The Third Chinese Corner was Held in Faculty of Humanities at University of Latvia
The third Chinese corner was held in Faculty of Humanities, Latvian University at 3:30 pm local time on 6th of October, 2016. As usual, Dr. Agita Baltgalve, professor of Sinology at the Faculty, hosted the activity, which attracted twenty participants or so.
They included junior students specializing in Sinology, Chinese language teachers who taught at the Faculty and volunteer Chinese language teachers from Confucius Institute, Chinese immigrants living in Riga and some exchange students from China. The topic of Chinese corner this time was literature. The first presentation was offered by Dr. Baltgalve who explained how she loved classical five-character Chinese poetry, particularly Tang Poetry. She recited two poems, Lovesickness by Wang Wei and Fishing in Snow by Liu Zongyuan. Next, Pan Bin, a volunteer Chinese language teacher presented Wang Wei’s Autumn Dusk in Mountains with detailed explanations and vivid PowerPoint illustration. Zeng Qingjun, another volunteer Chinese language teacher, presented Xin Qiji’s The Lantern Festival Night – to the tune of Green Jade Table with equally vivid PowerPoint illustration and an elegantly-translated English version. Surely, Tang poetry and Sung Ci-poems are the best part of classical Chinese literature, but modern Chinese literature was not ignored. This part was covered by introduction to Qian Zhongshu’s Fortress Besieged made by Zeng Rong wo was also a volunteer Chinese language teacher. The second phase of the activity focused on Latvian literature, especially nursery rhymes and ballads. All the participants were given a piece of paper where some fragments of a verse were written and they were asked to find other lines from the same work. The activity resembled a jigsaw puzzle game which greatly enlivened the interaction between the participants. After the game was over, people in the room naturally formed into according to the poem they pieced together. Then the Latvian student in each group read aloud the poem and the volunteer Chinese language teacher interpreted it in Chinese. Among them, Zeng Qingjun’s interpretation won compliments from Dr. Baltgalve. The last phase repeated the procedure of the previous one with focus on Chinese poems. This time, Hu Yue and Lin Jie, both volunteer Chinese language teachers, amused everyone tremendously by mimicry explanation and good translation of Luo Binwang’s Ballad of Geese. This Chinese corner lasted approximately two hours with drinks and cookies served on the table. The activity provided for Chinese participants a glimpse of Latvian nursery rhymes and ballads straightforwardly and lively and for Latvian participants a deeper understanding of the characteristics of Chinese poetry.
