One Off the Bucket List

Today's weather: High = 33 Low = 19
Sunny

It would be nice if the school gave us Easter holiday break, but this being a communist country, it's an unlikely scenario. We do, however, get May Holiday break coming up for a blissful 3 day weekend. Still trying to figure out my plans for that.

A couple weeks ago the crap hit the fan with about 5-6 things all going wrong at the same time. If anyone has lived in China for any period of time, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. When it rains, it pours, and things happen SIMULTANEOUSLY that require urgent attention to deal with.

Up until now, I've been able to tackle one item off that 'bucket list' with successful resolutions looming on the horizon. First is that the former host and current co-leader (both Chinese females) of the course I lead on weekends are agreeing to meet together and discuss their emotional conflicts with each other face-to-face, with myself and another man acting as intermediaries. It really and truly feels like the 6-party talks with North Korea and the USA as the antagonists, with the other 4 parties along for the ride to work together and facilitate a positive outcome.

Since the host and co-leader are still on edgy terms with another, it's a great relief that they've stopped trading insults with each other indirectly, and are now ready to sit down and talk directly to each other about the problems they have wiht one another. However, I'm definitely going to be facilitating this meeting. Up until now, we've had maybe 8-10 meetings without the two antagonists present. We've mainly just been relaying messages and meeting about when we should meet next.

Welcome to China!!! This is exactly how it works when face issues are involved. Related to my former post on halfpat culture shock, this is precisely why I write these blogs, because otherwise some uninformed westerner would just step in and make a criticism like, "why can't they be mature about it, and why do the Chinese act like children this way to drag out an emotional conflict to involve more and more people because one person lost their face"

The answer to this quesiton is:

a. I don't know why
b. I don't care why
c. Why questions are not to be asked in China

Basically I have a personal involvement in this issue, which depends on everyone getting along on my team. That's why it's key that the relationship problem between host and co-leader can be resolved, for the smooth running of this course, and for the purpose of forgiveness.