Darrol in China

Darrol's apartment buildings	Darrol and new roomates	Darrol's room

China Update #3 by Darrol Butler

 Dear Family, Friends, Fellow Students, and Professors:

First I want to make two notes: I want to send my condolences to everyone who was affected by hurricane Katrina and the following storms.   I hope that all of your families and friends are safe and healthy.  Though there was an initial lag in logistics for helping the victims I am proud to know that so many people came together from all over America, and the international community, to donate money, food, supplies, labor, and other items or services to the affected during their hour of need.   It is this spirit of helping each other, even those who we do not know, which makes us human.

Secondly, on a more personal level, I want to thank everyone who has so graciously helped me to realize a dream that I never thought was financially feasible for me.   Your kindness and generosity are allowing me to learn another language and culture halfway around the world from a perspective not possible while residing in the U.S.  The people who have helped me on this journey, in one way or another, are numerous, and I am sure that I have missed many on this list, but, I want to thank: Michael Ashlock, Art & Marilyn & Paula Bielfelt, Jan Bielfelt, Toby Bodeen, Dr. Scott Brady, Mary Broderick & Cole Spohr, Eileen Brownell, Mavorette Butler, Dr. Weikun Cheng, Debi Connor, Alex & Devora D'Angelo, Dr. John & Julia DeMartini, Tasha Dev, Rosie Finmand, Lindy & Emma Hoppough, John & Melissa Jewitt, Dr. William Loker, Dr. Susan Place, Elizabeth Rivers & Mimi Mitchell, Uintah (Ramona) Shabazz, Dario, Kevin Butler, Sarah and Leila, and Dr. Jerry & Terry Williams.   Again, I would also like to thank the donors of the CSUC Asian Studies Scholarship, the selection committee at the Institute of International Education for the Benjamin A. Gilman Scholarship and Trustee Emeritus Dr. Stanley Wang and his family for the Wang Family Scholarship.   Additionally, I would like to thank my father, brother and sister, and the rest of my family and friends (some who are already on this list and others who are not) who have either encouraged me in this pursuit or helped me emotionally prepare for it.   And, finally, I want to give a huge thank you to my mother whose tireless efforts, both before I left and now that I am here in China , have helped me in more ways than I can possibly express.  Thank you each and every one of you.  Darrol O'Doyle Butler

Please excuse my lack of timeliness in getting out this third email update to you.  This past month has been very trying for me.  There were many challenges, some I had anticipated, and others I had not, that I met in my registration process at Beijing University and at the beginning of my classes.

            The first issue appeared on August 29^th when I found out that my blood tests (showing whether or not I was HIV+) attached to my physical examination form from the U.S. were copies instead of the originals.  Not having the originals halted my registration process and also prevented me from finishing my household registration process to get a resident permit (more on this later).   So, I had to wait until the 1^st of September to go with a group of other international students who either, had not taken a physical exam prior to arrival in China, had not completed all of China's requirements for their physical exams, or did not have all of the original/official paperwork or test results.   They loaded all of us who needed to correct issues with out physical exam forms onto three busses and took us to a hospital.  For me it turned out to be completely unnecessary.   After waiting in line for about fifteen minutes, a nurse looked at all of my paperwork, made some marks on it, and then sent me to another counter where I had to pay about $8.   After that I figured out that I needed to go to the lab to get new blood tests.  However, once I was in the lab the nurse couldn't seem to find me in the computer system.   So, I waited for the other students to get registered one by one and take their blood tests, until the nurse finally found a gap in the arrival of students.  She then ran out to the front desk and promptly returned.   Using a lot of words in Chinese that I didn't understand, in conjunction with vivid hand signals, she got the point across to me that I didn't need to take the blood tests after all.   Apparently the first nurse had accepted the copies of my blood tests as originals.

            The next interesting challenge came when I showed up for my Chinese language proficiency test.   The students were not divided into groups based on length of study of Chinese language, or by some other requirements.  Instead, we all took the same test, which meant that it was set at a level high enough to challenge those who are most skilled in Chinese language.   So, I spent the better part of one hour listening to an oral test over the speakers in a large lecture hall.  Each question or dialogue was said once, and then repeated five seconds later.   Not only could I not understand the words, but I also could not read the characters to answer the questions being asked.  The next hour was spent looking at passages and questions, and then trying to choose the appropriate answer.   Even though I had studied very diligently at CSU Chico, spending the majority of my time learning characters, it proved to be completely useless for the proficiency test.   Regardless of which characters I recognized, they were always surrounded by many other characters that I didn't know, making it impossible to even guess at which answer was correct.   In the two hours, out of 116 questions I was only able to take a stab at answering four of them, and I have know idea whether I answered them correctly or not.  Needless to say, I later found out that I placed in the lowest levels of the Chinese language classes.

            My next hurdle caught me by surprise.  I decided to go to campus one morning to try and find out more information regarding our schedule.   When looking through my study abroad paperwork I noticed that the Chinese oral test was repeated for two days (the 31^st of August and the 1^st of September).   I assumed that it was being offered on two days to give the international students some flexibility, but I wanted to make sure.  I also needed to get some other school related questions answered.   When I arrived on campus at 10:35am I happened to see one of the other students in the CSU IP program.   I began to ask him about the schedule and then he interrupted me and asked how I did on my oral examination that morning.  I was not aware that we had to take another exam, as there was nothing mentioned about it on my recent Beijing University schedule.  He informed me that it ended at 10:30, so I raced over to the building where it was being held.  I just caught the examiner as she was walking out the door, and persuaded her to give me the test!  Later that day I found out that many students had missed the test because it was not listed on our schedule.   After returning home I looked over my study abroad paperwork again and I found one paper sent about a month before I left the U.S. with a schedule that had an oral test marked for that day.  However, the time of the oral test was not listed, nor was the location of it, and furthermore, the schedule did not include all of the other appointments listed on our recent Beijing University registration schedule.

            Class registration was also quite challenging.  On Friday the 2 ^nd we were finally allowed to register our classes, just three days before classes would start.  I showed up at the location to find a large group of international students standing around two sets of bulletin boards that had Chinese written all over them.   The only English I could see were several dozen names in English on a list of a few hundred names (both in Chinese and English) on one of the bulletin boards.   Of course, there were no instructions, and everyone was unsure what to do.  I decided to look at the list to find my name.  Unfortunately, after scanning the list I was unable to find it.   However, I remembered the characters for Meiguo (America) and for nan (man).   At least this way I could narrow the list down to American males from the few hundred international students on the list.  Then, hopefully I could recognize the Chinese name I had been given just the day before, though I had not tried to write it yet.  It took me about half an hour by looking over each character (name) but I finally recognized the characters for my Chinese name.  Next to my name, were two numbers, a one and a two, and I had no idea, at the moment, what they meant.   I noticed that everyone's name had two numbers after it, ranging anywhere from one to thirty-two.  The next set of posters was even worse.   It took me more than an hour to figure out that the poster was listing the classes based on our Chinese grammar level and oral level.  The two numbers next to our names on the other bulletin boards were the scores from our placement tests from two days before.   Other sets of numbers on the board were listing the period (not the time, because that would be too easy) that the classes meet for, as well as the building name where the classes would meet, the room number for the class, as well as the number of units for each class.   Finally after about two hours I managed to get my class schedule down.  As it turns out the process was more for getting my class schedule than for anything else, as there were absolutely no class choices at my Chinese language level.   I was placed at grammar/language level one, and oral level two.  As for the character class, the third class, it was the same class for both level one and level two.   Anyway, I was glad to finally know my class schedule.  Between the three classes I have twenty units, meaning I have twenty hours of class each week.   My classes start at 8:00am everyday.  On Monday, Tuesday and Thursday I have class for two hours and then I have a two and a half hour break, then I go back to class until 2:20pm.  On Wednesday and Friday I have classes for four hours straight, starting at 8:00am and ending at 12:00.  After the first day of classes on Monday I received some good news.   The professor for my grammar/language class said that the class would be too easy for me, and had me moved up to the level two class.  So, I am now at level two in all of my classes.

As if these challenges were not enough fun, the most exciting one was to find out that my visa was going to expire on the 16 ^th of September unless I completed the resident permit process.  I arrived in China with a one year X or Xuesheng (student) visa attached to my passport, so I assumed that my visa would be good for one year.   At the airport the immigration official pointed to a piece of paper in my passport and reminded me that I needed to complete household registration within one month.   Next to the Chinese visa in my passport is stapled a small piece of white paper which reads, "Important: You must complete household registration within one month of arrival in China."  However, nothing on the slip of paper mentions how to complete this process, or how to get the necessary information to find out how to complete it.   Furthermore, nothing on the Chinese Embassy's website mentions this process, nor was I able to get any additional information at the airport in Beijing upon arrival.  So, I was not aware that the process was actually mandatory to make my visa valid for my length of study in China.  On Wednesday the 31^st of August, at the international orientation, which turned out not to be a school orientation at all, but instead, a lecture by the senior Chinese immigrations official, we were notified that we must go along with the landlord (not another tenant or an apartment manager) to the local police station to get a temporary resident permit.   We would then need to return to Beijing University with the temporary resident permit by Friday the second (only two days later) to have them fill out paperwork and start the process of getting our actual resident permit.  We were told that if we could not get the necessary documents and temporary resident permit to the international office on time, that we would have to complete the process on our own, without the school's help, that it would be tedious and difficult to do, and we could risk overstaying our visas!

            For me it became a real problem because I arrived in Beijing on the 16^th of August, which meant I had only two weeks left before my visa would become invalidated.  And, I was told that I would need to apply for my resident permit at least one week prior to that date because government paperwork takes time.   To make matters worse, after talking to my roommates they let me know that they were subletting the room to me, and that they had no intention of letting the landlord know that I was living with them.   The best they could do was to ask their friends and colleagues if anyone was willing to let me get registration at their house/apartment.  So, I contacted my good friend Yang Fan to ask him if I could get registration at his brother's apartment where I stayed last year.   Unfortunately, however, their father was out of town (under the Chinese household registration system the senior male in the household, or woman if there is not a senior male, keeps the household registration for the family members) so even though Yang Yang (Yang Fan's brother) owned the apartment, I would have to wait for his father to return to get the registration.   I completely missed the two day deadline as Yang Fan was not able to get his family's household registration documents until Monday the 5^th (the day classes began).   So, Monday after classes I headed down to Dazhongsi where Yang Fan's restaurant and his brother's apartment are, and met with him to go to the local police station to get my temporary resident permit.   At the local police station they did not want to give me the permit because Yang Yang was not there.  However, Yang Fan persuaded the officer to let him call Yang Yang so that Yang Yang could give the officer his personal identification number over the phone.   I am indebted to them for their help.  Tuesday morning after my classes I went back to the international office with the temporary resident permit to see if they could help me finish the resident permit process even though I had missed the deadline.   As it turns out, there was a huge line going out the door as many other students were unable to make such a tight deadline.  Fortunately for us the university decided to extend the length of time it would help students with the process.

            All of the stress from the week of registration before classes started finally caught up with me, and I came down with a terrible flu.   I guess my body finally decided to adjust to China.  So, I spent the first two weeks of class downright miserable.   One of my Chinese friends got me a bunch of Chinese medicine which helped out a lot.  I also went through all of the Airborne supplements that my Mom made me bring to China.  My flu became so bad that I had to miss two days of class, but my teachers were very understanding and let me make up the homework.   I am glad to say that I am now caught up, and struggling along with the other students to learn the complex Chinese language.  The first three weeks of classes and the stresses of resident permit registration and class registration are over with.   I am now settling in quite well, and cruising along in my studies.  Since I have an enormous amount of new vocabulary, sounds and characters to memorize each week, it is taking all of my concentration.   However, I hope it will be smooth sailing from here on out.

 Until the next email update, take care, and thanks for reading,

 Darrol Butler

 hairyleprechaun@gmail.com

Laundry Room	Student ID	Great Wall