Sunday, April 6, 2003

From: Meg Thomsen meginchina@yahoo.com
Goodbye to China

Dear Friends and Family,

When we first got to our site, Peace Corps gave us an assortment of forms to fill out. One of them was called the "Site Locator Form" for emergency evacuation. Caryn and I worked on drawing our map of Dengguan, laughing at the silliness of drawing a map of a helicopter landing site in Dengguan. It was there, in Caryn's living room, that we developed our Evacuation Fantasy.

It goes like this: Caryn and I are industriously teaching class one morning. Suddenly, we hear a whirring outside. We hear, "Go, go, go!" and suddenly, a band of Marines burst into our classroom. The students' eyes grow wide. "We've got to go! Now!" they shout. "But our students, our lessons," we protest, like the model volunteers that we are. "There's no time!" they shout back. We run after them, and the helicopter is hovering over the sports field. Two hunky Marines (Caryn interjects here that her hunky Marine is a bald lady Marine in a wifebeater t-shirt) come swinging down from the chopper on ropes and sweep Caryn and I into the sky. We rise into the sky still dangling from the ropes, a la "True Lies." As we soar down Dengguan's only street, the last thing we hear is the lonesome cry of a motorcycle taxi driver: "The foreigners have left!"

Evacuation fantasy is quite different from evacuation reality. On Friday morning, we found out that all volunteers were to leave China due to SARS. We had no additional warning, just a little over twenty-four hours to pack our bags and leave. No chance to say good-bye to our students, no chance to do much of anything except frantically pack and give away all of the possessions which we have accumulated in the last two years. No chance to feel the sadness which is so natural at this time.

Why is it so frustrating to leave Peace Corps? At times, I have hated this place. I have taken out my calendar and literally counted the days until I could go home again. I have gotten into fights with taxi drivers and fruit vendors, gotten chewed-up corn cobs thrown at me by a man selling bicycle seat covers, been called a cultural imperialist, and broken into frustrated tears at times. There are times during my service when I have not been proud of my behavior. There were times when I wanted to skip class and hide under the covers all day. But I never left. And I dragged myself out every day to teach. Somehow, despite my laziness and my weakness, I have made this work. It has taken the better part of two years, but I finally feel comfortable here. I feel like I'm not a bad teacher, and that at times I may have helped some people. China has shaped me. It's made me a different person than I was in Boston.

It took about 3.25 seconds for the news to travel around Dengguan that I was leaving. My apartment was filled with people helping me pack, giving me going-away presents of wood-ear fungus and plastic Snoopy dolls. Our school organized a hasty going-away banquet with "many delicious vegetables just for you, Tang Mali." I watched my apartment turn from my home back into the dingy cement box that it was when I moved in.

Caryn and I loaded all of our things in the car. There was only enough room for us and Yang Ning, our waiban. However, Liang Aiping and Han Lu decided that they also wanted to see us off, so they hopped on the bus for the 4 1/2 ride to Chengdu.

"SARS?" they said, "There's no problem. The Chinese government has it under control." "Maybe you should take this to protect you," added Han Lu as she thrust a bag of Half Blue Root medicine to take with me. "This will keep you safe and healthy." She smiled. As we rumbled down the highway, we noticed one of the new billboards that the government has erected all over the highway: "Sichuan Province: A Disease-Free Zone."

We left Chengdu early the next morning. It was a grey day as usual, and all of us were crying as we embraced and said good-bye to this place which somehow has become our home. We piled onto a bus, then a series of airplanes, and now we're in Washington for the next week.

I realized something as I packed some things and threw out others. This is life. All of this time, I've been mistaking my old life in Boston for my life, and thinking of Peace Corps as something that fills the time until I get back to my real life. And I've been missing the point.

Each morning, I walk to the market to buy the day's vegetables. I buy one jin of tofu and whatever vegetables and fruit are in season. I joke with the ladies at the market, and I teach class. It's a simple life, but I built it myself. I have had the good fortune of knowing some wonderful people. And now, I am gone.

And I come back realizing that my life in Boston is gone too. I have no apartment, no job and no money. And somehow, in that there is a certain freedom. There are a million directions, and I could fly in any one.

I joined the Peace Corps because I wanted to cut the fat off the meat of my life. I wanted to learn, and I wanted to test myself. And I have, I have. And somehow, although I have left in a flurry and don't know what the next step might be, I feel like I'm heading in the right direction. Because if I built something in China, I can build something in Boston. Or Washington. Or Seattle, or Paris, or Tokyo, or wherever I might happen to end up.

I will return to Boston next week, and look forward to seeing you soon.

Love, Meg

I stepped from plank to plank
So slow and cautiously;
The stars about my head I felt,
About my feet the sea.

I knew not but the next
Would be my final inch,--
This gave me that precarious gait
Some call experience.

-Emily Dickinson

Love, Meg