How To Be A Bigshot On Your Old Campus

Let's face it, except for a handful of people who live in the town or city of their childhood, most of us when we return to our high school or college/university alma mater receive rather disinterested stares from the current student body and staff. The look on their faces asks, "Whose that old dude (or woman, as the case may be)?" Some passersby may be wondering, "Is that the new teacher/professor (or maybe janitor)?" Sure, one or two teachers/professors may remember who you are and be like, "Wow! How are things going? What are you up to these days? What brings you back here?" However, rarely does one receive a celebrity welcome where everyone crowds around and starts asking questions. Unless of course you attended a rural school in southern China on the border with Vietnam, and you bring two foreigners (instant celebrities) with you as show and tell.

During my recent trip to HeKou, Miss Suli's hometown at the southern tip of Yunnan Province, she escorted Candy (another teacher from KIA) and me around her former school--HeKou Xian BaSa Xuexiao. Her school sits in the forested BaSa area of the surrounding district known as HeKou, named after the most important town of the area (about the size of Kalispell, MT). Eleven years after Suli graduated from her school, some changes have naturally taken place; most importantly, the high schoolers must now go all the way to HeKou, another half-hour vehicle ride past the BaSa school. However, Suli sited very few physical differences to the campus.
While she never said what the above building was during her tenure at the BaSa school, Suli did remark that the building in the above photo was not originally dormitory housing. Evidently the school is growing. The school houses first through ninth grade (it is a bordering school for all except the students who live within walking distance--half an hour or so--of the campus). Suli and her sisters Xiang Yun and Xiang Lan all boarded at the school at various times during their academic careers. The walk to Suli's childhood home is at least a brisk one-hour walk. However, they usually rode the family bike. Now, most people in the area get around on some type of motorcycle. You may notice, in the upper right-hand corner of the photo, a tree like plant with red flowers. This is, in fact, a large poinsetta plant, which grow in this relatively warm and humid region.

The most obvious physical change on campus is the presence of a nearly complete five-story building that will be used as new dormitory housing when finished. Suli raised her eyebrows in surprise that the new building would be used for housing rather than for new classrooms, but based on the state of some of the older dorms--the shed-roofed walkway of one can be seen on the righthand side of this picture--this new building will be quite welcome. The metal tanks on either end of the building's roof are connected to solar panels, which heat the water, providing the only source of hot water for the buildings. This is probably sufficient for most days, considering the rather mild temperatures and general abundance of sun.

The above photo is a former dormitory that has been converted into the junior high school classrooms. Stretched in front of it is the former futebal pitch. Evidently the playing field was a bit better used during Suli's day, because now it is a very rugged patch of dirt with the ocassional tuft of weeds and pile of rocks. When I visited the school, the basketball court seemed to be receiving quite a bit more activity, which is no surprise. The younger generations in China love basketball. With Yao Ming and Yi JianLian playing in the NBA, one can almost always find either the Houston Rockets or New Jersey Nets jerseys or jackets wandering around the streets of China. So this tired patch of playing field has simply turned into a hangout point on campus.
Now, as stated above, the best way to return to campus and be instantly surrounded with current students and questions is to bring a couple celebrities with you. In the photo above, play "Where's the Waiguoren (foreigner)?" What started as a trickle of interested female students when we entered campus became a flood of noisy boys and girls, many screaming the most obvious English each of them knew, "Hello?" Some of the children asked interesting, probing questions, like "Where are you from?" and "Do you like China?" A couple boys even asked me if I play basketball, to which I replied, "Bu da. Wo ti zuqiu" (No. I play soccer). No one seemed too interested in that, but when the camera came out for pictures, everyone needed to figure out a way to to get in sight of the lens.BaSa is a region in which most of the children will live their entire lives. Suli ran into some former schoolmates and even picked out the children of some of her former classroom peers. While many different Chinese adults entered and exited the campus during our visit, Miss Suli received the most overwhelming interest from the students. According to Suli, she is one of the reasons HeKou is so famous, and while I look at her beautiful face and cannot help but agree with her estimation of her importance in the region, I also cannot help but think that having two foreigners tagging along might have helped her stature on that day. Her she is, the returning graduate who made it in the big city of Kunming, surrounded by the current generation of students. Who knows which of the smiling faces will become the next important graduate from BaSa? While most of us will never enter the campus of our former alma mater(s), it was nice to provide this rural school's students with a few thrills to remember, especially Suli's little nephew Xie Xing Yi, who became an instant celebrity two nights in a row when we picked him up on the motorcycle to give him a ride home after school let out for the evening.