We had a fine, if brief visit in Shanghai, leaving Thursday night for Wuhan. In a perfect world, we would have spent more time in Shanghai or Hangzhou, and less time in Wuhan, but I had made arrangements to visit a school, which could only be done on a weekday, and our boat leaves Sunday, so we had no choice.

Arriving in Wuhan was peaceful enough. We got a taxi right away and headed across a causeway to the Holiday Inn at the center of the city. Then a few sparks flew. We had established ahead of time that we would go by what the meter said. There was also a 10 yuan toll which we were happy to pay, but when we got to the hotel, the meter said 53 (plus ten for the toll) but the taxi driver refused to give us any change from 100. We enlisted the help of the hotel bell boys, who said that it was an arrangement taxi drivers had when there was "luggage" -- meaning foreigners. After quite a discussion, we finally got 15 yuan back. This time I gave up the fight ahead of Elene. It wasn't the amount of money, of course, but the feeling that you can be ripped off and the bell boys support the taxi driver.

So that was our welcome to Wuhan. On the other hand, there was a big sign in the airport announcing special summer rates at our Holiday Inn -- 388 yuan including two breakfasts. That's $50, and significantly cheaper than the $66 I had found on the Internet. And breakfast is no small item. There is a huge buffet in the revolving restaurant on the 27th floor. Too bad I just eat bread and tea, but I haven't wanted a big breakfast yet.

Yesterday was quite an adventure going to a local private boarding school Wuhan. The headmaster came to pick us up and took us in his handsome European car. The driver was a young fellow to whom we were not introduced. On the way the car was stopped by the police. The headmaster insisted it was a routine check, but then it turned out that the car had missed its re-registration date, and we had to wait on the side while first the driver and then the headmaster had quite a discussion with the police. I can only imagine how humiliated he must have felt, having two American women as passengers, and having us wait while all this got discussed -- and not resolved. Finally he hailed a little red taxi, and the three of us piled in for the last mile or so to the school, leaving the driver and fancy car to negotiate the fine with the police.

The school is seven years old. This past year it went through the tenth grade, next year eleventh, and finally 12th the following year. All students board five days a week and go home on the weekends. Most come from within the city limits, but the city is huge -- spread out like Los Angeles. It was originally three cities, separated by two rivers, one of which is the main branch of the Yangtze (called the Chiangjiang in Chinese). The oldest part is Wuchang. It is also the prettiest -- the quarter with parks, universities and a huge lake. The school is located in this section, while our hotel is in Hankou, sort of the Manhattan of Wuhan with the tallest buildings and hotels.

Arriving at the school we headed for the headmaster's office which would compete with the lobby of a four-star hotel -- wood paneling and beautiful furniture, a large terrace, and a large office separate from the conference room, and an air conditioner with remote control. This space was more remarkable in contrast to other areas where "dingy" might be a better description. We were particularly distressed at the rusted windows and peeling paint in a building which is only seven years old. The school bus (which has the school name on the side in English but with the words out of order) was missing one of the glass panels in the door and looked as if it was about to rust through on the bottom.

I can be sympathetic with the challenges of a humid climate, but the quality of construction we saw seemed like such a waste. The student bedrooms had four cots on the floor in the rooms for the youngest students and three bunk beds, holding six, in the rooms for the older students. More amazing, the teachers are expected to live at the school at least during the week and share three to a room! We saw one of the teachers' rooms which had the three beds, and no other furniture except one chair. The rooms are air-conditioned, and include "toilet facilities" but no reading lights, and no desks.

The headmaster arranged for us to have tea on our arrival and then left us with three teachers while he went off, presumably to deal with the car. Jack Ford was the "English name" of a young teacher who was very bright and remarkably articulate for someone who had learned all his Chinese in China. The other two teachers struggled with their English about on a par with my Chinese. One was a Physics teachers and one taught computers. Jack explained that they were the only teachers who could be mustered up during summer vacation. The physics teacher worked doing "admissions" in the summer.

I began by sharing materials I had brought from Poly: admissions materials, the curriculum guide, copies of the middle school and upper school literary magazines, the school's regular newspaper and history newspaper. Jack was overwhelmed with the amount and quality of writing our students do, lamenting that he would like to do more things with his students but is pressured by the exam system. He also explained that there were many students at the school who seemed indifferent to education and lacked the studious attitude we assume all Chinese students possess. These are students, he said, whose families are rich, and who think they don't have to work hard to get ahead. We were surprised that they didn't even work hard to learn English, which seems to be the calling card for all joint ventures.

As our discussion continued we brought up the subject of Kosovo and offered some thoughts about how Americans and Chinese viewed the situation differently. None of these teachers taught history, so they were quite willing to move on to other subjects. They were very interested in the pedagogy, and we were interested in the class load. Since this is a private school, class size is limited to 20-25. The English teachers have two (count them (TWO) classes per day -- although each one meets for a double period (90 minutes). Thus Jack's total class load is just under 50 students. In addition to those classes, he must supervise study hall for two hours in the evening -- and survive living in the dorm.

It is not clear to me why the teachers all have to live on campus since they do not have responsibility for the students dorm life -- there is a separate staff that takes care of that, cleaning, doing laundry, etc. It may be simply the distance, and lack of good public transportation to the area where the school is located.

After our tour of the school, which included the computer room (24 computers with Windows NT) we headed off to lunch in the school bus. We went to a lovely restaurant where we were taken to a private room which had the standard large circular table, but also a separate couch area set up for karioke. We were asked to select songs in English from a book, and then the song was cued up. Figuring there was safety in numbers, we said we would sing together, so we were given two microphones and did our best with "Que sera sera." Jack then offered a much more impressive performance with a song from Titanic in English, and at that point, luckily, the food arrived.

In the afternoon we had a tour of the lake, in the rain and a beautiful pagoda where we got to hear a brief concert including ancient Chinese bells (well, copies thereof).

We arrived back at our hotel, happy to be looking forward to a day with no responsibilities and I has delighted to have my luggage finally lightened from all the gifts I had been carrying around all these weeks. In all I gave the school a dozen pocket copies of the US Constitution, some Emily Dickinson Poetry, selections from Thoreau, a book about Cesar Chavez, a children's book about going west in a Conestoga wagons, some stencils for making signs in Roman letters, some decals of the alphabet, and a dozen lapel pins of the Poly Prep tower. I gave Jack some songs by Peter Seeger and tried to explain how he had an interesting past because he had been accused of being a communist. I think the message got lost in the translation.

Today has been "at leisure." We have worked out the details for the cruise due to start tomorrow night. Wuhan has flooded about four feet, but nowhere near the danger level at this point. (We went and looked at the dikes to make sure). Nevertheless, we can't go through the locks, so tomorrow we will take a bus for 4 1/2 hours to reach the "upper Yangtze" on the other side of the current dam. We will spend the night on our boat. The next morning we will get back off and tour the dam and have "a party" and then get back on the boat Monday afternoon and continue as per schedule for the rest of our trip.

I am not sure I will have e-mail access from the boat. If not, this journal will next continue on Friday evening July 23. I imagine I'll have lots to tell.