American Girl Trapped in a Chinese World

Here is a speech I did for a creative writing class I took this past semester in college. Ni hao means Hello in Mandarin and Xie Xie means Thanks. 

Quick Language Note: the Chinese characters for hello look like this: 你好 and the Chinese character for Thanks consist of the same character twice. It looks like this: 谢谢。Enjoy my speech!

-Spencer

Ni hao!

I can stand in front of you today and totally, honestly and freely confess that I am in Love!  The Love of my life makes me so happy and gives me that butterfly feeling every time we get together, but it’s not what or whom you might think.

I am an American girl trapped in a Chinese world.  I have always wondered why I was so intrigued with the Chinese culture.  From the time I was a little girl, I was fascinated with the faces, the food and the physiques. 

I have an uncanny feeling that my paternal grandmother has Asian descent in her DNA, which means I have it in mine too. That makes me happy!

When I came to Syracuse my freshman year, I was paired with a Chinese student who became my roommate.  I often listened to her conversations that she was having over the phone in Mandarin and became even more determined to learn the language. She taught me a lot about the culture and we became great friends.

I tried for the longest time to suppress this Chinese longing but it just would not go away.  I am definitely in love!  Call me crazy but I know that I am an American girl trapped in a Chinese world.

I have always had a knack for languages, English being my first language, then at an early age, mastering Spanish, even making Spanish my minor.

That was until I decided to see if the grass was greener on the other side and decided to get a private tutor last summer and fell in love, not with the tutor, but with the Mandarin language.  I finally felt free and alive! I am so glad I cheated on my Spanish love. It was worth it because  I found my true love.

While most kids my age are going out on dates, attending all you can drink parties, hanging out late at night, I choose to hold hands with my Chinese notecards, get my ear nibbled on by Chinese audio sessions and wake up early in the morning getting verbally drunk by having conversations with my Asian friends and watching any Chinese video, whether it’s a song, a movie  or anything that would allow my heart to skip a beat.  Yes, I am in love and I know that I am an American girl trapped in a Chinese world.

I will be going to Beijing in the fall to study abroad.  I know this will be an experience of a lifetime.   I am extremely excited to learn and grow while I am there. I have always had a love for travelling.  Not only do I find travelling as a way to escape from what is normal, it is also a way for me to see how another culture operates daily and at the same time, I get to meet new people and learn how they live their lives.

Once I started learning Mandarin last summer, I have been taking Chinese courses at Syracuse and even changed my minor from Spanish to Chinese Studies.  I plan to take intensive language courses in Beijing and want to be fluent in the language.

I love languages and I believe that learning a language is a way to set yourself  apart from other people, but also communicate with different kinds of people.  I dare to be different. I don’t want to be put in a box and I am not afraid to explore other cultures.  It gives me great satisfaction to see the look on people’s faces when I speak a sentence or two in their native language.  It makes me feel proud of my accomplishments.

I know that I am an American girl trapped in a Chinese world.

While in Beijing, I hope to improve my Mandarin, especially my listening and speaking skills, because 现在，我会说一点儿普通话, which means because right now, I can speak a little Mandarin.

I believe that anything I want to achieve comes with hard work and a lot of practice and like any solid and long-lasting relationship, that’s how I have been approaching my studies with Mandarin.

My example has been my parents who are celebrating 23 years of marriage this year and I hope to sustain my love for Mandarin just as long, and just in case you are wondering, I am trying hard to get them to understand the basics of Mandarin.  Now, that’s a work in progress.

At Syracuse, I am majoring in Broadcast journalism.  One of my goals for the future is to be an international correspondent.  I love the idea of anchoring and reporting.  Public speaking is one of my many strengths and I believe that this is the job for me.

I find that when you know more about the world and about people in the world, you can contribute to the global community in many ways imaginable.  You can communicate with people in different languages and can travel to many countries to report internationally on news abroad.  I believe that when you know a lot about how other societies operate, you can excel in the broadcast business.

Studying oversees will open my eyes to the world around me and I will soak up every bit of information that I receive.  I am super-excited to grow from my experience and return to the States with tons of knowledge of China.

I challenge any one who wants to grow, to get out of their box, to dare to be different, learn a new language.  I guarantee you will definitely fall in love. 

You will grow in many areas of your life.  Your life will never be the same.  Don’t be afraid.  Learning,  growing and setting goals takes commitment but anything worth having is worth working hard in order to be successful.   

I want to return with a solid grip on Mandarin and speak conversationally without hesitation so that I may be that international reporter who delivers news in multiple languages. 

It just takes a lot of dedication, hard work and global knowledge of the world to get there.

And who knows, this American girl who is trapped in a Chinese world may even get a chance to stop dating her notecards and really get her ear nibbled on in Beijing.

 Xie Xie! 

Spencer