Saturday, July 21, 2007
It's been raining for 4 days nonstop now. I wouldn't mind, except the streets are flooded and my shoes have holes in them. As the sewers fill they flood up onto the streets, so that the water is a foul smelling mix of rained out pollution, sewage and garbage. It is also rather disconcerting to walk by a manhole and see it pulsating from the water pressure. In typical Chinese fashion, people use brooms to try to sweep the water back into the sewers. It's working so well.
Staying with my former homestay family has been quite fun. I keep odd hours and come in at 4 or 5 am, but they've given me a key so I don't have to wake them. The other night we went to a hot pot restraurant. Hot pot is a Sichuan food that is basically a big bowl of soup that sits on a propane burner on your table. You order things and add them yourself. The soup contained a whole chicken and some Chinese herbs to begin with and we added some vegetables, pork, tofu and fish balls. Eating hot pot is like fishing for chicken using chopsticks. Sometimes you get lucky and pull out an edible piece, other times you get a foot or head.
Last night I went back to Summit Foreign Language School, my old job to visit former students and see Maggie, my ex-boss. It was good to see everyone, but somehow I got talked into teaching a class. After going through some basic conversational English, I taught them that their parents, teachers and government do not always act in their best interests and told them to always ask "why?" One of the first questions I got was "why does the American government care more about their children than the Chinese." Wow, I'm at a loss on that one. I'm not even sure its so. Any thoughts? At least the kids took what I had to say to heart. Hopefully it won't get them in too much trouble.
Summit now has a summer English Camp. It takes place at an Army base. The kids wear uniforms the whole time. When they're not learning English, they're practicing Kungfu or shooting AK47's and SKS's. This struck me as an odd place to have an English camp so I asked Maggie about it. It turns out her father was a General who oversaw the Chengdu Military Region and commanded over 1,000,000 troops, and he helped her facilitate the school and camp. These are good people to know and work for. Maggie is already planning for my return next year so I can resume teaching. Maybe next summer I will go to camp.
The other day I went with Tjasa and her Dragons group to a lesson on tea with my friend Rob, who is from Long Island. He has been here three years and has a tea export business. He talked for a bit about Chinese teas and we drank maybe 20 cups of tea. He was telling me that one of their larger customers is Trident Bookstore in Boulder, which recently bought 5 kilos of tea. I'll have to go there when I return to Colorado. Check out his website: An Dao (peaceful way) Teas http://www.andaotea.com
I've been playing a little game, asking foreigners who live here to describe Kunming in three words. I've had some interesting responses so far. My own three were: "cheap, relaxed, loud."
Giorgio, an Italian chose "non stop party."
Matt, a Brit chose "cheap, lazy, escape," as all the foreigners here are hiding from something back home.
Panya, an Aussie chose "aargghh, chhuch, thptu," her enunciation of Chinese people spitting.
Batiste, a Frenchman chose "drunk, stoned, wet."
Bike Mike, an American who has been here for 12 years chose "fucking hell." When I pointed out that was only two words, he added "yeah!"
Labels: army, camp, homestay, hot pot, rainy season, summit, teaching
Monday, July 02, 2007
7/1 was the 10th anniversary of the handover of Hong Kong to the mainland. All around Beijing people were out in force. Near Wangfujing, I heard traditional Chinese screeching, I mean music, and wandered over. There were Yunnan minority people doing traditional dances for a large audience in their brightly colored clothes which are exaggerated for the amusement of the Han Chinese (80% of the population). Then a police officer took the microphone. He was more decorated than I have ever seen an officer before, with multiple badges, bands and epaulettes. Music began to blare and he jumped to attention before wailing what I can only assume was the national anthem (I have to assume, since it is the first time I've heard anything of the sort, even though this is my 6th trip.) It was rather interesting, with a military chorus over the loudspeaker as his backup singers, reminding me a lot of the Soviet Army Chorus singing their own anthem.
I met this British guy Ian, who I hung out with during the day. He just started a 9 month trip around the world. We wandered around Tiananmen for a while and I told him about living in China. I warned him that Chinese people will not approach him unless they want something from him (such as money.) I told him about the art student scam and then we went to get duck. As I was reading his blog I noticed that he said he thought I was "full of shit." A day later he got scammed by some "English students" who took him to a tea ceremony, in which they let him "try" 10 teas (all of which cost almost nothing in Yunnan) and then attempted to charge him 2800RMB (almost $400.) He got away paying only a quarter of that. Sometimes I get tired of being right.
7/2 In the morning I wandered around and went to an internet cafe. That afternoon I was falling asleep but trying to get adjusted to the time so I headed over to the mall to get some Starbucks. I know, I know, Ben and Starbucks doesn't seem to fit, but I needed coffee and had a gift card (which subsequently didn't work outside of the US.) Walking through the mall, I was stopped by a white man with a beard. It took me a minute to realize that it was my Chinese History professor from Colorado. He seemed as surprised as I, briefly introduced me to his Chinese "friend," a very pretty young woman, and left. I seem to recall him being married, but I got an A in the class, so I will leave that one alone.
That night, I went to Houhai - one of the two main Beijing nightspots, with Tim Myers, his friend studying in Beijing, Ian, and this Chinese kid from San Francisco named James whom we met there. After exhausting myself with 5 minutes of circle dancing, we found a bar that served cheap (and expired, though everything here is) beer and got a hookah and hung out for a while.
7/3-4morning Nothing too much, prepared for a trip to Shanghai. I got to the overnight train around 745 and by 815 was asleep. Slept most of the way. I shared a car with these two guys from Beijing, one was an accountant, the other worked in IT. It was a rather uneventful trip. We got in at 7am and I checked into my hostel. Its clean and in a good location and cheap (for Shanghai) but I am a little disturbed that they don't give me a room key, housekeeping has to let me into my room every time. Today I'll be wandering around. It's raining again so I probably won't go too far. These next few days I'll post more as I visit my friends in Shanghai.
Other Notes:
The day I arrived it began to rain. Apparently it had been sunny for months up until my arrival, but monsoon season happened to begin the day I got there. After maybe 5" of rain in a day, the rain stopped and the sky was blue, something I've never before witnessed in Beijing. I guessed it rained out all the pollution. A dy later it was back to grey skies.
"alcoholism, whoring, gambling, drug taking and fighting are strictly forbidden in China" read a sign at my Beijing hotel.
An email with my dad:
Do you see much prep going on for the Olympics?
They've closed down some of the more sketchy places, especially bars which used to have hundreds of foreign students congregate there.
Have they taught the people not to spit?
Surprisingly, yes it seems. I did not witness nearly as many people spitting in Beijing, though neither did i witness any of the "civilization patrols." On top of that, people in Beijing can even now wait in lines (sort of, there's a bit of a learning curve.)
Shanghai for a few days, possibly an interjection of Nanjing (I feel compelled to go for the history after seeing my Chinese History professor here.) I have 3 days unaccounted for before I go to Kunming. I will be deciding between Hong Kong, Xiamen, Guangzhou, Macao and Taiwan.
Labels: beijing, duck, hong kong, rainy season, scam, starbucks
