By Paula Day

Age does not determine growth. With that view of living, it was not hard for Elizabeth Fodor, a veteran of 22 years of teaching and administration at St. Pius X High School, to decide to go to China.

Mrs. Fodor, who prefers “Betsy” to the more formal Elizabeth, will leave in early August for Nanchong in Sichuan province, China. She has a one-year contract to teach conversational English at Southwest petroleum Institute, a research facility for graduate students. Her students will be teachers of English and graduate students who already have a good grasp of English grammar and need the opportunity to express themselves in English – “Speaking out and listening in English,” as Betsy Fodor puts its.

“I have other lives to live,” she explained, quoting Thoreau when he left Walden Pond. This, at an age when others might consider looking toward retirement. About teaching and her administrative role as Pius’ dean of studies, she says, “I’ve done it. Just because you’ve done something successfully, you don’t have to do it the rest of your life. You go on and do other things. It’s called growth – growth is what I’m talking about.”

Mrs. Fodor’s interest in China developed when she taught an upper level course in the 1969-70 school year called “Tradition and Change in Four Societies.” As one segment, the cross-cultural course looked at the politics of modern China, especially the country’s development since its 1945-49 Communist revolution.

“That led me to a deeper study of China,” she explained. “I became vastly interested in the development of the whole China culture – philosophy, literature, art, as well as politics. I gained a keen appreciation of these people who developed such a high culture and maintained it almost without break for thousands of years.”

Betsy Fodor admires the Chinese for their pragmatic approach to life, and their rationality. “But what really impressed me was that over this continuous span they became influential but did not manifest aggressive tendencies. Nations all around them did pay tribute to them, but this was an acknowledgement of the fact that China had things they wanted. Writing – they gave the written language, and art, and philosophy to those around them.”

Mrs. Fodor visited China in 1981 with 11 other secondary school administrators. The group was sponsored by the U.S. Chinese Peoples Friendship Association. She spoke warmly of the experience, noting the hospitality of their Chinese hosts. The group visited schools and talked with Chinese educators about their problems.

“They were just coming out of the cultural revolution,” she pointed out. “After 10 years of demolishing, they not only had to build but had to remake. We would be accosted when recognized so they could speak to us and practice their English. Many young people in their 20s feel cut out,” she added, “frozen in place because they did not have opportunities for education.”

Elizabeth Fodor will not go to China wearing rose-tinted glasses. She knows living accommodations will be spare compared to Western standards. But she does not foresee eating meals provided from the Institute’s dining room and adjusting to a primitive hot water system as major challenges.

“Privacy – their attitudes toward privacy are different than ours. They think nothing of walking in to visit you and to practice their English at 7 in the morning. I would go out early in the morning to walk and find the park full at 7 a.m. There would be many people walking up and down in the park reciting from American textbooks – they want to speak American English. They do things in public places we would be loath to do.” Betsy Fodor admitted she’ll find this cultural difference a challenging adjustment.

“And dealing with the Chinese bureaucracy. After a while it’ll drive you crazy,” she said. “You just have to shrug your shoulders, realize you’re not at home – just have to accept it.”

“I tend to be an intense person and people may read that as rudeness,” she admitted. “I’ll have to make an effort to be gracious.”

Study, and a visit, not as a tourist but as a professional interacting with other professionals, have given her an advantage for the coming year, Betsy Fodor believes. She plans to keep a journal of her experience and is busy gathering tapes and books to take as resources. She is not certain what to expect regarding the climate, although Nanchong is in approximately the same latitude as Georgia. She will be living with a colleague and friend, an English teacher from New York City. Her daughter, who has just completed graduate studies, lives and works in Hong Kong. Mrs. Fodor says there is no connection with her decision to go to China, but the two will be several thousand miles closer.

“I’m at a crossroad,” Elizabeth Fodor, who is a widow, said. “My daughter has completed her graduate degree and my direct support is not needed, and so I am free to pursue other things.” In this pursuit, this August she will begin one of her “other lives to live.”