Individual Research Project

The questions I asked in my interviews

Every semester, my program assigns a 独立报告 (dulibaogao). Basically this is an independent research project that encourages students to use their language skills in the “real world.” The student topics range from “how the Olympics affected China’s…(whatever)” to “Chinese government’s relationship with the media.” I chose to do my first independent project (I have two because I will be here for two semesters) on “Beijing’s mindset towards working-out and the peoples’ perception of health.” My first round of interviewing people took place this weekend.

Because I am only a second year student, the program arranged for a teacher to accompany me on my first round of interviewing. We both went to a park near our school to survey some park dwellers. Most of the people there were really friendly and eager to help out. I interviewed a total of 4 people. In addition to going to the park, I also went to the local “Bally’s” (of which I’m a member) to interview some trainers. Surprisingly, their answers were strikingly similar. Here are some of my favorite responses.

Q: Does the Beijing air pollution concern you when you exercise outside?
A: No, the bad air is only in other parts of the city, not in the parks (which are located in the middle of the city).

Q: What foods do you consider to be beneficial to your health?
A: You can eat anything as long as you only eat a little bit of everything.
A: Very little meat and lots of liquid-like food/vegetables (everyone holds this belief)

Q: Can you describe the typical person who attends this gym?
A: yes, FAT

Also, I had a pretty cool experience today. My buddy and I went to a very expensive mall near our school so he could buy his Chinese friends a nice present. The mall is top notch and only filled with Gucci, Prada, Chanel, etc. In the basement, there is an upscale food court and a few more stores. We went to a tea store so he could invest in some quality oolong tea for his friends. I think he dropped about $100 USD to buy about a medium sized zip-lock bag of tea. Anyways, while he was selecting his tea. I was fiddling around with a tea set. The tea sets surprisingly are very intricate and have a bunch of tools that accompany the pot and cups. When I asked the shop attendant how to use them, she  told me to sit down and she could show me. For about two hours we sat there and talked while she brewed two sets of leaves. One set of oolong tea leaves can be brewed about 8 times. The experience was really beneficial to my learning Chinese. It also was pretty rewarding to be able to sit down with native Chinese person who isn’t a teacher and, for the most part, be able to carry on a decent conversation in Chinese. What was nice was that it was all free and I’m pretty sure she would have stayed and chatted with me for many more hours if I didn’t have to go. Perhaps I’ll return there in the future…