ENTERTAINMENT / Hot Pot Column
The big smile said it all
By Judy Polumbaum (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-03-29 10:28
My dad, who passed away six years ago, was one of the most affable people
you can imagine. When I was a kid, he used to mortify me by striking up
conversations with total strangers everywhere.
Parents' quirks often surface in their children, of course so eventually,
as an adult, I found myself doing the same thing. Just ask my kids;
they'll tell you how I constantly embarrass them by chatting with people
I've never met before and may never see again in elevators, in line for
movie tickets, at the grocery store.
A freelance photographer, my dad faced subjects ranging from diplomats
and corporate executives to artists, athletes, fishermen and factory
workers, so his ability to get along with everybody served him well. At
bottom, though, it was not utilitarian purpose that gave rise to his
friendliness; it was a profoundly democratic attitude that made him
converse as easily with a US senator as with a janitor.
I'd actually been pathologically shy as a child, but once I started work
as a newspaper reporter, my inheritance became second nature. After all,
much of journalism's raw material comes from listening to strangers. And
sometimes the best stories and sources come from serendipitous encounters
on the street.
While my days of daily reporting are past, my journalistic habits
persist, and I continue to find chance encounters a source of endless
fascination. Now that I'm back in Beijing for a couple of months,
however, chatting with strangers takes on new dimensions that I don't
always welcome.
On the one hand, if I initiate the interaction, typically with a request
for directions, I get gleeful reactions to my Beijing-inflected Mandarin
Chinese. On the other hand, Chinese who notice this middle-aged casually
dressed woman with dirty-blond hair and green eyes wandering a subway
platform or a department store may well seize a chance to practice their
English.
Being a sounding board for a language learner is not always my idea of
fun. If I'm tired, distracted, or in a bad mood, or if the speaker seems
to be talking at me rather than to me and doesn't catch what I say
ever-so-slowly in response, I'm seldom inclined to carry on. I prefer
two-way communication, for what is a conversation if not an exchange?
An incident last week, however, reminded me that crossing paths with
strangers has its own rewards. I was waiting to board the light rail when
a fellow with shaggy graying hair wheeled by on one of those folding
mini-bikes. "American?" he asked in English. When I said yes, he gave me
a big gap-toothed smile and pedaled on.
Half an hour later, he passed me on his bike in the street; evidently
we'd disembarked at the same station. He halted to give me a hearty
greeting before cycling on. In another 15 minutes, as I was walking on a
college campus, there he was again, rounding a corner. He told me he was
visiting an uncle who worked there. Again, he cycled off.
On each occasion, I got another smile. I didn't feel like a lesson plan.
I felt like we were old friends.
(China Daily 03/29/2007 page20)
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