One of my favorite games is Shenmue. While most other martial arts games focus on obliterating your opponent with your skills and shooting fireballs with your hands, this game focuses on the philosophy behind them. You play a young Japanese man whose father, a jiu-jutsu master, was killed by a Chinese gangster skilled in kung-fu. The first chapter takes place in Japan and the second in China. In the second chapter the hero had to meet various martial art masters to find out about the Chinese martial code (
). After I learned about the code, I even read some books on Shaolin kung-fu which verified the existence of such. Later on, I actually had to use that knowledge.
When I was in China as an English teacher, I received a phone call one night when I was in my apartment. It was my boss.
"Tomorrow the Cangzhou Medical College wants you and Michael to have a party with nursing students!"
Obviously the chance to meet cute nursing students grabbed my attention, yet it sound too good to be true. "What do you mean?" I asked.
She then switched to English, "Party! Party! Pretty girls! Very good!"
Then I replied back in Chinese, "OK, when is the party?"
"It starts at 8 PM. You should do a song and dance or perform kung-fu." Then she hung up the phone.
The first thing I did was call my co-worker, "Hey Mike. Did you get a call from the boss?"
"Yeah, a party with nursing students tomorrow. She kept on saying 'pretty girls' and 'party'. It'll be sweet."
"What else did she tell you?"
"She kept on saying kung-fu to me. I didn't get her."
"We'll see."
The next night we were picked up and got dropped off at the college. We were then led to the dining hall and met with a pleasant surprise. The students were sitting around watching these young girls do a dance routine. There was a karaoke machine playing music in the background. A young man came up to me and asked me in English, "You perform kung-fu?" I replied back to him in his language, "We'll think about it."
Mike and I were mollified. I didn't want to perform my taekwondo moves, nor he his kung-fu moves. When it was our turn, we just decided to tell a few jokes, answer some questions from the audience, and even sang "Waiting for you" accapella. When the show ended, the students even came up to chat with us until we were picked up.
On our way home, the driver received a call on his cell phone. He then handed it to me. Mike asked me who it was. I said it was the boss and she is complaining that we didn't perform martial arts moves like she wanted us to.
Mike then said, "Tell her that it is not part of our contract! We are here to teach English!"
The next thing I did is the proudest moment of my life for two reasons.
1. Mike was the better man. If I were Jerry Lewis, he was Dean Martin. He was very insightful in philosophy, he can pick up girls easily, and he could kick my ass anytime he felt like it. However, that day I had a better way of handling the situation.
2. This was my finest act of cultural jiu-jutsu.
So I simply told the boss this, "Well you know how Mike and I practice martial arts. So you probably know about the martial code, it is important in Chinese culture after all.
means to practice everyday.
to act with courage.
to act in accordance with Heaven. Of course, there is
which means to use our skills the right way. We can't even perform them in front of people. Right?"
My boss was silent for a moment. "Yes, of course. You're right. Carry on."
That is why if one decides to teach English in an Asian country, one should learn about its culture.
For those who don't have an Xbox or a Dreamcast, nor want to pay top dollar for those two games, I recommend going to this site and download the movies:
Gang Entertainment.
A bunch these guys from Chicago made a funny rendition of the games. Go there and have a laugh.
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