August 14, 2001
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Don’t Know When I’ll Be Back Again…
It is official. I just purchased my ticket and I’m leaving on a jet plane on August 28, 2001 bound for Shanghai.
The funniest thing happened to me last night though. Since I’m still working on getting my accomodations settled in Shanghai, I have had to call Shanghai quite a bit lately. The people on the other end at Fudan (the university I’ll be studying at) aren’t very helpful. I guess it would help if they picked up the phone. Well, last night, at 3am Toronto time, I made my usual call and was relieved when it was finally answered by someone. As relieved as I was, my biggest worry was me not being able to communicate with the person on the other end of the phone in Shanghai. I needed to confirm that they had rooms available for when I arrived in Shanghai! Where the hell am I going to sleep? I was certain that the foreign exchange school would have someone willing and able to speak English. I asked the gentleman if he spoke English in my best Mandarin, to which he replied to me with a mouthful of Mandarin and then, very slowly, “Yes, yes I do speak little English.”
I proceeded to tell him that I was an international student calling to see if they had any rooms available. It was difficult for me to explain it to him because I didn’t want to say something that misled him. I could have asked if they had any more rooms free for me, but he might have assumed that I was looking for a free ride. I didn’t want to say available because I wasn’t sure if he would understand what that meant. He asked me where I was calling from and upon hearing I was from Canada, asked me if I spoke French! I said yes, a little, and now it was my turn to stumble and bumble. This Shanghainese guy was busting out some crazy French left and right… I had to tell him to slow down! “Monsieur, peut-tu me parle lentement s’îl vous plait. Je ne peux pas le parle bien!” It was truly something else! His French was so good, it put my OAC class to shame. He spoke with such eloquence, I was baffled. And in all my years of being in Canada, never have I had to use French more.
I would never have thought that communication with the person in Shanghai would be something other than Chinese or English. It was kinda cool, haha… Well, I found out that there are rooms available. Pas-de problème was what he kept saying. I’m starting to get excited.
