Tuesday, May 29, 2007

counterfeit?

My Chinese tutor had an interesting lesson for me today. She told me that the 50 kuai bill that I had paid her with was counterfeit. When she went to the bank to deposit the money, they took it from her and destroyed it. The poor woman.

She apologized profusely on behalf the Chinese people. When I asked her that I might have gotten the bill accidentally, she was convinced that it was done on purpose. We then went over how to spot a counterfeit bill, along with watermarks, color-changing ink, and textures so even blind people can spot a fake. Unfortunately, none of those things help a dumb American.

So since now I'm out $6.25, I'm gonna start checking my 50s and 100s.

Monday, May 28, 2007

overcoming bureaucracy

At our dining hall, every day at lunch you have a good choice of a bunch of meat dishes, a few vegetable dishes. Behind a row of teller windows, lunch ladies stand in front of bowls, collecting the chits that are used for currency at DH (that's what I call dining hall [it's catching on]). You get to choose two meat and one veg, as well as a nice big block of rice. Usually, I'll mention one or two of the vegetables or dishes I know and point to the rest. I sit eating with chopsticks, shocking the teachers with my skill.

If someone finishes their tray and is still hungry, they are welcome to go back to back to the lunch ladies to get more...but only of the dishes that they chose the first time. Perhaps they are worried with too many choices the faculty may become fat. I'm not sure why, but some of the teachers have figured a way around this. After finishing your firsts, you clear off your tray into a soup bowl. (Soup is available at every meal. People drink that instead of a beverage.) Using your friend's tray, you get a bit of what you'd like to have that you didn't the first time, and go to the window. Spying your tray, they give you a refill of what they thought was there the first time. And boosh, you've beaten the system. Out of what, I have no idea, but you've beaten it. Congratulations.

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

syrup? not maple syrup, just syrup.

Squat toilets are not the most sweet smelling things. Trough squat toilets smell even worse. I will not describe the odor of trough squat toilets in a boys high school rest room. As Nadia and I pass the bathrooms, we can tell what day it is. Monday isn't too bad, but on Thursday I'm nauseous for the 20 seconds as I pass those foul rooms.

Today, however, there was a sweet smell of syrup as I walked by. Now this is not the syrup of the majority of my youth, not the amber nectar that is produced from the beautiful maple tree. This is the smell of fake syrup, of the french toast sticks of Burger King on an early morning trek to a ski race.

There is something pretty disturbing about the combination of smell and location. The smell is pleasant, but shouldn't be. The dissonance makes it that much worse. But, eh, such is China.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

buddhism

This week, I'm trying to be Buddhist. I'm not drinking alcohol or eating meat. Avoiding these things isn't hard, as there are plenty of veggie dishes, as well as plenty of vegetables in the meat dishes. My main difficulty is dealing with the external peer pressure and the internal rationalization. Patrick feels weird drinking alone, and I can't blame him. Especially since I stare longingly at his glass as he drinks it.

Yesterday, I had planned the crown jewel in my no meat week. At all the major temples in Chengdu there are vegetarian restaurants. I took 3 buses to get to this temple, paid 5 kuai, and found out the restaurant was closed, just for that Saturday. Right then and there I almost went to How Nice, a Brazilian Barbecue buffet. But in Buddhism it worse to break your vows than to ever make them in the first place, so I reined myself in.

Instead, I went to the supermarket and bought all the vegetarian western food I could think of. Milk, cheese, bread, spaghetti sauce, real orange juice (hard to find), peanut butter, jelly, and most importantly, Planter's Honey Roasted Peanuts. I then gorged myself on them and watched Patton. Take that China!

So now I'm trying to recover from a peanut binge, but I still haven't broken my vow. I'm just glad I didn't make it lifetime.

Friday, May 11, 2007

a fantastic ride

After class today, I packed my bag full of books (V. by Thomas Pynchon, Chinese books by Chinese teachers) and headed off on my bicycle. I rode west and north to explore Xi Pu and Pi Xian. Pi Xian is about a half an hour away by bike, and gorgeous.

I went down one street with trees on one side, and a river on the other. All the establishments on this road were either tea gardens, beer gardens, or just garden gardens. If anybody else visits, this is where I'm bringing them.

Riding around in Pi Xian today, I came up with a new way to practice Chinese. If anyone says hello to me, I turn around, ride back to them, and ask them (in Chinese) if they speak English. This is a great opening into a conversation, and I met a ton of people.

On my way back, I passed an electric scooter, and then he passed me. As he passed me, he asked if I was tired. I said no, but he still offered his shoulder to me, and we shot down the road toward my home. We had a broken conversation--steering a bike, holding on to a shoulder, and speaking Chinese is a bit much for me--but it was good enough. Often I fantasize about grabbing on to the back of a scooter. It was nice to have someone offer.

It's too bad my time in Chengdu is winding down. Things are going so well.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

xi'an and surroundings

Sorry for the lack of posts, but I've been on vacation (along with the rest of China). I also had the post-vacation work rush to deal with, hence the mid-week post.

Brian and I took a train up to Xi'an on Monday. We had a hard sleeper which was counter-intuitively comfortable, albeit intuitively hard. On the train we talked to a gaggle of strangers. One woman who I met after just getting on the train and putting my bags away was a real charmer. I told her in Chinese: "It's too hot!" She returned, "Perhaps it is just that you are too fat." Delightful. Now don't get me wrong, almost everyone calls me fat in China. It's just the too fat that bothers me. (Luckily, my Chinese teacher told me that she might have meant very fat, not too fat. Great.) The ride was a piece of cake, most of the sixteen hours happening while I was asleep.

Xi'an was cooking. Spring has sprung in China. Everywhere women had their umbrellas, their giant welder's-mask-like sun visors, their newspapers. We spent the first day checking out Xi'an proper, inside the giant city walls.

The day after, we went to the Terracotta Warriors, because if you're in Xi'an and you don't, you're an idiot. I wasn't too sure. First, we had to wait 45 minutes for a public bus. Then, about 2 or 3 kilometers away from the site, we hit huge amounts of traffic. It's barely a two-lane road, and there are buses up and down it. We finally get off the bus and walked. We walked past the entrance, and up into this tourist complex. It was filled with vendors, restaurants, and more vendors. All of them selling Terracotta miniatures for "one dollar!" When we arrived at a gate, we were told, nay gestured, that we were at the exit, and we had to walk back through the complex. And the vendors.

We finally made it in, and it was impressive. I can't imagine having all that built just for my dead body. But hey, maybe the afterlife is a rough place, and you need a division of clay soldiers to protect you. The sheer scale of everything in China is pretty amazing, and this rests its case.

We stood in line for another hour and a half for a bus back, and when we arrived, we ate some Paomo (noodles and lamb poured over pieces of bread), and I passed out.

Next we went to Hua Shan (Flower Mountain), THE MOST DANGEROUS MOUNTAIN IN ALL OF CHINA!!!!! Boy was it dangerous. We hiked for eight hours, and the scariest moment was when we thought we were going to be caught in a mob that was trying to push past some security guards/police. The place was crowded with tourists, but if you kept hiking up and up, you eventually outpaced the rest. On the east peak (there are five peaks in the shape of a blossom[I guess...], hence the name of Flower Mountain), we bought beds at exorbitant prices, and prepared for the sunrise the next morning.

We must have arrived early, for the rest of the night people trickled in. They either took a bed, or just bought a long army parka called a da yi (literally big clothes). By the time I turned in, there were people huddled against every wall, sometimes in a da yi, many times not. When I woke up at 4 (a little early for even a sunrise) I had to step over people sleeping outside my door. I staked out a spot and absorbed the quiet beauty of the mountain without an incredible amount of people. By the time the sun was rising at about 5:30, the barriers on the peak of the mountain were crowded like people were waiting for the Shriners at a parade.

A gorgeous sunrise, then a race to the bottom. Some of the other tourists waited for the last cusp of the sun to clear the horizon, and set off at a dead run for the bottom (Or to be accurate, the cable car to the bottom). We set off at a leisurely pace, and got to the cable car (after standing in line) at about 10:30. We then had a horrendous bus ride back that took almost twice as long, due to construction, and you guessed it, traffic.

The next day I spent relaxing, and the day after that, we took the train back to Chengdu. Now when I bought the tickets I could have sworn the lady said soft seats. Considering my Chinese, I was completely wrong. I booked hard seats. But since this time I had an seat assignment, and I wasn't standing room only (like I was for my previous 14 hour hard seat experience) it was cake.

My favorite thing about hard seats is that they try to sell you some great stuff. Sure there's snacks, drinks, beer, and even hot food, but they also try to sell you bracelets and toys and cool games. By far, the best, however, is the sock salesman. First he throws packets of socks at you, the motivation being that if you are simply close to the socks, you will want to buy them. Then he lets you touch the socks. Then he takes a fork, or some other object with a bunch of tines, stabs it into the sock, then drags the fork the length of the sock three or four times. The sock comes out unharmed! It is amazing. The final act is when he gets some unsuspecting audience member to grab one edge of the top of the sock while he grabs the other, and they both are unable to tear this incredible garment asunder. I'm shocked that I've been through two hard seat rides and I haven't bought any socks. I have a will of steel I tell you, a will of steel.

Finally our trip was done, and I was able to get some good spicy food. I missed Chengdu.

Editor's Note: Never ever travel in China during the first week of May, first week of October, or Spring Festival. These are national holidays, and everywhere is packed. I saw numerous guided tours, families, tourists, and it drove me nuts. You could come at any other time to China. Do not come during national holidays. DO NOT.