Activities
問道漢字

Student Composition: A Trip to China

This English version was translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The Chinese text is authoritative.

At last the day came — the day I arrived in China. This time our family went back to China specially to attend the wedding of my eldest cousin Zhang Weiwei and his bride Li Ang.

       We arrived home right at noon, and many relatives came to welcome us, and together we ate the vegetarian lunch Grandpa and Grandma had prepared for us. Afterwards my cousin, whom I hadn’t seen for a long time, and his bride, whom I was meeting for the first time, took Zhang Weikai, my cousin Lin Jianmin and me to Wenzhou Paradise amusement park. My cousin and I went on lots of rides, but the others hardly joined in. None of them dared, except my sister-in-law, who was pregnant and couldn’t, or else she would have come too. In the evening we met my sister-in-law’s parents, our in-laws, you might say. The two families had dinner together for the first time and discussed how to hold the wedding and how to divide the betrothal gifts and dowry and so on. In the end I didn’t really understand what they decided. Never mind, it’s not my business anyway.
       My sister-in-law was especially good to us. Since we so rarely came back to China, she took us out and bought us a few new clothes. She treated us to some local snacks, including one called “paopao,” where you just dip any kind of food in oil. I was shocked, because even bananas can be eaten that way. We also tried stinky tofu, octopus balls, kebabs and so on.
       In the following days Grandma took my uncle, my aunt, my mum and me to the temple to worship the Buddha. Once I bowed for a whole afternoon, at a Dharma ceremony specially arranged for our Zhang family, so it was very formal — not just a few kowtows and done, but bowing continuously for several hours, with only two ten-minute breaks in between. And during those days at the temple I ate several vegetarian temple meals in a row. Oh! Right — one of the temples has a scenic area called Xianyan. My uncle and I climbed the mountain there, while the others filled out some kind of papers for blessings to protect the family, I think; I’m not too sure. My uncle and I visited the Xie Gong Pavilion, Leixiang Pool, the Yellow Emperor’s Pool and so on. I recorded all this beautiful scenery on my phone.
      One of my cousins was getting married, and it happened to fall while we were there, so we were invited to the wedding venue. The guests took their seats early and started eating, but I hardly ate anything, because I was busy photographing the couple’s romantic moments, as well as the singers who came to liven things up with live performances and the game time. As soon as the performances were over, the guests all left at once. I think Chinese wedding banquets move much faster than French ones.
       At last the day of my eldest cousin’s wedding came. I went with the bridal procession to fetch the bride; after we brought her back, Zhang Weikai and I each carried a wedding lamp, lighting the way ahead for them. Later I became the flower child who served tea and noodles to the newlyweds, while the cameraman kept recording these beautiful moments beside us. Then everyone hurried to the hotel to go on capturing moments worth keeping. When the time came, it was time to witness their sweet and heartwarming declarations of love. My eldest cousin told the story of how he won her love and how nervous and excited he felt at that moment. Gazing at each other tenderly, they sang a song together to express their love. In short, I wish you eternal unity of heart and a hundred years of happy union. The wedding came to a perfect close. To celebrate and relax, a few of us went to sing karaoke. Those who went were my eldest cousin Lin Jianwu, cousin Jianmin, cousin Weiwei, my sister-in-law, Zhang Weikai and me. I had a great time — I must say here that I’m actually a very introverted person, so getting me to sing in front of others is almost impossible. But here I let myself go and sang out boldly. That didn’t last long, though, because I didn’t know the songs they picked, since most of them were songs from the eighties and nineties.
       In the remaining days, my cousin took us to see the MixC mall, and we also had a meal there. MixC is the biggest shopping mall in the area, with all kinds of clothing shops and restaurants. The next day our family went to visit my maternal grandparents to say goodbye. My parents chatted inside, while Zhang Weikai and I listened to music in the courtyard. Just then we saw my cousin Ruifang; I got on well with her the last time we came to China and played together a lot. Ruifang is only two years older than us and still at school, and during this time she had mock exams, so we hadn’t been able to meet. I felt she had changed a lot since I last saw her, she’d become like a grown-up. We chatted together for a while, which was a bit awkward, since we hadn’t seen each other for so long.
       Finally I have to mention a few things about coming to China. First, I got up very early every morning, because almost every day I could hear some family holding a funeral, and also because our house happens to stand on the road one must take to go up the mountain, or you could say to the cemetery. Second, there is no heating in this place, and I caught a cold on the very first day. Third, I didn’t expect China to have developed so far: even roadside stalls accept WeChat Pay, and France isn’t that advanced yet. But the toilets were hard for me to accept, because they are still the old kind, the squatting kind. I should be thankful the one at home wasn’t a primitive toilet.
(Zhang Huimin, 15, born in France, has studied Chinese at our school for 7 years)
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