"Daisy, Daisy..."

"...give me your answer do." Tonight I was belting out "A Bicycle Built for Two" while perched precariously on the back of a bicycle and clinging to Shaoyuan's shoulders.  I got a lot of laughs and funny looks from the locals, but was actually quite fun.  Sort of like one of those "trust" exercises that some companies do for team building.  It was much needed to repair our fragile relationship after a *HUGE* fight yesterday, but now we seem to be all good.  I'll spare you the gory details, but it centered around a poor little jerboa with its foot snapped in half, dangling with the bone sticking out.  Oops, I guess those *were* the gory details.  Shaoyuan adamantly refused to euthanize it, and I thought at the time that he was just taking an attitude with me (which sometimes happens).  We talked about it all today, and it turns out he felt sorry for the little guy and wanted to get medicine to treat it.  I'm sorry, but no concoction of Chinese herbs is going to fix a bone sticking a centimeter through the skin, and the little guy was clearly suffering.  So now I understand that he had gotten attached (it was just a baby) and didn't want to kill it, whereas I also felt sorry for it and wanted to put it out of its misery.  I ended up killing it myself, and now that we've discussed the situation and come to an understanding, all seems to be much better. Anyway, back to the bicycle - that was quite an experience riding side saddle on a wire luggage rack.  There are speed bumps on the way into town that weren't too kind to my tushy. And I've got some cushion - I can't image what it feels like for some of these skinny kids who ride like that all the time.

Additionally, I seem to have been "adopted" by one of the women who works here.  She has a daughter a little younger than myself who speaks quite good English, and she spent a long time encouraging her daughter to finally come talk to me.  So several days ago there was a knock at my door, and the two of them were standing in the hall with the most delightful bowl of plums and apricots I'd ever seen in my entire life.  I hadn't had fruit in about a month, and it almost brought a tear to my eye.  Then last night I was sitting outside listening to some music with one of our students, and she came to me again - this time with a package of tiny little strawberries.  She is currently my favorite person on the planet.   With fresh fruit, delicious sweet milk (hooray for finding real whole milk!), and dark chocolate that actually tastes like the real thing, I'm feeling quite decadent these days.

I had a really interesting and heart wrenching conversation with one of our students last night.  I've written about him before - Yakupjan, the Ughyur student.  He's a really neat kid, and we get along well.  His English is quite good, so it's easy for us to talk.  I can almost talk at a normal pace, and he picks up most of what I say without me having to repeat myself. Anyway, I was sitting outside listening to my ipod when he came back from dinner, and he joined me for a listen.  He suddenly started to get a very pained expression on his face, like he was struggling with something in his mind, and pulled out a little ring box.  He started to tell me about the arranged marriage that his parents have planned for him, so we went for a long walk and talked about it.  I really feel for him.  He's in a tough situation.  He just finished his bachelor's degree and is planning to start his masters in the fall.  After that he wants to try to go abroad to study.  His parents are worried that if he goes away, he'll never come back, and he's the youngest of 4.  He said that his parents have picked a girl for him to marry, and he hasn't met her.  I told him maybe he'd feel differently after he meets her, but he said that if he agrees to meet her then it's expected that they will immediately become engaged.  I just didn't know what to say.  I know that he looks up to me and is asking for advice and support, but we have *such* different cultures, and I have no experience with such things.  I just tried to give him the pros and cons of dating versus arranged marriages and explain the parents' point of view that they know they are getting a daughter-in-law that will get along well with the rest of the family - an attribute really important in a culture like this.  He's got a crush on one of his classmates and bought the ring as a gift for her, but now he's struggling with whether or not he should give it to her.  He's only just turned 22, and he supposed to meet the girl his parents have picked when he goes home this summer.  Ugh.  I'd hate to see him abandon his studies to take care of a new wife at his age.  He says he has a good relationship with his parents, and *maybe* he could talk to them about his feelings, but I think it would be a very difficult conversation. He's in a really tough spot, and I hope it works out well.

Work wise, things are trucking along.  We're getting tons of animals every day, but we're passing the peak of embryo availability.  The great thing is that this is a fantastic location for collecting this species.  We're right on the edge of a wildlife preservation area (the desert to the north) with fantastic vegetation and vast expanses of farmland in this immediate vicinity, so the animals seem to be very healthy and very well-fed.  I think this is the gold mine of rodent hunting.  The folks working for us are doing an excellent job catching them, and I think we're developing a great relationship.  I'm really glad for the carton of Marlboros I picked up in the duty free shop on my way here.  A pack of those as a gift every once in awhile seems to be well-received and a good signal of non-verbal gratitude.

If the guys go out tomorrow morning, I might get to go along.  I think they're starting to relax a little bit about me going with them now that we're nearing the end of our collection.  At this point, if I were to get in trouble with the police and get sent back to Urumqi, at least the work is just about done.  So I got to go a couple of days ago to help collect and re-set mouse traps.  That was quite fun and satisfying.  The guys here have very different expectations for women than do Western men.  They fuss over me getting too hot, getting lost (20 feet away from them), getting hurt, etc etc, and it's a little irritating for a fiercely independent woman like myself.  Shaoyuan knows me a little better since working with me last year, but he still isn't entirely over his gender biases.  I got a little miffed when they all seemed condescendingly surprised that I can set a mouse trap.  So then I took it as a personal challenge and set them faster than any of the guys. These are impressive mouse traps, too - not the little dainty wooden things you get at the hardware store for house mice.  These are some industrial high gauge spring traps that could take a finger off. Anyway, we might go out tomorrow morning to try to dig up burrows, but I have a feeling the guys are going to sleep in.  They just left with a couple of the locals to go chasing after a different species that Shaoyuan is trying to collect and are likely to be out really late.  We'll see - hopefully I'll have some interesting field stories for my next posting...