So today was my first teaching class. We were doing an oral lesson on Halloween for some employees of Kelloggs. The day did not start well as there was no hot water this morning to wash my hair and I managed to get the wrong bus not once but twice on my way to the school... I was a little bit late which I was annoyed at as I detest other people being late and always try to be nice and early myself.
However the lesson went well in the end! We made pumpkin lanterns which had a few interesting moments. The pumpkins supplied were very small and hard so several of the knives were broken. The Chinese were not dismayed however and happily hacked away with scissors. One group put their candle in the pumpkin and tried to light it inside using a wad of tissue. This didn't work so they tried using newspaper. They used rather a lot and it immediately went up in flames. The Chinese guy squawked a bit and dropped it onto some more newspaper. I, at this point, was checking out where the ermegency exit was. However he rallied and squashed some more newspaper on top which had the effect of snuffing it out and calm was restored. And the candle was lit.
I wonder what one's chances are of escaping from a burning skyscraper. High, do you think?
I told them all a ghost story I had made up and they were actually pretty scared by it! I just babbled on about a guy who didn't believe in Halloween, and then some ghost children punished him for not doing a trick or giving them sweets so now he believes in Halloween :P I threw in the odd bowl of soup turning into blood and a skeleton hand on the window for good measure and they all went oooooo.
Raymond, Fairy, Edward (3rd teacher of theirs-Chinese) and I went to the same restaurant as I had been to on Tuesday. It is apparently quite famous which explains why everyone I know always squees at the mention of its name. Raymond had asked what food I like and I had mention the fried pork in a sweet sauce and he had immediately though of that place. It is a North-Eastern Chinese dish and that restaurant specialises in that. So free nice dinner :D
However the really annoying downside is that I have to go and teach at the Kelloggs factory in a city called Yishui. This is so far away I and Raymond, and maybe others, have to go there on Friday night so we can be there early enough on the Saturday to teach. This means I will spend all of Saturday teaching, which will earn lots of lovely money if a tad exhausting! Buuuut this means I can't go and do the commercial for the Asian Games which had sounded really fun and paid well. The company rang me up a minute ago and I had to say no, which was painful. Then they rang me up again to try and change my mind because apparently the commercial shooters really wanted me. Gah! Hopefully they will remember me when something similar is wanted and I can start my acting career then :P But I figured that it was better to spend my time getting a job that potentially pays a 1000 a week rather than one that pays 1000 a day... Plus 6 hours of teaching on Saturday plus another hour on Halloween equals 910kuai which is around £91- only £9 less than the commercial. And I get to go to Yishui! Yay...
The other downside is that I can't see Vivien tomorrow as planned so I have had to reschedule her to Sunday. Luckily she didn't mind. Dammit, work gets in the way of my fun...
I am now planning 6 hours of classes. Not as easy as it looks!
2010-10-27
Laowai War...
As it was Becka's boyfriend, James,'s birthday we went out to dinner. We asked around to see who was free and wanted to come and both Nick and Helen could make it. Various other people couldn't make it for various reasons which was cool as it was supposed to be if you're free come, if not don't worry. This was to cause problems later...
So we went to the restaurant and spent ages picking what to get. We carefully looked up every character to translate each dish and then wrangled over the best combination. We hailed the waitress and confidently declared our choices to which the standard reply was “没有”, "we've run out". This took the wind out of our sails a tad so in the end we just stabbed with our fingers and went with that. We got lots of small fishes in some sort of stew. I think the fish was mackerel but not sure. Becka squeezed an eye out and tried to get someone to eat it but there were no takers. We also had shredded pork and pepper and shredded beef and shredded vegetables. I spotted that another laowai table, looked like a student and his parents, had got some 锅巴肉. This is an insanely tasty dish that I had forgotten about so that was duly summoned. It consists of deep-fried pork in a very sweet sauce. You can't eat very much of it, it is rather sickly, but boy is it heaven when you do. I also forced a bottle of Tsingtao beer down. Being in China, and Qingdao especially, I have figured that I am going to have to learn to like beer. So I am making myself drink at least a bottle everytime we go out. Bleurgh.
And then we went to LPG for more drinkies. A little while later more friends of ours turned up. Now Helen, as I found out afterwards, and Anthony don't get on apparently so Helen, being slightly tipsy by this point, took him not being at the meal as an excuse to get very very cross with him. He, not really welcoming being shouted at, promptly told her to fuck off which she took personally and then...
To cut a long story short there was a scene and tears and an almost-fight between Anthony and Helen's boyfriend who is also Anthony's best friend so awkward... and Becka, James and I were left feeling rather helpless. We weren't bothered in the slightest that Anthony had had to go to dinner with his football team, which he'd agreed to first, rather than someone he's never met's birthday party. So it was a bit out of order for Helen to cause such a scene. And it was out of order for him to say some of the things he did... Neither really came off well! Which is a shame as I've been getting on really well with both.
Sometimes life here is so different to the UK and then sometimes, so not...
After all that neither Anthony nor Becka nor Helen came to class today (although Becka made it to the 2nd). Bit sad:(
The weather here is very strange at the moment. If you are out of the wind and in the sun it is very warm and pleasant. But the second you are in the wind and shade it is absolutely freezing. The central heating in this building is controlled centrally and they haven't switched it on yet which has been ok so far- I grew up with my Mum after all in 14 degrees :P, but it won't be long before it gets uncomfortable. I saw a sign stuck to the lift that said that the central heating equipment is being checked this weekend and that we must be in our rooms "without fail". However it doesn't say when, other than Saturday and Sunday and I'm not spending my entire weekend in my room waiting!
I have a trial class tomorrow and am petrified. I have to teach my students about Halloween and help them make Jack-o-lanterns. Bearing in mind these are businessmen... I'm worried that we will not have enough time. I remember that Jack-o-lanterns take fairly long to do and the lesson is only an hour and in that I have to teach and tell ghost stories as well as make talismans to ward off evil spirits!
This has the potential to be a really embarassing disaster. Why do I not take the easy way? I always end up making my life more difficult than it needs to be... *panic*
So we went to the restaurant and spent ages picking what to get. We carefully looked up every character to translate each dish and then wrangled over the best combination. We hailed the waitress and confidently declared our choices to which the standard reply was “没有”, "we've run out". This took the wind out of our sails a tad so in the end we just stabbed with our fingers and went with that. We got lots of small fishes in some sort of stew. I think the fish was mackerel but not sure. Becka squeezed an eye out and tried to get someone to eat it but there were no takers. We also had shredded pork and pepper and shredded beef and shredded vegetables. I spotted that another laowai table, looked like a student and his parents, had got some 锅巴肉. This is an insanely tasty dish that I had forgotten about so that was duly summoned. It consists of deep-fried pork in a very sweet sauce. You can't eat very much of it, it is rather sickly, but boy is it heaven when you do. I also forced a bottle of Tsingtao beer down. Being in China, and Qingdao especially, I have figured that I am going to have to learn to like beer. So I am making myself drink at least a bottle everytime we go out. Bleurgh.
And then we went to LPG for more drinkies. A little while later more friends of ours turned up. Now Helen, as I found out afterwards, and Anthony don't get on apparently so Helen, being slightly tipsy by this point, took him not being at the meal as an excuse to get very very cross with him. He, not really welcoming being shouted at, promptly told her to fuck off which she took personally and then...
To cut a long story short there was a scene and tears and an almost-fight between Anthony and Helen's boyfriend who is also Anthony's best friend so awkward... and Becka, James and I were left feeling rather helpless. We weren't bothered in the slightest that Anthony had had to go to dinner with his football team, which he'd agreed to first, rather than someone he's never met's birthday party. So it was a bit out of order for Helen to cause such a scene. And it was out of order for him to say some of the things he did... Neither really came off well! Which is a shame as I've been getting on really well with both.
Sometimes life here is so different to the UK and then sometimes, so not...
After all that neither Anthony nor Becka nor Helen came to class today (although Becka made it to the 2nd). Bit sad:(
The weather here is very strange at the moment. If you are out of the wind and in the sun it is very warm and pleasant. But the second you are in the wind and shade it is absolutely freezing. The central heating in this building is controlled centrally and they haven't switched it on yet which has been ok so far- I grew up with my Mum after all in 14 degrees :P, but it won't be long before it gets uncomfortable. I saw a sign stuck to the lift that said that the central heating equipment is being checked this weekend and that we must be in our rooms "without fail". However it doesn't say when, other than Saturday and Sunday and I'm not spending my entire weekend in my room waiting!
I have a trial class tomorrow and am petrified. I have to teach my students about Halloween and help them make Jack-o-lanterns. Bearing in mind these are businessmen... I'm worried that we will not have enough time. I remember that Jack-o-lanterns take fairly long to do and the lesson is only an hour and in that I have to teach and tell ghost stories as well as make talismans to ward off evil spirits!
This has the potential to be a really embarassing disaster. Why do I not take the easy way? I always end up making my life more difficult than it needs to be... *panic*
2010-10-26
It Talks!
A post on "Talking Dog Syndrome". That is, when a Chinese person sees a Westerner approaching they do not expect them to start speaking Chinese. Just like if a dog approaches, in fact. Thus they are pretty sure they are not going to understand what you say and when you do start speaking Mandarin, and even if all you ask is "what time is it?" they will be so astonished that they will not be listening and thus will not understand.
This was demonstrated at lunch today when Kash asked for more meat, a very simple sentence, and at first just could not make himself understood despite speaking correctly and with a pretty good accent.
Went to a 兰州, Lanzhou, restaurant. Lanzhou people look Chinese but are Muslim and thus their cuisine relies more on meat/potato stew type meals which I prefer. A family was running it and all were wearing those Muslim caps and there was Arabic writing on the walls. The son was running around industriously serving customers as I suspect they can't afford schooling. Free schooling is a Capitalist idea evidently...
I am sorely tempted to go the Bentley shop and ask how many cars they sell a week. Or a month. Or at all. Although I suspect they might actually make more sales than I realise. For there to be this many luxury goods shops, there are more Prada stores than McDonalds I swear, there has to be a large number of very wealthy people. And I reckon there is a sizeable amount- purely because of the huge wealth gap that is developing here in China. Sure there are a lot of uber-rich, but these are complemented by masses and masses of dirt-poor people surviving on very little. In the UK the gap is smaller so there are fewer uber rich and thus this must be why there are so few Prada shops around.
There was a very cold wind today. Uber-cold. It was actually warm in the sun and out of the wind but the wind itself was the coldest I've ever felt. I have a horrible feeling that Anthony was not exaggerating how cold it gets here over winter...
This was demonstrated at lunch today when Kash asked for more meat, a very simple sentence, and at first just could not make himself understood despite speaking correctly and with a pretty good accent.
Went to a 兰州, Lanzhou, restaurant. Lanzhou people look Chinese but are Muslim and thus their cuisine relies more on meat/potato stew type meals which I prefer. A family was running it and all were wearing those Muslim caps and there was Arabic writing on the walls. The son was running around industriously serving customers as I suspect they can't afford schooling. Free schooling is a Capitalist idea evidently...
I am sorely tempted to go the Bentley shop and ask how many cars they sell a week. Or a month. Or at all. Although I suspect they might actually make more sales than I realise. For there to be this many luxury goods shops, there are more Prada stores than McDonalds I swear, there has to be a large number of very wealthy people. And I reckon there is a sizeable amount- purely because of the huge wealth gap that is developing here in China. Sure there are a lot of uber-rich, but these are complemented by masses and masses of dirt-poor people surviving on very little. In the UK the gap is smaller so there are fewer uber rich and thus this must be why there are so few Prada shops around.
There was a very cold wind today. Uber-cold. It was actually warm in the sun and out of the wind but the wind itself was the coldest I've ever felt. I have a horrible feeling that Anthony was not exaggerating how cold it gets here over winter...
2010-10-25
I Want One
The weather here seems to have a pattern where it is warm and generally still weather for several days, allowing banks of smog to build up, before freezing winds pick up, howl and blow all night, leaving Qingdao clear and crisp the next day. Which is nice. Or was, as I have noticed that each time the winds arrive, they are slightly colder than before, and it never quite warms up fully afterwards... I suspect Autumn may have reached us here at last. Qingdao, by virtue of being on a peninsula, is kept warm by the ocean so Autumn here is delayed a month. The flip side of this is that Spring is also delayed, but I'll worry about that later!
Anthony has acquired an ipod touch. I have never really liked ipods etc, seeing them as overpriced and, if technology can be so, far too smug. Plus I hate Macs. However there is now nothing I crave more than an ipod touch-purely because it is so damn useful for Chinese. You can look up characters very quickly by drawing them on the screen. It gives you extensive definitions and example sentences as well as a video of the stroke order. I love my battered paper dictionary but I fear that its bulk and time consuming method of looking up characters which requires you to know the radical of a character (which sometimes can be annoyingly obscure), plus lack of example sentences, means that I now crave a small, slick ipod touch. You have to understand that I am basically illiterate out here and this is just as large disadvantage here as it is at home. And if it takes me 60s with my paper dictionary to look up one character, and there can easily be 5 in a sentence I don't know, it'll take 5 minutes to read a sentence. 5 minutes I might not have... Hence why spending £150 on such a gadget might be worth it.
God I miss having an alphabet.
Plus an ipod plays music, can make Skype phone calls, can check emails and other useful things. I just need to persuade my parents to get me one for Christmas... Or rather, reimburse me as I really want one NOW...
I went to where I am potentially going to work. Raymond said that if anyone asks, I am a full-time teacher. Fairy has blue contact lenses. These don't quite work if you are Chinese with Chinese black eyes. But kudos for trying. They want me to talk about Halloween with some Kelloggs employees and tell ghost stories. And show them how to make pumpkin lanterns...
On the way I go past the Town Hall which from the front is Big and Splendid with smart guards and a fleet of black mercedes parked in front. It faces May 4th Square which is a huge avenue running down to the coast ending with a bizarre red lego sculpture. All very impressive. However my route then takes me along the side and round the back is the washing line with all the uniforms on :P
I finally plucked up the courage to text Vivien about her being my language partner. She sounds fantastic from her texts! She said "I am somewhat heavy but still a lovely person!". Chinese girls are very self concious about their weight. I'm looking forward to meeting her on Friday and practising my oral Chinese which is frankly appalling. Fingers crossed it goes well :)
I thought I might talk a bit about Chinese buses. They cost around 10p a ticket, although the 501 charges 20p and Becka and I have boycotted this one in protest. They specialise in fast moves in and out of traffic, normally if there is a female driver the slaloms are faster and more aggressive, and have an annoying design flaw where some seats at the back have nowhere to put your feet as the wheel compartment juts up leaving you with your knees level with your face. I am curious, and the Chinese seem to be as well as they keep trying, as to how many Chinese can fit on one single decker bus. A bus pulls up, absolutely crammed with people, faces squashed against the glass, and I've seen around 20 more eagerly push on, leaving around 10 on the last step huddled together as the doors bang shut again and again on their backs.
But they never give up and get off...
As Becka and I get more sinified we too are now braving the uber full buses and have found out that actually it's not the getting on that's the problem, it's the getting off... by the time your stop arrives you will have been inexorably pushed to the middle of the bus and have to barge through a solid wall of bodies to reach a door. And I mean solid! You inevitably leave ripples of angry Chinese whose ribs you've barged through to escape. Oh well.
Becka, James and I went in search of kebabs today and all the street sellers have disappeared... Where have they gone? Why? Are they coming back? We had to have McDonalds in the end and the cashier girl decided to interpret my saying I wanted five chicken nugget pieces as 10 and by the time I'd noticed I couldn't be bothered to change it. So now I'm pretty nuggeted out.
Anthony has acquired an ipod touch. I have never really liked ipods etc, seeing them as overpriced and, if technology can be so, far too smug. Plus I hate Macs. However there is now nothing I crave more than an ipod touch-purely because it is so damn useful for Chinese. You can look up characters very quickly by drawing them on the screen. It gives you extensive definitions and example sentences as well as a video of the stroke order. I love my battered paper dictionary but I fear that its bulk and time consuming method of looking up characters which requires you to know the radical of a character (which sometimes can be annoyingly obscure), plus lack of example sentences, means that I now crave a small, slick ipod touch. You have to understand that I am basically illiterate out here and this is just as large disadvantage here as it is at home. And if it takes me 60s with my paper dictionary to look up one character, and there can easily be 5 in a sentence I don't know, it'll take 5 minutes to read a sentence. 5 minutes I might not have... Hence why spending £150 on such a gadget might be worth it.
God I miss having an alphabet.
Plus an ipod plays music, can make Skype phone calls, can check emails and other useful things. I just need to persuade my parents to get me one for Christmas... Or rather, reimburse me as I really want one NOW...
I went to where I am potentially going to work. Raymond said that if anyone asks, I am a full-time teacher. Fairy has blue contact lenses. These don't quite work if you are Chinese with Chinese black eyes. But kudos for trying. They want me to talk about Halloween with some Kelloggs employees and tell ghost stories. And show them how to make pumpkin lanterns...
On the way I go past the Town Hall which from the front is Big and Splendid with smart guards and a fleet of black mercedes parked in front. It faces May 4th Square which is a huge avenue running down to the coast ending with a bizarre red lego sculpture. All very impressive. However my route then takes me along the side and round the back is the washing line with all the uniforms on :P
I finally plucked up the courage to text Vivien about her being my language partner. She sounds fantastic from her texts! She said "I am somewhat heavy but still a lovely person!". Chinese girls are very self concious about their weight. I'm looking forward to meeting her on Friday and practising my oral Chinese which is frankly appalling. Fingers crossed it goes well :)
I thought I might talk a bit about Chinese buses. They cost around 10p a ticket, although the 501 charges 20p and Becka and I have boycotted this one in protest. They specialise in fast moves in and out of traffic, normally if there is a female driver the slaloms are faster and more aggressive, and have an annoying design flaw where some seats at the back have nowhere to put your feet as the wheel compartment juts up leaving you with your knees level with your face. I am curious, and the Chinese seem to be as well as they keep trying, as to how many Chinese can fit on one single decker bus. A bus pulls up, absolutely crammed with people, faces squashed against the glass, and I've seen around 20 more eagerly push on, leaving around 10 on the last step huddled together as the doors bang shut again and again on their backs.
But they never give up and get off...
As Becka and I get more sinified we too are now braving the uber full buses and have found out that actually it's not the getting on that's the problem, it's the getting off... by the time your stop arrives you will have been inexorably pushed to the middle of the bus and have to barge through a solid wall of bodies to reach a door. And I mean solid! You inevitably leave ripples of angry Chinese whose ribs you've barged through to escape. Oh well.
Becka, James and I went in search of kebabs today and all the street sellers have disappeared... Where have they gone? Why? Are they coming back? We had to have McDonalds in the end and the cashier girl decided to interpret my saying I wanted five chicken nugget pieces as 10 and by the time I'd noticed I couldn't be bothered to change it. So now I'm pretty nuggeted out.
2010-10-24
Omg what made that noise...
This morning I crawled out of bed determined to spend my Sunday morning doing something healthy. I at last decided to climb 浮山,Fushan, which may or may not mean Floating Mountain... It's the high ridge of peaks behind my campus that is not quite as large or impressive as Laoshan but still still quite wild considering it is in the middle of a city. James, Becka's boyfriend who arrived yesterday, has brought me a camera and I was happily snapping away. To get there I walked up 青大一路, Qingdao University 1 Road, where we normally eat lunch. There are some workmen enthusiastically digging it up so I had to negociate my way past a massive gash in the road, with fairly heavy duty piping at the bottom. It still amazes me how fast they can work here in China- in the UK digging a hole as large as that would take days. Here they can do it overnight. I'm willing to bet it will all be back to normal by tomorrow! I carried on past the house where I want to live, basically a tiny concrete hut with a lake and some ducks, and picked a random path and started climbing. The one I chose was a tiny track winding off into the wood that grew increasingly overgrown as I walked. I noticed that part of the hill was terraced although the stone embankments were starting to fall down and the surfaces were long buried in undergrowth. I passed what was clearly the outline of a house underneath the tangly bushes as well. The woodland here was mostly thin, dry conifers and deciduous trees with largely open ground between them- just dry grasses and reeds.
Although there had been a lot of Chinese walkers at the beginning, once I left the main road and started on my track I was completely alone, just me and several butterflies.
At this point I wondered if there were any big scary things still wandering around in China these days.
I think it is the natural instinct of a human, when walking alone, to start to get the heeby-jeebies- however ridiculous that is! It's interesting how I have never needed to watch out for predators my entire life and yet something in the back of mind is ready, just in case, with a pricked ear. And coming across a mound of feathers didn't reassure me... My track led down a gully and then turned up a ridge and I was back on slightly more open ground, with human shoeprints in the dust and I stopped twitching at every rustle.
I just carried on along picking random paths which varied from dust to scrambling over rocks until I eventually arrived at the ridge at the top. My arrival caused an immediate hush in the Chinese at the top, before they started talking again. Except two who started whispering instead. I still find it odd how eternally surprised the Chinese are to see a white person.
Although it was, as ever, smoggy I could now see Qingdao both sides of the mountain and a teeny smudge of the sea. The sea-side part is much the nicer with the old town and the more fancily designed skyscrapers. The other side is just row after row of slightly decaying high-rise blocks. And a random giant, golden-domed mosque. This when I saw how Qingdao, which has a relatively small surface area, could contain such a mass as 7 million people. The numbers are so big in China it's impossible to comprehend what it must be like to be one person in so so many. You must feel like such a small fish in such a large pond! The entire population of the UK could move to China and it would barely cause a ripple. They abort the equivalent of two times the population of Scotland in foetuses here per year alone.
After a while I headed back down, slipping and sliding much to the amusement of some Chinese who told me to be careful, proudly in English. Eventually I reached the bottom, past a reservoir with a sign saying "washing clothes is not permitted" and several Chinese women doing just that, past a farmhouse with chickens and a vegetable patch-I want to live there so badly- and home.
In the afternoon, Becka, Nick, James and I headed off to see a man about appearing in their commercial for the Guangzhou games. White people make these things look better. Kenton, the scout who found us, said that the agency would also ask us to other bits and bobs of work which is welcome as you can earn quite a bit for not much. This commercial pays us 600元- 1000元 if I wear a bikini apparently...
This article irritated me so much:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/oct/23/china-west-expansionist-influence
In it the author shows every classic Western misapprehension and misunderstanding about China. I bet the author's never been near China in his life. And it shows the classic depiction of the protest of Tiananmen Square in 1989 as pro-democracy innocent students Good People Fighting the Machine when it was nothing of the sort. Awful piece of journalism.
Although there had been a lot of Chinese walkers at the beginning, once I left the main road and started on my track I was completely alone, just me and several butterflies.
At this point I wondered if there were any big scary things still wandering around in China these days.
I think it is the natural instinct of a human, when walking alone, to start to get the heeby-jeebies- however ridiculous that is! It's interesting how I have never needed to watch out for predators my entire life and yet something in the back of mind is ready, just in case, with a pricked ear. And coming across a mound of feathers didn't reassure me... My track led down a gully and then turned up a ridge and I was back on slightly more open ground, with human shoeprints in the dust and I stopped twitching at every rustle.
I just carried on along picking random paths which varied from dust to scrambling over rocks until I eventually arrived at the ridge at the top. My arrival caused an immediate hush in the Chinese at the top, before they started talking again. Except two who started whispering instead. I still find it odd how eternally surprised the Chinese are to see a white person.
Although it was, as ever, smoggy I could now see Qingdao both sides of the mountain and a teeny smudge of the sea. The sea-side part is much the nicer with the old town and the more fancily designed skyscrapers. The other side is just row after row of slightly decaying high-rise blocks. And a random giant, golden-domed mosque. This when I saw how Qingdao, which has a relatively small surface area, could contain such a mass as 7 million people. The numbers are so big in China it's impossible to comprehend what it must be like to be one person in so so many. You must feel like such a small fish in such a large pond! The entire population of the UK could move to China and it would barely cause a ripple. They abort the equivalent of two times the population of Scotland in foetuses here per year alone.
After a while I headed back down, slipping and sliding much to the amusement of some Chinese who told me to be careful, proudly in English. Eventually I reached the bottom, past a reservoir with a sign saying "washing clothes is not permitted" and several Chinese women doing just that, past a farmhouse with chickens and a vegetable patch-I want to live there so badly- and home.
In the afternoon, Becka, Nick, James and I headed off to see a man about appearing in their commercial for the Guangzhou games. White people make these things look better. Kenton, the scout who found us, said that the agency would also ask us to other bits and bobs of work which is welcome as you can earn quite a bit for not much. This commercial pays us 600元- 1000元 if I wear a bikini apparently...
This article irritated me so much:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/oct/23/china-west-expansionist-influence
In it the author shows every classic Western misapprehension and misunderstanding about China. I bet the author's never been near China in his life. And it shows the classic depiction of the protest of Tiananmen Square in 1989 as pro-democracy innocent students Good People Fighting the Machine when it was nothing of the sort. Awful piece of journalism.
2010-10-23
The Start of My Movie Career
Friday class had a sticky moment when for the last hour we were down to a mere three men- myself, Becka and a Russian. Needless to say, the atmosphere was a little forced.
A friend of Peter's turned up on the hunt for laowai to appear in a commerical for the Guangzhou Asian Games. They like having laowai as it makes everything look more modern and sophisticated. The end result is that several of us are going to pretend to be spectators/volunteers and appear on TV :D Exciting! Plus we get 600元 for our efforts which is equally exciting!
Further on the job front, I went for an interview with Raymond today. I was met at the bus stop by Fairy (dilemma: does one point out that their choice of name exposes themselves to ridicule or tactfully keep quiet?) and taken to the 20th floor of a random building. The school specialises in teaching businessmen from companies such as Kelloggs' etc and sounds ideal for me. My role would be to focus on their oral and aural skills for 5-10 hours a week. I'd get 130元 an hour to start off with and see where we went from there-which is a pretty good deal. I have to do some trial lessons first so hopefully I will be clued up enough to run those well. I'll probably get Anthony to give me a hand as well. Fingers crossed a job will work out!
Went to LPG with Nick last night. We were meeting some distant friends of his, or rather friends of friends. One was a teacher here (although not of English- I think he taught IT or something) and another was from Nashville, Tennessee, who owned a tyre-making company "tyres bigger than this room" and had factories out here. He showed me lots of photos of his daughter's wedding in Las Vegas. Interestingly for me he had been to 徐州, Xuzhou, which is a city around 5 hours away. Near there is a farm breeding 果下, Guoxia, Under the Fruit Tree, horses. These are horses that are so small they can walk under fruit trees. A retired vet professor I know through the Exmoors wants me to collect some hair samples for him so I am going to go and visit and yank some hairs from some poor unsuspecting beastie. Anyway, Frank, his name was, was surprised at anyone voluntarily wanting to go to such a place and happily nattered away about how end-of-the-line it was. I suspect it was not quite as bad as he made out as he is used to a higher standard than poor students like me. Plus part of the reason we want to go is that we want to visit unremarkable parts of China to get a real feel for the place. But it did sound, er, like it wasn't exactly a holiday destination.
Xuzhou is a city of 7 million people. Nearly the size of London and yet its global presence is less significant than Loughborough. The numbers here boggle the mind. My province, Shandong, has 90 million people in. The largest has 120 million. How does such a huge behemoth even begin to function as a cohesive state?
I ordered chips as I was hungry and when they arrived the fat American girl squealed "who ordered French Fries!" and started shovelling them into her mouth. I was not impressed.
A friend of Peter's turned up on the hunt for laowai to appear in a commerical for the Guangzhou Asian Games. They like having laowai as it makes everything look more modern and sophisticated. The end result is that several of us are going to pretend to be spectators/volunteers and appear on TV :D Exciting! Plus we get 600元 for our efforts which is equally exciting!
Further on the job front, I went for an interview with Raymond today. I was met at the bus stop by Fairy (dilemma: does one point out that their choice of name exposes themselves to ridicule or tactfully keep quiet?) and taken to the 20th floor of a random building. The school specialises in teaching businessmen from companies such as Kelloggs' etc and sounds ideal for me. My role would be to focus on their oral and aural skills for 5-10 hours a week. I'd get 130元 an hour to start off with and see where we went from there-which is a pretty good deal. I have to do some trial lessons first so hopefully I will be clued up enough to run those well. I'll probably get Anthony to give me a hand as well. Fingers crossed a job will work out!
Went to LPG with Nick last night. We were meeting some distant friends of his, or rather friends of friends. One was a teacher here (although not of English- I think he taught IT or something) and another was from Nashville, Tennessee, who owned a tyre-making company "tyres bigger than this room" and had factories out here. He showed me lots of photos of his daughter's wedding in Las Vegas. Interestingly for me he had been to 徐州, Xuzhou, which is a city around 5 hours away. Near there is a farm breeding 果下, Guoxia, Under the Fruit Tree, horses. These are horses that are so small they can walk under fruit trees. A retired vet professor I know through the Exmoors wants me to collect some hair samples for him so I am going to go and visit and yank some hairs from some poor unsuspecting beastie. Anyway, Frank, his name was, was surprised at anyone voluntarily wanting to go to such a place and happily nattered away about how end-of-the-line it was. I suspect it was not quite as bad as he made out as he is used to a higher standard than poor students like me. Plus part of the reason we want to go is that we want to visit unremarkable parts of China to get a real feel for the place. But it did sound, er, like it wasn't exactly a holiday destination.
Xuzhou is a city of 7 million people. Nearly the size of London and yet its global presence is less significant than Loughborough. The numbers here boggle the mind. My province, Shandong, has 90 million people in. The largest has 120 million. How does such a huge behemoth even begin to function as a cohesive state?
I ordered chips as I was hungry and when they arrived the fat American girl squealed "who ordered French Fries!" and started shovelling them into her mouth. I was not impressed.
2010-10-21
崂山
So today was the long awaited trip to 崂山, Laoshan, Mount Lao. Got a lovely lie-in for an extra half an hour and then skidaddled over to meet the coach that was taking "B 班" "B class" to Laoshan. Kash had said he was coming but predictably when Becka rang, he was still in bed :P Well he missed out!
We set off. Becka fidgeted the whole way as her chair wouldn't stay upright- she always seems to get a broken chair... Qingdao is covered in statues of massive red characters all declaring "文明赢得尊重""Civilisation wins respect". China is on a drive to become better-mannered and thus have become great fans of this concept of 文明. They have it everywhere. Not sure it's working... They also have the concept of 公安, Public Security...
We drove to a different entrance than the one we had tried to go to before so we drove inland. There was a moment, that I received with mixed feelings, when the driver had to brake suddenly to avoid hitting a car in front. I had thought he'd crashed but we were ok. I wished the bus had seatbelts. While we were waiting at the lights, a bus with schoolchildren pulled alongside and we had a one of those "Across the Language Barrier" moments when they all waved at us and we waved back. The Korean lads made faces against the glass to amuse the kids. Heart-warming moment.
Passed a skyscraper-in-progress that had 爱丁堡 in huge letters on the side. This means Edinburgh. The walls around the site had a huge recurring picture of a mounted soldier from the Household Cavalry stuck on. This confused me...
We also passed what looked like a garden centre. Odd, as most Chinese don't have a garden. There were huge statues of Romanesque cavalrymen-I want one! We also drove by 海大 (Haida-shorthand for my University)'s laoshan campus. It was huge!
As we carried on into the countryside modern buildings gave way to rows and rows of little red-tiled brick houses. They are arranged around tiny courtyards with tiny alleys separating them. I'm sure they are not desirable to live in but my British fondness for all things quaint adored them. Interestingly, a lot of them had solar panels on the roofs. The Chinese government is surprisingly green you know. We also passed Qingdao International Horticultural Extension- which looked like a collection of stubby conifers... Nearby was a school and we could see all the kids doing their morning exercise, 锻炼, in the playground in lovely conforming unison.
As we travelled further into the hills we could make out terraces on the sides. I wasn't sure what was being grown on them as they looked the same as the scrub either sides. The farmhouses were tiny. I now want a tiny rundown house with some land and scrawny chickens...
The final part was through a village (which may or not have been called Yellow Cow Village) which was all dilapidated and full of debris and I loved it. Then up a hill, which produced an interesting moment where our driver, who may or may not ever have driven a coach before, kept stalling driving up the hill causing us to roll back alarmingly. Then, just past the Sanatorium, we arrived.
Laoshan must be one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited. The Yosemite National Park was impressive, the Highlands of Scotland had a brooding beauty, but this Chinese mountain is probably the prettiest. The route we chose took us up along the banks of a river. The water was crystal clear, so clear you could see the fish darting around near the bottom of the pools that had collected along the river's course. The water level was quite low as there hasn't been much rain lately so great boulders, white with dryness, lay carelessly scattered around the riverbed. Either side the mountain reared up high, cloaked in conifers and small trees. Autumn is just beginning here so red and yellow were scattered amongst the green. Pillars of creamy rock pointed up at the blue sky through the forest.
Laoshan is quite spiritual for the Chinese and many of the great boulders had Chinese characters carved or painted on. I wasn't sure what they meant as many were in the Running Script, which is a stylised type of handwriting that was not meant to be read. At least by inexperienced laowai. One Big Daddy of a rock had dragons carved on it around a text. Up behind it was a pavillion that gave a great view down the valley. Becka and I had osmosed into a group with 2 Germans and 2 Koreans so we had lots of group photos. The Eastern tradition is to to make a V sign with both hands and smile cheesily- I stuck to a Reserved British smile.
A track led up off the main path and though we didn't follow it, I saw an iron lamppost at the top which reminded me of Narnia. We also passed a tiny vegetable patch nestled amongst some rocks. If a vegetable patch can be cute, this definitely was.
As we climbed we passed several small cafes serving tea. There is a local type grown here. I bought a tin for my Dad's birthday- if I can get it to him back in the UK. I thought it was a lovely place to run a cafe. At one was a Chinese film crew. I watched the presenter try some Laoshan tea and go mmm delicious! We also had to walk across large bridges which were constructed with planks attached to ropes so it wobbled alarmingly-especially when the Korean lads jumped up and down. All part of the fun. We encountered a phalanx of people walking down all dressed in pink, followed by some in red, then some in green and so on covering the whole rainbow. Weren't sure who they were- they were a mix of Chinese and laowai.
The path ended in a waterfall cascading down from a cleft high in the mountain and ending in a deep pool. I wonder what secret little spring the river starts from, known only to the magpies I guess. There was a cafe carved from the stone to one side of the quiet pool and a pavillion opposite on an outcrop. More pictures with V signs. There was a policeman wandering around to make sure we didn't jump in the water. Mountain pools are strange place to find the Law but there you go.
Then we turned back a bit and followed a fork which eventually lead to the peak of the mountain. I got there first as the others are weaklings, :P, and golly it was steep climbing! Still I made it, puffing and red-faced, to find a pavillion on the summit as well as a small cafe (when I say cafe in China I mean some small tables with a tarpaulin) as well as a policeman mooching around. Lol, or not. The view was spectacular. You could see the autumnal forest falling away from the rocky peaks all around. Nearby was a huge pillar of rock around which two magpies were showing off their acrobatic flying skills, twisting and tumbling in the air.
I sat in the pavillion, all warm in the sun, waiting for the others. I ate my sandwich which was part egg mayonaise part Nasty. Once again a perfectly nice food ruined by the Chinese... The nearby specimens of the breed were enjoying themselves admiring the view. They like climbing mountains here. They also kept hollering to slower family members further down which ruined the peaceful atmosphere a little but hey.
Eventually the others arrived and after they had eaten their food we set off down a different route. This took us through a smaller valley which was more densely forested. We passed a small temple. The most spectacular bit was when we came to a huge, black pool floating on the side of the mountain. There was a wooden bridge over it that one side was bordered by the dark, silent water and on the other a huge drop. The water level was so low that the waterfall that should have been there was really a trickle. You could see the rockface that would normally be obscured by water and the gouges made by the erosion were evident. Strange to think that water can do such things to rock! The little trickle looked so innocent by comparison. The bridge turned into a wooden walkway clinging onto a cliff. There was a fantastic view down the valley of the river, with its silent pools floating on different levels, and the beautiful painted foliage either side.
We hurried the last way as we hadn't much time before we were supposed to be meeting to go home. Back through the hamlet that feeds the hotels and restaurants, and where they were happily digging up the entire road, to the meeting point.
To cut a long story short we waited an hour on the coach (in the "Car Pack") for some ditzy Russians. Grrr.
On the way pack we passed a Guard Dog School, complete with a poster of German Shepherds attacking humans in various ways as well as one embarrassed looking Rottweiler. Our driver showed off his Skillz by letting the coach freewheel down the hill and nearly hitting a rock outcrop.
English of the Day: "No Striding!""Danger- Rock the Bridge!" I'm afraid we did Stride but we did at least obey the one ordering us to rock the bridge...
Did I mention that 崂山 is stunning?
We set off. Becka fidgeted the whole way as her chair wouldn't stay upright- she always seems to get a broken chair... Qingdao is covered in statues of massive red characters all declaring "文明赢得尊重""Civilisation wins respect". China is on a drive to become better-mannered and thus have become great fans of this concept of 文明. They have it everywhere. Not sure it's working... They also have the concept of 公安, Public Security...
We drove to a different entrance than the one we had tried to go to before so we drove inland. There was a moment, that I received with mixed feelings, when the driver had to brake suddenly to avoid hitting a car in front. I had thought he'd crashed but we were ok. I wished the bus had seatbelts. While we were waiting at the lights, a bus with schoolchildren pulled alongside and we had a one of those "Across the Language Barrier" moments when they all waved at us and we waved back. The Korean lads made faces against the glass to amuse the kids. Heart-warming moment.
Passed a skyscraper-in-progress that had 爱丁堡 in huge letters on the side. This means Edinburgh. The walls around the site had a huge recurring picture of a mounted soldier from the Household Cavalry stuck on. This confused me...
We also passed what looked like a garden centre. Odd, as most Chinese don't have a garden. There were huge statues of Romanesque cavalrymen-I want one! We also drove by 海大 (Haida-shorthand for my University)'s laoshan campus. It was huge!
As we carried on into the countryside modern buildings gave way to rows and rows of little red-tiled brick houses. They are arranged around tiny courtyards with tiny alleys separating them. I'm sure they are not desirable to live in but my British fondness for all things quaint adored them. Interestingly, a lot of them had solar panels on the roofs. The Chinese government is surprisingly green you know. We also passed Qingdao International Horticultural Extension- which looked like a collection of stubby conifers... Nearby was a school and we could see all the kids doing their morning exercise, 锻炼, in the playground in lovely conforming unison.
As we travelled further into the hills we could make out terraces on the sides. I wasn't sure what was being grown on them as they looked the same as the scrub either sides. The farmhouses were tiny. I now want a tiny rundown house with some land and scrawny chickens...
The final part was through a village (which may or not have been called Yellow Cow Village) which was all dilapidated and full of debris and I loved it. Then up a hill, which produced an interesting moment where our driver, who may or may not ever have driven a coach before, kept stalling driving up the hill causing us to roll back alarmingly. Then, just past the Sanatorium, we arrived.
Laoshan must be one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited. The Yosemite National Park was impressive, the Highlands of Scotland had a brooding beauty, but this Chinese mountain is probably the prettiest. The route we chose took us up along the banks of a river. The water was crystal clear, so clear you could see the fish darting around near the bottom of the pools that had collected along the river's course. The water level was quite low as there hasn't been much rain lately so great boulders, white with dryness, lay carelessly scattered around the riverbed. Either side the mountain reared up high, cloaked in conifers and small trees. Autumn is just beginning here so red and yellow were scattered amongst the green. Pillars of creamy rock pointed up at the blue sky through the forest.
Laoshan is quite spiritual for the Chinese and many of the great boulders had Chinese characters carved or painted on. I wasn't sure what they meant as many were in the Running Script, which is a stylised type of handwriting that was not meant to be read. At least by inexperienced laowai. One Big Daddy of a rock had dragons carved on it around a text. Up behind it was a pavillion that gave a great view down the valley. Becka and I had osmosed into a group with 2 Germans and 2 Koreans so we had lots of group photos. The Eastern tradition is to to make a V sign with both hands and smile cheesily- I stuck to a Reserved British smile.
A track led up off the main path and though we didn't follow it, I saw an iron lamppost at the top which reminded me of Narnia. We also passed a tiny vegetable patch nestled amongst some rocks. If a vegetable patch can be cute, this definitely was.
As we climbed we passed several small cafes serving tea. There is a local type grown here. I bought a tin for my Dad's birthday- if I can get it to him back in the UK. I thought it was a lovely place to run a cafe. At one was a Chinese film crew. I watched the presenter try some Laoshan tea and go mmm delicious! We also had to walk across large bridges which were constructed with planks attached to ropes so it wobbled alarmingly-especially when the Korean lads jumped up and down. All part of the fun. We encountered a phalanx of people walking down all dressed in pink, followed by some in red, then some in green and so on covering the whole rainbow. Weren't sure who they were- they were a mix of Chinese and laowai.
The path ended in a waterfall cascading down from a cleft high in the mountain and ending in a deep pool. I wonder what secret little spring the river starts from, known only to the magpies I guess. There was a cafe carved from the stone to one side of the quiet pool and a pavillion opposite on an outcrop. More pictures with V signs. There was a policeman wandering around to make sure we didn't jump in the water. Mountain pools are strange place to find the Law but there you go.
Then we turned back a bit and followed a fork which eventually lead to the peak of the mountain. I got there first as the others are weaklings, :P, and golly it was steep climbing! Still I made it, puffing and red-faced, to find a pavillion on the summit as well as a small cafe (when I say cafe in China I mean some small tables with a tarpaulin) as well as a policeman mooching around. Lol, or not. The view was spectacular. You could see the autumnal forest falling away from the rocky peaks all around. Nearby was a huge pillar of rock around which two magpies were showing off their acrobatic flying skills, twisting and tumbling in the air.
I sat in the pavillion, all warm in the sun, waiting for the others. I ate my sandwich which was part egg mayonaise part Nasty. Once again a perfectly nice food ruined by the Chinese... The nearby specimens of the breed were enjoying themselves admiring the view. They like climbing mountains here. They also kept hollering to slower family members further down which ruined the peaceful atmosphere a little but hey.
Eventually the others arrived and after they had eaten their food we set off down a different route. This took us through a smaller valley which was more densely forested. We passed a small temple. The most spectacular bit was when we came to a huge, black pool floating on the side of the mountain. There was a wooden bridge over it that one side was bordered by the dark, silent water and on the other a huge drop. The water level was so low that the waterfall that should have been there was really a trickle. You could see the rockface that would normally be obscured by water and the gouges made by the erosion were evident. Strange to think that water can do such things to rock! The little trickle looked so innocent by comparison. The bridge turned into a wooden walkway clinging onto a cliff. There was a fantastic view down the valley of the river, with its silent pools floating on different levels, and the beautiful painted foliage either side.
We hurried the last way as we hadn't much time before we were supposed to be meeting to go home. Back through the hamlet that feeds the hotels and restaurants, and where they were happily digging up the entire road, to the meeting point.
To cut a long story short we waited an hour on the coach (in the "Car Pack") for some ditzy Russians. Grrr.
On the way pack we passed a Guard Dog School, complete with a poster of German Shepherds attacking humans in various ways as well as one embarrassed looking Rottweiler. Our driver showed off his Skillz by letting the coach freewheel down the hill and nearly hitting a rock outcrop.
English of the Day: "No Striding!""Danger- Rock the Bridge!" I'm afraid we did Stride but we did at least obey the one ordering us to rock the bridge...
Did I mention that 崂山 is stunning?
2010-10-20
EW TENTACLES NO
Went to a restaurant for dinner. I ordered 五花肉比管 on the basis that 五花肉 is bacon and I figured 比管 couldn't mean anything more than stew or something. However, it does mean more than stew. It means a teeny weeny bit of bacon served in a pile, nay a HEAP of squid, slimy, flaccid tentacles and all.
I don't like squid. I don't do things with tentacles. I extracted a piece of bacon but couldn't handle the plate of tentacles, complete with suckers, in front of me and pushed it away to the corner of the table. *Shudders*. I ate a bit of the shredded raw potato smothered in oil before just munching my way through a cake.
Oh China, you do ruin food. Potato should be served roasted or boiled or fried or mashed. Not raw! What a waste!
Tomorrow we are going on a class trip to 崂山. The Chinese like climbing mountains. We were told to bring a packed lunch so we went along to the shop and perused the selection of sandwiches. Not for China the sensible combination of cheese and pickle, or ham and lettuce, no there must be Weird Stuff. I opted for what may or may not be egg (I can't believe it is) and, er, rice sandwich. Not sure who thought the rice was a good idea...
Job Offer of the Day: Helen's listening teacher had asked Helen if she wanted a job but as Helen already has a job, she gave the teacher my number. I got rung up this evening by a nice-sounding gentleman who I will see some time this weekend to talk more. Fingers crossed this one bears fruit!
Tommy, Anthony's student, keeps texting me. I wanted a language partner not a limpet... Anthony recommends being blunt and telling him not to text 24/7 as the Chinese don't do hints but I haven't been out here long enough to entirely lose my English reserve. I'm just not replying and seeing if that works...
I don't like squid. I don't do things with tentacles. I extracted a piece of bacon but couldn't handle the plate of tentacles, complete with suckers, in front of me and pushed it away to the corner of the table. *Shudders*. I ate a bit of the shredded raw potato smothered in oil before just munching my way through a cake.
Oh China, you do ruin food. Potato should be served roasted or boiled or fried or mashed. Not raw! What a waste!
Tomorrow we are going on a class trip to 崂山. The Chinese like climbing mountains. We were told to bring a packed lunch so we went along to the shop and perused the selection of sandwiches. Not for China the sensible combination of cheese and pickle, or ham and lettuce, no there must be Weird Stuff. I opted for what may or may not be egg (I can't believe it is) and, er, rice sandwich. Not sure who thought the rice was a good idea...
Job Offer of the Day: Helen's listening teacher had asked Helen if she wanted a job but as Helen already has a job, she gave the teacher my number. I got rung up this evening by a nice-sounding gentleman who I will see some time this weekend to talk more. Fingers crossed this one bears fruit!
Tommy, Anthony's student, keeps texting me. I wanted a language partner not a limpet... Anthony recommends being blunt and telling him not to text 24/7 as the Chinese don't do hints but I haven't been out here long enough to entirely lose my English reserve. I'm just not replying and seeing if that works...
2010-10-19
God Save the Queen!
Whilst life here is very different to home, some things never change... Predictably, my room had got in a state so I spent a good while tidying and sorting. I tried to pin my wonderful paintings up but the walls here are concrete not plaster so that failed. It was the first time I'd tried it so should have guessed it wouldn't work... I then went downstairs to borrow a brush, as I have done before. However no sooner had I grabbed the brush than the receptionist hurried over and started chittering at me that I couldn't take the dustban and brush. I did not understand a word why. At least, I did but not in the context. She asked for my room number and went on about someone giving me something. All I wanted was to sweep my room. I implied this to her and she carried on chittering. I replied that it would take me 5 minutes if I just took the brush and swept the room. Eventually she gave up and I could make off with my prize. The impression I got was that I'd go and wait in my room and someone would bring me a brush... which sounds like classic Chinese logic. They like making things complicated. So that was my Communication Fail of the Day.
Another offer of a job has found me. We shall if this one bears fruit.
I had to go and put money on my phone today. Phones here are incredibly annoying as if you run out of credit you can't even receive calls/texts. You also can't check your balance so you have no idea when you will run out. And to refill you have to go to a shop and not just ring a number like nice, lovely, easy-peasy England... I went along and tried to work the machine but was flummoxed by the bit asking me to enter my phone number a second time to check I had entered it right the first time. I didn't understand the characters and thought it wanted some other number that I didn't have. Luckily the security guard, delighted at having something to do, came over and happily pressed everything for me. Bless.
In class today we somehow arrived at a point in the lesson where the teacher asked us all to sing our respective national anthems. There were 4 of us Englishmen so we went first and gave a good rendition, complete with nur nur nur nur in the middle, of God Save the Queen. Except I was too busy laughing to sing properly. The whole thing is so alien to the rest of the class. The Russians shot their kings, the Chinese packed them away and the Koreans must have done something to them as they are now a Republic. The Japanese may have an Emperor but the concept of God as we know it is still pretty foreign to them.
The Russians were too shy to sing- plus only one seemed to know the words. The Koreans gave a good performance. They look like a country that sings their anthem in class a lot. The lone American bravely sang but had forgotten the words so just hummed the tune. Then the teacher sang the Chinese one and it was all about Workers Rising Up and other inspiring exhortations. The Congolese sang hers and it sounded very melodic.
The teacher also talked a little about the One Child Policy. Interestingly, ethnic minorities can have two children. I knew that peasants could have a second child if the first was a girl but did not know about the minorities. I thought that was quite caring of the Chinese government to take such a measure to protect the minorities and not try and Mandarinise them.
My reading teacher told me her English and Polish names: Karen and Monika. I should probably try and find out her Chinese name one day too...
Another offer of a job has found me. We shall if this one bears fruit.
I had to go and put money on my phone today. Phones here are incredibly annoying as if you run out of credit you can't even receive calls/texts. You also can't check your balance so you have no idea when you will run out. And to refill you have to go to a shop and not just ring a number like nice, lovely, easy-peasy England... I went along and tried to work the machine but was flummoxed by the bit asking me to enter my phone number a second time to check I had entered it right the first time. I didn't understand the characters and thought it wanted some other number that I didn't have. Luckily the security guard, delighted at having something to do, came over and happily pressed everything for me. Bless.
In class today we somehow arrived at a point in the lesson where the teacher asked us all to sing our respective national anthems. There were 4 of us Englishmen so we went first and gave a good rendition, complete with nur nur nur nur in the middle, of God Save the Queen. Except I was too busy laughing to sing properly. The whole thing is so alien to the rest of the class. The Russians shot their kings, the Chinese packed them away and the Koreans must have done something to them as they are now a Republic. The Japanese may have an Emperor but the concept of God as we know it is still pretty foreign to them.
The Russians were too shy to sing- plus only one seemed to know the words. The Koreans gave a good performance. They look like a country that sings their anthem in class a lot. The lone American bravely sang but had forgotten the words so just hummed the tune. Then the teacher sang the Chinese one and it was all about Workers Rising Up and other inspiring exhortations. The Congolese sang hers and it sounded very melodic.
The teacher also talked a little about the One Child Policy. Interestingly, ethnic minorities can have two children. I knew that peasants could have a second child if the first was a girl but did not know about the minorities. I thought that was quite caring of the Chinese government to take such a measure to protect the minorities and not try and Mandarinise them.
My reading teacher told me her English and Polish names: Karen and Monika. I should probably try and find out her Chinese name one day too...
2010-10-18
The Furture Mrs Dong?
We had lunch at a Korean place and I had 拌饭, baofan, a mixed meal. Portions of vegetables and rice are served in a little pot (placed on a hot plate so it keeps cooking) with a fried egg placed on top. Today there were also pink bean thingies that tasted like meat. Were they meat? Who knows... The aim of the game is to mix everything up, including the egg, before you eat it. The broken egg yolk is cooked by the hot rice so the rice is nice and eggy. I, however, refuse to do this, as I think it spoils the individual flavours, so I just eat everything without mixing and leave the yummy egg, intact, til last. I think that the reason I prefer Western cuisine is that meals are normally served up with a portion of this, a portion of that etc. With Eastern, everything is shredded and mixed together so it is easier to eat with chopsticks. This means each mouthful tastes the same, which gets boring. I like having a bit of potato, then the taste of pie, then the different taste of say, carrot.
I always ask for "不要辣"-"don't want spice". This amuses them- the laowai can't handle a little heat...
While we were eating I noticed a massive hairy caterpillar on my shoulder. I screamed and knocked it off. That wouldn't happen in Edinburgh. Humph.
I went with Anthony to his school as I had an informal interview with his boss about a job. I helped out in Anthony's class-which consisted of several 20 year-old Chinese people desperately trying to avoid saying anything. They had to find out about me and what my interests were etc. The Chinese can be quite blunt, especially the guys, and sure enough the classic "do you have a boyfriend" came up. I explained you don't ask British people that straightaway... They also asked, out of an American, an Englishman and a Chinese man, who I would date. I pointed out that I would choose based on personality not nationality and you shouldn't judge people on race. I did clarify that I would never date an American though:P
I told them about Tibby, my pet cat. Another girl had two cats and we had a squee moment over how cute cats are. Ahem. Another amusing moment was a girl asking if I liked football. I said yes, and then she got really worried that if she went to the UK she would have to like football too...
I told them a bit about Scotland. They knew nothing, except that Scottish men "wear dresses".
I was offered the teaching job but I have decided not to accept as it is too few hours a week (2-3) and I would only have a couple of weeks off at Spring Festival when I want at least 4. Plus it would be teaching children and I would prefer older students.
Becka and I had dinner with Tommy. He took us to another Korean restaurant. I was a bit fazed at first as the waiters kept carrying pots overflowing with flaming hot coals around. I felt this was a hazard. Their purpose, other than to make customers get out of the waiter's way, was to be placed under and thus heat the hot plates in the middle of the tables. Streaky bacon was cooked on this hot plate and then you wrapped it in lettuce and ate it like that. There was also thicker meat of some animal or t'other and a proper looking steak that was chopped up-which I thought was sacrilege. The steak was cooked from frozen which I thought you were never supposed to do... We also had lots of little free dishes like seaweed, a dollop of cold mashed potato (quite yummy actually-had carrot in it) and 茶蛋, chadan, which are eggs that have spent some time in a bowl of tea. It was the first time I tried them and they did not offend the tastebuds as much as I had feared. Lastly, there was a pot of vegetable soup that had peppers in it. It looked very spicy but Tommy was like oh you have come to China you must try everything so I had it and it burned my mouth off and I TOLD YOU SO. Tommy apologised while I gulped down water.
Tommy was lovely and paid for it all. I had been worrying through the day as Anthony had implied the difference between a language partner and a fiance is about 2 weeks... Plus he said that Tommy liked Western girls and Tommy had texted me "好梦" "sweet dreams" two out of the last three nights...so I made sure Becka came along Nice and Friendly. However we had a really good time and were chatting away like ol chums so no danger there I think. Although he would actually make a good husband- he's got a stable job which pays enough for him to afford to learn English. Perhaps I should not be too hasty...
I love the institution of Chinese Marriage. The other day I was on the bus travelling down the main road and there was a wedding "convoy". At the front was a convertible, roof down, with the bonnet covered in flowers. Inside was a groom driving, and the bride in a big poofy dress and with flowers in her hair. Following behind were several black cars with pink ribbons tied to the doorhandles. Being black, with blacked out windows, made them slightly menacing looking. The pink ribbons added to this rather than detracted...They travelled so slowly that my bus kept pace with them despite stopping for passengers.
In class today we did sport. Anthony explained the Offside Rule clearly and correctly. In fluent Mandarin. He gets points for that.
I always ask for "不要辣"-"don't want spice". This amuses them- the laowai can't handle a little heat...
While we were eating I noticed a massive hairy caterpillar on my shoulder. I screamed and knocked it off. That wouldn't happen in Edinburgh. Humph.
I went with Anthony to his school as I had an informal interview with his boss about a job. I helped out in Anthony's class-which consisted of several 20 year-old Chinese people desperately trying to avoid saying anything. They had to find out about me and what my interests were etc. The Chinese can be quite blunt, especially the guys, and sure enough the classic "do you have a boyfriend" came up. I explained you don't ask British people that straightaway... They also asked, out of an American, an Englishman and a Chinese man, who I would date. I pointed out that I would choose based on personality not nationality and you shouldn't judge people on race. I did clarify that I would never date an American though:P
I told them about Tibby, my pet cat. Another girl had two cats and we had a squee moment over how cute cats are. Ahem. Another amusing moment was a girl asking if I liked football. I said yes, and then she got really worried that if she went to the UK she would have to like football too...
I told them a bit about Scotland. They knew nothing, except that Scottish men "wear dresses".
I was offered the teaching job but I have decided not to accept as it is too few hours a week (2-3) and I would only have a couple of weeks off at Spring Festival when I want at least 4. Plus it would be teaching children and I would prefer older students.
Becka and I had dinner with Tommy. He took us to another Korean restaurant. I was a bit fazed at first as the waiters kept carrying pots overflowing with flaming hot coals around. I felt this was a hazard. Their purpose, other than to make customers get out of the waiter's way, was to be placed under and thus heat the hot plates in the middle of the tables. Streaky bacon was cooked on this hot plate and then you wrapped it in lettuce and ate it like that. There was also thicker meat of some animal or t'other and a proper looking steak that was chopped up-which I thought was sacrilege. The steak was cooked from frozen which I thought you were never supposed to do... We also had lots of little free dishes like seaweed, a dollop of cold mashed potato (quite yummy actually-had carrot in it) and 茶蛋, chadan, which are eggs that have spent some time in a bowl of tea. It was the first time I tried them and they did not offend the tastebuds as much as I had feared. Lastly, there was a pot of vegetable soup that had peppers in it. It looked very spicy but Tommy was like oh you have come to China you must try everything so I had it and it burned my mouth off and I TOLD YOU SO. Tommy apologised while I gulped down water.
Tommy was lovely and paid for it all. I had been worrying through the day as Anthony had implied the difference between a language partner and a fiance is about 2 weeks... Plus he said that Tommy liked Western girls and Tommy had texted me "好梦" "sweet dreams" two out of the last three nights...so I made sure Becka came along Nice and Friendly. However we had a really good time and were chatting away like ol chums so no danger there I think. Although he would actually make a good husband- he's got a stable job which pays enough for him to afford to learn English. Perhaps I should not be too hasty...
I love the institution of Chinese Marriage. The other day I was on the bus travelling down the main road and there was a wedding "convoy". At the front was a convertible, roof down, with the bonnet covered in flowers. Inside was a groom driving, and the bride in a big poofy dress and with flowers in her hair. Following behind were several black cars with pink ribbons tied to the doorhandles. Being black, with blacked out windows, made them slightly menacing looking. The pink ribbons added to this rather than detracted...They travelled so slowly that my bus kept pace with them despite stopping for passengers.
In class today we did sport. Anthony explained the Offside Rule clearly and correctly. In fluent Mandarin. He gets points for that.
2010-10-16
干杯!
I think today totally exemplifies my new maxim that nothing works the first time you try it in China. I had organised Ghassan, Daisy and Becka to catch a bus to go and check out 崂山Mount Lao. This is a famous mountain here in Shandong and apparently it is the tallest mountain on China's coastline. It was once covered in many temples and monasteries but a lot of these have since been destroyed. I don't know when but I suspect the Cultural Revolution... Anyway Becka and I were feeling a little tired as had been to a birthday party last night. It was the birthday of Pierre who is a French Canadian. He calls me Nicole as he thinks I look like Nicole Kidman and I make fun of him for being a French Canadian. Last night was the first time we met but we seem to have happily settled into insults. We met quite a few new people last night which was great fun.
Although there were only a couple of Chinese people there, several Chinese traditions were still in use:P There is a exhortation here called 干杯, ganbei, which means finish your glass. When someone says this you have to down your drink and heaven help you if it's 白酒-baijiu-basically paintstripper. Chinese businessmen love getting Western businessmen very drunk on it. Luckily we only had beer- and suspiciously watery beer at that. Which was good as the tradition at birthdays is that the birthday boy has to down a glass with everyone there one by one. This can result in a lot of alcohol being ingested... Luckily Pierre managed it without throwing up. Another fun tradition was throwing bits of his cake at him at the end. That is a real one apparently but I might check before I do that myself... Anyway I had a great time squashed up with lovely interesting new people (the table was way to too small for 20 people...) and the Chinese way of dining is very conducive to parties as you order dishes and then take what you want rather than have your own meal alone. We had the classic 糖醋肌理, sweet and sour pork, as well as some sort of honey glazed pork (was delicious). There was some vegetable in a gravy sauce that was lovely as well as grated potato-not sure about that one. There were also great big bowls of a fantastically tasty fish stew. Normally fish isnt my thing but I was digging into that. And a lot of beer.
A moment that had me nearly crying with laughter was when Pierre, drunk, was shouting "服务员!!!", fuwuyuan, waiter, at the top of his voice and getting exactly no answer.
Then we shipped off to LPG. I met Kash's boss by accident. He started talking to me and said he worked in real estate and I asked if he knew Kash, a real shot in the dark, and he said he did and then pulled a face. I didn't delve any further as I know Kash doesn't work there any more... He was very nice although for some reason I said something a bit more angrily than I meant to and he wondered why I was being aggressive. I felt a bit mortified and then spent the next few minutes of conversation trying to be extra nice. He was from Texas. Perhaps that was why.
Anthony also introduced me to Tommy who is a student of his. The idea was we could practise English/Chinese and we had a good time chatting about this and that in various languages. I gave him my phone number and when I had left to go home, he texted me saying 好梦, which means sweet dreams. Aahhhh.
There is a pole at LPG and there was also a pole dancer. She was Chinese, wearing a lot of leather (well not a lot...she was in fact wearing very little. It was just all leather) and waving a red leather flail. She was very confident. The very opposite of your average Chinese girl- who tends to be coy, giggly, and wearing a Hello Kitty sweater. Most of the guys there were too embarrassed to watch but Becka and I just stood there staring in awe :P
Most of my class appeared to be in the bar and I found myself playing some dice game with some Russians and Ukranians. I played it a bit but still have no idea of the rules.
So back to this morning. We caught the bus and headed out. It was a way away but I rather enjoyed seeing more of Qingdao. The skyscrapers eventually turned into low brick housing with red tiled roofs and yellow painted walls. There were fields of this and that as well as a group of bee hives. Which were placed right next to a bus stop... On one side of the road was the ocean, which was very sparkly and inviting in the sun, and on the other were rocky mountains covered in sparse shrubs. Annoyingly at first were a group of Americans on the bus who continued to prove my theory that Americans talk louder than everyone else. There was one guy whose drawl about his sexual exploits sounded throughout the entire bus. I didn't miss them when they got off. We passed a sign about "China Sport Lottery". I see a lot of signs for this but am not sure what it is. I am, however, reminded inexorably of the Lottery in 1984... We also passed a river full of wooden Chinese junks which was scenic to see.
Eventually we arrived at Laoshan, or rather the carpark. There was the usual greeting party of randomers offering taxi rides for a million pounds. However we found out that tickets were 100元 to get in to 崂山 and while this was a fair price we decided it would be a waste as it was very smoggy today. You could not see very far at all. So as we had been enjoying the bus ride we hopped back on, much to the bewilderment of the conductor at 4 laowais getting a bus to 崂山 but not staying..., and travelled a bit further to the end of the line. So our first attempt at going to 崂山 had ended in failure- as do so many first attempts in China...
We got out at some bus station, watched a woman sweep our bus and then we got back on in the same seats. We decided to buy tickets to 石老人, shilaoren, old stone man, but when we reached that stop we realised it wasn't what we wanted as it was basically the side of the road. However the conductor shouted at us that it was our stop and we declined. Then the rest of the bus, thinking we didn't understand, started eagerly telling us it was our stop. After a while we convinced them we knew what we were doing and then we got off at the next stop. There was a row of shops/restaurants and as Ghassan was starving we went to get food. Normally little restaurants are a bit dirty and the furniture is all mismatched and covered in sticky stuff but this one had shiny fake wood tables and chairs and was spotless. I had lamb kebabs and roast slices of potato on a skewer and they were the first things I have eaten in China that were actually truly delicious. They were all covered in rosemary and tasted soooo goooood. The 老板, laoban, owner, was a bit of a character and was loving having four laowai in. He was making little jokes and happily saying any English words he knew. He had a newspaper with a picture of Obama and brought it out thinking we were American and was a bit disappointed when we weren't.
Damn those lamb kebabs were good.
The food was so tasty and the laoban so entertaining we think getting the bus out there just to go to the restaurant might be worth it:P
Then Daisy and I headed to 书城 Book City, as I wanted a copy of a book called 聊斋志异, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio. It is a book of folk tales written by a civil servant around 200ish years ago. Bizarrely, they had books such as Lady Chatterly's Lover, Plato's Republic, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and Barchester Towers.. the first seems a bit steamy for the Chinese, who like to keep such things under wraps, and the rest... well... Plato's Republic??? I confidently bet that there is not a single person in the whole of China, out of 1.3billion, who has read that, or will...
I also found a book written by a Chinese man who had travelled in Britain in the 1940s. There were several different ones, one on Oxford, one on London, one on "Lakeland"(I'm thinking Lake District) and one on Edinburgh. Naturally I grabbed the Edinburgh one. It was full of sketches and paintings he'd done of Edinburgh that were very true to life. I could recognise the places instantly and he had captured the gloomy Scottish rain very well :P He had done one of a panda outside the Balmoral though... I am very much looking forward to working my way through that. I miss Edinburgh- I love that place way too much.
Although there were only a couple of Chinese people there, several Chinese traditions were still in use:P There is a exhortation here called 干杯, ganbei, which means finish your glass. When someone says this you have to down your drink and heaven help you if it's 白酒-baijiu-basically paintstripper. Chinese businessmen love getting Western businessmen very drunk on it. Luckily we only had beer- and suspiciously watery beer at that. Which was good as the tradition at birthdays is that the birthday boy has to down a glass with everyone there one by one. This can result in a lot of alcohol being ingested... Luckily Pierre managed it without throwing up. Another fun tradition was throwing bits of his cake at him at the end. That is a real one apparently but I might check before I do that myself... Anyway I had a great time squashed up with lovely interesting new people (the table was way to too small for 20 people...) and the Chinese way of dining is very conducive to parties as you order dishes and then take what you want rather than have your own meal alone. We had the classic 糖醋肌理, sweet and sour pork, as well as some sort of honey glazed pork (was delicious). There was some vegetable in a gravy sauce that was lovely as well as grated potato-not sure about that one. There were also great big bowls of a fantastically tasty fish stew. Normally fish isnt my thing but I was digging into that. And a lot of beer.
A moment that had me nearly crying with laughter was when Pierre, drunk, was shouting "服务员!!!", fuwuyuan, waiter, at the top of his voice and getting exactly no answer.
Then we shipped off to LPG. I met Kash's boss by accident. He started talking to me and said he worked in real estate and I asked if he knew Kash, a real shot in the dark, and he said he did and then pulled a face. I didn't delve any further as I know Kash doesn't work there any more... He was very nice although for some reason I said something a bit more angrily than I meant to and he wondered why I was being aggressive. I felt a bit mortified and then spent the next few minutes of conversation trying to be extra nice. He was from Texas. Perhaps that was why.
Anthony also introduced me to Tommy who is a student of his. The idea was we could practise English/Chinese and we had a good time chatting about this and that in various languages. I gave him my phone number and when I had left to go home, he texted me saying 好梦, which means sweet dreams. Aahhhh.
There is a pole at LPG and there was also a pole dancer. She was Chinese, wearing a lot of leather (well not a lot...she was in fact wearing very little. It was just all leather) and waving a red leather flail. She was very confident. The very opposite of your average Chinese girl- who tends to be coy, giggly, and wearing a Hello Kitty sweater. Most of the guys there were too embarrassed to watch but Becka and I just stood there staring in awe :P
Most of my class appeared to be in the bar and I found myself playing some dice game with some Russians and Ukranians. I played it a bit but still have no idea of the rules.
So back to this morning. We caught the bus and headed out. It was a way away but I rather enjoyed seeing more of Qingdao. The skyscrapers eventually turned into low brick housing with red tiled roofs and yellow painted walls. There were fields of this and that as well as a group of bee hives. Which were placed right next to a bus stop... On one side of the road was the ocean, which was very sparkly and inviting in the sun, and on the other were rocky mountains covered in sparse shrubs. Annoyingly at first were a group of Americans on the bus who continued to prove my theory that Americans talk louder than everyone else. There was one guy whose drawl about his sexual exploits sounded throughout the entire bus. I didn't miss them when they got off. We passed a sign about "China Sport Lottery". I see a lot of signs for this but am not sure what it is. I am, however, reminded inexorably of the Lottery in 1984... We also passed a river full of wooden Chinese junks which was scenic to see.
Eventually we arrived at Laoshan, or rather the carpark. There was the usual greeting party of randomers offering taxi rides for a million pounds. However we found out that tickets were 100元 to get in to 崂山 and while this was a fair price we decided it would be a waste as it was very smoggy today. You could not see very far at all. So as we had been enjoying the bus ride we hopped back on, much to the bewilderment of the conductor at 4 laowais getting a bus to 崂山 but not staying..., and travelled a bit further to the end of the line. So our first attempt at going to 崂山 had ended in failure- as do so many first attempts in China...
We got out at some bus station, watched a woman sweep our bus and then we got back on in the same seats. We decided to buy tickets to 石老人, shilaoren, old stone man, but when we reached that stop we realised it wasn't what we wanted as it was basically the side of the road. However the conductor shouted at us that it was our stop and we declined. Then the rest of the bus, thinking we didn't understand, started eagerly telling us it was our stop. After a while we convinced them we knew what we were doing and then we got off at the next stop. There was a row of shops/restaurants and as Ghassan was starving we went to get food. Normally little restaurants are a bit dirty and the furniture is all mismatched and covered in sticky stuff but this one had shiny fake wood tables and chairs and was spotless. I had lamb kebabs and roast slices of potato on a skewer and they were the first things I have eaten in China that were actually truly delicious. They were all covered in rosemary and tasted soooo goooood. The 老板, laoban, owner, was a bit of a character and was loving having four laowai in. He was making little jokes and happily saying any English words he knew. He had a newspaper with a picture of Obama and brought it out thinking we were American and was a bit disappointed when we weren't.
Damn those lamb kebabs were good.
The food was so tasty and the laoban so entertaining we think getting the bus out there just to go to the restaurant might be worth it:P
Then Daisy and I headed to 书城 Book City, as I wanted a copy of a book called 聊斋志异, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio. It is a book of folk tales written by a civil servant around 200ish years ago. Bizarrely, they had books such as Lady Chatterly's Lover, Plato's Republic, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and Barchester Towers.. the first seems a bit steamy for the Chinese, who like to keep such things under wraps, and the rest... well... Plato's Republic??? I confidently bet that there is not a single person in the whole of China, out of 1.3billion, who has read that, or will...
I also found a book written by a Chinese man who had travelled in Britain in the 1940s. There were several different ones, one on Oxford, one on London, one on "Lakeland"(I'm thinking Lake District) and one on Edinburgh. Naturally I grabbed the Edinburgh one. It was full of sketches and paintings he'd done of Edinburgh that were very true to life. I could recognise the places instantly and he had captured the gloomy Scottish rain very well :P He had done one of a panda outside the Balmoral though... I am very much looking forward to working my way through that. I miss Edinburgh- I love that place way too much.
2010-10-15
Humph
When we came out of class today a woman was lying in wait. She hurried over, all smiles, and started eagerly talking to us. All went well until she asked if we were American and we had to disappoint her as we were British, Australian and German. She was, you see, after a teacher and she wanted American English. Which is silly as the differences between that and British English are so slight that it would only affect the speech of a very advanced student. However it does illustrate how keen they are to get English teachers- jobs will literally hunt you!
We bought some cakes today. Chinese cakes tend to look fantastic but disappoint on further inspection. They can be a bit tasteless and green tea in a cake? Really? However the ones we had today, wrapped in cute boxes, "taste our beautiful happiness", actually had an agreeable flavour (not sure it was of beautiful happiness lol) as well as looking fancy. I've bought a few from that shop now which is probably not very healthy. But they are quite cheap and, well, I can resist everything except temptation...
I got a letter today:D Coming in from munching on cake outside in the sun, I spotted the Queen's head peeking out from the pile of letters dumped on the table, which is our mail delivery, and hurried over to find it was for me! It's not the first letter I've received but it is a very novel feeling to rip open an envelope and deal with handwriting. I felt very colonial, receiving it :P
I thought I'd comment on Liu Xiaobo winning the Nobel Peace Prize. The government has harrumphed a bit, which is understandable as he is a convicted criminal. Mainland China has not given a reaction, at least to me, mostly because I suspect that the majority of the population have never heard of the Nobel prizes. They are probably more concerned with feeding their families. And I doubt they have heard of Liu Xiaobo although this is probably due to censorship. News of the Nobels was blacked out here. However in Hong Kong there have been marches in support of releasing Liu Xiaobo. Intriguingly, Daisy's teacher asked her for her opinion on the matter and told Daisy that whilst she herself did have an opinion, she was not about to voice it. So I suspect the well-educated have a good idea of what is going on. Also interestingly, I heard that there have been calls from Party elders for the censors to be reined in. Believe it or not, freedom of speech and a free media is enshrined in the Chinese constitution although there has been debate over how to "implement" this. I think it is fairly obvious how to "implement" this- stop censoring... However I suspect that it is inevitable that the censors will diminish- but in China's own time. Liu Xiaobo, for those who don't know him (X is pronounced like a sh), is an advocate of free speech and signed Charter 08. Charter 08 was a charter calling for freedom of association/expression/religion (basically every human right China currently infringes) written in 2008 and released on the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. There have been many such documents but this is the one that has stood out. Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years for "inciting subversion of state power". Apparently he was also at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Weren't we all. Now it was all very laudable, particularly seeing the price Liu has paid, but the Nobel Peace Prize is for someone who "shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". Are you telling me that Liu is the person in the world at present who has done the most in pursuit of said goals? No, he's not. The reason he won the prize is to have a dig at China. Let's face it, the 5 members of the slection committee, all Norwegians, are going to know dangerously little about China and understand it even less. All they know is that Nasty China puts Poor Little People in gaol and that Liu was standing up for Democracy! And Freedom! The fact that the only other Chinese person to have won the Peace Prize is the Dalai Lama (if you can call him Chinese) only strengthens my suspicions that Chinese government Bad, Innocent citizens Good. When in actual fact the situation is a lot murkier. The Dalai Lama aims to establish a feudal theocracy in Tibet- hardly laudable! Liu Xiaobo is a convicted criminal. Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, has worked tirelessly to improve the relations between North Korea and South Korea- will he even get a nomination?
In my humble opinion, the lack of human rights here is merely a growing pain. In the not too distant future, I can see even the Great Firewall crumbling. But it will happen in China's own time, as it happened to us in our own time. Arrogant Westerners scolding the Chinese government should eat a slice of humble pie and concentrate on their own problems.
Edit: Just drawing this article to your attention: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-10/13/c_13555559.htm It is an English language article published on the website of Xinhua- China's news agency. Interesting quotes include (highlighting and comments are mine):
"The professor explicitly rejected the Norwegian body's argument that Liu's struggle for human rights, especially the freedom of speech, and a Western parliamentary democratic system in China is a prerequisite to world peace.
Many countries that have long followed the Western political system, such as the United States, Britain and Norway, have been among the most aggressive military powers in the last 50 years, occupying and starting wars in others countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, he noted." Ouch.
"Many in the West still believe that their system is the best in the world and has to be exported to all other countries". We do rather think our way is best.
"China has made remarkable progress in human rights, such as plugging starvation, curbing crimes and promoting food safety, which are "important not only for a developing and still poor country like China, but for developed countries as well," Kolstad said.
"In this way, the Western world can learn human rights from China," he added." It's true that the human right to food is more important that to free speech... Lol to the last sentence though...
"It is also simply unfair to label China as an undemocratic country, he stressed, explaining that China adopts "another kind of relationship between those in power and the people."- fair point.
"The parliamentary system with more parties is not the only way to give people influence on political decisions and the future of their country. We have to accept that other countries choose other political and democratic solutions, based on their culture and level of development," he said." True.
"I do not know if it is more democratic to have a system where presidential candidates have to be extremely rich to run for presidency," he added." Ouch at how true that is...
"I therefore think it is unfair to give a Peace Prize to the opposition and dissidents in China instead of giving it to the president, as in the U.S." Fair point.
We bought some cakes today. Chinese cakes tend to look fantastic but disappoint on further inspection. They can be a bit tasteless and green tea in a cake? Really? However the ones we had today, wrapped in cute boxes, "taste our beautiful happiness", actually had an agreeable flavour (not sure it was of beautiful happiness lol) as well as looking fancy. I've bought a few from that shop now which is probably not very healthy. But they are quite cheap and, well, I can resist everything except temptation...
I got a letter today:D Coming in from munching on cake outside in the sun, I spotted the Queen's head peeking out from the pile of letters dumped on the table, which is our mail delivery, and hurried over to find it was for me! It's not the first letter I've received but it is a very novel feeling to rip open an envelope and deal with handwriting. I felt very colonial, receiving it :P
I thought I'd comment on Liu Xiaobo winning the Nobel Peace Prize. The government has harrumphed a bit, which is understandable as he is a convicted criminal. Mainland China has not given a reaction, at least to me, mostly because I suspect that the majority of the population have never heard of the Nobel prizes. They are probably more concerned with feeding their families. And I doubt they have heard of Liu Xiaobo although this is probably due to censorship. News of the Nobels was blacked out here. However in Hong Kong there have been marches in support of releasing Liu Xiaobo. Intriguingly, Daisy's teacher asked her for her opinion on the matter and told Daisy that whilst she herself did have an opinion, she was not about to voice it. So I suspect the well-educated have a good idea of what is going on. Also interestingly, I heard that there have been calls from Party elders for the censors to be reined in. Believe it or not, freedom of speech and a free media is enshrined in the Chinese constitution although there has been debate over how to "implement" this. I think it is fairly obvious how to "implement" this- stop censoring... However I suspect that it is inevitable that the censors will diminish- but in China's own time. Liu Xiaobo, for those who don't know him (X is pronounced like a sh), is an advocate of free speech and signed Charter 08. Charter 08 was a charter calling for freedom of association/expression/religion (basically every human right China currently infringes) written in 2008 and released on the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. There have been many such documents but this is the one that has stood out. Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years for "inciting subversion of state power". Apparently he was also at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Weren't we all. Now it was all very laudable, particularly seeing the price Liu has paid, but the Nobel Peace Prize is for someone who "shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses". Are you telling me that Liu is the person in the world at present who has done the most in pursuit of said goals? No, he's not. The reason he won the prize is to have a dig at China. Let's face it, the 5 members of the slection committee, all Norwegians, are going to know dangerously little about China and understand it even less. All they know is that Nasty China puts Poor Little People in gaol and that Liu was standing up for Democracy! And Freedom! The fact that the only other Chinese person to have won the Peace Prize is the Dalai Lama (if you can call him Chinese) only strengthens my suspicions that Chinese government Bad, Innocent citizens Good. When in actual fact the situation is a lot murkier. The Dalai Lama aims to establish a feudal theocracy in Tibet- hardly laudable! Liu Xiaobo is a convicted criminal. Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, has worked tirelessly to improve the relations between North Korea and South Korea- will he even get a nomination?
In my humble opinion, the lack of human rights here is merely a growing pain. In the not too distant future, I can see even the Great Firewall crumbling. But it will happen in China's own time, as it happened to us in our own time. Arrogant Westerners scolding the Chinese government should eat a slice of humble pie and concentrate on their own problems.
Edit: Just drawing this article to your attention: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-10/13/c_13555559.htm It is an English language article published on the website of Xinhua- China's news agency. Interesting quotes include (highlighting and comments are mine):
"The professor explicitly rejected the Norwegian body's argument that Liu's struggle for human rights, especially the freedom of speech, and a Western parliamentary democratic system in China is a prerequisite to world peace.
Many countries that have long followed the Western political system, such as the United States, Britain and Norway, have been among the most aggressive military powers in the last 50 years, occupying and starting wars in others countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, he noted." Ouch.
"Many in the West still believe that their system is the best in the world and has to be exported to all other countries". We do rather think our way is best.
"China has made remarkable progress in human rights, such as plugging starvation, curbing crimes and promoting food safety, which are "important not only for a developing and still poor country like China, but for developed countries as well," Kolstad said.
"In this way, the Western world can learn human rights from China," he added." It's true that the human right to food is more important that to free speech... Lol to the last sentence though...
"It is also simply unfair to label China as an undemocratic country, he stressed, explaining that China adopts "another kind of relationship between those in power and the people."- fair point.
"The parliamentary system with more parties is not the only way to give people influence on political decisions and the future of their country. We have to accept that other countries choose other political and democratic solutions, based on their culture and level of development," he said." True.
"I do not know if it is more democratic to have a system where presidential candidates have to be extremely rich to run for presidency," he added." Ouch at how true that is...
"I therefore think it is unfair to give a Peace Prize to the opposition and dissidents in China instead of giving it to the president, as in the U.S." Fair point.
2010-10-14
Money, money, money...
Would you put carrot in an orange juice drink? Or tomato in a strawberry? Would you, would you really? You wouldn't. Because it tastes foul. But China goes ahead and does it anyway.
Went with Daisy and Jesse to see Inception. It was in English with Chinese subtitles and I felt for whoever had had to translate. If you have seen the movie it gets quite abstract and that's when it gets hard to interpret right.
As you can see, the fact that I was pondering the difficulties of translation meant that I wasn't exactly enthralled by the film. It makes itself out to be pondering the difference between dreams and reality- you know like Deep Philosophy. But it was boring. Just various men blowing things up/gun battles. I like a bit more wordplay. And less ooo you shouldn't make dreams out of memories...
Anthony told me about a teaching job that I have emailed his boss about. The boss has replied and I thnk I will be meeting him on Monday for a mini-interview. The job is teaching a class of primary school children for around 15 hours a week- earning around 5000元 a month. Which works out at over 100元 an hour-10pounds roughly. Which is only 2pounds less than what Mum gets and she has a degree and training:P. This should mean that I could save a couple of thousand pounds while I'm out here. I'll probably spend some of it on travelling but the rest is going in the kitty. It'll be good to be paid in yuan- no more bank fees for changing currency! But we shall see if it materialises.
Today I did something rather drastic- at least for me:P I now have a centre parting in my hair and not a side one! This sounds small but is probably the biggest change I've made to my hairstyle in 5 years... I don't dare cut it off as I don't think I could bear to part with it. And dying it is such a faff-other than just sticking highlights in now and again.It does feel strange to have hair around the right side of my face- and I can feel it wanting to revert back to the original parting.
Went with Daisy and Jesse to see Inception. It was in English with Chinese subtitles and I felt for whoever had had to translate. If you have seen the movie it gets quite abstract and that's when it gets hard to interpret right.
As you can see, the fact that I was pondering the difficulties of translation meant that I wasn't exactly enthralled by the film. It makes itself out to be pondering the difference between dreams and reality- you know like Deep Philosophy. But it was boring. Just various men blowing things up/gun battles. I like a bit more wordplay. And less ooo you shouldn't make dreams out of memories...
Anthony told me about a teaching job that I have emailed his boss about. The boss has replied and I thnk I will be meeting him on Monday for a mini-interview. The job is teaching a class of primary school children for around 15 hours a week- earning around 5000元 a month. Which works out at over 100元 an hour-10pounds roughly. Which is only 2pounds less than what Mum gets and she has a degree and training:P. This should mean that I could save a couple of thousand pounds while I'm out here. I'll probably spend some of it on travelling but the rest is going in the kitty. It'll be good to be paid in yuan- no more bank fees for changing currency! But we shall see if it materialises.
Today I did something rather drastic- at least for me:P I now have a centre parting in my hair and not a side one! This sounds small but is probably the biggest change I've made to my hairstyle in 5 years... I don't dare cut it off as I don't think I could bear to part with it. And dying it is such a faff-other than just sticking highlights in now and again.It does feel strange to have hair around the right side of my face- and I can feel it wanting to revert back to the original parting.
2010-10-13
Last of the Summer Sun + Dramatis Personae
Today had another fail as I overslept and so missed the first class. I'd been dreaming that I was shopping with Sara in Spain and predictably I did not want to wake up. I sloped over for the second class though. It was glorious weather- exactly like a perfect British summer's day. Warm, but with a freshness in the air. Our teacher thought so too and in a stunningly non-Chinese manner did something Not In The Rulebook and suggested having class outside. We all agreed and we had a lovely lesson sat on the grass chatting away in Chinese. I have even tanned a little today! However the enjoyment of this weather is tainted slightly by Anthony's dark warnings of the bitter Qingdao winter that awaits us... When this happens I intend to migrate south and spend the 6 week spring festival loitering in the sun!
In the course of our lesson I discovered that our teacher lived in Poland for two years. She had travelled all over Europe but liked Paris and Italy best. She did not leave China until university and I suspect this was when China went on a drive to send students to study oversees. She may just be old enough to have studied when Poland was Communist so maybe this was why she was there, of all places. I wonder how well-travelled the average Chinese is. When going to the Entry/Exit bureau I got the impression that a Chinese person has to "sign out" when leaving China and from what I can glean from the internet you have to ask permission to study or work abroad. Not sure about just tourism. In any case I think it is far too expensive for your average Chinese, even to go to bordering countries. This is why I love the EU- being able to travel so easily!
Had lunch with Cash, Becka and Daisy at a sushi place. I have never really had sushi before but it was very nice. It was in 海信广场, Haixin Guangchang, Hisense Plaza, which definitely fits in the category of Shiny. Generally, the only Western stores here, apart from McDonalds/KFC/Starbucks, are designer and jewelry stores such as Gucci, Prada, Tiffany's etc.In Qingdao I swear there must be around 5 outlets of Gucci alone. There's probably not even that many in London! I wonder if the Chinese think our streets are lined with Prada and that everyone shops there... And eats fried nuggets all the time! I often wonder how all these luxury outlets are sustained but I guess that China is so large that even if only a miniscule percentage can afford to wear Gucci, that probably still numbers thousands! We went to the supermarket there, which is slightly more upmarket (read: Western) than the one in Jusco. They had cheddar cheese, Lindt chocolate, Lurpak butter and Heinz baked beans. It is a mark of how long we have been here that we found these items Utterly Amazing... I bought some yoghurt and some biscuits that I had eaten before and loved but never been able to find again. China has this annoying habit of overwrapping everything so in the cardboard box, each biscuit is individually wrapped. Query: absolutely necessary?
Then on to Jusco for cheap bread and jam. Except they had moved the jam. I spent a long time trying to find it, gave up and asked one of the numerous assisstants. Down there, she said, so down there I went. No luck. Another recommended near the front. Another the back. Still no jam. Finally we made the fourth, much to her annoyance, physically take us to the jam.
It felt like a lot of effort for jam, if I'm honest...
Daisy and I also went to look at microwaves. They seemed around 400元 which was what I was hoping for. Intriguingly they also sold microwave-size ovens that grill and cook normally. Also for around 400元. I may be investing in one- the thought of being able to make chicken pie is a tantalising one...
I mention a few people in this blog so I think they deserve a proper introduction so here is a quick dramatis personae- hopefully without offending anyone:
Becka: fellow student from Edinburgh and my "wife". Will kick ass if required.
Daisy: student from Cambridge University. Originally from Bath but lived in Malaysia for a while. As you do. Warm and intelligent.
Ghrassam: also a student from Cambridge. He seems to be a German of Syrian descent. He is the man for whom the word "opinionated" was invented. I like that.
Jesse: a loquacious, gay ex-Mormon here on a scholarship. A sweet guy, if sometimes amusing for the wrong reasons. Got his ass kicked by Becka so there is er, awkwardness, there.
Anthony: my study buddy. He teaches in his spare time and works dutifully hard. He speaks Mandarin slowly but with perfect tones. Originally from Bexhill, East Sussex, but has lived 2 years or so in China. Also a twin :D
Cash: this may or may not be how you spell his name... a chillaxed Londoner who lived in Shanghai for 2 years and came here to work and study. Has now dropped the work to concentrate on study. Loves China.
Helen: another part-time teacher. Lovely lady :)
Nick: also a teacher. Originally from New Mexico. Very cool.
Kit: recent Chinese Graduate from Edinburgh- working in Nanjing
Ruth: fellow Edinburgh student currently in Dalian along with most of the Edinburgh lot. Ruth and Becka are the only ones from my class I really know- the rest I never found time in class to talk to which is a little bit of a shame.
Skateboard beggar: he drags himself around on a skateboard. Looking very pathetic. With big pathetic eyes. I give him 10元 every now and then- mostly because I suspect Chinese Communism doesn't involve such Capitalist policies as caring for the disabled...
Pipe man: plays some awful pipe instrument outside my window every now and then. I am contemplating paying him 100元 to go away and never come back.
In the course of our lesson I discovered that our teacher lived in Poland for two years. She had travelled all over Europe but liked Paris and Italy best. She did not leave China until university and I suspect this was when China went on a drive to send students to study oversees. She may just be old enough to have studied when Poland was Communist so maybe this was why she was there, of all places. I wonder how well-travelled the average Chinese is. When going to the Entry/Exit bureau I got the impression that a Chinese person has to "sign out" when leaving China and from what I can glean from the internet you have to ask permission to study or work abroad. Not sure about just tourism. In any case I think it is far too expensive for your average Chinese, even to go to bordering countries. This is why I love the EU- being able to travel so easily!
Had lunch with Cash, Becka and Daisy at a sushi place. I have never really had sushi before but it was very nice. It was in 海信广场, Haixin Guangchang, Hisense Plaza, which definitely fits in the category of Shiny. Generally, the only Western stores here, apart from McDonalds/KFC/Starbucks, are designer and jewelry stores such as Gucci, Prada, Tiffany's etc.In Qingdao I swear there must be around 5 outlets of Gucci alone. There's probably not even that many in London! I wonder if the Chinese think our streets are lined with Prada and that everyone shops there... And eats fried nuggets all the time! I often wonder how all these luxury outlets are sustained but I guess that China is so large that even if only a miniscule percentage can afford to wear Gucci, that probably still numbers thousands! We went to the supermarket there, which is slightly more upmarket (read: Western) than the one in Jusco. They had cheddar cheese, Lindt chocolate, Lurpak butter and Heinz baked beans. It is a mark of how long we have been here that we found these items Utterly Amazing... I bought some yoghurt and some biscuits that I had eaten before and loved but never been able to find again. China has this annoying habit of overwrapping everything so in the cardboard box, each biscuit is individually wrapped. Query: absolutely necessary?
Then on to Jusco for cheap bread and jam. Except they had moved the jam. I spent a long time trying to find it, gave up and asked one of the numerous assisstants. Down there, she said, so down there I went. No luck. Another recommended near the front. Another the back. Still no jam. Finally we made the fourth, much to her annoyance, physically take us to the jam.
It felt like a lot of effort for jam, if I'm honest...
Daisy and I also went to look at microwaves. They seemed around 400元 which was what I was hoping for. Intriguingly they also sold microwave-size ovens that grill and cook normally. Also for around 400元. I may be investing in one- the thought of being able to make chicken pie is a tantalising one...
I mention a few people in this blog so I think they deserve a proper introduction so here is a quick dramatis personae- hopefully without offending anyone:
Becka: fellow student from Edinburgh and my "wife". Will kick ass if required.
Daisy: student from Cambridge University. Originally from Bath but lived in Malaysia for a while. As you do. Warm and intelligent.
Ghrassam: also a student from Cambridge. He seems to be a German of Syrian descent. He is the man for whom the word "opinionated" was invented. I like that.
Jesse: a loquacious, gay ex-Mormon here on a scholarship. A sweet guy, if sometimes amusing for the wrong reasons. Got his ass kicked by Becka so there is er, awkwardness, there.
Anthony: my study buddy. He teaches in his spare time and works dutifully hard. He speaks Mandarin slowly but with perfect tones. Originally from Bexhill, East Sussex, but has lived 2 years or so in China. Also a twin :D
Cash: this may or may not be how you spell his name... a chillaxed Londoner who lived in Shanghai for 2 years and came here to work and study. Has now dropped the work to concentrate on study. Loves China.
Helen: another part-time teacher. Lovely lady :)
Nick: also a teacher. Originally from New Mexico. Very cool.
Kit: recent Chinese Graduate from Edinburgh- working in Nanjing
Ruth: fellow Edinburgh student currently in Dalian along with most of the Edinburgh lot. Ruth and Becka are the only ones from my class I really know- the rest I never found time in class to talk to which is a little bit of a shame.
Skateboard beggar: he drags himself around on a skateboard. Looking very pathetic. With big pathetic eyes. I give him 10元 every now and then- mostly because I suspect Chinese Communism doesn't involve such Capitalist policies as caring for the disabled...
Pipe man: plays some awful pipe instrument outside my window every now and then. I am contemplating paying him 100元 to go away and never come back.
2010-10-12
In Which I Get All Depressing
So today I did crawl to class- not feeling much better than yesterday but anyway. I felt dire during the first hour and contemplated retreat back to bed but made myself stay for the next hour, during which I perked up a wee bit. Then I heard we watching a film for the next two so I decided to stay for that and felt better by the end- although still very tired. My throat is still hoarse :(
In our reading lesson today we were giving presentations on our home towns. It was quite amusing to see the Koreans and Russians with pictures of the industrial sprawls they called home and then see Anthony's on Bexhill-on-Sea, complete with pictures of rows of houses with neat gardens.
The film we were shown was a surprise as I had seen clips of it before at a restaurant Becka and I had been to. And whenever I have been past that restaurant they appear to always be showing it too. It was nice to see the whole thing. It was called 人在炯图, (I think that's right) which means Men on a Journey, or something similar. It was about a post office manager journeying home who bumps into a cow hand travelling to the same destination. The cowhand is a bit of a village idiot and annoys the manager no end but because of various circumstances (first the plane breaks down, then the train, then the coach... ) they are lumped together. Comic situations ensue. Lessons are learnt. There came an intriguing part where the wife appeared to be consoling her husband when his girlfriend dumps him but perhaps I misunderstood the Chinese... All Chinese films/programmes are handily subtitled automatically. This is because all programmes are spoken in Standard Mandarin but a significant minority have different dialects which means that they cannot understand the language. Handily when written all the differences disappear so everyone can understand the subtitles. If you can read- which is not a given in China!.
This is one of the few redeeming features of Chinese characters- that they are universally understood!
Since coming here I swear I am growing more and more conservative. As a liberal the idea seems to be to question everything and, if it is found wanting, to discard it. But this implies we can fully comprehend everything's postive and negative effects- which of course we can't. Sometimes things which have happened a certain way for centuries that nowadays seem completely nonsensical have happened for a reason that we don't realise until we have changed things- accidentally for the worse. I am still completely for constantly questioning the way things are run but now reckon that "because we always have" might have some weight to it after all. For example Daisy, Becka and I were sat on the roof enjoying the sun today and we got to talking about careers and we talked about the traditional setup of the Man as a Provider with the Woman as the Home-maker and Child-rearer, and how this was a very unfashionable concept these days. And on the surface it doesn't make sense. Surely it is better to have two wage-earners in a family. A woman needs fulfilment as much as a man and home-making does not offer the same satisfaction as becoming the chief executive of a business. But what we realised was that in a couple one will always have to sacrifice their career for the other's. There will be very few situations where both partners can pursue their careers 100% i.e. the couple may have to move to be nearer to one partner's work that will mean the other will be further away/need to look for a new job. But why should it always be the wife's? Well it generally turns out that men are more driven and less willing to compromise whereas women will do so out of love. Plus there is the problem of kiddies...When children are involved, it becomes very difficult for the woman to be the main one pursuing a career and the man to childcare. Which inexorably leads back to the Wife set-up... Which is disheartening. All through school and university I and my female contemporaries have been planning for a future career that we intended to give 100% to and I wonder how many of us actually will end up in a position to do that. Is it possible to be happily married, with kids, and an unrestrained career? Or is it just a dream?
I had the worst sweet and sour pork today. Can't WAIT to get a flat- even with so rudimentary a kitchen as they tend to have here (Chinese cooking doesn't really involve ovens so they are rarely available in cheap flats). I'd kill for a jacket potato with salad. Salad. Green.Vegetables.
In our reading lesson today we were giving presentations on our home towns. It was quite amusing to see the Koreans and Russians with pictures of the industrial sprawls they called home and then see Anthony's on Bexhill-on-Sea, complete with pictures of rows of houses with neat gardens.
The film we were shown was a surprise as I had seen clips of it before at a restaurant Becka and I had been to. And whenever I have been past that restaurant they appear to always be showing it too. It was nice to see the whole thing. It was called 人在炯图, (I think that's right) which means Men on a Journey, or something similar. It was about a post office manager journeying home who bumps into a cow hand travelling to the same destination. The cowhand is a bit of a village idiot and annoys the manager no end but because of various circumstances (first the plane breaks down, then the train, then the coach... ) they are lumped together. Comic situations ensue. Lessons are learnt. There came an intriguing part where the wife appeared to be consoling her husband when his girlfriend dumps him but perhaps I misunderstood the Chinese... All Chinese films/programmes are handily subtitled automatically. This is because all programmes are spoken in Standard Mandarin but a significant minority have different dialects which means that they cannot understand the language. Handily when written all the differences disappear so everyone can understand the subtitles. If you can read- which is not a given in China!.
This is one of the few redeeming features of Chinese characters- that they are universally understood!
Since coming here I swear I am growing more and more conservative. As a liberal the idea seems to be to question everything and, if it is found wanting, to discard it. But this implies we can fully comprehend everything's postive and negative effects- which of course we can't. Sometimes things which have happened a certain way for centuries that nowadays seem completely nonsensical have happened for a reason that we don't realise until we have changed things- accidentally for the worse. I am still completely for constantly questioning the way things are run but now reckon that "because we always have" might have some weight to it after all. For example Daisy, Becka and I were sat on the roof enjoying the sun today and we got to talking about careers and we talked about the traditional setup of the Man as a Provider with the Woman as the Home-maker and Child-rearer, and how this was a very unfashionable concept these days. And on the surface it doesn't make sense. Surely it is better to have two wage-earners in a family. A woman needs fulfilment as much as a man and home-making does not offer the same satisfaction as becoming the chief executive of a business. But what we realised was that in a couple one will always have to sacrifice their career for the other's. There will be very few situations where both partners can pursue their careers 100% i.e. the couple may have to move to be nearer to one partner's work that will mean the other will be further away/need to look for a new job. But why should it always be the wife's? Well it generally turns out that men are more driven and less willing to compromise whereas women will do so out of love. Plus there is the problem of kiddies...When children are involved, it becomes very difficult for the woman to be the main one pursuing a career and the man to childcare. Which inexorably leads back to the Wife set-up... Which is disheartening. All through school and university I and my female contemporaries have been planning for a future career that we intended to give 100% to and I wonder how many of us actually will end up in a position to do that. Is it possible to be happily married, with kids, and an unrestrained career? Or is it just a dream?
I had the worst sweet and sour pork today. Can't WAIT to get a flat- even with so rudimentary a kitchen as they tend to have here (Chinese cooking doesn't really involve ovens so they are rarely available in cheap flats). I'd kill for a jacket potato with salad. Salad. Green.Vegetables.
2010-10-11
I Can Haz Internet
So today did not go entirely to plan when I woke up this morning still feeling ill. I'd spent pretty much the whole night coughing and tossing and turning so this probably hadn't helped. I bravely decided to skip class and stayed in bed feeling a bit manky instead. I was missing the oral class and as I had no voice, there wouldn't really have been much point in going. I roused myself eventually and had lunch with Becka before heading off to buy some more Internetz for our rooms. This involved going to a different building to our normal one. This one is quite dishevelled and there are great chunks missing from the staircase. A lot of windows and doors are boarded up but there are still signs for classrooms so I don't know if people are taught in it or not. At the top of this is a small room filled with various bleeping machines and two Chinese Computer Nerds who sit hunched behind a desk, surrounded by fast food packages, playing computer games. I think they spend their time here hiding from their mothers. We bought another month's worth and then I headed back and Becka headed off to buy an electronic dictionary. Predictably my internet didn't work straight out so I had to go all the way back and slog up to the tallest tower and get them to sort it out, which they did very swiftly. So now I have internet again:D
Why does nothing ever work first time out in China?
On the way there a small dog nipped me on the leg. I was wearing jeans so it didn't hurt. It was more the principle of thing. I would have kicked it but I was wearing flip-flops and didn't fancy losing a toe so just hissed at it and carried on.
Why does nothing ever work first time out in China?
On the way there a small dog nipped me on the leg. I was wearing jeans so it didn't hurt. It was more the principle of thing. I would have kicked it but I was wearing flip-flops and didn't fancy losing a toe so just hissed at it and carried on.
2010-10-10
Catch-up
So where were we?
The 1st full day in Suzhou was spent in pursuit of a wedding dress for Ruth. We skipped off to the train station first to get tickets for Becka and I to Shanghai later in the week. There were ticket machines and these were negotiated safely before heading back and choosing the "bus perminal" over the "taxi stano". We were aiming for 虎丘, huqiu, Tiger Hill which is famed for its dresses but all the buses seemed to go all around the city before going there. In the end we found one which seemed to be only a couple of stops away. 40 minutes later, and a ride back past our hotel, we arrived...
First impressions of Tiger Hill were that it looked a bit shit really. The pavement slabs were all broken, the road was dusty and the shops all were shabby. However we pressed on, undaunted.
Let me say now, there are a lot of wedding dresses on Tiger Hill. A lot. However we did not find one for Ruth in the end as it soon became apparent that Chinese tastes differ from the English. They like big, and white, and fluffy, and sequined, and glittery and FABULOUS. Ruth, a typical English Rose, was after something simple and elegant and that ain't happening in China... I tried one on in the end. It was so big I could barely lift it and I needed an old-fashioned hoop skirt :D It had a massive train as well.
I found a wedding dress made of camounflage material. Who would wear that?
We quit for lunch and I happily had one of my mince burger thingies and the other two ordered noodles. This was when we encountered a small but crucial difference between standard Mandarin and the local accent used here. They pronounce sh- like s- so when Becka asked how much her noodles were they said what sounded like "si" which means 4. But what they meant was "shi" which means 10. So the bill was larger than expected lol.
I wanted a 旗袍, qipao- Chinese style dress, so we had a little hunt. I tried a few on and quite liked them. An annoying trait of Chinese customer service is that the assistants come in the changing room with you. I don't particularly like having a total stranger ogling me while I'm getting changed. I found a couple that I liked but did not buy in the end as figured would try more later. Then Ruth felt ill so we decided to head back. This was easier said then done :P We had the idea of hailing a taxi but as there was a park at the top of the hill as well as all the shops, there were a lot of people wanting only a few taxis. We spent a long while trailing up and down continually being beaten to the precious cars whilst being followed by men waving keys parroting "hello" and "taxi" at us. This is annoying. The buses were stupidly full and none of us felt like squishing on to one. In the end we walked down the hill and back towards the centre. We walked like a mile or two until I managed to catch a taxi and we could travel back in comfort.
When we arrived back Kit, a graduate from Edinburgh last year in Chinese and who is working in Nanjing, arrived to meet us. We were being very naughty and he was staying in our room as he couldn't afford to get one all to himself. We went to an Italian for dinner and I had one of the nicest spag bogs I've ever eaten plus a rather tasty banana split. That night I slept on the floor of our room in my sleeping bag and Kit had the bed- I didn't mind as mattresses here are so hard there isn't really a difference plus it meant I wouldn't pay very much for the room.
However the next day I woke up Ill. I got as far as Starbucks with the guys for breakfast and then limped home with a fever. I got back and the key didn't work. This was because they block your room unless you have paid for the day but they don't ask for your money in advance so you get back and you can't get in... After a zombie trip to pay up and back the cleaner appeared and showed me how to work the curtains and wear the slippers. It was very nice of her but I was just wishing her to leave... Then she did and I passed out face first in a pillow for the entire day. The others hired bikes and cycled all around Suzhou :(
Suzhou is very interesting as it feels a lot more like a town than a city. The buildings are brick and small and in a chinese style. The roads are small and there are lots of little alleyways. Suzhou is on the delta of the Yangtze River so there are hundreds of little waterways and pools all over the town. As Ruth said, "it's the Venice of China. Except it's not Venice". All of this makes the town feel like a nice place to be in. All the little alleways with tiny shops selling jade contributed a lovely Chinese feel that is lacking from the bigger Hangzhou and Qingdao. I was very annoyed to miss exploring it for shivering in bed.
In the evening the others went to the cinema to see some "truly awful" Hong Kong film which, interestingly, the guy sat near me in Starbucks is now watching on his laptop. It's a small world...
The next day Becka and I said farewell and headed off to Shanghai. One thing they do better here is trains. It was clean, comfy and fast. Very fast. They kept showing the speed and although I didn't notice it until we were slowing down, we were still going at over 200kph. A lot faster than anything goes, or will go for about 20 years, in the UK.
We arrived in Shanghai. Becka felt shit and I felt shit but we staggered through the subway system and ended up at our hotel in 豫园, Yu Gardens. Yu Gardens is an area of traditional style buildings full of shops, shops and more shops. They sell everything. We didn't do much that day but the next we headed out with our cash to see what we could get. I finally found size 42 shoes and bought these monstrosities which I would never wear in the UK- they are covered in embroidery and decorations. Great for China though :P. I tried on some more qipao but wasn't feeling in the mood so didn't get one. By this point I had also completely lost my voice so was relying on Becka to translate my mouthed english. I think the assistants thought I was special...
I also bought some jade earrings ("normally these are 400, I give them to you for 350"me:"i'll give you 200") and deliberated over some chopsticks for dad's birthday but then decided they were too boring. We looked at some traditional chinese instruments as well as endless statues of jade. There were a lot of laowai in Yu Gardens and I hadn't seen any for so long I was staring at them like a Chinese person :P
We bought some haagen-daaz ice cream to sooth my throat. It was very expensive but soooo good. Although Becka got very cross when the server couldn't understand our order (confusion over how many scoops we wanted).
Then we asked a policeman where to get credit for Becka's phone and he took us to a complex underground. This was virtually deserted, in contrast to up above, and intriguingly was stuffed with shops full of what looked like basically loot. Some of it did look pilfered from some ancient tomb. The stuff down here wasn't shiny but bizarrely authentic. There was a shop selling things from the 50s such as old posters and pamphlets. Another was full of artefacts from the Miao minority, a people in southern China. Becka bought some hairpins here. I ended up buying a bronze statue of a horse. Mostly because it was originally 600 and when I was actually saying no I don't want it what would I do with a bronze statue of a horse the shop owner eventually said I could have it for 250 and, well, I did. I like it.
This is the point I racistly moan about Americans. With other Laowai I pass in the street they could be French, English, Swedish or even South African for all I know. If they are speaking, it will be too quiet for me to understand. I have spent the past hour trying to eavesdrop some laowai 4m away at a table and have only just decided they are speaking French. But with Americans... They will be walking down the middle of whatever street they are on, no matter how big/small. They will be speaking very loudly saying how it's all probably just junk and way overpriced and to just offer "like, 10 bucks or something". They will be wearing shorts, sandals and a hat. They will be clutching a rucksack to their belly very tightly so that a dastardly native won't pull it off them. And they will be around twice as big as the rest of us. Seriously, being here throws into perspective quite how huge some Westerners are. It's gross that a 40yr old American who should be in their prime is just a bag of lard. The whole effect is just embarrassing. Why can't they just be normal? Why do they dress like they are hiking in the Wild West when they are in a cosmopolitan city?
It annoys me.
As we both felt ill Becka and I retreated back to the room for a lie down. In the evening we scraped ourselves together and went to the Bund. The Bund is basically the riverfront here. Becka wasn't overly impressed as it is "just like Liverpool". All the buildings are indeed in a neo-classical style. I liked the Bund. The river either had very brightly lit pleasure boats (the Chinese like neon) or eerily dark freight boats slipping through. On one side were these fantasticly futuristic buildings and on the other a reminder of the colonial past.
We headed down it in search of the "food court" but this proved elusive so we crossed a bridge and headed into the nearest restaurant in search, basically, of mash potato. This one was the restaurant of a hotel which turned out to have quite a history. It was called the Astor Hotel and had been the first western-owned hotel in Shanghai. Einstein and Ulysses S. Grant and stayed here, as had Chiang Kai-Shek when he was on the run. It was all in the art-deco style and suddenly I got a taste of what it must have been like in Shanghai in the 1920s. This was when the city was very glamorous and the rich would be dressed up with fancy hairstyles while the men in sharp suits smoked cigarettes. You realise that China actually had style at this point and that it did once have a fragile opportunity to be somewhere...refined. Then it was all destroyed as China tore itself apart in the following decades. It made me sad to think that whilst China is modernising now, it is all money, money, money. Noone cares about culture or aesthetics.
I had leg of lamb. It came with mash and gravy. I nearly cried.
We walked back but encountered the intriguing phenomenon that if you walk in a line from A to B and then walk back along that line from B, you will not find A. In the end we gave up and got a taxi.
The next day we got the subway to the airport. We went in the wrong direction at first but soon ended up where we wanted. We had a little bit of excitement when checking in as they spotted Becka's new metal, relic sword in my large rucksack. On the x-ray it was pretty obvious it was a sword but they had me get it out so they could check the metal pointy thing was indeed a metal pointy thing. Then we went through security and they were a bit bemused by all Becka's hairpins as they looked pretty deadly. However they were allowed through and we caught the plane back. I was a bit worried going up as the plane made an odd noise and had a fairly bumpy ascent but I realised I was being arrogant for not trusting a Chinese plane and pilot. The pilot in the end, performed one of the smoothest landings I've ever had so that proves me wrong.
And home!! Lovely, lovely Qingdao :D Although annoyingly the month's worth of internet I bought had run out so when I was dying to skype people I could only poke the "diagnose problem" button dejectedly. Boo.
My bamboo plant must have been feeling depressed as it had jumped out of its pot onto the floor. I rescued it and half-drowned it in water but we shall see if it pulls through.
The 1st full day in Suzhou was spent in pursuit of a wedding dress for Ruth. We skipped off to the train station first to get tickets for Becka and I to Shanghai later in the week. There were ticket machines and these were negotiated safely before heading back and choosing the "bus perminal" over the "taxi stano". We were aiming for 虎丘, huqiu, Tiger Hill which is famed for its dresses but all the buses seemed to go all around the city before going there. In the end we found one which seemed to be only a couple of stops away. 40 minutes later, and a ride back past our hotel, we arrived...
First impressions of Tiger Hill were that it looked a bit shit really. The pavement slabs were all broken, the road was dusty and the shops all were shabby. However we pressed on, undaunted.
Let me say now, there are a lot of wedding dresses on Tiger Hill. A lot. However we did not find one for Ruth in the end as it soon became apparent that Chinese tastes differ from the English. They like big, and white, and fluffy, and sequined, and glittery and FABULOUS. Ruth, a typical English Rose, was after something simple and elegant and that ain't happening in China... I tried one on in the end. It was so big I could barely lift it and I needed an old-fashioned hoop skirt :D It had a massive train as well.
I found a wedding dress made of camounflage material. Who would wear that?
We quit for lunch and I happily had one of my mince burger thingies and the other two ordered noodles. This was when we encountered a small but crucial difference between standard Mandarin and the local accent used here. They pronounce sh- like s- so when Becka asked how much her noodles were they said what sounded like "si" which means 4. But what they meant was "shi" which means 10. So the bill was larger than expected lol.
I wanted a 旗袍, qipao- Chinese style dress, so we had a little hunt. I tried a few on and quite liked them. An annoying trait of Chinese customer service is that the assistants come in the changing room with you. I don't particularly like having a total stranger ogling me while I'm getting changed. I found a couple that I liked but did not buy in the end as figured would try more later. Then Ruth felt ill so we decided to head back. This was easier said then done :P We had the idea of hailing a taxi but as there was a park at the top of the hill as well as all the shops, there were a lot of people wanting only a few taxis. We spent a long while trailing up and down continually being beaten to the precious cars whilst being followed by men waving keys parroting "hello" and "taxi" at us. This is annoying. The buses were stupidly full and none of us felt like squishing on to one. In the end we walked down the hill and back towards the centre. We walked like a mile or two until I managed to catch a taxi and we could travel back in comfort.
When we arrived back Kit, a graduate from Edinburgh last year in Chinese and who is working in Nanjing, arrived to meet us. We were being very naughty and he was staying in our room as he couldn't afford to get one all to himself. We went to an Italian for dinner and I had one of the nicest spag bogs I've ever eaten plus a rather tasty banana split. That night I slept on the floor of our room in my sleeping bag and Kit had the bed- I didn't mind as mattresses here are so hard there isn't really a difference plus it meant I wouldn't pay very much for the room.
However the next day I woke up Ill. I got as far as Starbucks with the guys for breakfast and then limped home with a fever. I got back and the key didn't work. This was because they block your room unless you have paid for the day but they don't ask for your money in advance so you get back and you can't get in... After a zombie trip to pay up and back the cleaner appeared and showed me how to work the curtains and wear the slippers. It was very nice of her but I was just wishing her to leave... Then she did and I passed out face first in a pillow for the entire day. The others hired bikes and cycled all around Suzhou :(
Suzhou is very interesting as it feels a lot more like a town than a city. The buildings are brick and small and in a chinese style. The roads are small and there are lots of little alleyways. Suzhou is on the delta of the Yangtze River so there are hundreds of little waterways and pools all over the town. As Ruth said, "it's the Venice of China. Except it's not Venice". All of this makes the town feel like a nice place to be in. All the little alleways with tiny shops selling jade contributed a lovely Chinese feel that is lacking from the bigger Hangzhou and Qingdao. I was very annoyed to miss exploring it for shivering in bed.
In the evening the others went to the cinema to see some "truly awful" Hong Kong film which, interestingly, the guy sat near me in Starbucks is now watching on his laptop. It's a small world...
The next day Becka and I said farewell and headed off to Shanghai. One thing they do better here is trains. It was clean, comfy and fast. Very fast. They kept showing the speed and although I didn't notice it until we were slowing down, we were still going at over 200kph. A lot faster than anything goes, or will go for about 20 years, in the UK.
We arrived in Shanghai. Becka felt shit and I felt shit but we staggered through the subway system and ended up at our hotel in 豫园, Yu Gardens. Yu Gardens is an area of traditional style buildings full of shops, shops and more shops. They sell everything. We didn't do much that day but the next we headed out with our cash to see what we could get. I finally found size 42 shoes and bought these monstrosities which I would never wear in the UK- they are covered in embroidery and decorations. Great for China though :P. I tried on some more qipao but wasn't feeling in the mood so didn't get one. By this point I had also completely lost my voice so was relying on Becka to translate my mouthed english. I think the assistants thought I was special...
I also bought some jade earrings ("normally these are 400, I give them to you for 350"me:"i'll give you 200") and deliberated over some chopsticks for dad's birthday but then decided they were too boring. We looked at some traditional chinese instruments as well as endless statues of jade. There were a lot of laowai in Yu Gardens and I hadn't seen any for so long I was staring at them like a Chinese person :P
We bought some haagen-daaz ice cream to sooth my throat. It was very expensive but soooo good. Although Becka got very cross when the server couldn't understand our order (confusion over how many scoops we wanted).
Then we asked a policeman where to get credit for Becka's phone and he took us to a complex underground. This was virtually deserted, in contrast to up above, and intriguingly was stuffed with shops full of what looked like basically loot. Some of it did look pilfered from some ancient tomb. The stuff down here wasn't shiny but bizarrely authentic. There was a shop selling things from the 50s such as old posters and pamphlets. Another was full of artefacts from the Miao minority, a people in southern China. Becka bought some hairpins here. I ended up buying a bronze statue of a horse. Mostly because it was originally 600 and when I was actually saying no I don't want it what would I do with a bronze statue of a horse the shop owner eventually said I could have it for 250 and, well, I did. I like it.
This is the point I racistly moan about Americans. With other Laowai I pass in the street they could be French, English, Swedish or even South African for all I know. If they are speaking, it will be too quiet for me to understand. I have spent the past hour trying to eavesdrop some laowai 4m away at a table and have only just decided they are speaking French. But with Americans... They will be walking down the middle of whatever street they are on, no matter how big/small. They will be speaking very loudly saying how it's all probably just junk and way overpriced and to just offer "like, 10 bucks or something". They will be wearing shorts, sandals and a hat. They will be clutching a rucksack to their belly very tightly so that a dastardly native won't pull it off them. And they will be around twice as big as the rest of us. Seriously, being here throws into perspective quite how huge some Westerners are. It's gross that a 40yr old American who should be in their prime is just a bag of lard. The whole effect is just embarrassing. Why can't they just be normal? Why do they dress like they are hiking in the Wild West when they are in a cosmopolitan city?
It annoys me.
As we both felt ill Becka and I retreated back to the room for a lie down. In the evening we scraped ourselves together and went to the Bund. The Bund is basically the riverfront here. Becka wasn't overly impressed as it is "just like Liverpool". All the buildings are indeed in a neo-classical style. I liked the Bund. The river either had very brightly lit pleasure boats (the Chinese like neon) or eerily dark freight boats slipping through. On one side were these fantasticly futuristic buildings and on the other a reminder of the colonial past.
We headed down it in search of the "food court" but this proved elusive so we crossed a bridge and headed into the nearest restaurant in search, basically, of mash potato. This one was the restaurant of a hotel which turned out to have quite a history. It was called the Astor Hotel and had been the first western-owned hotel in Shanghai. Einstein and Ulysses S. Grant and stayed here, as had Chiang Kai-Shek when he was on the run. It was all in the art-deco style and suddenly I got a taste of what it must have been like in Shanghai in the 1920s. This was when the city was very glamorous and the rich would be dressed up with fancy hairstyles while the men in sharp suits smoked cigarettes. You realise that China actually had style at this point and that it did once have a fragile opportunity to be somewhere...refined. Then it was all destroyed as China tore itself apart in the following decades. It made me sad to think that whilst China is modernising now, it is all money, money, money. Noone cares about culture or aesthetics.
I had leg of lamb. It came with mash and gravy. I nearly cried.
We walked back but encountered the intriguing phenomenon that if you walk in a line from A to B and then walk back along that line from B, you will not find A. In the end we gave up and got a taxi.
The next day we got the subway to the airport. We went in the wrong direction at first but soon ended up where we wanted. We had a little bit of excitement when checking in as they spotted Becka's new metal, relic sword in my large rucksack. On the x-ray it was pretty obvious it was a sword but they had me get it out so they could check the metal pointy thing was indeed a metal pointy thing. Then we went through security and they were a bit bemused by all Becka's hairpins as they looked pretty deadly. However they were allowed through and we caught the plane back. I was a bit worried going up as the plane made an odd noise and had a fairly bumpy ascent but I realised I was being arrogant for not trusting a Chinese plane and pilot. The pilot in the end, performed one of the smoothest landings I've ever had so that proves me wrong.
And home!! Lovely, lovely Qingdao :D Although annoyingly the month's worth of internet I bought had run out so when I was dying to skype people I could only poke the "diagnose problem" button dejectedly. Boo.
My bamboo plant must have been feeling depressed as it had jumped out of its pot onto the floor. I rescued it and half-drowned it in water but we shall see if it pulls through.
2010-10-08
Iiillllll
Sorry I haven't been updating but have been ill for the past couple of days so have spent what little energy I have on getting around Suzhou/Shanghai. I shall write up what's been happening soon though.
xxx
xxx
2010-10-05
Yesterday to Suzhou
I wrote this yesterday but couldn't post as had no internet:
So today we headed on to Suzhou UK
So we checked out, got our 押金 back (*long speech in Chinese* me: “errrr” receptionist: “er…minibar?”me: “ohhh 没有! (didn’t use)”) and then caught a bus to 汽车北站, Qiche Bei Zhan, North Bus Station and joined in the queue/scrum. The next two buses were full so we got one an hour later and then went to sit in the waiting room. I did some homework and Becka read her pokemon book. Then we hopped on what we hoped was the right bus and set off. The seats were rather bizarre as they were tilted very far back and wouldn’t come more upright. Becka’s in particular was very far back which annoyed her a little. We passed several coaches destined for places like 广东, Guangdong a.k.a Canton
The countryside we passed through was quite interesting as it was the first time I’d seen China Belgium UK China
The coach had a tv and an advert for the film The Expendables came on. This wasn’t really interesting in itself but the Chinese title is 敢死队, Gan Si Dui, literally- Willing to Die Team. I always find the translations of films interesting.
The coach’s sick bag was called an “Airsickness Bag” in English. Oh so close with that translation, oh so close…
Eventually we arrived in 苏州, Suzhou
Sometimes I feel conspicuous as a Westerner…
We whizzed through Suzhou Suzhou are that it is much like Hangzhou Hangzhou Hangzhou Shanghai
Added: Ruth finally got here at around half 10 having got an unregistered taxi to Suzhou. These can be dodgy as the normal ruse is that they drive you halfway to your destionation and stop in the middle of nowhere by the side of a motorway and hike the price up a lot. Of course you have to pay or you'll be left by the side of a motorway... Luckily, and slightly oddly, Ruth's price only got hiked up £1. They could have got her life's savings and a kidney off her at that point! She'd been forced to get one as all the trains and buses were full. She was so relieved to get to Suzhou in one piece and not be sold as a sex slave by the driver. Becka and I were relieved too!
I shall write up today's tomorrow as I am rather tired from today. Today was hard work.
2010-10-03
Did I Mention There Were a Lot of People There?
So today was Epic Tourist Day. Or "Touruist" if we are going with the Chinese spelling but I digress- Becka and I woke up bright and early at around 8 and then messed around watching kids tv before leaving around 10am. We were watching some cartoon about sheep- the baddie was a wolf. I felt sorry for the wolf. All he wanted was a decent meal... Was a rather bizarre moment at around 9am as someone started letting off loads of fireworks a few blocks away.
We headed off to the famous West Lake, 西湖, which is a very large, er, lake in Hangzhou. It is one of the "Four Beauties" of China or something. On the way we passed a bakery and I nabbed a jam bun thing and a massive twisty doughnut. Probably not the healthiest breakfast but very tasty! When we arrived at the lake it was predictably very busy and full of tourists but that did not really spoil the loveliness of the place. It is surrounded by wooded mountains on three sides with the tall skyscrapers of Hangzhou on another so from where we were it was very green and pretty. We queued up to catch the boat to the biggest island in the middle called 小瀛洲, Xiao Ying Zhou. According to my boat ticket this means Fairy Islet but I'm not sure. However my translation has come up with Little Sea Continent so perhaps it is right. The queue was fairly long and the Chinese do not quite have such a great tradition of queuing as the British so Becka got a bit incensed by the number of people pushing in. I was distracted by the child behind who, when his balloon wasn't hitting me in the face, was wrapping himself around my legs. I didn't like this. Eventually we made it onto an old chinese-style boat that ferried us across to 小瀛洲. I quite enjoyed the ride-lakes are very peaceful places to be. The peace didn't last, however, as when we got to 小瀛洲 we discovered a good few percent of the population of China there. The island has a very unusual geography in that it is mostly made up of 4 pools and the land is limited to a strip around the edge and through the middle of these pools. Becka and I wandered around and I must admit it had been worth the journey. There were lots of old style pagoda type buildings as well as a bamboo forest and little bridges over the pools. Very picturesque. After a while we decided to try to get to another of the smaller islands on the lake. Unfortunately, as Becka had been able to go two years ago when she came, we couldn't find a boat that went there. This was a shame as the smaller islands had looked very pretty and, now I think about it, suspiciously empty. In the end we plumped for a boat to take us to shore opposite to where we had left. Leaving was not as easy as anticipated as the queue was again fairly epic. Did I mention there were a lot of people about? Eventually we shoved onto a boat (we had spurned the previous boat as we had reckoned that it could only sink with that many people on board-although I think it made it) and made port. Then we went in search of food. This wasn't very plentiful on this side but eventually we rocked up at a teahouse and perused the menu. We went for spring rolls, something with cucmber in, and a duck. The spring rolls were completely flat. The thing with cucumber was a slice of cucumber rolled up in a yellow pastry (for wont of a better word) with something... unidentifiable. It was sort of fibrous. And pink. And tasted ambivalent. The duck was served cold... with the head. All cooked in a soy sauce type thing. It was very nice although eating meat like that using chopsticks is tricky, not to mention messy, and well, it would have been nicer warm... We had a frustrating moment as there was a character on a sign warning against thieves that I just could not find in my dictionary despite searching for ages. I still don't know what it means grrr.
Then we went to see the 雷锋塔, Leifeng Ta, Thunder Peak Pagoda. This had an interesting history in that originally it was built of red brick with wooden carvings in 972. It's purpose was "to hold a lock of Sakyamuni's hair" (I think he is the original Buddha). However in 1550 it was set on fire by Japanese pirates and eventually in 1924 it collapsed. It was then rebuilt in 2002. So whilst it is sort-of new it does have a long history. An interesting fact about it is that it is supposed to make you give birth to boys. There are 7 floors and it is octagonal in shape.
The first and second floors have the remains of the brick foundations of the old pagoda in the middle. The second also had various showcases dedicated to buddhist thingies that I really didn't understand. And a shop. The third was fairly spectacular as the walls were covered in magnificent, and very intricate, wooden carvings of scenes from a myth called "Legend of the White Snake". In this legend a white snake demon called 白素貞, Bai Suzhen, transforms into a human to try to do good deeds to become a goddess. She attempts to bring rain to drought-stricken areas but promptly floods it instead. This means she can't become a goddess. Then a human called Xu Xian accidentally gets into the demon world and he and 白素貞 fall in love. Xu Xian, however, has to go back to the human world and forgets everything in the process- including 白素貞. But luckily they meet again and fall in love before opening a medicine shop. In one last twist 白素貞 gives birth to a child and is forced to tell Xu Xian her real identity. The weakened 白素貞 is then captured by a sorcerer and imprisoned in the 雷锋塔 forever. The course of true love never did run smooth...
The fourth floor had modern chinese-style paintings depicting the rebuilding of the pagoda. On the 5th were huge inscriptions in the style of the old bamboo strips used for writing. On the 6th were wooden carvings of the modern, or contemporary to 2002 as while there were skyscrapers etc there were definitely fewer, Hangzhou. The next was the top and had a fabulous gold ceiling as well as fantastic views over the surrounding city and mountains, not forgetting the lake with its flotilla of various boats, rafts and ferries. The pagoda was quite crowded- did I mention there were a lot of tourists about?
Intriguingly I seemed to be as photogenic as the scenery as I got quite a few requests to have my picture taken with the askee and his friends/family. Becka thinks I should start charging and I'm tempted to agree... This blond hair costs to maintain! We also got a few little kids bouncing up to us and saying "hello" rather proudly- as well as one who said "welcome to China".
When we exited we went down a different side of the hill we had gone up. It was all forested and had little paths through it. For some reason someone had put loudspeakers inside fake plastic rocks and was playing Chinese music... There was a little 亭, ting-pavillion, as well which had a stele inside inscribed by the Emperor Qianlong- from a couple of hundred years ago. He came to Hangzhou and liked it so much he picked out 西湖十景, 10 scenic spots of the West Lake. The 雷锋塔 was one of them and the epithet for it is 雷锋夕照-Leifeng in the Evening Glow.
Then we left the pagoda and on a whim entered the temple opposite. I'm glad we did as it was only 10元 and was virtually empty of tourists. This was very strange considering how many there were in the pagoda! It was called 净慈寺,Jingci Si, which I think means "Nothing But Kindness Temple". It had several buildings housing shrines as well as 运木古井, which according to the translation provided means "The Miraculous Well that Once Delivered Timber". Amusement.
There was a quite sad part opposite this amazing well. It consisted of 15 pillars. The temple was first built in 954 but was destroyed by fire in 1932. In 1955 the 济公, Jigong, Hall was rebuilt but then was torn down during the Cultural Revolution. The pillars remain in the hope the Hall will be rebuilt some day. It summed up how destructive the last century was for China.
The largest temple contained a statue of the buddhe sat on something. It was the largest statue I have ever seen- truly it was around the size of 6 large cars. There were more statues around the side, all made of brass or something similar, including one with eyebrows that reached to the floor. The ceiling was covered in paintings of cranes. There were yellow kneeling cushions everywhere for praying and banners hung down covered in characters. In front were offerings of fruit and flowers. Near the back were two large statues of monks-one sat on a lion, the other an elephant with 6 tusks.
The ancient temple at the top was still under construction :P Apparently most of it was built in the 1980s but it was very beautiful nonetheless. There were monks around too and I had a conversation with one that didn't involve me going errrr. He asked us where we were from (he seemed taken aback by our answer- I don't know why) and asked if we were studying.
The whole temple was full of the smell of incense being burned.
There is a gigantic bell in one the buildings. It is rung every evening and is another of the Ten Scenic Spots, "Evening Bell Ringing at the Nanping Hill"(南屏晚钟).
Then Becka and I walked back to the hotel. We had a little detour, slightly unintended, but found a nice restaurant for dinner. I happily tucked into my thin noodles with bits of pork (maybe) but when I looked up Becka had a clean plate in front of her. She must have inhaled it or something. She ordered another while I plodded through mine. Then we carried on. We had a bit of a husband and wife moment where we argued for about 5 minutes about where we were. I was the Man and refused to ask directions and Becka was the Woman with a hopeless sense of direction. Eventually we agreed that I was right about where we were and we set off back. After a while we arrived back at the hotel safe and sound- if a bit footsore and weary! Becka headed straight to a bath and bed while I wrote this, admiring the view over Hangzhou.
Tomorrow Suzhou! I got a text from Kit, friend from Edinburgh working in Nanjing, that he would be meeting us there. Good times! And whilst there were many, many people in Hangzhou, Shanghai is apparently expecting 8 million tourists this week... This is week is one of 2 Golden Weeks where everyone gets a week off, the other being New Year. During these times, China gets on the move.
We headed off to the famous West Lake, 西湖, which is a very large, er, lake in Hangzhou. It is one of the "Four Beauties" of China or something. On the way we passed a bakery and I nabbed a jam bun thing and a massive twisty doughnut. Probably not the healthiest breakfast but very tasty! When we arrived at the lake it was predictably very busy and full of tourists but that did not really spoil the loveliness of the place. It is surrounded by wooded mountains on three sides with the tall skyscrapers of Hangzhou on another so from where we were it was very green and pretty. We queued up to catch the boat to the biggest island in the middle called 小瀛洲, Xiao Ying Zhou. According to my boat ticket this means Fairy Islet but I'm not sure. However my translation has come up with Little Sea Continent so perhaps it is right. The queue was fairly long and the Chinese do not quite have such a great tradition of queuing as the British so Becka got a bit incensed by the number of people pushing in. I was distracted by the child behind who, when his balloon wasn't hitting me in the face, was wrapping himself around my legs. I didn't like this. Eventually we made it onto an old chinese-style boat that ferried us across to 小瀛洲. I quite enjoyed the ride-lakes are very peaceful places to be. The peace didn't last, however, as when we got to 小瀛洲 we discovered a good few percent of the population of China there. The island has a very unusual geography in that it is mostly made up of 4 pools and the land is limited to a strip around the edge and through the middle of these pools. Becka and I wandered around and I must admit it had been worth the journey. There were lots of old style pagoda type buildings as well as a bamboo forest and little bridges over the pools. Very picturesque. After a while we decided to try to get to another of the smaller islands on the lake. Unfortunately, as Becka had been able to go two years ago when she came, we couldn't find a boat that went there. This was a shame as the smaller islands had looked very pretty and, now I think about it, suspiciously empty. In the end we plumped for a boat to take us to shore opposite to where we had left. Leaving was not as easy as anticipated as the queue was again fairly epic. Did I mention there were a lot of people about? Eventually we shoved onto a boat (we had spurned the previous boat as we had reckoned that it could only sink with that many people on board-although I think it made it) and made port. Then we went in search of food. This wasn't very plentiful on this side but eventually we rocked up at a teahouse and perused the menu. We went for spring rolls, something with cucmber in, and a duck. The spring rolls were completely flat. The thing with cucumber was a slice of cucumber rolled up in a yellow pastry (for wont of a better word) with something... unidentifiable. It was sort of fibrous. And pink. And tasted ambivalent. The duck was served cold... with the head. All cooked in a soy sauce type thing. It was very nice although eating meat like that using chopsticks is tricky, not to mention messy, and well, it would have been nicer warm... We had a frustrating moment as there was a character on a sign warning against thieves that I just could not find in my dictionary despite searching for ages. I still don't know what it means grrr.
Then we went to see the 雷锋塔, Leifeng Ta, Thunder Peak Pagoda. This had an interesting history in that originally it was built of red brick with wooden carvings in 972. It's purpose was "to hold a lock of Sakyamuni's hair" (I think he is the original Buddha). However in 1550 it was set on fire by Japanese pirates and eventually in 1924 it collapsed. It was then rebuilt in 2002. So whilst it is sort-of new it does have a long history. An interesting fact about it is that it is supposed to make you give birth to boys. There are 7 floors and it is octagonal in shape.
The first and second floors have the remains of the brick foundations of the old pagoda in the middle. The second also had various showcases dedicated to buddhist thingies that I really didn't understand. And a shop. The third was fairly spectacular as the walls were covered in magnificent, and very intricate, wooden carvings of scenes from a myth called "Legend of the White Snake". In this legend a white snake demon called 白素貞, Bai Suzhen, transforms into a human to try to do good deeds to become a goddess. She attempts to bring rain to drought-stricken areas but promptly floods it instead. This means she can't become a goddess. Then a human called Xu Xian accidentally gets into the demon world and he and 白素貞 fall in love. Xu Xian, however, has to go back to the human world and forgets everything in the process- including 白素貞. But luckily they meet again and fall in love before opening a medicine shop. In one last twist 白素貞 gives birth to a child and is forced to tell Xu Xian her real identity. The weakened 白素貞 is then captured by a sorcerer and imprisoned in the 雷锋塔 forever. The course of true love never did run smooth...
The fourth floor had modern chinese-style paintings depicting the rebuilding of the pagoda. On the 5th were huge inscriptions in the style of the old bamboo strips used for writing. On the 6th were wooden carvings of the modern, or contemporary to 2002 as while there were skyscrapers etc there were definitely fewer, Hangzhou. The next was the top and had a fabulous gold ceiling as well as fantastic views over the surrounding city and mountains, not forgetting the lake with its flotilla of various boats, rafts and ferries. The pagoda was quite crowded- did I mention there were a lot of tourists about?
Intriguingly I seemed to be as photogenic as the scenery as I got quite a few requests to have my picture taken with the askee and his friends/family. Becka thinks I should start charging and I'm tempted to agree... This blond hair costs to maintain! We also got a few little kids bouncing up to us and saying "hello" rather proudly- as well as one who said "welcome to China".
When we exited we went down a different side of the hill we had gone up. It was all forested and had little paths through it. For some reason someone had put loudspeakers inside fake plastic rocks and was playing Chinese music... There was a little 亭, ting-pavillion, as well which had a stele inside inscribed by the Emperor Qianlong- from a couple of hundred years ago. He came to Hangzhou and liked it so much he picked out 西湖十景, 10 scenic spots of the West Lake. The 雷锋塔 was one of them and the epithet for it is 雷锋夕照-Leifeng in the Evening Glow.
Then we left the pagoda and on a whim entered the temple opposite. I'm glad we did as it was only 10元 and was virtually empty of tourists. This was very strange considering how many there were in the pagoda! It was called 净慈寺,Jingci Si, which I think means "Nothing But Kindness Temple". It had several buildings housing shrines as well as 运木古井, which according to the translation provided means "The Miraculous Well that Once Delivered Timber". Amusement.
There was a quite sad part opposite this amazing well. It consisted of 15 pillars. The temple was first built in 954 but was destroyed by fire in 1932. In 1955 the 济公, Jigong, Hall was rebuilt but then was torn down during the Cultural Revolution. The pillars remain in the hope the Hall will be rebuilt some day. It summed up how destructive the last century was for China.
The largest temple contained a statue of the buddhe sat on something. It was the largest statue I have ever seen- truly it was around the size of 6 large cars. There were more statues around the side, all made of brass or something similar, including one with eyebrows that reached to the floor. The ceiling was covered in paintings of cranes. There were yellow kneeling cushions everywhere for praying and banners hung down covered in characters. In front were offerings of fruit and flowers. Near the back were two large statues of monks-one sat on a lion, the other an elephant with 6 tusks.
The ancient temple at the top was still under construction :P Apparently most of it was built in the 1980s but it was very beautiful nonetheless. There were monks around too and I had a conversation with one that didn't involve me going errrr. He asked us where we were from (he seemed taken aback by our answer- I don't know why) and asked if we were studying.
The whole temple was full of the smell of incense being burned.
There is a gigantic bell in one the buildings. It is rung every evening and is another of the Ten Scenic Spots, "Evening Bell Ringing at the Nanping Hill"(南屏晚钟).
Then Becka and I walked back to the hotel. We had a little detour, slightly unintended, but found a nice restaurant for dinner. I happily tucked into my thin noodles with bits of pork (maybe) but when I looked up Becka had a clean plate in front of her. She must have inhaled it or something. She ordered another while I plodded through mine. Then we carried on. We had a bit of a husband and wife moment where we argued for about 5 minutes about where we were. I was the Man and refused to ask directions and Becka was the Woman with a hopeless sense of direction. Eventually we agreed that I was right about where we were and we set off back. After a while we arrived back at the hotel safe and sound- if a bit footsore and weary! Becka headed straight to a bath and bed while I wrote this, admiring the view over Hangzhou.
Tomorrow Suzhou! I got a text from Kit, friend from Edinburgh working in Nanjing, that he would be meeting us there. Good times! And whilst there were many, many people in Hangzhou, Shanghai is apparently expecting 8 million tourists this week... This is week is one of 2 Golden Weeks where everyone gets a week off, the other being New Year. During these times, China gets on the move.
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