The Facts of Life....In China

Some of the following only apply to foreigners:

1. Any bed in China is harder than the floor.
2. Everyday you will hear these things being screamed out behind you: "Hello!" or "外国!" (waiguo- foreigner)".
- If you are a foreign teacher: "老外," which well means....foreign teacher...
- If you are Max: "好高!!"," 怎么高!!", "很高!!, "怎么那么高!!", "天啊!", or any other variant use of 高 (gao- tall)
3. If something makes logical sense, it is strictly prohibited.
4. If something makes absolutely no sense, it will be implemented immediately.
5. Traffic signs, lines, police, and rules are only for aesthetic purposes.
6. If a man hole cover goes missing, the following protocol must be followed: First, cut down a young tree, second, carry the young tree to the exposed hole, three, insert. Problem solved.
7. No matter where you go, you will be stared at. Constantly.
8. Everything can and should be bargained for.
9. Squat toilets some how manage to be more dirty, wet, and disgusting than you thought possible.

Thanksgiving in Nanchang

The evening really began at about 3:30 PM. I still had one class left to teach and had to catch the bus as soon as class ended. So, I put on my suit and headed out the door to teach my final Thanksgiving day class. Max and I had decided that this could be our only opportunity to wear our suits, so we went with it.

Class was fairly uneventful. On the way to class and on the way to the bus afterwards I got even more stairs and giggles than normal, but that was to be expected. Max also had a late class at old campus, so Matt, Janice, and I hoped on to the teacher bus to head over to meet him. I had a nice conversation with an older Chinese gentleman, who turned out to be an advanced English reading teacher. His English was fairly decent and he told me that my Chinese was pretty good as well. He asked me questions about my life in Nanchang and my life in America as well. I'm still surprised nearly everyday by how friendly and inquisitive everyone is here. There seems to be a small portion of the population who wants absolutely nothing to do with foreigners, but for the most part everyone here in Nanchang has been extremely friendly and helpful.

After meeting Max, we headed over to Detox to meet the rest of our Thanksgiving party. When we got out of the cab we were greeted by Terry who introduced us to a few of his fellow teachers who were also all from America. Two were from California, Crystal a mid-twenties, Berkley graduate and Rodney from San Diego, and finally, one teacher was from Maine. I have forgotten his name but during conversation he revealed that he was well over 60. Once we arrived at the restaurant we meet several more foreigners and were seated around many more that I never had the opportunity to meet. Others were from Los Angeles, Georgia (Union City! you'll be happy to hear that Sarah!), Australia, Canada, and Britain.

The dinner was amazing. The first course was a chicken terrine with bacon and caramelized onions. The second course was a dream: garlic mashed potatoes, sage bread stuffing, carrots, and roast turkey all swimming in a delicious gravy. The dinner was finished with a pumpkin tart and the entire evening was accompanied by Chilean wine, Heinekens and Coronas. I was more than stuffed.

We ended the evening at Escape Bar and a little conversation with our new western friends. It was as this point that a few of our new acquaintances revealed that they thought that Max and I were religous because we had dressed up. "China, the only place where dressing up for dinner can be held against you." Having missed Thanksgiving dinner for the last two years, this was a nearly perfect substitution for the real thing. It was only missing my family and friends. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, and I can't wait to hear about them all!

Hoping for Turkey

Well, I just finished my first tutoring session here in China. One of my students, Clark, volunteered to tutor me. Nearly all of my students have volunteered to tutor me, but Clark's English is quite suburb (He's the fellow in the picture with the beer). He is also very upbeat and willing to teach, so it seems that it will work out very well. Also it's free! I can honestly say that my listening comprehension and speaking skills have gotten much better since arriving in China, but I have been slacking off on my writing, reading, and grammar expansion. I was about to make up an excuse, but there really isn't one other than myself.

This Thursday is Thanksgiving, or at least that's what I have been told here in China. This will be my third, count it third, time to miss Thanksgiving with my family. It's kinda sad, but I have been having some interesting adventures during my Turkey Days so I can't complain. Two years ago I was in Zion National Park Hiking through a beautiful canyon. We had a majestic, all be it freezing, star-lit dinner of packaged chicken, rice, and biscuits (Dave, you may be able to correct me here). Last year I was in Beijing, where a Thanksgiving party was held by my Chinese university. It was very nice, but pathetic all the same. Every table got one turkey (火鸡 huo ji) leg and a few sweet things. This year, I believe will be a nice combo of adventure and delicious, traditional Thanksgiving food. Sort of.

Last weekend two teachers from the Netherlands, Gerry and Patrick, came to visit our school to select a few students who would have the opportunity to go to the Netherlands for a semester. So Max, Matt, and I, being the good ambassadors for Nanchang that we are, brought Gerry and Patrick to dinner one evening. We also met them at the fountain across the river later in the week. It happens to be the largest fountain in Asia if you must ask. Following our viewing of the fountain we decided to head over to Escape Bar for a few drinks. The bar was fairly crowded and I noticed an older gentleman wearing a Chicago T-shirt and a New York Jets cap. I figured that he must be American. He would later introduce himself as Terry, the criminal defense lawyer from Chicago. Needless to say it is always nice to bump into a fellow American. We had quite the mix that evening. One Canadian, three Americans, two Netherlanders, a few Chinese students, and finally a pair of Nanchang business men, who were insistent on teaching me about Confucius (孔子 kong zi).

Yesterday I got a text from Terry asking if I was interested in a Thanksgiving dinner at Detox. A Thanksgiving dinner?? I'll take two please. Detox is a Western restaurant in town that is run by a fellow from Britain. It may not be a genuine Thanksgiving, but it'll be better than prepackaged chicken or cold turkey drumsticks. All of the foreign teachers, sans Steven, are heading over on Thursday evening as well. I must say, I'm quite excited for dinner and for the opportunity to meet a few more westerners in Nanchang.

Finally, as a fail safe, I'd like to ask all of you to take some pictures at your Thanksgiving gatherings and email them into me (smannear@gmail.com). Then I can at least drool over the pictures if nothing else. If I don't speak to you before Thanksgiving, I hope you have a great one and remember to eat a little extra food for me. Besides, winter is coming and you need to bulk up.

Quick update

Things that have happened since the last update:

1. Had a party at my place. Students cooked food. My place now smells like fish.
2. Matt arrived. He's the new foreign teacher at our campus. He's from Ohio.
3. Haiyan and Steven tried to get onto a local television show. Similar to Oprah, but not as successful. The plan was to arrive at Haiyan's parents home with a camera and resolve the differences between Steven and Haiyan's parents. Haiyan's mother hates Steven. He's foreign. Haiyan's father doesn't know they are dating. Steven and Haiyan decided it wasn't the best plan.
4. Judged an English drama competition here at school. My favorite was a rendition of Gone with the Wind performed by several of my male students in drag. The competition ended up lasting three hours. About two and a half hours longer than it should have been.

Tomorrow I will be judging a debate. Hopefully it's much shorter. Hopefully more people will be in drag.

An Ode to Friday

Friday, oh how I hate you.
You give me six hours of classes.
You give me students who want to get out of class almost as much as me.
You tempt me with the promise of the weekend.
After six hours of class, you are the weekend.
Oh how I love you Friday.

I've come to the conclusion that I will never see my laptop again. I think that acceptance is the best way to get over my loss. Laptop, I'll miss you. You served me well.

One of the bag ladies came into my classroom today. I yelled at her in Chinese asking if she had my computer. She ran away.

It's time to head to the local shop and buy a few beers and a bottle of wine. Steven and Haiyan are cooking dinner for the group again this evening, and then, perhaps we will play some poker. I've realized that I really enjoy meeting new people. I was quite a hermit for most of my life. It's time to savor the evening.

It's good to be evolving and expanding.

Bad Week--Good Weekend

Let me start with the bad news first. My laptop is MIA. In fact, it has been MIA since Wednesday afternoon. I was hoping that it would show up and I wouldn't even have to make this post, but it seems like I may never see my laptop again.

On Wednesday afternoon I brought my iPod, speakers, and laptop computer to class. My intention was to play a little Halloween music while I told my students about Halloween in America. I brought the laptop as a back up in case I couldn't find an outlet for the speakers and iPod. Thankfully the class was equipped with an outlet near the blackboard so I just placed my computer on the ground next to my backpack. This was where everything went wrong. I didn't use the laptop all class, so I completely forgot that I had brought it to class. When I was leaving class I was talking to one of my students about basketball or something and so wasn't paying attention. My student and I were the last ones to leave the class room and I turned off the light as I left.

When I got back to my building I realized the terrible mistake that I had just made. I ran back to the class room, but when I arrived the laptop was no where to be found. Two students were in the classroom studying. I asked them if they had found my laptop and they said no. Then I asked if the lights were off when they came in to the classroom and they told me that they had been. So, someone came in to the classroom while it was dark and grabbed my laptop.

I have been told and also seen that there are ladies who wander around campus collecting bottles to make extra money. One of those ladies peeked into my classroom that afternoon. I have a suspicion that she returned after class and scored a much better prize than a few water bottles. I still have a little hope that my laptop may be returned on Wednesday by someone who doesn't know how to return it but to return it to my classroom. I'm fairly confident that a student did not take it. The teachers and students have all been extremely helpful in trying to get my laptop back, and it is hard to believe that any of them would have stolen my property, but perhaps I'm being naive.

In other news, I had a very exciting weekend. Friday evening Max, Janice, Steven, his Chinese girlfriend Haiyan, and I went to eat hotpot. Hotpot is fairly similar to fondue. You are given a big bowl of seasoned water, which is often divided into a spicy section and a regular section. This bowl is placed onto a burner in the middle of your table and set to a rolling boil. Then it's time to choose your ingredients. Since Haiyan was with us, she did all of the ordering. We had beef, lamb, pork, chicken, several vegetables, eggs, and tofu. You can throw whatever you want into whichever side you want and then wait a few minutes and fish it out with a nice slotted spoon. It really is quite delicious.

Saturday was also quite a day. As a group we headed over to the zoo in the center of the city. We took the city bus--something that I have not done since Beijing. Max had never taken the public bus in China, and he wasn't too happy about his first experience. Like any public area in China, the buses are incredibly crowded. Finding a seat is like finding a winning lottery ticket.

When we finally arrived at the zoo we realized that the animal show had already started. We rushed around the zoo spotting many different exciting exhibits but were unable to find the animal show. When we finally did find the show we arrived just in time to see a monkey riding a goat on a tight rope. There was a surprise ending, but I won't give it away (you can watch the video on my vimeo page). After that the trainers brought out a bear that jumped over hurdles and then kicked them over, a bear who jumped rope, and finally a bear that rode a bicycle. The bear's riding skills were suburb. If bears ever figure out how to race, Lance Armstrong may be in trouble. Unfortunately, because of our late arrival, we had missed the section of the show where a tiger rides a horse.

After the show we decided to check out all of the exhibits. The zoo had many monkey exhibits, a panda exhibit, a bear exhibit, many bird exhibits, several elephants, a giraffe, and even penguins. Whenever I go to the zoo the term "animal prison" is always in the back of my mind. It always seems cruel to have these animals locked away out of the wild, but in America at least they seem to be in some sort of five-star federal prison with gourmet meals and luxurious acomidations. With all of the animal rights groups in the US, I would expect nothing less. However here in Nanchang I feel like I was visiting a third world prisoner of war prison for animals. The animals all seemed to be either sick, infected, depressed or a combination of all three. The cages were extremely small and dirty. The only attempt at making a "realistic habitat" consisted of a few concrete rock structures. Needless to say, I won't be making a second trip out to the zoo.

The rest of the weekend went by quickly. Janice, Max, and I went across the river to try and see the biggest fountain show in Asia and the biggest ferris wheel in the world, but didn't get to see either in action. The fountain area was hosting some sort of TV show (because we were all white we got to get a little bit closer), so the fountain was inactive. The ferris wheel was lit up, but was not running for some reason.

Max and I also made a trip over to the Tengwang Pavilion, which is also on the river (on the opposite side of the ferris wheel). I'll have to look up its history again, but I believe that it was some sort of mansion that belonged to a famous painter? It was a gorgeous structure and I wasn't reading any of the signs. The views from the top were beautiful and the grounds surrounding the house were also very impressive. Following our time at the pavilion Max and I went to catch up with the rest of the group, who had already seen the pavilion before. We found out that they had decided to get a foot massage. I've never had a massage from a real massage parlor. After standing all day in class for the last several weeks, it was just what the doctor ordered, though at some points they seemed to be rather violent especially when they cracked our toes. Regardless, it was well worth the $4 charge.

Sunday was a day of shopping. Max and I were determined to find some gym equipment. After going into nearly every sports shop we could find downtown we were pretty depressed at the prices we had found. Also Max was unable to find any size 13 shoes...surprise surprise. With the intention of returning later in the day to get some gym equipment Max, Janice, and I headed over to a western style market called "Metro." It is arranged very similarly to a Home Depot in the states. Big industrial shelves packed with innumerable items. We decided to check out their sports section for gym equipment, and it turned out quite nicely. We found a flat bench for very cheap and the weights cost less than anywhere else that we had previously looked. Apart from this great find, I fell in love with the store in general. The prices are bit steeper than at Walmart, but the selection is ten times better. Also, it wasn't packed from wall to wall with customers and employees. It was a nice leisurely shopping experience. To top it all off "Metro" also has a large import section filled with invaluable goods like western liquors, beers, cheese (thank god we found some), snacks, ketchup, cereal, ect. We will be returning often to "Metro."

It was a very busy weekend, but I had a lot of fun. It was good to finally be part of a group. Janice, the 60-something-year-old from Australia; Steven, the 25-year-old Brit; his Chinese girlfriend; Max and I work quite nicely as a group. Hopefully many more fun weekends will follow.