A postcard from one traveler who had a journey inward when she journeyed all
the way to China. The lessons you can learn when you immerse yourself in
another culture. Reflecting on how travel can make you rethink everything
you've ever known about your place in the world.
Postcard from China
by Mary Jo Pehl
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Dear Rudy,
I accidentally went to China. Last May, a friend of mine found a really
cheap package deal to Beijing, and there I was -- out of a job and broke --
so I panicked, said okay, and a week later, we were on a plane to Beijing.
We were ten hours into the flight when I remembered that I don't like
Chinese food.
Beijing is enormous and bursts with people, cars, bicycles, and more
people. While we were sightseeing, I was stopped several times by denizens
wanting to take my photograph. One young woman wanted to take a picture of
me with her friend but she was laughing so hard she couldn't take the
picture. My friend pointed out that I am possibly the whitest person on
the planet. I'm nurse's uniform white. And big and blonde. Suddenly I
understood what it was like to be so distinctly a minority in a homogeneous
culture. I imagine families throughout China pouring over photo albums,
reminiscing fondly, and then trying to explain the big white girl standing
there with them like Zelig.
One morning we learned that the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade had been
bombed by NATO during the night. The information was vague and it all seemed
very far away -- until I remembered that I was in China at that very moment.
We rented bicycles and biked through the morass of Beijing traffic.
We passed huge crowds of demonstrators marching in protest against the
bombing. I felt panicky and found myself thinking, This is something I'm
supposed to be seeing on TV! I don't know how to be in the middle of this!
I don't like Chinese food!
Our Chinese guide translated the angry slogans on the banners, written in
vivid and beautiful Chinese lettering. He shook his head sadly and said,
"America does not understand China." We found ourselves apologizing to
whomever we encountered: bell-boys, shopkeepers, waitresses. I apologized
for something I couldn't comprehend to people who couldn't comprehend what I
was saying.
We decided to leave the next day. We wanted to slip out quietly,
like guests at a party who have committed a grave faux pas. I wish I could
recount some dramatic escape, like we were trapped in our hotel for weeks,
then the French Foreign Legion stormed the hotel, and a strapping soldier
named Pierre grabbed me and we rappelled down the the side of the hotel where
a helicopter awaited us in the Beijing night. But I had had enough drama.
We simply boarded our flight back to Minnesota where I look like all the
other big white people and the food is off-white. And I didn't find it very
comforting.
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