I’ve been rather busy with lots of random stuff, which I’ll get onto, and yesterday had my first meeting with my new language exchange partners here in Xiamen. That is where I’ll start.
I met Jia through CEAC, he is a postgraduate art student who has been stringing out his studies in Xiamen University for seven years now, something I too would be inclined to do in his position. Jia introduced me to a friend of his who I will also exchange with, Lizzie a native of Fujian province who works in IT. They took me to a cafe where I drank my first decent cup of coffee since arriving. I have noted the address. Tea here is varied and often wonderful; coffee is an imported habit and rarely what it can be. I read that Starbucks opened their largest store in China just a few days ago here in Xiamen so there must be some movement here. Anyway, sitting in a far nicer local cafe, Jia showed me some of his work and we talked about a language exchange.
The work he showed was a folder of photographs and video stills. It was clearly accomplished. In one way the work was familiar in terms of the photographic language: highly staged portraits that were close to performance and installation. In another respect I was aware that the specific symbolism used was often unfamiliar to me and I was left asking myself to what degree would having access to this information enhance my appreciation of the work. In other words, I was trying to work out how to look at these photographs, how to position myself in relation to them. This is a bit of a running theme when looking at work here and I daresay similar questions may attend Chinese viewers of my performances. I am no believer in universals but I can see how some things travels better than others so do wrestle with this issue when making and adapting performances. In this instance I was lucky enough to have the artist present so we could have a conversation around the work and this issue of how to look at it.
Now the random stuff… The first I can file under weddings. I was doing a few more preparations down at the beach and came across a wedding photograph bonanza of at least 5 couples. What was unclear was whether they were models or genuine brides and grooms. The wedding industry is rather large and conspicuous and the photographs are often taken before the wedding day. They are, in effect, high-quality staged photographic performances. A young woman who was working as part of the crew stopped me to say hello and practice her English so I took the chance to ask here if these were real or fake. Her English did not quite go that far however and neither did my Chinese make it in the other direction so I will have let these blissful brides and grooms hover somewhere between real and fake, in a zone that I will simply call professional.
Returning to another theme, the size issue, I have found that the kitchen was designed for the same person as the shower.
Something I knew would be an issue is crossing roads. There are some larger roads that have three lanes in either direction and you have to cross them in stages, pausing between lanes with traffic flowing either side around you. What I usually do is wait till I see some Chinese people crossing and then follow them as they make their way across. Last night I got caught out and found myself at a crossing with nobody around so had to brave it myself. To cross safely you have to think a bit like the driver and do it by negotiation realising that the car always has the stronger hand. There is a leap of faith moment and then you have to just try to relax into it. I have seen few accidents so this system must more or less work but it is a lot more improvised and takes a bit of getting adjusted to.
