Remembering February: When I collide with 99 Qinghai Tibetans in Guizhou

"我们有缘分。" (We are fated to be brought together)
So says the Tibetan leader of the 99 touring Qinghai Tibetans I met on a train from Guilin to Nanning. I didn't know if it was yuanfen (fate) or not, but I was sure thankful for whatever strange forces had worked to make me take the same train as these lovely people.

I was going to Nanning to visit a friend I had made in Kunming. She was studying traditional medicine there, but her home was in Nanning. As I was waiting in the smoke-filled (the "smoking room" consisted of a hallway that connected to the main waiting rooms), hot trainstation, a large group of mostly older men began crowding the asiles by the gates that would open to let us to the platform. They were wearing thick layers of clothing and all of them were sweating profusely. Their skin was darker than other Chinese, and many of their eyes a light honey brown, and their hair slightly curly. A couple of older men caught my eye, realizing how I too didn't look like the rest of the people--mostly Han Chinese--in the waiting room, and smiled at me. I even got videotaped for a moment as one older man did a circular view of everyone crammed into the train station waiting room. Most of them were older men, so I offered my seat to one while we were waiting. He refused at first, but after much insistence on my part and encouragement by bystanders, he shyly and gratefully took my seat. The tour guide, a Han Chinese man, asked me where I was from and started up a conversation with me. He told me that the group were all Qinghai Tibetans on a tour outside of their village. Once I got my seat, he said, I should come find them. He told me there were 99 of them and these people loved 热闹（renao. Again, this Chinese word I can't translate that means something like: "bustling with noise and excitement"). He asked what car I was in so he could come find me once they were settled. I showed him my ticket, but I assumed he was joking, so I just smiled in response.

Soon, they were opening the gates to let us onto the platform and after the chaotic mass migration that always occurs before you get on a train in China, I found my respective seat and settled in. I sat next to some Guilin ladies who chattered away in their dialect while I slept through the next hour. But sure enough, after woke up from my nap, the tourguide came into my car. Okay, he said, follow me. I figured, why not, so I grabbed my stuff and followed him. I was so glad I did.

The guide sat me down next to the leader of the group who spoke to me in his strongly accented Mandarin (although his pronunciation was probably one of the best of the men in the group). Most of them were speaking Tibetan to eachother. The leader asked me how to say a few things in English (including his phrase about 缘分, or fate which I struggled to translate）and I in turn asked him how to say some things in Tibetan. Soon, he pointed to a young, pretty woman sitting across the asle. She should be your teacher, he said. And out of her mouth came the most perfect English I had heard out of anyone in China--Hello. How are you? I liked her right away.

She was an English teacher in their village, and with her almost flawless English she helped explain to me more about who this group was in ways I couldn't understand in 普通话 （standard Mandarin). She explained that the village had organized an outing for all the village leaders to go outside of Qinghai (for many their first time outside the province and first time on a train). So they had come from Xi'an and Guilin and now they were headed to Beihai (which they heartily encouraged me to come with them). And all of these older men were extremely, extremely excited (if a little shocked by the warmth--home was full of snow) about this trip and they loved seeing these places. Although she said that they had had some trouble with barganing, because, she explained, Tibetans are so trusting, that they assume that everything someone tells them is the truth. So when the vendors tell the older men that they absolutely must have these things and this absolutely is the best price you can find, the old men will believe them. And in spite of her and the other young people's protests that they should try to ask for a better price, they will buy the thing. (Some of the men ended up proving this phenomenon true at the end of the trip. As we were reaching our station, the workers on the train advertised a kind of flexible toothbrush in a two for one deal that almost all the older Tibetans immediately bought up. Although interestingly enough, on the way back from Nanning I found that a number of Han Chinese people also bought the same toothbrush. It made me feel better to know that it wasn't just us foreigners from outside of China who were tricked by "deals.")

They kept inviting me to go to their hometown. I kept saying how much I wanted to. Then, as I continued talking with the woman, a young man came up, and told her to introduce him as handsome, but say that he was shy around beautiful ladies. At which I of course laughed. They told me I was pretty, which seemed funny to me in my sweaty glasses, pigtails and plaid shirt. (I always wonder if people just say this in China because I am foreign and thus exotic, or just to be polite or nice to me.) The young people seemed to talk with bits of Mandarin and bits of Tibetan (and with these people, some English), while the older people predominantly spoke Tibetan, unless they were talking to me or the guide.

One of the older men started singing to me (after much joking and encouragement). My new friend explained that Tibetans love singing, and it was common for a man to sing to a woman, and her back to him. I don't know if you have ever heard Tibetan songs or a Tibetan sing before, but you should make sure it is something on your list of things to do before you die. His voice was clear, true and almost eirie in the way it sounded like it was echoing in the mountains. Our half of the car quieted down the moment he began. The teacher translated the song for me: the man was comparing me to the moon--so beautiful, but so far away and unreachable. It was really lovely sounding. And then he stopped singing, and she explained, they will not continue, unless I sing in reply. I looked to my new friend for suggestions, and she offered, "You are my sunshine" which I sang and which she then translated for them into Tibetan. They enjoyed that translation. After more encouragement "handsome" also sang a song for me. He too had a beautiful voice. I sang back 甜密密 , one of the few Chinese songs I can sing all the way through, and a well-known favorite in China. It was the best time I've ever had on a train.

I was so excited the entire time I spent with them on the train, I was enthralled by their excitement, their culture, their language, their songs, their warmth and automatic acceptance of me. And I got to talk with this one English teacher quite a bit. I learned things from her all sorts of things I didn't know about Tibetans, like how conservative their culture is in terms of marriage age. Or, more relevant to my own life, how one of her English teachers from University was sent back to the U.S. for teaching too many Tibetans. And how now her school has trouble getting enough foreign teachers because the government won't accept their VISAs. Of course, she explained this all in English. The leader of the Village later asked me if I wouldn't come and teach English in their village. I thought how amazing that would be--beautiful mountains, a new language to learn, a facinating culture to surround myself in--and then I remembered that I still have a year and a half of a fellowship to complete. Visiting is probably the best bet at this point. Although I was so tempted to just continue to follow them on their trip to Beihai.

There was another woman who sat next to me who was a divorcee, but rather young-looking. She was reading one of those older American "manners" books for "proper ladies" that had been re-published in a modern looking Chinese version. She asked me if I had read the book and told me I was the first foreigner she had ever met. Funny. So lovely.

I told them I would visit them this summer. I hope it works out. I would love to see where such lovely people call home.