For a more "objective" account of my days in Hefei and USTC, click here for a student-written story -- with full-color pictures!!
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Last night I attended what was billed to be (and described by colleagues as) traditional Hefei opera. Unfortunately, it wasn't all that. It kind of reminded me of long ago when you'd find a very cheap "Beatles" LP in a cutout bin and buy it, only to discover the tiny print after you'd get home: "As interpreted by the Clyde Singers Five."
I went with a new foreign grad student who arrived in Hefei a few days ago from Poland, Agata Pienkosz. (More about her unlikely appearance at a later date.) As she and I were walking with the student who brought us to the theater, the student told us of the first time she'd gone to the opera. Her grandmother had brought her, but the affair proved too much for the child and she fell asleep. "My grandmother was so mad at me," she said. Then, years later, the student returned the favor and brought grandma to the movie theater to see "Harry Potter." And, yes...grandma fell asleep! In her defense, grandma said, "All that flying around and magic...it's just nonsense!" I feared I might fall asleep during the opera because some Chinese traditional opera can go on for many hours. Supposedly there's a difference between, say, Beijing opera and the kinds native to other regions. I can't tell much difference. The dialogue is mostly sung, in a very nasally fashion. Agata is a huge opera fan back in her native homecity of Warsaw, where there are four major opera houses. What we got, however, was not a play. Present was the ubiquitous host of all Chinese entertainment, who would come out from backstage wearing a strapless blue dress and announce the next song (all in Chinese language). Then a performer would come out. One guy was dressed in a pastel dress shirt with a cheap tie. Not exactly traditional unless "Death of a Salesman" has passed into antiquity. Toward the beginning, two men and two women came out and hopped around to a song that they were lip-synching. I looked over at Agata and saw on her face pure astonishment. Later, she leaned over and said, "This is the strangest opera I've ever seen." Well, it wasn't really an opera. It was only certain "hit" songs excised from various plays and sung to the audience (which was very, very receptive, I should add) at deafening decibels. Anyway, click here for the jump and a few pictures. Just outside the walls of USTC is the building pictured below. Quiz: Who or what is housed in it?
The answer after the jump... You've probably never heard of the city of Hefei, in Anhui Province. Well, keep reading this blog in the weeks to come and you'll learn what I'm learning. The city's biggest claim to fame is being home to the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) -- the "third best university in China," as the staff and faculty regularly point out. I'm here as a "visiting professor" for the summer of 2010. While I am the holder of no doctorate nor tenured faculty position, flying over the Pacific Ocean from America to mainland China has magically granted me the title, apparently. I'm here for the university's summer school session, which is covering topics such as intellectual property rights and transportation/logistics. What do those things have to do with Professor Crane? Well, I'm giving lectures on copyright law, plagiarism and cultural/communication differences between Chinese and the Westerners. More on those later. For the moment, I just want to offer a photo of me and two of the summer school's incoming freshmen who did a little sightseeing with me recently.
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Crane
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