got shot, but only in the news. In their town, no one got shot.
WENDY / She’s amazed that instead of slums there are churches all over the place, I guess you don’t realize from the movies how many of them there are. Do we go to church, she wants to know, and is amazed when we say we don’t even though our mom does sometimes, because that’s what we decided and our parents didn’t make us. Like they said it was our choice.
LAN /
How could the parents let the child choose something so important? I could not understand it. Didn’t American parents care enough to control their children?
WENDY / — Not all parents do that, says Lizzy. Just some do. We’re lucky.
Lanlan gets quiet like for a sec.
— People can do whatever they want, nobody has anything to say, she says. Wow.
— Freedom, we say. America is about freedom.
— Freedom, she says, wow.
But then she says she thinks too much freedom is no good either, and that individualism is terrible, she hopes we don’t believe too much in individualism. I tell her I’m not sure what individualism even is, and she’s glad.
She is surprised how there are no Thermoses, instead lots of computers. Four just in our house! That’s because Dad’s in high tech, we say, and Mom has a home machine hooked up to work too, and we have some extra machines left over from whatever. It’s not typical.
— Wow, says Lanlan anyway.
We start to explain about the Internet, but it turns out she knows what that is already.
— In China, she begins.
And Lizzy says: — In China, big city have everything these days.
Then we all laugh. And how everyone crosses the street in the crosswalk downtown—Lanlan thinks that’s amazing, that people don’t just walk all over. Though how fast people walk here! Everyone in a hurry all the time.
LAN /
Chinese people were much more relaxed. Everything was so easy in America, so convenient. And yet people were tense.
WENDY / And the bicyclists all wear helmets, and how many cars people had!
— In China, many people have car now, she says.
But still she is amazed that some families have two or three, and that even some kids have cars. And will Lizzy really be learning to drive soon? She is surprised that people drive one-handed, some of them, and talk on their cell phones at the same time, she thinks everyone in America talks and talks, especially the children are so curious. In China, kids do not ask
why why why,
she says. Then make everyone listen to them, as if they have something to say.
— At school, people say American children are very easy, she says. People say you ask them one question they will talk, talk, talk. You ask them three questions they will love you.
— Like you ask us questions! I say.
She smiles her funny smile.
LAN /
At school, people say that when you talk to American children you have to ask,
You want this one or that one? The blue one or the red one?
Then they will be happy. If you simply say
Here is red one, I know you like red,
the children will not be happy. They don’t want you to know what they like, they want to choose for themselves.
WENDY / — That’s kind of true, says Lizzy. Like I wanted to have blond hair, I didn’t want my hair to be plain black until I died. Do you know what I mean?
Lanlan nods, but then she says: — Black hair very nice, nothing the matter with black hair. That is your natural hair.
She says she hopes we will not grow up
one hundred percent American.
First the children talk about themselves all day, she says, and then they think about themselves all day. All day long they think, What is my favorite this? What is my favorite that?
LAN /
Chinese people say Americans don’t care about other people, they only care about themselves. Americans do not take care of even their own mothers and fathers. When their parents get old, Americans just put them in a nursing home. Their parents die by themselves. Chinese people say Americans
WENDY / She’s amazed that instead of slums there are churches all over the place, I guess you don’t realize from the movies how many of them there are. Do we go to church, she wants to know, and is amazed when we say we don’t even though our mom does sometimes, because that’s what we decided and our parents didn’t make us. Like they said it was our choice.
LAN /
How could the parents let the child choose something so important? I could not understand it. Didn’t American parents care enough to control their children?
WENDY / — Not all parents do that, says Lizzy. Just some do. We’re lucky.
Lanlan gets quiet like for a sec.
— People can do whatever they want, nobody has anything to say, she says. Wow.
— Freedom, we say. America is about freedom.
— Freedom, she says, wow.
But then she says she thinks too much freedom is no good either, and that individualism is terrible, she hopes we don’t believe too much in individualism. I tell her I’m not sure what individualism even is, and she’s glad.
She is surprised how there are no Thermoses, instead lots of computers. Four just in our house! That’s because Dad’s in high tech, we say, and Mom has a home machine hooked up to work too, and we have some extra machines left over from whatever. It’s not typical.
— Wow, says Lanlan anyway.
We start to explain about the Internet, but it turns out she knows what that is already.
— In China, she begins.
And Lizzy says: — In China, big city have everything these days.
Then we all laugh. And how everyone crosses the street in the crosswalk downtown—Lanlan thinks that’s amazing, that people don’t just walk all over. Though how fast people walk here! Everyone in a hurry all the time.
LAN /
Chinese people were much more relaxed. Everything was so easy in America, so convenient. And yet people were tense.
WENDY / And the bicyclists all wear helmets, and how many cars people had!
— In China, many people have car now, she says.
But still she is amazed that some families have two or three, and that even some kids have cars. And will Lizzy really be learning to drive soon? She is surprised that people drive one-handed, some of them, and talk on their cell phones at the same time, she thinks everyone in America talks and talks, especially the children are so curious. In China, kids do not ask
why why why,
she says. Then make everyone listen to them, as if they have something to say.
— At school, people say American children are very easy, she says. People say you ask them one question they will talk, talk, talk. You ask them three questions they will love you.
— Like you ask us questions! I say.
She smiles her funny smile.
LAN /
At school, people say that when you talk to American children you have to ask,
You want this one or that one? The blue one or the red one?
Then they will be happy. If you simply say
Here is red one, I know you like red,
the children will not be happy. They don’t want you to know what they like, they want to choose for themselves.
WENDY / — That’s kind of true, says Lizzy. Like I wanted to have blond hair, I didn’t want my hair to be plain black until I died. Do you know what I mean?
Lanlan nods, but then she says: — Black hair very nice, nothing the matter with black hair. That is your natural hair.
She says she hopes we will not grow up
one hundred percent American.
First the children talk about themselves all day, she says, and then they think about themselves all day. All day long they think, What is my favorite this? What is my favorite that?
LAN /
Chinese people say Americans don’t care about other people, they only care about themselves. Americans do not take care of even their own mothers and fathers. When their parents get old, Americans just put them in a nursing home. Their parents die by themselves. Chinese people say Americans
Similar Books
