In all my thinking and preparing for this competition, I hadn't considered make-up. Of course. I'm going on TV. There will be make up. One of the first activities after arriving in Beijing for this competition was getting made-up for our photos. Yes. That's right. We got photos taken in both our 'tradition dress' (for America I decided that meant a suit...my grey, shiny one that is) and one in the official t-shirt.
Coming out of baggage claim on day 1, we were met by representatives of CCTV and the competition, complete with video camera recording our arrival. The first evening was spent getting made up and having pictures taken. Day two involved getting dressed up again and heading to the TV station for pictures. This involved a lot of standing around, lining up on the front steps and yelling the competition slogan over and over and over for the video camera. Then there was lining up and running past the camera one by one for yet another shot.
Last night entailed an inspection of our 'costume' for the first night of competition and a 'party'. The 'party' was basically an audition of sorts. One the last night of the competition, several contestants will be selected to perform regardless of whether they've been eliminated prior or not. We started about 8pm. There are about 100 contestants. I was number 31. Taking my dutar and donning my dopa, I took the stage and sang my heart out. To be honest, my hope is to nail down a chance to perform that last night. As you can imagine, 100 performances took a bit of time. Let's see if I make the cut.
Now. Regarding the contest itself. It's interesting arriving in a place for this kind of competition. I don't know what anyone else was thinking but I was immediately sizing up everyone's language proficiency. What I realized very quickly was, "holy crap. these people are freaking awesome at Chinese!" As I thought through my interactions with my fellow competitors I considered learning to say the infamous reality TV line in Chinese..."I didn't come to make friends. I came to win." I would be all hard and serious and intimidate all my opponents. After assessing the advanced level of Chinese here I have firmly settled on a more relaxed stance, "I didn't come to win. I came to make friends....and nail a spot to perform on national TV."
In all seriousness it is an honor to be here. There are several hundred thousand international students in China. It's an honor and privilege to be standing side-by-side with some of the best in the country. These are very hard-working and gifted students. I'm blown away by the young woman from Latvia doing her masters in law, or the guy from the states studying medicine, or the Russian student studying engineering. It is no small feat to study these majors, let alone in a foreign language. And Chinese at that. My hope is to take the route of humility and realize I can learn much from my fellow contestants. There have been several times where I didn't understand what people were saying to me. My hope is that I can take a stance of humility and simply ask for clarification. Doing this, I stand to benefit from a lot of new friends and some free Chinese tutoring!
Stay tuned for more adventures from Chinese Bridge.....the official competition starts August 15th.
Coming out of baggage claim on day 1, we were met by representatives of CCTV and the competition, complete with video camera recording our arrival. The first evening was spent getting made up and having pictures taken. Day two involved getting dressed up again and heading to the TV station for pictures. This involved a lot of standing around, lining up on the front steps and yelling the competition slogan over and over and over for the video camera. Then there was lining up and running past the camera one by one for yet another shot.
Last night entailed an inspection of our 'costume' for the first night of competition and a 'party'. The 'party' was basically an audition of sorts. One the last night of the competition, several contestants will be selected to perform regardless of whether they've been eliminated prior or not. We started about 8pm. There are about 100 contestants. I was number 31. Taking my dutar and donning my dopa, I took the stage and sang my heart out. To be honest, my hope is to nail down a chance to perform that last night. As you can imagine, 100 performances took a bit of time. Let's see if I make the cut.
Now. Regarding the contest itself. It's interesting arriving in a place for this kind of competition. I don't know what anyone else was thinking but I was immediately sizing up everyone's language proficiency. What I realized very quickly was, "holy crap. these people are freaking awesome at Chinese!" As I thought through my interactions with my fellow competitors I considered learning to say the infamous reality TV line in Chinese..."I didn't come to make friends. I came to win." I would be all hard and serious and intimidate all my opponents. After assessing the advanced level of Chinese here I have firmly settled on a more relaxed stance, "I didn't come to win. I came to make friends....and nail a spot to perform on national TV."
In all seriousness it is an honor to be here. There are several hundred thousand international students in China. It's an honor and privilege to be standing side-by-side with some of the best in the country. These are very hard-working and gifted students. I'm blown away by the young woman from Latvia doing her masters in law, or the guy from the states studying medicine, or the Russian student studying engineering. It is no small feat to study these majors, let alone in a foreign language. And Chinese at that. My hope is to take the route of humility and realize I can learn much from my fellow contestants. There have been several times where I didn't understand what people were saying to me. My hope is that I can take a stance of humility and simply ask for clarification. Doing this, I stand to benefit from a lot of new friends and some free Chinese tutoring!
Stay tuned for more adventures from Chinese Bridge.....the official competition starts August 15th.