I didn't know...

[clay dube]

As we read and talk, I hope that all of us might be able to offer at least a few substantial endings to the "I didn't know..." opening.

Was there anything that you "knew" that you discovered to be incorrect or incomplete? I've been studying Asia and especially China for a long time and still frequently find that the "conventional wisdom" or at least what I've assumed to be the case is either wrong, misleading, or at least flawed.

Please take a moment to reflect on the range of topics and materials we've worked on and share your own endings to "I didn't know...." or "I thought ...., but now I ...." While your ideas about Asia almost certainly have been enhanced, revolutionized, or challenged, it may be that studying other peoples and other times have helped clarify your ideas about yourself, our society, and our time.

[Anonymous]

This is my test comment, but it also pertains to the subject thread.
Last night, my wife and I went to our favorite sushi place. There was a small sign that read, "Did you know... In Japan, it is bad manners to rub your chopsticks together?"
Is this true?

[Anonymous]

This is true also of Chinese culture. But we all do it anyways, because we don't want to eat splinters with our sushi, right?

lc

[Anonymous]

This pertains to adding an avatar to your name.
Once you've made an error its practically impossible to change it or
delete the prior one. So, if you know the answer to this problem inform us.

[Anonymous]

Its also bad manners in chinese custom to stick your chopstick into your bowl of rice. Because it looks like you are putting incense in a bowl for honoring your ancestors.[Edit by="yochan60 on Oct 14, 5:08:43 PM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

I didn’t know that women’s wrestling was a popular sport in Japan. It began in 1948 as an underground sport. I was watching gender benders on the National Geographic channel. WOW. Female wrestlers break all the stereotypes regarding what a woman “should be” in Japan. These women are tough! One wrestler was quoted as saying, “we betray your expectations of us as women”. Women wrestlers go through intense training. About 80% of the people attending the matches are female office workers. In some ways, these office workers are living vicariously through the wrestlers. How refreshing would it be to break out of your traditional role as a woman?

[Anonymous]

I don't think that I realized to what extent the schools of interpretation affected the political, social, and philosophical direction of China. In reading the "Postface..." article, it is fascinating to unfold the layers of changes in China's history. I am sure that this applies to other civilizations as well. It gives me some insight on explaining changes in governmental direction to the students. It will be interesting for them to research changes in a chosen country or group of people.

[Anonymous]

I didn't know that in Taiwan it was pretty common for there to be a fist fight in the parliament. I read something about it last weekend, and my friend told me that it happens all the time. He also told me that there are "taxi gangs" where taxi drivers will get out and beat drivers from rival companies if they hit one of their cabs, etc. Is this true?

[Anonymous]

Respond to YoChan60 RE: Chopstick manner.
This is also the same in the Vietnamese culture. I guess some of the customs has been adopted by our ancestors. Although i didn't know it was bad manner; i just never saw anyone did that. At the temple, cooked rice is served with both chopsticks sticking up in the middle of the bowl as a symbol of serving the last meal to the newly dead person. Usually, the eldest child does the serving, holding the bowl over his head and and pay respect to his father for devoting his life to raising him. [Edit by="tnguyen on Nov 29, 5:34:03 PM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

From one of the lectures. I didn't know calligraphy was such a highly regarded art form. I just assumed it was only a form of writing--in this country we do not hold handwriting in such high regard, especially with the advent of typewriting/word processing. I found it very interesting in the detail calligraphy was taught, and the years it takes to master this art form. Also, how stylized it is.

[Anonymous]

I'm watching Mythbusters right now on the discovery channel. http://dsc.discovery.com/fansites/mythbusters/episode/episode.html
Episode 24: Ming Dynasty Astronaut
Deep in the Mojave Desert Buster takes the hot seat in the MythBusters' quest to test the myth of the Ming Dynasty Astronaut. Will he defy the laws of gravity and survive an explosive launch into space?

I didn't know there was a legend from the Ming Dynasty that says a Chinese stargazeer named Wan Hu dreamed about going to space and tried to turn his dream into reality by launching himself into space by using 47 rockets.

"According to the legend, Wan, a local government official, was obsessed by the stars and planned a rather harebrained scheme to get himself closer to them.
Something of a nutty professor character, Wan set out to make himself the world's first astronaut.
Picking up on China's recently developed expertise in rocketry, he took up the task of building himself a space ship.

He was somewhat ahead of his time.
Come the launch day, Wan dressed himself in his imperial finery, strapped himself in the chair and called upon his 47 servants, each armed with a flaming torch, to light the 47 fuses.

Their job done, the servants speedily retreated to a safe distance ... and waited.
What came next, the legend goes, was an enormous bang.
When the smoke eventually cleared, Wan and his chair were nowhere to be seen.
Whether Wan actually made it or not has never been made clear.

The prognosis does seem a little doubtful.
But despite the somewhat cranky nature of spacecraft he was certainly on the right track.

Four-and-a-half centuries later and those same principles behind the first Chinese rockets did indeed lift Gagarin on his historic flight beyond Earth's gravity.

Another four decades on and China finally followed suit, launching a man into space and turning Wan Hu's centuries-old dream into reality".
http://edition.cnn.com/2003/TECH/space/09/30/china.wanhu/

Something to share with my students. Ties ancient China and modern China together in a fun way. We can look at other legends and inventions.

[Edit by="jchan on Dec 5, 8:44:59 PM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

I didn’t know that Taiwan was once a part of main land China, or that there was any adversity between them. Having read in the article, “Unions Across a Divide” about the tensions between the two it struck me that they were, in fact, originally one country. I was most surprised, however, with the fact that Taiwan, while the more economically prosperous, was also the more traditional. You would think that a country that had advanced faster would abandon its more traditional customs.

[Anonymous]

I remember studying the art of caligraphy in high school art class. It actually got to be quite competitive. In college drawing classes we studied the technique of drawing with brush and ink. While we got quite technical about the technique, learning different brush strokes and such, we did not spend any time learning the history of the art form. I always thought that was a shame, to study the art and not the history of it.

[Anonymous]

I didn't know that the average Mattel actory worker in China makes about twenty-five cents an hour to assemble toys.

I was interested in locating a study that focusses on salaries vs. the cost of living in China. It's quite obvious why labor is being outsourced. Does anyone have any information on salaries in China?

[Anonymous]

Not only is calligraphy such an important art form, but I have heard that in China, you might not get a job if your handwriting is not neat enough. Is that true?

[Author]

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