To Be or Not To Be a Professional Juggler

Maybe I will stay in Beijing for another year. That means that maybe I will stay in Beijing until 2012, and maybe I won’t go to Spain until the 2012-2013 school year.

This is the option I am considering: after finishing my year of work at American House in June, I could get an apartment in the inner east side of Beijing, closer to the Cervantes Institute, close to the GuLou area, and close to Natooke. As my primary occupation, I could help Fede teach juggling and acrobatics to children in international schools, as well as performing juggling and acrobatics around town with Fede and his Beijing Performers group. It would be fairly easy to extend my visa. I could also still go to Spain, just a year later than I had originally planned on. It has been there for several hundred years already, I imagine that it will still be there for the next decade.

Living on the east side would put me closer to the Cervantes Institute. Currently it takes me about 90 minutes to get to the Cervantes Institute by public transit or by biking. Taking a taxi is certainly much quicker, but the price of it causes me to avoid it in most situations. This potential life of next year would allow me to have less than a 40 hour work week, thereby allowing me to spend more time doing Spanish language activities, whether that is studying, conversing, or watching movies. Both a professional focus on juggling and a less than 40 hour work week would allow and encourage me to improve my juggling skill. The same goes for the other skills that I could perform, such as fire staff and partner acrobatics. Although a less than 40 hour work week is a big desire of mine, even if I spent 45 hours a week doing it, I think I would enjoy 45 hours of teaching and performing juggling and acrobatics more than most jobs.

I think that one of the biggest benefits would be that when someone asks me what I do, I could honestly respond “I am a juggler.” Call it a dream, but I would love to be ably to honestly consider myself a professional performer and a teacher of circus skills. Fede says that there would be enough work to make a living from. I tend to not frivolously spent too much money, and although my standard of what counts as enough money might be a bit higher than Fede’s (due to monthly payments of college debt), I can always do other freelance jobs to supplement my juggling income. If I felt that I needed extra money to supplement that income I could always do a few hours of English teaching here or there.

Fede has also said that he would welcome my help to teach and spread his Body Foundation method (a health and fitness centered curriculum), which is another thing that I would love to be a part of. He has already said that, if the budget he receives allows it, he would welcome me to go with him to Tibet next summer to train the local teachers in his method. That would also serve as my training in how to teach the method, after which I would be able to do the training without Fede’s supervision. Fede has already taught some preliminary form of his program in Sudan and around Beijing. I have no doubt that he may try to teach it when he is visiting his girlfriend in the Central African Republic in January and February. If I were to help him with this project it could potentially give me a lot of opportunities to travel to various African countries to train local staff at schools and NGOs. I would love it if it involved some Latin American countries as well, and there is no reason why the curriculum could only be applied in China and Africa.

Even if I end up pursuing this future, I would still fly back to the United States during the summer of 2011; I want to take care of my oral assessment with the State Department and I want to go to Jocco and Allie’s wedding. There is also an important person or two that, although I did not make explicit promises to, I said that I would see very much like to see during the summer.

On learning Spanish, and on being (thought of as) mixed blood

I took the level test at the Cervantes Institute today, and I tested into B.12, which is a lower/middle level of the intermediate level. It was a little shocking to realize just how much I have forgotten since June, but I think it is perfectly understandable since I have studied less than a dozen hours over the past four months. Although the Spanish conversation nights are going well and adding a few new faces each week, I think that nothing but sitting down and studying is gonna help me remember all of the verb tenses that I have forgotten how to construct. Anyway, since it would take me so long to get from my home to the Cervantes Institute I decided to enroll in an online course (for about 1/8 of the price of an in-person course). If I want to take a course in person, I can always give that a shot in January, when a new round of classes start. In the mean time I will use self-study, the online course, and the conversation night to try and improv my Spanish a bit.

Aside from actually registering for the class, the most interesting part was when one of the people working in the office asked me (in Chinese) "Are your parents both from the United States? Why can you speak Chinese? Are you a mixed blood child?" I told her that both my parents were born in the U.S., and I just happened to decide to study languages when I was in college. She said I looked like I could be a mixed blood child. It once again illustrated what I perceive as a common view here in China: foreigners learning Chinese is not normal, so if a foreigner (like me) can speak some Chinese (like I can) there must be some special reason or unusual situation for it (such as being half-Chinese, as I am not). I think the idea that people can learn any language they like without any special reason is quite foreign to many people's mindsets around here.

Netbook, iPod, Spanish

The best part of life at the moment is that I am still so excited about my new computer. Just so you know, it was not a frivolous purchase either. My previous computer was crippled by an internal hardware problem which caused it to freeze up after a few minutes of use. I was able to find, via NewEgg, a new laptop which fit my requirements for the lowest possible price. I got a netbook, so it is very small and very light. As a consequence, it is very portable. I am actually writing this into a word processing document while sitting on the bus. I am very pleased that I found a seat. In fact, the reason that I have my little netbook with me is related to the worst part of life at the moment: my iPod touch is broken. I am now the owner of a very expensive second hand Apple-brand paperweight. I normally wouldn’t complain a lot about a small piece of electronic equipment getting broken, but this is a piece of electronic equipment that I tend to use a LOT and which is expensive enough that I would want to think long and hard before purchasing a new one. I used the iPod for making phone calls via Skype, for sending text messages to friends in the United States, for keeping up to date on both world news and on China-specific news, as well as for mapping locations and routes, converting currencies, and the incredibly versatile English-Chinese and Chinese-English dictionary. Fortunately, my new netbook can perform most of these functions either at the same level of effectiveness or at a lower but acceptable level. However, despite how beautifully small it is, it is neither as convenient nor as portable as the iPod.

Why am I using my netbook on the public bus? Because this is a long bus ride! It takes more than an hour to get from my home (which is on the west side of town) to the Cervantes Institute (which is on the east side of town). I went to the Cervantes Institute for their Spanish corner, which happens every Saturday afternoon. I didn’t go just to practice speaking and listening though! I also came armed with several sheets containing details about my own Spanish conversation night that I am having over on the west side of town, near where I live. I got Professora Selma (the lady who taught the first Spanish class that I ever took) to correct it, and I met and told several Chinese students about it, some of whom I think are very likely to come!