Ningbo Noise

Since Ningbo University was so new, there was only a freshman class. The new campus was also under constant construction, banging-breaking-drilling-slamming-sawing from sunup to sundown, except during nap-time after lunch. A constant chorus of "Wei, Wei, Wei!" served as a kind of warning from the workers to teachers and students when the daily tightrope walk commenced across bricks and slabs of wood, over nails and glass floating in muddy rivulets and puddles between the Foreign Guest House and the unfinished Number One Teaching Building. No matter how quick you were at this game of construction hopscotch, it was nearly impossible not to sink a foot into a gooey soup of clay and cement at least once a day while patriotic Beijing Opera music blasted over crackling speakers on campus in between classes. Sometimes I played Laurie Anderson on my walkman to drown out the fact that I was in China.