Reading China

The Year of the Panda by Miriam Schlein is a book that my seventh graders are reading in class. As language learners, the book presents certain challenges to some, not the least of which is recalling story sequence. As the character Lu Yi learns more about the orphaned baby panda he has adopted, he also learns about the plight of the panda. I'm using the book not only to teach the structure of the novel, but also how to use research to deepen understanding of real world issues, in this case, the panda's loss of habitat. But reading this book has made me think again of China.

I went to Beijing last November for a weekend workshop. It was my first time in the country of my ancestors and it was a homecoming of sorts. But I was still the foreigner. At the Church where I went to mass, I noticed it was filled with old women. The priest was old, with a smoker's cough. I sat with the other teachers from my school; Penny, Sister Cecilia, Chuchi. Though we were Thai, Vietnamese, Filipina, and Chinese, we might have blended in but we were obviously strangers to this community. The woman in the pew in front of me turned and said in English, "Where are you from?" That was an unexpectedly complicated question. Do I tell her I'm Chinese, Jamaican, or American? It's a simple polite question that can't be answered in a single word. In the end, I said, "Thailand" which was true; it was my destination. It's the response I have learned to give to impossible questions.