Columbia Graduate School of Journalism

Leaping errr.. Falling down the Tiger Leaping Gorge

Monday, July 6th, 2009 | posts | 1 Comment

On July 5, 2008 – one year and old day ago – I fell down a cliff in SW China, in Yunnan’s Tiger Leaping Gorge. I fell a good five meters down a sandy, rocky mountain side and was stopped by the roots of a giant plant. Below me, hundreds of meters straight down below me, were the rushing white waters of the gorge. The mountainside grew more and more rocky. I was lucky the plants were there to stop me, but I had fallen so far down that I was out of reach. My friends exclaimed many “Holy $hit”s as they worked quickly to get me back up.

My travel mates formed a human chain to hand me a thick tree branch. I was holding onto plants above my head, afraid to move in case I’d drop down further and be totally out of reach. They pulled up from my frozen perch within minutes, with just a few scratches, a lot of dirt on my clothes and some frayed nerves. I am so grateful to my friends – friends for life! – for acting so fast. 

I often think about that day. I was exhausted from the seven hours hike the day before. The red dirt on the trail was loose, after a night of rainfall. I was running, happy to have caught up with the group. Marc was behind me when I got too close to the edge, and fell sideways, twisting, and tumbling down…

Looking at the diary I kept of my travels last summer, I see that beside the entry I wrote about my fall, is a list of classes at Columbia’s Jschool that I was interested in signing up for:

That class, listed as #1, was Howard French‘s very first class at Columbia, titled “Foreign Reporting Off the Beaten Path”  - an interesting title, given my “off the path” experience at the Gorge. I got into that class and also took his second semester seminar on Reporting in China.

Columbia is over now. Graduation was in May. And here I am, counting my blessings.

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On Speaking Chinese at Home, a Pulitzer, and more..

Sunday, May 24th, 2009 | posts | No Comments


Earlier this month, when sister-brother team Tammy and Victor Jih won The Amazing Race, I was cheerleading for them, dancing in my room, in my pajamas, in my small NYC apartment.

In the 14th season of the show, in which 11 teams compete in a race around the world, the Jihs – Chinese born Americans and Harvard-educated lawyers – crossed the finish line first to win the $1 million.

They were strong competitors from the start, smart, athletic, dominating many of the challenges and coming first in five legs of the race. The second last leg of the race took place in China (Guilin and Beijing), where Tammy and Victor were able to stay at the head of the game because they could speak Mandarin. The Jihs have credited their mother, an immigrant from Taiwan, as the person who forced them to speak Chinese even though Victor and Tammy were both born and raised in America. They were annoyed as children. $1 million later, they are grateful.

Their language skills came in handy when talking to taxi drivers, booking plane tickets, and in one challenge, pronouncing the names of traditional Beijing dishes to a Chinese chef. And, over and over the siblings exclaimed to amused Chinese locals that they were overseas Chinese in a race and if they didn’t win, their Chinese parents would be embarrassed to death.

A blogger for the Chicago-Sun Times asks if the Jihs had an “unfair advantage”: Was it fair for Tammy and Victor to dominate the challenges in China, considering that they are of Chinese descent and speak Chinese? Especially considering one of the challenges was, um, to speak Chinese?

Being able to speak one of the most popular languages in the world is, of course, an advantage. It’s not only an advantage in The Amazing Race, but in many of life’s experiences — for getting into a good school, getting a good job, traveling. So why an unfair advantage? If it were a Spanish speaking team won in Spain or French speaking team won in France, would we be asking the same questions? If the Jihs were white and could speak Chinese, would that be an “unfair advantage” too? In one challenge that required the teams to swim laps in a pool, Tammy (who was smart and planned ahead) had taken swimming lessons before entering The Amazing Race. Does that give her an unfair advantage because other teams didn’t know how to swim?

No doubt, the Jihs had an advantage in the China leg, but they dominated the entire race and therefore demonstrated their strengths (besides their Chinese language abilities) throughout. To question whether the Jihs really deserved the prize is really applying double standards. It’s time people got with the program and recognized that being bilingual, even in America, is normal and acceptable these days. *rolls eyes*

Today, I’m at my parent’s home in Canada, and as I type, I listen to the sounds of the house; kitchen dishes clanging, water and soap in the laundry machine swishing, a smooth mix of English and Cantonese. I grew up speaking both languages. My parents, both university-educated here in Canada, are fluent in both English and Chinese. Having educated parents who speak and write in English has been a blessing, but it has also allowed me to get away with using English a lot over the years.

Hence, my sub-standard Chinese.

Having been away from China for almost a year now, I have been witness to lapses of what I will call temporary amnesia. It makes me feel better to classify this forgetfulness as temporary. Inside my head, the bank of Chinese characters I had painfully memorized and locked away safely after hours and hours of studying in Beijing, seems to be slipping away. There’s a leak somewhere. And I need to patch it up.  Last week, I tried to write the word “apple” in Chinese. 苹果 . I couldn’t remember how. My pencil hovered over my piece of paper for a few seconds before I had to look it up on the computer. 

The patch can be applied in a number of ways.

Point 1) Self Study

Counterpoint – Can’t find time and discipline to sit down and do this during my “free” time.

Point 2) Get a tutor

Counterpoint – When I’m reporting for the Associated Press this summer, will I really have the time? I know I won’t.

Point 3) Return to China.

Within hours of returning to Hong Kong or China, it all starts coming back. So, I think, that’s what I’m going to do.

Last week, at my Columbia graduation, I was awarded a Pulitzer Traveling Fellowship. I can travel anywhere in the world and write stories. So, naturally, this was the perfect opportunity for me to get back to China. !!! I didn’t think I’d make it back to the motherland so soon. I am super excited. Now to find a great story to write about..

~~

(To watch an interview with Victor and Tammy Jih, see them here on Regis and Kelly)

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Graduation

Sunday, May 17th, 2009 | posts | No Comments

 

Sorry I’ve been MIA! I’ll be graduating this week from Columbia University with a Masters of Science degree at the Graduate School of Journalism.

I’ll be out of the country for about a month after that, traveling in Europe.

At the end of June, I start working as a reporter for the Associated Press here in New York City. I’ll be sure to be back then with more news/opinion/analysis on China.

And who knows? Maybe in a few months, or a year or more, I’ll be back in China myself as a reporter. 

For now, I’m getting ready for the big day at Columbia. I’ll be in the baby blue school colors and feeling good.

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Blogging on China and the Chinese in America

Tuesday, March 31st, 2009 | posts | 2 Comments

Hello, world. I’m finally starting up a new blog. It’s been awhile. I was an avid blogger years ago during my first year of university. I wrote about some news but blogged mostly about my personal comings and goings. This time around, I’m going to be blogging about two of my interests that have developed over the years: China and the Chinese in America.

My interest in Chinese Americans stems from being born and raised in Toronto (where there is a huge Chinese population) and growing up in a Chinese American household. My parents, Chinese immigrants, raised me in the best of both worlds. Homemade Cantonese soya sauce chicken one night. Lasagna the next. I have always felt close to Chinese culture and grew up with the conversational Cantonese and Mandarin language skills. Through high school and my undergraduate degree, I yearned to improve my language skills. While I could converse, I could not read and write. I felt incomplete and in many ways, barred from fully understanding China and Chinese culture. In addition to my personal urgings, China began to dominate news headlines and understanding this place became all the more important.

In September 2007, I moved to Beijing and enrolled in the Chinese language program at Tsinghua University. For a year, I spent my days and nights studying and on holidays, I traveled throughout the country.

I returned to America in September 2008 to start my Master’s at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in New York City. I began reporting in Manhattan’s Chinatown and in early March, finished a 6,000 word magazine feature on Fujanese immigrant mothers in Brooklyn. In June 2009, I’ll be reporting for the Associated Press in New York, with a special focus on the city’s Chinese community.

I am going to continue learning about China and about America’s Chinese immigrants. Some day, I’d like to go back to China and report as a foreign correspondent. On this blog, I will share interesting news on China, my thoughts on various China-related topics, and some of my own reporting, too. Please visit often. I hope you’ll find the blog enlightening, informative and entertaining.

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