batgirldrivesbatmobile >In China!

Going home...

2007-07-14T07:06:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking a lot about Hawaii lately. It sounds kind of silly because I’ve never actually been there, but I’ve been saying to friends since I was a kid that I was going to live there when I grow up. I think I’d make a great citizen of Hawaii; I grew up on an island, I’m a fan of Hawaii 5-0, I’m eager to learn Pidgin and I want to become a surfer. I have a fondness for shave ice, and enjoy hot weather, swimming pools and beaches. My dream career (besides cold noodle stand operator) is surfer by morning, shave ice vendor by day. I’ve even looked up graduate programs at several schools in Hawaii. They’re not very highly rated, but for an excuse to live in Hawaii, does it matter?

I’m going home in ten hours. I’ve been trying not to count the time all day. Finals week was tough as usual, I’ve developed a new appreciation for the American university system and grading on a curve. Each class has an exam, and each exam requires a good long cram session. I’m taking seven language classes and three culture classes. I’ve written four fairly good sized papers in the last two weeks and started an online science class. Everyone I’ve met here wants to take me out for a farewell dinner and give me small gifts to cram into my overstuffed suitcase. I’d love to have dinner with everyone, but the fact of the matter is that I just don’t have the time. The most important dates I had crammed all into two days. Yesterday I went to lunch with a student and a couple of hours later went to an SU hosted banquet. Today I ate breakfast with one friend, lunch with another and dinner with yet another. Despite this there are still a number of people I would have liked to see before I left. Even if we aren’t best friends, saying goodbye gives me a sense of closure for this year.

I’m happy and I’m sad to be leaving. I’m really excited to get started with my life in Seattle again. Living in China feels like I’ve been living in some sort of alternate universe where everything back home remains exactly the same. It’s hard to believe that my house has been remodeled, my sister had a baby, and my friends have made all new plans for the upcoming year. I’m excited to start school again, although I’m worried that credit transferring, language assessments or something else will not turn out as I like and end up requiring more time from me. I’m also excited to start working again, but am dreading the application, interview and first day of where ever I end up.

I started videotaping China this past week. I suddenly felt a bit of regret that I had not taken any footage of day-to-day China, and wanted to make up for it. I also regret that the journal I tried to keep barely passes page twenty. There’s just so much you can write about and so little time to do it! How do I explain the oddities of China life or the aspects of living in China that grate on my nerves? How do I explain just how delicious and fun it is to try new foods, or just how strange some of our travel adventures have been? What about culture? We talk about cultural differences all the time here, weird things we run into or situations we can’t get out of. We can talk endlessly about China while in China, how am I supposed to share all my thoughts on paper? That was fun, this is weird, I really hate it when they do that, it’s delicious!

Having an entire year to think about future plans has left me feeling up in the air. Perhaps if the time were short I would just make a decision and be done with it. Do I want to stay in China? Yes. No. Do I want to come back? Yes. Do I want to go into business, government, language or none of the above? Yes. No. And then, what about sign language?

I have ideas like moving to Hawaii and opening a shave ice stand. When it comes down to the reality of my idea, I can see myself doing it but not for a long way off. Real life things like money and grades and resumes and jobs and experiences and contacts tend to get in the way or alternate the course. But then, just maybe, I’ll graduate and meet someone who is willing to teach me the secrets of the shave ice business and surfing. Who knows? The possibilities are endless.

My last adventure on my last full weekend in China

2007-07-10T08:05:00.000-07:00

We've been talking for weeks now about making a trip out to the small city of Lezhi for a visit to a traditional soy sauce factory. We read about it in a book somewhere and it sounded like fun, if not a little weird. Last time the group decided to go, the bus hit a motorcyclist and everyone ended up turning around. The blood and guts ruined all the excitement for us.

After discovering that there are in fact two Lezhis, we opted instead to make a trip to Zigong, home of China's salt mines.

Our first stop was the salt museum. It wasn't too exciting, but I did get some nice pictures:

One of our professors made the trip with us, and after the museum visit he insisted that we find Zigong's most famous traditional mine. The Shenhaijing mine tourist trap was located in the middle of a sprawling mass of currently operating salt mines. Rusty pipes and cinderblock buildings surround the tiny complex. We forked over twenty kuai for an English speaking guide (versus ten kuai for one that only speaks Chinese). She first took us to the standard "famous pictures of dignitaries who have been here" room and told us over and over again that we must "enjoy the photos."

The coolest part of seeing Shenhaijing was seeing where the salt is boiled down from the brine. This part of the tour, athough neat, was only set up for tourist's sake. The pillars of salt sat in one corner of the room, and we were all invited to taste it. Then we were hurried to the gift shop for some overpriced bags of table salt.

By far the best, best, BEST part of the day was the famous Zigong dinosaur museum. I'm pretty sure most of the bones in the place were replicas, and the open air dig site looked suspicous too. The place even tried to knock off Jurassic Park, take a look:
But unlike at Jurassic Park, the gift shop was only too happy to sell some dinoham.
In the middle of the museum there was an electronic dinosaur who for five kuai would poop out a dinosaur egg. I didn't have any money, but I conned Sarah into buying one. It took several tries to get an egg out, but in the end it was totally worth it.

We also found these funny named dinosaurs:

And while there I gained some architechteral inspiration. When I grow up I want my house to look like this:

It's been a long time!

2007-07-03T08:39:00.000-07:00

Wow, I didn't realize it had been so long since I've written last! These past couple of weeks have been crazy, and the next couple of weeks will be too. I'm taking final exams next week and am trying to finish up three papers, pack, see all my friends and go home! I leave here on the fifteenth, so I now have less than two weeks left!

Despite the short time I'm still up for some Chinese adventures, although my motivation is waning. Last week Sarah, Deborah and I decided to go and get a "cupping" massage. We all went out to dinner and while we were talking, someone began to discuss the funny bruises they had seen on one of the locals. We'd all heard of "cupping" before and seen the marks on people to know it was more than just a crazy Chinese myth. Suddenly it hit me-- we had to go and try this before we left China! I turned to Sarah and mentioned the idea, thinking we would put it off until another date when we had summoned up sufficient courage to go. Another person at the dinner table piped up and mentioned a massage place nearby where they had been once. Before any of us could chicken out, it was agreed that we would go as soon as the meal was done.

Stuffed full of Chinese food, we waddled on down to the twenty-four hour massage parlor. The place itself was kind of shady, the front room was full of massage beds laying end to end. We were taken out the back door, and then up to a small apartment that had been converted to a massage parlor.

The massage itself wasn't bad. It definitely wasn't a massage for comfort, it hurt. The cupping was preceded by a treatment called "gua sha." Basically, after the massage the masseuse scrapes your
back with something that looks like a shoehorn. He scrapes long
enough that after a couple of minutes, we all had stripes across our backs that still haven't healed. After this was completed they brought out glass bulbs
which they lit a fire inside to suck out the oxygen. About a dozen
bulbs are placed on your back suctioning up your skin and leaving HUGE
round bruises. Sarah and I returned home that night and looked in the mirror; we looked like victims of torture.

Despite how the pictures look, it really wasn't painful. It was awkward and weird, but definitely not painful. I woke up the next day pretty stiff and sore, and we've all been wearing tee-shirts instead of tank tops to hide the extent of our injuries.

We rode home from the 24-hour massage parlor in a massive lightning storm. Perhaps God was trying to tell us something...

Watermelon

2007-06-22T07:44:00.000-07:00

I bought this a couple of days ago. I'll just post the pictures here and let you all check it out yourselves. I've been trying to find a watermelon knife for several months with no luck until last week.

I'd venture to say this is my greatest purchase in China. My new watermelon knife actually has several functions. Although the
label says it's only for watermelon (right next to the company slogan,
"Resist the Germs!"), I think Sarah and I have found several other
creative uses:

Thanksgiving- No longer will you have to lean over your guests to
carve the turkey at Thanksgiving. You can handle this family tradition
from the comfortable distance of two feet.

When grandma comes over and needs a little help carving her steak you
won't have to get up and walk over, just whip out the watermelon knife
and presto! It's taken care of.

Ribs- For that time when you must barbecue the entire rack at once.
Flames a little high? That's okay with the new watermelon knife. You
can seperate the ribs into portions from your lawn chair.

Besides these functions, it's just great to have a knife that cuts
through a watermelon in one slice. No more sawing action to get all
the way through, this baby makes one clean cut.

Marriage Market

2007-06-20T06:42:00.000-07:00

In my Chinese culture class we discussed marriage and dating in China. Our teacher mentioned that at some parks small marriage markets are set up for singles to find potential suitors. Each "market" is set up by the parents. Advertisements stating things such as job, hobbies, and what that person is looking for in a mate are strung up along clothes lines just far enough apart for people to walk through the aisles.

The other day several of my classmates and I decided to take a trip to the People's Park; a large wooded park in the center of city. There just happened to be an activity day being held at the time. Nearly every corner was packed by crowds of people singing karaoke and dancing. Public exercise and dancing is big in China. I know of two places near my house where hundreds of people gather faithfully every night to dance. It's not much on style, mostly arm flapping and shuffling of feet, but it looks like everyone has a good time.

Anyway, the entire park was packed with dancers and singers. One crowd was doing a group sing-a-long. A small band sat on stools in the middle of the pack, while audience members shared song books.

At the marriage market, dozens of parents were milling around looking at future daughter or son-in laws. There were no young people. My classmate Deborah and I decided we would peruse the aisles for future husbands. I stopped and looked at one description just a little too long. An older couple walked over and in proud terms started describing their son to me. He speaks English, has a good job, lives in Singapore. This couple was so intent on telling me about their son that I literally had a hard time walking away. All I could think about was how sad it would be if my parents tried to sell me at the marriage market.

That night I called home just to make sure.

Life as usual...

2007-06-20T05:46:00.000-07:00

There's a tower in Chengdu that looks vaguely like this: I don't have a picture of the actual tower, but you get the point.

Since the first time I saw this building I've wanted to go up in it. As I've mentioned before Chengdu is entirely flat, so finding a view is difficult. For months I've been bringing it up to people in hopes that one of us will remember to make the trek on a clear day. Finally I had the opportunity to ask a group of Chinese people whether or not they had been in the tower and how much it cost. Everyone stopped their conversation and just stared at me.

"Why would you want to go up there?"

"I don't think people are allowed up there."

"There's nothing for you to see."

"I don't think you can."

"Why do you want to do that?"

I was really startled! Did these people really mean to say that the television tower, with all the windows and come-to-me tourist appeal is actually off limits? Did they really mean to say the television tower isn't a tourist trap at all? Why in the world would you build it then?!

I have no conclusion to this story except to say that I have yet to go and try my luck at getting up.

Life

2007-06-10T06:02:00.000-07:00

Life has been rather slow lately. With my homecoming just over a month away, I'm finding myself increasingly anxious about the amount of stuff I need to finish, and at the same time losing motivation to do it. My weekend has dragged by while I sat on my floor and tried to finish a paper. I'm out of practice and the topic is boring. Inbetween the paper and surfing the internet, I found time to write up a script for a skit I have to perform in my spoken language class.

Other useless stuff is killing my time too. I'm still working my way through a large stack of classic novels I bought at a sale in Shanghai. English books are hard to find in Chengdu, and those that are here are both pricy and old. Why Chengdu bookstores sell only the classics I'll never know. Chinese students of English should be offered a selection of easier to read novels than those that even native speakers struggle with. Anyway, that's a topic for another time.

The most exciting thing of my week was the discovery of a HUGE cockroach in my house. It was nearly two inches long, the kind of thing you only see in movies. I've seen these things roaming the street before, they're a type of free-range roach. I saw it just as I was about to run out of the house for class. I realized I forgot my phone so I ran back in my room to find it. When I did, I saw the beast crawling slowly across the floor. After the initial shock (adrenaline rush turn into flight or fight mode) I grabbed a shoe and squished it.

I was in denial about it all morning. In class I reported to my friends that it was a "huge bug" that caused me to be late. I don't have cockroaches in my house. We're fairly clean and there's no other evidence of infestation. Whenever I do see cockroaches in China-- in hotels, buses, or in apartments, they're always the small kind. Like I said this was a free range roach, not a resident.

When I came back that afternoon I was determined to do a massive cleaning of the entire house. If any evidence turned up I was going to buy roach motels by the dozen and then spray the entire house with roach killer and let it settle while I went shopping. When I went to clean up the original "giant bug" it was still moving. That was the moment my denial changed into acceptance. There was a roach in my house and he was going to die.

Thank goodness nothing else turned up. I've been keeping a tight watch on things all week, and I've concluded that my roach came in through the window when I wasn't looking. Nothing to be worried about. Nothing.

Post office adventures

2007-06-01T08:46:00.000-07:00

I meant to post this a couple of weeks ago when it happened, but I've been busy doing everything except blogging. As we leave in just over a month, Sarah and I have been getting things ready to pack and ship home. She bought a basket that she wants to send to a friend, but it's too large for a carry-on, and too awkward to check in. We decided that we would take her pile of stuff and my smaller pile to the post office to send it. We'd heard that if we send it the cheapest way home-via boat, then it would take two months.

The problem with sending stuff from a Chinese post office is that you have to buy the box from them and then have your things hand searched before they are sent off. This means that anything you want to send has to be small enough to fit in the post office boxes, and you must be ready to unpack for the search.

There's a post office about a ten-minute walk from our house. As with everything in China, sending our stuff was bound to take several trips over several days' time. We finally found an afternoon when we were both free to make the hike and buy the boxes. When we got there, we asked for a couple of their largest boxes. When the woman brought them out, we realized they were not large enough to send the basket. We explained that we wanted to send the basket to America and asked what we should do. At first they just stared at us, finally after some negotiations they agreed to mail the basket so long as we found a larger box ourselves. Fine.

The next couple of days were spent searching for a large enough box to fit all of Sarah's stuff. I was successful in packing what I wanted to send home into my smaller box, but still had some left over for another trip later. Several days after acquiring the box, Sarah and I took off carrying our loads down to the gate of the apartment complex. The boxes were so heavy that by the time we got there, we were drenched with sweat. Fortunately the complex guard guys keep a shopping cart at the gate for just such an emergency.

We hauled our stuff down the road, the shopping cart squeaking and people staring the entire trip. We pulled up the post office a while later and shoved the cart up against the side of the building to keep it from rolling away. As soon as we walked in the front door, the same woman from our last visit announced to us that they did not ship internationally. What!?

This is such a good example of China. She could have told us the first time that they don't ship internationally when we were buying boxes and asking about shipping to America! But no, she waited until we followed what she told us to do, took an afternoon off and made the haul. No amount of complaining would do the trick; they we're under no circumstances going to send the boxes. Needless to say, I was not happy.

A couple of days later we brought our boxes down from the apartment (again!), found the shopping cart, received the warning from the guard guys about not loosing it and started walking in the other direction to another post office about a mile away. Again everyone was staring at us. People slowed their cars to gape out the window, and those in the bike lane were nearly the cause of several accidents themselves.

We made it to the post office in one piece. Most importantly though, no one was killed along the way.

Sarah's box is obviously not standard issue and the woman balked when we told her we wanted to send it. She was certain that it was against the rules and could not be done. Rather than take the complaining method to get what we wanted we went on the offensive. We began to argue that because the other post office directed us there, they had to send it for us. She countered that they didn't know what they were doing and were just trying to get rid of us.

"But we believed them!" Sarah countered. We were not going to leave until something got done. We argued in circles for several minutes, she telling us there was no way, and us asking what then we were supposed to do. After some time passed and we still hadn't left, she gave in and agreed to send the boxes for us.

If I went to a post office in the US and was told I couldn't mail a particular item, I would just accept it as law. In China, my feeling is there's an excess of rules and nobody knows them. They'll tell you something is against the rules, but the feeling is clear that they are just making it up or are acting on a vague notion of what the rules might say. What is this?

Strange happenings at ChuanDa

2007-05-26T09:50:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, Sarah and I were taking a walk between classes. Our class break normally coincides with the break the elementary students take at the grade school next door. When we leave our classroom we are forced to wade through packs of kids on our way to get a snack or something to drink. The kids are pretty fun to watch. Their class break is preceded by the blasting of the national anthem over a loudspeaker. The older kids then march off to play on a track while the younger ones stay inside the school grounds for some "exercise." What they really do is flap their arms around and sometimes kick their legs to the sound of someone shouting off the count of eight over and over again. The counting is done with the help of a megaphone, and as though that weren't bad enough, music plays over the school's loudspeakers at the same time. I heard that their exercises are actually designed by Beijing, and every grade school kid in the country participates in the same workout. I can't verify the truth to this, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Anyway, this blog isn't about kids and flapping arms, it's about something else we saw while walking one day:

As we were walking, we began to hear a low rumbling sound in the distance. As we were walking past a particular alley way we looked up just in time to see a wild herd of college students running at full tilt in our direction. Nobody was stopping, old ladies were dodging out of the way, bicyclists were turning away from the crowd and people like me were looking for the nearest cover. All the students were wearing bright colored Sichuan University tee-shirts. Some shouted slogans as they ran past, and others carried large banners. What were they doing? No idea.

Living in China is interesting: although I'm seeing a world I've never seen before, my own personal world feels very small and confined. Parades and other happenings are always a surprise to me. My life and base of knowledge is so completely out of sync with the Chinese students that I just have to resign myself to the fact that I know very, very little about what's going on most of the time. I guess that's what makes it interesting though. If I knew everything that was going to happen, I probably wouldn't last very long here.

Blogger

2007-05-18T20:01:00.001-07:00

I've been working on that last post for over a week now, but everytime I tried to post it the entire internet nearly collapsed. When I'd finally finished writing I tried to add some pictures. About half way through the post, the picture button on Blogger stopped working. For the past couple of days I've been trying to get it to work with no luck. In the end, I posted it without everything that I wanted, averting a global internet disaster.

More Pictures:

2007-05-14T01:58:00.000-07:00

Xinjiang

2007-05-12T06:29:00.000-07:00

I've been putting off this blog all week just because I know it's going to be long and I have other things to do. The weekend is finally here, and although I still have a couple of midterms, things have slowed down for a bit.

Xinjiang was a ton of fun. We've been talking about going to Xinjiang ever since we walked into a Xinjiang restaurant and ate dapanji-big plate of chicken. The grilled lamb kebabs found nearly everywhere in Chengdu cemented the deal. We had to go.

In both October and May there is a week-long holiday in China. Nearly everyone has the time off, (although they are forced to work the weekends to make it up) and they often use it for travel. Traveling is insane; the trains are packed, the airfares are high, and the buses are stuffed to the brim with workers and students returning home. Although taking the train would have been cheaper, we couldn't afford to spend three days on the train each way. In the end, we opted to fly.

Flying to the capital of Xinjiang, a city that looks just like nearly every other city in China, takes well over three hours. We arrived in the evening, grabbed our bags and headed out to catch a cab. We'd been warned that cab drivers in Urumqi were notorious for their bad practices, so when we asked the driver to use the meter we weren't surprised that he ignored us and only after some badgering did he comply with our request.

After checking into the youth hostel, we headed out to the night market. Our guide book listed this as one of the only things to do in Urumqi, and added that it was not to be missed.

The night market stretched down a narrow road for about six blocks. Every stall sold some sort of kebab, and many more additionally sold noodles, yogurt, naan bread, and other treats. I love Xinjiang food...

The next morning we met up with some other foreigners we had met in Chengdu. They have been living in Xinjiang for nearly a year now, so they were familiar with the layout of the city and could give us some advice. Our first order of business was to take a trip to the train station. We wanted to get on a fast train to Kashgar. While we were standing in line, we met another European foreigner. He looked like one of those rejected by the West types. He was drunk, dressed in Hawaiian garb, and had a girlfriend young enough to be his daughter. We told him our destination, and he commented that ha ha, if we find Bin Laden, ha ha, we were not to turn him over to the Americans, ha ha.

No fast train tickets were left, the only train that we could get took over twenty-four hours.

The entire trip is made through the desert. At times you can see ruins of some homes or a small town just off the horizon. At others, dusty mountains tower over the tracks. The ride was hot. Every hour or so, we would open the windows to let fresh air in. About ten minutes after that, a Chinese person would come along and close all of them. Sometimes it was justified; the wind would blow and all the passengers would suddenly be covered in a layer of dust. But most of the time it wasn't justified. It was hot, and the open windows helped a lot. This opening and shutting of windows went on all day, all evening, and all the next day until we finally pulled into the Kashgar station.

The hotel we were booked into claimed to be the sight of the former British consulate in Kashgar. It’s hard to know what to believe, the place looked just like every other building in China, and the interior was most definitely a hotel. The hotel was comprised of several cookie cutter buildings, all with different names. The building we stayed in was called the Qinibagh, the one across the way had the word “International” written in English, and the word “Friendship” written in Chinese.

Because we’re all poor students, we opted for a three-bed cheap room. We didn’t know this until we got there, but the place we were staying in was under construction. It was obvious when we walked in the doors that something was amiss. All the lights were out, and you could hear workers banging around with their hammers and things. When we stepped off the elevator, we very nearly walked into a bucket of paint. Everyday we had to walk over piles of newspaper on the floor, duck hanging wires, and avoid piles of debris to get to our room. The electricity was iffy, the wall had a hole in it, and the water only had two temperatures: scalding and ice.

We decided to check out the night market and see what we could scrounge up for dinner. As usual, everything was delicious and we got to try several things we’d never had before. On our way back to the hotel, Sarah and I passed a shop that was selling fur hats. The best ones they had were hats made from sheep. Not wool hats, sheep hats. I tried to resist buying them, but the urge was too great. I’m sure you’ll agree they were a worthwhile purchase!

Our last stop before turning in was at a small stall near our hotel. The vendor was making a drink out of yogurt, honey and ice, which he mixed expertly by flicking his wrist causing the drink to splash up and back into the small bowl. While we were drinking, an English-speaking guy approached and introduced himself as a tour guide. I thought he was going to try and sell us one of his tours, but nope, he just wanted to warn us to eat something hot afterwards otherwise would be spending the whole night puking. With that friendly reminder, he trudged off into the night.

Our first full day in Kashgar was spent at the morning market. The city isn’t very big; everywhere we wanted to go was within walking distance. The morning market was a covered market, and nearly every stall was jammed with prayer rugs and hajib scarves. We spent a lot of time just wandering around looking at all that could be had. The biggest mosque in China is located in Kashgar and in order to visit we were told that we would have to cover up. Even though there was a huge selection, most of the scarves weren’t that pretty or just didn’t suit our tastes. The women in Kashgar dressed differently than the women in other parts of China. Some women wore more rustic looking traditional clothes, but more often than not, the women were wearing gaudy, loud, neon colored, sparkly dresses. I couldn’t figure it out; here these women were going about their daily routine in ugly sparkly dresses! I wish I had taken more pictures of this; it was way too funny.

After making all our purchases, we decided to walk to the mosque. On every street corner, people were selling fruit and spices that we don’t see in the rest of China. There was a ton of pomegranate merchants, most of them making juice out of the fruit with large, spiky contraptions.

The mosque itself was rather small. At the entrance there was a sign talking about how wonderful China is for allowing freedom of religion, and how the minorities all sought unity with Beijing and the country at large. This kind of propaganda was everywhere in Kashgar (which ironically is home to the largest statue of Mao in the world). Xinjiang is not one of China’s happiest places, but yet if you believed everything that was written, you would think it was paradise.

We booked a tour with our hotel to Karakul Lake and the Stone Castle. Included in the tour was a “home visit.” Also included was a stay in a yurt at the lakeside. The guy who booked our tickets had a friend who let us stay at his place, bypassing the tourist yurt-motel area and the accompanying fees.

The next morning we got up early and drove several hours to a small town called Tashkurgan near the border of Pakistan. On the way, we had to stop and go through a Chinese checkpoint. No pictures were allowed, but vendors had already sought out the lonely spot and were selling their wares.

The Stone Castle is located just outside Tashkurgan’s small downtown. A total of maybe a dozen buildings housing grocery stores and restaurants were all that was there. In the far corner of the town was the ruin of what we were told was Stone Castle. I really have no idea what this fortress was; I’ve searched the internet and haven’t turned up anything useful. Needless to say it was fun poking around and looking at various rocks and animal bones at the sight. Sarah and I both found cool rocks, something we’ve been doing since the beginning. From the castle sight, you could look out into a valley where a dozen or so yurts were located. From my spot on the hill, I could see a small soccer game taking place and people outside all engage in various activities.

That afternoon we were taken for the home visit part of our tour. I was dreading this part of the trip, the whole thing sounded hokey and contrived. I wasn’t disappointed. We were led by our tour guide to a mud house down at the edge of the valley. Several women sat outside in traditional clothes working on some crafts. Another women held a baby (I’ll show you the picture in the next post, I don’t want to horrify you all when you’re half way through the blog!), and a small boy stood shyly by his mother. The oldest women invited us inside to take a look around and ask any questions if we had them. It turns out that they were the perfect, China-loving, communist family. On the walls of one room, pictures of all the past communist leaders were displayed lovingly. The visit went from awkward to really, really awkward when the tour guide decided to stall us until the hour was up. Finally, we left.

That night we stayed at Karakul Lake. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves as to the beauty of this place. Several hundred feet down the shore was the yurt motel. This is where I thought we were going to be staying, but because of the tour guide agreement/shady dealings we ended up staying in someone’s home. They cooked dinner and breakfast for us, and made up beds when it was time to sleep. When we first arrived, we asked where the bathrooms where. The tour guide laughed.

The next morning the ladies who made us breakfast treated us to the obligatory sales pitch. They laid out their jewelry and hand made crafts, while the tour guide acted as interpreter. Even though the price was jacked up, I just couldn’t find it in my heart to refuse these ladies. I’m such a sucker.

A little later that morning one of the yurt neighbors came by trying to sell us sheep hats. Along with the sheep hats he had some made from unknown animals. I asked what they were, but he didn’t seem to know. One hat looked particularly familiar. When I was a kid, I owned a tabby cat named Silvia. This hat looked just like her! I know it’s a little gross, but at the time I thought it was hilarious and so I asked the guy if he had any others. He then invited us to his house where we sat and waited for his brother to go and get them from another yurt neighbor. I’ll let you all know I bought two of them, and they are kind of gross.

We stayed at the lake one night, and the next morning headed back to Kashgar. Again we spent the day checking out the sights of the city, although this time we made a special stop to a Taj Mahal-style mausoleum. That night we stopped again for a bowl of yogurt/ice drink. As soon as the vendor saw us, he put a cassette tape in a small player and began to play Uyger pop music. Then he wanted to dance. The small benches were pushed away from the stand, and the music was cranked up. Then he began to dance. Soon a crowd had gathered and he was inviting us to join him. The dancing included a lot of walking in circles and arm waving, but it was a ton of fun. After everyone had joined in the dance at least once, it was time to close up and go. The crowd dissipated after a number of goodbyes, and the bill was paid only after a short argument with the now drunk vendor.

In order to make our plane in Urumqi, we either had to fly the night before or take the sleeper bus. Sarah, Ben and I opted for the sleeper bus. Carly, who is much wiser, opted to pay the airfare. To be fair, the sleeper bus wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, although it didn’t stop enough and you couldn’t get up and walk around. The beds were too short for me, so I slept with my legs sprawled out into the aisle. The bus has three rows of bunk beds, each about half the size (length and width) and a normal twin bed. I was in the middle bottom bunk, with the television just above my head. The kung fu movie and karaoke wasn’t the worst I’ve seen in China, but it was bad. I’m not sure I’d travel this way again, but as all things in China are, it was an adventure.

We made it back to Chengdu in one piece, and I packed up and sent the cat hats home a day ago. Xinjiang was awesome, but I’m happy to be back.

First the Pics:

2007-05-12T05:13:00.000-07:00

Another China Day

2007-05-11T00:29:00.000-07:00

Some days in China are just more exciting than others. Today for example, I left class with a long to-do list, but as so often happens in China, I was interrupted half way through.

After class, I first needed to retrieve my video camera from a friend and then I needed to visit a couple of stores for some shopping. As the mosquitoes are back in full force, I decided to stop by a pharmacy and see if I could get some anti-itch cream. I wasn't sure what to ask for, so I sidled up to one of the clerks and told her mosquitoes bite me a lot. She seemed to understand because a few minutes later she reappeared with a tube of medicine.

Later that afternoon, I went in search of a bicycle repair man who would pump up the tires on my bike. I get them pumped up about once every two weeks. Every time I ask for new tires, the repair man just replaces the patches. There's a repair man on nearly every corner here, so you're never far away from help.

There's a mall about a mile from my house. In front of the mall is a very large, very busy intersection. Everyday people run the red light, ride on the wrong side of the road, and just generally make a nuisance of themselves. As I was trying to cross the street, a man on a scooter came flying towards me. We both stared at each other for a second unsure which way to go. In the US when people are heading on a collision course, they'll usually both move to the right. Not so in China; people don't move at all, or they move in whatever direction suits them. This guy didn't move. I made a sharp turn at the last second. His scooter rammed into the front tire of my bike, sending my groceries flying. I was fine, but at this point I wasn't sure what to do. Do I apologize, or just walk away? Do I wait to see if he offers to repair the now mangled wheel, or should I offer to fix his hand break that mysteriously fell off? In the end I opted to walk away while he was preoccupied with the hand brake.

The front tire of the bike was so bent out of shape that it wouldn't move. I lifted it by the handlebars and pulled it to the nearest bike guy who happened to be across the street. He looked at my bike, told me to flip it over and proceeded to work on it. I thought he was just going to give me a new wheel, but nope, he opted to instead bend the wheel back into shape. He first took it off the bike, and then leaned it up against a brick. Stepping onto the outer rim, he began to bounce until it was nearly back to normal. After a bit more tweaking and the addition of some new brakes, I was ready to go. I hopped on the bike and took off.

Several blocks later the new brakes loosened and fell down so that they were rattling against the spokes. I tried to fix the problem myself, but after a few minutes it became clear I wasn't going to make it anywhere very fast without another trip to the bike guy. Once again, I picked up the bike by the handlebars and pulled it to a bike fixing station a block down the road. This time, an old woman was working. She spent nearly a half hour tinkering with and replacing parts of the brakes until she finally threw her hands up and wired them back on. They don't really work, but I don't think that was her point. She spoke to me the whole time I stood with her. She had a heavy Sichuan accent and the only thing I managed to understand from her was "lift the bike and let me look" and "you need to replace that part and this part and that other part and this one here and that one and this one..."

I took off again. Several blocks later the chain fell off. Fixing that I took off again, nearly getting mowed down by a dump truck on the way. I made it home in one piece to soon find that the I had accidentaly left a packet of tissue in some pants that I had just laundered. My clothes had been TP'd.

The only thing that could make this day more "China" would be if that tube of mosquito stuff kills me. It's starting to tingle...

Stolen Bike Market: Part 2

2007-05-08T08:54:00.000-07:00

Several weeks after arriving in China, some of the Chinese students took myself and Sarah out to buy bikes. Rumors of a stolen bike market where bikes were sold dirt cheap had reached our ears and we determined to go and check it out for ourselves.

The market wasn't actually a market, it was a street filled with shady looking people. As we entered the main intersection, the quickest vendor made his way over to us and asked in a hushed voice if we wanted a bike.

The reason I bring this up again is that recently Sarah's bike was stolen. Bike thievery is incredibly common here in China. Most foreigners I know say the going rate is one or more a year stolen. The Chinese I talk to put their lifetime totals at twenty or thirty. Mine fortunately, is still with me.

The first trip to the bike market required a Chinese guide. Sarah and I were determined that a second trip would only require us. The day after her bike was stolen, we shared lunch together and determined what are plan of action should be. We decided that 100 kuai was a good price, but we wanted to make sure that included a lock.

We paid our bill and walked in the direction of the bike market. As predicted, as soon as we stepped in the neighborhood we were asked if we needed a bike. We told the man yes, and he beckoned for us to follow him behind a row of shacks. We walked down a muddy pathway, past several small huts, and through a small construction site until we finally arrived at the front door of a shack. Opening it, we could see that a single light bulb hung from the ceiling, lighting up what would otherwise have been a pitch black room. A young woman sat at a table eating lunch. She paid us no attention. Our host led us to a back room, kept closed and locked to keep prying eyes out. He reached out and pulled a switch, illuminating the room. There before us stood nearly half a dozen brand new bicycles.

I looked at the vendor, sure he was wanting us to spend more than we were willing. We told him no, these bikes would not do. We needed a cheaper one. His friend, a man who mysteriously appeared in the room as soon as we started talking, agreed to go and find us a cheaper one. We stood silently in the room for a while until he came back with a bright-orange-older-than-my-parents-bike. It was perfect.

We haggled over the price for a while until we were finally satisfied. At first they were willing to give us the bike for 100 kuai, but we needed a lock and they didn't want to include that with the price. After another few minutes of awkward silence, they agreed to bring a lock. The friend then reached into a box and pulled out the flimsiest lock I have ever seen. At this point a third person arrived on the scene, her purse full of bike locks. We stood around a bit more and finally agreed to buy the bike and the two locks for just over 100. The friend pulled out an album full of fake brand stickers and stuck one directly on top of the original sticker on the bike. Not a bad deal if you ask me.

Spring is come!

2007-04-28T06:53:00.000-07:00

Spring has finally come to Chengdu! After freezing our behinds off all winter, spring has come with a vengeance. It was warm a couple of days and then suddenly someone turned the furnace up and it became hot! The weather here is always humid, making the cold feel colder and the hot hotter. For two days we actually had blue sky. I so rarely see it that when it comes, it's all I can do to stay inside. White skin is all the rage here, so I get lots of stares when I roll up my sleeves and pants and bask in the sun.

The students have gotten into the spirit too. Outside dorm and apartment buildings, residents can be seen hanging their bed linens on the shrubbery to dry. The women have finally taken off their long underwear in favor of gloves and sweaters (I will never understand this), and have donned welder's masks whenever they are outside to keep the sun from tanning their skin. Girls are carrying pretty umbrellas to keep the sun off their faces, while those on bikes have rigged their umbrellas to stand up straight from the handlebars.

All of this is quite a sight, but the oncoming of spring has made me feel the passage of time more now than ever. I'm beginning to realize how close home is, and am in part dreading it and excited at the same time. China is a lot of fun, but home will be good too.

It rained today reminding me of Seattle. I never thought I'd say this, but I miss the rain.

Arrgh...

2007-04-28T06:45:00.000-07:00

Last weekend my classmate Matt was hurt and taken to the hospital. I'd heard stories of hospital visits, but have fortunately never had to visit one on my own. I thought about writing a whole blog post about the experience, but decided it was better left in the hands of those who saw it. Here's an excerpt from Sarah's blog telling all about it:

"At about 2pm we see a few of the guys run across our field back to where everyone's stuff is and we look over the field the men were playing on and everyone has stopped and gathered in a circle. I hear someone say "someone's hurt" and I look over and it's Matt. A minute later two guys are helping Matt walk back over to the bench and it is obvious Matt has broken both the bones in his right forearm (like his arm is bent in a way that bones don't typically bend and it has broken the skin). Garth, who has a car, drives Matt, Eoin (an Irish guy that was the guy takling Matt when it happened) and Xiao Mei (a CHinese girl going to translate) to Huaxi hospital and we all don't really know what to do, so we keep playing. After another hour we finish practice and I hop in the first car going back. On the way back we stopped at this guy Mike's factory. He is in China helping set up a factory to make MRI machines so we saw them making and testing the first MRI machine ever made in China and I learned how MRI's really work, which was very interesting. However, I was really worried about Matt this whole time and I just wanted to get to the hospital and make sure he was going to be ok. I finally got there and Matt was in a room on a bed and X-Rays had been taken (which they had to wait an hour for to be developed), but nothing besides that had happened. The arm was still in a cardboard sling that a guy on our team had put on when it first happened. By this time it was probably about 4:30 already. In the next hour three different doctors came by to look at it. The first doctor took off the sling and looked at the arm and the X-Rays then put it back on and went away. Then the next one came and took off the sling and looked at it with some nurses and then without putting anything back on just walked away. So I am standing there holding Matt because it really hurts and I don't want him to look down at his arm which has the forearm part hanging alot lower than the hand which he is holding with his other hand. It feels like we are waiting forever like this (maybe a few minutes in reality, but WAY TOO LONG) until someone finally comes back and they wrap it up again. Then the last doctor comes and says that he is just going to set it in a cast for now and then Matt will need surgery to re-set the bones in about a week. By this time many more people have arrived, one of them being a Western doctor who a guy from the rugby team brought over to help out. The Western doctor says "no, this surgery should happen now" and goes to talk to the doctors. We find out the the whole reason they want to wait is so they can make sure that we pay before they preform the surgery, they essentially won't do anything until we pay them upfront. SO I call Matt's mom (in the middle of the night in Seattle) and get Matt's insurance information and we try to get that rolling and decided we will do whatever it takes to have the surgery happen now. In the end it turns out the the western doctor convinced them that money would not be a problem and by calling the insurance company we were able to open a case as well, so at 7pm Matt finally went into surgery. It took 3 hours to finish and they screwed a metal plate to each of his bones to stabilize them. After the surgery I felt alot better, but it was just a very scary, stressful experience because you felt like you couldn't trust anything the doctors were telling you. Thank god the western doctor came to help, but he left again after like an hour so we were on our own again (andrea being the next most qualified person to make decisions). The level of care was just so much lower than anything you would ever receive in the states and whenever you tried to ask anyone a question they would never give you an answer. Like when we tried to ask how long Matt's surgery would take, they just said when it's done you'll know, which was the kind of responses we were getting all night. But after the surgery was done and we were back upstairs in a recovery room (with a few other patients too of course) I felt alot better because atleast the break was secured now and I felt like the hard part was over. Andrea stayed the night with Matt and I got home at like 12:45am or so. The next day, Monday, after class I went right back to the hospital with some things for Matt, like movies, his computer, etc. Surgery in China is not like in the states and we had no idea how long he would have to stay there, so we were preparing for the long haul. When I got there that afternoon Matt was looking alot better, but very uncomfortable because his arm hurt alot and was swelling like MAD and they also had to put in a catheter. I stayed with Matt all afternoon. We had to have someone with him all the time because, aside from the fact that he doesn't speak Chinese and it's good to have moral support, in China it is BYO nurse. So while I was there I was in charge of alerting the nurse attending to our room when his IV was getting low and emptying the catheter every two hours. I also keep asking every doctor that came around (all two of them) if the swelling was normal because the wrapping seemed really tight and when we could take out the cathedar and of course getting no answers. Matt asked me to take that picture of his arm, he has wanted me to document this for some reason. That evening I was relived and left for our customary UW meeting and to get dinner and then went back to stay the night. By the time I got back we had gotten the catheter out and the bandages changed (and loosened) so Matt was in much higher spirits. Plus he was finally sleeping, which was really good. He slept alot of the night, but unfortunately I did not. That's ok though, I didn't really expect to. I did homework and read and we watched a movie, "Time Bandits". Andrea came to relieve me at 7:30 so I could go to class. I just got home and ate lunch and now, although I am exhausted, I can't sleep. But I am laying in my bed as I write this and will hopefully try to get some rest, or atleast go to sleep early tonight. I know I will crash at some point. We also just found out the Matt will be getting out of the hospital tomorrow, which is great. He has been so brave and great through this whole thing, I am so proud of him. It's scary enough to have this happen to you in the states and I remember how much it sucks. Having it happen in China I can't even imagine. Anyways, it has been an intense few days but it seems as though we are out of the woods."

Almost Xinjiang!

2007-04-28T06:34:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow several of my classmates and I will be heading off on our Spring break trip. We'll be going to Xinjiang, first flying to Urumqi and then making our way over land to Kashi. We'll be gone a week.

We've been talking of making this trip for quite some time now. We've talked of going to Tibet and various other parts of China, but I think the place that won out was Xinjiang.

Xinjiang is located in the far Northwest corner of China. It is home to the Uyger minority people, and some of the best food to be found in China. The majority of China's muslim people live in that area, and it was also there that the old silk road passed through. This will be my last big trip of the year, and I'm really excited about it. When I return I'll be posting pictures and sharing stories.

Xi'an!

2007-04-19T06:16:00.000-07:00

I just returned from a long weekend away in Xi'an. My teacher took us on an archeological excursion, and aside from killing my fantasies of becoming an archeologist, the trip was a ton of fun.

The first day was spent touring a museum and visiting the Banpo archeological site. The site itself is an ancient village that had been unearthed just outside of the city. Before entering the dig, we were taken to a dark and musty building which housed pottery remains and brief descriptions of what is known of the Banpo people. After entering the site (a large warehouse has been built to cover and protect the findings), we were led by a tour guide who proudly explained the different types of structures at the site. We'd been hearing that the Banpo people had a matriarchial society, but as we walked through the museum, the evidence for this claim seemed to be missing. Finally, at the end of the tour I asked the tour guide on what basis it is believed that these people lived in a matriarchial society. She replied that several graves had been uncovered and archeologists were surprised to discover that the women were buried with more pottery than the men. The evidence still doesn't seem to be as strong as everyone at the site made it out to be, but I'll accept it for now.

As the tour guide was pointing out the different foundations, she pointed to a large hole in the ground. This, she said, was were the Banpo people kept their grain. Obviously everyone shared and there was no sense of property. Is archeology always this much guess work?

The second day we were taken to the Terracotta Warriors museum. On the way there we had the opportunity to see a nearby site where some armour had been uncovered. We weren't allowed to take any photos, but we were allowed to go down into the pits and take a closer look.

We were officially recieved at the Terracotta museum by the director of the site. Every place we went on this trip we were officially recieved. Each time the group would take turns shaking hands with the curator or director, then we would be led to a reception room and given tea. Meanwhile, our professors would proclaim how wonderful the site was and how wonderful the director was. The directors in turn would praise our professors, with exclamations on both sides like "we could really learn from you!" and "your university is so advanced!" clearing the way for a free lunch.

The museum itself was awesome. We entered the complex through the back gate, past the photos of world leaders visiting the site, and into the reception building. After the obligitory guanxi session, we were allowed to roam around free. In addition to the site most seen in photographs, the comlex houses a smaller museum, a gift shop, a restaurant and another dig site where soldiers still lie broken upon the ground.

The director of the site ended up treating us to lunch where as always, the food was wonderful. I took a picture of a terracotta vegetable, and posted it below. After lunch, all the students went outside to wait for the professors to finish eating. Sarah and I sat in a garden near the back of the complex. We were in the middle of a conversation when a Chinese man approached and tried to sell us a box of terracotta figurines. I told him I didn't want any, and as I was speaking, a group of about half a dozen young men surrounded us. The guy with the figurines lowered his price down to one US dollar, and then when I still refused, he said, "free?" No.

We got up and walked away to join the rest of our group. When we got there we were told that the group of men had entered the complex, hopped the fence, five minutes later came back over the fence, and were just now hiding behind some bushes. All we could conclude was that they were gift shop thieves.

When we weren't visiting archeological sites we were touring around the city. Sarah and I rented bicycles and rode atop the city wall. We spent one evening at the "Street of Islam" eating street food and buying dried fruit. We also spent an afternoon shopping at a tourist market in the center of the city. Each evening we returned to the hotel to watch several hours of the National Geographic channel, the only English language television station available in Xi'an.

All in all we had a great time. I've posted some of the pictures below and will be posting the rest on my webshots account when I get the chance.

It was a great trip.

Xi'An!

2007-04-11T04:47:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I'll be heading out to Xi'an with several of my classmates to see the Terracotta Soldiers as well as some other neighboring archaeological sites. I am currently in a Chinese archeology class and my professor is taking us as a group. Truth be told, all of us took the class because we knew there would be a field trip component, so we're pretty excited.

Other than that, things have been going well. School is as busy as always, and I never feel like I have enough time to complete what I want to get done. I'm really good at wasting time doing things like eating, reading cookbooks, devising ways to kill mosquitoes (this would be a great research project), and eating. As you can see, my issues with time management are entirely my fault.

My research is going okay. I turned my original set of interview questions into a questionnaire which I then sent to some friends of friends. I got them all back during winter break, and spent a bit of time roughly translating them back to English. Most of them weren't very helpful, with people giving me very short or one-word answers. Actually- the questionnaires were a big flop... Going through the questions helped me see where there were problems with the original translation from English to Chinese. Some of the questions morphed during the process ("What's your name?" somehow changed to "What's you name and how old are you?"). The majority of questions I still feel are fine, although there are a few that need to be changed. As far as everything goes, I feel as though I'm back at square one, but this time with a better picture of what I'm stepping into. If I had to, I could come up with a paper, but it would be ninety-percent literature review and very little original thought.

I still think my interview questions, although they need some tweaking, aren't too far off the mark. I'm pretty sure that people will answer the questions, but they need to be presented in a different way. Hence, I'm now actively looking for an interpreter who can do CSL and Chinese. I'm willing to pay, feed, and help with transportation, I just need someone for a few hours, a few times. What I'd like to do is sit down with several people and ask them about their experiences as deaf people in China. Even if I come up nothing with nothing new or interesting, I feel that their experiences as a group cut off from most of society by a language barrier (like me!), make their lives unique and worth recording. Hopefully I'll find that interpreter soon!

Pictures from Huang Long Xi adventure:

2007-04-07T07:10:00.000-07:00

These are my pictures from the Huang Long Xi adventure. I'm waiting on some better pictures to be emailed to me. Check my webshots account soon for the pictures of me in weird Chinese costume and other new pictures.

English Corner

2007-04-07T06:28:00.000-07:00

Every week on campus and in various places around the city Chinese students gather to converse and improve their English. This practice is called English corner, and if you're a foreigner and not careful you might just get roped into one. I attended SU's when I first arrived in Chengdu at the request of my roommate. I haven't been back since. In fact, I've been actively avoiding the gathering.

My first experience with English corner was absolutely overwhelming. Every friday night, a group of close to hundred students gather at the main flagpole on campus. They huddle into small groups and chat with each other, or gather around someone who is particularly fluent to listen. I rode up on my bike, stopped and waited while scanning the crowd for my friend. Within a few minutes, a group of Chinese boys had gathered around me to talk. This small group of boys soon developed into a large group of boys with about thirty students packed in tight to listen. Every five minutes or so, a new student would push their way to the front of the pack and start the conversation over. Where are you from? What are you doing here? You speak Chinese? Is America going to war with Iran? You're so pretty, can I have your phone number? Can you use chopsticks? Can you eat spicy food?

Sometimes a student who had attained near-native fluency would come and discuss things like politics or economics. These people are always fun to talk to because they ask questions about topics Americans don't generally talk about. They ask interesting questions about life in general, and I enjoy having them there. They are usually the ones who know American geography and society as well, so when I tell them I'm from Washington State, they don't ask if I've seen the president. The chopstick and spice question I get asked all the time, do I really look like I'm starving?

The one I have a hard time answering is the phone number question. I'm just not sure how to politely decline phone number requests in this situation. I usually move to make eye contact with someone else and either ignore the question or change the subject. After my first time at English corner, I was fielding calls from Chinese mothers, boys and "friends" for weeks. The problem got so bad that I stopped answering the phone if I didn't recognize the number, or I would put the caller in my phonebook and change their name to DONOTANSWER.

Last week I was invited to English corner again. A friend who I had not seen in a while invited me, and out of guilt for not calling her back in a timely manner, I agreed to go. I'm not sure if she was purposely trying to torture me or she just didn't know that English corner was so taxing on the foreigner. I arrived a few minutes late, and thought a miracle had happened when I didn't see her in the crowd. I got a text message a several minutes later. Nope, it wasn't a miracle, I was at the wrong English corner and she would be coming to find me in a few minutes.

We joined the crowd, and although I got the feeling that she wanted me to spend the evening talking with her, I was soon engaged in conversation with thirty-odd teenage boys. After a couple of hours, my friend looked like she was about to fall asleep and I offered to leave with her. I was glad for the excuse, as the first time I attended English corner I wasn't able to leave until well after midnight. As she was leaving she said, "So next week, how 'bout we meet at that tea house. It's a lot quiter there." Phew!

Article of the week:

2007-04-03T09:37:00.000-07:00

Let me just summarize this. Crazy daughter, old guy selling his kidney, nutty mom, and suicide by ocean. What more could you want?

It's Tuesday!

2007-04-03T08:49:00.000-07:00

This week has been pretty busy with school and stuff. My Chinese roomy had been trying to get me to go with a couple of her friends to a panda reserve in Chengdu. It's a great place, but I've already been once and I'm didn't think it warrented a second trip. She'd been trying to arrange this trip for a while now. Some of her friends own a car, and so the transportation would be provided for. Besides, she told me, they're rich!

The day before the trip, she came into my room at six in the morning to tell me that plans had changed, but I was to be ready to leave by ten the following day. I woke up several hours later, the entire conversation lost to my dreams except for the words: "Be ready by ten o'clock."

I called my classmate who was going to join us and told him what I knew of the change of plans. I reiterated that he had to arrive at my house no later than ten o'clock, and the trip itself we decided to remain purposfully in the dark about.

That day my roomy, classmate and I all trudged out to the road to meet with the rich people. I knew they were rich, but I'd never guessed the extent of their wealth. In the car, the conversation between my roomy and the rich lady consisted of discussing all the new homes they had acquired and where they were moving this week. I sat in the back and pretended to sleep, but soon the conversation moved to me. They didn't say anything bad, but I couldn't keep the smile off my face. When they saw this, the rich lady yelped "what? You're not asleep!"

We finally pulled off the road and into a gravel parking lot. The mystery trip turned out to be to an ancient city called Huang Long Xi. The place was crowded with tourists and vendors were selling everything from vegetables and cotton candy to hats woven from fresh flowers and shoes. The rich folks treated us to flower hats and we wandered in.

The town itself was pretty cool. I took some pictures which I'll post as soon as I get them uploaded. The roads were just large enough for a cart to be pushed through, definitely not big enough for a car. At the entrance, there were vendors selling rickshaw rides.

After wandering for a bit, the group decided to go on a boat ride. The town overlooks a river and tourist boats float lazily past the town in a bid for more customers. Next to these slow moving tourist traps was a seperate dock where a dozen or so speed boats waited. I could see the speed boats racing up and down another bend in the river. The person in charge of steering each boat was pulling the motor in such a way as to make the boat tip to one side. Then just when the weight began to shift and it felt as though you would capsize, he would ease up or pull the motor hard in the other direction.

After sizing up our options, we decided that we had to take both boat rides. First we would float slowly up the river and appreciate the scenery, and then we would put our lives in danger with the speed boat.

The ride was nice, although being on a malaria river such as we were, I got bit by a ton of mosquitos. Clearly my regimine of Vitamin B isn't working, but that's an issue for another time.

The second boat trip was awesome! I wish I could do it justice, but I'm afraid words fail me. I love rides so this death trap-capsizing boat ride was a good thing.

Later that afternoon, we passed one of those photo stands where the victim is forced to dress in period costume. Well, as the only two foreigners in Huang Long Xi that day, the lot fell to my classmate and I. He dressed up as an emporer while I wore a purple sequin covered dress and posed by him. At first all the pictures were taken inside the studio, but then everyone insisted that we move the party outside. Once outside, we became the star tourist attraction at Huang Long Xi. People gathered around us to stare, laugh, pose, and talk to us. I commented to my classmate that we ought to start a pose-with-foreigner business to make a little more cash on the side.

It was a pretty fun day had by all. I'll be posting some pictures later when I get a chance. Most of the pictures were taken by my roommate's friend, so I'll see if I can get copies to post here.

Last night...

2007-03-25T04:56:00.000-07:00

One of the hardest things to find in Chengdu is a comfortable place to study. The school has a couple of libraries, but they are cold, dark, and have limited seating. They also lack internet access, and the English books are pretty much off limits.

My classmate Deborah and I have been lamenting this problem ever since we arrived. Studying at home is hard because it's distracting, studying at a coffee shop is too expensive, and tea houses are smoky, loud, or both.

Rumor has it that SU's new campus, located about half an hour outside of town had a brand new library complete with wireless internet access. The main campus where my classes are located has a shuttle bus that runs regularly between the two schools. After figuring out the logistics of how and when to go, Deborah and I packed up and headed out.

The new campus is large, but unlike the one where I attend classes, isn't crowded from dawn to dusk nor jam-packed with buildings. As if that wasn't remarkable enough, the library itself was stunning.

"Windows! It has windows!!!" We kept whispering loudly to each other.

"And a view! Windows with a view!"

"Wow! An elevator! A real, working elevator!"

"Lights! The lights are on and I can see!"

"Internet, it has wireless internet!"

The downside to the library was that in order to get in, you must have a library card. We had inquired about library cards earlier in the year and were told that if we wanted one, we had to put down a 2000 kuai deposit. This time however, we went to our representative at the foreign student office and asked for one. Voila! They gave us one for free.

I have yet to make use of my new found library freedom, but next week starts tomorrow and I have plenty of time.

Some Serious Health Concerns to Discuss (part 2)

2007-03-20T05:23:00.000-07:00

I made it through the winter without catching malaria, and have been living a fairly mosquito-free existence. I was having a pretty rough time with the bugs in my first few months here (read part 1 of this post here). The worst part of the problem was that I seemed to be the only one suffering. Other people would ask why I looked diseased and I could only shrug and blame it on terrors in the night. I tried everything to make the mosquitoes go away, but nothing seemed one hundred percent effective. At night I piled blankets over my head and body, placed a constantly whirring fan on the bedside table, used a mosquito plug-in, and even took vitamin B (supposedly it helps). Whether it was my ever-alert-with-the-mosquito-squisher-"Patton" attitude, or simply the onset of winter that deterred them, I'll never know. Either way, things have been great these past few months.

I've spent fruitless hours searching the stores and markets for a product suitable for killing mosquitoes. But my luck changed recently with a trip to Century Mart, a grocery store twice as nice and half as crowded as my favorite place Trust Mart. While scanning the aisles for a new plug-in, I stumbled upon a freshly stocked shelf full of Raid Mosquito Killer spray. I'd been discussing the possibility of mosquito nets with Sarah, and was trying to figure out a way to mosquito net the entire room. Now my problem was solved. I bought two more plug-ins, and a foot tall can of spray. I brought the goods home and conducted some tests. First I lied down on my bed and aimed the can at the ceiling. Did the spray reach? Not quite, but close enough. Next I sprayed a wall shot to make sure it didn't discolor the paint, and followed that by a smell test to make sure it didn't smell like something that causes cancer. Then I did the "stupid test" by spraying it over a candle to make sure the cloud of spray didn't catch fire. (Note that I sprayed it OVER and not INTO the candle, and after that was successful I read the "do not spray near flames" warning on the back.) That all happened well over a week ago, and I've been waiting for my chance to use it ever since.

Tonight I got my opportunity. I was turning on my computer to write a blog (not about this topic) when a mosquito flew into my face. I tried swatting it and missed. From prior experience I know that if I sit quietly and wait, the beast will land somewhere soon. It did. I aimed. I sprayed. I killed. I felt good.

I'm still adhering to my regimen of vitamin B, fans, blankets, and most importantly, waiting at night for them to land and then using my "Patton" DVD to kill them. However, I've been trying to eat a lot of garlic at dinner and that seems to be working too. Now with the addition of the mosquito killer spray-The Exterminator-I'm thinking about retiring "Patton" and shipping him off for a new life in Egypt with my best friend Sarah so she can use him to kill flies. The work of a great patriot is never done...

Advertisement of the week:

2007-03-16T06:40:00.000-07:00

Advertisement for the bus, seen on a bus:

"Harmonious and comprehensive wisdom and honest verily and innovatively."

It's been a while...

2007-03-16T04:54:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to blog for days but my internet service has been out. What was originally meant to be several seperate articles will now be joined into one long piece.

First the life news:

I started school on monday. All of my classes so far have been great. My main Chinese class has roughly thirty students, and it grows larger everyday. Many students in the lower class skip up, while students in the other class at the same level switch because they don't like their teacher. I'm now in class with two of my UW classmates, so I have more brains to remind me what homework assignment to do. I sit in class three hours every morning, and I love it! My only complaint is this: I am constantly distracted by one of my new classmates. If he was a young, rich, handsome, rich man it would be understandable. I can live with that kind of distraction. Unfortunately, he is none of the above. No, the guy that distracts me looks like Kim Jong Il. I know he can't help it, but if he'd get rid of the perm it would go a long way.

And the weird news:

I spent most of last week going on adventures with various Chinese people. One of my friends wanted to invite me over to have coffee. Every time I talk to this friend she wants to know if I know how to make coffee syrup like Starbucks, when I'll learn to make coffee syrup like Starbucks, and whether or not I've found a place to buy coffee syrup like Starbucks. One day last week she called and asked me to come over so we can make coffee together. We've talked about trying to make homemade syrups, so I told her I'd pick up the ingredients and bring the French press along the way.

That afternoon I set out on my bicycle for Sabrinas, the only place in town where you can buy Western goods. I was riding my bike on the right side of the road, dodging people, bikes and cars, when I noticed out of the corner of my eye a yellow Chinese mini-car flying towards me. He was trying to make a turn onto the small lane I was passing. I hate using this cliche, but when I say everything moved in slow motion, everything really moved in slow motion. The yellow car came speeding towards me. I started to turn the wheel of the bike away from the oncoming car. Suddenly, the car was a foot from my foot. I cringed waiting for the impact. The bumper (thank God it was a mini-car and not a bus!), slammed into my lower leg knocking me off the bike and onto the pavement. The car screeched to a halt and the driver started to open the door. As soon as he saw I was moving and apparently not hurt, he sat back down, waved and sped off. I stood dumfounded that neither I nor the bike were damaged. And then I stood in the middle of the road shaking and laughing like a madman. I was just hit by a car!!!

I somehow made the rest of the trip to Sabrinas, bought my groceries, and met with my friend. The plan for the day was to take a trip to IKEA, where we would pick up a coffee maker for her and then head home to make the treat. IKEA was awesome as always, and we found the coffee makers right away.

One of the greatest things about IKEA is that they sell American style hot dogs, Chinese food and ice cream. They also sell cheap coffee and licorice. I ended up with several bags of coffee (you can never have too much), and a bag of candy. My friend hated the licorice, which meant more for me!

When we arrived at my friend's apartment, she went to the kitchen and pulled out another, larger coffee maker that her husband had recently acquired. The problem is, she explained to me, they don't know how to use it. Then I had a weird China moment: teaching my friend how to use a coffee maker. I always assumed it was instinct that taught man how to make coffee, or perhaps it's just Seattle. Either way, that evening grew more interesting as I ended up showing her how to use a spray can of whip cream, and explaining that vanilla extract may smell sweet, but it doesn't taste the same way.

All I could think about that day was that I had just been hit by a car and walked away. I didn't want to tell my friend because from experience I knew she would try to baby me. The Chinese have been incredibly helpful and kind to me, but they are often too helpful. For example, today my bike chain broke and six people ran over to help me fix it. They all grabbed for a chance to hold the bike or reset the chain while I stood to the side and made like I was trying to help. Six people!!

After that day I thought my life in China couldn't get any weirder, but it soon did. That week my Chinese roommate started work again, meaning her students are back in school. From what I gather, most of them returned home during the winter break. Now that they're all back in town, they're back trying to kiss up to their teacher once again. EVERYONE has stopped by our place at least once, and everyone brought a box of some regional specialty. Most of these have been mysterious dried meat products, but some are candies or fruit. My roommate has also been home a lot, and everytime she cooks she makes some for me. It all started with the chicken feet noodles. She made a large bowl of pasta and despite my prostests, forced me to eat some. In the middle of the meal, her phone rang and she got up to go and find it. I seized my opportunity when I saw it. I quickly shoveled all the chicken feet back into the serving dish and was done arranging them so they looked "natural" just in time to see her walk back in.

The next day someone brought over several vacumme-packed ducks. The small refrigerator we have was filled with them, and everyday my roommate urged Sarah and I to eat one. I like duck, but I really don't know what to do with it. Sarah and I discussed making soup, salad, or eating it plain. We finally decided on making duck sandwiches. We waited until it was just the two of us at home, then we got to work. We chopped off the head, pulled the skin and fat away from the meat, and then made grilled duck sandwiches. They turned out surprisingly good. We've been craving Western food a lot lately. Every night after we eat, we sit around the table and discuss the foods we love and hate. Most nights we sit for an hour or so dreaming of what we will eat when we return home.

Later that week, a cold pot of chicken innards and seaweed soup appeared on the table. Although it looked awful, after much urging we promised my roommate we would eat it. When it was just Sarah and I at home, we dumped the pot, making sure to hide the solid parts deep in the garbage.

Again, my Chinese roommate brought home some weird food for me to eat. This time she was more sneaky about her intentions. "Do you like Indian food?" She asked.

"I love Indian food. It's one of my favorites."

"Oh great! There's a doggy bag on the table for you to eat."

The fried rice in the doggy bag looked like Indian food, it even smelled like Indian food. But when I tasted it I found it full of Chinese spam-like products and another unique Chinese creation called "meat floss." When it was noticed that I hadn't eaten the leftovers, I discretely took the container to my room and dumped it deep in the garbage.

It's taken nearly two weeks of covert operations to get rid of all the weird food in the house. It started with a rotting fish in the fridge and ended with "Indian" food. Hopefully everything is better now. We're all busy with school and work, so life should be back to normal. Finally.

Beijing

2007-03-06T06:04:00.000-08:00

After spending ten days in Shanghai, my classmate and I took the fast train to Beijing. Beijing was fun although I don't think it is nearly as interesting as Chengdu. Chengdu feels like China. Beijing feels like Tacoma. The Forbidden City, Great Wall, and Tiananmen Square were all cool and I'm glad I got to see them, but by far the most interesting part of the trip was the Mao Zedong Mausoleum.

Situated smack dab in the center of Tiananmen Square is the body of Mao Zedong. Okay, so it's on the first floor of a large concrete building, but it's there nonetheless.

The highlight of my vacation (I'm not sure about my mom) was the trip to the Mausoleum where we saw the body in all it's neon glowing glory. Before we could enter, the tour guides took everyone to a booth where you could buy a flower to lay at the foot of a statue of the Great Helmslmen as you entered the building. I decided my money was better spent on a booklet describing the achievements of the late great chairman, but was disappointed that it didn't have a picture of the body (we weren't allowed to take cameras in).

It's hard to describe just how weird this experience was. Everyone was herded past the body which was laying in a glass coffin. A bright neon orange light shown on Mao's face, making it look as though he had been irradiated. He was glowing. Glowing like the Las Vegas strip. His body was covered with the national flag, and the coffin was surrounded by rows and rows of fake plants. It was really bizarre! Although I've seen plenty of weird things in China, this topped the list.

Okay, I'm finally back--

2007-02-28T06:08:00.000-08:00

After a longer-than-promised break from blogging, I'm back. I'll be posting more regularly from now on. To be honest, I'm finding it harder and harder to post regularly, but I start a new semester soon and regular blogging is one of my new semester resolutions.

I've posted some pictures of Shanghai below, and the important ones are now on my webshots account (there's a link on the right hand side of this page). Shanghai is most definitely a city I could live in and be happy.

After a forty-four hour train ride, my classmate and I arrived in Shanghai just after dawn. Although we didn't know which train station we had arrived at (Shanghai has several), we took a gamble that it would be the one next to the metro line and decided the best course of action would be to find the subway hole. We lugged our stuff off the train, through several underground passageways, and into the daylight. The hostel we had booked was reported to be a five-minute walk from one of the main lines, although finding the metro station proved harder than initially thought. We wandered around for a short while, lugging our bags and searching for the elusive subway hole. Finally we stopped and asked a local-it was right in front of us. We spent the next half hour trying to figure out where to buy a ticket. It was one of those things that should have been easy, but like most things in China was hard to figure out. That seems to be the way of things here: they are always twice as complicated as they should be and take twice as long.

Anyway, we made it to the hostel in one piece and I was pleased to see that it was very, very clean. In fact, I would wager to say it was the cleanest place in China. It was spotless: no bugs, no mosquitoes, no dirty sheets, no smelly bathrooms, no overflowing garbage cans... It was like heaven in a dorm room.

I spent nearly everyday wandering around the city. I loved looking at the architecture and art deco. I wandered in and out of old buildings and new shopping centers. There's a lot to write about, but I think I'll just share some things that I wrote while there. These are excerpts of emails I sent during those ten days.

"The People's Square is ironically surrounded by shopping malls. I
wandered in a few of them, looked at the overpriced clothes and then
wandered back out again. There's a ton of Korean, Japanese and Western
food here, it's really tempting to buy it all. Even the grocery stores
carry more Western food than in Chengdu. I ate Doritos for lunch
yesterday, Oreos for breakfast today. I finally found a bottle of Diet
Coke (almost non-exhistant in Chengdu), and drank that with the Oreos.
There's a bunch of Western candy too, but in the spirit of self
discipline, I didn't buy any.

I tried to get some pictures, but it's hard to get a perspective of
the city. I ended up taking a lot of photos from pedestrian
overpasses. I'm looking for a book with good pictures so I can show
people something better than what I took."

"I saw the old Cathay Hotel (now the Peace Hotel). The interiors of
these old buildings is really amazing. Many of them have mosaic
ceilings, stained glass windows, large chandeliers...

The Cathay Hotel apparently was the place to hang out if you were rich
and shady. The original owner of the hotel used to say, "the only race
greater than the Jews is the Derby." When the communists "liberated"
Shanghai, the owners ended up giving the hotel to the state in return
for exit visas. The communist government made them pay "back taxes"
though before letting them leave."

"After the train station, I went for a walk to find Sun Yat-sen's
former residence. I ended up in the French Concession, which has a lot
of really cool old houses, and a lot of trendy boutiques.

Before going to Sun Yat-sen's place, I took a side trip to the first
meeting place of the National Congress of the CCP. Ironically enough,
it's in a neighborhood that has been renovated to be a trendy shopping
district. My guidebook says all the brick buildings had been rebuilt,
and that some of the town's best restaurants can be found inside.

The meeting hall was in one of those old brick buildings. After buying
the ticket, you are taken into a museum which houses artifacts of the
founding of the People's Republic, as well as artifacts from the
foreign aggressors. After you make the round of the museum, you're
taken to a dusty room where there sits a table with about a dozen
chairs. This, the placard tells you, is the sight of the first
National Congress. It's not much of a surprise, the museum houses wax
replicas of all the delegates sitting around a room that looks
suspiciously like the one before you.

Next I headed to Dr. Sun's place, which wasn't too far of a walk away.
The museum part of this attraction is actually housed in Dr. Sun's
neighbor's house. It's pretty nice, the artifacts are all preserved
well, and the Chinglish is minimal. Next I was shown by a guard to the
souvenir room and then on to Dr. Sun's house.

The house is preserved just as it had been when he lived there. You
aren't allowed to enter any of the rooms, but you are allowed to walk
the hallways and peek in. If you don't mind the guard following you,
it's a pretty cool experience.

After visiting the house, I decided to walk back to the People's
Square and catch the metro to a Catholic church that I saw yesterday.
The sign said they hold mass the first Friday of every month, and I
thought it might be fun. However, on the way back I saw a road sign
that said, "Second Meeting Place of the National Congress of the CCP."
I'd been to the first, I just HAD to go to the second. I followed the
road signs until I came to a park. Just off the sidewalk sat a brick
building that was nearly identical to the one that housed the first
meeting place. I tried to walk in, but was shooed away because people
actually live there.

By the time I got back to the People's Square, it was too late to go
to mass."

Besides the Las Vegas/Shanghai photos below, here's some more pictures of Shanghai:

My future office building:

Right next to my other future office building:

My future apartment building:

In my future neighborhood:

Including my future movie theatre:

And my future shopping center:

And some other random places I'm sure I'll be going back to:

In order to see Shanghai--

2007-02-18T07:14:00.000-08:00

--Go no further than Las Vegas! Let's take a look:

That one might be a coincidence, but there's more:
And more:
Even more:
Some more:

A bit more:

This is becoming a pattern:

Who copied who?

More:

Look closely:

And last:

Urgent Update:

2007-01-28T23:14:00.000-08:00

Aack! While I was out shopping, Mama organized all the cupboards in the kitchen and is now outside scrubbing the patio! I keep trying to help, but she keeps pushing me away. I've only got another hour before I head out to the train station. I've just got to make it til then...

Shanghai or bust!!!

2007-01-28T21:16:00.000-08:00

I survived finals, went on a few last minute Chinese adventures, ate, packed, and am finally ready to go. I'll be leaving this afternoon for Shanghai, my classmate and I will be spending the next two nights on the train. I won't be back in Chengdu until the middle of February, so I probably won't be updating the blog until then.

There's actually quite a lot that I want to write about, it seems as though my Chinese adventures never end. It's what makes life here both interesting and fun--well, that and the food. But because I still have a few errands to do before heading out to the train station, I'll keep this post short and to the point.

I've been waiting a long time for winter break to come. Don't get me wrong, I really like taking Chinese classes and am excited about starting next quarter. What makes this winter break so great is that my mom is coming to see me.

All of my American classmates have family coming at some time or other during the year. We often talk of where we are going to house them, take them, and feed them. It's one of those things that we've all been waiting for since the day we touched down. I'll be spending almost two weeks traveling in and around Shanghai, then I'll catch another train to Beijing where my classmate and I will split and go in our own directions. My classmate has a friend coming, so while she goes off to meet her, I'll be heading to the airport to pick up my mom. I can't wait. I absolutely can't wait.

Everyone in my house is leaving for break. My classmate Sarah has several trips planned, my Chinese roommate is returning home. I arrived home late last night intent on finishing my packing and cleaning house. We've all been busy lately, and with packing and planning have let the house fall apart. There were clothes strung out on the couch, the clothes line was packed, the dishes were dirty, the floor hadn't been cleaned in a long time, and the bathroom was a mess. I walked in the door, and was depositing my stuff on the bed when I heard the doorbell ring. I entered the living room to see who it was when I heard a key turning in the lock and a second later, the door swung open. I looked at the caller, a woman I didn't recognized. She smiled at me and introduced herself as my Chinese roommate's mom. She wanted to know where her daugher was. I told her she had left town the day before, and I didn't know when she would return. Mama, as she calls herself, sat down on one of the couches and spent the next hour on the phone trying to reach her daughter. I offered her some tea, and then tried to discretely clean the house. A couple of hours later, my roommate arrived and everyone settled in for the evening.

I woke up this morning to the sound of glass breaking. Praying it wasn't my coffee pot, I stumbled out of bed and wandered into the kitchen. Mama was in the middle of cleaning up the remains of some unlucky bowl. Her back was turned to me and I snuck back into the bedroom and put on some decent clothes.

After showering and getting ready, I stumbled back into the kitchen to see that Mama had already spread out some food on the counter and was preparing to cook what looked like quite the feast. She turned to me and asked, "Can I cook for you?" She didn't ask if I had eaten, was I hungry, or anything like that. It was just, "can I cook for you?" She doesn't speak standard Mandarin, so the fact that I actually understood that sentence is a miracle in itself. I fumbled a minute at her question, I didn't really need her to cook for me. I was perfectly fine eating a piece of fruit. She saw the look on my face, and then began to insist that she be allowed to cook me a meal. I finally agreed, and with that settled, started cleaning the house.

She cooked her feast all morning, and everytime she caught me cleaning something, would argue that I let Mama do it. She tried to take the broom away from me when I wasn't looking, blocked me when I tried to take out the garbage, and argued with me when it came time to mop. I was touched--in a very embarrassing kind of way.

The food she made was wonderful. She had hand-made some sausages that were delicious, fed me pig ear, and several vegetable dishes. When the meal was done, she insisted that I pack some up and take it for dinner on the train. She had earlier wanted me to invite a friend to lunch; after refusing that request, I felt obligated to take at least some of the meat. I think I'm going to try and secretly feed the pig ear to my classmate on the train. I'll update you later if it works.

I've been sitting here typing emails for a little over an hour now. Meanwhile, mama is outside scrubbing the patio. I feel really awkward watching her work, but I just don't know what to do. I've encountered situations like this before, and I'm beginning to chalk up my discomfort to mutual misunderstanding.

I once went to dinner at a friend's house. The host spent the entire meal cooking and cleaning, while the rest of us sat around the table and talked. Every once in a while, my Chinese roommate hires a women to come and do some deep cleaning. When she comes, it's all I can do to stay in the house. It's sooooo uncomfortable. I once went for a walk with a Chinese friend, when she noticed that the bottom of my pant leg was getting wet, she leaned down and started rolling them up for me. I heard one Westerner say that the thing that irritated him most about his Chinese employees is that they were always trying to do things for him such as clean his office, get him tea, etc. I think it's just a cultural difference. Westerners want to make everyone feel equal. Having someone do something for me that I could easily do myself makes me really uncomfortable.

Anyway, I'll be updating you all at the middle of next month. Until then, it's Shanghai or bust!

Finals are done!

2007-01-25T07:12:00.000-08:00

I just love to read the important headlines.

Mood?

2007-01-25T06:28:00.000-08:00

Every once in a while I get an email survey asking me everything from what my favorite ice cream flavor is to the color of my panties. They usually have the mood question too. What mood are you in?

Mood: Road rage.
That's a mood? It is when I'm on the road.

Hey you! You with your finger on the motorbike horn! Do you really think I can distinguish your horn from the other fifty motorbike horns? Can you distinguish yours?

Mood: Road rage.
It was today's mood, yesterday's mood, the day before that...

Hey you! You running the red light to make that left turn! Do you really want to clean me off your windshield? I guarantee it won't be pretty.

Mood: Road rage.
Last week's mood, Christmas' mood, Thanksgiving's mood...

Hey you! Bus driver! I nearly face planted into the side of your bus! Would you mind using the road and not the bike lane next time?!

Mood: Serious road rage.
2007's mood, 2006's mood...

Hey you! Driver! When your bumper passes within a millimeter of my ankle, I start to worry about my future as a ballet dancer. Please leave a little space next time.

Mood: Still road ragin'.
November's mood, October's mood, September's mood...

Hey you! Bus! When I can feel the heat from your engine on my backside, that means you are too close! Stop tailgating!!!

Mood: Road rage.

(That picture above is an actual picture of an intersection in China. I was in an intersection like this once. Everything stopped for about twenty minutes so the drivers could get out and yell at each other. Absolutely the most amazing thing I've ever seen.)

Finals

2007-01-20T05:01:00.000-08:00

I have finals this week, six of them all together. It's insane, my main class has had no exams the entire semester except for the midterm. I've learned a lot, but all of us feel that we surpassed the book about half way through, and the teacher has been dragging the remaining lessons out much longer than they should be. Finally on Thursday, we were given a pop quiz instead of class. The pop quiz covered some sayings that were mentioned several months ago. They seemed incidental at the time. Most people left the test pretty angry. There were eight sayings that we were suppossed to remember, I think most of us only got two or three correct. The other five I guessed the meaning, or made one up myself. Needless to say, it wasn't a pretty picture.

Nobody knows what is on the final exam. We were only told that we needed to study everything, including the chapters we didn't cover in class. I sat down at my desk at one o'clock this afternoon. I didn't leave until about five-thirty when I couldn't stand sitting any longer. I went for a walk, made dinner, and then resumed studying. I've been at it again for about an hour, and then set my book down to do this. I think I'll put another hour in before going to bed.

I'm nervous about this test. I'm a good student, and tests aren't usually a problem. But I also didn't know what to prepare for the midterm, and scored lower than I would have liked. I wasn't the only one, but it made me want to study harder for these exams coming up.

Ever since the midterm, I've studied less too. In the beginning, the class was moving at a good pace, but since the midterm things have slowed down signifigantly. Now, the lessons drag by and the homework assignments are few. I haven't let everything slide, I was focusing more on my other classes, and have shown improvement.

I guess that's enough complaining for now. I'll let you all know how I do. Until then here's some reading material:

Today's China news

It's Monday!

2007-01-15T06:20:00.000-08:00

Sarah and I often discuss our purchases with each other, and we inevetibly end up rating them from best to worst. My best three purchases in China are: quilted pajamas, a french press coffee maker (for travel of course!), and a North Korean tour company coffee mug. I bought a jacket several days ago that almost falls into the top three, except that the jacket will only be used for a few months, while the coffee cup can be used forever. As for the quilted pajamas, I saw some on sale the other day and may just return to pick up another pair.

Last week I made arrangements with a friend to go and buy a marshmallow coat. These kinds of coats are big here, and people wear them everywhere. They come in every color and in every length. They come with fur, plaid, sparkles, or a combination of the above. In between the time we had talked and the time we were to go shopping, I bought a coat at Carrefour. It's large enough for the sleaves to come to my wrist, it's thick and it's not marshmallow. When my friend called to confirm a time and date, I told her I had already bought a coat, but would still be up for some shopping.

On Saturday we met at the appointed shopping mall, and she took me inside to the all-marshmallow coat store. We searched the floor, looking for that perfect coat. I would point one out that I liked, then she would shake her head and point at another one that had sparkles and fur and plaid and ruffles and a phrase in Chinglish on it. After searching the entire floor for a suitable coat, it was becoming clear our tastes our WAY different. I mentioned again that I had already bought a coat, I'd be fine if we didn't get one. I kept getting the feeling that it was buy one now, or we're not leaving. I don't know why she kept insisting on it, but in the end she won. I bought a marshmallow coat. It's not as bad as the others, it doesn't stretch to my ankles or anything. In fact, it's the one that my friend hated the most, meaning it was the most like something I'd wear in the States. I can't believe it, I was peer pressured into buying an ugly coat.

Needless to say, the marshmallow coat is in the top three worst purchases.

Pictures:

2007-01-15T05:54:00.000-08:00

Here's a few more pictures of our Christmas adventure. My camera was finally fixed yesterday, so you'll be seeing more of my pictures in the future. These pictures come courtesy of Sarah.

This photo was taken from the top of Xilingxue Mountain, on a gondola of death.
This photo is of the mountain resort where we stayed over the weekend before Christmas.
The very sad, lamer-than-the-bunny-hill ski run at Xilingxue Mountain.
This picture was taken about half way through our mountain hike.
This is the view from the top of the mountain we hiked.

Does anyone know what this is?

2007-01-11T07:00:00.000-08:00

Due to my quick thinking (run away!), this didn't kill me. Does anybody know what it is?

I'm (almost) Famous!

2007-01-11T06:36:00.000-08:00

Hey, guess what?! Your favorite blogger was in the newspaper! It's really not all that exciting, it's just a small blurb about the sign language class I've been taking. In it there's some quotes from me that I don't think I really said, and a picture. The picture isn't of me, but I've got a copy of the article.

I found out I was in the newspaper when a couple of SU students tracked me down to see if I would volunteer to teach a song in ASL. They told me a friend of theirs read about me in the newspaper, and then contacted the person in charge of the sign language classes to find out who I was. I really have no idea who the reporter is, it could have been any one of my classmates. They never identified themselves to me, so I'm still completely in the dark. Oh well, it's cool to see my name in the paper.

Here's an interesting article. We all knew those Canadians were up to no good...

Weird Days:

2007-01-11T05:57:00.001-08:00

I went out with some friends recently for a three hour scenic walk, followed by lunch. After eating, we crossed the street to a teahouse where we decided to rest for a while before making the three hour hike back to where our bikes were. The server was a young chick, dressed in acid washed jeans, a sparkly tank top, and she sported a mullet. A real mullet.

With a glass of tea in hand, we settled into our chairs to relax. A few people fell asleep while others watched the television in the corner. An hour later, the server came back to the private room we were in to prepare the bill. A few words were exchanged between her and my friends, and I got the impression everything was fine. We each paid the woman five kuai owed, and were on our way. As we reached the door of the teahouse however, the woman who owned the place immediately started yelling that we hadn't paid our bill in full. She appeared out of nowhere, and immedietly pushed her way to the door in order to block our escape. She started screaming at one of my new friends, telling her that we had to pay the money or we wouldn't be allowed to leave. This woman was crazy, absolutely nuts. She was screaming and gesticulating wildly, making the problem clear to everyone in the room. I was totally embarrassed.

I thought the amount owed was only five kuai. I reached into my pocket, pulled out the right amount and handed it to the lady.

She glared at me, "This isn't enough. You still owe fifteen kuai." At this point, she positioned herself between us and the door, sticking her arms out to the side to make her intention clear. My new friend argued with her several more minutes before the rest of the group who were outside got curious and came to see what was holding us up. Soon, the entire group was involved in the shouting match until finally a man from the corner of the teahouse approached the door and offered to pay the bill for us. I know I said this before, but I was totally embarrassed.

Somehow we made it out of their unscathed, though I doubt any of us will be going back.

And China's fifth great invention is:

2007-01-06T07:22:00.000-08:00

Quilted pajamas.

Christmas and all that stuff:

2007-01-03T06:34:00.000-08:00

Ah, Christmas- a time to spend with family, eating and drinking while preparing for a night of presents and laughter. I thought going through the holiday would make me homesick, and was mildly surprised that it didn't. Somehow being placed in an environment completly foreign from your own has a way of making you feel as though the holidays don't matter so much. Christmas is celebrated in Chengdu, but it's different. Very different.

My Christmas started the Thursday before. That afternoon I recieved a phone call from my Chinese roommate informing me that I had an already scheduled appointment with her that evening. This was news to me, but the plan included eating, so I was in. Later that evening, we were taken to her friend's place where we were treated to a special Christmas dinner and presents. The appointment phone call had initially annoyed me: I hadn't been clued in to that evening's plans until the last minute. Being so well treated by complete strangers changed my thinking on the matter. From what I gathered, they didn't ordinally celebrate Christmas, but because they knew we did they made dinner and bought us gifts.

The following day I packed up enough clothes for the weekend, shoved the bottles of margarita mix and tequila into the bottom of my new TrustMart bag and left with a few classmates for the mountains. We were first taken by private car to a hotel located about an hour outside the city. The hotel was quite literally in the middle of nowhere, the only draw being that it was located next to hot springs.

We sat in the hot springs for a little over an hour. The heat felt great after spending the last few weeks freezing in my house. Our hot water has been next to zilch lately, so I tried to soak up as much warmth as I could. It was great.

After drying off we drove further, our destination being some cabins in the mountains. We pulled onto a one lane road that was situated precariously on the edge of a ravine. The driver drove like mad while we all hung on for dear life. Fortunately, the drive was short and we all made it in one piece.

When we arrived, the owners of the cabins came out to greet us. It was then that we realized the place was closed for the winter, but they had opened especially for us. Dinner was served in the restauarant part of the resort, everything was wonderful as always.

That evening, we retreated to a main room where there was a fireplace and Christmas karaoke. The entire complex had been decorated for Christmas, and Sarah had made a box full of Christmas cookies. I spent most of the evening trying to avoid the karaoke microphone and eating cookies. Sarah told me she had made well over one hundred, I'm sure I ate at least the first hundred.

The next day we decided to take a hike up one of the mountains. The retreat was situated far from any development, the only signs of life being a few peasant homes nearby. There was a trail up one of the mountains that led to a Temple.

The trail was incredibly steep, although it wasn't hard enough to be unpleasant. We walked up a jagged stairway for a couple of hours before finally arriving at the top. Along the way we got lost once, found a really deep hole to throw rocks in, and found the biggest bee in China to take pictures of. I don't know what this type of bug (shall I say, beast?) was, but I do know that one of them once dive-bombed me while I was trying to buy a bootleg DVD. I'm totally-totally-totally-completelyfreakedoutI'mgoingtodieandnobody'sgoingtoknow-scared of bees. My classmates, being much more smart and science-ier than me, just had to stop and take pictures. Just the sight of the bee was making important organs such as my brain shut down, so I opted to continue up the hill. I'll be posting pictures of godzilla's offspring as soon as I get them. Later that afternoon we decided to head out to see one of the tourist sites nearby. It was described to me as a "some old rich guy's house." We arrived, checked the entrance fee (way too expensive), and opted to hang out in the parking lot for a while, checking out the vendor's goods. In the far corner of the lot sat a group of old men in front of their honeybee nests. Nearby sat several jars of honey, just waiting for a brave tourist to enter the danger zone and buy one. I was not that tourist. We didn't actually go in the rich old guy's mansion, but we still had fun. We ate pinapple-on-a-stick, discovered some mint candy, found the back door and tried to sneak into the mansion, and wandered around. It was fun.

That evening we sat around the fire, telling stories of ghosts and drinking warm margaritas. When the margaritas were finished, we bought several bottles of wine and finished those off too.

After breakfast the next day, we packed up our stuff and left for a mountain ski resort called xilingxue shan. The "xue" part of that word means snow, but there was little to be found. As we pulled up to the park entrance, we asked the man selling tickets if we would find snow at the top of the mountain. If we rode the gondolla to the top, he assured us, we would find snow. I'm a heights person, I love being in tall skyscrapers and admiring the view from someone's top-floor apartment. But even with that mindset, the Chinese gondolla was still a scary ride.
The top of the mountain was cluttered with all sorts of odd tourist activities. There was paintball (we think- check out the picture below), an ice Great Wall, a hot air balloon, and what looked like a Chinese version of a luge slide. The actual ski run was lamer than the bunny hill, with maybe three inches of compacted snow making it just possible to slide down the hill rather than ski. Nevertheless, the Chinese tourists were decked out for a full blown ski trip and seemed to be enjoying themselves. I'm not sure if you can see what the English caption says at the bottom of this picture. It reads: "We provide arms and ammunition as well as targets. You can experience the excitement of killing!"

After surveying all that the "resort" had to offer, we opted to spend 30kuai for a ride on the luge. The fee included a ride further up the mountain in another, even scarier looking gondola. As the gondola rounded the last stretch of track, the operator pulled open the door for us to get in. As he did so, we all looked on in horror as the door literally came off in his hands and fell to the cement floor. Completely unfazed by this, the operator signaled for us to wait pulled open the door of the next car, shouting for us to get in.
The ride to the top was uneventful, and we got off the car unhurt. I've never been on a luge before, but I think on a luge the rider usually lays on a sled. We however, sat on a go-cart type of car, complete with hand brake that worked about as well as the brakes on my bike. I watched from the top as Sarah took the plunge, then I sat on the car and gave myself a good push. The slide started out rather slow, but as it continued, the car started going faster and faster. Soon I was having to use the handbrake to keep from flying over the sides of the track on the curves. As I rounded one curve, I came face to face with a HUGE rat. I'm not normally scared of rats, but this one had me freaked out. I screamed, pulling my handbrake as far as it would go. The rat ran out of the way, and I was left sitting on the track.

We ate lunch at one of the degected looking hotels The place was nearly empty, but it was the only one that looked as though the construction was completed.

That evening we drove back to Chengdu. Discussing with friends beforehand, I discovered a new holiday tradition: bat bashing. On Christmas eve everyone gathers around the fire and-- wait, that's America. In Chengdu, the people gather in downtown with inflatable bats and hit each other. No kidding.

The gathering place for Christmas eve festivities is a street named Chunxilu. It's the main shopping centers in Chengdu, much like Westlake in downtown Seattle. My friends had told me of this tradition, and then in all ernestness warned me not to go. How could I not, when they had just filled me in on all the details? The bat bashing in Chunxilu has become so violent and out of control the past couple of years, that rumour was the police were going to try and put a stop to it.

We arrived Chunxilu just in time to see the police forming lines and pushing people out of the shopping area. This left only one place for them to go: the streets. Instead of one mega-crowd engaged in bat bashing, this left gangs of roaming teenage boys ready to take out their energy on passing foreigners. For the most part, people without bats were left out of the brawls, but when one of my classmates bought one, it was all we could do to walk a block without getting attacked. Eventually the police caught on to what was happening, and began confiscating or popping bats. On each corner sat a pile of deflated Christmas cheer.

In comparison to the weekend, Christmas day was pretty mild. We made omelets, and then watched movies until we couldn't put off the homework any longer. We were supposed to be in class that day, but from what I hear, my teacher showed up to an empty room. Oh well.

Sorry for taking so long to update. Things have been busy as usual, and I've been having a hard time staying connected to the internet. I hope you all enjoyed the holidays!

An Apology:

2007-01-03T06:26:00.000-08:00

If you've been waiting on the edge of your seat for a new posting, wait no longer! Your not-so-faithful blogger has returned from holiday haitus. The break in blogging wasn't completely my fault, apparently an earthquake in Taiwan severed some underwater fiberoptic cables and disrupted internet for everyone in mainland China. Things seem to be back now, although my internet connection is a bit slower than normal, and the Great Firewall appears to be working at full strength. Anyway, if you've been waiting for me, I apologize.

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-25T22:58:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. 圣诞节快乐！新年快乐！

IKEA

2006-12-21T01:31:00.000-08:00

This week has been great. It's been cold lately, and with that everything seems to have slowed down a bit. I'll be heading out this weekend to spend some time in the mountains. Along the way, we'll be stopping and soaking in some hot springs. It should be really fun. I'll let you all know how it goes after we get back.

And on to this week's news:

-I finally broke down and bought a pair of quilted pajamas. It's just too cold in my house to not own a pair. For those of you who have never had the pleasure of seeing what these look like, they are made out of the same fabric that the comforter on your bed is. They are thick and stiff, and fit well over any article of clothing. They're ugly but warm. In a nutshell, they're perfect. We don't have heat, so we spend most of our time at home in bed on top of the heating pad. The cold usually makes my nose run, and I can see my breath in the house. The showers are especially brutal: the hot water is no where near hot enough, and the pressure is next to nothing. The open window doesn't help things either.

-I bought some margarita mix and "Pepe Lopez" tequila. I think it'll go good this weekend when I'm sitting in the hot springs. We probably won't have ice, but I hear there's already snow, so we'll be having "snow-garitas."

-Christmas planning is moving slowly. My roommate and I are talking of hosting a Christmas brunch. What we'll make depends on what we can find. I want to make french toast, but finding anything thicker than wonderbread is proving difficult. We may end up just having eggs and sausage. Maybe a sno-garita on the side.

-Got my hair cut at this place: It was the only place I've ever been that was literally a hole in the wall. You can see it there behind me in blue. The next photo is me walking up the stairs and through the "door."
I brought with me a couple of pictures to show the woman, but I was still nervous. Sarah and I were ushered into the salon where we were seperated for the hair washing. I was brought back to a dimly lit room where I was asked to lay down on a specially designed hair-washing seat. It was great! I was comfortable and warm, and the woman washed my hair for a good twenty minutes.

I sat down in the chair next to Sarah, and tried to calm my nerves. Here's the after picture, I think she did a good job. Let me know what you all think.By far the highlight of my week was a trip to the newly opened IKEA. Several weeks ago, I heard from one of my classmates that the new IKEA had just opened. Someone had a brochure that had pictures of the IKEA cafeteria, and it looked like they served real hot dogs. When we saw that, we had to go if only for the food.
Several of my classmates took a preliminary trip to see what all they offered, and whether or not we could afford it. They found out that IKEA has a courtesy bus roaming the city everyday. We made our way to one of the purported stops and waited. Twenty minutes later the IKEA bus pulled up and we piled on.

The ride was short; IKEA is located just outside of the city center in the middle of some fields. Next to the monolith furniture store stands the Chinese equivelent: a large open-air market. One side of the parking lot was crowded with butchers, people pulling carts of fruit, tables spread with spices, and fruit salesman. The other side was full of Chengdu's young and hip, on their way to a day at IKEA.

The store was full, absolutely packed with people. We made a bee-line for the cafeteria on the second floor, and after ordering some Americanized Chinese food sat down to enjoy our surroundings. The food and furniture was cheap, everything had been knocked down to prices that are affordable to middle/upper middle class Chinese. This meant that we would be going away with a full load. You don't know what you don't need until you go to IKEA. I ended up with a blanket, a french press coffee maker, a picture frame, and some scented candles. I also ate a hot dog, an ice cream cone, some Americanized Chinese food, and a cup of coffee. It was all wonderful, and in the midst of my eating binge I discovered that IKEA sells some of the cheapest bagged coffee in Chengdu. I'll be back soon!

Take 6!

2006-12-19T22:30:00.001-08:00

Video: Take 5!

2006-12-19T22:24:00.000-08:00

I've finally succeeded in uploading a video to the blog. In order to put the complete clip online I had to cut it in two. The first half of the video you will find just below this post. The second half just above. It may take a couple of minutes to load fully, so be patient. The second clip is funnier than the first, but they're both worth watching. If you watch carefully, you'll hear our fellow commuters shouting "Hello! Hello!", you'll see me come dangerously close to a couple of cars, while Sarah passes a bus on the right. Honestly, the day we filmed this was pretty mild, but don't think that means there is no excitement!

Let's try this again--

2006-12-19T22:23:00.001-08:00

Video!!

2006-12-16T02:02:00.000-08:00

Here's a short video clip for you all. It's about 15 minutes long, and although the first couple of minutes are rough, it's worth sticking around until the end. The video was taken while riding to and from school. I was going to edit it, but decided that it is best in its raw form. If you watch closely you'll hear our fellow commuters shouting hello, and you'll see the sweeper ladies I've talked about. There's a couple of near-death experiences towards the end, so be sure not to miss those. Enjoy!

A very short research update:

2006-12-15T03:56:00.000-08:00

Sign language class is officially over for the year, and won't be starting up again until March. Being with my favorite Chengdu-ers in my favorite class in Chengdu has been fun, and I'll miss going. All is not doom and gloom however, I was assured that there would be deaf community events and activities that I would be invited to, so for now I'm just waiting for my phone to ring with a new text message.

Sign language class has been really fun. I'm learning it much faster than most of my fellow classmates, and I really love hanging out with the teacher and deaf students I sit with. They've been patient with my questions, and are always willing to teach me new signs. I've even talked to most of them about my research intentions, and asked if I could conduct interviews. All of them gave me an enthusiastic go-ahead, so I'm tentatively planning for the end of January and again at the beginning of March. I'm not fluent enough in CSL to conduct interviews in the language, I'll be getting my interview questions translated into Chinese.

I've also started a paper based on some of what I've learned at class. Although it's research based, it's not as long or detailed as my final research project will be (I hope!). I'll post it when I'm done, although it may not interest most of you.

I also had the opportunity to visit a school for deaf children in Chengdu. I won't be using anything from my visit in my research, but it was a fun experience and I was glad I had the chance to go. I was accompanied by someone in the International Office at SU. I was worried that she wouldn't find it interesting, but to my surprise she seemed more interested than I was. It turns out her graduate work was in education, so the visit wasn't something completely foreign to her.

That's all for now. Stay tuned for the next installment of "Research Updates."

And again-

2006-12-12T05:10:00.000-08:00

So you go to your favorite store again, the one that requires the precious discount card which you now hold in your wallet. After picking up your groceries, you head to one of the checkout lines confident that today's transaction will go smoothly. Picking the shortest line, you watch as the cashier asks the customer in front of you if she has a card. The customer replies no, and the cashier lifts her eyes in your direction. Upon seeing you, she turns and begins scanning the other lines (foreigners don't carry discount cards) for a customer willing to give up their card for a moment. You shuffle your basket on the counter, drawing the cashier's attention. You then pull out your discount card and hand it to her.

It's the little things, really.

More photos:

2006-12-08T18:28:00.000-08:00

Here's some pictures from last week's photo opp at sign language class. The woman in the red coat is my teacher, the others are deaf students who are there learning as well. We all sit together in the back of the classroom and practice our skills with those who are fluent instead of paying attention like we should. It's pretty fun.

As if there weren't enough things to worry about--

2006-12-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

They start messing with the food too.

More about driving-

2006-12-07T05:54:00.000-08:00

Good Ol' Wikipedia with an article on how to drive in China. Always a funny read.
http://wikitravel.org/en/Driving_in_China

This is one of the funniest things I've read in a long time. Highly recommended.
http://www.bookofjoe.com/2006/11/driving_in_chin.html

Also, I just wanted to alert you all to a new link on the right hand side of the page. I've linked to SCOTUS blog, an interesting read if you have time to kill.

A Good Read:

2006-12-07T05:35:00.000-08:00

This article was emailed to me earlier this week. Although it gives a decent explanation of the roads in China, there is really so much more. I've pasted the article below. It was taken from the Irish Times, authored by Fintan O'Toole (You just can't help but love a guy named Fintan) You can click this post's title for the link.

Motoring Madness Puts Spoke in China's Wheel

Letter from Beijing: For the benefit of intending travellers, here are some Chinese rules of the road:

1. Driving is like making cloth or baskets - the skill is in the weaving. If there is more room on the far side of a three-lane highway, your duty is to get into it as fast as possible. Lanes are for bowling alleys.

2. Sound waves are a powerful form of energy. If you blow your horn loudly and continuously, obstacles in your way will disappear, clearing the road ahead.

3. Seatbelts restrict the flow of blood to the brain and may be dangerous. Drivers may buckle up if they are approaching a police checkpoint, but the belt should be removed as soon as the checkpoint is passed. Passengers should on no account wear seatbelts, as attempts to find the buckles which have been carefully stored under the seat covers may distract the driver from an important mobile phone conversation.

4. When approaching a junction with a major road, enter the flow of traffic immediately and decisively. The drivers on the main road will be well aware of your presence, even at night, and stopping to wait for a gap may be interpreted as an insult to their sixth sense.

5. Remember that Kung Fu movies such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon are entirely realistic. Chinese people can sense at all times what is happening behind them, even without looking. They also have lightening-fast reflexes, so any momentary danger will inevitably be averted.

6. Overtaking is a spiritual quest, a homage to the gods of time, who do not like to see their precious gift wasted. The less time wasted and the more dangerous the manoeuvre (for example, overtaking on a hairpin bend on a mountain road with a ravine 5,000ft below) the greater the devotion demonstrated. You will get your reward in the next life, a destination which you may also reach sooner than everyone else.

7. Even the narrowest road has two sides - it is wasteful not to use both.

8. If you find yourself facing a head-on collision with another vehicle, it is vital to assume that the other driver will blink first and take the necessary evasive action. If everyone abides by this principle, then there can be no confusion. All drivers will understand their proper responses in this situation and there can be no danger of an accident.

I offer these rules as a cut-out-and-keep guide for anyone intending to travel to China, because, oddly, they are not published by the road safety authorities and can be learned only by observation. This might suggest that they are not rules at all, but they are universally observed in every part of China I've been to so far, and are presumably so well understood that they do not need to be made explicit.

So deeply entrenched are these rules, indeed, that they turn on their heads western perceptions of what is and is not good driving. In the West, for example, someone who swings out into the middle of the road while approaching a blind blend is a maniac who has no right to be on the road. In China, such a person is genuinely a good driver. If you assume that when you turn the corner, there may be cars bearing down on you (because they are overtaking on the other side of the bend), then it makes perfect sense to stay in the middle so that you have room, if necessary, to swerve to either side.

This kind of skill may explain one of two astonishing aspects of Chinese driving: the relatively low rate of accidents. It is not that the carnage on the roads in China is not appalling, even by Irish standards. It is. In China, injuries from road traffic accidents are the leading cause of death for people aged between 15 and 45. Every day, about 600 people are killed and 45,000 injured on the roads. But if you travel in buses and taxis for a while, these figures come to seem remarkably low.

I can hardly believe that I've seen only one bad crash in the last two months. (Though having my eyes closed most of the time may have had something to do with it.) The other amazing thing is the relative absence of road rage. In most other societies, driving would come to a halt because the roads would be filled with the bodies of drivers who had shot each other, or with the burnt-out wrecks of vehicles whose owners had spontaneously combusted. But I've only seen one episode of serious cursing, when a parked car suddenly and without any signal pulled out right in front of a taxi I was in, missing it by a centimetre. The taxi driver turned the air blue and the guilty party gave a sheepish smile and an apologetic wave, as if he had accidentally brushed up against an old lady's elbow.

When only the most egregious offences raise any objections, it seems clear that all the other offences are regarded as normality.
This all means that there's no point in asking Chinese people to explain the awful driving, since they don't regard it as awful at all. On long drives, when I've got tired of taking the holy name in vain, I try to calm myself by thinking up explanations. The most obvious is that mass driving is a new thing here and that China has gone from the ubiquitous bicycle to 130 million motor vehicles in the blink of an eye. But such an explanation would equally apply if Chinese drivers were slow and cautious.

I do think bicycles have something to do with it, though. Most drivers learned their road sense in the bicycle era, when weaving around obstacles made sense and the risks from a crash were small. Another, related, reason may be that the car is still a symbol of personal freedom, an escape from a communal rule-bound world into a private space where you can follow your own instincts. Or maybe it's just the peculiarly Chinese combination of fatalism ("If I'm going to die, there's nothing I can do about it") and optimism ("Sure haven't I survived worse?") that comes from a hard history.

This article tells it like it is. I especially liked his point about the seatbelts. I was in the front seat of a taxi once, reaching over to put on my seatbelt when the driver reached across and told me there was no need.

Another Day in Trustmart--

2006-12-06T05:42:00.000-08:00

So you go to your favorite store again, the one that still won't give you the discount card everyone else has. You're a regular customer, and the treatment you receive at the cashier has you doubting whether or not you'll come back. Each time you ask for the discount card, the cashier either borrows one from another customer for you, or tells you that you really don't need one.

Today's visit is going fairly well, the store isn't as full as it usually is, and the megaphones are blissfully quiet. After gathering your things, you make your way over to find a checkout line. Picking the shortest one, you lay your basket on the counter and wait for the inevitable question regarding the discount card. Do you have one? Nope. Just as you are about to ask where to get one, a petite woman appears and offers to help. She speaks English, and upon finding out you don't have the card, proceeds to poll everyone in line for one. You thank her for finding a willing customer, and then explain to her that you would like to obtain the card for yourself. Your new friend soon understands the problem, and agrees to take you to get the card. This is turning out to be a good day after all.

You pay for your goods and follow your new friend out the door and around the corner to a teller window built into the side of the building. In true Chinese fashion, you cut to the front of the crowd and watch as your friend issues a list of demands to the woman behind the glass window. The woman looks you over, and reluctantly agrees to give you an application form.

You and your new friend step aside and start filling out the form. Name? Check. Gender? Check. 身份证? Nope.

"What? You don't have a 身份证, the national ID card?" Your friend asks.

"Well, I'm not Chinese. Will my student ID work?"

"No."

"Oh. Well all I have is two student ID cards and a driver's license from the States. Won't anything else do?" Your friend turns back to the window and argues with the woman for several more minutes. Finally she announces that your passport will work as a suitable form of identification. Do you have it with you? You answer honestly that no, you don't have it with you. Your friend's look of disappointment at that response is almost more than you can bear. You look at her again, and make an offer hoping it'll work.

"I don't have my passport with me, but I know the number..." A few more tense negotiations later, the woman agrees to let you write down your passport number. Seizing the opportunity, you snatch the application from your friend's hands and proceed to start the acting bit of this little show.

"Hmm, what is my passport number again? Oh yeah... DVELL14766598-023. I think that's it. Yeah, that's it." In reality, you have no idea what this number is. You pass the application back as your friend orders you to get your student ID out again. The ID card is in a flip case that fits neatly inside your wallet. As you pull it out, it flips open to reveal the first page and these words: "Passport number" followed by your non-fraudulent passport number. You start to worry that perhaps this little charade won't be so successful after all. Will this woman compare the actual passport number to the one you put down on the application form? Does it really matter?

The woman takes the closed ID card and sets it on the desk beside her. "Could you repeat that number?" She asks you, "I can't read it."

"Uh... Er... Um..., it's DEV787-- Can you hand that to me? I'll just write it down for you." She passes the application form back to you and you finish scrawling in the numbers.

"And your phone number?" This time you give her a real number, but as you watch, she writes it down wrong. Oh well, one fake number for another. After ten minutes of inputting your falsified information, you hold in your hand a brand new discount card, and it feels like gold.

Days Without SARS, Birdflu or Falling in the Squatty Potty...

2006-12-03T06:34:00.001-08:00

103

Personal Space

2006-12-02T07:47:00.002-08:00

In a country with a population of over a billion people, crowding and invasion of personal space are just facts of life. There are people everywhere, every time of the day.

Most of us Americans are not what is described as "touchy-feely" types. We don't hug often, only shake hands when necessary, and never, I mean NEVER hold hands. I've found many Chinese people are completely comfortable with the holding of hands. People I don't know often grab my hand as a sign of friendship. Others I barely know reach out and hug me as a greeting. I'm not offended by it and I'm not bothered by it; it's just a cultural difference. Most of the time when I encounter a "touchy-feely" moment, I'm just startled. Take for example my sign language class. I often sit in the back of the class and chat with a group of deaf and hard of hearing people. In this situation it's very common for someone to lean across me and place a hand on my thigh. They'll even leave it there after returning to their seats. I can live with this. I'm not offended by this.

Next week the sign language class will be taking their final test, and then the Saturday afternoon class will be finished. As with nearly everything else in China, this requires a photo or twenty. I was pulled from one side embrace to another, trying to keep up my smile. I was finally put into a pose with the teacher. We stood next to each other, arms down at our sides. Suddenly I felt her swat my back side. I could deal with this. I'm not offended by this.

I smiled at the teacher and turned to go back to my seat when I was grabbed by the arm.

"Just one more, please." A Chinese student stood in front of us poised with camera in hand. Reluctantly we all assembled into a line again. This time I stood next to one of my fellow classmates.

"1...2..."

SWAT!!!

There it was again! Some unknown person had just swatted my backside! I just continued smiling. I could deal with this. I'm not offended by this.

"...3" The picture was taken and we all hurried back to our seats.

The holding hands thing I can live with. The hugs I can tolerate. The hand on thigh isn't a problem. I just don't think I can get used to the swatting...

Another Urgent Update!!!!

2006-11-28T05:13:00.000-08:00

What am I going to do??? I just realized that my update erased all the communist music and the video I had embedded at the bottom of the blog! ARRRGGGHHHH!!!!

An Announcement:

2006-11-28T04:57:00.000-08:00

You'll notice the new color scheme on the blog. It is the unintended consequence of running some updates on my side of things. It took a lot of work to transform this template to the one that you normally see. I'm not happy with these changes and will be working to once again customize the look of the blog.

China

2006-11-28T04:10:00.000-08:00

I've complained about learning Chinese before. Unlike easy languages (read: every other language on earth), Chinese requires several steps to memorize each word. You have to memorize the pronunciation, the tone and the character. Reading the characters is much easier than learning to write them, although with time the writing becomes easier. Predictably, one of the most frustrating aspects of the language is the characters. It's not so much that they are hard to read and write, it's that you cannot sound out characters that are unfamiliar. Signs read like this to me: Danger! Don't Touch the 鳄鱼! 警察要 Punish You Severely! I'm getting a bit better at guessing what these blank parts are, but it's still a challenge and I rely on context a lot.

Another problem I encounter when reading is that sometimes I remember the pronunciation of a character, I just don't remember the meaning. Other times I remember the meaning, I just don't remember the pronunciation. It's like this: blah, blah, blah, crocodile, blah, blah, blah. Don't know how to pronounce the word for crocodile, I just know the characters. A real example of this would be the two characters that mean something like, "don't do..." I see these two characters everywhere. Don't smoke, don't fish in the pond, don't honk your car's horn. The problem is, I can't pronounce them. I know the meaning, not the pronunciation. Some characters have phonetic parts to them, making it easier to guess what the sound might be. For example, take a look at the following characters:

方 fang
芳 fang
放 fang
访 fang
房 fang
坊 fang
纺 fang
旁 pang

As you can see, the first seven characters are pronounced "fang". The tones and meanings are different. The last character is pronounced "pang." If you saw one of these characters, you could guess the pronounciation based on the radical 方 which is found in every character (look closely). For these types of characters, the toughest part is remembering the tone. Also, some of them have similiar meanings, so remembering which one to write is a bit of a challenge as well.

Here's something that I can finally sort of read:

It reads: Chairman Mao is the red sun in our hearts

Literally: Mao Chairman is our heart center red sun

At first all I could read was the "Chairman Mao is our..." Later came the "red sun" part. Hopefully I translated this correctly. Who knows, it could have some other meaning that I don't understand yet, but I doubt it. My translation sounds sufficiently communist.

This is weird--

2006-11-28T04:05:00.000-08:00

This sounds like a name you might come across in China.

It's Monday!

2006-11-27T05:42:00.000-08:00

Hi. My name is Laura and I've been mosquito free for two weeks.

What a beautiful day!

2006-11-27T05:11:00.000-08:00

There's this friend of a friend of a friend who's now become my friend. Her English name is Connie. We get together about once every two weeks. Usually I go to her place, and her husband cooks while we practice Chinese and English. A lot of the other foreigners have taken Chinese culture classes either here or in their home countries, but there is nothing better than going out and meeting people. Living with a Chinese woman and spending time with Connie has given me some weird insights.

When I first met Connie, she told me that she had just recently started going out again. She had given birth to a baby less than two months prior, so this explanation made sense to me. Well, it made sense to me until she explained what she meant fully. You see, traditionally Chinese women will not leave the house for a month after giving birth. I know you're thinking, "yeah, so what?" It gets worse than that: only specific foods are allowed, nothing too spicy or cold. The part of this ritual I found most disturbing was the prohibition against bathing and washing of the hair. Apparently, the mother must restore her yin and yang, and washing will somehow throw this out of whack.

A lot of our conversations are just plain strange. A conversation I had last night went something like this:

"I told my husband that you like to eat fish. He wanted to cook some, but last night we ate this vegetable and it made our lips dry, so we can't have fish. We can have hot pot though." (Huh?)

"Oh, that sounds great!"

Another conversation:

"I've noticed that you Westerners wear less clothes than we Chinese." (It's cold here and the Chinese are big on long underwear and "I'm hiking Mt. Everest" jackets.)

"Hmm, I never noticed the difference. I suppose we do wear less layers."

"When you were little, did you only wear a little clothes? Maybe that's why you are used to it." (Huh?)

I have a lot of these strange conversations. I wish I could record them all for you. They always make me wonder if the things I say come across as weird to her as the things she says do to me.

Trust(?)mart

2006-11-27T04:45:00.000-08:00

So you go to your favorite store again, the one that still requires the mysterious discount card that you don't have. You know their prices are good and who knows, maybe you'll find a discount card hidden under the dried jellyfish. With this kind of positive thinking, you enter the store hoping you'll make it out again in one piece. It's noon, meaning everyone is on their two-hour siesta and the place is destined to be packed.

After loading your basket with an assortment of goods you push your way through the crowd to the row of cashiers. Picking the shortest line and the slowest checker, you rehearse what you are going to say. After all, you didn't find a card under the jellyfish, stomach, brain or duck blood and you are still hoping for one. You tell yourself today is your lucky day.

"Excuse me, where do I go to get that card?" The cashier looks at you, turns to the next person in line and takes the card from her hand. She scans it, thanks the customer, throws your stuff in a bag and tells you the total. You pay and leave, deciding on the way out that you should take a drive by the consulate.

Did she not hear you? Was she purposly avoiding my question? Why won't she give me that damn card?!

As promised--

2006-11-27T04:25:00.000-08:00

Some pictures of the Sea of Bamboo:

3 Month Update:

2006-11-24T01:15:00.001-08:00

This past week I passed the three month mark in China. Here's a short summary of what I've learned, what I love, what I hate, and what surprises me about living in the Middle Kingdom.

What I love: The food. It's by far some of the best food I've ever had.

The classes. They are interesting, if not a bit disorganized. I'm learning a lot.

My bike: It may be a piece of junk, but it's the best way around the city. I think mountain biking is in my future...

Making friends at CSL class.

The food. I know I said it before, but it's so incredibly good! It makes life in Chengdu worth living.

What I hate: Riding a bicycle/on the floor loogie spitters. The Chinese spit like no other people on earth. Most of the time this doesn't bother me, except for those two exceptions above.

The general disorganization of everything.

The foreigner tax.

General dishonesty.

Racism.

Chinese organized tours. They really suck.

What surprises me: The lack of hills in Chengdu. I've been riding my bike around the city for three months and have not encountered a hill yet. Not even a small one.

The awesome apartment I live in. I wasn't really expecting anything this nice, but we really lucked out.

Meeting another American who knows Chinese Sign Language.

The driving. Insane. Mad. Crazy.

What I've learned: The phrase "I don't eat innards, head or feet."

That you might not always get what you ask for when buying things. People take the liberty to give you more than you want, thus charging more(rounding up, of course!).

It's good to always back everything up with an email or three.

Flashing lights means: "MOVE!!!" Horns mean: "Don't make any sudden moves!"

Ignoring the crossing guards is perfectly acceptable.

Pretending that you don't speak Chinese can be very useful. It helps you get away with things you otherwise couldn't.

The clerks at Trustmart will under no circumstances give you the discount card. They won't even tell you how to get one.

People with sticks sell the cheapest fruit.

Anything sold on the street is good.

That's just a short summary. I'll be updating again at the six month mark.

It's almost Thanksgiving!

2006-11-21T07:30:00.000-08:00

I've developed a real affinity for the American Consulate. I'm like a child with a special blankie. I just like it. I like looking at it. Having it around makes me feel good. In fact, if I could open up a consulate next door, downstairs, down the road, or in a storefront I would. I enjoy riding my bike past the guards, past the gates around gates, and the barred windows. I ride past the line of visa applicants snaking around the corner, and the Chinese guards who demand to know your business, and I feel a sense of pride. Pride and joy, pride and joy...

Day 18

2006-11-18T02:13:00.000-08:00

So far I've been pretty good about not eating sugar. I mentioned earlier that I was going to try and give up sugar until Thanksgiving. Although I eat things like bread and fruit, things like candy and cake is out. I've done fairly well.

I've had several surprises when it comes to the Chinese food. I bought what I thought was a fried potato thing, only to find it filled with sweet bean paste. I've bought what I thought were crackers, only to find them sweet like animal crackers. There was one overt violation, but by and large, all the other ones have been unintentional.

As to whether or not I'll continue my sugar fast after Thanksgiving: the answer is no. I love Almond M&Ms, and I don't think I can last much longer without them. The peanut ones are a good substitute, and a Snickers bar will do when nothing else is available.

While we're on the topic of names--

2006-11-18T01:46:00.000-08:00

I should mention that I met both Fish and Sing A Song this week. I'm not sure about that last one, if it's Singasong or Sing-A-Song...

What's your name?

2006-11-14T06:48:00.000-08:00

The other day I was at one of the Western restaurants in town. My waiter's name was Elephant. Has anyone heard of the one dog policy?

2006-11-14T06:26:00.000-08:00

It's hard to explain what living in China is like without giving you all an analogy or story.

On Sunday, my classmates and I had planned to take a trip to the Sea of Bamboo. One of our friends from the Yangtze River cruise, a man known simply as "The Judge", had given us an open invitation to tour the park with him. We sent a text message to him earlier this week explaining that seven of us would be making the journey on Sunday. We were told to take the bus from Chengdu, and it would only take two hours.

Early Sunday morning, Andrea, the onsight coordinator of our exchange program went to the bus stop to buy the tickets. When she asked how long the bus trip was, the cashier told her it was four hours. She called us, and we decided to go ahead and go anyway.

We got on a nearly empty bus and settled in for the journey. Two hours came and went. Three hours came and went. Four and a half hours came and went. Just as we were reaching hour number six, the bus pulled up to the park entrance at the Sea of Bamboo. It was now about three in the afternoon, and we had to get back to Chengdu that evening. Andrea asked the driver when the next bus back to Chengdu was and found out it was either in fifteen minutes, or the next morning. As we were discussing what to do, a man (hereafter referred to as "that bozo") approached and asked if we were willing to hire a private car for the return trip to the city. After some haggling, the price was still too high and we asked if he would just take us to a train station in a town called Yibin. We had passed through Yibin about an hour before. After some more haggling, we agreed to take his car to Yibin where he promised there was a night train back to Chengdu.

We bought our entrance tickets and started walking up the road and into the park. Pretty soon a car pulled alongside our little band of travelers and offered to take us on a driving tour of the park. We declined, and the driver drove off. Suddenly, we heard some shouting coming from behind. We stopped and turned around only to see our new friend, the bozo running up the hill towards us. "I'll give you a ride, only 200 kuai! You must take a driving tour of the park, you won't see the good sites otherwise!"

Another ten minutes was spent arguing with the guy. He backed off the driving trip idea in favor of following us in hopes that we would get tired and take him up on his offer.

We meandered into the park, stopping when we found a stream running parallel to the road. Several of us scootched down to the creek's edge and took photos. After living in Chengdu nearly three months, it's a real treat to be in such a beautiful park.

A little further up the road we came across a trail cut through the bamboo. The trail went straight up hill, away from other tourists and most importantly, the bozo. We started to ascend the steep hill, all the while wondering aloud where the trail would lead us.

"Hey! Hey! You won't see any of the sites here!" We looked behind us and discovered our friend was close to catching up. "Don't look at him and maybe he'll just go away. Pretend like he's not there."

The trail led us up to a small gathering of homes perched on top of the hillside. From the road below, you cannot see the fields and farmland that had been cultivated here. We continued past the houses and back out onto another street.

Dee-Dee-Dee-Dee-Dee!!!... Bozo's phone rang. "WEI!?" We started walking faster.

Further down the road we ran into a small row of shops. Stopping at an empty storefront, we bought ramen noodles and sat down at a small table. All through lunch, we watched as our new friend paced outside, hoping desperately that he would leave. His phone number had already been obtained by one of our group, and we still didn't want the driving trip. Walking would do just fine, thank you.

We continued down the road a ways until we came to another trail. This one appeared to be one of the stops on the tourist route. A large pagoda sat near the entrance, and a line of shops selling dried mushrooms sat nearby. Entering the trail, I was struck by how dark it was. The bamboo blocked out all traces of sunlight, and suddenly the world seemed damp. The trail zig-zagged up a steep hill, eventually leading to a waterfall.

As evening approached, it was decided that we needed to leave the waterfall and head back down the hill. It had been made clear that if we arrived in the neighboring city of Yibin before too late, we could catch a night train back to Chengdu. Bozo was waiting at the bottom of the hill. He had arranged for a larger car to drive us to Yibin.

The car pulled up to the train station an hour later. The train station was small and delapidated, the lobby nearly empty. We approached the single open window. The woman looked up from her schedules and barked into the microphone, "What tickets do you want?"

"We want to take the 9:00 pm train back to Chengdu."

"We don't have a train to Chengdu tonight, the only one is tomorrow morning."

Several young ladies gathered around to eavesdrop on our conversation. Realizing our problem, one of the ladies pulled Andrea aside and told her about a night bus to Chengdu. It only cost sixty kuai she was assured, and it only took three hours. The bus was scheduled to arrive at the train station in a few minutes, we would have to rush to get there. We bounded out the door, leaving the crowd of onlookers behind. The young woman who helped us was right, the bus pulled up just as we reached the curb and we all boarded.

The four and a half hour bus ride was uneventful, but like everything in China, was an interesting experience. There was spitting and smoking, littering, and Chinese movies. The woman behind me sat with her head out a half open window the entire trip. Perhaps the combination of smoke and karaoke music had finally gotten to her.

Pulling into Chengdu was a relief. The bus dropped us off at the edge of the city, from there we took a taxi to retrieve our bicycles. All in all I had a great time. I'll be posting some of the pictures later, although they are already posted to my webshots account.

GAH!!!

2006-11-11T04:55:00.000-08:00

Sometimes using a proxy to access this page takes so long that I forget what I came for! Oh well, here's a little tidbit to keep you happy. Also, I posted some more pictures to my webshots account. My camera's memory card was broken, but it mysteriously started working again today.

2006-11-11T04:04:00.000-08:00

To what shall I compare thee, beautiful laowai?
You are a foreigner of foreigners, and I wish I was like you,
With your big hair and passive-aggressive smile.
But lo, if I stopped a car like that I would be run over.
We applaude you laowai. Thank you.

A Foreign Lady in Beijing

The top story at Nanfang Daily today was titled "Foreign Auntie Challenges Rule-Breaking Vehicle." The story was originally posted by blogger known as Lao An (老安, Old An). The original blog post was titled "A foreigner helps the Chinese to improve their civic quality."

Here is the translation of the text:

At around 8:50am on October 20, 2006, on the road from the Zhaoyang East bridge towards the Blue Island Building, a funny episode occurred: a foreigner acted as traffic police and made a small sedan which had gone into the bicycle lane move back out into the car lane.

By the time that I got there, a foreigner had stopped and held her bicycle in the bicycle lane in front of a silver car (license plate number HL ****). She was smiling and saying something to the driver while making gestures. At first I went past and I did not take any photographs. Then I saw the foreigner go past the car and stopped her bicycle in front of the car. So she was trying to get the car to go back into the car lane instead of being in the bicycle lane. This went on for a few minutes. The driver got mad and got out of the car to curse the foreigner. He even picked up the bicycle and hook it. Even so, the foreigner would not budge and she insisted that the car get back on the car lane.

Finally, the car turned back into the car lane. The foreigner then blocked the next car (a white Santana), which quickly retreated and went into the car lane.

The whole incident occurred in under 10 minutes and drew quite a few spectators. After the foreigner left, the spectators commented: "The Chinese really need to be educated this way!" Dear brother and sister readers, what do you think?

The foreigner catches up to the car and stops in front of it.

She holds her ground and maintains a smile.

She will not budge

The driver gets out and pushes the bicycle.

But the foreigner holds her ground.

The driver gets out again and demands: "Are you leaving or not?"

The driver picks up the bicycle and threw it on the side.
He said: "If you block me again, I'll throw it even farther away!"

"Go home and mind your own business!"

But she does not leave.

"If you block me again, I won't be polite anymore!"
(but he drives into the car lane all the same)

The foreigner now blocks a white Santana that entered the bicycle lane. This car quickly backed up and retreated into the car lane.

(This article was borrowed from http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20061027_1.htm)

I really am back!

2006-11-11T01:56:00.000-08:00

Everything moves at such a fast pace around here. With the expansion of the economy in the last dozen years, everything feels rushed and half complete. Buildings were erected before there were tenants to fill them. I've seen quite a few in the Chengdu area that look abandoned or never completed. Although the pace of life may be slower than in the States, the rate at which things get done is not.

The apartment complex I live in is fairly new. If I were to guess, I would say it was built within the last five years. Despite this, there is constant construction taking place. I moved in, and a couple of weeks later the speed bumps were removed. Next there was an overhaul of landscaping, followed by the addition of spikes on the gutters to keep would-be climbers off. Last week they remodeled the showcase room at the entrance to the complex. Before this, they installed electronic gates at the front walkway (despite the fact that there are three guards on duty all day and night). This week they started adding and removing trees. Why? No idea.

Along with the building/remodeling/removing plants phenomena is the overabundance of labor. Let me give you a few examples:

The sweeping ladies: On every street, at every hour there are ladies sweeping. They gather in clusters of three or four, and with their long brooms and crooked dustpans fight a war on the Chinese pastime of littering. It's a 24/7 thing. They're sweeping at noon, they're sweeping at midnight. The sad thing is, there would be no need to sweep if people would stop littering.

I remember one night riding my bike home. Although most of the shops were closed, there was still a remarkably large number of people around. I rode through the intersection at Second Ring Road and past the yellow building where I get off the bus. There in the courtyard of the building were several dozen men and women. They were digging holes in the garden, and laying bricks for a pathway. Not that remarkable, right? It was well past midnight.

My apartment complex: My apartment complex is guarded at all times by a platoon of young teenagers. There are three stationed at the front gate: one interrogates drivers, one hands out bicycle passes, and the third stands around trying to look busy. Besides these three, there are several more riding bikes around the grounds, and a couple stationed at the back gate. The back gate is locked and leads to a construction site. Nobody comes in or exits through this gate. One afternoon, my roommate and I found ourselves locked out. We decided to go to the guard at the back gate to see if we could get some help. After hearing our plea, the guard took us to a first-floor surveillance room. This place was seriously high tech, with dozens of television screens lining the walls. These pubescent security guards take their jobs seriously. They wear camouflage, engage in bootcamp style exercises, salute entering cars, and stand in formation. The problem is, there's just too many of them! We live in a nice complex, do we really need three dozen fifteen-year olds on duty day and night?

The super markets: The worst offender in this category is Trust Mart. Every super market I have been to has at least three dozen more employees on duty than they need. If I look at something too long, I'll gather a crowd of bored, megaphone wielding clerks who are all too eager to help me find something. I try not to make eye contact, but it doesn't help much.

The Overseas School: The Overseas School at Sichuan University is housed in a small building in the far corner of the campus. Like everything else in Chengdu it is guarded by several young, vaguely official looking guards. One opens the gate to the bicycle parking lot, the other two sit behind a window and stare as the students enter the building for morning classes. The one with the keys opens classroom doors at the request of teachers or students. As far as I know, the other two just sit and stare.

Landscaping/Construction: Anything that can be done with a powertool is done by hand. I don't think this is because there is a lack of powertools but rather, is because of the abundance of physical labor. There's a quarter mile stretch of sidewalk near my house that has been completely redone in the past two days. The first day, workers removed the bricks with mallets. The second day, they laid new bricks. Voila! It was done!

Street vendors: China has 1.3 billion people. One would think this makes the ability to succeed in this society incredibly tough. I'm not sure this is totally accurate. Because there is such a large number of people, things that would turn people off to a business go largely unnoticed. Take restaurants for example; if a restaurant is bad in the US, I won't go back. If my experience is shared by others, the restaurant will lose business and will be forced to change or close. Not here. If I think a restaurant is bad, I may opt to never go back, but there's 1,299,000,000 other people willing to take my place. It's kind of like this with the street vendors. Although there is great diversity in what they sell, you'll often see two or three carts in a row selling the exact same thing. Why don't they spread out to try and maximize their business?

What is the deal with this?! Can someone explain it to me?

I'm Back

2006-11-09T07:00:00.000-08:00

Hello again! I'm nearly done with midterms, and I think I lost a pound of brain weight in the process. Midterms here are a long and painful process. Every class I take has a seperate exam or paper (five language classes, one history class), leaving me with very little free time. My last exam is tomorrow, so wish me luck. I'll be blogging more then. I have a lot to catch up on, but for now what I need is sleep. stay tuned, there is more to come.

Oh-- After a bit of tinkering, my proxy is up and happy again giving me full access to the internet.

2006-11-02T06:09:00.000-08:00

So you go to your favorite store --the one that requires the special card-- to pick up a few things. So far, you've managed to get by without the card. Whenever you approach the cash register another person always lets you use theirs. Not a big deal, right? But let's say you want that card. You know that one day people won't be as friendly. You ask the cashier, "Where do I go to get the card?"

"You don't need the card, this isn't on sale."

"I know but where do I go to get the card?"

"You don't need the card. There is no sale."

"But I want the card... Where do I go?"

"You don't need the card, this isn't on sale." At this point, the cashier swivels the computer screen in your direction to show you exactly what "not on sale" means. In your frustration you say, "I know, I know, I know! I know it's not on sale, but I just want the card!"

"Well, borrow one from someone in line."

Day: 1

2006-11-01T06:27:00.000-08:00

I would like to announce that I made it through day one relatively sugar free. As predicted I woke up in the morning with a severe hankering for something sweet. Instead of indulging my craving, I decided to follow one of the twelve steps I posted earlier: eat protein at breakfast. I munched on some chicken wings I recovered from the fridge and proceeded to down my coffee.

Sarah and I often cook at home, although we rarely make enough to have leftovers. Today was unique as it is the day after the day of Li Juan's birthday party.

Several days ago while I was getting ready for school, Li Juan announced that her birthday was coming up. "Ooohhh, we will eat hot pot-huo guo- with my friend. Okay? You are willing?"

"Sure! That sounds like fun? When is your birthday? Where are we going?"

"A traditional restaurant. Very good. You will like, I am sure."

I discussed the proposition with Sarah, and we agreed that we could free up our schedule in order to make the party. She also asked me to make some spaghetti like I had done for a few friends of mine.

The day of the party approached and nothing more had been exchanged between us. I was beginning to think the party was off. Monday afternoon I recieved a text message:"Hi honey. We are eating at home. Two friends are coming over to prepare the food. Please make pasta and tell Sarah."

I rounded up the ingredients I would need at a Western goods store near campus. It costs a fortune to make these kinds of meals, even more than it would in the States, but it was her birthday and spaghetti was sounding good.

That evening I pulled up to my apartment building, and was escorted into the building by the sounds of "Who Let the Dogs Out?" My neighbors are pretty quiet, and I started to wonder just where that sound was coming from. As I reached the front door, the music became much louder. I pressed my ear against the door which was now vibrating from the sound, put my key in the lock, and turned. Sarah was supposed to be home, but I doubted she would be playing music full blast.

The door swung open, and I stood frozen in the entry. There were already half a dozen people at the house, and by looking at how much food was already spread on the table, I was guessing there would be more. The tv was on; two microphones placed on the floor for later karaoke. I placed the cake I was carrying on the table, and proceeded to push my way into the kitchen. The kitchen was a mess of pans and bones and vegetable scraps. A man I didn't know stood in the corner peeling a kiwi onto the floor. No one seemed to acknowledge my presence as I pulled pans off of shelves and proceeded to make the spaghetti.

Soon enough I heard Li Juan's footsteps out in the hall. The feast was spread out over the dining room and coffee tables. The pan of spaghetti sat in the center.

Li Juan entered the room and screamed.

The party lasted well into the evening. One of the girls at the party told me that once they discovered our bedrooms, they had to close the door. I knew the house looked cleaner than I had left it!

I know I've mentioned this before, the way things happen around here is all kind of mysterious to me. I'm usually not in on the planning stages of things, I'm just made aware of the results. It's pretty funny and makes life interesting.

A Short Interlude:

2006-10-31T02:31:00.000-08:00

It's true! Your favorite blogger is unable to view her own blog! I can post things, but I can't load the page. Your Favorite blogger (The "YFB", pronounced: why-eff-bee) is also taking mid-terms this week and is very busy. So, between now and whenever the Great Firewall decides I'm not a threat, the blog is going to change focus a bit. It will be a short interlude between blogging about how weird China is, and blogging about other stuff.

I only have two addictions: coffee and sugar. In the States, I drink at least a pot of coffee a day. When I finish the pot, I often take to drinking Diet Coke and tea to satisify the constant caffeine craving. I want it because I need it. I want it because I like it. I want it because I'm bored. I want it because I'm thirsty. I want it when it's cold out. I want it when it's warm. I take coffee instead of tylenol. I take coffee instead of food.

This addiction came to a head when I realized I had stopped drinking water. I never drank it. Not even once. I knew that by coming to China, I would have to give up this addiction or at least severly curb it. I wasn't giving up without a fight though, I brought a can of instant coffee in my carry on, and received a coffee maker on my birthday.

The coffee maker is half the size of the one I have at home, and I drink half the pot. I've cut down signifigantly on my caffeine intake, now I'm feeling the need to cut back on my sugar addiction.

According to some so-called "scientist", sugar withdrawal is sometimes marked by symptoms similar to those of drug withdrawal. I'm not sure how much validity there is to this argument (they don't either), but I intend to find out. Starting tomorrow, I will be kicking the sugar habit. I ate three bags of M&M's today, two pieces of banana bread and a piece of cake. I'm craving the stuff like I've never craved it before, and I think it's time to stop. For the pleasure of all those out in blogland, I will be documenting my detox.

In order to start this thing off right, I looked up a twelve-step program. Here they are: (I'm a big fan of number 12.)

1. Stick to foods that are closest to their original form. Instead of eating corn from a can, eat corn on the cob. Banish white bread and embrace wheat bread. Forget fruit juices; go for the actual fruit. The closer a food is to it's original form, then less processed sugar it will contain.

2. Eat protein with breakfast. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, but do you know why? Breakfast is the meal that will make or break you for the rest of the day. Your first meal must create blood sugar stability that will carry you to the next meal without sugar cravings.

3. Eat protein with every meal. As soon as your blood sugar is thrown out of whack, you will be off the wagon again. Eating protein with each meal prepares your body for the increase of seratonin production and keeps your blood sugar stable throughout the day.

4. Read Labels! It's incredible how many things we put into our mouths without the slightest idea what is in them. The longer the list of ingredients, the more likely sugar is going to be included on that list.

5. Don't starve yourself in order to reward your restraint with a donut or a Twix. Not only is this bad for your body, but you won't lose weight. Your body will just go into starvation mode, storing all your calories as fat. So that slice of chocolate cake you eat after a seven hour fast is going straight to fat.

6. Keep a journal of what you eat. You will be surprised, and probably shocked, by the amount of sugar-filled snacks and extras involved in your diet. Write down everything, down to those five M&Ms or that tablespoon of teriyaki sauce.

7. Brown is beautiful: brown rice, wheat bread, brown cereals, etc... Brown foods give your body the positive effects of carbohydrates without unbalancing your blood sugar and creating cravings.

8. Be active and keep busy. Most of us snack the most when we are bored and inactive. Go for a walk. Go shopping. Organize your entire house. Anything to keep your hands busy and away from the cookie jar.

9. Eat a potato before bed. Before your head explodes from the thought of eating a starchy, carbohydrate-filled potato right before bed, consider this: when taken with the right vitamins, that spud will increase your production of seratonin, balancing your blood sugar levels. Besides, it's better than eating ice cream before bed.

10. Try a detox program. Detoxing isn't just for yoga yogis and Enya junkies anymore. There are dozens of detox programs designed for health enthusiasts of all levels. Some last two days, some last two months. But they all have one thing in common: after the initial overwhelming sugar cravings, your body adjusts and you won't even want the sugar anymore.

11. Drink water constantly. The more water you drink, the more your body will be fooled into thinking it is not hungry. Plus, you can rest assured that there is not a grain of sugar in water.

12. Don't get down on yourself if you slip and eat a desert every once in a while. It's okay to reward yourself, just don't start the addiction all over again. There are always healthier options for deserts. Eat berries with some low-calorie whipped topping. Snack on a couple of graham crackers. Maybe you would be healthier if you cut out sugar altogether forever, but people who do things in moderation get the best of both worlds. Enjoy your life, but don't overdo it.

There's a couple of these steps that I am going to skip. I am NOT keeping a journal. I am NOT eating a potato before bed. I won't read lables, and I'm NOT going through a real detox program. That cancels out four of the steps, making my job a third of the way easier. I'd tell you all how much I weigh, but the only scale in the house is in kilograms.

I'll let you know how tomorrow goes. Once again, I apologize for the irregular blogging of these past few weeks. Things will be getting back to normal soon.

Testing...

2006-10-30T21:08:00.000-08:00

Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3... If you can see this, please post a comment. I've been unable to get around the Great Firewall, and am not sure if this is actually posting or not.

It's Sunday!

2006-10-29T04:11:00.000-08:00

"But Laura," You ask, "Where have you been? It's been nearly a week without a new post, and we're starting to get worried."

So am I, so am I. The truth is, I think I've been b@nn3d. I'm having a hard time accessing the blog to post anything. Some b@nn3d websites work on my computer, some don't. My pr0xxy hasn't totally failed me, but I'm not really sure what to do at this point. I can get onto blogger.com, but viewing anyone's blog is out of the question. If anyone knows of a way around the Great Firew@11 of China, please send me an email. For now, I've written a poem to commemorate this sad failure of my proxy:

B@nned, schmanned!
If only I had planned!
I would like to have manned
the pr0xyy with my hand.
B@nned, schmanned!

Hopefully, this will actually post. Someone please write a comment (blogger emails me when you do this), and let me know if you can see this post. I've written another poem:

Comment, schmomment!
You folks are my abutment!
Do you know what abutment meant?
How 'bout additament?
Comment, schmomment!

There's a bunch of interesting articles about the Great F1rew@ll. There seems to be a lot of debate about how it works. Some argue that the Great Fir3wa11 isn't there at all; it's really the result of government pressure on different internet companies causing them to moniter themselves. Others argue about the technicalities of how it works. Still others are constantly working to circumvent it. Here's some links to articles I found particularly interesting. You should all read the article about Google mirror. Type that into your Google search box, and click the first link. You'll see what I mean...

Read this first.

Google Mirror If you want to search anything, remember to type the words
backwards.

This isn't my favorite news site, but it's a good article.

Why this blogger loves the USA.

Update:

2006-10-29T03:11:00.000-08:00

There's a mosquito on my ceiling just waiting for a visit from Patton. This is a war, and I'm winning.

It's Tuesday!

2006-10-24T08:08:00.000-07:00

Yay! It's Tuesday, meaning it's sign language class day! I've been attending for a couple of weeks now, and find that learning a second sign language is much easier than the first one. Sign languages are hard to wrap your brain around, they force you to think of language in a completely different way. How can you convey the abstract in a sign language? What about subject-verb agreement? Is it as fast to use as a spoken language? Is it universal? Why not? All these questions and more are answered more through a trial and error process than from direct teaching. In order to use sign language effectively, you must learn to think in visual terms. You must learn to listen with your eyes, and shortcut the thoughts from your mind to your hands.

Sign language class has been good, so far. There are about a dozen native users who attend, and about 100 students. One thing I find interesting is that the teacher teaches word-for-word Chinese signs. My textbook has a small section on what is termed the "Natural Sign Language". As I follow along with the teacher, the deaf participants often interrupt me to show me the "real" signs. Even though these participants use a natural sign language, they still teach others the word-for-word Chinese. Trust me, there is a huge difference between these two sign systems. The Signed Chinese feels awkward and clumsy. It's slow and cumbersome, many signs consisting of three or four parts. The natural sign language seems to flow more smoothly. Some of the handshapes are hard for me (handshapes not found in ASL), but overall it feels okay.

I mentioned to someone at last week's class that I was in Chengdu conducting research. I mentioned that I wanted to research sign language, but I didn't go into any further details. Everything has worked out well, but now I'm feeling nervous about approaching with my research idea. I think I'll wait a few more class sessions, and then bring the topic up. I want to show that I am sincere, and that I am not trying to expose any wrongdoings or down sides of this community.

Some Serious Health Concerns to Discuss--

2006-10-21T09:17:00.000-07:00

Before leaving the States I made a first-aid kit. I hardly ever get sick, and I didn't want take any chances in China. I was given very detailed and graphic descriptions of the types of diseases I could get, and how I should prepare. "You'll be sick the ENTIRE time. Don't worry, you'll get used to it." Or my favorite, "A Pepto a day keeps the doctor away!"

With this motto in mind, I trudged off to Costco to buy a year's supply of Pepto, and whatever else I could shove into my new first aid kit. I bought enough supplies that I could probably care for half of China in the event of a bird flu outbreak. Then I packed the kit and lugged it half way across the world.

I haven't even felt a twinge of sickness. I eat everything, I drink boiled water, and I spend a lot of time in close quarters with other people. I haven't had reason to crack the first aid kit open. My good health aside, there is one thing I didn't count on being an issue: mosquitos.

The problem didn't start until my second week here, after I had moved out of the student dorms. At the apartment we leave our patio door and windows open-- there are no screens. I live on the third floor of the apartment building, and had not anticipated having a problem with the mosquitos. On my second night in the apartment, I slept with the blankets off. The weather had been unbearably hot, and the cool air felt good. The next morning I woke up with nearly twenty mosquito bites on my legs. Describing them as mosquito bites isn't quite accurate; they are mosquito welts, and they itched like hell. By the end of that week, nearly half of my anti-itch cream had been used and bandages covered my legs. I closed the window in the bedroom and made sure I ALWAYS slept under the blankets. That system worked fine for a couple of days. No new bites, and the other ones were finally started to heal.

About a week later I had another bout with the mosquitos. That time, I woke up with mosquito bites covering half of my face. I had one on my eyelid that made my eye feel heavy and swollen. I was a little more patient with these ones, and within a couple of days they were gone.

I spent some time that week looking up the Chinese words for mosquito bite, mosquito spray, and kill, kill, kill. After my Chinese roommate saw my face and realized the problem, she gave me a fan to use. If the fan was blowing on me at night, the mosquitos would be unable to bite me. This seemed to work pretty well for a while. The only problem is that they are ever present during the day. Every morning when I take a shower, there is the inevitable mosquito flying around the bathroom. (Ooh, I just love killing them with the shower spray!) Everyday when I eat meals or do homework, there is always a mosquito buzzing just out of my reach.

What make this situation all the worse is that I seem to be the only one with this problem. Oh, others do get bit, it's just that their reaction is much smaller, if noticable at all. My mosquito bites are huge, and last for days on end.

I finally went shopping and bought a mosquito killer plug-in. I'm not sure if it really works or not, but having it on makes me feel better. I still use the fan and refuse to open my window, so it's hard to know what to attribute my reduction of mosquito bites to.

The week before last was the first week I didn't have any new bites. (I've taken to counting them to see how many new ones I get everyday.) I thought that I was finally on the road to a mosquito free existance, when it happened again. I was shopping for some bootleg DVDs at the time. The DVD stand was in the shade, and as I stood there reading the labels, I could feel pricking on my legs, and an intense itching. I must have been absorbed in whatever I was reading, because for some reason it didn't register in my brain what was going on. It was only when I started using one foot to scratch at the other leg that I realized there was a problem. I looked down: at least a dozen mosquitos had already attached themselves to my calves and were happily sucking in my blood. Back to wearing long pants again...

AAARRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I've developed a method recent days to deal with the mosquitos that bite me at night. Whether I see them or not, they seem to be always present. When I'm ready to go to bed, I lay back and wait. In the evenings, the mosquitos get hungry. If I lay still I can watch as they come out of their hiding places and land on my wall. I just know they're waiting for me to close my eyes. I've found that heading them off at the pass has been the best method. I wait until they're on the wall, and then I take a DVD case and proceed to smoosh 'em. I've chosen the DVD "Patton" to do the job. Patton is a pretty tough guy, and the mosquito blood--my blood--blends in with the red on the picture. I wouldn't want to mess with Patton; he's a man carrying a crop-whip.

My other method of mosquito deterance has been a daily dose of vitamin B. Apparently, people who don't have enough vitamin B get mosquito bites more often. I was also told that people with blood type B also attract mosquitos. I don't know what my blood type is, but I now have a strong suspicion.

Oops, one just landed above my head-- gotta go!

Wow! What great news!

2006-10-19T01:07:00.000-07:00

I got this article in my inbox this morning:

Wal-Mart Said to Be Acquiring Chain in China

By DAVID BARBOZA and MICHAEL BARBARO

SHANGHAI, Tuesday, Oct. 17 — Wal-Mart Stores , the largest retailer in the United States, is laying the groundwork to become the biggest foreign chain in China with the $1 billion purchase of a major retailer here, according to people briefed on the deal.

The move represents a large step for Wal-Mart's strategy in China, allowing the American retailer to more than double its presence in a country that, despite its size and growing middle class, remains largely untapped by foreign retailers.

Though the size of the acquisition — of a Taiwanese-owned supermarket chain called Trust-Mart — may be modest for Wal-Mart, it is a critical one because the Chinese market is becoming much more pivotal in the retailer's overall international strategy. For Wal-Mart, China represents an opportunity to tap a vast and fast-growing market abroad at a time when the company's sales are lagging elsewhere and it has run into obstacles to expansion at home.

"China is the only country in the world that offers Wal-Mart the chance to replicate what they have accomplished in the U.S.," said Bill Dreher, an analyst at Deutsche Bank Securities.

Wal-Mart expects to close the deal for Trust-Mart by the end of the year, but it still needs approval by Chinese authorities, according to a person briefed on the transaction.

The acquisition is likely to trigger an intense battle among foreign and domestic retailers to gain a strong foothold in the world's fastest-growing economy.

The deal puts Wal-Mart neck-and-neck in China with Carrefour, the giant French retailer, which also bid for Trust-Mart. Wal-Mart, which has only 66 stores in China compared with Carrefour's more than 200, outbid not only Carrefour, but also Tesco of Britain and one of China's large retailers, Lianhua.

The purchase also highlights the staggering reach of the $300 billion Wal-Mart empire. The company started in rural Arkansas 45 years ago and has become the largest foreign retailer in Mexico and Canada. In numerous other foreign markets, however, Wal-Mart has been stymied, pulling out of Germany and South Korea, or has met strong challenges, as in Japan, where it has struggled to gain a share of the market.

By acquiring Trust-Mart, Wal-Mart will not only be able to match Carrefour, but also to compete with much bigger Chinese retailers, like China Resources and the Shanghai Brilliance Group, which are the country's largest retailers with more than $3 billion in sales and more than 8,000 stores combined.

Trust-Mart has more than 100 stores with 30,000 employees in more than 20 Chinese provinces, but it operates mainly at the low end of the supermarket chains. One challenge for Wal-Mart will to determine where it will position itself in the retailing market.

China's economy is expanding at a rate of 10 percent to 11 percent a year, making it by far the world's fastest-growing major economy. Retail sales are even more robust, jumping by about 15 percent a year for the last several years.

Big retailers are fairly new in China, which for decades has been dominated by small regional chains. Indeed, China has no dominant national players in the retail market, which is why Wal-Mart and other international retailers are battling aggressively to expand there.

"China's a very fragmented market and very diverse," says George Svinos, head of Asia Pacific retail at KPMG's office in Australia. "So in order to get any penetration into that market you'd need to make a big move."

China, however, is a tricky market for American retailers. Chinese consumers spend less than Americans when they go into stores, but they shop more frequently.

The average Chinese shopper spends about $4 at Wal-Mart, compared with $20 for the average American, according to Wal-Mart.

But Wal-Mart and other retailers hope to lure the middle-class Chinese, one of the fastest-growing segments of the population. Already, middle-class shoppers crowd into Carrefour, Wal-Mart and Ikea.

Other retailers, like Toys "R" Us, Home Depot and Best Buy, have just announced plans to open outlets in China.

The government has opened its retail market to foreigners, but at the same time, it has also encouraged Chinese companies to merge. In one example, the Shanghai Bailian Group struck a deal with Dashang, which operates the second-largest chain store group, to create new stores.

Moreover, China's biggest state-owned retailers and a handful of aggressive entrepreneurs are pushing to create national chains, like Beijing-based WuMart and Gome, the country's largest consumer electronics store, which is owned by one of the country's wealthiest men.

Carrefour, which is the largest foreign retailer in China by sales, with more than $2 billion, has been expanding much more aggressively than Wal-Mart. Carrefour plans to open 100 new superstores this year, which will raise its total to more than 300.

Analysts say that Wal-Mart's expansion has stepped up only in recent years. Up until now, they say, the retailer has not had great advantages over its bigger competitors. It has had high costs in China because systems for purchasing, transportation and distribution are clogged and complicated in a country that is still largely inefficient and without a strong national highway grid.

Wal-Mart appeared to smooth the way for expansion in China in July when, for the first time, it allowed employees to form a trade union, the company's first in China. The retailer has long battled unions in the United States, arguing they will make the company less efficient.

In the United States, where Wal-Mart has more than 4,000 mostly suburban stores, its performance has begun to trail that of major competitors, like Target, particularly in sales at stores open at least a year. And Wal-Mart has encountered growing resistance to locating new stores in urban areas.

A Wal-Mart spokeswoman, Beth Keck, declined to comment on the Trust-Mart transaction.

Wal-Mart entered China in 1996 with a supercenter under its own name and a Sam's Club in Shenzhen, near Hong Kong. In a departure from its practice of buying domestic chains with strong local name recognition, Wal-Mart started by building its business in China on its own.

But the pace of Wal-Mart's growth in China has been slow. A decade after arriving, it has just 66 stores, failing to crack the list of the country's top 20 retailers; hence, the move to acquire Trust-Mart.

Wal-Mart operates stores in 13 countries, including Brazil, Japan, and England, but foreign sales represent just $64 billion, or 20 percent, of its more than $300 billion in annual sales.

In several countries, it has discovered its American formula for success — rock-bottom prices, zealous control of inventory and a wide array of products — simply does not translate.

In Germany, for example, Wal-Mart never established comfortable relations with the powerful unions, which dominate retail in the country. In South Korea, it failed to satisfy the tastes of finicky local consumers.

Thus, in a stinging admission of defeat, Wal-Mart pulled out of Germany and South Korea this year after failing to turn around poor sales.

Wal-Mart, however, remains committed to Japan, where it operates stores under the name Seiyu, despite lackluster performance.

A major obstacle overseas for Wal-Mart has been building a big enough network of stores to compete with local chains and to secure low prices from suppliers. That may explain, in part, why Wal-Mart is eager to grow in China.

Mr. Dreher, of Deutsche Bank, expects Wal-Mart to expand aggressively there. By the year 2010, he predicts the company will have as many as 400 stores in China.

David Barboza reported from Shanghai, and Michael Barbaro from New York. Keith Bradsher contributed reporting from Hong Kong.

Leshan

2006-10-18T06:46:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday, Sichuan University took us foreigners on a field trip to Leshan. Leshan is the site of the world's largest Buddha, which is carved into a cliff overlooking the Dadu river. The Buddah hasn't always been the largest, Leshan owes the Taliban for that favor.

We were asked to arrive at SU's East Gate at 8:00 to load up the buses. In the beginning of the sememster, we were given a list of places we could go free of charge on school sponsored field trips. This one was by far the most popular, with most of the foreign students turning out.

We drove several hours out of Chengdu before arriving at large park (I don't remember the name) in a small town (still don't know the name). In true Chinese fashion, we were given a half-hour to take pictures of the important stuff, and then rounded up for the next leg of our trip.

The Chinese have the Americans beat when it comes to parks. In the US, when you go to a park that is say, in the woods, it will look like the woods. Not so in China. Every park I have been to has been meticulously planned. The scenery is stunning, the plants are beautiful, and the buildings look as though they are a part of nature.
Leshan was still an hour away from the park, so after grabbing some snacks, we loaded into the bus and took off.

Leshan's only claim to fame is the giant Buddha. Construction was started in 713 AD, it took over a decade to complete. It is over 500 meters in height, and the cliffs on either side are dotted with smaller Buddhas.

In order to reach the Buddha, we had to climb down a switchback trail. Along the way, we could see hundreds of Buddhas that had been carved along the way. Some were very intricate in design, others had weathered away to mere stumps. When we arrived at the bottom of the trail, we were able to see the full scale of the Buddha. It was HUGE, and worth the hike!

Later that afternoon, I met up with one of my classmates, a Korean whose job sent him to Chengdu for language training. He and his wife invited myself and another classmate to join them for lunch on Sunday. It should be fun. I seem to be really busy with these kinds of get-togethers. I always appreciate that people are willing to take us newbies in. On Friday I'll be having dinner at one of my neighbor's homes, and Sunday evening I will be cooking spaghetti for a Chinese family that has taken me in.

I still think my toilet is the best--

2006-10-17T07:56:00.000-07:00

But mine doesn't have the tongue feature.

2006-10-17T07:44:00.000-07:00

Wal-Mart!

2006-10-17T05:46:00.000-07:00

I believe I've posted before about how much I like Wal-Mart. Oh, I know it's not the most well liked or politically correct place to hang out, but I still love it. The crowds of people, the cheap prices, the stuff scattered across the floor... It's just great!

There's several Western type stores scattered about Chengdu. The one I frequent the most is called Trust Mart. Century Mart and Carrefour run a close second. Although all three of these stores have more of a "Western" feel to them than say, your average street vendor, they are still distinctly Chinese. Because of the crowds, these stores are almost overwhelming to shop in. This is only worsened by the sales people who shout the day's special using megaphones.

I'd read somewhere that Wal-Mart was advancing on China, but I had no idea there was one in Chengdu. Then, one day I was staring at my Chengdu map when I saw it: in the far corner, in the opposite direction of my house, there was a little notation, "Wal-Mart".

After assertaining that Sarah was indeed willing to come with me, we set a date. Wal-Mart is on the opposite end of town, but we figured we would just bike there and see how long it took us. Biking everywhere has helped me gain an understanding of how the city is laid out. For that reason, I like to bike whenever I get the chance. The day arrived, we pointed our handlebars in the right direction, and headed out.

It took us over an hour to get there, but we arrived in one piece and without getting lost (this is a feat in itself!). Wal-Mart was actually a part of a larger shopping complex, which included several Chinese clothing stores and a KFC. It seems wherever there is a Western store, there is a KFC nearby.

We manueverd our bikes toward the bicycle parking lot, noticing a group of Wal-Mart employees smoking near the entrance. I commented to Sarah, "The don't look too disgruntled." She agreed, and we made our way into the shopping center.

Wal-Mart was an escalator ride up, and a short trip around the corner to find the entrance. There were no Wal-Mart greeters, and all the employees wore bright red shirts instead of those silly vests they wear in the States.

Wal-Mart had the best variety out of all the grocery stores I've been to. I picked up some banana bread, spaghetti noodles, dried coconut, and a couple of storage bins. What made Wal-Mart nicer than some of the other stores was the lack of crowds. The aisles were wider, and although there were a ton of people there, you didn't feel suffocated like you do in Trust Mart. Best of all, there were no megaphones to be found. The prices were good, the variety was good, and the people were sort-of friendly. What more could you ask for?

It's Saturday!

2006-10-14T00:14:00.000-07:00

Ahh, Saturday. A day to relax and catch up on all the blogging I haven't been doing. I usually have a list of things I wish to blog about, but when I sit down to my computer, I only have the energy and time to blog one or two things.

It's been yet another exciting week in the good ol' PRC. My bike, "The Batmobile" has been holding up fairly well since I bought it. While I was riding my bike to school, a car actually scraped my front tire. I was riding through an alley way that I take (the "secret way" is what Sarah and I call it). When I came to the mouth of the alley, I stopped my bike to wait for an opportunity to cross the street. The mouth of the alley is on a narrow two-lane street. About fifteen feet from where I stood there is a sharp, 90-degree turn. That morning there was a large, overloaded truck trying to negotiate that 90-degree turn while the cars heading in the opposite direction either stopped or tried to use the sidewalk as a passing route. It looked like I would be able to make a clean break through the traffic as most of the cars had come to a stop. Horns were blaring, and people were yelling. I slowly pushed my bike out into the road when something caught my eye. A car was trying to squeeze around the right side of the truck. I pulled my bike back a few inches to let the car through. As he passed, the front wheel of my bike scraped along the side of his car. SCHREEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!! I stood in fascinated horror as the rubber from my tire painted a black streak across the new VW.

A little later that week, my front tire popped.

I think I saw one of these yesterday--

2006-10-11T06:08:00.000-07:00

It was in a restaurant.

If you value your sanity--

2006-10-11T05:51:00.000-07:00

Do not even think about clicking this link. I've warned you.

WARDEN NOTICE: Possible Nucle...

2006-10-10T07:24:00.000-07:00

That's what me and many other Americans woke up to find in our email inboxes. I've posted the contents of the email below.

WARDEN NOTICE: Possible Nuclear Test in North Korea

AmCitBeijing to undisclosed-re.
More options Oct 9 (12 hours ago)

On Monday, October 9, U.S. and South Korean intelligence services detected a seismic event at a suspected nuclear test site in North Korea. North Korea has claimed it conducted an underground nuclear test, but these reports are unconfirmed. The United States Government is monitoring the situation closely. As of the morning of October 10, the Embassy has received no information from any source indicating that there are health dangers that pose a risk to American citizens in any areas of China.

Actually, this was just an email from the consulate. I get them fairly often, but this one made me laugh. Honestly, the potential of a second head or glowing skin didn't even occur to me until today. And now I'm freaked out.

I still like my toilet better--

2006-10-08T09:24:00.000-07:00

But it's lacking that personal touch.

Baijiu

2006-10-08T04:22:00.000-07:00

This would be my vision of satan.

Mysterious English of the Holiday Break, So Far--

2006-10-08T04:01:00.000-07:00

What caught my attention was the "No Crowding." They should put a "Drive Safe" sign next to it.
Then, I looked up and saw this beauty--

This one is especially for you, Sarah:

2006-10-08T03:55:00.000-07:00

Pink Barbie boots are back--

It's Monday!

2006-10-07T04:04:00.000-07:00

I didn't shower for three days, and my fellow passengers were starting to stink.

We started our trip early Sunday morning. Leaving our apartment in the dark of the morning, my roommate and I walked to the street corner where we were met by a cab. We shoved our bags in the back, and directed the driver to Sichuan University. He dropped us off a few minutes early, so Sarah took off to see if our other classmate, Matthew was awake. We'd been calling him all morning to make sure he woke up on time, but so far had no luck. A bus was waiting for us; I hopped in and pointed the driver in the direction Sarah had just run. Pretty soon we were all nestled in the back of the minibus driving around Chengdu picking up fellow passengers.

After about an hour, we pulled up to a bus stop and were directed to a larger bus. We threw our stuff underneath, and again piled into the back.

The bus ride from Chengdu to Chongqing was about four hours. Every hour or so, the bus would pull over and let everyone out for a squat pot break. The highway passed through farmland and towns, we went through small valleys and over large hills. After living in no-hills Chengdu, the change of scenery was a welcome one.

Chongqing (pronounced Chong Ching) lies sprawled out over several large hills overlooking the Yangtze. It was foggy the day we arrived, but I suspect that like all the places I've been so far, it's "foggy" most of the time.

We were met at the bus stop by an English speaking guide. In reality, she was a travel agent who was there to sell us on all the different tour options we could buy. It worked out well though, we booked a tour of the Three Gorges Dam, train and bus tickets from her. After taking care of business we left in search of Carrefour, the French version of Wal-Mart.

We bought a ton of supplies and made our way back to the travel agency where we were led down to the river by one of the agents.

Because the water level is rising, the ships are not moored onto permenant docks. Instead, there is a series of barges roped together. You must walk barge-to-barge, and then ship-to-ship until you can board your own.

We opted to take one of the cruises designed for Chinese tourists. The Westerner cruise takes place on the classy Victoria. We however, sailed on the #7.

My classmates and I booked a third-class cabin, meaning we would be sharing with three other people.

The cruise wasn't large; maybe four-hundred passengers in total. It had a small restaurant and bar that were only open at meal times. The ship was old; the steel floors were warped and uneven. One got the impression that the ship had already sunk, and was somehow hauled back to the surface to be put to use once again.

A mother, father, and their daughter whose English name was Lily were our fellow cabin mates. Lily is in sixth grade, and wants to be a singer when she grows up. At one point during the trip she even sang for us. She was good. Really good.

We left Chongqing that evening. The city's skyline was an amazing show of laser lights and neon. We all crowded out of our rooms and pushed our way out of steerage to the upper decks. I stood on the second floor deck and let the wind blow across my face.

"You can't come up here. You don't have the card." I looked to my right. A steerage cop stood there, glaring at me. She had the look of a hardened lunch lady. She'd seen all the tricks, and there was no way I was going to get past her. She stuck her hand out, "The card is 55 kuai."

I snorted and retreated back to steerage. I waited for a moment and watched as my classmates were also kicked out. We stood at the bottom of the stairs for a moment before coming to a decision.

"Let's just sneak past her. I don't see why we should have to pay. Honestly, sneaking past her will make this trip all the more fun." We waited a few minutes, and then proceeded back up the stairs. This time, we were allowed to stay on deck a few minutes before we were finally sent back to steerage.

It wasn't until the next day that we discovered that we needed the 55 kuai card in order to enter the bar, have a seat on deck, go to the restaurant, or spend any amount of time outside of steerage. Eventually, the lack of seats in steerage drove us to forking over the money.

The first stop we made was at the Ghost City Temple. Here's some pictures:

The rest of the first day was spent on the boat. We were the only Americans on board. There was one other Westerner, a teacher named Jess. She's from Great Britian, and had already spent the better part of a year in China. We fast made friends.

Life on the upper decks is pretty casual. Everyone sits on plastic stools and sips tea as they watch the scenery go by.

We were pretty popular, and made a lot of new Chinese friends. Actually, if we stood around for too long, we became the subjects of people's photographs.

Everyday we were awakened early in the morning by our tour guide who rounded us like cattle and made sure we got off the boat on time.

The afternoon of the third day we went on a tour of the Little Three Gorges and the Little Little Three Gorges. That morning we had passed through the first of the Three Gorges.
We were taken off the cruise ship and led to smaller boats that would take us into the small gorges. They were beautiful!

On the return trip, several of our fellow passengers just had to talk with us. One man from Harbin kept asking questions about American politics. He spoke with such a heavy accent, that even if we could answer him, we still wouldn't have understood him. After about five minutes of him yelling questions about Bin Laden and George Bush at us, some other passengers came by and started "interpreting" what he was saying. Pretty soon we had a crowd of Chinese people all yelling at each other and at us. My classmates and I just sat and stared. I kept trying to look away and make it obvious I didn't want to talk, but they were having none of it. All was not in vain however, we were invited to join them for dinner on board the cruise ship.

We met the gentleman(?) in the restaurant. There was already a table full of food, and I noticed he was carrying a bottle of Chinese rice wine (Baijiu), also known as "satan's brew." I'd heard of this tradition before, and was warned that I would probably have to take part in one of these rice wine drinking banquets.

As we sat down to eat, he pulled out small plastic cups and filled them to the brim with baijiu. Then he started toasting us. I took a tiny sip of the wine and recoiled in horror. The stuff was painful. It didn't quite burn, it was almost sweet. I continued taking baby sips, each one tasting worse than the one before. Finally during one toast, Sarah and I looked at each other and gulped the entire thing.

It hit me like a ton of bricks. I was very near drunk. Meanwhile, our host had broken out the preserved meat products and was using his chopsticks to fill my bowl with them. The dinner went on like this for about another hour. By the time I felt steady enough to stand up, our hosts were paying the bill. I pushed away from the table, waiting for the sloshing in my stomach to settle, and walked outside.

It was strange, I was clear-headed but I could still feel the baijiu sloshing around in my stomach. I sat on the back deck amid the smokers, while the boat rocked, and my stomach churned with spam and alcohol.

We got off the boat early the next day. We had bought tickets for a tour of the damn dam. Once again, we booked one of the Chinese tours, meaning we spent the morning running around from scenic spot to scenic spot, taking as many pictures as we could manage before we were herded back onto the bus.

Here's a picture of me beautifying the dam. The last day of our trip was spent in Wuhan. We read up in a guidebook that Mao Zedong had a villa in the city. We asked our hotel clerks about buses, and headed off in search of Mao's pad. As it turned out, the place was closed. I did get some good pictures of the road to Mao's place and the city.

Just a side note: heres the Captain's Quarters on the #7:

You can all see the pictures of a Baijiu advertisement I saw above.

National Day

2006-09-29T07:14:00.000-07:00

My roommate and I bought tickets for the Yangtze River cruise. We'll be traveling with one other classmate. The itinerary is as follows: On Sunday we'll take a bus from Chengdu to Chongqing. We'll arrive in Chongqing early afternoon, and be given a half-day tour of the city. That evening we'll board the boat.

My understanding is that we are going to be taking one of the cruises that are designed for Chinese tourists. I've been trying to find some information on these cruises, and so far haven't come up with much. Needless to say, blogging will be light for a few days.

We'll be on the boat for three days, making occasional stops at a few of the tourist traps along the way. On Wednesday, we disembark at Yichang. From there we must find our own way back to Chengdu. There are several possibilities: take the bus from Yichang to Chongqing and then another bus to Chengdu. We could also take the bus to Wuhan, and from there either catch a train or buy a plane ticket back to Chengdu. Wuhan isn't too far from Yichang, but traveling the further distance would require us to backtrack a bit. The third possibility is to buy a ferry ticket from Yichang back to Chongqing, and then buy another bus or train ticket.

Wish us luck. Traveling during the holiday is notoriously difficult.