Thursday, December 18, 2008

ningxia or bust


































Here in Yinchuan, my assistant, treated me to the local delicacy of sheep-innards noodle soup - it is halal, and not bad tasting with enough chili sauce.


Although my time here is very boring and VERY slow moving, this place is kind of growing on me and I will certainly always remember my dissertation field work days.



Thankfully, the people here are so awesome. I have a research assistant, Ms. Zuo Xiao, and other friends here at the University that have all been so helpful in my wild endeavors to examine this crazy water resource bureaucracy. Another interesting thing about being in Ningxia, as opposed to Beijing or Shanghai, is the types of other foreigners I meet. Out here, smack in the middle of the ancient Silk Road most of the students studying Chinese are from Africa and Central Asia (the 'stans). This is for several reasons, first because of proximity, we are not far from Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, etc. Second, because the Hui people are Muslim so many Muslim students feel comfortable to study here where there are many mosques. Third, because this isn't exactly a tourist mecca, studying Mandarin at Ningxia University is cheap and affordable to people from the developing world.



In Beijing the foreigner crowd is diverse, but mostly consists of Europeans and North Americans looking to live out their orientalist dreams (like me!), or cash in on the 1.2 billion new capitalists (like me too!).


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