Yvonne, a special friend of Chinese

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Yvonne, a special friend of Chinese

For Yvonne and Norval’s 50 years anniversary

Dreamer

I first met Yvonne in spring of 1996 in a boarding school in China.
At that time, Haikou Jingshan School was not like it is now. It was only a group of villas in the Bai Shui Tang area. At that time the School only had about 40 staff members, and Yvonne was one of the founders..

I was the only doctor there building the school clinic. Yvonne was the first American I actually got to know. In 1996, Haikou was not an open city, and foreigners were really rare. Her special beauty, warm heart, sincere friendship and understanding mind really brought a new culture and fresh air to the school and she became a friend of many teachers there.

I personally became her friend from the day I was asked to help the communication between her and the school’s chef since I spoke a little English. My English was very poor, but I could use my dictionary to simply communicate with her. After the first talk, I asked Yvonne to help me to practice and teach me English.

In China, when people build a school, the school needs to be running at the same time. At the beginning of the spring in 1996, there were already 200 students in the school (from kindergarten to high school), and the daily teaching and living was already started. As the school doctor, I was responsible for all the students and staff’s health 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I lived next to my office so that people could find me whenever they needed me.

When Yvonne and I started the English teaching and learning, it was already Autumn of 1996. The student house and the clinic were moved to the new building in the other end of the Bai Shui Tang, but Yvonne, teachers and the kitchen were still in the villa area which was 20 minutes away from the actual school campus. Because the villas were temporarily borrowed from a company, the owner felt there was no need to make the road nicer and even put some lights on the side of the road. So the 20 minutes walking was a challenge for most of the teachers, especially when it was dark.

The only free time I had was in the evening between 8:00 to 9:00 when students were in the classroom. So I could go to Yvonne’s house to learn English from her. We did this for a month, quite frequently, we were interrupted by the phone calls from the campus requiring me to come back to my office. Yvonne decided to come to my office to continue our teaching and learning, I felt bad that she had to walk through the difficult road in the dark to teach me! Because of her kindness, my English was getting better and better, and soon we overcame the difficulties of communication and also became close friends.

Every day after school when students were playing, there was a special picture of Haikou Jingshan school: An elegant beautiful American lady with gloves and cleaning basket in hands was picking up garbage on the road from villa area to campus. That was Yvonne. She was trying her best to make the environment better. At that time, school construction was still going, that road was out of campus, and the school did not pay any attention to clean it. Garbage was all over the road. Yvonne’s action embarrassed every Chinese who was working there. A couple of weeks later, the school started to organize students to do a weekly cleaning of the road. And Yvonne won a great respect from our Chinese people.

Yvonne taught elementary to high school during her first year working in Haikou Jingshan School. Many students’ English names came from her; this included my son. At that time, my son was in fifth grade. Yvonne taught one class a week, just for the one class and my son got his English name: Ben. Now, he is 20 and attending college in the United States, he is still using this name.

Yvonne brought new culture and new vision to Haikou Jingshan School. There were always lots of students and teachers around her. Many of them do not speak English, but still love to be with her because her sense of humor, her friendship, her understanding and her kindness. Sufang Liang, Dianne Feng were her buddies in teaching. The school chief, Cheng Li, Aiping Zhang, Liming Yang, Honghai Li, Yang Young and I were her friends. Many of us do not understand English and Yvonne does not speak Chinese. This friendship built from body language, facial expression and caring for each other, it is special, precious and lasting. It gave us so much pleasure in the stressful life in Hainan. This friendship kept Yvonne in China for years. She still cannot stop herself from going back to “home” to visit.

Yvonne’s experience in China not only brought her so many ordinary Chinese friends, but also won great deal of respect from the leaders of the school. Mr. Wu Wei Xong, the former chairman of the board of the school and the mayor of Haikou now is one of her good friend, and his only daughter is one of Yvonne’s Chinese daughters.

June first is Children’s day. Children all over the China celebrate the day every year. On the first of June in 1996 at Haikou Jingshan School there was a big celebration. Yvonne, as a special English teacher, of curse had to be pushed? to the front for school’s benefits by the principal. A Haikou Jingshan School’s edition of the sound of music was performed by Yvonne, Andy (the other American English teacher) and 5 students in Haikou theatre. When we were watching the performance, we could not believe the singer, dancer on the stage was Yvonne. She was so professional, so unforgettable! She was not Yvonne, she was Maria! That performance won a good name for the school and Yvonne herself got more respects from Chinese: for her capabilities, for her hard work and her love of Haikou Jingshan! I used to keep a copy of the performance of the celebration but when I moved to the US, I let a friend borrowed it. I can not find it anymore.

Yvonne’s friendship is so precious to us. Living in Haikou, for some reasons, life was stressful. Sometimes people got depressed by certain situations. Yvonne always could use her special view to help friends overcome the difficulties. I was one of them who used to get her help. Her home was the most happy place friends liked to be. We felt safe, warm and happy there. When we watch TV, there was popcorn, when we were there, there was dinner and beer waiting. Sometimes during holidays, we played music, singing and dancing there till midnight. Those unforgettable memories are so charming and romantic. I miss that…

I often think, as an American who has a happy warm family, a nice and convenient life in the US, how come Yvonne was so much in love with China? So much in love with Haikou Jingshan School? Probably, because of her beautiful mind, loving heart as a Christian, she loves to help people. Probably, it is this love that has made her gone back to serve Haikou Jingshan so many years and come back to China for many times. As one member of Haikou Jingshan School, I want to say: “Thank you, Yvonne!”