Field Trip

Last Friday Dr. Kang, JoAnn, two other students, and I left on the 6:45 AM train for the Chinese countryside. The purpose of our trip was to expose JoAnn and me to a Chinese lifestyle other than what we had witnessed in Beijing.

We arrived at a small village just before noon. I’m still not exactly sure where we were, but I know we stayed in Beijing’s province. The town was situated in a mountain valley, right next to a broad, beautiful river. From the train station we walked down 341 stairs (yeah, I counted…) to the house where we were spending the weekend. It was a charming little place, and actually built to house visitors and tourists. So there were plenty of extra beds (actually softer than the one in my dorm), hot showers, and western toilets. JoAnn and I were braced to spend the weekend sleeping on the dirt floor of a hut without any showers, if necessary to get a true experience, but Dr. Kang insisted on finding us more comfortable accommodations.

Anyway, we spent the afternoon in the garden hoeing and picking vegetables for dinner. While everyone else was hanging out watching TV, JoAnn and I snuck into the kitchen to see if our non-English speaking hostess needed help with the cooking. Although we were probably just slowing her down, she humored us by letting us chop the meat and vegetables with huge butcher cleaver-like knives. We must not have messed up too bad, because dinner was quite delicious.

Saturday morning we woke up at 5 and headed to the nearby portion of the Great Wall. The experience was completely different from that of Badaling. For one thing, there was actually clear weather, so I could take in the magnificent views! Also, this area was much less reconstructed, so one had to use a lot more caution to scale the crumbling steps. A few times we even had to skirt around the wall itself, where the path was impassable. Because it’s a spot for the more adventurous sightseer (and because it was 6:30 in the morning) there were very few people there. We’d run into someone maybe every twenty minutes or so. A welcome change from the suffocating crowds of Badaling.

We hiked most of the morning, and were dripping in sweat by the end of it. After lunch back in the village, the plan was to sleep away the afternoon. JoAnn and I tried, but were unable to nap for very long and quickly bored by Chinese television. So we decided to explore the village a little more. It was quite a change to be in such a rural place after seven weeks in Beijing, but we were by no means in one of the poorest parts of China. There was a local grocery store, solar panels for the streetlights, and a few people (including our hostess) with very nice houses. On the other hand, there were many with extremely modest housing – dirt floors, no running water, and perhaps one or two rooms. It was another prime example of how China is a motley collision of modern technology and ancient customs, and the gaping differences in standards of living.

Back at our “home” JoAnn and I helped with dinner again – this time dumplings! Jiao zi might be my favorite food that I’ve tried here, and I can’t wait to cook them at home.

In the evening there was a celebration at the village’s “playground” – a small square with two basketball hoops and a few pieces of exercise equipment. A group of visiting college students were putting on a promotion (as far as I could gather) for the Olympic games. Contests of various kinds were being held and ’08 Olympics merchandise being handed out as prizes. One student named David, who had invited us, was in charge of recording everything on his video camera. He insisted on filming JoAnn and I signing our names on the banner, and conducting short interviews with us on our views of China (though I doubt we could be heard over all the noise).

We were also dragged over to a group of children who were drawing pictures of the Great Wall and the Olympic mascots and told to add our own artistic creation. Feeling rather intimidated by the marker masterpieces around us, we scrapped together drawing which was promptly posted on the wall. It looked a little pathetic but, we each received a package of Olympic mascot keychains for our efforts.

We also participated in the jump rope contest (quite embarrassing) and tried to play hacky sack (even more embarrassing). My favorite part of the evening was when drums were brought out and a few of the village women began doing traditional Chinese dances.

Sunday morning we left early again to do more hiking at what I would describe as the equivalent of a national park. We spent a couple hours viewing the woods and waterfalls, which were beautiful. However, I think our Chinese friends were more enthusiastic about the visit, since it was obviously famous to them, and JoAnn and I had already seen similar formations in North America.

In addition, though it had only been two days, it felt like much longer, and we were all anxious to get back to Beijing. We caught the 3:08 train and JoAnn and I watched Chinese movies on Dr. Kang’s computer until the battery died. It took about five hours to reach Beijing and I was thoroughly glad to see my cozy dorm room.

Pictures of the trip (along with some others I’ve been sitting on for awhile) will be on flickr imminently.

Great Wall

On Saturday I made the trek I’ve been looking forward to ever since I found out I was coming to China – I visited the Great Wall!

Courtney, JoAnn, and I had hoped that we might be able to do this trip together, but, as usual, it was decided at the last minute, so we didn’t have time to coordinate. When I returned to PKU and checked my email, I found out that JoAnn also ended up visiting the Great Wall Saturday, but we didn’t see each other. It wasn’t really a big deal, though – we’ve all met up with each other at least once since arriving, and that’s what counts.

Anyway, Dr. Kang and I took a taxi to the train station (actually, we were dropped off at the tracks, which we ran across to get to the station) to catch the 8:20 train. It was the most old-fashioned train I’d been on, with bench seats, open windows, and screechy brakes. Dr. Kang brought some fried bread and tea for breakfast, which we ate on the way.

The train ride took about 2 hours total, with a couple short stops along the way. Dr. Kang napped, but I was glued to the window the whole time. After you leave Beijing, the mountains rise up so quickly, and it’s absolutely beautiful. I also caught glimpses of a few small communities and spotted a chicken farm, bee hives, and – believe it or not – a camel.

The weather was very cool Saturday, barely drizzling, and a thick fog smothered everything. For this reason, I didn’t get to view the wall in a panoramic way, but I found it no less impressive. Seeing the arches and towers come looming out of the mist only added to the mystery and enormity of the place. It doesn’t look as cool on a postcard, but is very satisfying in person.

I should also mention that I spent a great deal of time paying attention to my feet, anyway. Maybe everyone else was aware of this, but I thought you could walk, even stroll, along the Great Wall. Unfortunately, this was not the case (at least at the part I visited – the south length of Badaling). Everything was steep inclines and plummeting declines, with very little in between. So my attention was often focused on gripping the rail and carefully making my way up and down very tall narrow stairs. And on not being trampled by the masses accompanying me. It was certainly entertaining to see such an international crowd, and hear so many languages just by walking a few dozen feet.

I was also thankful that I wore practical footwear – some women I saw who had chosen to wear heels looked pretty miserable.

We spent a couple hours on the wall (we did follow it all the way to the end of that section!) and then headed back to Tourist Trap Central, as I call it, at the gate. By this I mean the clusters of restaurants and booths selling flashy Chinese souvenirs of dubious authenticity at outrageous prices for eager visitors (not strictly Westerners – although the shopkeepers did seem to have a target demographic as they shouted “Hello, Hello! T-shirt! Postcards!”). Dr. K and I had noodles at a small restaurant and then visited a museum about the Wall and the man who built the first railroad through the mountains. It was very quiet there – a nice change from the jostling crowds outside – and as we rested our weary limbs we couldn’t resist a little catnap.

We didn’t oversleep, luckily, and caught the 3:10 train back to Beijing.

What I'm Researching

My internship at PKU is a working internship, which means that I spend most of my day helping out in the biotech lab. At the end of my internship I will write a paper on both my research and cultural experiences. Below is an abstract describing the outline of my projects:

The first part of my research will focus on refining the steps of tissue culture in regenerating the plant hawthoria comptoniana. This may include analyzing such variables as the sterilization of the explant sample, the composition of the growth medium, and light exposure received while the callus is forming.

Hawthoria comptoniana is a plant that originates from South Africa and does not perform well in China because it is sensitive to drought. Creating a regeneration system for this plant is the first step in determining the genes responsible for drought resistance, and whether this can be transferred to rice. The genes SOS-1, SOS-2, and SOS-3 are of particular interest because they have already been shown to have function related to soil salinity in Arabidopsis.

I will be contributing to this research by performing the initial step of regenerating hawthoria comptoniana. By manipulating the above-mentioned variables, and then analyzing the resulting callus quality, it is hypothesized that the optimal tissue culture procedure may be determined.

Unfortunately, calluses take several months to develop, so I will be unable to see the direct results of my work. Instead, I will be photographing and analyzing the calluses previously cultured.

In this way, the conclusions I draw from collecting data concerning previously cultured calluses will be predictive of my expected results of my own tissue culture work, and affect the decisions I make concerning the process.

The second part of my research will concern two strains of maize, one fertile and one sterile (unable to self-pollinate) as a result of a genetic mutation. When the two strains are crossed, the resulting generation is sterile. It is unknown which protein is responsible for the plant’s sterility.

Cross-breeding varieties of a plant is important for producing more robust and high-yielding strains. Normally, plant breeders would work to solve the described problem with fertility by searching for a variety which, when crossed with the sterile variety, would produce a fertile hybrid. It is hypothesized that this problem may also be solved by understanding the cause of the original strain’s sterility.

In order to locate the proteins related to the strain’s sterility, I will be running samples of maize protein from both the fertile and sterile strain through SDS-PAGE (sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis). The two strains are genetically identical except for the mutation causing sterility. By comparing the gels of the two strains, it is hoped that anomalous proteins may be identified for further study.

If the research is successful, and the proteins of interest are identified, the data will be sent to another research institute where in-depth 2D protein analysis can be conducted.

Independence Day

Well, today was my first Independence Day spent away from the USA.

It was definitely an interesting day – I had been thinking about what it might be like for a few days, but I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.

This morning I donned my red shorts and blue shirt. That alone made the day different – I usually don’t think about the holiday enough to coordinate my outfit for it. But I was curious to see how many people noticed/did the same.

I did see one person at breakfast that gave me a funny look, but no one dressed as blatantly in red, white, and blue as me.

To be fair, though, I wasn’t exactly walking around all day. I actually wasn’t even on campus most of the day. Dr. Kang and I biked to the CAU (Chinese Agricultural University) in the morning because he was giving a test there, and I could visit JoAnn (BR Intern there). Based unfairly on the short time I’ve spent there, I don’t think there are quite as many international students as at PKU.

So I celebrated the Fourth of July by sitting around eating watermelon and speaking a lot of English with another American. Not a bad way to spend any day.

The 4th of July is not usually high up on my list of favorite holidays – I get more excited about St. Patrick’s Day. I enjoyed going to watch fireworks and eating with my family, of course, but I had little interest in the holiday itself. In fact I’d often get annoyed with the antics of overzealous patriots.

Now, I did not go running down the street singing the Star-Spangled Banner, but I did spend a great deal of time thinking about what it means for me to be an American, and exactly what I value most about my country. And I was able to do this from a perspective of one who is not living in an American lifestyle.

And maybe that’s the most patriotic thing I could have done.

(I know this because last night 3 spirits and Nixon’s ghost came and showed me the true meaning of Independence Day. ☺)

Have a terrific Fourth, everyone! Eat an extra slice of pie for me!