Up and Downs of Chinese Volunteers in Laos

Six months are neither long nor short. For most people, life is ordinary, with nothing too exciting. Study, work, rest… it’s the same everyday. Time passes by like this. However, for the sixth group of 13 volunteers who went to Laos from Shanghai, the six months from October 2006 to April 2007 were a unique and unforgettable experience, during which curiosity, joy, difficulty, homesickness, exchange and conflicts were interwoven into their medical and health service and in their teaching of English and Chinese. Reporter Wen Junhua paid a visit to Laos in October 2006 and got a full picture of the sweetness and bitterness of the life of the volunteers. 

Why did you want to go to Laos? The 13 volunteers listed 13 reasons. 

Yin Baobing, MD: to get some experience and have something memorable. 

His reply is representative: to have a look at the outside world. “There are 50 to 60 remaining years in life. It would be meaningless to live the same life everyday. I would like to get some experience and have something to remember when young,” said Yin, 34, deputy head of the group and a Shanghai native. He obtained a degree in medicine in 2004 and took up a job as a surgeon at the Huashan Teaching Hospital of Fudan University. He regarded joining the volunteer service as being full of significance, a hard-to-get opportunity. 

Zhu Yuchen, the youngest of the group: to steel myself. 

His reply was instant. Zhu Yuchen was 10 years younger than Yin Baobing. Born in luxury in the 1980s, she lacked some “toughening”, as her father and mother had experienced the ‘Great Cultural Revolution’ and worked in the countryside. 

As soon as she saw the announcement about the recruitment of volunteers in Laos, Zhu, who was then working with an enterprise affiliated with the Shanghai municipal government, signed up for it. She applied to work in Laos, where life was much harder than in Shanghai, and became a computer teacher at the Youth League Training School of Laos. 

Lu Feng: a new Shanghainese: like the ways of living in different cities. 

Unlike Yin and Zhu, Lu was new to Shanghai. Born in Shandong, he studied at and graduated from the Shanghai Huadong University of Technology and got a job at the Shanghai Personnel Service Centre, melting into this megacity. The 26-year-old Lu Feng described himself as a man who was “seeking changes in stability”. A student of international trade, he won the opportunity of serving as a volunteer by his facility in English. “I like the feeling of living in different cities,” said Lu. There was no lofty reason for him to choose to be a volunteer. A six-month experience in a different place is what he wanted. 

Ye Changhai, TV director: Seeking peace. 

In contrast with Lu Feng’s purpose for volunteering, Ye Changhai wanted some peace. He chose to become a Chinese teacher. With a pair of glasses on his pale face, the 26-year-old Ye Changhai looked sedate, too sedate for his age. “I’d like to have a change of environment,” he said. “I want to regulate the state of my mind.” 

Ye hoped that the simple life in Laos would awaken his perception. He conceived that he would use his experiences in Laos as material for his literary creations. 

Background of Chinese youth aid service volunteer project  

The Laos Project of Chinese Youth Volunteer for Overseas Service was started in May 2002 jointly by the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League of China, the Ministry of Commerce and the China Youth Volunteer Association. This was the first project undertaken by the Chinese youth volunteers. 

Starting from 2003, Shanghai has to date sent six groups of 62 youth volunteers to Laos. Their services covered health and medicine, the teaching of Chinese and English, computer operation, culture and education, business management and agricultural techniques. The 62 volunteers averaged 29 in age. Forty-three of them have a university education, including 13 people with a master’s degree and three with a doctoral degree. Their outstanding performance in Laos has buttressed the international image of Chinese youth. 

Chinese volunteers are full of vigour and vitality, said officials of the Youth League of Laos. Their performance is excellent, they do everything on their own and they adapt quickly to local conditions, they added. 

Human interests 

Joy: hundreds of thousands in the pocket. 

Although they went to Laos with different purposes, the 13 volunteers have the same feeling: It is a great relief and life there is much better than imagined, only that it is too hot. 

The city district of Vientiane is not big. A few days after temporary settlement in a hotel, the volunteers became familiar with the surroundings, forming in their minds a picture of their work and life in the following six months.

But that does not mean that there are no difficulties. The first brain-teaser was the conversion of the currency. They were quite taken aback after seeing the Lao currency for the first time: the kip came in denominations of 500, 1000, 2000, 5000, 10,000, 20,000 and 500,000 bills. Each volunteer suddenly became a person worth at least ten thousand, and often they had hundreds of thousands of kip in their pockets. Likewise, for the first-time arrivals, there seemed to be not much of a difference in the currency in terms of design, colour and denomination. Each time they were going to pay for something, they had to read the numerals on the bills several times before parting with the money. Zhu Yuchen, who loves to crack jokes, said that they had created a method of managing the money: put the money of the same face value together, just like playing poker.  

The kip’s exchange rate to the Chinese currency is about 1,250 to 1,200 to a yuan. Most Lao shops and restaurant accept both U.S. dollars and kip. To calculate how much RMB kip cost, the volunteers converted the kip amount into U.S. dollars first and then converted from U.S dollar into RMB.  

Immersed in the illusion of being “men of ten thousand yuan”, as popularly known in China, some careful volunteers found that the prices of daily necessities were slightly higher than in Shanghai and that they had to grapple with how to spend their money wisely. 

Sourness: Hoodwinked by ‘tuktuk’ drivers 

If currency conversion caused small trouble, communication was a bigger problem – and was actually a headache for the group leader Gu Chenjie. As the Lao side was not responsible for communications between the volunteers’ residence and the places they work in, the volunteers had to take both safety and efficiency into account because most of their areas of work were far away from their lodgings. 

The ‘tuktuk’ , a motorcycle with a canopy, is the most common means of transport in Laos and naturally the volunteers’ first choice for moving around. After learning from the hotel boss and Lao colleagues that the reasonable monthly rate for tuktuk should be 70 U.S. dollars, Ye Changhai and Zhu Yuchen went up to a ‘tuktuk’ driver waiting outside the hotel in the hope of bargaining for a good price. After a round of verbal war, Ye and Zhu seemed quite contented and reported back to the group members: 60 dollars a month. As the price was lower than what they thought, they thought that they had hoodwinked the driver. But their joy did not last long. Early in the morning the second day, the driver came to, saying that he would accept no less than 80 dollars. The volunteers who had to work that day had to find another driver. Then, after finding out that the volunteers had to go to their working areas and back in the day, as well as o to different places, the driver raised the price to 100 dollars. Pressed for time, the volunteers had to promise for the time being to pay the full amount later, and paid 20 dollars as downpayment. The first day’s communications problem was thus solved.

But early on the morning of the second day of their going to work, the driver pulled out another “trick” before the group thought out a bargaining strategy, saying with apology that his Australian friend came to Laos and offered 10 dollars a day for the tuktuk and “I would take you no more after noon.” The sudden change of mind threw the group members into confusion. Unhappy, they boarded the tuktuk. Arriving at the training school, the driver gave back, with a lot of apologies, the 20 dollars that he had earlier received. In the end, Gu Chenjie had to be prepared for two options: to increase the charge up to 150 dollars a month so that the driver would not go away. He also told his members to find another driver. Through this round of verbal battle, the group members came to understand fully the ficklemindedness of the Lao ‘tuktuk’. “We ourselves have been hoodwinked by the driver, ” they sighed, helplessly. 

Bitterness: Having meat for the first time in a week 

In the kitchen in the hostel of the Lao Youth League Central committee, previous volunteers had all cooked for themselves. But when the sixth group of volunteers arrived, the hostel was being renovated, so they had to live in a hotel without a kitchen -- and had to live a “guerrilla’s life”. 

“I want to have meat”. This became a classic joke. 

Considering the hygienic conditions and cost factors, group leader Gu Chenjie and his team decided to have meals together in the evening and each had to prepare his own lunch. They found a Guangdong food restaurant and a Sichuan restaurant where the hygienic conditions and food were good, and the group decided to have their dinner in the restaurant for 20-30 U.S. dollars per table of 10 to 13 people. 

All the group members, except the youngest Zhu Yuchen, felt good after a few meals. “I want to have meat”, cried Zhu. This caused quite hearty laughter. It turned out that in the previous meals, the group members all ordered mainly vegetable dishes. But Zhu, nicknamed “meat-monger”, was not quite happy. Of course, it was not too difficult to get some meat to eat in Vientiane. But it was indeed very difficult for English teacher Lu Feng and computer teacher Xu Yongshi, who worked at the Youth Development Centre of the Vientiane Provincial Youth League, more than 70 kilometres from Vientiane. They jokingly called this place the “countryside”, which they reached after a three-hour trip by bus. Lu and Xu lived in the centre from Monday through Friday, and joined the other members of the group only during weekends. 

When this reporter arrived at the centre, Lu Feng and Xu Yongshi were happily preparing lunch. Xu made an egg soup while Lu Feng was opening a 300-gramme can of luncheon meat. “This is the first time we have meat in a week,” said Lu. On the table were luncheon meat, cabbage, fried onion and egg soup. That was their best meal in the week. 

Pork is very expensive in Laos, usually the equivalent of 26 yuan per kilogramme or twice as much as in China. That was why Lu and Xu were excited about having their first meat dish in a week. Lu and Xu, who always had cabbage, onions and eggs, eagerly awaited the weekends, when they could have a better meal in town. 

Teaching Lao students to sing Wang Fei’s ‘May Friendship Last’ 

Three years ago, Chang Tianle, the youngest of the second group of Chinese volunteers, taught English for half a year at the Youth Development Centre of the Vientiane Provincial Youth League Committee. Her memories are still fresh in her mind. She liked to recall the “thatched house joke” that always makes her laugh her head off. It was September 2003, at the Youth Development Centre of the Vientiane Provincial Youth League Committee. After she had settled down, a Lao teacher of English came to visit her. Pointing to a photograph showing a thatched house on the wall, the Lao teacher asked: “Is this your home in Shanghai?” Chang Tianle was so surprised that she almost fainted. It was in fact a photograph of Chang’s father and mother taken in the Nationalities Cultural Park in Hainan. This shows that although China and Laos are neighbours, their peoples know little about each other.  

Three years have now passed, and more and more Chinese have come to Laos to do business. The two peoples have begun to know each other better. For most Lao people, what comes to mind about China are “Yunnan” and “Chinese merchants”. So, Gu Chenkie, the leader of the sixth group of Chinese volunteers, took upon himself the additional task of introducing China to his students in the Chinese language. Gu, who loves ancient poetry, inserted into his language class Chinese songs, poems and Chinese geographical knowledge in the hope that Lao students would know more about China. He also gave his Lao students names with Chinese flavour, such as ‘Ah Yue’ and ‘Ah Wen’.  

In his first class just after the Mid-Autumn Festival, Gu taught the students to sing the pop song ‘May Friendship Last’ (one of the representative songs sung by pop star Wang Fei) adapted from the poem by Song Dongpo, a great man of letters in the Sung Dynasty. In his second class, Gu drew a map of China and told the students about its administrative divisions. During the break in grammar class, he read out the Tang Dynasty poem ‘Thoughts at Quiet Night’ by the famous Tang Poet Li Bai. “I have brought with me the book ‘Poems of Tang and Song Dynasties’ and will introduce them to the students,” said Gu. 

There were 20 students in Gu’s class, mostly government functionaries or university and middle school students. ‘Ah Lei’, who worked with the Lao Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was the best student here. He had studied Chinese for four months. Occasionally responsible for receiving Chinese delegations, regarded the Chinese language very important because it is becoming an international language. That was why he took time out to go to this class. The same was true with Supawan  who worked with the Lao State Physical Education and Sports Commission. She had learned some Chinese but forgot it after a period without practice, and had to pick it up again. The 20-year-old Ah Wen, a student of the Business School, was the most active in the class. She came to the class simply because, she liked the Chinese language. Twenty-four-year-old Li Guo Ming (pronunciation) had just graduated from university. He came to the Chinese-language class in the hope of finding a good job, like an increasing number among Lao youth. Chinese-operated companies in Laos pay more than the local companies and a person who can speak Chinese would get the upper hand in applying for a job a Chinese company. The ideal job Li Guoming visualised was a being a clerk at the Chinese language department of a university. Officials from the Lao Youth League Central Committee also said that while more and more Lao youth were learning Mandarin, there were not enough qualified teachers of the language. 

Doctors of both Chinese and Western medicine are popular 

In Hospital 109 where Yin Baobing worked, there was only one surgeon. The hospital president hoped that Yin’s arrival would help improve the surgical skills of the hospital. After a few days, Yin Baobing, a specialist in kidney and bladder operations, had almost become a general doctor: to give B-scanning, treat burn cases, nursing and changing dressings, which he had never done at home. According to Yin Baobing, Hospital 109 was like a township clinic in China and the equipment and technology were like those found in China in the 1970s. There were only one B-scanner in the hospital with a staff of 200 and a poorly equipped operational theatre. The only operation the hospital could handle was removal of appendicitis. In contrast, its message department was staffed by 10 doctors, something seldom seen even in a large hospital in Shanghai, according to Chinese doctor Gu Junqing, who is from the Shanghai Guanghua Chinese and Western Integrated Hospital. Because traditional medicine is treated with great esteem and love and it has become fashionable to learn traditional Chinese medicine and consult traditional Chinese doctors, Gu was expecting to be able to display his talent to the full there. 

In short, Chinese volunteers met with great challenges in their work. The use of computers and Internet was not very popular in Laos. There were 12 computers in the Development Centre where Zhu Yuchen worked, but six were functional and they mostly had 286 or 386 processors. The training centre of the Lao Ministry of Public Security where Wu Ying was teaching Chinese and English consisted of just a few thatched houses. Gymnastics coach Shan Guang taught not gymnasts, but circus performers. Yet the Lao team hoped that the trainees could compete in the gymnastic events at the 2009 East Asia Games. The teaching equipment included only a 7x8 metre round carpet, three thin sponge pads and a big sponge bag. The table tennis teacher Jia Zhijuan taught the student team of the Lao State University in a hall converted from an asphalt warehouse.  

It was amid in such circumstances that the members of the volunteer team shared information and exchanged their feelings, supported each other and gave each other encouragement. There were endless stories and emotions to share everyday. But how to give the Lao people the maximum assistance with limited time and limited resources – that became the centre of their six-month stint in Laos.  

Problems: Curricula and communications should have been better 

There is no doubt that the volunteer service project can provide affordable and multifaceted aid to more Lao people. The project has also helped China achieve its purpose of aiding its neighbouring country and its people. It’s a win-win situation. But the win-win project can be made much better in terms of curricula and communications. 

Qu Shanshan, assigned to teach English at the training school of the Lao Youth League Central Committee, was to have had a full schedule in the mornings and afternoons from Monday through Friday. But on the first day, she came to the morning eagerly, only to find that only two students had come. It turned out that only these two signed up for the middle-level English class in the morning. On the second day, only one student was left because the other was absent. She reported the situation to the school, but was surprised to be informed that there were no more students for that class and the training class was thus cancelled. In the two computer classes taught by Zhu Yuchen, one had six students and the other had only one.  

The language barrier was another problem. Except for the advanced Mandarin classes, where Gu Chenjie could conduct simple exchanges, all the students in the other classes knew little Chinese - and it was also difficult to communicate in English. In the junior Chinese class, Ye Changhai taught the students in English as well as sign language. The English-speaking abilities of the students in Zhu Yuchen’s class was also limited, but it was much easier because computer classes stressed operation more than discussion. Computer teacher Gao Lei enjoyed the most best treatment because the college of technology where he taught assigned a Lao teacher to be his interpreter.  

While almost all the volunteers had jobs a week after coming to Laos, two sports teachers – Shan Guang, the gymnastics coach of the Shanghai Gymnastic Team and teacher of the Shanghai Institute of Physical Education, and Jia Zhijuan, teacher of table tennis and calisthenics of the Shanghai Zhangyan Middle School – were still idle, without any assignment. It was only after several rounds of discussion with the Lao Youth League Central Committee officials that Shan and Jia got in contact with the officials of the Lao State Physical Education Commission. 

(*Wen Junhua of ‘Guangzhou Daily’ wrote this story under the Imaging Our Mekong media fellowship programme 2006-07, implemented by IPS Asia-Pacific and Probe Media Foundation Inc with the supported of the Rockefeller Foundation.)