Who on the faculty is in charge of off-campus studies and what is the email address? Who in the Chinese department (and email address) would be most interested? (Kim B.?) I plan to find out about existing programs here at Zhongshan U. They might be ok for Colby students. regards, tom

However, hotmail will pick up popmail over the web, so we are using hotmail for the time being and processing email very slowly over the web. I can be reached at
trberger@colby.edu
trberger99@hotmail.com
stswym@zsu.edu.cn (Yanming Wang)

Now on to the web. All web access if filtered. We were unsuccessful reaching CNN, CBS, PBS, and other news services. However, we did find ABC. However, there was no time to see if all the news was there. We get a huge number of TV channels from PRC and Hong Kong. There are two Hong Kong channels mostly in "mostly English." Almost every news cast is "bleeped" at some point or other. The newscast just stops, we see some stills for a bit,then restarts. We do get news from VOA over the radio.

I think that Guangzhou is more "up to date" than most US cities. The array of foods available is mind boggling. However, most of it is pretty unfamiliar. On the other hand, Coke, Macdonalds, KFC, Pizza Hut, etc. are universal. We get off the bus outside the South Gate of the university in front of a Macdonalds. Jeanne insists we must eat there, but I have been resisting so far.

The city water seems fine but tastes awful. We've been eating pretty much everything. The strange herbs ands spices are creating trouble with our innards, but we don't seem to have acquired any bugs. We are learning rapidly to use chopsticks. They do almost anything is a very leaky fashion. The people here are very nice, if totally unintelligible. Many kids say, "Hello" and "How are you?" The schools seem to be putting on a big push to teach children English. In both India and China our overwhelming impression is PEOPLE!!! People everywhere in very large numbers.

Labor is cheap and this completely alters how people approach tasks. They were removing some trees here on the campus. The wood is hardwood. The tree was down and was being cut into logs about 2 meters long then loaded onto a truck. All of this was being done by hand. Several men were sitting on the ground sawing through the log. I am sure they have chain saws and the like, but this task is obviously not economical to do that way. Building is going on everywhere. This place is wealthy and growing at the rate of 15% per year. (That's growth of wealth!) Wood just about does not exist since China was logged off centuries ago. So temporary barriers are brick walls. The bricks are laid by humans and then taken down with a jack hammer and humans. Workers on a building live in temporary concrete and brick buildings that are torn down after the project is complete. One can't really tell the difference between permanent and temporary construction except by theshape of things. Temporary buildings are usually one or two stories near a high rise and are very blockish and straightforward. The soils seems to consist of real soil mixed with broken concrete and brick pieces from eons ago. People here work very hard and for long hours. And, as far as we are told and can see, they are much much wealthier than their parents or anyone in their past.

The next impression after people is heat and humidity. I guess this is the tropics. We are just about right on the Tropic of Cancer. Our host has an apartment on the fifteenth (top) floor of a high rise. The view from their place of the city is spectacular. But as time passes, higher rises are going up around them blocking some of their view. The Pearl River flows through the center of the city and there is a great deal of fancy development along the river. The place has been perking along for 4,000 years so we have seen some stuff that is almost a couple thousand years old. Since people don't like old stuff (even in the US), most of the old stuff is gone. That's probably more than you wanted to know about China, so I'll close. regards, tom

General comments: Food and water do not seem to be a problem in Guangzhou. The water tastes awful, like Southern California water, so we drink bottled water. We're eating too much fresh fruit so that is a problem, but no more than in Maine. The tropics have a wild array of fresh stuff. The pineapple is unbelievably fresh and sweet. The spices affect us but we're getting used to it, so life is an eating adventure. The guidebook says that if it moves, they eat it in Guangzhou. We can say that if it is edible, they eat it: every single part. The heat and humidity are oppressive but bearable. The heat mist is great. However, the sky is not brown with pollution as I expected. Yanming lives on the 15th floor so the view is incredible from his home. He has a garden on the roof. So, more will arrive soon as this computer adventure continues.