Home is a Roof Over a Pig: An American Family's Journey in China [Hardcover]

Aminta Arrington (Author)

Book Description

Release date: July 5, 2012

When all-American Aminta Arrington moves from suburban Georgia to a small town in China, she doesn't go alone. Her army husband and three young children, including an adopted Chinese daughter, uproot themselves too. Aminta hopes to understand the country with its long civilization, ancient philosophy, and complex language. She is also determined that her daughter Grace, born in China, regain some of the culture she lost when the Arringtons brought her to America as a baby.

In the university town of Tai'an, a small city where pigs' hooves are available at the local supermarket, donkeys share the road with cars, and the warm-hearted locals welcome this strange looking foreign family, the Arringtons settle in . . . but not at first. Aminta teaches at the university, not realizing she is countering the propaganda the students had memorized for years. Her creative, independent (and loud) American children chafe in their classrooms, the first rung in society's effort to ensure conformity. The family is bewildered by the seemingly endless cultural differences they face, but they find their way. With humor and unexpectedly moving moments, Aminta's story is appealingly reminiscent of Reading Lolita in Tehran. It will rivet anyone who is thinking of adopting a child, or anyone who is already familiar with the experience. An everywoman with courage and acute cultural perspective, Aminta recounts this transformative quest with a freshness that will delight anyone looking for an original, accessible point of view on the new China.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Home Is a Roof Over a Pig is a brutally honest and fascinating peek at life for an American family living in a foreign country. I was engrossed in the story as Arrington used her humor, and ultimately understanding and flexibility to survive, realize, and eventually love the contradictory land of China."
--Kay Bratt, bestselling author of Silent Tears: A Journey of Hope in a Chinese Orphanage

"The power of Aminta Arrington's Home Is a Roof Over a Pig is you can see both sides of the 'China coin' from it--something most people won't get just by traveling through, or only by hearing about China in Western languages. Read it, it will help you dip into the real China."--Xinran, author of The Good Women of China

"American teacher Arrington (editor, Saving Grandmother's Face) nicely demystifies the Chinese language for English speakers in this down-to-earth memoir chronicling her family's stint in the Chinese province of Shandong on the eve of the Beijing Olympics."--Publishers Weekly

"A military wife turned ESL instructor's sharp-eyed account of how the adoption of a Chinese baby girl led to her family's life-changing decision to live and work in rural China . . . candid and heartfelt."--Kirkus

"A fresh, illuminating look at contemporary China." --Booklist

"Her chronicle of their adventures with the language and with the local culture and characters presents intimate glimpses of the profoundly different ideology and philosophy that underlie the quotidian Chinese experience—and of the essential human kindness that can transcend those differences." --National Geographic Traveler

"This book captivated me through vivid accounts of everyday life in China from an American’s viewpoint. The refreshing insights stirred an appreciation and fascination in me for the Chinese people and their culture. As we shape our cultural identity in the increasingly global context, Aminta Arrington inspires us to broaden our understanding."--Yakima Herald

"Arrington is a sunny ('cynicism and I cannot breathe the same air') and energetic guide to today’s China—where Volvos glide among donkey carts and the Kitchen God coexists with Marxism. It is here that Arrington—while seeking out her daughter’s roots—also discovers 'the person I was created to be.'"--Christian Science Monitor Weekly

About the Author

Aminta Arrington has an M.A. in international relations from Johns Hopkins University School of advanced International Studies and studied at Waseda University in Tokyo. She has written about China for The Seattle Times, and she edited the anthology Saving Grandmother's Face: and Other Tales from Christian Teachers in China. Arrington continues to live and work in China with her family.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Overlook Hardcover (July 5, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590208994
• ISBN-13: 978-1590208991
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #820,041 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Originally from the Pacific Northwest, Aminta Arrington is a graduate of The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and has lived in China with her family since 2006. She has previously written for The Seattle Times and China Daily.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Best China book I've read since Peter Hessler's "River Town" July 30, 2012

By Bill Driscoll

Format:Hardcover

This book has several notable achievements.
1. The chapters are based on Chinese characters. Each chapter has a character as a theme. This works well, because that's how Chinese people process information. It's how they think. (I've lived in China the past four years, and the pictograph-based language is really fascinating.) It's basic enough so that you don't have to be student of Chinese language to follow the concept.
2. The depiction of one family's culture-shock and gradual adjustment to life in a small provincial town is full of grace and humor. It illustrates the warmth and humanity of Chinese people beautifully.
3. The description of how the Chinese exam-based education system discourages critical, inquiry-based thinking is excellent. The book follows several college students, showing how their thinking process, based on what they have come to understand as "truth" is gently challenged by the author over hot-button issues like the Western media, Dalai Lama, Taiwan, Communism. It shows how life can be easier and simpler for Chinese students if they don't question received truth. With empathy and patience, the author encourages her students to take "baby steps" in critical inquiry, while concurrently validating and honoring their individual processes. Reading this has given me a better understanding of the striking information gap between average people in China and our pro-democracy based Western concepts.
The book is full of wonderful insights and anecdotes. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The kind of American Family in China memoir I've always wanted to read September 2, 2012

By Suzanne Amara VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

For a reason I am not sure of, but like many people around the world, I am fascinated with China. I've read probably hundreds of Chinese memoirs, both of the lives of the Chinese and the lives of those who are drawn to China and go to live there. This book was the first time I've read of a family that truly embraced living in China, and in fact still lives there.

Aminta Arrington and her husband Chris have three children. The middle one, Grace, was adopted from China. Often, I know, those with Chinese adopted children strive to give them some Chinese culture, but the Arringtons went a step beyond---they went to live in China, in a small city where they both taught English and their young children attended a Chinese kindergarten. This book tells of a very ordinary life in China, but it is an extraordinary life in its ordinariness. Most Americans in China live the ex-pat life, in complexes, their children going to international schools, their contacts with actual regular Chinese people rare. This family lived in a regular small apartment, sent their kids to learn Chinese by going to school where that was all that was spoken, shopped where the Chinese did, and lived as they did. They became one of the community. It was a remarkable thing to do, to really understand the life their daughter would have had had she stayed in China.

The book also is fascinating when it talks about Chinese words and characters, and how they give insight into the thinking of the Chinese. Arrington, in her teaching, also encounters the vastly different view of the Chinese about various political issues and about concepts like freedom.

I hope there is another book about this family, now that they live in Beijing and their children are older. They seem like remarkable people.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Insights into both Chinese & American culture through thoughtful Memoir January 2, 2013

By Mark Wenger

Format:Hardcover

Memoir has become THE book to write,it seems, and many are the poorly written ones! A few stand out as breathtakingly insightful due to significant risk-taking on the part of the authors. Risk-taking in poorly written memoir tends towards exhibitionism (on the part of the author) and voyeurism (on the part of the readers), while excellent memoir tends towards vulnerability and shared intimacy. Arrington's memoir is almost another type - the teaching (pedagogic but not pedantic) memoir. Surely, any family having adopted, or contemplating adopting a child from China should read this book, but those who are learning about China, or hoping to live and work there, particularly as English teachers, should read it, also. But not only those readers: it is a book for learners to read, one learner sharing with other learners where and how to find something worth knowing.

What is worth knowing is not just "the other", which this book has in healthy doses. We learn much about contemporary and traditional Chinese culture, and can appreciate the beauty of China and her people better because of it. There is remarkably little that casts China in a negative light, even as the author discovers and explores uncomfortable topics, such as female infanticide or Chinese testing methods, Arrington has written about the China she has come to know quite well, and which she clearly loves.

However, she did not just learn about "the other" she also discovered and explored much of herself as an American woman, wife, mother, teacher and student, and these insights she also makes available for her readers. Why do Americans need to explain Chinese characters, and the character of China, (to Chinese, no less!)? Why indeed. Although not explicitly stated, much regarding such a question is revealed by Aminta, and for this she is to be commended. Although not the most breathtakingly honest memoir I have read (A Glass Castle takes that category for me), this book could be a valuable text for any American preparing to study or live abroad, or for any Chinese preparing to live or study in America. I believe it has much to offer anyone seeking greater self-awareness and ability in inter-culture communication and living.