Ok, so I'm a terrible blogger. That's not news. I guess I've learned that there's no point in promising makeup posts, 'cause I just can't seem to bring myself to write them!
Anyway, I did end up switching to the upper intermediate classes, and I'm so glad I did! My new classes are great. The content is challenging - especially the volume of new and increasingly obscure characters I have to learn every week - but we spend enough time on it that I'm able to absorb at least some of it. The classes themselves are actually really fun, as we're all at a high enough level that the teachers can chat freely and naturally instead of spoon feeding us.
On top of the brisk classroom pace, they've also added a composition class to our curriculum. I now have to write an essay of 500 characters or more every week. It's exhausting, but it's also kind of fun trying to put your thoughts together using unfamiliar vocabulary and grammar structures, like a puzzle. I also find it liberating to focus on just getting words on the page, hopefully in the correct order, without getting bogged down by flow and balance and other details that plague perfectionists like me. I actually remember reading somewhere that Samuel Beckett used to write his poems in French and then translate them into English to keep them pared-down and pure. I thought it was a cool idea at the time, but now I really get it.
The fact that a class that was way too hard for me just five months ago is way too easy for me now is a real milestone. Immersing yourself in a foreign language is an utterly bewildering and overwhelming experience. Boxed in on all sides by a towering language barrier, the new skills you learn every day seem completely insignificant in comparison; no matter how quickly you learn, the progress feels maddeningly slow. I remember feeling pretty confident when I came to China - I was at the top of my class, after all - and arriving here and finding out how little I really knew was a pretty rude awakening. I despaired that my dream of becoming bilingual was just a delusion. The simplest things became difficult or impossible. For months, I felt like I was making only minimal progress. It wasn't until I started finding myself coping easily with situations that had previously stumped me that I realized how far I've come.
Chinese word of the day:
成功
chéng gōng
Success (n); to succeed (v)
