Nothing to Prove

I commented on the weather to my cabbie.  It’s lovely today.  He immediately replied that the this was special-ordered weather.  There is an event today, welcoming leaders of the world to the capital.  I’d see various flags flying yesterday along beside the Chinese flag, every one- hundred yards or so, on the drive out to the Yanglin Exit.  “They wanted beautiful weather.”  Perhaps the clouds were seeded.  Perhaps something else was done.  Perhaps it’s just a nice day and not a “fake” nice day.

My older one is learning Scuba Diving or an upcoming trip.   I took her down to the first class this morning.  I wish I could have stayed and learned with her for the rest of the day.  I’d like to go scuba diving, but I need to fly out to the U.S. in a few hours.   The open water aspect of the training will apparently be done in a lake near the Great Wall.  I couldn’t catch it but perhaps it’s the Miyun Reservoir?  The teacher reminded her that there wouldn’t be much to see in that cold dark water.  Such is the manner of scuba lessons in landlocked Beijing.

The teacher seemed like a nice young man.  Everyone’s young these days.  I used the facilities and when I returned my daughter was in a room with a half a dozen other young people filling out a form.  The teacher commented to my daughter that he had an English one as well, but she quietly confirmed that she was just fine in Chinese.  He looked over her shoulder and noticed her Chinese name was Zhang Lan and said as much.  She corrected his tone with one syllable utterance.   He laughed and commented that her Mandarin was better than his.

I watched al this felt proud, of course, that unlike me she was truly bicultural, bilingual.  I thought of all the times I overreact to someone’s innocent observation about my Chinese with an over assertion of my ability, which only goes to the rickety nature of my confidence and capacity.  My daughter had nothing to prove.  One syllable and she’d quietly asserted her mastery of the language.  The thought of investing any more air proving anything was entirely unnecessary.    I fear that sort of confidence and mastery may remain forever illusory.

Saturday 05/13/17