Impressions of China

Not unlike the YMCAs and YWCAs that grace our country, a “Children’s Palace” (a translation) is a place for people to go to learn music, athletics, and the arts. While YWCAs and YMCAs are generally all-ages, the Children’s Palace, as specified by the title, is geared towards the youth of China. Walking up several steep flights of wide stairs, we found ourself in a conference room of sorts being oriented to the ways of the recreational center. We learned from the director about the age groups, activities, and information along those lines.

Ping Pong Session by Stephanie

After this we met up with a group of children who were playing ping pong. We found, most of all, that the children, while not as ‘impressed’ with our presence as the older population of literally everywhere we went, they were shy with us, meaning…’shy’ for a Chinese child. Shy, for them, is to not immediately jump all over you, but to test the waters a bit before making the initial plunge in to friendship. In fact, for the most part, we were more shy than they were in our ping-pong ways. Most of them were better than most of us, and some were even able to beat Cliff, our ping pong master. It was here we got to try our hand at competitive Chinese sports and get a taste of the efficiency involved. One kid would serve to an instructor until the ball fell, and while they were retrieving it another child would serve with a line of two or three at each table. The kids knew the ropes and everything went without a slip-up. It was very disciplined.

Practicing Kung Fu with the Little Ones - by Lauren

Another class we visited was a bunch of smaller children attending their first kung fu class. We joined in, finding them much easier to keep up with than the Shaolin students , and found that even the kids, who worked at a much slower pace than the students in Shaolin, were somewhat familiar with the moves. We presumed that they had been raised with it in their household, so they were familiar with it. The class was primarily male, but there were two girls. There was no obvious discrimination of them, they stood in line evenly with everyone else, and nobody edged away from them muttering something about ‘cooties.’ This was very surprising because in a kung fu class in America, a girl would almost always be ostracized in a group that was mostly male.

Young Pianist - by John

The music classes at the Children’s Palace were singular, as opposed to the group classes like ping pong, kung fu, and ballet, which was not mentioned above. Walking through the halls of the Palace we would hear distant notes. It was very serene, we’d come and go as we pleased through any doorway and observe the students performing piano and some instruments that were foreign to us. While we were enjoying our peaceful walk over the linoleum floors, a giant sound began to rumble underfoot. It started on the floor, and bounced on to the cement walls and filled the hallway with a loud ruckus. We walked to find the source (which was not hard because it was so loud!) and we all met up at the end of the hall. A small boy, maybe 8 years old, was banging with all his might on some drums while his instructor flipped music pages and his parents watched. We applauded his racket of a composition once he had finished and left the Children’s Palace with a sense of ‘wow’ for these young children who are persuing their passions at a young age.