Journal Entry - Starting Classes

Week 1 and 2
Entry 1
I guess the first thing that I should talk about for one of these learning journals is probably the first two weeks of class and how we didn’t really have class for many of the classes that I was looking at taking or auditing. Dr. Christensen, I think you had mentioned something about this before in our internship preparation course, but I think yall should tell students about it a bit more in depth or let them read some of the previous journals so that they know exactly what they are getting into.
Its really not that complicated, but I do think it’s a little unnecessary. The first two weeks are for first year masters students, but for those who have already been here before, classes do not start until the third week. I’m not sure why they do this, and I don’t think its particularly necessary. However, in China’s defense, I was venting with my friend who finished his masters degree in India, and he said they do something similar. Maybe all crappy third-world education systems do this because they are based on the Soviet Model. Or maybe they actually have a good reason and I just haven’t figured it out.

Entry 2
I’m going to keep talking about the one week three week split, since it is the most interesting thing that has occurred over these past two weeks (since most of my classes didn’t start meeting until today).
This split is not as straight forward as it would seem though. It is not just first year classes meet week one and other classes meet week three. In the course catalog, they listed classes as 08级 and 09级, the first being those that started the first week and the latter being those that started during the third week. But almost all the classes that I wanted to take were in the level 8 or were unclear in how they were designated in the course catalog. So I just went to them.
The first one I went to was a success, which is strange because it was not a first year class. Huh? Everyone in the class knew each other, and the professor had taught them all before. But it meet on the first week? I’m really not sure what’s going on, and I don’t know that I will ever be able to now. But its been kind of interesting trying to learn.

Entry 3
I realize this must be boring for you to read three entries on the same topic, but it has been a study in Chinese culture, trying to figure this class thing out. The next few entries will probably be about this topic.
So today, I went to a class with Thomas, from BYU, and Lauren, a girl from the University of Oregon who I got to know at the OSU Qingdao Center. The class was on China’s political systems and it was listed not listed as an 08 or an 09 class. We got there a little early, talked with some of the students in the class. But the teacher didn’t show up. We waited for fifteen, then twenty minutes, and we started to wonder if they had a fifteen minute rule in Chinese Universities. No one else left, so we dared not leave either. But around the fifteen minute mark, some of the students got on their phones. They were calling friends to see who had the number of the teacher. Eventually they called enough people and found the teachers number. Once they talked with the teacher, he said, “Oh no, class doesn’t start until the third week.” I don’t know why everybody got it wrong except for him, but it made me feel a little bit better that I was not just a stupid foreigner.

Entry 4
The fourth day of my classes, I went to another class in the morning. The classroom was full of students who were sleeping on books, busy looking over some of their notes or surreptiously chating. I sat down at the front of the class, near the only electrical outlet so that I could plug my computer in. And then I waited. About fifteen minutes into when I thought the class was supposed to start, I looked around and realized that I was doing something wrong. Unlike the other class, no one seemed perplexed by the teacher’s tardiness. I leaned over and asked a girl in front of me if she knew when the teacher was coming. She had no idea what I was talking about. I asked again, rearrange my sentence hoping to make my question clearer.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t my bad Chinese that was the problem. She, along with most of the people in the classroom, were not students in the class I wanted to take. Fortunately, she turned out to be the daughter of a professor in the history department, the same department my class was in. I gave her my phone number, and she said she would call me with more information on the classes.

Entry 5
The next day, that girl sitting in front of me eventually called me back with the numbers of some students in the history department who could help me. I took down their numbers and thanked her, and started calling the numbers she gave me. The first was a number from a professor, and he did not answer. I am kind of glad that he did not answer because I would have felt awkward talking to a professor, asking him when some other professors class was supposed to start.
The next person I called was a student. She picked up and I immediately asked her if she knew when the class was going to start. This was a mistake. I could tell she was a little put off because I had not introduced myself really. Nevertheless, she gave me the number of another person who should probably know (she was a student of ancient Chinese history and the class was on Taiwan-mainland history, so she did not know).
Finally, I called the next girl, this time making sure to explain who I was and what my situation was. She seemed quite happy to tell me that the class would not be starting until the third week, and that it was a three hour class, not a two hour class.

Entry 6
For my final entry for this assignment, I’m going to talk about the final problem I had with classes starting. I went to a class that was supposed to start during the first week (like all the others), but I did not expect it to. It was difficult to find the building. No one had ever heard of the Center for the Study of Chinese Philosophers. It turned out to be squirreled away in a small house behind another building.
I went to that building. It was abandoned except for janitor/secretary in there. I mentioned the class, and she said that the teacher was in a meeting this week so it would not start until the second week, and that the time had been changed from Friday morning to Thursday afternoon. Really? Next week, I went to the class on Thursday afternoon and the teacher and another student were there, just as she had said. But the classes eight other students were not there. Just as I thought I had gotten the hang of it, I lost it, but, like the time we meet and the teacher was the only one who did not show up, this time it was not really might fault. Someone else had messed up too, a comforting thought for an American trying to figure this whole thing out.