Dear Colleagues

Here is a brief report on CAPA/AADP Study Tour of China

The tour, October 16-November 1 was jointly sponsored by CAPA and the Academy (www.aapdp.org) and led by Cesar Alfonso and myself, We visited 5 cities: Beijing, Xi’an, Chengdu, Wuhan and Shanghai. There were 25 people total, twenty analysts and therapists and five significant others.

In each of the 5 cities, the tour members went sight seeing, but also visited hospitals and clinics where they lectured, taught their classes, saw their psychoanalytic and psychotherapy patients in person, supervised, gave lectures and case conferences, etc., etc,

Almost every day, we all had a meal with students (and the faculty at their institutions). At times we were the hosts, at times we were treated to a banquet by the host institution. There were three problems with the tour: First we really needed 35 hour days and another week in China; second, the traffic jams were unbelievable on all the new eight lane superhighways-we should have taken the brand new subways, and third, we should have included a weight loss program as a post tour event. It was an extraordinary experience for everyone.

An example of a day: day one (Sunday) in Beijing. The tour members went to Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, Great Hall of the People, China National Grand Theatre, etc. Cesar Alfonso and I went to Beijing University (aka Beida, aka Peking University). At the university, there was an audience of about 130 people from Beida, other universities, departments of psychiatry, psychology and student counseling services. The audience was enthusiastic, delighted to see us. A wonderful start!

I had meetings with the chairs at Beida, Tsinghua (the Harvard and Yale of China) and other universities and hospitals and counseling services. The reception was uniformly positive and all wanted to have our program at their institution.

The following is characteristic of the reactions of the tour members “I want to tell you how inspirational and informative I found the trip to China and the opportunity to participate in CAPA both as a therapist and as an emissary on behalf of the program… The entire trip was incredibly enlightening. All of my biases and preconceived notions about China and the Chinese were torn completely apart by our experiences. The fellow travelers were delightful …”

By the end of the tour, members were taking the Shanghai subway by themselves, travelling by train to other cities etc. They had begun to feel really comfortable in China. I think the 4 most important things about the tour were:
1. A tour like this is a visit to a very old and remarkable civilization.
2. A tour like this is a visit to the future, one that shatters all the stereotypes we
have about China.
3. A tour like this is an opportunity to meet and interact directly with the future leaders of Chinese psychotherapy and psychoanalysis
4. A tour like this is an amazing amount of fun.

We will be repeating this tour in October 2010 and probably Spring 2011. Please contact me if you are interested. Many people have already expressed interest and we have a limit of 25. The brochure with dates and costs should be ready in about a month. Because of the great interest, we may need to give priority to people who are treating or teaching in China.
Elise Snyder