Recap of the Xmas festivities

I had a fantastic Christmas. The CCEPers had a Christmas party at Steph’s place two weeks ago and last Friday all the foreigners were invited to a party held by the government. The past two days, I’ve been treated to dinner by my school. My classes have given me apples or cards or some other kind of gift. I might be making dumplings on Monday with one of my classes. At least I hope I can go. I felt bad because this past Thursday I said I’d go and then I got the invitation to go to the school sponsored dinner which is compulsory. So I couldn’t go make dumplings. : (

The wrapped apples and oranges are popular gifts here because apples signify peace and security and oranges signify happiness. Tomorrow I’m going to Beijing to meet up with Jeremy, CJ and Michelle. I might meet up with Jenna and Aleks because they’re also going to be in Beijing. I think Steph and Kelsey might be in Beijing too, but I’m not sure. CJ is leaving for good on January 4th. It makes me sad. She’s also a really cool, chill person to hang out with. She’s moving on to grad school, so I guess it’s for the best, but I’m still going to miss her.

It still seems surreal that I’ve been here for 4 months now. I’ve been contemplating staying another year. I just really like it here. My Chinese is progressing albeit slowly and I’ve settled into a nice routine. Routine is a relative term in China as anything can happen at anytime. Classes are winding down and finals are beginning here. I’m officially finished January 18th, but the last day of classes is January 4th. Then I’ll be off until February 24th. I’ll be traveling with fellow CCEPers. We’re going to go to Harbin up north for the ice festival and then we’ll make our way down south to Hong Kong and Sanya, Hainan. Sanya is where the Miss World pageant was held recently. This is where Miss China was crowned Miss World. Another interesting fact to note, she was born in Shijiazhuang, where I live. How nuts is that?

I'm a teacher? What??

I now have confirmation that what I am teaching does not matter at all. Why? Yesterday while I was giving a final in my class, I had a student show up in the middle of it that I had never seen before. She asked me to give her a grade for freshman English. What she was telling me wasn’t making much sense so I told her to come back after class. She was a sophomore who had changed her major so she hadn’t taken freshman English because she was an education major last year. So she wanted me to give her a final and then a grade even though she’s not on my roster or ever been in my class. I talked to one of my bosses and she said I should do it. Hmmm…okay. So, there’s no need to go to class or participate or do anything other than show up for the day of finals and ask a random teacher for a grade??? How does this make sense? Oh that’s right. I’m in China. And yes, I’m giving her a grade today.

Handan and Xi'an!

In other news, I went to Handan and Xi’an this past weekend!! It was fantastic. Jenna and I went to Handan where Erin and Ben teach and from there we took the train to Xi’an. Pictures do not do the terra cotta warriors justice. We also visited a famous mosque in Xi’an. Xi'an is a great mix of old and new. I really liked Xi'an. Handan is nice because it's a small town and everybody knows each other. It seems like a nice place to teach.

Okay, I know I’m not in India but there are some things that are identical to how it is in India. First example: On a bus in Xi’an, the extra people standing in the aisle ducked to avoid being caught by the police. It’s illegal to have a packed bus and have people standing in the aisle. At least for a bus passing a checkpoint. Second example: Bargaining with vendors. They say, “Mingtian, wu kuai” meaning “Tomorrow, 5 kuai.” They say the same thing when you bargain with vendors in India. Tomorrow it’ll be that price. Of course they don’t mean it but it’s funny they say the same thing.

I got back from a very shady dinner with some old creepy Chinese men. I went with my friend because there was no way I was going to let her go alone. There was nasty Great Wall wine involved and some bizarre phone calls. The “tea master” would not let us leave and I just finally got up, put my coat on and said I have to teach early in the morning, which I do. I don’t know how we would have gotten out of there if I hadn’t done that. The tea master kept making excuses, “one more glass,” or “one more cigarette” to my friend. It was not that late, but late enough. I was tired and the whole American and Indian fetish is getting old.

Today I decorated my room for Christmas. I feel more cheerful already.

Living in China

I think James Fallows has China down to a T. If you want an idea of how things work in China or why there are so many accidents in China, you should definitely read this. http://jamesfallows.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/11/the_way_vs_a_way_japan_v_china.php

Other related news:
I have now wandered onto two constructions sites since being in China. This doesn’t include the construction site that a taxi driver took my friends and I through once upon a time. How many have I walked through in the US? Zero. I was trying to get out of Future Mall, the basement of which has a grocery store. The rest of the floors are under construction. One would think it would be simple to do this. Not so. The exits were clearly not exits in this mall o’ the future.

Weekend recap

Saturday
Vikey woke me up at 8:30 am to remind me about today’s radio broadcast. I woke up a couple times, at 4 am due to Richard’s loud talking and 9:30 to get ready. I heard lots of people talking in the hallway and then it got quiet so I thought people had left. Nope, at 10:30 am when I went downstairs, the hallway was filled with people, many of whom were wearing suits. Obviously, I had no idea what was going on. There were maybe 100-200 people in my hall just standing and blocking the way out.

I went to a housewarming with Rich, Hugh, Josh and Jenna. I met a lot of new people including Mike and Cindy who grew up in Des Moines. It’s bizarre how many people have ties to Des Moines. They’ve lived in China for 17 years now.

Sunday
I met up with Caroline to go Christmas shopping near the train station. At lunch, we were stared at by a Chinese beggar for the entirety of our lunch, maybe a good 30-45 minutes. After lunch, he started to follow us and so Caroline and I split up with Sharon and Wendy (our Chinese acquaintances) to distract him. It worked and we walked away quickly.

Jenna met me later for dinner and we watched a Korean movie and part of the Simpsons Movie. We also got delicious lamb sticks.

Oh China

A few days ago I was warning Jenna to avoid riding her bike in or near any puddles at my campus. “Why?” she asks.
“Oh because there’s sewage spilled everywhere.”
“And how did that happen?”
“Oh well they couldn’t fit it in the truck, so they spewed it on the ground.” This sounded very logical when I said it. Then I realized how absurd my life really is.

A few nights ago, I went to go get lamb skewers with Jenna at the corner across from my school.
Jenna- “Man, I will never be able to out hard-core the Chinese.”
Me – “Yeah” We watched for a few minutes as the couple set up their corner stand and start their fires for the barbeque pit.
Jenna- “He just walked through the fire.” Exactly.

Other absurd things that now seem normal:
-couches and branches in the middle of the street covering manholes where construction is happening (who’s really going to be stupid and run over a couch, right?)
-cars in the wrong lane…and on the sidewalk…and wherever there is enough space
-walking calmly into said traffic and expecting not to be hit
-foreigners drink free at certain clubs
-everybody is your friend…Hallo!
-Communist party members closing buildings instead of security closing buildings

Things I will miss when leaving China:
-eating family style and the food
-barbeque!!!! (lamb sticks and mantou steamed bread are particular favorites of mine)
-how everyone is always outside doing something
-only working 12-15 hours a week
-bargaining (or arguing in some cases)
-there are no drive thrus in Shijiazhuang!!!
-not understanding what’s going on and claiming ignorance when stuff happens
-working on my Chinese with cab drivers (see above)
-naps!! People will just conk out wherever they are after lunch, for example, at a counter manning a shop or under/on a statue or on a streetcart. It’s fantastic and I don’t know why Americans don’t have scheduled naps
-milk tea with boba

Bob

I have a new roommate, I discovered him yesterday after my shower. I named him Bob. You can’t tell from the picture but he’s tiny, about as long as my middle finger. It was funny because I had just been thinking about how nice the apartment is because I don’t have an infestation of cockroaches or lizards or snakes and then I open my bathroom door and he’s just chillin on the floor near my rug. One would think it would be too cold for lizards to still be around, but no. I still consider myself lucky because so far, he’s the only one I’ve found. And he’s not a snake or a cockroach. I had a harrowing experience trying to kill a mighty cockroach when I first arrived. I also heard that Josh had found a lizard in one of his shoes which would have scarred me for life if that happened to me.

I went to Mazzo cause Rich was making his second debut as DJ there. All the Shizzy folks were there so I went even though I had to teach this morning at 8 am. When I came back from the club, I was greeted by Bob again and this time I was able to shoo him out of my apartment. Now whether he will return to surprise me is another story.

Mystery fruit and politics

I ate part of a gigantic unidentifiable fruit on Tuesday. It was bigger than a coconut and heavy and green. It reminded me of jackfruit. It looked like a pear on steroids. My neighbor/student Lee Jung In brought it over and we attacked it with my puny paring knife. Then he ripped it apart because my knife just wasn’t cutting it. It tasted like a grapefruit. It’s called a Yowsa in Chinese. Not that I know what that is in English. I love the fruit here. I wish we had more of it in the States.

Now for today’s topic: American politics

Oh lord, if you want to see fear, you should have just seen me when I was talking about politics in my 8 am sophomore class today. All of the students became very serious and quiet and no one dared ask a question, until I changed the subject and talked about American society and the TV shows they watch here. One of my students wouldn’t leave me alone until I talked about it in class, so now it’s done and she can’t pester me anymore. Let’s just say that the first hour (or the hour that shall not be named) was intense. The second hour was light hearted and everyone started talking again because we did fun activities and I finally got them to speak mostly in English because I had a “trophy” for the person who spoke the least amount of English and I made them speak at the end of class. I told them they could pass it on to whoever was speaking in Chinese, so it traveled a bit.

Bathroom from hell

On a different note…so far, since I have been living in my apartment, these are the things that have malfunctioned in my bathroom from hell.

When I first got here (two months ago):
-shower drain clogged with several months of pollution and water
-leaky sink in bathroom from hell
-slow, leaky toilet in bathroom from hell
-leaky water heater in bathroom from hell
-doorknob fell off from the inside of the bathroom from hell

In short, everything. Well, no that's not true. The lights work.

So I told the not-so-handyman about these problems and he saw the actual leak in the sink so he fixed that. And nothing else. He did not seem to understand the problems with the toilet and water heater for my shower. The drain did not bother me as much and the doorknob I can jimmy it back onto the door, if I really feel like using it.

So in the past week, these are the things that have broken:
-my fucking toilet (as a result of 5-6 people coming over and drinking lots of beer)
-my fucking water heater for my fucking shower (I don’t like cold showers!)

In conclusion, I hate my bathroom.

The haunted house from hell

We helped with the haunted house around 5:30 and it lasted about 15-20 minutes before a glass door was shattered by the crush of students trying to get into the haunted house. I think there were maybe 200-400 students. It looked like 1000 students from inside the place. It was chaos.

It was fun but then it quickly got out of hand. The students started getting rowdy. Lindsey had a wire around her neck and a pot on her head to look like she was being electrocuted and students were pulling the wire essentially strangling her. Students jumped on Emily’s back and a few students kept threatening me with a lighter. This was among fighting off the students who were trying to take off our masks and costumes. These are middle school students who range in age from 12-18. I felt bad for my Chinese sophomores, Becky and Sunny because they felt guilty for what happened and it was not their fault at all, the kids were just not under control at all. They were not listening to anybody. There were supposed to be 2 times that students could come at 5:30 and at 8:30 but unfortunately, the haunted house was shut down after the first 15-20 minutes. I’m a bit worried about what will happen to the 42 girls.

The Chinese teachers were not happy with what happened. Luckily, nobody was injured with the broken glass. We did see some students limping away because no one seemed to understand the idea that you were supposed to crawl through the tunnel, not just lie down at the entrance and wait for people to pile on top of you. There were many a lost hat and many a lost set of keys.

I guess we should have seen some of this coming because there are no lines in China and people always push in crowds, so why would we have thought any differently about this crowd?

Chengde! Yay

We went to the Summer Mountain Resort in Chengde this past weekend. The highlights of this trip were the dragon boat ride of death, me disappearing on the bumper cars and Michelle shooting Jenna in the ass.

So we saw a carnival inside the resort and decided that the dragon boat would be fun to ride. Jeremy and CJ were on both sides of me and as soon as the ride starts Jeremy says, “What if this ride goes upside down?” Immediately, fear consumes our faces. The ride screeches each time it goes up, and it freaked us out each time. Luckily, there’s tape of it. It was the most terrifying thing ever because it kept going higher and higher and we were hoping that it wouldn’t fall off the structure and plummet us to our early deaths. So that was unforgettable moment number 1.

So we decided to do bumper cars after that because it wasn’t tempting death, so I thought. I was bumped by CJ and Jeremy and flew off my seat. I started laughing uncontrollably so I couldn’t get up back onto my seat and for a few minutes looked like I had disappeared from my car. It was great.

Moment 3 came when Jenna, CJ and Michelle decided to do a carnival game where you shoot pellets at balloons. So Michelle’s first shot was in the air and then she managed to shoot Jenna. “What the hell?!” was Jenna’s response. No prizes were won for that.

Sometime during the day, I think it was Jeremy who said “She was mother fuckin Teresa. She knew God was on her side.” We were discussing whether Mother Teresa was a saint yet or not.

We also witnessed the first snow for us. It was just an inch or so.

Chengde is the place to be, I've decided.

Pensando en otras cosas...

So I taught my class the rest of the idioms and I told them about some superstitions. I talked about how breaking a mirror would be bad luck for 7 years. So what did I do after I got back from class? I broke my damn mirror. Oh yeah. It’s funny cause the last time I had class on Monday, I taught them “under the weather,” and then I started coughing uncontrollably because I was still sick. Oh yeah.

I should probably watch what I teach them because it seems that whatever I talk about happens.

Has anyone heard of The Darjeeling Limited? It’s a movie that’s supposed to be coming out although I’m not sure if it’s in all cities or just major ones. I want to know if it’s good because I will buy it when it comes out on DVD here, but I’d like an opinion or two.

I found out that Bobby Jindal was elected governor of Louisiana. It's exciting to see an Indian in any visible political office. Regarding politics, I do have to say that I am missing the whole Iowa caucus media circus even though it’s a long time from now. It’s hard for me to believe that I won’t have an inside scoop on what’s going on with campaigns and candidates. I was glad I was able to go to the Dem debate with George Stephanopoulos before I came to China.

The Mall and World Trade Plaza Hotel

I missed our sports day because I was chilling with various homies. But Hugh went and he sent me his pictures. These are some of the gals in my sophomore class. They were his freshmen last year. Aren’t they adorable? They all had matching outfits which made me want one too. Sadly, I did not get one.

I went on a small spree yesterday and I got some winter wear and a teapot. I also tried to get lotion in a store in the big mall place near the train station and they handed me a bottle of whitening lotion. Not what I was looking for at all. I figured that was all they were going to offer me, so I left the store defeated.

Oh, I finally got my first experience getting yelled at for not buying something. I saw a purse that I really liked and started bargaining with the owner. She didn’t want to budge, so I said I don’t want it and tried to walk out. She said okay to my price and then I noticed the hole in the purse. Hmmm, now I really didn’t want it, so I tried to leave. As I walked out, the lady started yelling in crazy Chinese, telling her store neighbors something to the extent of, “You made me lower the price, I said okay, and now you don’t want it?! What’s wrong with you?” And so on. It wasn’t like she was really that invested in the sale; it lasted all of 5 minutes. Oh dang.

I went to the expat ladies’ lunch today. It’s on the third Sunday of each month. It was the most coherent English I’d heard since coming to China. It was nice. The food was fantastic. We ate at the World Trade Plaza Hotel. It’s the fanciest place I’ve ever seen anywhere, including the US. Look at the ashtray, what the hell? They have their emblem in the ashtray sand. The revolving doors to this hotel have giant vases with flowers in two of the four chambers.

I got my first foot massage today after lunch. Holy crap, it was amazing. They did the whole reflexology thing on my feet and hit my feet with some wooden hammer contraption. It was amazing.

Not Youtube too?!?!

I tried to use Youtube today and it was a bit slower than usual. As in it didn’t work at all. Crap, there goes weeks of ESL plans. For reasons why youtube.com doesn’t work in China, haz click aqui! It really is interesting.

http://shanghaiist.com/2007/10/18/give_us_back_ou.php

Ozomatli + me = bliss

I just read online that Ozomatli was in Shanghai Oct. 5th. Guess who else was there? ME!!! I didn’t know otherwise that would have been amazing to see. It was in Zhongshan Park which we were near enough to go. AHH! I can’t believe I was that close to them. They were in Beijing a few days before. : ( Not to say that we didn’t have a great time, but it would have made my year to see them.

Oh yeah, this is a picture of the group I went to Shanghai with. 9 people total. Pure craziness. Our 9th person, Nate, was taking the picture.

Maybe I'm delusional

I could do this for another year or two. This idea has been invading my thoughts over the last few days. My family would not be happy with me. But, I love being completely anonymous. And I’ve decided that people staring in the US is much worse than the staring in China. Here, people only stare at you because they have never seen a foreigner. It is a curiosity. Can’t say I’ll miss being stared at in the US. I also like how people are so friendly here. Everyone says hello, which I know annoys some people, but I find it cute. I like meeting the foreigners here, even the assholes. These people aren’t in the US because they’re always traveling. Everyone seems to have a story here, even the creepers. I like exploring this place and I like how everyone is outside, not holed up inside glued to the TV or computer. Although many places here shut down around here by 9 or so, it’s still a much more active place than a lot of cities in the US. I do miss my family and friends quite a bit but I fancy this China.

It’s the people that make a place special, obviously.

Shanghai encounters

One thing I forgot to mention which happened when we went to Shanghai was my first encounter with Chinese people in Shanghai. So we had just arrived after our ridiculously long train ride (18 hours) on Tuesday. We went across the street to the Mr. Donut which was amazing by the way. Our group had 9 people in it, so we split up trying to get train tickets back to our respective cities and to buy other items in the store next door. In China, you can only buy train tickets 7 days in advance, which is frustrating but hey, it’s China.

So I stood guard of our bags in Mr. Donut and a Chinese person comes up to us (Michelle and Caroline and I) and hands us a card. It says he is deaf and that he would appreciate any financial help we could give him (in English). So what are the chances that a deaf Chinese person would happen to come across a foreigner who happens to be fluent in American Sign Language? Oh yes, that’s exactly what happened. So I was ecstatic because this was the first Chinese deaf person I had met in China. I started signing to him in ASL and he signed back to me in Chinese Sign Language. I was surprised to find that I actually understood about half of what he was saying. He still wanted money, but I kept insisting that we didn’t have much because we were teachers. He asked if we had flown to Shanghai and I said no, we took the train. He decided that since we had taken the train, we actually didn’t have money, so he left. Well, I might have scared him off with my ability to sign. But it was so strange because that was the first Chinese person that came up to us in Shanghai and he happened to be deaf. I felt bad for him even though he probably wasn’t really a beggar, but he might have been just because China isn’t too proud to have people that are blind, disabled or deaf. Later that same day, as we were walking back to our hostel, I saw a group of 3 or 4 people and they were also signing. It made me think that there was a deaf school nearby or something, which would have been really cool to see.

Buses and gangsta Tibetans

I’ve managed to hop onto 4 buses today, all of them wrong. In the morning, I hopped onto the one that Mr. Zhang was on so he told me it was the bus in front of me to go to the west campus. On the way back to east campus, I tried to get on the wrong bus shuttle again. I got on the right one only to be kicked off because it was too full. Are you kidding me? There were 4 people standing, the rest were sitting. Considering the city buses are cram-packed full of people, don’t think 4 people standing was really that big of a deal.

So there I was stranded (sorta) at Caroline’s campus when I decided to befriend the girl that was in front of me when we were kicked off. So after a little bit, she decided that we would need to take the bus cause they weren’t sending another shuttle. Okay, I follow her onto bus #46. And this bus was pretty much empty, so that should have been a red flag. Only people that live out in the country would get onto buses that empty around rush hour. We go a little bit and she decides that we’re on the wrong #46 and that we need to be going the opposite direction. We hop off and hop onto another 46 only to realize the same thing, only this time we’re really out in the middle of nowhere. Okay, the girl talks to the bus driver and then decides to jump off. I was like “Oh fuck!!! Wait!” So about a block later the bus driver decides to let me off. I run back towards where the girl was standing and of course, I couldn’t find her. By this time, the fog had settled permanently and it was night time. We were at a school but I don’t know which one because there were tons of students around and tons of street vendors. So I saw a taxi and took my chances on it. 25 kuai later and I arrived at my campus. I should really learn Chinese so I don’t have to rely on Chinese people who may or may not know what the hell is going on.

On a different note, when I was at the west campus, I saw the sports day meetings that Caroline was talking about. Basically, it’s an all-school event where everyone either participates in some sport or cheers on people participating in a sport. There was tug-of-war, track events, some game like monkey in the middle among others. It was interesting to see. What we did not expect however, was to be paraded around the track by Caroline’s students. First one came and after a while another came and talked with us. Then another and then we saw the section of students that Caroline teaches. Oh man, we were like celebrities, they all whipped out their cell phones to take pictures and some of the students were bold enough to jump out and stand next to us as they got their picture taken with the teacher. We couldn’t do anything but smile and wave and try to walk around the track faster. There is one thing which is hilarious about her students though, they really are gangsta. I didn’t believe her when she said it but it is true. Gangsta Tibetans. How weird is that? The other weird thing is that some thought I was Chinese, others assumed Tibetan. I’ve been told that there is an ethnic minority in China which I resemble, but I didn’t make the connection that it was the Tibetans which I resembled. It was weird walking by her students and having to tell myself, they are not Indian because some of them really look Indian. I even saw a girl with a nose ring and her head covered.

The Whore of Asia (Shanghai)

Shanghai recap (very long):

Train ride to Shanghai:
We left at 1:40 pm from Shijiazhuang to Shanghai October 1st and were to arrive around 8 am the next day (~18 hours).

October 2nd, 2007 (Tuesday)
At around 3:30 am, the sweeper made everyone get up so he could sweep the trash from all of the areas. Yes, that’s right, it’s most convenient at 3:30 am. Erin jokingly said, “Yeah, and at 4:30 am, they’ll bring out the mops.” So of course that’s exactly what happened. The highlight of the train ride was when around 5 am, Jeremy had a breakdown and started bitching about the baby that kept saying “yeah yeah yeah” over and over. I lost it and could not stop laughing. I think Caroline got part of his breakdown on video. We were so deprived of sleep that it was just the most hilarious thing ever. We arrived at 7:45 am finally.

We went to the Shanghai Museum. They had cool ceramics, Buddha, Goya and mask exhibits. I was surprised about the Goya exhibit there, but disappointed to see that his most famous works were left out. I was also surprised to see Islamic art there.

After the museum we went to the Bund and walked alongside the Huangpu river promenade. It was cool. The skyline was all lit up and lasers shoot from the tops of some buildings which gives for a fantastic show just along the promenade.

October 3rd (Wed)

We walked along East Nanjing Road through the shops and the nonstop people traffic. At the end was the Huangpu River Cruise which we enjoyed for an hour.

After we headed to Nanjing Road again to shop some more and eat. We headed towards Jinmao Tower around 5 so that we could see the sunset. We got some beautiful pictures of the city from 88 floors up.

October 4th, 2007 (Thursday)
We went to the Yuyuan gardens and hit up the bazaar that’s just before it.

After leaving the gardens, we saw a little blond boy wandering by himself in the bazaar. He looked to be at most 4 or 5 years old. We didn’t see his parents around. Jenna and Erin ran after him and he ran into the gardens. They finally got him to stop and our group eventually made it to a corner with security and a loudspeaker on it. We didn’t know what language he spoke at first, but eventually they realized he was French. By the time we had gotten to the corner, not only was our group there, but there was a French group and a Chinese group staying with him. The French girls spoke into the loudspeaker and 10-15 minutes later his mom showed up. There was a moment when his mom came and ran to him and they hugged. At that moment, the Europeans and the Americans started bawling. The Chinese were beaming. I turned around to see what was going on and all I saw was everybody crying. It was a good moment. It was also the absolute worst place to lose a child, in a bazaar full of people who don’t speak the same language.

After that, we went to the Shanghai Temple of the City. It was crowded, but not as bad as the bazaar. After the temple, we split up and tried to find the Indian restaurant I had written down. Turns out it doesn’t exist and neither does the other one 3 blocks from it. So by this time, everybody’s pissed because they’re tired of walking and hungry and of course, I feel bad and this was the one thing I wanted to do and it was out of the way and yeah it didn’t work out. So our group went to a hot pot restaurant across the street from the non-existant Indian restaurant. At least that was good. Then Michelle and CJ left to go back to Chengde.

We went to a tea ceremony with 3 girls and a guy we met on the street. We went in for a nice tea ceremony and had ridiculously expensive tea. Then we paid 258 kuai. We realized later we were scammed because we started to tell Caroline about it after we had got back and she pretty much told us what happened because it happened to a couple of other guys in the hostel that she had just talked with. But at least we got a good luck trinket out of it. We also have their pictures because we thought we had made friends with them. Eh.

October 5th, 2007 (Friday)
Mr. Donut was our breakfast as we searched for info about Special Olympics. Then we went to Longhua Temple and afterwards, we saw the Special Olympics. There was hardly anyone at the Special Olympics which was sad. It was free too, but that didn’t draw any attention. There were these little guys (9-10 years old) who were just adorable doing their floor routines. After the Special Olympics, we went to see the Chinese acrobats. It was an amazing show. After the show, we went to City Walks restaurant and had a fantastic Western meal. I had 4 cheese pasta penne and shared it with Jenna. Caroline had chicken cordon bleu and I think Erin had barbecued pork chops. It was a wonderful way to end our trip.

October 6th-7th, 2007 (Saturday and Sunday)
We had a long and tiring ride back to the Shiz.

Indian stores and champagne rooms

So I found an Indian store yesterday!!!! They only sell a few clothes and incense and like 3 cds, but I found an Indian store!!!!! That means there has to be enough Indians or enough people that like Indian stuff to sustain that store. I saw it on the way back from Xinhua with Jenna, I only saw the script that looked like Hindi. I was like oh my god! It can’t be. I love China.

I went to a “western” restaurant with Brick and Hugh. I ate cow tongue, something’s intestines (they made it into sausage), only 1 chicken heart (there were 5 others on my plate I didn’t really want to eat, those poor chickens), and several other odd varieties of “meat.” I did not eat donkey, rabbit, dog, cat, or other stereotypical meats. I’m glad I didn’t know what I was eating otherwise I probably wouldn’t have eaten it. I did know the heart was a heart. I was looking at it and thinking, I’m eating its left ventricle now…now the right atrium…and so on. It was a great moment in biology.

So later I went to Mcdonald’s bar and met a few new foreigners including Emmanuel from Cameroon. Emmanuel can speak like 6 languages. All of the foreigners that I meet that can actually speak Chinese are ones that already know a ridiculous amount of languages. And I also met Peru from Nepal. Oh my god a desi??? What the hell is going on? Two things in one day is just too much for me. And guess what? He speaks Chinese. Oh yeah, he’s a pimp. He was in Nanjing for a year and he learned quite a bit because there wasn’t anyone around who spoke English. I hope to do that by the end of this year. He also mentioned that there are like 500 Malayalees. What? I’m in the wrong city.

So I hung out with Blake, Levi and Peru after Mcdonald’s bar at Scotland. They have good music and no drama, except from the big Chinese guys who want lovin’ from little foreigners. We had fun. Just how I like it. No broken tables, no obnoxious fights. Blake went into the “champagne room” at Dalian restaurant (after the club) and walked out of there maybe 5 or 10 minutes later and could not walk straight to our table. He was completely sober when he went in. It amazes me how much Chinese people can drink. Dalian had good steamed bread (real bread!) and skewers. I also had duck there, which I think I’ve had before but didn’t know it. It was yummy.

Tunisia? Where the hell is that country??

Around 10:30 pm Monday night I heard a knock on my door. I opened it to see a strange man there. He introduced himself and asked if he could come in. I said ok because I didn’t want to be rude but in my mind I was thinking, who the hell is this? So he sits down and I continue to hang up my laundry and he gets to talking about how he likes beer. He asked if I liked beer. I said sometimes, then he asked if I had any here. I don’t actually keep beer here, sorry man. Then he offered me a nut from his pocket. I said oh, no that’s okay, then he said it’s from Tunisia. So of course I couldn’t refuse then, right? I can’t say no to someone offering something from their homeland right? Even if it came from somebody’s pocket? So I had a shady ass Tunisian nut. It wasn’t terrible. There wasn’t as much lint as I had thought.

So we talk and he says I’m so lonely here, I don’t have any friends. I felt bad for him kinda, he had only been here for 3 days and he is a student of Chinese so he wasn’t getting help from the university like the foreign teachers. He kept asking me why I didn’t have a boyfriend and why I don’t like anything. Then he said he didn’t like Chinese girls because they don’t like guys to kiss them and they don’t like to “practice love.” He also mentioned he was Muslim. I’m not sure what sect of Islam allows for alcohol and “practicing love” with Chinese girls. Yes, this is when the conversation got too awkward even for China. I told him I’d introduce him to other foreigners here and he said noo, that’s okay, I said there was a nice Korean woman living in the building and he said, oh, I like women. I got him to finally leave by saying I had to teach early morning, which was true.

There is one cool thing about him aside from the rest of him being creepy: he knows Arabic and some Chinese. I would love to learn Arabic and need to learn Chinese. He needs to learn English more. I can help him with that. In the daytime. Not in my room. No beer involved. Or “practice love.”

Crazy weekend

Friday
I had the leak in my bathroom sink fixed on Friday. It is really nice to have a dry floor now. Friday evening, my doorknob fell off while I was in the bathroom. I had to jimmy it back on there to get the door open. My bathroom is ridiculous. I also have a leaky toilet and a possibly leaky water heater. But I love that my floor is dry, I’m so happy about that.

We went to Bailao tai tai for a long and drunken dinner. It was ridiculous. The Chinese people in the room next to us joined us in our room and ganbei-ed us silly. We also met a guy who opened the beer bottles with his mouth. It was intense. We went to Allan Story after that. There were many a drunken foreigner.

Saturday
So let’s just say that someone in our group managed to pee on a guest bed in a drunken stupor. And then he managed to stumble back to his buddy’s apartment on the first floor in the morning. I was surprised to see him downstairs because before I went to bed Friday, I definitely saw him at someone else’s apartment.

We went to bailao tai tai for another exquisite meal in the evening. Tang su li ji (like sweet and sour chicken) is a new favorite of mine as are the carmelized bananas and the beef with the egg is also amazing. I love that restaurant. I need to learn the Chinese names for these things. It appears that Michelle and Erin got wasted off of 1-2 beers. Erin’s funny when she’s drunk. She pretty much made my night. After the restaurant, we headed to Allan Story again and lots of drama ensued which involved Russians, Britons, Canadians, a Swede and lots of drunk CCEPers. It was the most multicultural bs ever.

The night definitely ended when Michelle fell onto 3-4 plastic tables across the street from Mcdonalds and broke them to pieces. I’m not sure how she managed to keep falling onto and breaking tables, but I was mortified. The Chinese owners of the bbq were obviously pissed and we think one was on the phone with the police. They demanded lots of money which one person thought was a ridiculous amount so he tried to argue his way out in English, so of course that meant nothing. Jeremy paid it unbeknownst to the rest of us and some of us tried to walk away with at least one of the troublemakers so that a fight wouldn’t break out. This didn’t work, so we just went home. And this is why Americans are loved the world over.

Banquets and class

I had my smallest class today. It had 16 girls, not one single boy. I’ve noticed there are a few who are a little bit more arrogant in showing off their English skills. I try not to let them take over because some of the students can barely speak and understand English and I’m pretty sure they feel crappy about their skills as it is without the more advanced students showing off. One girl named herself Jane, after Jane Eyre. What the hell? I haven’t even read that. Oh well, they don’t have to know that. At the end of class, I was surprised to find that one of my students wants to learn Spanish. Actually, I was excited. After class, I went to the supermarket and bought “Volver.” I saw it there before but was apprehensive because I wasn’t sure it would be good quality or not. Plus, I wanted it in Spanish, not dubbed over. I can’t wait to watch my Spanish movie in China!! I’m so weird.

Just yesterday I was at a banquet with all the other foreign teachers from Hebei Normal (all the campuses). I met a woman who is from Spain who speaks French, Catalan, English, Spanish (duh), and some Chinese. She is an interesting lady. I also met a teacher who married here. He is an old white man married to one of his former students, as in a 18-19 year old Chinese girl. Perverted? I think so. I don’t understand how her family would have allowed her to marry him. There are a lot of older, perverted men here. It’s creepy as hell. I also met this really nice Korean gal Song Joo. She is also studying Chinese, but she teaches Korean here. After the banquet yesterday, we went to the barbecue place outside our side gate. As everyone was getting drunker and drunker (including me), she suggested I go “over there” with her, pointing to near our gate. I thought we were leaving; it was getting a bit late. I had to teach an 8 am class. It turns out she wanted to buy barbecued squid on skewers. She bought each of us one stick with squid tentacles dangling from it. I was thinking, oh crap, I’m pretty sure not everyone will want to eat this. How do I tell her not to buy so much? Even more, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to eat it. It was dangly and it had tentacles. Caroline came over to see what we were doing and declared her love for squid, so thank god for that. We went back to the table and gave everyone the squid, even Hugh tried it, which was surprising. It actually isn’t that bad. The smaller ones taste like barbecued chicken. I would have felt terrible if I hadn’t tried it. Plus I was not so sober, so it became more okay. After we left, she came down to my room and gave me and Richard moon cakes. She’s so nice!

First freshmen class

I taught my first freshmen class today. I had a few older people in my class, like one who is a mom with children from South Korea. She looks like a typical Korean lady from the soap operas. I also had a student from Inner Mongolia. I totally flew over Mongolia on my way to China. This class is so much more enthusiastic about everything. I like this class way better than my sophomore class. I was really surprised how well some of these freshmen spoke considering they’ve been away from English for 3 months. All the guys sit in the back, I’m not sure if they’re trying to be “slackers” or if they’re just afraid of all of the girls. It’s the same in my sophomore class; the two guys sit in the back. I was trying not to fall out of my shoes because they’re a little bigger than I thought. When I was at the store, the lady said “Oh, ok” to them and gave me the matching shoe. I’m not sure it’s the same size as the other one, since neither are marked with sizes at all. It doesn’t matter really, they’re still cute shoes.

I’ve noticed the Chinese all have very cute shoes. I’ve yet to see one ugly pair of shoes. When I get paid, I’m going shoe shopping for everyone. The hairstyles here range from very cute to very bizarre. I’m not sure if some of them are trying to be punk or just super trendy but long mullets are in with some girls as is having long hair half curly and half straight underneath. I’ve noticed ponytails are very common here and there are not so many girls with long hair which is weird, because I thought everyone would have long hair. The guys dress pretty much the same as in the US, except a lot of them have red string necklaces with jade carved stones on them. China’s a lot more westernized than I thought. No one wears traditional clothing here except a few of the elderly and it’s just the shirts even then.

Saturday at the zoo...

Saturday, I went to the zoo with a bunch of other Shijiazhuangers and Jake. We walked around the train station for an hour looking for the number 5 bus. When we found it, we crammed into it on our long ride into the countryside. The zoo was definitely the biggest I’ve ever been to and it was beautiful. There were mountains and lakes and it was kind of nice for some of the animals. For the bigger animals, it wasn’t so nice because they were in much smaller cages with thick bars. There weren’t that many animals out, I’m not sure why. But there was one fun thing we got to do; some of us paid 5 or 6 kuai to get sticks with fish attached to string at the end of them to feed the crocodiles. I think 3 people did it. It was the most entertaining when Lindsey did it because when she would raise the stick to get the fish away from the crocodiles, she would flip the fish over our heads and splash nasty water on us. When big papa croc got her fish, she got into a tug-of-war with the croc so she could get the stick back and not flip over the bridge we were on. Caroline helped her win back the fishing stick.

Pictures to catch up on

This would be the weird toy I kind of want. As you can see, the white doll shuffles forward and pulls the cart forward. Hidden message? I think so. Very strange but very entertaining.

Under the girl’s curly hair, it says shit. Another thing to note: the girls are holding hands. This does not mean they are lesbians, it is a sign of friendship and basically everyone does it. It’s the same way in India. It reminds me of when Chi and I would walk around like this and sing very loudly/badly. Of course, in the United States, this will get stares and lots of whispering.

Caroline and I are climbing over my gate because it is locked and no one usually comes when we ring the buzzer, so we’re taking matters into our own hands. So logically the next question would be how do I get in if the gate is locked? Well, you would be right to assume the front door is locked, but there is a door in the back locked with a bike lock that I can squeeze through. After squeezing through the back door, I do have to make sure I don’t knock any bikes over which is very difficult when there’s 50 of them and especially when not sober. It’s mission impossible. The only thing that sucks is that after squeezing through the door and through the maze of bikes, I’m covered in dust and cobwebs. It’s gross. But it is better than not getting into my apartment. I’m going to be screwed when they decide to fix the back door. Caroline has more trouble getting into her campus because not only is the front door locked, but the hallway to her apartment is locked.

This would be the aftermath of Caroline clinking Bryan’s beer. What you don’t see is the table soaked in beer and the floor and the hordes of Chinese laughing at us meiguoren.

Look China butt! These are the split pants that babies wear until they are toilet trained. I have mixed feelings about these. In a country of 1.3 billion, I’m glad they don’t use diapers just because that would be a tremendous waste. Although in winter, they have the same split pants which would be terrible for the cold. What if they get frostbite…on their ass?

This gigantic balloon appeared mysteriously one night in front of TKL (the stadium/supermarket). Jenna and I thought it was cute, but what the hell is it?

KFC after non-stop consumption of noodles and street food. I had chicken because it’s amazing. They’re also big on corn here which is truly strange. I had a small cup of corn and peas with a coleslaw type of dressing on it. It was not bad. I thought I was getting fries, guess not. You can get boiled corn on the cob on many street corners. There is also a cornsicle which is like a popsicle but corn flavored. I’ve been told there is corn juice also. I’m probably not going to have corn juice. I’ll probably have the cornsicle though. In short, corn corn corn.