People are judged on their worth; currency is all about the aspects of a person that affect their relationships with others and garner them respect and admiration or resentment and hatred. here at 交通大学 age and ethnicity don't have much bearing, and i have written before about how cool that is. Language, however, is paramount. If you can speak Chinese better than your friend, it doesn't matter where he worked or went to school or even if he's your senior. And with no dearth of Koreans and Japanese and Indonesians and Thai and so forth, students who speak multiple languages are the coolest of the cool. It's interesting to see older, established friends in the beginning levels and semi to fully fluent guys my age hang out with locals and stuff like that. The playing field is all about Mandarin. Not only is it an unspoken wavelength of strength and confidence, but it can and does manifest itself in tangible ways. For example: two students and some Zhong guo ren are hanging out in Shanghai, and the higher level student decides to slip in a joke in Mandarin at the expense of lower level student causing instant laughter from all but said fresh meat. The beginner can only give a sheepish smile and steel himself to study harder. This is a cold knife in the back that is plunged more often than you'd think, sometimes without a thought. But for the beginners, it sure is a shitty feeling to not understand and feel so dumb.
Makes me wish I treated foreigners in high school better. Then again...that can lead to MORE problems which I won't elaborate on now. Sigh.
Zaijian
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