The world has a love-hate relationship with Babel.
The Love:
2011: A mother rejoices as her 6-month old utters his first syllables: “Ma-Ma-Ma-Ma-Ma.”
The Hate:
1511: A tribe of Chickasaw Indians ponders why, "Greetings! A herd of meaty buffalo is just around the river bend! Let us hunt and sup together!" is met by the barrel of the white man's gun.
I embrace a similar bitter-sweet relationship with that Before-the-Common-Era Tower Fiasco and its 21st century ramifications. On the one hand, I enjoy the intellectual challenge of trying to tackle Mandarin (or at least obtain some sort of face-mask penalty). It is like a linguistic Sudoku puzzle. Aerobics for my brain. An escape from abstract ponderings about life's varying shades of gray into the concrete, black-and white "Adverb goes before verb.” Every time. No exceptions.
And yet, there are other days. Melancholy days. Days when I long to do more than merely babble, but instead, to really communicate, to CONVERSE with Chinese people. Days when I want to say "Hey! I really do have a brain even though you can't tell because I just said ‘today the sky is black plus white’ because nobody ever taught me the word for ‘gray.’
For the first week of Chinese class this semester, I didn’t turn in any homework. Given that for the past 17 years I would have rather been hung by my toenails in a Japanese POW camp than miss an assignment, one might be surprised by such a turn of events. But, I beg you to tell me how one is supposed to know what one’s assignment is when one’s assignment is written entirely in Chinese characters.
Flash forward two months. Things have improved. My Chinese dictionary is getting a lot less action these days. I am sporting the deer-in-the-headlights face far less frequently. And still…there are moments.
Like today. I thought my teacher was asking us about our hobbies. She wrote a list of verbs on the board and asked which activities we liked. I chose the only one I understood and proceeded to jump in with an “I like to sing.” In retrospect, you think I would have noticed that no one else was offering such information. The sheepish silence should have been the clue that sent a little alarm of “Retreat! Retreat!” sounding in my brain. But, no. No, no, no. I am learning that apparently, I speak Mandarin in 24/7 word-vomit mode. There is no social filter. There is no thinking before speaking.
After my declaration, my teacher became excited and told me that she would inform the main office of my love for singing.
Why does the main office need to know what I do in my spare time? I am still not sure. But I think it has something to do with some kind of school-wide talent show.
Oops.
I hope my 600+ Korean and Kazak classmates enjoy Chris Tomlin.
