Zài Zhōngguó (在中国): The Beginning

Zài Zhōngguó (在中国), or “In China,” details my almost three-week trip to China in 2024, and uses that trip as a springboard to explore a wide range of topics – travel, culture, history, the arts. Most importantly, I hope this blog will serve as an opportunity to celebrate our global humanity. The blog reflects my own thoughts and recollections. Please forgive any errors or omissions. Respectful corrections are appreciated. 谢谢。

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In November 2024, I embarked on my first trip to Asia. I spent a few days in Hong Kong before spending almost three weeks in China. I traveled to Shanghai, Beijing, Chongqing, and Chengdu, with a few day trips to smaller cities. Upon learning of my trip, a number of people have asked,

“Why China?”

“Do you have any connections to China?”

I can imagine that it might seem odd to some that a Black, Caribbean American woman from Brooklyn would decide to take a solo trip to China without a pressing reason. (No, I wasn’t heading to China for a music conference or to attend a friend’s wedding.) And people might better understand someone of my hue and nationality traveling to Japan, South Korea, or Hong Kong…but China? Makes some folks wanna scratch their heads. 哈哈。

Well, let me start by addressing the first question. Those of you who have read my ethnographic memoir, East of Flatbush, North of Love: An Ethnography of Home, know that my father has practiced martial arts for as long as I have been alive, and even trained my older brother (我哥哥) and me as children. To this day, my father and I bond over watching martial arts films (功夫电影). But outside of wanting to visit the Shaolin Temple (which my brother, after visiting China in 2008, warned me is a tourist trap), and knowing that I wanted to visit an East Asian country one day, I never had a pressing urge to visit China. Truthfully, I was following an intuitive nudge to visit the country that began with a strong desire to learn Mandarin in December 2023 and continued to grow in 2024. But more on that later.

The answer to the second question is a bit more involved. My connection to China? Where do I start? Perhaps I’ll start with Charlie and his scaredy-cat dog. Charlie was our Chinese neighbor. He lived next door to my family’s home in Diego Martin, Trinidad. His scaredy-cat dog was a German Shepherd (or Alsatian as my mother says) who apparently did not live up to his breed’s reputation.

Then there was the Chinese couple who owned a Chinese restaurant (中国饭馆) on Montague Street in Brooklyn, named “China Chili.” My father had become friends with the owners after patronizing their restaurant for years. I was a little girl when I first visited the restaurant. After many years at that location, they had to shut their doors due to rising rent. By then, I was a teenager. Perhaps, the restaurant’s closure was an early indicator of the gentrification trend that would start hitting Brooklyn in earnest by the early 2000s. I still have fond memories of going to that restaurant. We were treated like family. In those days, it was our go-to spot for special occasions (outside of Red Lobster. IYKYK).

And then there was my dear mentor and undergraduate professor, the late Lise Waxer, whose Chinese ancestry was not always visible to the naked eye. In the years since her passing in 2002, I often wondered what role her heritage may have played in her understanding of and dedication to Black, Brown, Indigenous, and Asian (BBIA) students on campus. She saw everyone. Besides the Chinese connection through Lise, my voice teacher for four years in college was born and raised in China. And there were other ties to China – friends and colleagues, from high school to the present day – who are from, or for whom one or both parents are from, China or Hong Kong.

Also, in graduate school, I was part of the Chinese ensemble. It would have not been my first choice, but ensemble participation was part of our graduation requirements, and this was the ensemble on offer while I was doing coursework. I don’t regret it. I learned to play the gǔzhēng (or zhēng) under the tutelage of Mercedes Dujunco and Susan Cheng. I later incorporated some of what I learned into the music classes I eventually taught as a professor. And as life would have it, some twenty years later, during my visit to China, I would be reintroduced to the gǔzhēng. More on that later.

For now, I think that about sums up the extent of my connection to China, at least what I can recall after a bit of thought. Although it is more extensive than I even realized, and maybe more than the average American, it still is minimal. While none of those connections to China is what prompted me to travel there, I have no doubt they influenced my approach to and understanding of the country and its people. Chinese culture was not as foreign to me as one might expect it would be for a Black, Caribbean American woman from Brooklyn. But this does not mean there wasn’t a lot for me to learn. There were many surprises for me to be had on this journey Zài Zhōngguó (在中国).

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