blabber about all of the problems of overpopulation, but it is interesting to see the way it rears its ugly head in literally all facets of life. Aside from the obvious impact that it can have on the environment(which is scary and deserves comment in a later blog), it can have unthought of consequences on your daily life. Avoiding a lunchtime rush here means that you will just have to wait in line for your lunch, rather than literally fighting with your elbows, or shouting in order to get what you want. Bike rides are meant purely for getting from point A to point B, for riding your bike among Chinese traffic(let me make this clear, I HATE Chinese traffic) is a high stress, sometimes dangerous affair thanks to the enormous quantity of cars on the road, a quantity that grows daily with the budding middle class in the country. Find the sound of babies crying annoying or irritating? Tough shit. Being a foreigner you become especially acute to the population problem, since with a larger population comes a larger pool of assholes to yell comments at you as you walk by them.


Even my teaching is influenced by the overpopulation. I teach Oral English, and before you begin salivating at the prospect of all the jokes that could arise from me teaching hundreds of teenagers how to improve their "Oral," let me assure you that I am teaching them how to improve their spoken English. The problem is that in order to improve your spoken English you need to actually talk, and I have over 350 students a semester. There is just no opportunity for me to talk with all of them on a consistent basis, let alone get them all to talk during our limited two hours together a week.


This is a picture of a side road in Zaozhuang ,it could be any hour of day, a place considered to be a small town.

These are just a few examples of the ever-present influence of overpopulation here. As I have mentioned before, the Chinese have become largely immune to the annoyances of overpopulation that I notice since they have always lived with it. But I come from Hamilton NY, Pop.- 3000, and not a day goes by that I don't marvel at the amount of people there are around me here. I hope this can make the problem of overpopulation in China a bit more comprehensible, for I will unavoidably continue to talk(rant?) about it in many blogs to come.