A Shopper’s Paradise
31 Aug 2009 Leave a Comment
in Traveling Tags: markets, shopping
China has meant so much to my imagination that the reality shocked me. I still cannot get the images of Shaolin warrior monks out of my mind. Or workers in Mao suits brandishing Little Red Books. Or even just old folk practicing tai chi in a public square. I half expected to find them all going about their daily lives. I remembered growing up hearing that I should eat everything on my plate because there are starving children in China. I remembered Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem “Kubla Khan,” and James Clavell’s novel Tai Pan. The truth is that China is dirty, cruddy, and trying oh so hard to fit in with her modern siblings. Its beauty is found in the way a family values its only child, in the happiness of people coming home from work, and in the joy of sharing meals with friends. Perhaps someday China’s siblings will one day emulate her. But now, it is convenient for everybody to realize she is still a growing child.
Being a Highly Respectable Foreigner with Chinese Characteristics
29 Aug 2009 1 Comment
in Traveling Tags: Gee, history, laowai, traffic
You like spicy food? You know how use chopsticks? You know Chinese President Hu Jintao?
Of course I do. Chinese people are so easy to impress. Either their expectations are very low, or I just don’t fit the mold of a stereotypical American.
A college mathematics student at a party told me that while hanging out in Beijing and Shanghai she was amazed at the ignorance of foreigners pouring into the country without knowing the current president or the role Deng Xiaoping (kind of pronounced like “Dung show—rhymes with plow—ping”) played in the Reform and Opening of China. Of course everybody knows Chairman Mao Zedong. But to know that under Deng Xiaoping’s leadership the People’s Republic of China took its first steps towards modernization—and he’s why Americans and other Westerners are now allowed in China in the first place—to know something of this is to earn beaucoup street cred. If life was a video game then my Mianzi (prestige and face) status bar would be at full strength.
The Only Westerner in Town
Street Life
25 Aug 2009 Leave a Comment
in Traveling
There was a dirty two lane street just outside the gates. Construction vehicles threw up plumes of exhaust and dust as they tore up the pavement and surrounding countryside. Vehicles of all shapes and sizes sped to and fro. People rode motorcycles, cars, trucks, and tricycle-like cars. Some people seemed to have engineered their own personal motorized vehicle from remnants found in a junkyard. Meanwhile, students filtering in from summer vacation weaved their way across the street to the bus stop and the market area just opposite of the university.
This “market area” resembled a two-block section of a city that just sprouted out of the stony ground. There were shops, restaurants, internet cafes, book stores, and barbers. People laid produce on blankets in the back alleys. In one stall, a boy sat with his head down on his arms mindlessly waving a flyswatter through an insect cloud that hung over a wooden board of chicken carcasses. A woman sat by white tiled tubs of crystal clear water and charcoal grey catfish. In yet another stall, a woman kept roosters in a neat stack of cages.
The Awakening
25 Aug 2009 Leave a Comment
in Traveling
It was Saturday evening and dusk was falling. The thundering had stopped. There were text messages from Sail asking how I was doing, “Was the apartment convenient for u now?” And Vanno, a highschool senior and the son of a chemistry professor had called to see when it would be convenient for him to come over to practice English. I had met Vanno the day before, and he made himself useful by helping out as translator and carrying bags. He introduced himself as “very eager to learn oral English” from me. Vanno prefaced his suggestions and advice with, “Is it convenient, if…”
I tried texting Sail back but I couldn’t figure out how to work the keypad. The directions were in Chinese characters.
I rolled out of bed, ate some brown colored bread shaped like bowls that had been left over from a restaurant meal the day before. The world outside had grown dark: A study in violet and the hills were black before the hazy twilight. It was a perfect Kodak moment. Seized with purpose, I grabbed my camera, went outside, closing the door behind to prevent further insect infiltration, and snapped some shots of the deserted campus which had taken on a phantasmagoric ambience.
Of Fried Chicken Feet
24 Aug 2009 Leave a Comment
in Traveling Tags: Guangzhou, traffic
Second Thoughts
Well… I’m here.
“You must act like you are at home. Please tell me if you experience any inconvenience.”
These were the words of Mr. Bob Chen—his words a constant refrain throughout our first hours together. Bob was a small, thin man wearing a short sleeve dress shirt tucked into slacks. He took my fully loaded backpack away from me—if he was a contortionist he would be able to fit inside it; pack being about half his weight. He was small, but I knew his heart was big.
A couple days in country… How can I sum it all up? China was dirty, hot, loud, and bustling. The people were beautiful, industrious, and eager to please. The land was rugged. Green hills like dragon’s teeth corralled the roads and towns. It was hot and hazy. The people shy. They wavered between gawking and hiding their eyes—but their eyes lit up and they smiled when I said hello in Chinese, “Ni hao.”
