The Real China

I had dinner tonight with the French linguist I met a couple of weeks ago. Oh my, I really like this person. She's just so alive. She's 65, retired from the University of Paris for one year now, and she is in Xi'an to do research, but she's also teaching at XISU. She speaks Mandarin, German, Spanish, English, and, of course, French. Oh, and she reads Sanskrit. She is a bundle of energy: smart and so curious. Anyway, she took me off to a great restaurant where we had a fascinating conversation about education in China, about social change here, about all sorts of things. She was telling me about her plans for the summer and talked about her friends. "My friend, Julia," she started, and then stopped and cocked her head and said, "perhaps you've heard of her. Julia Kristeva?" I almost spit my duck at her. Julia Kristeva? Famous French philosopher and literary theorist? That Julia Kristeva? Yes, indeed. I must tell you that I don't know my dinner companion's last name, but I SO had to resist the urge to say, "who are you? Are you famous, too?". My plan is to give her my card the next time I see her so that I can get hers and find out who she is. Hey, some people get excited when they meet friends of movie stars. Apparently, I get excited when I meet friends of famous philosophers.

The best part of the night came next. She decided that I had been missing the real China, so she took me down a side street full of street vendors, vegetable stalls, street food sellers, and more people than you can imagine. The street narrowed and narrowed until it seemed impossible for cars to drive down it, but they did. I wish I could describe the sights and sounds and smells to you. The place was amazing. My friend says she comes to this area to buy vegetables every week, and she clearly knew the vendors. She'd stop and chat with them and translate for me. We'd walk a little further, and she'd say, "oh, I must show you this," and we'd be off in another direction. She tells me that much of big city China used to be like this area, but that things are changing rapidly, and these areas are being cleared out for apartment high rises and shopping malls. I'm so glad she took me there. It was like nothing I'd ever seen.

We walked back to the main road near campus, and she showed me a restaurant that she says is very good. She took me right inside and we wandered around, checking the place out. When we got outside, she told me there was a Hutong nearby that she wanted to show me--a very narrow, very old alleyway, quite common in parts of China, but fast disappearing. I understand many Hutongs have been knocked down in the name of progress, but that now, there are efforts to preserve many of the remaining ones. Sadly, as we started walking, she realized it was further away than she remembered. Another time, perhaps. All in all, it was a delightful night.


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