Real Life @ Brandeisposts by students, faculty, and staff
Thinking about Beijing from Waltham
29 Oct 2009, 9:02AM
I'm officially going to Beijing next semester.
On Monday, one day before my 20th birthday, I received the final missing piece in my study abroad puzzle - my acceptance to the CET Beijing Chinese Language program. Quite a birthday present indeed!
I will certainly be sprinkling more details about my upcoming experience over the course of the semester but let me give you the basics. This is a language intensive program meaning I have 4 hours of class per day, 3-4 hours of homework a night, and I must sign a language pledge to not speak a word of English. Also, I will be living with a Chinese roommate.
Since the program doesn't begin until February 16, I'm planning to go to Beijing a little over a month prior to the start of my program and stay with a family of a friend I have at Brandeis from Beijing. I met this friend over the summer in DC at a Brandeis alumni event that I helped get current students to attend. When I saw her this year I told her about my thinking about going to Beijing early, she asked if I had a place to stay yet. When I said no, she made the offer and within a week I found out I could stay with her family.
What's especially exciting (and completely nerve-racking) about this set up is that her parents don't speak any English. I'm essentially entering a pseudo-language pledge upon my arrival. I'm hoping this will get me used to speaking Chinese 24/7 so that the transition into the language pledge won't be so difficult. Also, I am hoping to find some type of part-time volunteer work to take on during the day so I will have something to do while her parents are both at work.
Needless to say, Chinese class has become a clear strategic necessity. Thankfully, I love my Chinese class as much as ever.
This past weekend was Fall Fest (parents weekend) and my parents came up to take part in the activities. One of the highlights of the weekend was a presentation on the "Trends of Chinese Learning" given by my two Chinese professors - Feng and Lu Laoshi. I could not have been happier as my parents got to learn some Chinese and learn why I LOVE Brandeis' Chinese department.
I also learned a great deal from the presentation. For example, I learned that at many other universities, first-year Chinese students are not expected to write or sometimes even recognize any characters. However, at Brandeis students are expected to write over 100 character and recognize around 500 after their first year.
So Brandeis Chinese must be unbearably difficult, right? Nope. Actually, this year, 66 students signed up to take Chinese 10a (First Year Chinese), and only 2 dropped the course. A drop rate of 3% would be an incredible statistic for any course, but for Chinese, that says it all.
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