A Time to Teach and a Time to Learn

I was teaching those one hundred students a unit on culture. They were examining their own culture, and their project was to select five items they thought most representative of China and her culture.

They would go into a hypothetical culture capsule, and any item too large would go into my magic shrinking machine. Some students even chose the Great Wall. They presented their items to the class, group by group, and the class had the task of asking questions about them.

One group had Chairman Mao as their entry. During the question time a student asked, “What do you think of Chairman Mao’s mistake?” Whoa! THIS IS CHINA! There is no freedom of speech here, and talk of politics between foreigners and natives is prohibited. I was also aware that there was probably a class monitor whose duty it was to report such things.

But it was between natives, so I overlooked it. There was a round of nervous laughter, and then the chattering began. The three girls presenting Chairman Mao just stood there, stone-faced and mute.

I waited a minute, and then I asked the questioning student, “What do you mean by his mistake? I think you’ll have to name it.”

Again there was a ripple of chattering in Chinese and quick looks around as he replied, “The Cultural Revolution.”

I turned and looked at the girls, waiting for their response. The most fluent of the three spoke into the microphone, “We all know that Chairman Mao did many great things for our country. If he made a mistake it was when he was very old , and that’s why he made it.”

That was a politically correct statement if I ever heard one!