Well for class this morning I was completely drawing a blank as to what do so I just came to class and had everyone write down questions for me about differences between Western and Chinese cultures and then I pulled the questions out of a bag and answered them. We talked about weddings, and dating, and eating, and movies, and parties, and everything you can think of. It also gave me a chance to ask them about how it works in China.

Over here, for example, the first week after a couple is married everyone comes to their house and tells them congratulations; so there is no Honeymoon, just a lot of time to spend with relatives and such. Also, they hide the bride and make the husband pay to try and find her. The man's family pays for the wedding. Sometimes people will hide under the bed when a couple spends their first night together as a joke (although I guess they leave before any hanky panky starts, hopefully). However, one student told me about a couple who spent their wedding night in bed not knowing that a cousin had also spent the night under their bed. He had never left. Everyone laughed and said this was not common. They also make the husband take of the wife’s underwear in the bed in front of people sometimes under the covers. However, maybe I did not understand my students right when they told me this! Every local area has different traditions for weddings. In this modern age my students said most women buy two dresses: a red traditional Chinese dress called a Qi Pao and a white Western Wedding dress. They change half way through the wedding.

My students told me they are not allowed to date when they are younger. If any of them had a boyfriend or girlfriend in high school their teachers would discourage it by either punishing them or telling their parents. Most parents strictly forbid it. My students said they would forbid their children from dating in high school as well. Most of them who do have boyfriends or girlfriends in college now have never told their parents. Their parents would disapprove and want them to only focus on their studies. Only one of my students said her mother knew she had a boyfriend, the others all laughed embarrassedly and said there is no way they would tell their parents. Most Chinese marry by the time they are 25. They told me they never kiss in public. I have seen this happening at nighttime in the park because they have nowhere else to go! When I mentioned this all of my students laughed. They said it was true. There was nowhere to go if you wanted to kiss your girlfriend or boyfriend. One brave student yelled out that you could go to a hotel. Everyone laughed embarrassedly again. It is common for couples to rent hotel rooms by the hour but in China no one ever talks about these things. People might do things, but no one talks about it. I guess because I am a foreigner some students might feel they can behave differently and that is why I was able to ask about such private matters. My students also told me that if you ask someone to go out to dinner, for example, if a boy asks a girl to dinner, then that usually means he loves her and it is very serious.

Also, people never have parties but just go out to dinner with each other. There is nowhere to have any parties. The dorm rooms are so cramped and there are so many strict rules. Even if a student does live in an apartment, which a few more wealthier students do, there is not a lot of room. Going out to eat is fairly inexpensive in China so this is where Chinese people and students have their social time. They might eat for hours and stuff themselves. They never go to bars because it is expensive and a new Western idea and their curfew is at 11:30 pm anyway. The other place for Chinese to go to have fun is KTV, or Karaoke. These KTV places are open all night. You can have your own room with a group of friends and sing and dance all night. Most of my students love KTV. They are always inviting me to go but I can never stay very long. I do not know any of the Chinese songs and I cannot even fake it because it is too hard to read the Chinese characters! Also, they stay up late and sing and without any alcohol in me I just get tired and want to go to sleep!

A lot of the questions people asked were about what kinds of freedoms I had. For example, was I allowed to choose what I wanted to study and was I independent of my parents? In China you are dependent on your parents until you get married, although you still might live with them after marriage for a while. Chinese students never work. Their parents have to pay for everything. In return, children will always take care of their parents; and parents can even sue their children if they do not think their children are taking care of them right. Other questions were about Americans values. For example, did Americans value business or family more? Chinese, according to my students, value family more and LOVE children. I found it hard to answer for all of the American people and also found myself wanting to portray Americans in the best light possible but also I did not want to brag about the freedoms I had and make them feel bad. Even though I am very far from being overly proud of the US, I found myself suddenly very attached and nationalistic towards my country and did not want to say anything negative. I guess I felt like some of the questions were leading and they wanted me to confirm their suspicions that Americans were unhappy inside even if we could choose our own majors.