Have you ever heard of the “Peach Orchard?”
Have you ever been to a Chinese speech competition?
This summer I attended the Columbia in Beijing Summer Language Program, during which I studied two semesters’ worth of Chinese in ten weeks. Towards the end of our first term, one of my teachers asked me to participate in the annual Chinese Speech Competition. I was immediately flattered and distressed—while her request demonstrated her confidence in my speaking skills, the prospect of adding other tasks to my already heavy workload was pretty unappealing.
I was instructed to plan my essay over the upcoming weeklong vacation. I traveled across Yunnan province with two friends, starting in Yuanyang. After returning from an amazing trip, I decided to write about my attempts to appreciate Yunnan’s beautiful culture, even though, at times, I felt excluded from it—there were quite a few instances in which I would speak solid Chinese to a local, who would then turn to my Chinese friends and ask, “Is she speaking Chinese? Why is she here?”
I was satisfied with this plan and began to write my travelogue essay, which I thought was a vast improvement over my last Chinese essay, entitled “Why I like to Text Message.”
When my teacher helped me edit my essay, she said: “I’ve been meaning to ask you, why didn’t you include the peach orchard parable in your essay?” “I actually don’t know that parable, haha...”
From what I understood, the parable involved a man who gets lost and wanders into a peach orchard, and discovers an alternate society there. Its inhabitants, while cut off entirely from the outside world, live in peace and harmony.
“If you had known this story, you surely would have made the connection,” my teacher said.
“Yeah, maybe…” It sounded good though, so I put it in.
That week, I did nothing but practice. After memorizing the text itself, which proved to be quite difficult, I then had to work on my “performance,” which would contribute to my overall score at the competition.
I listened to a recording of my teacher saying the speech over and over, so I could replicate the “natural intonations” of a Chinese person. My speech began as follows:
“Have you ever heard of ‘The Peach Orchard?’” (pause)
“Have you ever been to Yunnan?” (pause, raise in volume)
“Have you ever enjoyed Yunnan?”
I also had to add in hand movements and facial expressions. They asked me raise up my hands when asking these questions, to point to my body when talking about myself, to look incredibly confused when talking about my experience with the locals. I did try, but I don’t think I satisfied my teachers—every time I would practice they would say: “More feelings, more emotions.” Upon my teacher’s suggestions I watched clips of Chinese speech-competitions on YouTube and saw kids rapt during their speeches, jumping around with booming voices, ridiculous hand gestures and impassioned faces. “But no one will be like that at our speech competition,” I thought.
After a week of grueling practice, the day finally arrived.
The first participant was called. A blonde girl in a flame-red Qipao (a traditional Chinese dress that you might see nowadays in Hong Kong period films), with chopsticks in her hair went to the front of the room. Before she spoke, she grasped her hands together as if she were a member of a children’s Christmas choir and then began: “Hello everyone,” she said, beaming, extending one carefully choreographed arm, and waving it around the room. My jaw dropped. So strange, contrived theatrics were expected of us after all.
I don’t exactly remember the content of her speech—I was either too shocked by her choreography to focus, or it was too advanced for me to comprehend. I know that it had to do with family, that she told us a secret about herself and raised her hand up to her mouth, coyly looking around when she did so, and that she discovered she loved her family. When she said that, her eyes were misty.
I was astounded, and was also up next. Like Frank from “Old School,” I blacked out. I only remember that I had steady eye contact with one competitor, who for some reason was smiling and nodding at me the entire time, and that I faltered when the judges notified me of the four-minute mark. I didn’t win, but neither did red Qipao girl. My teachers were disappointed, but they made suitable excuses about why I hadn’t snagged the gold medal. Actually, I am still confused about the competition’s criteria for winning. Some really impressive people won (three from the CIB program), and some weirdo creeps won as well.
But as for the experience itself, I’m happy that I got to represent the Lions in the land of the dragon. I’m also happy I had a chance to try to master a foreign language, and to see and experience the strange behavior this overwhelming endeavor produces.
I am also glad that I now know the peach orchard parable.
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