Interviews and Questionnaires

Had my first 4 interviews yesterday, all girls from the English teacher's class. We mostly spoke English, which was nice for me, and I think they appreciated the opportunity to practice their English. One of them told me that she had been a little nervous when she first came in and sat down, because it was her first time to speak one-on-one with a native English speaker, but by the end of the interview she was relaxed. It's interesting to hear about their future plans and their relationships with their families; in some ways, I think I would get similar responses were I to ask these questions of Sewanee students. Some things are different, though. I'm definitely noticing some "collectivist" tendencies, and I don't think it's just because I'm expecting to find them. When I ask what qualities a good leader should have, all of the girls replied that first he or she should be able to get along well with others. Somehow I imagine I'd get a different response if I asked American students that question.

I also got my first batch of questionnaire responses back yesterday, and Daniel and I began the mind-numbing task of entering everything into the computer. I consoled both of us by reminding Daniel that that batch was about 1/5 of the entire study, and since we knocked it out in an afternoon, we should have plenty of time to play in Shanghai and on our grand tour at the end of the trip. Speaking of the grand tour; I'm really excited about planning all that out. I think I'll wait until we get back to Shanghai to buy the tickets and everything, but I've been reading up on the destinations I want to go to in the travel book. It's going to be fun. Even if I do decide to drag Daniel to a bunch of temples...

We'll get the second batch of questionnaires this afternoon, which works out well since it's raining and not a good day for wandering the city. We've been to most of the tourist attractions here (although I'm still trying to convince Daniel that the Potted Plant Garden sounds like fun) so mostly we've been hanging out around the campus. I'm enjoying catching up on my reading and sleeping. Daniel has requested jiaozi for dinner, so we're going to have to venture out for that.