{"id":9737,"date":"1994-01-07T14:13:00","date_gmt":"1994-01-07T20:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/?p=9737"},"modified":"2025-06-08T11:25:04","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T16:25:04","slug":"china-with-students-the-first-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/1994\/01\/07\/china-with-students-the-first-time\/","title":{"rendered":"China with Students: The First Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

You never forget your first (Reminiscences 2025)<\/p>\n

\"\"
If we turned toward the sea, we might have seen Quemoy from Xiamen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u2018Tis said you never forget your first.\u00a0 I certainly remember big chunks of my first trip with students\u2014to China and Korea.\u00a0 Imbued with enthusiasm and the taste for travel, I sought and failed to get one of my teaching assignments in business as a travel course. Instead, George Kieh of International Studies was willing to house a January-term course entitled, \u201cTrade and Diplomacy on the China Coast,\u201d a play on the book by the well-known China scholar, John Fairbanks.\u00a0 As I recall, IWU then called in a number of vendors who bid on the trip.\u00a0 I wound up working with a local operation, Suzi Davis, and would soon learn how to navigate the torturous channel that led the agency to use a wholesaler in the US who would use a wholesaler in China who would arrange with a Chinese retailer\u2026.you get the fuzzy picture. To make the trip work, I applied for a grant from the “Fred Foundation,” paying my own way to make sure the numbers worked.<\/p>\n

The trip would go to China and Korea. As I said, an opportunity to share my excitement and discovery with 10-25 students for two to three weeks, mixing business with history and culture.<\/p>\n

In those days, we flew via Japan Air to Tokyo, stayed overnight in an airport hotel whose rooms were barely larger than a closet, then flew on to Hong Kong for a gradual introduction to \u201cChina.\u201d\u00a0 Hong Kong still had some manufacturing, but it was clear that Southern China was soon going to be the factory to the world, and Hong Kong the transshipment point.<\/p>\n

\"\"We were going to Guangzhou and staying on Shamian Island, which still had many of the old colonial buildings from the days it was THE international area.\u00a0 Cannons from the Opium War, sites from the postcards I collected!<\/p>\n

Most of our meals were together and the one-table lazy-susan format became quite normal for us.<\/p>\n

We had an interesting visit with the American\u00a0 Consul at the Dongfeng Hotel. He closed the door and explained China’s “environmental” policy at the time: Build a nuclear reactor at the edge of the ocean and dump the waste in the sea.\u00a0 One of the students observed the contradiction between the man\/nature relationship in painting, and the rampant pollution in the air and the water he saw everywhere.\u00a0 However astute the comment, he fell in love with snake wine and decided to purchase a gallon jug (with pickled snake inside) in Guangzhou, which he carried with him for the rest of the trip.\u00a0 When he got home, his mom shried, and made him put it on the porch.\u00a0 It being winter, the wine froze, expanded, broke the glass, and freed wine and snake.\u00a0 Lesson learned.<\/p>\n

We had an interesting flight somewhere.\u00a0 We were at the wrong gate, but our guide’s boyfriend was a traffic controller and I think he held the flight–to the disgruntlement of the passengers–until he could locate us. Pays to have friends in high places.<\/p>\n

We took the train to Fuzhou, and once of the students cornered me and asked me if I’d seen the bathrooms on the train.\u00a0 “What’s the problem?” I asked her.\u00a0 “They’re holes in the ground,” adding, “I’ve never before experienced penis envy.”<\/p>\n

\"\"
In the Judge’s apartment<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On the plus side, we met a judge who invited us to his house for beer and peanuts and a discussion of how to get his son into Illinois Wesleyan University.<\/p>\n

There followed the longer train ride from Fuzhou to the international settlement at Gulangsu in Xiamen (Amoy).\u00a0 This city had classical music wafting from colonial structures, and some of the charm of its historical past.\u00a0 I later learned that because it was across the straits from the\"\" Kuomintang-controlled Taiwan, it had been a military base and not much changed had been allowed. The accommodation was at a hotel with a honeymoon suite.\u00a0 John Archer and I shared it (only one faculty member \"\"was required at the time), with a vibrating heart shaped bed.\u00a0 Don\u2019t ask. The boys came back disappointed from the massage parlor, complaining that they had gotten only a massage.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Ross’s father owned a McDs in Gibson City. Ross took 38 rolls of film. He’s probably still processing them.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In Shanghai, we stayed in the Palace Hotel, the former Sassoon Building, classic Art Deco of the 193os.\u00a0 The famed Jazz band was back, along with a restaurant on the top floor.\u00a0 When we went there for a meal, I spotted chopsticks with Peace Hotel markings.\u00a0 I was so excited I asked if I could buy a pair.\u00a0 The waiter said 25 yuan (or whatever), took my currency, and went to the next table.\u00a0 He picked up a pair and brought them back.\u00a0 The next 5 pairs were free, since I eliminated the middleman.\u00a0 I remember walking back from the discos at 1 am thinking, \u201cI would never do this in Chicago.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Beijing meant visiting the impressive sites that had dazzled and overwhelmed visitors from other countries, convincing them that China was the Middle Kingdom, a superior civilization.\u00a0 And of course, we spent time along the Great Wall, which had been a vain effort to keep the\"\" barbarians at bay and to mark the end of the civilized world. Being winter, many of the students purchased warm winter coats at the Red Army store I asked our guide to find for us.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

That was not necessary considered appropriate apparel when we got to Korea, since China was North Korea\u2019s biggest supporter (and maybe only friend). The students had another problem: they had bought so much in China that they were so broke they could not afford to go out of the hotel.\u00a0 \u00a0Plus, Seoul was much more expensive than China.\u00a0 Luckily for them, I had played “Let’s make a deal” with one of our Korean students whose dad was a senior executive \"\"with Samsung.\u00a0 The son got an independent study course so he could return to Seoul for J Term.\u00a0 The grateful dad provided us with a guide, a bus, and all the meals we desired, and we went to Panmunjom, Samsung, and the King Sejong grave (he invented the Korean alphabet)\"\". As our last meal in Asia, he provided us with a meal at a private dining room at the top of the tallest building (at the time) in Asia, which included chateaubriand.<\/p>\n

Everyone left happy, and I bet they remember that \u201cfirst time\u201d too.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You never forget your first (Reminiscences 2025) \u2018Tis said you never forget your first.\u00a0 I certainly remember big chunks of my first trip with students\u2014to China and Korea.\u00a0 Imbued with enthusiasm and the taste for travel, I sought and failed to get one of my teaching assignments in business as a travel course. Instead, George … Continue reading “China with Students: The First Time”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-china-with-students-the-first-time"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9737"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9737\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9788,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9737\/revisions\/9788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}