Ah, language!

Having studied German and Latin in my youth, I can “sort of” get around in Europe. I frequently can understand signs and menus, and when I can’t, there typically are fluent English speakers nearby. I recall trying out my German on a shopkeeper in Austria who smiled sympathetically and then said: “Let’s talk English, OK?”

Well, Chinese is so different that I have absolutely no clue what people or signs are saying. The upside is that I can ignore chatter on the street, and choose to be oblivious as to whether people are talking about me, although on the buses I sense, frequently, that they are. In fact, as a former Portuguese colony, much of the signage – on buses, in public offices, etc. – is in both Chinese and Portuguese, and by necessity, I’m learning to make sense of some Portuguese!

Foreigners’ (particularly Asian) attempts to communicate in English are often the source of politically insensitive yet very funny anecdotes. There’s even a Web site dedicated to signage of this sort. We Americans can be assured that our efforts to communicate in Japanese, or Chinese, or Thai are often equally silly, if not more so.

However, two recent incidents have been enlightening as well as amusing. First, I’ve had to impress repeatedly upon my students the need to cite their sources in the papers they write. It’s a professional courtesy to indicate where one finds information, or to provide attribution for a quote and to enable the reader to go to the source for further information. On the whole, Chinese students are not accustomed to doing this. In a recent paper submission, I was gratified to see several footnotes, and, curious to explore further a point made by the student, went to the Web site he cited – only to discover that it was in Chinese! Serves me right, I guess.

The second incident was during a recent presentation by an alumnus to students in the business school here. After introducing himself and his topic in halting English, he launched into his native Cantonese. Sitting in the front row, I considered this to be a good idea on his part, even though I couldn’t understand him. After all, the room was full of Chinese students. What I didn’t realize until later, however, was that the majority of the students were from the mainland, and spoke Mandarin (known as Putangua here). They couldn’t understand him either!

East and West

Five years ago, I was privileged to direct the Sigmund Weis School of Business (SWSB) London Program. Now, of course, I’m with the first cohort of Susquehanna students in our exchange program with the University of Macau. As the current experience in Macau has developed, several people have asked how the two programs compare. In many respects, the programs are so different that in many dimensions they practically defy comparison.

The SWSB London Program is for junior business majors who take SU courses, only with each other, in a somewhat familiar environment, and in the world’s most expensive city. The program is highly structured, and all students enroll in the same four courses, partly so that everyone stays on track for graduation. They live with each other, go to class together and generally are together 24/7. The SWSB professor who directs the program sees them regularly, teaching one of the courses and serving as counselor and “go-to” person. Students bond with each other to an extraordinary degree and form what I am sure will be lifetime friendships. They travel in small groups all over Europe on weekends, seeing the Western heritage that most of them share. They move out of their accustomed “comfort zone” and become seasoned, competent travelers, comfortable throughout Europe. They have a ball, learn about European and international business practices, get exposed to fine arts through the Theatre course and learn mostly about their own capabilities.

The new exchange program with the University of Macau is available to all Susquehanna sophomores and juniors, who join between 50 and 80 other exchange students from around the world in taking regular courses. Like students in other study abroad programs, they work closely with their academic advisers in selecting courses that will keep them on track for graduation. The University of Macau teaches in English, and with the exception of recommended courses in Chinese culture and language, an exchange student often is the only non-Chinese student in a class. While many exchange students get to know each other well and travel together, they also get to know Chinese students, both from here in Macau and from the Chinese mainland. Food, housing, transportation and clothing are all considerably less expensive than in the U.S.

Students in Macau are more “on their own” than in the London Program. Their comfort zones are stretched farther than in London, by virtue of the fact that they are in a much different culture than the one in which they probably grew up. They study harder simply because everyone studies harder at an Asian university, and because the program attracts more serious students who are taking a large leap of faith in coming to Asia. They travel to exotic locations in Asia, but have full class schedules that limit the frequency with which they can get away from Macau. They see sights that are utterly different from what they’ve seen all their lives, from monkeys scurrying around Cambodian temples to thousands of people on motorbikes in virtually every city, to the frenzy of Hong Kong harbor, to the amazing markets selling everything from live octopi to knockoff Nike running shoes. Students in the Macau exchange program learn about Asia by being in the midst of it, from the international faculty at the university, from fellow exchange students representing over 20 countries, from Chinese people they meet as classmates and friends. And, of course, they learn mostly about their own capabilities.

Both programs are strongly supported by Susquehanna. In both, students pay regular Susquehanna tuition. In both, they receive round-trip airfare and at least two multi-day, expense-paid trips to a major venue away from London or Macau. London students typically go to Prague and Rome, taking company tours and making presentations to business executives. This semester, Macau students enjoyed a 12-day study tour to Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, and also visited the Guilin area.

What the programs have most in common is that they are both life-changing cross-cultural immersion experiences. Students are exposed to differences, grow comfortable in a different milieu, and come to appreciate and participate in that difference. In every respect, the opportunity to study abroad is a gift, and one that too many students choose to leave unopened. My hope is that, just as the London Program has become part of the SWSB culture, the Macau exchange will similarly become part of what many SU students expect to do as part of their education. Two of the students in Macau this term participated in the SWSB London Program last fall, and at least one of the SU students here will participate in the London Program next year. Think of it, these students will complete four years of college AND will have lived in both Europe and Asia. Think how well they are preparing themselves for the global community that increasingly influences our daily lives. Think how confident they are becoming in different cultures, able to negotiate logistics that many classmates would find simply overwhelming, gaining some genuine cross-cultural understanding, and in the process understanding themselves and their own culture more deeply.

Who would not want to open a gift like this? The answer, unfortunately, is that students often don’t know what they don’t know, and aren’t sufficiently curious to go and find out. Almost always, students who take the leap of faith discover, to their amazement, that THEY can do it, that it’s not that hard, really, and that the reward is to be seeing and experiencing the broader world. In that regard, consider the following quote from Dag Hammarskjold, former Secretary General of the United Nations: “Never measure the height of a mountain until you have reached the top. Then you will see how low it was.”

Freedom and Safety

After all of 10 weeks as a resident of Macau, China, I’ve repeatedly observed two related phenomena:

1. This is not a free country. And it’s not a democracy. Political dissidents are swiftly and brutally repressed. The all-powerful state has a low threshold for disagreement.
2. There is virtually no crime here. I feel safe on the streets at any time of day or night, in any location. I don’t fret for the personal safety of the eight Susquehanna students who walk in Macau and travel to other Chinese destinations.

Obviously, these are related, but I don’t know how much. I’ve observed essentially the same thing in the United Arab Emirates, although dissidents there don’t seem to be treated with such brutality as we see here. However, there are countries where people are both free and pretty safe walking around, for example in Scandinavia or The Netherlands. Thus political repression doesn’t appear to be a necessary condition for personal safety.

I’m thinking about this because I don’t feel safe walking around in U.S. cities after dark, or – in some neighborhoods – even in broad daylight. Poverty, racial tension, drugs, general hopelessness and a tough street culture all contribute to a social milieu in which personal safety is at risk, most especially for those who live there. While I look forward to returning to the land of the free, I don’t look forward to that feeling of apprehension when I park my car or get off the bus in an unfamiliar neighborhood.

Nothing But The Truth

We get news on at least three political levels here in Macau. For example, depending on the source, the recent “issues” in Tibet were: a) killer terrorists executing a heinous plot by the “Dali-clique;” b) a frustrated people who want more autonomy and religious freedom, but not independence from China; or c) the latest chapter in a history of heavy-handed and repressive responses to anything that challenges the authority of the state. We lean toward b) and c) as closer to the truth, but as Westerners, we might be expected to. Meanwhile, the Chinese-controlled press (including the English-language newspaper China Daily) repeat endlessly that the Dali Lama is behind the whole thing, that his offer to resign is both a lie and also part of his plot, and that Chinese authorities are merely trying to maintain social order.

I’ve gotten pretty fed up with the American press in recent years, and particularly with the spin doctors in Washington, D.C., who turn the Iraq tragedies into good news, and with campaign press releases that stretch the truth way beyond the truth. It has made me more suspicious of news in general and pickier about my news sources. But after reading the China press and watching the evening news here, I’m more impressed with America’s commitment to a free press and the determination of most reporters to get to the truth. There’s no pretense about a free press in China, and it makes virtually all news suspect – unless it’s about a new muffler on the local school bus.

Dubious Distinction

Years ago, when living very remotely in Montana, I was keenly aware of the state’s population density (6 per square mile, or about 2.3 persons per square km). At the time, I noticed that the tiny colony of Macau was the world’s most densely populated area, never imagining that someday I’d be living here! And enjoying it immensely! Then we moved to Pennsylvania (106 per square km), Portugal returned Macau to the People’s Republic, and I no longer paid much attention to population density statistics. Meanwhile, Macau’s land area of 15 square kilometers was practically doubled, to 28, by filling in the mud flats between the islands of Coloane and Taipa to create the Cotai Strip (get it?) where the major new casinos are being built. Game, set, and match, or so I figured.

This past Monday, the South China Morning Post carried a small article on Page A2, titled “Crowded Macau Takes Monaco’s Title.” The upshot is that while Macau’s area has grown, so has its population so that, once again, it is the world’s most densely populated region. For the record, there are 19,078 people per square kilometer here, or 49,412 per square mile. What’s more, there are several virtually uninhabited areas in Macau, with lovely – and empty – hiking trails. I’ve been on all of them and have seen fewer than a dozen other people in total. That’s good news if one likes the great outdoors, but it also implies that where people do live in Macau they are packed in pretty tightly.

A Trip to Guilin – Part 2

Friday was a free day for us to do whatever suited our fancy. Elaine and I were eager to see some of the countryside and to hike to the top of at least one of the hills. We invited the group to join us, but they all had other equally tempting plans, and thus it was that only she, I, and our guide Chris headed out of town on new single-speed rental bikes (about $5/day each). We rode for miles, sometimes seeing other groups of tourists on rental bikes and sometimes having the country roads completely to ourselves. We pedaled by farmers plowing flooded rice paddies with water buffalo, flocks of amorous ducks and an old beekeeper tending what looked like a healthy aviary. Little children peed from open doorways in various rustic villages. Incongruously, homes lacked plumbing (we saw several hand-operated village pumps) yet several satellite dishes poked up between old tiled roofs. The mountain scenery was utterly spectacular. We’d heard about Moon Hill, a hike up several hundred stone steps to a huge natural stone arch. Chris asked if we wanted to view it from a distance (his preference) or actually climb up to it, and to his credit – and a handsome tip – he joined us for the trek to the top.

A common “feature” of being a tourist in China is the rather constant barrage of middle-aged and older women trying to sell you something. Anything. Little carved wooden ducks, hats, DVDs, postcards, fruit, cold bottled drinks – you name it. There were several at the Moon Hill trailhead, carrying Styrofoam coolers and offering us water or soda. We declined as politely as possible, having already stocked up on water and oranges. There were even women with their coolers on the way up the hill, but at the very top, some 300 meters above the valley floor, was the oldest, sweetest and by far most persistent saleswoman of them all, perhaps five feet tall and probably in her 70s. We took her picture, and bought several postcards from her.

On the way back to town, we found ourselves in the middle of lots of bicyclists, tourists and locals alike, all of us sharing the road’s shoulder while motorcycles, large trucks and tour buses whizzed past. At one point the road led over a bridge where many bicyclists had stopped to view the bamboo rafts, and the girls on the tandem bike in front of me swerved over to stop, catching my front wheel and sending me tumbling to the pavement. As I struggled to extract myself from under my bike, three women rushed to me, leaned over me with serious looks on their faces, and asked in broken English if they could … sell me postcards!

Unscathed and not at all discouraged, we returned to Yangshuo, dropped off our bikes, and headed for coffee and curried potatoes at Minnie Mao’s. We bought a few souvenirs for family back in the U.S., joined the group for dinner, and then headed to our hotel room to catch our breath for just a few minutes before going out on the town. We must have been tired after our adventure because next thing we knew it was Saturday morning!

Saturday involved a bus ride to a riverside village and a boat ride to view the truly amazing mountain scenery. Our boat had about 70 passengers, and we were the only non-Chinese aboard. Everyone had cameras, and we all crowded the rails to snap away at cliffs, waterfalls and each other. The bus ride back to the Guilin airport provided a last chance to "ooh" and "aah" at the countryside, and we enjoyed an uneventful flight back to Macau.

We woke this morning to Easter Sunday, and to our delight seven of our group headed to the beautiful little church on the hill overlooking Taipa Village. This evening they’re all coming over for Easter dinner; Elaine’s cooking lamb and potatoes, and the students are bringing other goodies. It promises to be a joyful conclusion to a perfect holiday!

A Trip to Guilin – Part 1

Chinese often think of Guilin as heaven on earth. Steep and rugged limestone hills create a magical area of over 5,000 square kilometers, a seemingly endless succession of jutting exclamation marks with rivers, pastures, and occasional towns in the flat valleys below. Words cannot do justice to how awesome they really are.

Ten of us flew to Guilin for Easter break, leaving Macau on Wednesday afternoon for the 50-minute flight. Our group included seven of the nine Susquehanna students, an alumnus from SU’s Class of ’06, and an Anthropology professor – an American – at the University of Macau. (The other two SU students opted for a visit to the Philippines.) Guilin itself is a city of 800,000 in the northeast of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and a major attraction for both Chinese and international tourists.

Our guide, Chris Huang, met us at the airport and escorted us to our bus, a “Golden Dragon” 16-passenger model, piloted ably by Mr. Wong, a strong believer in the power of the horn. After a night in Guilin itself, we headed for our primary destination, the smaller city of Yangshuo, where outdoor recreation opportunities abound. River trips are available on large tour boats or tiny bamboo rafts. World-class rock climbing routes are everywhere, and several guide services are available to lead experienced climbers. There are even hot air balloon rides. And there must be thousands of bicycles for rent. The town itself features lots of shops with souvenirs and knockoff clothing, hotels, hostels, travel agencies, bars and restaurants, including Minnie Mao’s Café, a name that rather captures the East/West blend of the whole place.

On the way to Yangshuo, we joined the throngs on a tour through the Silver Cave, which was wonderful. Next we were taken to a “native village” where it slowly dawned on us that what we were witnessing was a remnant of three indigenous cultures. Each has been uprooted by the Chinese government from their original homelands and moved to the Guilin area. Basically, the peoples we saw have been reduced to dancing for tourists. In order for their unique and beautiful traditions and crafts to be “preserved for posterity,” the government has commercialized them. It was a sham, perhaps not unlike the way Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show depicted Native Americans in the U.S. 120 years ago. In retrospect we realized that our very presence contributed to the pretence, and wondered if a charade like this could be one of the travesties that native Tibetans hope to avoid. These seem like strong words, but I don’t want to be blithe about what we saw.

Today we joined 2,000 other tourists by the River Li for a Chinese opera of sorts, “Impression on Sanjie Liu,” created by Zhang Yimou, one of China’s most famous film directors. It was performed on the river – the world’s largest natural theater – by a cast of 600 hundred local actors. “Impressions” is a seven-chapter story of the Zhuang people, China’s largest ethnic minority, who for centuries have lived, worked, and loved in the Li River region of the province. It is a “must see” for any visitor.

After the performance I hoped to find some better hiking shoes than the smooth-bottomed and worn out tennis shoes I’d brought from the U.S. It had been raining every night and I knew we’d face slippery ground hiking on Friday even under the best conditions. To my surprise, even at 10 p.m., the entire shopping area (“West Street”) was in full swing, and I found a pair of hiking shoes and a pair of cross-trainers for a combined price of about $25!

Beachcombing

There’s a lot of concrete in Macau, many tall buildings, much noise and people almost everywhere, which is what made our “discovery” this afternoon so special. Needing to get out of the apartment for some fresh air, Elaine and I caught the bus to the sleepy, quiet village of Coloane on the southern tip of Macau. From there we walked along the beaches and rocks to Cheoc Van Beach, just the two of us, with a few fishing boats well off shore and the Chinese mainland in the western distance. Low tide, quiet, sunny, beautiful, perfect. At Cheoc Van Beach we found an outdoor café with two Brits at one table, a French family at another and one large, friendly dog. It was in every respect a perfect afternoon.

Stairs

The University of Macau holds many things: serious students, dedicated teachers and scholars, breathtaking views of the Macau Peninsula and the South China Sea, a great rock climbing wall and many others. It also is about stairs.

Growing up, my image of China was always of a broad and fertile valley dotted with rice fields and a few homes, with dirt roads winding through. The reality of Macau is that it is among the most densely populated areas on earth, and the university, instead of being in a broad valley, is rather perched on the side of a cliff. There are stairs, elevators and escalators everywhere. But mostly there are stairs.

Last week Elaine and I left our apartment early to watch the sunrise from the top of the highest classroom building on campus, and 364 stairs later there we were. The good news is that the stairs are a form of forced exercise, since the elevators are usually crowded with students who wouldn’t dream of climbing even two flights to get to class. We’re thankful for small things!

Church

Although Macau is fast becoming a city of steel and glass and gigantic modern buildings, there are dozens of Catholic churches and Buddhist temples scattered everywhere. Some of the churches date from the late 1500s, and the one we’ve discovered, on a hilltop about a 20-minute walk from our apartment, was built in 1865. Sunday Mass in Chinese is at 9 a.m., in English at 10 a.m. and in Portuguese at 11 a.m. We go to the 10, and our fellow churchgoers are primarily from the sizeable Filipino community. The Australian priest is humble, brilliant and a dedicated servant of God and his “flock” of parishioners. The choir of Filipino women evokes a childlike innocence. The place is filled with joy. I have been asked to be a reader each time we’ve gone there, and that role helps me be even more engaged in the service and sense of community. I don’t know that I’ve ever wanted so much to go to church on Sunday!

Prejudice

My wife, Elaine, a 55-year old grandmother of Scots, Welsh, and Germanic lineage, is also a full-time student here at the University of Macau. Like other Susquehanna students with us, she has had some encounters with prejudice. This is from a note she sent to one of our daughters:

I had a terrible/wonderful experience in my first Community Psychology class, last Friday morning. Arriving early, I had chosen a seat where I could be in the midst of the action. To my sorrow and horror, every one of the 19 Chinese students who came in later sat as FAR AWAY from me as they possibly could. It was excruciating!!! But, when the professor came in, she made some of the students come and sit near me ... which wasn't much better, because they still made it clear that I was not welcome. Still, over the three hours, our prof put me in a group with two other mainland Chinese girls (over 8,000 students from the mainland apply to the University of Macau each year, and only 200 are admitted, so they really are cream-of-the-crop spectacular students!!) and we had about 20 minutes to prepare a project on a community problem of our choosing. I mentioned the problem of "materialism" which was a totally new concept to my teammates. They had no idea what I was talking about. But they listened and thought about it, and BAM!!, when it came time to present our proposal to the class, my teammate stood, and nailed it in the most inspired demonstration of "getting it" (within a very short period of time) than I have ever seen! I could not help but clap spontaneously for her, and she in turn, high-fived me. In a way, she exemplified the rapid rise (within 15 years) of China itself - from an impoverished communist backwater ... to its role on center stage today.

At any rate, even though I was something of a thorn in the side of the class, politely raising my hand to point out every single (and they were constant) instance of anti-American bias, stereotyping and propaganda that underlies much of my classmates' personal ideology, by the end of the three hours, I no longer felt ostracized. My prof shared how she grew up in South Africa, spoon-fed the notion that black-skinned people were less intelligent than whites. She knew well that many Chinese think they are the superior race and that this elitism works against any notion of diverse community, which is what our class is partly about. ... So, it is all, um, very interesting! Frankly, because the students are truly top-notch, it is evident to me that they could very well think of themselves as "superior" to most anyone else on earth! THAT keeps me "ever so 'umble!"

Study Tour Group pics

We have returned to Macau from our study tour of Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia. Classes have started, the weather has warmed (finally) and we all have begun a new chapter here.

Here are a few select photos of the many, many that were taken during the two-week excursion:

The group poses with some children in Vietnam, after a trip by sampan to see some fish farms.





We visited Angkor Wat, the huge Cabodian religous "city" dating back to the 10th-12th century. We were blown away.




On our last night of the study tour, we had dinner aboard a boat that cruised the Mekong River at Saigon (officially known as Ho Chi Minh City).

Grainy Photographs

Like most of us who watched the news during the Vietnam War, my images of the conflicts, battles and torn lives on both sides consisted mostly of grainy, black and white photos transmitted by wire to the U.S. Even thinking of friends I lost there, or friends of friends, the images in my mind were always low-resolution B&W.

How different to be there, to see the Viet Cong tunnels at Cu Chi, to tour the American War Museum in Ho Chi Minh City, and to begin to understand, for the first time, the perspectives of the Vietnamese people who resisted and fought and killed my friends, and died. Dominated by the Chinese for a thousand years, colonized by the French for 90 years, these were people who had had enough control from outside interests, thank you, and who willingly gave their lives for independence. Kind of like their own Revolutionary War, which they won in 1975.

Drive-thru Supermarket

In Can Tho, Vietnam, I walked through a street market late in the afternoon, where people were buying food for the evening. Imagine a supermarket with one very wide and long aisle, and instead of shopping carts, everyone is on a motorbike, buying fish here, vegetables there, and pineapples down the aisle, haggling over prices, and receiving their merchandise in plastic bags that drivers put into little baskets or tied to handlebars or fenders. What amazed me most was how natural it all seemed; no one was honking or shouting, yet the entire scene was alive with activity and I, as one of the only pedestrians, had to weave my way carefully through the throng of vendors and motorized shoppers.

Drunk Driver

Highways in Vietnam are packed with zillions of motorbikes, many carrying entire families. It’s not uncommon to see a couple astride a motor scooter, with a small child or two on its mother’s lap, sandwiched between mom and dad. There are also large vans, buses, and trucks, and everyone is vying for position on impossibly narrow two-lane roads. It was terrifying to witness from the passenger seat of our bus, yet we only saw two accidents in some 200 km of frantic driving. We often seemed to be blazing along at reckless speed, but it was impossible to know how fast exactly, as almost none of our buses had working speedometers. Instead, most were “protected” by various amulets, and dried flower and ribbon charms “for luck,” dangling from the rear view mirrors. But more than luck was involved. We had countless near-misses, and give kudos to our drivers for their breathtaking skill.

At one point we saw a man on a motorbike weaving obliviously all over the highway, and almost tipping other scooters into the ditch or into the homes and small businesses set up where the road’s shoulders should have been. As we finally passed the bare-chested, middle-aged fellow, it was all too obvious that he was fall-down drunk, barely able to keep his machine on the road, and a threat to the already tenuous safety of everyone else around him. It may have been the first time ever that I saw so clearly the danger of driving while intoxicated.

Contrasts

We flew from Siem Reap, where we’d seen the amazing structures at Angkor Wat, and landed mid-afternoon in Pnom Penh. Our guide took us immediately to the “torture prison” where Pol Pot and his cronies imprisoned and tortured some 17,000 of his countrymen before sending them – beaten, blindfolded and broken – to the killing fields outside of town. Official estimates are that 1.5 million Cambodians were killed by the Kmer Rouge regime, but that doesn’t include the additional 1.5 million who starved or worked themselves to death just trying to stay alive. The photos in the prison include a wall of children, most taken with, and executed with, their parents. Another part of the prison consists of old school classrooms that had been divided into 3’ X 6’ cells, where landowners, doctors, teachers and anyone who might possibly have resisted were chained, with only a small bucket for collecting their own waste.

We left the prison and checked into a very nice 4-star hotel in the heart of town. One baffling feature was an insanely high-tech shower, measuring 3’ X 6’ and featuring remote controlled stereo sound, nozzles and air jets, a steamer feature, and gosh only knows what else. Within a mile of one another were examples of man’s capacity for unspeakable brutality, and human ingenuity that turns taking a simple shower into a memorable (although complicated and not altogether pleasant) experience.

Elephants

One feature of our time in Thailand was a 45-minute ride on an elephant. We’d all eagerly looked forward to this unique experience. I’ve concluded that thinking about taking an elephant ride is more fun than actually taking it. Pictured here are Susquehanna students Alex White '09 and Amy Markowski '09.

Exchange Students

A group shot of this semester's exchange students at the University of Macau during a tour of the city, in front of a Buddhist temple. Note the multinational character of the group - and our students' experience.

Differences

We anticipated that this semester in Macau would entail a lot of exposure to difference, and are pleased to report on some we’ve encountered so far.

The first is the wonderful variety of nationalities among the exchange students, who hail from, in addition to mainland China, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Columbia, France, Germany, Holland, Japan, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Thailand, and the U.S. As a result, our Susquehanna students are getting an exposure to diversity that ranges far beyond Macau and China. At last night’s orientation dinner the karaoke was quite the mix of styles and languages!

The second is the variety of food. On the first night of orientation, the University of Macau administrator who oversees exchange students deliberately took the group to a restaurant that serves, er, unusual foods. It reminded me of a coffee mug I had years ago, with the inscription: “Eat a live toad first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you all day.” The administrator, Grace Chau, told us that after this meal nothing else we encountered the entire semester would be so different. We hope she was right; our meal included cuttlefish, pig brain, chicken feet, snake, frog, sand worm, field worm, and the piece de resistance, silk worm larvae. I’m not kidding. Nobody died, and nobody even got sick. It convinced Elaine and me that under extreme situations, we were capable of ingesting protein we never imagined eating. And, the next night, at a Portuguese restaurant, we dived right in to oxtail soup, beef tongue, and fried pig neck as though they were no challenge at all!

The third is captured just a bit in the photos we took over the past few days:

Here is a “neighborhood” of high-rise apartments about a kilometer from the campus. Interestingly, it was shot from a beautiful nature trail that winds around and to the top of a wooded and uninhabited hill nearby.


We strolled through a section of “old” Macau, which is full of narrow streets with laundry hanging from windows and motor scooters everywhere.



One of the many charming churches, this one in Coloane Village at the southern end of Macau.


And those who want a glimpse of the ultra-modern Macau are invited to Google “venetian macau” to see the newest – and world’s largest – casino/entertainment/shopping complex.

Macau: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

In the mid 1500s, the Ming Dynasty allowed Portuguese traders to use a small, remote and all but forgotten peninsula in Southeast China. The most distant outpost of European influence, Macau enjoyed a heyday for over 100 years as the only permanent Western access point to the region. European traders at Canton were not allowed to stay beyond the trading season and maintained permanent homes in Macau. Macau-based traders took silk from India to eager buyers in Japan. The Portuguese navy maintained a strong presence based at Macau. Jesuits and other Catholic orders used Macau as “base camp” in futile hopes of bringing Christianity to the Chinese.

Then, over a short span in the mid-17th century, the Dutch began competing with Portugal for maritime control, and Japan closed its borders to all outsiders. Left stranded by receding European colonial interests on the one hand, and all but forgotten by China on the other, Macau receded into a more minor role as a diverse scene of languid decadence that attracted pirates, gamblers, artists, and people from all over the world escaping oppression, arrest and their former lives.

Macau’s role was further diminished by the founding nearby of Hong Kong in the 1840s, a concession by China to the British as an outcome of the Opium Wars. Unlike Macau, Hong Kong offered a sheltered deep-water port, and quickly grew to dominate trade activity between China and the rest of the world. Macau slipped further into obscurity.

Long administered as a Portuguese colony, Macau was “returned” to the People’s Republic of China in 1999, much as Hong Kong had been handed over by the British in 1997. Both are maintained as Special Administrative Regions (SARs) of the People’s Republic, a promise to leave their political and economic systems in place for 50 years.

Today, Macau is booming. Since 1960 the population has grown from 160,000 to over 500,000 today. The long-time gambling monopoly held by the Ho family was lifted in 2002. Now, ever bigger casinos are being constructed throughout Macau, particularly on what until recently were mud flats between the islands of Taipa and Coloane. Known as the Cotai Strip, it is home to the world’s largest casino (the Venetian, opened in August 2007) and an even larger GalaxyWorld Resort is under construction nearby. With several enormous casinos already, Macau has now overtaken Las Vegas in gambling revenues. Throngs of tourists from Hong Kong and mainland China visit daily. Macau also hopes to build its reputation as a destination resort with broader appeal – as a family-friendly place for relaxing, shopping and enjoying outstanding cuisine.

Macau is also a great vantage point from which to witness the rapid development of China and the Asia Pacific Rim. Over 200 years ago, Napoleon is alleged to have said: “Let China sleep, for when China awakes the world will tremble.” It is waking, the world is trembling, and the nine Susquehanna University students who are studying at the University of Macau this semester have box seats to view the rapid emergence of the region as a new world power.

The Adventure Ahead

One February several years ago, a colleague learned that he’d be traveling to Japan in June. He promptly set about to study Japanese culture, history, phrases, etc. in order to learn as much as he could before actually arriving. He told me later that he learned more about Japan on the bus ride from the airport to his hotel than he had in all of his studies over the previous five months.

His remark has had a lasting influence on me, and it has been borne out in virtually all of my international travel. There’s something about being there – seeing it firsthand, smelling it, hearing it, and being disconnected from one’s familiar home environment – that accelerates and intensifies the learning process.

One thing I’ve asked our nine Macau-bound Susquehanna students to do is write their impressions of Southeast Asia before getting on the plane this Thursday. It will be interesting to compare these thoughts with what they come to learn over the course of the coming semester.

Everyone’s very excited about the adventure ahead, I no less than the other students. There’s also a bit of nervousness and apprehension, which is probably a good thing given distances, language barriers, cultural differences, and all of the uncertainties that need to be managed in the moment. All of are also extremely grateful for this opportunity!

My next post will be from “on the ground” in Macau!