I am aware, and have been for some time, that I am hampered in my ability to learn about (and exist in) China by the fact that my Chinese is rather poor – this seems like a rather ridiculous statement but perhaps it’s not. You get used to being able to survive in China with little to no Chinese, used to understanding things on the basis of what you see, refracted through the lens of your western-ness. Helped only by English speaking Chinese friends and family who tend to represent a particular section of society or by non English speaking friends where the discussion and analysis gets dumb’d down to the level of your of Chinese.

I want to be able to read the graffiti (not that there is much to read), listen to conversations on the bus (not that I ever get on one) read the local newspapers, read the chitter chatter of the Chinese blogosphere.

I want to read articles like this one, because I am aware that because of my inability with the language I miss out on this kind of input and lots more besides. Currently my mental map of China and Chinese-ness is too full of the spitters, the queue jumpers, the dumb / racist comments said to you or about you when someone is assuming you don’t understand, the horrendous way that people treat other human beings on the road, etc. I need to be able to speak Chinese properly to open myself up to other inputs to restore the balance.

Tip of the hat to the humanaught as that is where I found the link to the danwei translation of the article.