Sticking my neck out

As I've written here and on Facebook, it's been a trying week in Chinese class. Fortunately, the great outdoors is close at hand, and a negative-ion shower proved to be just the tonic I needed this morning as I explored Mason Neck State Park, a Virginia state park just a short 45-minute drive from Falls Church.

The first trail I took after parking in the picnic area lot was the Bay View Trail. The bay in question is Belmont Bay, located at the mouth of the Occoquan River and part of a network of waterways leading to Chesapeake Bay. The trail followed the shoreline of the bay before turning inland:

The views of the interior were no less impressive as the trail passed through a freshwater marsh, tinged with the colors indicative of the onset of fall:

From the marsh, the path made its way through the forest. From the Bay View Trail, I continued on to the Wilson Spring Trail, and then the Kane's Creek Trail. From the latter, I took a detour onto the Eagle Spur Trail. The latter route is so named because it ends at an observation blind overlooking Kane's Creek, which is a nesting and roosting area for the bald eagle. I spotted several birds of prey circling the skies over the treetops in the distance, but a park ranger who was leading a troop of boy scouts confirmed that they were turkey vultures, and not the national bird. It was still a nice out-and-back walk:

The rest of the hike consisted of ambling through the woods, as I made my back to the Kane's Creek Trail:

As I was zip-a-dee-doo-dahling along, I came face-to-face with a deer walking toward me. The deer got off the path and moved into the woods, but it didn't seem too perturbed by my presence. A couple that passed by while I was taking the photo below told me that they had just seen a fox cross their path a few moments earlier:

Following my brush with Bambi, I returned to the Wilson Spring Trail, which in turn connected with the Bay View Trail, from where I made my way back to the parking lot. Mission completed and head cleared, I'm ready to tackle 中文 again in the week upcoming.

Today's vital statistics include a walking time of roughly three hours; a distance of about 5.5 miles (8.9 kilometers); and an elevation gain of 250 feet (76 meters).

The trials and tribulations of 中文

My drink of choice before starting my Mandarin Chinese 普通话/國語 homework...

It's been a rough week in Mandarin class. Without being informed in advance, I was placed in a new speaking class beginning on Monday afternoon (my morning reading class hasn't changed). That in itself wasn't a problem, as I'm not opposed to change, and I was welcoming a new challenge. Unfortunately, though there was only one other student in the class, her listening and speaking abilities were far greater than mine. Furthermore, she and the teacher had a well-established listening, questioning and reporting regime going that left me feeling clueless, helpless and intimidated, and definitely on the outside. In fairness to the 老师, she tried to incorporate me into the new routine, but it was clear to everyone there that I was out of my element. Frustration bred resentment and anger, to the point where I just started refusing to even try, not wanting to humiliate myself anymore (I'd already had my share of those kinds of moments when I was living in Taiwan). This morning I met with the head of the Mandarin Chinese department at the language section, and told him everything. He agreed that I had been misplaced, and this afternoon I found myself back in my original class. Back on familiar turf, I was able to open up again today, but I feel that a week has been wasted, and what little confidence in myself that I had going into this week has been all but shattered.

Let's face it - I don't think I'm ever going to be an effective communicator in Mandarin Chinese. Despite years of living in Taiwan, and having a wife and a child who both speak the language fluently, I still struggle to form coherent sentences. Even worse, my ability to comprehend the language when it is spoken by others is abysmal. Why do I suck at it so badly? The reasons are many - feel free to take your pick: a fear of making mistakes and losing face; shyness, especially when it comes to having to use a language other than my native one; and a thin skin that provides little protection during those embarrassing moments that arise out of misunderstandings and miscommunication. My wife says I worry too much, while a couple of the teachers at FSI 外交学院 have told me I stop and think when I should just open my mouth and let the words fall where they may. All of them are right.

One other factor may be at play - I am not a Sinophile. During one of the lessons this week, the teacher showed some slides of famous locations in China - the Great Wall 长城, Shanghai  上海 and the Terracotta Army 秦兵马佣 in Xian 西安. My classmate (who I felt sorry for, having to put up with me) had visited all of those places, but when I was asked if I would like to see them as well, my reply was 没有意思, meaning I have "little interest" in doing so. OK, a big part of my answer was plain old pique, as I wouldn't pass up a chance to go sightseeing in China (and I'll be going to Shanghai next year, provided I pass the Mandarin class). But China has always been at the bottom of my list when it comes to Northeast Asia. Whether it be history, culture, cuisine or modern society, Japan has always held pride of place for me. I am also 很有意思 when it comes to Korea, and I would like to visit Mongolia and Tibet someday as well. But what about Taiwan, you might ask? For me, the interest there has always lain in the differences between Formosa and the Chinese mainland, and not the similarities, and especially in the ways in which Taiwanese society absorbed, and continues to absorb, the influences coming from Japan. Not for me is the myth of a 5000 year-old unbroken civilization, and my efforts at Mandarin acquisition have suffered as a result.

Excuses, excuses. I've only myself to blame for why my Mandarin Chinese is as poor as it is now, and only I can overcome the many hurdles that I've put it in my own path. I'll do whatever it takes to get through the course, and be on my way to Shanghai when the time comes. Just don't expect me to wax lyrical on the beauty of  山水画 or on how tasty the 饺子 are. 

Though I do hope to eat some 炒饭 while admiring the peaks of 桂林 someday.

...and my drink of choice during and after studying Mandarin Chinese.

Arbor(etum) Day

It took some aimless driving around downtown Washington, D.C., and I had to stop and ask police officers on two occasions for directions, but eventually we found our way this morning to the National Arboretum, a surprisingly expansive oasis of flowers, plants and trees located in area of northwest Washington filled with warehouses and auto parts shops. It was worth the effort to get there, and not just because there was no admission charge. Among the things the three of us did today:

First order of business was to stop and feed the koi コイ 「鯉」, those ornamental carp one so often sees in Japan (and also in Taiwan, for that matter).

The koi feeding frenzy was an apt introduction to the adjacent National Bonsai and Penjing Museum. Bonsai 盆栽 and penjing  盆景 are the Japanese and Chinese arts, respectively, of torturing unnaturally tiny trees. The bonsai in the photo above is not only an elegant 400 year-old beauty, it's also a survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima 広島 in 1945, emerging unscathed from the blast despite being less than two miles from the hypocenter; concrete walls saved it from destruction. The bottom bonsai is a work of art entitled Goshin from noted horticulturist John Naka.

Across the road from the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum is the National Herb Garden, where the butterflies were out in force.

After pausing to eat the snacks we had brought with us, we made the short walk up to Mount Hamilton. The mountain is covered with azaleas, though none of them were in bloom at this time of year (I imagine spring would quite a sight here). Still, all the foliage really made it seem like we were miles from the District of Columbia, though at the top glimpses through the canopy served to remind us of just where we were.

Coming down the mountain, we walked through the National Grove of State Trees (I couldn't find any giant sequoias, the state tree of California), then made our way over to the surreal Capitol Columns. These Corinthian-style columns were part of the east portico of the Capitol Building between 1828 and 1958, when they were relocated to their present home in a meadow at the National Arboretum. It felt like wandering among the ruins of an ancient temple in Greece.

By this time, the girls were tired of walking, so it was decided to explore the rest of the arboretum by car. Actually, we didn't come close to checking out the "rest of" the arboretum, as the grounds cover 446 acres (180.5 hectares), but we did take time to see the Youth Garden and stroll through Fern Valley. Our final stop of the day was the Asian Collections, consisting of plants native to China, Japan and Korea. The path meandering down through "China Valley" led to an unlocked fence, which in turn provided access to the Anacostia River. It was here, in the warmth of a late afternoon in early fall, that I felt like I'd stepped back in time to a lazy waterway in the deep South. Evocations of Stephen Foster, resulting from an easily impressionable mind?

Utilizations

In one of those little slices of small town (OK, suburban in our case) American life, the city of Falls Church's Department of Public Utilities held an open house this Saturday morning. "Come and see the equipment and utilities demonstrations!" announced the flyer that my daughter had brought home from school a couple of weeks earlier. "I want to go" announced my daughter. And so my daughter and I went, and so Amber had a good time. There were plenty of free goodies for the young ones, including a plastic hard hat, a "City of Falls Church Public Utilities Open House" T-shirt that Amber wants to wear to school on Monday and an eraser shaped like a dump truck. I myself made off with a free mouse pad that had the customer service number for the public utilities department printed on it:

As promised, there were utilities demonstrations. Here, Amber tries her hand at pipe cutting. She also got to maneuver a heavy piece of pipe using a control panel:

The highlight of the morning, though, had to be the opportunity to sit behind of the wheel of a variety of equipment and vehicles, including backhoes and dump trucks. Amber tried all of them out:

Following the end of the open house, the two of us went to a local park, where Amber rode around on her bike for a while, and then finished the afternoon with a fittingly apt dip in the apartment complex's pool. Single people might smile wryly at the thought of a visit to the local public utilities department as being the highlight of a sunny Saturday, but when you're six years old, there can be few finer activities than getting a free hat and being allowed to act like a working grownup for one short morning.

Cliffs Notes

The weather in our area has been very nice of late, but this development has not been convincing enough to persuade my wife to join my daughter and me on our weekend walks. Her loss was in evidence today as Amber and I made our way out to Calvert Cliffs State Park in Lusby, Maryland, located on the Western Shore of Chesapeake Bay, not far from the mouth of the Patuxent River. In only 90 minutes or so after setting off from Falls Church, my daughter was ready to hit the Cliff Trail at the park, butterfly net in hand:

It was an easy walk of 1.8 miles (2.9 kilometers) from the start of the trail to Chesapeake Bay. The red-blazed path began at a small pond:

Wild mushrooms were sprouting everywhere we walked this afternoon. Although Amber loves mushrooms, she knows not to pick the wild variety:

My daughter takes a break in an armchair (including footrest) that someone had thoughtfully carved out of a felled tree:

Roughly halfway to the shore, the trail opened up to reveal a large marsh. Evidence of beaver dams could be easily seen, though the engineers themselves remained elusive:

On the other hand, the local turtles were not so shy:

It was already beginning to look and feel like fall in the marshes:

The highlight of Calvert Cliffs State Park is the cliffs that give it its name. They are 100 feet (30 meters) in height and were formed 18 to 15 million years ago during the Miocene epoch, when the southern part of Maryland was under the sea. The area has proven to be a bonanza for fossil hunters (according to the information boards), but the cliffs themselves are off-limits due to instability. On the other hand, the beach is open, and the waters of Chesapeake Bay felt warm enough that I had wished we had brought along swimming suits. That didn't stop my daughter from having fun, as she set about looking for shells to bury in the sand:

For the return leg of our walk, we opted for a longer path back to the parking lot. This route, the Orange Trail, was more heavily forested than our trail in, though it passed through Thomas Creek Bog as we set off:

The Orange Trail followed a lot of up-and-down terrain, but Amber didn't seem to mind much. Though butterflies proved to be elusive for the most part, she was happy picking up acorns from the ground, and watching Daddy longlegs crisscrossing the trail:

My child of the corn. Just before taking this picture, a park ranger came by to warn us to be careful of hunters in the woods (the very ones we had just been walking through!). Although hunting on state land is banned on Sundays, the ranger told us illegal activities do take place, and that accidents do occur. Soon after the photo was snapped, we were warned by some hikers coming from the opposite direction to beware of a copperhead snake lurking in the grass off to the side of the trail ahead. Unfortunately, we weren't able to catch a glimpse of the magnificent beast, but we did reach our parked car without having been shot or bitten:

The vital stats for today's outing include a total distance of 4.8 miles (7.7 kilometers); a gain in elevation of 330 feet (101 meters); and, most importantly, one very satisfied offspring.