Above is an iPhone photo of a questionnaire I was recently given, which is supposed to help a facility improve its teaching and approach to students. At first, it looked harmless enough.. where have you been in China, what is your language proficiency.. etc. And then the questions got… stranger.

What is your attitude towards Chinese people? Four answer choices given: admiration, contempt, envy, pity.

Please rate the following statements according to the scale (how much you agree):

1. I am certain that I can produce novel and appropriate ideas.
2. The people in this country can handle whatever comes their way
3. I like to live close to my good friends
4. Aging parents should live at home with their children
5. Children should live with their parents until they get married.

… and so on.

Along with 30 or so questions on (a foreigner’s) opinions on the individual characteristics of Chinese people, in four different formats.

I really had to stretch my imagination on how any of these answers would help an institution tailor its teaching towards international students. Especially my personal favorite – the question on whether parents have the right to feel honored if their child wins the the Nobel Prize, pictured above.

Parents?? Let’s not forget that most of America (and albeit, the world) is still flabbergasted by the latest Nobel Prize winner. I don’t think anyone’s given any serious thought to whether his parents have the right to feel honored.

I would be remiss to make a mountain out of this molehill, but this was one of the daily reminders of the various culture shock(s) one is bound to face while living in China. I have long since come to the terms with being a global mutt. There are some serious perks. But then again, you’ll forever be standing in the divide between the nations of your birth, youth, and influence. Being asked these questions, however impersonally and far-removed, made me realize how stark the difference in thinking between the country of my ethnicity… and everything else that has been influential.

To put it in broader strokes, I forget how important image is in China, once I get accustomed to the day-to-day details of living here. What foreigners think really seems to matter. This is what drives the censorship, which makes educational surveys come off as something entirely in it’s own category, and why there is no Freedom of Youtube. If I could write my own charter on the universal rights and freedoms of the intar-web, freedom of Youtube would definitely be one of the first articles. Broadly interpreted as the right to access what’s blocked by the Great Wall.

But on a more cheery note, I bring you another iPhone picture, as part of my chronicles of the mundane that I find hilariously interesting.

There you have it. A scene which perfectly expresses what I am feeling this particular day. I snapped this picture while grocery shopping this evening – a lone little crab, who had somehow managed to scramble out of the crowded tank, holding on by a claw – TO FREEDOM.