Li Yang is an evil son of a bitch – Tim Lyde edition

Following Li Yang’s “I’m mature.  Nothing offends me” comments, we walked back to the hotel for lunch.  We ate lunch and dinner in a private room at the hotel’s restaurant.  They put out the same buffet for each meal.  Good food, but the same stuff for each meal for 12 days. …. At lunch that day, some black dude in his 50s showed up with a Chinese woman and a half black-half Chinese baby girl.  He sat down at the table where I was sitting and introduced himself.

“I’m Tim, and I’m here to observe and evaluate,” he said.

“Are you sure you’re not here to replace one of us?” I said.

At that point, I really thought I was going to be fired.  Actually, I kind of wanted to be fired so I could return to Shenzhen and write.  It didn’t happen, though.  Tim really was there to observe and evaluate.

“I just got done working another camp, and I wanted to have a few days off, but Li kept calling and calling begging me to come here.  The man doesn’t take no for an answer.  Then Clark called me, and I gave in,” Tim said.

I wasn’t buying it.  I immediately assumed he either was replacing me, or he was there as Li Yang’s token black friend.  The latter turned out to be true.

The other people at the table began asking him questions, like where was he from (Dallas), how long he’d been in China – shit like that.  Tim said he started working in China many years ago, when he helped put the first Wal-Mart in the country.  He then pulled down his yellow coat to reveal the Wal-Mart logo on his shirt.

“So you were corporate Wal-Mart?” I said.

“Yes, sir,” Tim said.

I wanted to puke.

It’s funny.  Here in China, I have no problem going to Wal-Mart because I know it’s a safe bet for buying food and accessories.  But, in America, I fucking hate going into Wal-Mart.

Tim didn’t exactly look like corporate anything.  I haven’t seen a set a teeth that jacked up in a long time, and I’m living in China.  His one front tooth was practically backwards.  Tim Lyde is one ugly son of a bitch.

I had a feeling this asshole was going to show up at my class that day, and sure enough, right as I was about to start teaching, he struts into the room.  I had written the lyrics to Dave Matthews Band’s “The Dreaming Tree” on the board.  Clark had told us to teach the students these retarded questions and answers, but, like almost all the other teachers, I’d given up on that after Day 1 and was doing whatever I wanted.  I put the lyrics on the board with blank spaces so the students could listen to the song and try to figure out what word was omitted.  It’s a pretty good listening exercise.  Other songs I had the students listen to at the camp included, “I’m only sleeping,” by the Beatles, “What a wonderful world,” by Louis Armstrong, and “Hurricane,” by Bob Dylan.  I played the latter after Li Yang’s ridiculous “very dark skin” comments.

Tim walked in and shook my hand.  The Chinese teacher assistants had no idea who Tim was or what was going on.

“I’m just gonna sit in the back and observe,” he said.

“OK,” I said.  I turned to the students.  “Class, this is Tim.  Tim, this is my class.”

Tim then proceeded to talk for 15 minutes.  He regurgitated the same shit Li Yang has been saying for over a week: talk loud, exaggerate your body language, work hard.  He wasting my motherfucking time, and teaching that class was the only Goddamn thing I liked about the camp.  I wanted to kill him.  Every time he glanced my way, I gave him a mad face.  I even looked at my watch a couple of times.  Still, he kept rambling.  Then, without giving any warning, he turned to one of my TAs and asked her to translate what he had just said.

“I’m sorry, but I could not follow you,” she said.

Like all of the students, she had stopped paying attention, as well.

“You’re not good then,” he said.

Then Tim Lyde pointed at another TA, who was probably the only person in the room paying attention, and was able to translate.

I finally had enough and interrupted him.

“Class, Tim here used to be a big man for Wal-Mart.  You all know Wal-Mart, right?  Well, in America working for Wal-Mart isn’t exactly a good job, but here in China, it can be a good place to work, and if you know English, you can get a really good job with Wal-Mart.  Back me up on this, Tim.”

Tim didn’t look too happy, but he backed me up anyway, and said something about how Wal-Mart would cling to them like a life preserver if they spoke English.  There’s no way the kids understood ‘life preserver.’  They also had no idea what “cookie cutter” meant, but Tim kept throwing it out there as a term for some reason, even after I told him they didn’t understand him.  Finally, I put my hand on Tim’s shoulder and said, “Let’s hear it for Tim,” the students clapped, and Tim left the room without observing.  The second he left, the girl he offended said: “Gavin, who was that man, and why was he mean to me?”

China has a shame culture, and my TA had “lost face” in front of the students.  After the class, I hunted down Tim and asked him what his deal was.

“Why’d you disrespect that girl?”

“I didn’t disrespect anyone.”

“You told that girl she wasn’t good at English when you asked her to translate.”

“I didn’t say that.  I was merely–”

“No dude, you did, and I’d appreciate it if you came back to class tomorrow and apologized.”

Tim agreed to say he was sorry, but the next day he didn’t show up during my class.  I asked the TA if he had apologized outside of class, and she said no.  Again, I hunted this prick down and asked him what was up.  He said he was going to stop by, but hadn’t gotten around to it, yet.   Fine, I said, and walked away.

The next night was the final exam for students.  As a class, the students had to recite this idiotic passage Li Yang had written about the differences between American English and British English.  The passage contained the phrase “the differences between American English and British English” four times.  Li Yang believed the students’ English would be improved if they could blindly memorize and recite the speech without knowing what most of the words meant.

I had to be there for this.  Li Yang walked around the building visiting each class.  He had entourage with him, as always.  His entourage always contains a camera man and a photographer.  It’s disgusting.  Tim Lyde was a part of the entourage to witness the test.  When he followed Li into the room, I grabbed Tim’s arm and gave him a stern look.  He shook me off, and then tripped over part of the teacher’s stand.  Li, who was carrying the Olympic torch he carried before the Beijing Games, didn’t even listen to half the speech.  He stopped the students, told them they passed, and then posed for a picture with them.  I was standoffish with the man.  He had to say “join us” twice to me, once when he and his entourage stood in front of the room to hear the recital, and again when he posed for the picture with the class.

After the picture, Tim walked over to the TA and said: “This was great.  You are great.  Everyone makes mistakes.  Keep working hard.”

He tried to head for the door, but I grabbed his arm again.

“That wasn’t an apology, Tim,” I said.

He shook his arm free.  “I gotta get going,” he said.

“That wasn’t an apology, Tim,” I said again, louder.

What a fucking asshole.  I hope that fucking prick gets what he has coming.  He insulted a few other students and teachers in his 3 days at the camp.  Everyone tolerated him because most of the time he had his baby with him.  The money-loving nameless friend who got me the job said several times how cute Tim’s baby was.  I got sick of it.  Fuck that guy and his baby.  I started telling people his little girl looked like my asshole.

And Li Yang used Tim exactly how he wanted.  He called him up to speak during one of his lectures.  He threw his arm around him.  He made the students look at his baby, as the camera man focused on it, putting its picture on the movie screen on the stage.  Timothy Lyde, Wal-Mart cocksucker, Li Yang butt buddy.