frauke at large

Been back in Europe for about 3 weeks now and just thought I’d write down a few of my thoughts and impressions since returning.

My very first observation was that everything was so neat and tidy … no room for chaos, dust and the ‘Shanghai’ shabby chic which I have come so accustomed to since living in China. Particularly the quaint, narrow, bendy roads of the villages, with the almost toy like houses struck me, compared to the hundreds of sky scrapers shooting out of the ground like mushrooms all over Shanghai and NingBo. Further, everywhere is so empty – more a function of population size than desertedness or hiding as a result of having lost the Euro 2008 final, I know, but still strange when the last 5 months have been filled with the endless redefinition of the boundaries of personal space and the continuous trying to avoid bumping into someone.

It’s also nice to be able to read and understand everything everyone says – although sometimes it’s better not: it can be rather cringeworthy. The other day I had to listen to an obnoxious passenger complaining about the lavatory facilities at Amsterdam airport, could have done without the details, thank you! Language can really facilitate an enormous amount of intrusion of privacy. This scenario would have nicely passed me by without the slightest registration back in Zhongguo.

On the other hand, I do miss trying to decipher what the written language says – now that I have taken to learning Chinese characters, I find myself addicted to trying to find the ones I know, understand the meaning of new ones, finding their radical and then from the content of other characters, piecing together some context – it’s not always successful. I also miss the life being played out in the street, the street vendors, the open-air food stalls (not so much the stinky tofu) and the general sense of ease and calm. I guess my impressions of ease and calm might be because of my disconnectedness due to the language barrier; it could very well be that life is just as chaotic as it is in Europe, just that I can’t partake in that sense because I am still very much an outsider looking in with very limited reference points, but then again it could be a focus on different priorities.

Nevertheless, it is nice to see the blue sky, the contours and the different shapes of the clouds and then the stars at night. Certainly the two places are like day and night and by no means comparable, but both are charming, stimulating and enriching in their own way.

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