bikes and fights

to start yesterday, we had a meeting where we finally found out what we were doing. it turns out, i'm here to teach english! what a surprise. Hu Bin (the head master) went over our benefits and our responsibilities. (my responsibilities are few. i have 11 hours of class and 2 lesson plans a week, yesssssss!)

After our meeting, we went into town to buy the men bikes. (the women had bikes in their apartment to begin with.) Oliver picked out 3 spanking new bikes, and had them attach baskets and locks, and adjust the seats. I have given myself two weeks until I accidentally have it stolen. While we were waiting, we were provided with stools and bottled water. It was a pleasant experience, albeit maybe a bit long. We sat drinking water and looking at the street, while Oliver and the bike people tried to get our bikes just right. People kept riding by rubbernecking. I always worry about those riding bicycles and scooters. I'm afraid they'll crash into something as they crane their necks around and try to stare at me after they've passed. i've caused no crashes yet. (knock on wood.)

But the ride back was delightful. I felt like listening to Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head and robbing banks. [archaic movie reference]

this morning, on my way to pick up some groceries, i passed the corner where the busses come and the rickshaws wait. on the corner a man and women were fighting. screaming at each other with voices full. i did a bit of rubbernecking myself at that point, and it looked like it was coming to physical violence. the idea of the quiet, demure chinese woman is a misconception, i believe. they are full of fire, and seem quite able to speak their mind. but who knows? i've only been here five days--that alone blows my mind. it feels like it's been a month already.

tai duo le

yesterday, again, I went to have lunch, sans chinese speakers. This time however Rachel and Patrick were with me. Rachel decided that she would have noodles on her own, in order to save space for the welcome dinner we were to have that night. patrick and i decided we could get a light lunch at a table. of course, we were wrong. having learned from my past experiences, we decided to keep it simple, and work with the point and say "that" method. we began to order exactly what they were eating next to us. then a university english student came up and tried to help. she confirmed to us that we had indeed ordered the two dishes at the table next to us, then asked, "fish is their specialty. do you want fish?" Patrick and I looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders, as we are wont to do in those situations. So I said yes, and she asked how big. We said small, mindful of our welcome dinner that night. I heard her say to the waitress xiao, which means small. The student then asked if we wanted soup, and we answered with an emphatic no, including words, vigorous head shaking, and exaggerated hand motions. our food was ordered, and we waited a long time for our three small dishes. then the first small dish of fish came out. it was about a foot in diameter, and four or five inches deep. we knew we were in trouble at that point. we were enjoying this delicious, spicy dish, when our other two dishes came out. these looked about the size of something you would for a light lunch. finally, the soup came out as well. we did our best, but at the end, it didn't look like we had touched the dishes at all. patrick took out his rough guide phrasebook and looked up the right word: "tai duo le." too much. i think our waitress understood what we were saying.

And now, a word about Oliver

oliver, the aforementioned teacher liason, is a powerhouse. a few months behind me in age, he has mastered two of the most difficult languages on the planet, one with a delightful english accent. he has been our tour guide these past few days, our interpreter, our friend. he took us to chengdu proper, showed us the best restaurants to eat at, and even showed us where to get western food. he has been a bit protective of us, but i think he's relaxing a bit now. i asked oliver tonight how to say grapes and apples, and he told me right off the bat. then he said, "go on, we'll see how you do." i looked at him like a child looks at a parent on his first day of school, and went over to butcher the chinese language at the fruit stand. afterwards, he told me my chinese was getting better, and since has said before that my chinese handwriting was like a first grader's, i think i'll believe him.

mai jie yi and bick

[editor's note--i'm blatantly ripping off peter hessler here. if you want to know how, read rivertown.]

there are two sides to my personality in china. bick is witty, clever,and knows how to speak clearly and be understood (if i do say so myself). mai jie yi is neither witty nor clever, and most definitely cannot speak clearly. this was demonstrated by his bumbling in downtown high tech district today.

first he went to a fruit vendor, where he picked out grapes, and 4 apples. the conversation went like this. me (ahem, i mean) mai jie yi: "ni hao" hello. her: something in chinese said quickly. mai jie yi: shrug, shake of head, point to apples. her: produces bag.--now here's where the real magic happens--mai jie yi: "si ge" four. her: she puts four apples in the bag. score. he's a genius. mai jie yi: "xie xie" thank you, "zaijian" see you later. i'm not sure anyone has communicated less, yet felt so proud to do so. he was simply ecstatic about purchasing the fruit.

and here my writing in the third person stops, yet my ignorance continues.

my next bright idea was for lunch, i'd go to a restaurant in the village, and when they asked me what i wanted to eat, i'd pull my favorite trick and ask the waitress what she liked. i know all the words, or at least the way they're spelled, without tones. so i walk up to the full-lunch-crowd restaurant, and i'm like 2pac--all eyez on me--twan, that's for you buddy--and i get nervous. so a waitress, she's one of ten there, comes up and says something to me quickly in chinese. it seems like they do that a lot to me. i say back to her the thing i've been practicing in my head the fifteen minute walk over. i want the food that you like to eat. and she has the nerve to say to me my favorite refrain, "ting bu dong" i don't understand. so i try again, different words, bigger hand gestures, i break down to english at a point. finally an english student comes up to help, and she doesn't understand my english. finally, i get my idea across, and my food is ordered. i sit down sheepishly, and watch the laughing faces as they turn back to their food. mostly. staring is acceptable in china, no doubt. so i eat my food, get my check, and pay without problem. then comes seven tonight, when oliver tells me were gonna go to that restaurant for dinner. boy, were they happy to see me.

the pats are following me to china

so checking my email this morning, i found something that is very important in the little bar above my email. the Pats are playing the Seahawks next summer in Beijing. rediculous. my dreams have come through. not that i was really dreaming about the pats playing beijing. but still, it's awesome.

shopping and waiguoren

while touring the village with oliver, our teacher liason, we bumped into another waiguoren (foreigner) by the name of Rob. This was his third year teaching in chengdu in four years (think pats and the superbowl), and he was excited about being western in an asian country. he spoke loudly and profanely, and a european might have misidentified him as american. but no, there were boats in his abouts, and the goofy demeanor that only our northern brethren can pull off. he invited us to a cookout in october, and made us feel a bit uneasy.

so that was my first sketchball northern american meeting.

i realize here, that i need to explain the area. Chengdu Foreign Language School is situated in lovely downtown High Tech Zone (West). This is a suburb of chengdu, and was non existent five years ago. then a man who spent two years in jail, who despite his challenges became a great and respectable, not to mention wealthy businessman built CFLS. It is an amazing story of the work-ethic and strength of a Chinese person. Then he built another school. then he built a university. so a village formed and is now a thriving college town. all the schools focus on learning about the outside world, so foreign teachers abound.

the next day, while shopping in an electronics store near the center of the expat universe, carrefour (a french supermarket), there was another. an extremely bearded fellow, oliver said hello, instead of ni hao. now in chengdu, if someone says hello, or for that matter shouts hello at you, they think you're a foreigner. i think this bearded fellow took offense to this, because he said something quickly in chinese that i didn't understand, and moved away. it was like someone had accused him of being an alien or something. i know, i know, it works on almost too many levels.

it turned out he was from pittsburgh.

rimshot please

my first day

was a nightmare. I arrived in Beijing at the same time as my flight to Chengdu departed. Upon arriving, I realized that i lacked two checked bags, one carrying my clothes (replaceable), the second carrying only books (not). bummed about that, i went about rescheduling my flight. i was booked on the last plane to Chengdu at 10:10pm. now this is going on about 24 hours of travel...and it turns out that flight was delayed. finally, we began to board at 1:30am. i sat next to elson, a teenage student of english. he spoke in broken english to me, i spoke broken chinese to him. we both wrote furiously in our notebooks. i arrived in chengdu at 4:30 in the morning. Elson asked if i wanted a ride, and i demurred, thinking that in the chinese culture it is polite to do so at least twice before accepting. he took the first no, and was on his way. i bartered with a taxi driver (badly) to take me to the chengdu sheraton, where i spent from 5 to 6:30 reading in the lobby (thank you the sun!) and waiting for it to be light. at 6:30, i struck out to see the city and kill time before it was reasonable to call the headmaster. at the center of chengdu, there is a statue of mao. i thought if i could find that everything would be okay, i could get my bearings, buy a phone card, and meet my ride at an easily distinguishable place. i was told later by my coordinator that statue is under construction, and cannot be seen. so i wandered aimlessly, trying to work up my courage to ask a shop owner "you mei you dian hua mumble mumble mumble." i never could. finally i spotted an internet cafe. i spoke to the clerk, and situated myself at a terminal. i shot an email off to the lovely parents, and noticed a payphone on the desk and asked if i could make a call. luckily the clerk's english was good, and he assisted me in making a call, buying a phone card, and finally walking two or three blocks to help me find my ride.
since then, the trip has been cake. my apartment is rediculously huge. 90sq meters. i have a bedroom, bath, kitchen, dining room, study, sitting room, and a nook that looks perfect for meditating. the other teachers are from england and really pleasant. all i need now are my bags, and more importantly, my books.


good night and good morning,
bick