Cultural Heyday

I do apologize for my prolonged silence. Country-hopping around Asia kept me preoccupied for quite some time; after that, it was readjusting to life in America. So that’s the biggest news – I am safe and sound, back in Columbus. However, as I mentioned earlier, I am not quite done with this blog yet. I would like to put up some posts about my travels as well as one or two more posts concerning China. Today’s topic: the influence of culture on our daily lives.

Our lives are so intricately shaped by culture that most of us don’t even realize it – and continue to be oblivious until we see an entire other culture doing things differently. Much of my experience in China this past semester revolved around this idea; as it turns out, far more is cultural than I had ever thought.

Consider money habits. When counting money, Americans tend to shuffle the bills from hand to hand. Go grab some bills and try it out – I’ll bet you didn’t even have to think about it. Chinese people, though, count money differently; they fold the bills in half, hold them in one hand, and in the other hand unfold each bill one by one as it is counted. Like so many cultural habits, neither method is superior – just different.

Also, when cashiers give you change back in America, they usually hold onto one of the shorter ends of the bill with one hand and extend it towards you longways. In China, however, they use two hands, one on each of the corners of a long side. I always felt like I should accept the change the same way, but somehow never remembered and only used one hand. Old habits die hard.

Chinese people also give you business cards in a similar fashion. In fact, Chinese business card etiquette is very specific and must be followed exactly to prevent insulting the person you’re talking to. They hand you the business card the same way change is returned; you accept it in the same fashion and stare at it for thirty full seconds; then, for the duration of your meeting, you put the business card out in front of you in plain sight.

Even facial expressions are cultural. Some are innate, to be sure – smiling and crying transcend cultural boundaries. But the subtler expressions, like displaying pleasure, these are the ones that are shaped by the culture you are immersed in. For example, when Chinese women are pleased, they tend to hide their smile behind a hand, as though they know they’re taking more pleasure than they should. I have also been told that, say, when I speak French, my facial expressions change – I forgo the American facial expressions and use French ones instead.

And, believe it or not, the way people run in public is also cultural. Chinese women do a little shuffle-run that I have never seen anywhere else. When Americans run in public, it tends to look a little more natural to my eyes (for lack of a better, culturally-neutral expression). That is, it’s more along the lines of how someone would run if they were going to be running a long distance. But Chinese women only run for very short distances in public – thus the shuffle-run.

In fact, our lives are so dependent on culture that I feel very little is actually innate. I mean, think about it. Where does cultural influence end? Even many ideas people have are cultural. The opinions many Americans express about things like respect and independence are different from the ideas many Chinese people express about the same topics. In China, family is everything; in America, it’s important to strike out on your own. So how many of your thoughts are actually your own and not part of the culture you were raised in? Does this affect free will? That’s not to say we don’t have free will, but the actions we are free to take are also shaped by our cultures (as well as other factors, such as gender and religion).

I suppose the whole point of this is to suggest that far more is cultural than most people think.

Price Comparison

In my bag everyday, I carry a cheap watch. I say cheap because it is cheap by American standards; $25 is not much to pay for a watch. It does what I want it to, in that in keeps the time accurately and has a stopwatch so I can time myself when I go running. In America, as we all know, the currency is the dollar; in China, it's the RMB; in Thailand it's the baht; in Cambodia (where I am right now) it's the riel. There are approximately 7 RMB to the dollar, 30 baht to the dollar, and 4000 riel to the same dollar. Now consider the price of a bottle of water. In China, the average cost of a bottle of water is 1.5 RMB. In Thailand, it's 6 baht. In Cambodia, they use the dollar anyway (since their own currency is so unsteady), so it costs $.25, or 1000 riel. In America, to be optimistic, I could theoretically spend $1 and get a bottle of water. However, I have been told that prices have sky-rocketed while I've been away, so I cannot claim that my information is current. Here is what I have concluded. In Thailand, my watch can buy me 125 bottles of water. In China, my watch can buy me 116 bottles of water. In Cambodia, my watch can buy me 100 bottles of water. In America, my watch can buy me absolutely no more than 25 bottles of water. On a good day.

One more time… One more time… One more time… One more t…

I’m currently in Thailand but way behind on my posting, so I’m still talking about China. Not to worry, I will definitely tell you all about Thailand, but probably not until I make it back to America and have a chance to upload my photos (seriously, Thailand without photos? That just wouldn’t be any fun at all). One of the things that I find very interesting about Chinese culture is how deeply engrained the concept of repetition is. Everything is repetition. Any kind of physical or mental exercise is centered around repetition. For example, there was a little park by my apartment complex and every morning when I woke up, I could hear the Chinese version of “Livin’ la Vida Loca.” And I do mean every morning; not a day went by without being graced by a Chinese Ricky Martin. The same people were doing the same dance to the same song every single morning. At the gym I went to, there existed a similar phenomenon. For all the exercise classes, they listened to the same music and repeated the same moves over and over again. I remember this one particular hip-hop routine – I think the instructor even wore the same silly clothes to all of the classes (you know, red warm-up suit, some bling hanging around his neck, one pant leg rolled up, baseball cap worn at a 45-degree angle; all this and he was still a terrible choreographer). In any case, they would play the same song over and over and over again and do the same dance. If the class was lucky, some moves might be added on to the routine they had already learned. It was interesting, though – they never would work on specific parts of the routine. It was just the whole thing, again and again. Another example is how all my Chinese classes have been structured. Class can be a bit boring because of the mind-numbing amount of repetition. We read the vocabulary out loud, twice for each vocab word; we read the whole dialogue out loud two times; we do similar exercises for every chapter; we write out each new character at least five times so we memorize it. The focus is on reading and writing. Oral speaking tends to be kept to a minimum (which has always bothered me). Every once in a while we’ll go around the room and come up with examples using some particular grammatical structure. Mostly, though, we focus on what is on the page in front of us – which requires no independent thought at all. It gets you thinking. First of all, if those dance classes were happening in America – well, they just wouldn’t. All of the dancers would be bored out of their minds. Dance is by nature a creative process and so each week you listen to different music and do different exercises than you did the week before. But then education in America is largely about learning how to be creative and thinking for yourself, whereas in China I feel like you’re learning to be just like everyone else. It seems to me that the Chinese educational system does not encourage creativity. I suppose with such heavy governmental censoring, that’s a necessary by-product. It’s hard to feel free to think for yourself if you’re constantly afraid the government is going to exile you for it. So anyway, my theory is that the reason there’s so much repetition in everything people do in China is that that’s the way the educational system is structured. In a sense it has to be; the writing system is so complicated that if you don’t practice the characters over and over again until you want to lose your mind, you won’t be literate. So repetition is the heart and soul of everything. I have heard previously that all of the well-known Chinese-speaking pop stars are Taiwanese – from what I’ve seen of China, I believe it.

Safe and Sound

A quick note to everyone: I am alive and well here in Chiang Mai, Thailand. I am still upset about the earthquake in China, especially since it was so close to where I spent the past four months of my life. I have friends in Chengdu that I still haven't heard from, despite sending messages as well as I am able. However, I heard phone lines and such things are down, which is probably why I haven't heard from them. I also heard that the tremors could be felt as far away as Bangkok, but by the time the earthquake hit, we had already left Bangkok and were in Chiang Mai (despite being closer to China, we didn't feel a thing). In any case, again, Sofia and I are fine. We didn't even know there had been an earthquake until we read the news.

An Update on Rebekah

This is Rebekah's sister. I'm sure by now you've all heard about the quake in Chengdu. As you know, Rebekah left Chengdu a few days ago, and she's totally fine - she's currently in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Despite the news reports that buildings in Bangkok were shaking from the quake, she didn't feel a thing. I wanted to leave a message here so that you all knew, since we haven't gotten any blog posts lately.

The End

Well, this is it. This is The End. Tomorrow night I will be leaving China, ne’er to return (truth be told, I highly doubt that will be the case, but at the very least I won’t be coming back for quite some time). Quite soon I will find myself in Thailand. After Thailand, I’m going to Cambodia. My last stop before returning to America is Japan. Stay tuned, though – I’m not through with this blog yet. I’d like to write up posts about all the countries I will soon be visiting, and I have some more posts about China that I’d still like to put up. As the time of my departure draws ever nearer, I find myself more and more melancholic. Don’t get me wrong – I can’t wait to go home. I miss so many of the American commodities that can’t be found in China. I miss being able to breathe clean air and see the sun shine in a sky that is truly blue. I miss walking barefoot in the grass and not being yelled at when I sit in it. I miss ovens and running outside. I miss being able to drink fresh 1% milk and eat fresh fruit like strawberries, grapes, blueberries, and apples with the skins intact. I miss my delicious British tea that I used to drink every morning. I miss seeing the stars at night. I miss swing dancing. I imagine I’ll even be happy to drink water out of the tap. Most of all, I miss the people that make America worthwhile to me – my family, my friends, my cat. But despite how much I’m looking forward to all of these wonderful things, I know I’m going to miss China terribly. Truth be told, I’m tearing up even as I write these words. This country has been my home for the past four months. It’s seen my ups and downs. I’ve made friends and deepened my understanding of Chinese language and culture. I’ve fallen in love with the food. One by one, the people that make up our little community of expatriates are leaving. Mario left last week; Sol leaves tonight; I leave tomorrow. These people have been my lifeline, my friends, my companions for the past few months. It makes me sad knowing that we are all going back to our old lives and we may not see each other again for a very long time. I lived with them, cooked with them, shared meals with them, studied with them, hung out with them on the weekends. We shared birthdays and the novelty of being in a foreign country together. I can’t believe this time has come already – it seems just yesterday I arrived in China, totally unaccustomed to life here and reveling in the umpteen new experiences that came with each day. Every day that passes brings me closer to home, and I become more and more elated. At the same time, though, I feel terribly heartbroken. I am leaving China. I am leaving the home and life that I have created for myself. In a sense, I am leaving my home. 中国，我爱你。我已经想你了。

Permission to Leave

It’s official. I am now allowed to leave China since I have climbed the Great Wall.

For the International Labor Day holiday (May 1), a couple friends and I made our way to Beijing. Let me just say – I know Chengdu is polluted, but it doesn’t hold a candle to Beijing. I read in my Lonely Planet that breathing the Beijing air is the equivalent of smoking seventy packs of cigarettes – a day. The plane landed in a haze of smog so thick that despite the cloudless day, nary a shadow was to be seen. Also, when you blow your nose in Beijing, it comes out black. The same is true in Chengdu, but the particular shade of black is less striking.

Although the city is putting a huge amount of effort (and expense) into cleaning Beijing up for the Olympics, there’s no way they’ll actually have clean air. I’m very curious to see if the pollution will affect the athletes’ performance and if the Chinese athletes will fare better since they’re more used to it. I’m also interested in whether Chinese athletes perform better than average when they’re in other countries.

Anyway, that aside, we only had a few days, so we pared down what we wanted to see to a handful of the most famous sites. That is, the Temple of Heaven, the Great Wall, Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City, and the Summer Palace. I was a bit disappointed in the Temple of Heaven since it was impossible to get a good look at anything. There was no interior lighting and you weren’t even allowed inside any of the buildings (which is a shame, since the ceiling of the Harvest Temple is what everyone goes to see).

The Great Wall was everything I imagined it could be – except for the weather. Again, the smog was so intense that the sun didn’t seem to make it down. I found out later, however, much to my dismay, that smog does not block out UV rays. So even though I couldn’t see the sun, I still got a sunburn from it. Bah.

The Forbidden City was quite an adventure, with weather to match. That day we rose plenty early so we would have the whole day to explore. Tiananmen Square is attached to the Forbidden City (which, by the way, is where the emperors lived), so that was our first stop. As we crossed the street to the Forbidden City, though, one ominous roll of thunder sounded from the clouds above. Aware that we were about to be caught in a deluge, Traci, Shay, and I made a quick purchase of cheap ponchos. We made our way to the ticket booth, and I kid you not, when we turned around, it looked like the middle of the night. Clearly we were in for a nasty storm.

As soon as we crossed the threshold into the actual city, the rain started. And oh, did it rain. Regardless of the precautions we took, we were all soon soaked through. It didn’t help that the ponchos were even more cheaply made than what we bargained down to. My bottom button wouldn’t stay buttoned, so I had to hold it with my hand. On top of that, I very quickly developed a large hole all the way down my arm – Traci had to tie the plastic in a knot so that my clothes didn’t get totally soaked. But still, every time I took a step, water squished out of my shoes. My hair was so wet it looked as though I’d just stepped out of the shower (and yes, I did have a hood).

Eventually the rain abated, so we were actually able to explore a bit. But almost immediately the temperature dropped about twenty degrees and the wind started blowing so hard that it buffeted and pushed us along on our way. And then it started to rain again. We ended up cutting our visit short so that we could throw our shoes in the dryer (and prevent ending up with hypothermia).

Our last few hours in Beijing were spent at the Summer Palace, when we were actually blessed with the first nice weather we’d seen in Beijing. The sun shone, the sky was blue, and the heat was delicious. Mostly as a result of the favorable weather (finally), the Summer Palace was our favorite place we visited.

In conclusion, I like Chengdu better. The food is better and the pollution is less intense. On the other hand, it was nice to actually understand what people were saying for once (by way of an explanation, the dialect spoken in Beijing is considered the standard, and it’s what all foreign students learn).

Chairman Mao once said, “You are not a real man until you’ve climbed the Great Wall.” At least I can rest easy now, knowing that I am indeed a real man.

Photos:










1. The Temple of Heaven, the outside of the Harvest Temple

2. Did I not tell you it was as dark as night? This was taken at about ten in the morning.

3. The Forbidden City

4. The largest rock carving in... some area... not really sure. Anyway, the steps were beautiful and that huge rock carving got rolled halfway across China (remember: no cars).

5-7. The Great Wall of China!

8-9. The Summer Palace

Nasty Buggers

Monkeys – you think they’re cute, but really they’re pint-size devils in disguise.

This weekend, a few friends and I took a trip to 峨眉山 (Emei Mountain), one of Sichuan’s jewels as far as touristry goes. Being one of those important Buddhist mountains (there are plenty of them here in China), it’s more or less a beacon for pilgrims and tourists alike. And at 3,077 meters, it’s no slight undertaking. We were roughing it, just like real, tried and true backpackers – that is, if you consider having a bed to sleep in, not needing to carry all our food on our backs (myriads of mountainside cafes to be found), and being armed with iPods to be roughing it.

Since we were pressed for time (darn those classes we have to attend), we cheated a mite. Our starting point was not the true bottom of the mountain; instead, we shaved off three hours of hiking by catching a ride to 中山段, or what they consider to be the middle of the mountain.

Thus began our epic ascent of Emei Shan. The scenery was lush and green and beautiful, but once again we were blessed (ha!) with suboptimal weather. Apparently it’s not just Chengdu that’s cloudy all the time.

If I haven’t mentioned it before, keep in mind that Chinese nature trails have very little that’s natural about them. They tend to be paved and involve a lot of stairs – heaven forbid we should actually walk on an incline, since the world is flat after all. The one exception to this is Tiger Leaping Gorge, which far too soon will be no more.

So now picture a large mountain and an ascent that consists entirely of stairs, continuously and without pause. Now imagine climbing those stairs for nine hours non-stop. If you have an active imagination, you may come close to visualizing our first day on Emer Shan – and when we stopped that night, after all that, we had only made it two-thirds of the way up the mountain.

On the second day we made it to the top. The original plan had been to watch the sunrise from the summit, but we were too far away and it was much too haze in any case. After hiking for three solid hours, we cheated yet again and took a cable car to the Golden Summit. Despite the cheating, I was thrilled to have made it to the top. But what am I going on about? Back to the monkeys!

EXHIBIT A: Sofia mistakes one of the foul fiends as “cute”

During a brief pause en route at a temple, Sofia espied a monkey. “Oh, it’s so cute!” the poor, naïve Sofia proclaimed. She wanted to document it’s misleading cuteness on film, so she put down her backpack (at which point big red “WARNING!” signs started flashing behind my eyes) in order to remove her camera. Nasty monkey #1 seized the opportunity to seize her backpack – he darted over and started unzipping it. Of course Sofia objected and so attempted to regain control of her backpack, at which point the not-so-friendly monkey bared his teeth and started climbing on her instead. Fortunately, being at a temple, we were not alone; one of the inhabitants (human, this time) grabbed a long pole and shooed the monkey away.

EXHIBIT B: Darn you if you want to take a bathroom break

At a different temple, Jessica decided it was time to make use of the facilities. She entrusted her backpack (WARNING! WARNING!) to Sofia, who safeguarded it to the best of her ability. Regardless, a big monkey waltzed on over, walked into the bathroom, and made for the backpack. Once again, upon recovery of the backpack in question, Jessica got climbed on. The residents scared the monkeys by throwing bricks at them and then, since monkeys always come in droves, they threw two packets of crackers at them. This resulted in all the other monkeys (maybe four total) chasing the one with the goodies. Suffice to say, I went to the bathroom with my backpack on.

EXHIBIT C: The great banana caper

For our one night one the mountain, the three of us stayed at 洗像池, or Elephant Bathing Pool, an old monastery. Our accommodations were rustic at best, but a bed is a bed no matter how you slice it. The next morning, as we started our hike for the day, I was munching on a banana – and you know how monkeys go bananas over bananas (ha ha ha! Groan). Sure enough, two of them started stalking me. I ran behind Jessica, but to no avail – the banana-sighting was official. I was absolutely not going to give them my banana, so Sofia suggested throwing them the peel. I tore off one section, threw it, and upon the blank stare from the monkey, said, “Go get it!” Which he did. But there was still one hungry monkey prepared to pounce, so I peeled off another strip and tossed it at him. He caught it. And ate it. The three of us ran for cover in a nearby café, where the owner was lying in wait with a slingshot at hand.

Three girls, three monkeys, three incidents.

Monkeys sure are nasty buggers.

Photos:






1. One of our first views of Emei Shan

2. Sofia and Jessica, my fellow hikers, on the trail (or steps)

3. I'm not sure this one requires explanation.

4. Another stunning view of the beautiful Emei Shan!

5. One of the nasty buggers, mother and child

6. Victory! A view of the Golden Summit

A Study of Tea

One of my favorite things in the world is tea. Tea is central to my being. A day without tea just isn’t a day at all! Most everyone knows how enthusiastic I am about tea. So of course I feel right at home in China, where everyone drinks tea all the time. In fact, you’re often given tea instead of water in restaurants. Another benefit of this is that no matter where you go, inevitably, one of the local specialties is some kind of tea that only grows in that part of China. The Chinese really know what they’re talking about when it comes to tea. Their teacups often have lids – not everyone is a fast tea-drinker. Also, there’s this special kind of ceramic only produced in one part of China called boccaro earthenware – it’s a deep brown and apparently retains the flavor of the tea for much longer than a normal teapot. That is, with a normal ceramic teapot, the tea, if left in the pot, only retains the original, untainted flavor for about a day or so. This special teapot, though, will not alter the flavor of the tea. On the other hand, why you would want to drink week-old tea is still a mystery to me. I am constantly amazed by the tea here. One of the big differences between drinking tea in China and in America is that here, the tea leaves are placed directly in the cup. No bag, no filter, nothing. The drawback, of course, is that you often end up with tea leaves in your mouth, which is less than savory. On the other hand, normal bag black tea like the kind you can find in the States is only good for one steeping. Chinese tea, no matter how many times you refill your cup with hot water, retains the original strength and flavor. Unbelievable. The other day I walked into a tea shop – one of the umpteen to be found locally – and was treated to a tea-tasting. My roommate Liz and I tried two kinds of very well-known teas: 竹叶青茶 (bamboo leaf-green tea) and 普洱茶 (Pu’er tea). The entire process of the serving of the tea was quite complex. Our server had an ample supply of hot water and all of the necessary tea accessories were spread out on this long, thin, hollow box with slits in it so the water could be spilled and not make a mess. One of the vital steps in this process was pouring the hot water over the cups you were going to be drinking out of and then drying them off so your hands didn’t get wet. This way, I assume, the tea stays as hot as possible for as long as possible. Liz and I got into a bit of a conversation with the woman who was serving us tea. It turned out she was my age – 22, I’m such an old thing, aren’t I – and she was still in school. She asked us what we were studying, and we duly replied with our appropriate majors. Upon asking her the same question, she replied that she was studying tea. In China, it seems that you can get a three- or four-year degree in tea. How to drink it, how to serve it, the different kinds – a degree in the art of tea. Maybe I should stay in China a little while longer and pick up that degree.

Looking for a job?

I once heard that the Chinese government employs far too many people. On the way to school one day, I saw a sidewalk-cleaning expedition underway. Don’t forget that these sidewalks are so filthy that no amount of work will ever scrub them clean. Regardless, there were several people sprinkling dry soap on the sidewalk, several more following them with water, and many more after that (five minimum) with big brushes, hard at work scrubbing that sidewalk. On top of that, there were people in the street with big brooms, pushing the suds that escaped into the gutter. How many people does it take to clean a sidewalk? (Insert corny punch-line here.)

Liquid Gold

When I was young, I used to read Tintin comic books – delightful little mysteries in an easy-to-digest form. There was one that was entitled “Black Gold,” which referred to oil, as it is so often turned into gold (it’s almost like magic!). Before I go on, I should say that Tintin has absolutely nothing to do with what I’m writing about today. It is, however, about oil, which is what the title alludes to. On the other hand, it has more to do with cooking oil than the black kind so often used to make things go. Unfortunately, it would have seemed a bit silly to title this entry “Yellow Gold,” so my somewhat esoteric (at least in the sense that I doubt many people understood the allusion without the peremptory explanation) title is stuck being called “Liquid Gold.” At least we can all agree that oil is, generally speaking, liquid. The thing about oil in China is that it’s used absolutely everywhere, except where it’s needed most. Oil is used to prepare every Chinese dish I can think of. In my cooking class, we learned to make a number of dishes – for example, sweet and sour potatoes, in which the potatoes are deep-fried; fried rice, in which both the egg and the rice are lightly fried; tomato fried-egg, in which everything is, surprise, surprise, fried; fish-flavored eggplant, in which, drum-roll please, the eggplant is also deep-fried. In fact, of all twelve dishes we studied, every single one of them required oil in the preparation and/or cooking stages. Depending on the restaurant you go to, your food may even be sitting in a delightful-looking pool of oil. Yummy. Before I go any further, I would like to reassure you that yes, the people here are quite slim. My point is that oil is often available and present to excess – when it comes to edible things. Outside of food, though, oil is scarce to be found, often with painful, unpleasant results for everyone within a one-mile radius (which, considering the fact that this is China, is just about everyone). That is, imagine the sound of a street filled with vehicles. Buses, cars, bikes… they’re all there. People are crossing the street haphazardly, forcing cars to stop on a dime, as it were. This in turn causes a bunch of other random vehicles to screech to a halt. Now, let’s examine that last sentence for just a moment. When I say “screech,” I am speaking quite literally. These are brakes that have not been oiled since the day the vehicle was bought. And those buses are heavy – it takes a long application of brakes to make them come to a full stop. So the kind of “screech” in question is very much like the long-nails-scratching-a-blackboard, blast-out-your-eardrums, make-the-hair-on-your-arms-stand-up kind. I consider myself lucky to have not gone totally deaf already.

Hooked!

My time in China can be described as a series of addictions. You know, you show up, find something you like, and end up devouring it every day for three weeks. Since I’m nearing the end of my stay in this crazy country (less than three weeks left, it’s hard to believe!), now seemed like a good time to chronicle my obsessions. The first amazing thing I discovered in China was called 鱼香茄子 [ed. note: unfortunately, the characters she used didn't translate], which translates as Fish-Flavored Eggplant. For me, it was one of the most delicious things I had ever tasted. It was a taste explosion of sweet, sour, and eggplant all in one! Believe it or not, it actually has nothing to do with fish, except that the eggplant is prepared similarly to how fish can also be prepared. The eggplant still tastes like eggplant – nothing fishy. However, I effectively got over this addiction about a month after I arrived in China (also, realizing that the eggplant was deep-fried helped quite a bit). While traveling in Yunnan, I had a plate of mediocre Fish-Flavored Eggplant and proceeded to get sick. While my head knew this disease was not caused by the eggplant, my tastebuds told my stomach to get queasy whenever鱼香茄子was in the near vicinity. Suffice to say, by the time I was able to overcome the silly brainlessness of my taste-buds, I was over addiction #1. In the meantime, I filled the empty place in my heart (and stomach) with tasty things from the local bakeries. This was not aided by the fact that they’re all dirt cheap, like most everything else in this country. However, realizing this was not the healthiest habit I could have picked up in China, I forced myself to stay away from the bakeries for two weeks, and by the end of the two weeks I was cured once again. Somewhere in the middle of those, at some point in the beginning of my stay in Chengdu, I discovered green onion bread. This bread really is phenomenal – kind of like a round patty of bread stuffed with green onion deliciousness (also friend, I believe). For a while, I got green onion bread every day. It was warm (and believe me, it was cold outside) and delightful. This was one that I made no conscious effort to get over, but simply faded away with the ravages (or apathies) of time. From here we proceed on to milk tea, which for a time was my favorite kind of tea in China (and I effectively got several other people hooked as well – mwa ha ha). We have a milk tea stand quite close to my apartment complex, and when it was chilly, nothing felt better than some hot milk tea. I started buying boxes of milk tea at the local supermarket – I drank it at least once a day. At some point I realized I wasn’t quite as keen on it as I used to be, which might have had something to do with the fact that the milk tea stand’s milk tea had so much sugar in it that if I drank it too fast I tended to feel vaguely ill. And so that obsession ceased to be, like all the others. Next in line are rice cakes. In fact, I’m not even sure they are rice, but they make me think of rice, so I shall proceed to call them rice cakes. They were steamed treats from a restaurant close to the gym I frequent; for a long time they were my treat after every workout. I got my other gym buddies hooked on them too – another addiction that gently ebbed away to nothingness. My last and latest obsession is baozi, which I wrote about it a previous post. In fact, so ardent was my enthusiasm about them that I took a picture of the baozi (包子) from the place I buy them and put that up online (which I’m sure some of you may recall). At one point I got baozi three times in as many days. The woman who makes them quickly learned who I was and knew what I wanted without me having to say a word. I am happy to say that as of right now, I am addiction-free. I did get milk tea today, but it was the first time in quite a while. I also go to the bakery (quite infrequently) every once in a while for some sweet bread. I am, of course, still hooked on tea – but that’s nothing new. And as far as addictions go, it’s rather innocuous. What can I say? I’m hooked!

Spring Has Come… And so have the mosquitoes

The other day I was outside enjoying a pleasant and leisurely evening reading a book. Now, it’s been a while since spring made its grand (and quite welcome) entrance in Chengdu; however, the insects happily lagged behind (happily for us, in any case). Much to my chagrin, that is no longer the case. Despite the fact that it was only six in the evening, I counted no less than 18 mosquito bites on the back of my right calf alone. In other news, I am officially promoting my friend Stella’s blog. She is a pint-sized ball of solid muscle who greatly enjoys climbing big rocks. She’s my oldest friend – we met infamously when I was in second grade (and she was in third) and apparently randomly introduced myself of my own accord. We proceeded to play Red Rover and my life has never been the same since. So check it out. http://stellathegiant.blogspot.com. She really is a giant. Despite her size.

Sink Beneath the Surface

When a Westerner first arrives in China, it is not difficult to mistake it for America with a disproportionate amount of black hair and brown eyes. People wear typical Western clothing. Western restaurants abound, especially Tex-Mex places. Many people have a good command of the English language. Everyone knows about the NBA and the NCAA (in fact, they most likely know more than you do, and in my case, they absolutely do). However, once you spend a little time in the country, you realize that almost everything distinguishes it from America. Of course, the most obvious difference is the language they speak everyday and the food they eat, so I won’t even take that into account. But the subtleties, the little details, differ so dramatically from America that it is hard now to look at the two countries in a similar light. Even though the clothes look similar, it’s how they wear them that distinguishes them. The women wear extra-long skinny jeans with four-inch heels, with the pant leg pulled so low over the shoe that only the part closest to the ground is visible. The only kind of maternity clothing pregnant women wear is overalls. Babies don’t wear diapers, just these strange pants missing a rather large area in the back. China makes itself apparent in the rules of social interaction – not a lot of smiling and laughing in public. Emotions are private things, meant to be kept within the confines of the home. People don’t go running or eat in public. If you buy a bottle of water and don’t offer to buy your Chinese friend one, he or she will think you don’t care about your friendship. You are supposed to argue over the bill – everyone wants to pay. In conclusion, I can no longer look at the country as I once did. Spending time here has forever altered my perspective. However, it took me a long time to discover all these tiny little details; I had to sink below the surface instead of just skimming the top.

Travels – I’ve lost track of what round we’re on (part 2)

After a few days hanging about Guangxi, I bought a ticket on a sleeper train to take me back to Lijiang, so I could go to Tiger Leaping Gorge. In a moment of indecision, I canceled my train ticket to Yunnan as well as my plane ticket back to Chengdu. Then, realizing I’d made a horrible decision and that the weather at Tiger Leaping Gorge was going to be unbelievably good (instead of the disgusting nonsense in Guangxi), I called everyone back and un-canceled it all. Fortunately the financial penalty amounted to less than $9.

What followed was a lot of long, boring traveling in which I proceeded to (very unfortunately) run out of reading material and had to come up with an itinerary for my trip to Japan instead (oh darn). I took an 18-hour sleeper train to Kunming and then another 8- or 9-hour bus to Lijiang. I got in just in time to go to sleep and woke up early the next morning to take another 3-hour bus ride to Tiger Leaping Gorge.

Despite the length of time spent in transit, I knew the second I arrived at Tiger Leaping Gorge that it was the right decision. The weather was perfect. It was warm and sunny and the sky was actually blue (instead of the muted brown-blue of a fair day in Chengdu). Also, as soon as I arrived, I was immediately accosted by a café owner offering me people to hike with so that I wouldn’t be alone. Thus it was that I met Evan and Liz, a couple of Canadians taking a break from the real world to globetrot.

Allow me to take a moment to introduce the Tiger Leaping Gorge. It is apparently named so because there’s some legend that tigers used to leap across the gorge by means of one of the large rocks in the river. The river, by the way, is the Yangtze, China’s longest. Also, due to a large dam being built, the entire gorge is going to be underwater within a few years. I know that this will simplify river transport immensely, but I can’t help feeling it’s a waste to destroy such a beautiful place. So then, on with the hike!

The mountains are populated, but quite sparsely at that. They call them villages, but really that just consists of a few houses within easy walking distance of each other pock-marking the hillside. The houses are tucked in the mountain along with other signs of domesticity – terraced rice paddies, a couple chickens flapping their wings about, maybe a dog or two. The Tiger Leaping Gorge also happens to be the first place in China where I have not been forced to walk on a paved path. The path was simply dirt, the kind found in many parks in America. I would even say it was adamantly dirty, just to make up for all the concrete and asphalt elsewhere. My legs were constantly covered with a thick film of brown dirt and my feet, despite being covered by socks and sneakers, were similarly dirty. I would do it again in a second, though!

We spent two days hiking the gorge, and the first day was quite probably the most difficult hike of my life. However, it was totally worth it. There was this beast of a path called “28 bends,” for just the reason that it winds back and forth in a constant ascent. For most of the way, one of the locals was following me around on a mule, trying to convince me to pay him to ride the mule instead of doing it on my own. I even explained to him (let alone in Chinese) that I wanted to do it on my own, but he persisted. At some point, he gave up and went to socialize with one of the other horsemen.

But oh – this was just the break I needed from the endless metropolis that is Chengdu. The air smelled clean and fresh; there was no scent of grit for two whole days. There was no city noise polluting the air either. No cars, no smell of exhaust, no constant fear for my life when crossing the street (instead, I got to fear for my life trying not to fall off the cliff). And night! Oh! The night sky was amazing! We were so far away from civilization and humanity that there was almost no light pollution. The mountains were dark – and I mean really dark, not that pretend dark you get in cities where street lights are still shining on everything. The sky, in comparison, was lit up with an indescribable amount of stars. It was one of the most beautiful night skies I have seen in my life, and certainly one of the fullest. There were so many stars! In an art museum once, I saw a painting that used diamond dust as a medium. The tablet glistened and sparkled. Though I hesitate to wax poetic, the sky looked as though it had been scattered with diamond dust ground to varying sizes. It winked and blinked and twinkled and sparkled and shone.

On top of all these wonderful things, the bed I slept on the first night (though to say the lodgings were merely rustic would be optimistic) was the best bed I had encountered in China. The beds here are all very hard – not that I’m accustomed to super-soft beds, but you don’t want to sit down too heavily on these beds because you risk breaking something (and I don’t mean the bed). But this bed – oh, it was delicious. I wanted to stay forever just so I could experience that amazing bed again.

Another highlight of the hike (I’m including a picture) was the crazy goat we ran into. Imagine this scene: on all sides, you are surrounded by mountains. You have a path to walk on, but stray too far off the path, one awkward, overly large step, and you will tumble down, down, down quite a precipitous slope. So steep is it, in fact, that trees grow out of the cliff-side sideways instead of upright. Which means that the bulk of the tree is hanging over, well, nothing. Now along comes a hungry goat who sees some nice, munchy leaves on the outer reaches (I suppose “upper reaches” would be inappropriate in this case) of one of these horizontal trees. So, of course, the most reasonable thing for the goat to do is walk out on the sideways branch of the sideways tree, only a tree trunk away from a fatal fall and eternal oblivion. Since this is all very nice and logical, this is of course that the goat in question did. And it just so happened that we were there to document the event. You’ll be happy to know that to my knowledge, the goat took no tumble, but happily munched away until his appetite was sated.

The long and short of it is that the gorge was – heh heh heh – gorge-ous. Truth be told, I made that pun unintentionally several times throughout the hike. I couldn’t figure out why Evan and Liz were laughing at me so often (except for the obvious hilarity experienced by my typical enthusiasm) until Liz explained it later. My best puns are never on purpose!

I’ve lost track of what round we’re on (part 1)

I’m having trouble coming up with a snappy opening line, so I’ll just out with it – we recently got a nice little spring break, and, as is my habit, I took off for a bit of adventuring. This time I went to Guangxi province (southeast of Sichuan) and Tiger Leaping Gorge, back in Yunnan province (south of Sichuan). To keep the post lengths under control, I’m going to split them up. Today will be Guangxi and I’ll talk about Tiger Leaping Gorge in the next one (because really, it deserves a whole post all to itself).

In Guangxi I visited two cities – Guilin and Yangshuo. Although the weather was less than ideal (foggy, rainy, and depressingly chilly), the scenery was still beautiful. Guilin is known for its unique geological formations called karsts. Karsts are rather large hills made of limestone. According to a geology buff that I met along the way, limestone is a very soft rock that erodes quite quickly. Cracks in the rock are easily invaded by water, which creates large cave systems running through the hills. Some of them cave in, creating these really cool-looking gumdrop-shaped hills. For further information, consult Wikipedia, which tends to know a lot more than me about most things.

The karsts make for quite a dramatic landscape. Since the sides are steep enough that you can’t really build on them, cities like Guilin and Yangshuo just incorporate the karsts into the town so that a wide panorama of the town is speckled with verdant hills. In the case of Yangshuo, it’s more like a bunch of karsts with as much town as possible crammed in-between.

Of everything I’ve seen so far in China, this was by far the greenest. It was great! There were trees and grass and hills and more green than I’d seen in months. I found myself wondering if the people who actually inhabit these places knew how lucky they were, how unique and distinctive and beautiful their living space is. Never in my life had I seen anything even remotely resembling this. But then, of course, they’ve probably grown up there, and even if they didn’t, they probably wake up every day, look out their window, and say, “Oh look. Another large hill. What a surprise.” In any case, I thought it was exceptional and magnificent, but maybe they just see large, useless obstructions. For me, though, it was great; if I got bored, I could walk a few feet in order to reach the base of a large hill and then, woohoo!, climb right on up.

Aside from climbing up random karsts, in a business deal that I’m pretty sure was illegal, Andrew (he’s in my program, I was traveling with him) and I paid one of the locals to take us out on the river on his bamboo raft. Let me tell you… that little bamboo raft was not very efficient. It was very long and rectangular-shaped with a tiny motor, so it didn’t move very quickly. But then, I suppose that wasn’t really the idea. In any case, we got a nice look at some karsts from the water.

Another highlight of Guangxi was the Seven-Star Cave, which was this huge cave system in one of the karsts in Guilin. They were really artsy about it, which made for a fantastic visit through the cave; they lit up the stalactites and stalagmites with pretty, colored lights.

As far as adventures go, though, I didn’t really have any because of the weather. In fact, the weather was so horrendous in Yangshuo that I was unable to do any sightseeing at all, unless, as they say in China, I wanted to be 落汤鸡 (like a drenched chicken). However, in Seven-Star Park (which is where Seven-Star Cave is, I’ll bet you didn’t figure that one out) I wandered off the trail and climbed some large rocks, but that was about as crazy as it got.

Next time, Tiger Leaping Gorge – by far the best place I’ve been so far in all of China. And on that note, I’m signing off, knowing I’ve left you all in a delicious state of suspense until the next post is up.

I apologize for the not-nearly-as-exciting-or-interesting-as-usual post, but I’m compensating with lots of pretty pictures!

Pictures:

1-2. Seven Star Park


3-4. Seven Star Cave



5. Practicing my Asian squat next to Seven Star Cave

6-7. Karsts


8. The glorious night-life on Xijie (West Street) in Yangshuo

When Life Gives You Lemons

Sometimes China depresses me. The country is riddled with natural assets – beautiful landscapes, breathtaking scenery, diverse flora and fauna, and so on. On top of all that, China often boasts about having the longest written historical record in history, stretching back three thousand years or more. But the beautiful scenery is scarce to be found. Everything is urban, modernized, new. Many of those same natural assets are being systematically destroyed to make way for new roads, highways, methods of transportation, and to prevent floods in other parts of the country. Take the Tiger Leaping Gorge, for example. If I remember correctly, this is one of the largest natural gorges in China, maybe in the whole world. It is a place I am visiting in about a week – and good timing, too, because in three years it will be under water. The Tiger Leaping Gorge will be part of a large lake that simplifies river transport from one end of the country to another. At least I’ll get to see it while it’s still around. And this very same country, with a semi-cohesive history spanning thousands of years – where are its relics? The China I see is brand new. It’s only been around for fifty years or so. In Europe, evidence of its age and history is everywhere. You can walk into a building and smell the age that has settled into its cracks and crevices. But here, all I see are modern high-rises and apartment buildings. So many of the structures that hint at China’s great and glorious history have been torn down and replaced with other things. What’s more, the government is a much more present force than what I am used to, even in its absence. When I was in high school, my government class talked about the constant struggle between security and privacy – the more privacy you have, the less secure you are, and vice versa. In China, it seems as though much of privacy has been done away with in favor of security – but I wonder who it is that benefits from it. The government is everywhere; reading my emails, blocking my access to the internet, watching me throughout the day. There are topics of conversation I don’t feel comfortable discussing with the locals. What if someone hears me? They might throw me in jail or deport me. The entire concept of free flow of information that my life has been structured around simply is not relevant here. The government owns the media. The government issues propaganda so that its citizens only know what the government wants them to know. The government delivers its version of Chinese history to its citizens. Truth is not the primary concern – it is the propagation and perpetuation of the government. Consider the recent riots in Lhasa. Everyone had some vague idea of what was going on, but no one really knew, since any mention of Tibet was conspicuously absent in local media. Newspapers, television programs, all reported on things that had nothing to do with Tibet. In fact, it’s still hard to know what went on or is continuing to go on. All foreign journalists were kicked out and tourists are no longer allowed in. It makes me sad – I recently heard my Chinese teacher talk about Tibet, and it was both troubling and depressing. She is an educated woman, but the only things that came out of her mouth were clearly what the government wanted her to believe. “Everyone in Tibet is really very lucky,” she said, “the average citizen in Lhasa is more wealthy than the average Han elsewhere in China.” That wasn’t where it ended. “The situation in Lhasa’s not so bad,” she continued, “really, Tibetans are very lucky people. The government has treated them so well. All of the provinces are required to have building provinces in Tibet, did you know that?” Tibet has the poorest economy of all of China’s provinces.

The Chinese Recycling Program and Buttless Baby Pants

A quick note on the Chinese Recycling Program, which in my opinion epitomizes the operation of the country. The country actually has no recycling program. But the government pays you for turning in recyclables so they can be used again, and this is how it works. Normal people throw out everything that you can recycle. These sorts of things end up in trash cans, naturally. People less well off root through trash cans, pull out plastic and glass, and turn them in for money. Truly, this is an excellent description of how China functions. Also, I've discovered Chinese people don't believe in diapers. Instead, pants for small children have a big section cut out of the back, so naked baby butts abound. I'll bet it's quite drafty! At least it provides an impetus for the parents to house-train their kids as quickly as possible.

Bits and Pieces, Odds and Ends

First, I thought I would list a few things I have a newfound appreciation for now that I'm in China.
1. Peanut butter and jelly. I can't believe I used to think it was boring. Here, it's heaven.
2. Apples with the peel intact. In China, you can't eat any fruit peels because of the pesticides they use. Which means that if you want an apple, you first have to peel off the skin. When I get back to America, I'm going to eat a lot of apples. With the skin intact.
3. Libraries. I love them. And book stores, too. Unfortunately, I can't actually read anything in any of the ones around here. I miss them so!
4. 1% milk. France had no fresh milk. China has plenty of fresh milk, but it's all whole milk, which means it's so thick and icky that I can't drink it. I am going to drink A LOT of milk when I get back home.

Also, I've had some requests for my mailing address in China. Here it is:

Rebekah Farrar
c/o Wentao Song
Foreign Affairs Office
Southwest University for Nationalities
Chengdu, Sichuan
610041 PR CHINA

Finally, I am including some random pictures.

1. My friend Kerry on Chunxi Lu. Chunxi Lu is a street in Chengdu that is known as Walking Street. Lots of shopping. She accompanied me there since I had never seen it.




2. Me in my cooking class! The dish on the left is friend noodles. The one on the right is Yangzhou fried rice. Yes, I cooked both of them, and yes, they were quite tasty.



3. Me and the statue of Mao in Tianfu Square, the center of Chengdu. Apparently (according to Kerry) his statue is in that position because he was always seen trying to hail taxis.


4. My pride and joy! The beautiful, gorgeous, WONDERFUL tea set I bought in Xi'an. There are two more cups and saucers not pictured here.

Longer, more interesting post to follow.

How to Make Cookies Without Any Ingredients Or: My Life in China

Mostly, life in China is pretty interesting. Well, insane would be an apt way of putting it. However, sometimes life gets you down, as it is prone to do, and all you want are some cookies. But here in China, the local conception of “cookie” is very different from the one you are used to. They think of cookies as sweet, spongy things, more like very small quantities of bread. And you want the kind you are used to. Which means you can’t go to the bakeries. As for the expensive imports aisle in Carrefour, they only have things like Chips Ahoy. No. You don’t want those kinds of cookies. You want the kind you make yourself. What a fabulous idea, you find yourself thinking. I’ll go pick up the ingredients I need and bake myself some cookies. But wait. After more than a moment’s reflection, you see a problem arise. One big, glaring flaw to your brilliant plan: you don’t have an oven. In fact, the only ovens you’ve ever seen in China are in the bakeries. And in fact, you haven’t even seen them, but bakeries sell bread and other baked goods, so you infer that they must be there. Well, it’s not the end of the world, you tell yourself. For even though you’re craving the hot, freshly baked kind of cookie, you would settle for any cookie you could make with your own two hands. So this just means your recipe choices are somewhat limited – that is, you can only make no-bake cookies. Fortunately, there are plenty of no-bake cookie recipes to be had. Sit down at your computer and google “no-bake cookies” and you’ll find untold numbers of recipes, just waiting for you to un-bake them. Now hold on just one more minute. You’ve really got a problem now. Because once you start looking at the recipes, you realize you have no ingredients. For one thing, most of them call for vanilla extract, and your entire time in China, you haven’t even seen anything that remotely resembles vanilla extract. And what about butter or margarine? You’ve seen that in the imports aisle, but well, it’s about $4 for a single stick of butter, which is a little out of your budget. Come to think of it, you haven’t seen any powdered sugar either. A little disheartened, you head down to Carrefour to see what you can scrounge up. You find a jar of peanut butter, nice and cheap since it’s the store brand. Hurrah! One success down, several more to go. Right next to the peanut butter, you realize, to your amazement, that there is something that might be distantly related to powdered sugar. The bright, shiny label proudly declares, “Glucose Powder.” That’ll just have to do, you tell yourself. Margarine is out of the question, though. Too expensive. Wandering through the store, you stumble across some cheap oats. Perfect, you think, I’ll just add this to the mix. So now you have peanut butter, fake powdered sugar, and oatmeal. Something’s missing, you tell yourself. Ah! All of a sudden, you realize no cookie recipe is complete without chocolate chips. Hold it, hold it! There are no chocolate chips in China. In fact, you’re not even sure they believe in chocolate. Well, it’s just going to require a little more work than you anticipated. You buy a solid bar of dark chocolate (the best kind), and resort to chopping it up yourself. Now you’re actually ready to begin making your cookies! So here’s what you do, step by step. 1. Most importantly, find some clean dishes. This is rather difficult, as some of your roommates tend to hoard them in their rooms for weeks at a time. Or leave them in the sink for days on end, hoping upon hope that a different roommate will do their dirty work for them. 2. Upon locating clean dishes, scoop out an appropriate size of peanut butter into your nice, clean bowl. Add some knock-off powdered sugar to your knock-off peanut butter and mix it in. Continue until you get something that’s less sticky than peanut butter by itself, but still holds together. 3. Chop up an entire bar of chocolate and dump it in. Oh no, there’s too much chocolate! But what were you supposed to do? Chocolate is gold! You can’t waste a single sliver. Okay, fine, add some more peanut butter. 4. Add some oats. Mix. You’ll probably end up readjusting the peanut butter levels again. 5. Roll your fake peanut butter cookies into a ball and then roll them in some fake powdered sugar (which, as you suspected, is not actually powdered sugar as you conceive of it, but it will have to suffice). Put them on your nice, clean plate. This last step is very useful, as it prevents your cookies from sticking together. 6. Place them in the refrigerator (after shoving all your roommates’ foodstuffs out of the way, of course). 7. Share them with your American friends. They’ll love you forever.

Travels: Round Two

Xi’an is a city that pulses with its own rhythm. It is a city I could live in; it lets you breathe; it doesn’t force itself upon you. It does not have the crowded nature or rushed, frenetic pace of London and New York. The city spreads out, sprawls just a little bit, just to let you know it can. The sidewalks are wide enough that you rarely bump into another pedestrian (a fine feat for a country with such as exorbitantly large population), and open enough that there is room for large, garish sculptures in front of business complexes. The city is clean, to boot; not pristine in any sense of the word, but the sidewalks are not so thickly caked with years of grit and grime that no amount of cleansing will ever truly leave them clean. There is none of the unsavory detritus found on the streets of Chengdu – trash goes in the trash can, and all manner of bodily secretions are dealt with appropriately, not left out for the public to gawk and gag at.

Xi’an is a manageable city. It is big enough that there will be no lack of whatever you’re looking for. If you’re craving some good ol’ traditional Western food, there is no shortage of restaurants waiting to serve you. If you prefer Korean food, no problem. If you’re dying to be the proud owner of the latest Gucci handbag or European fashion, Xi’an is the place to go. If you’re in the mood for a unique cultural experience, head on down to Xi’an’s Muslim quarter. Yet, in spite of the availability of anything you could possibly want, the city is small enough that it isn’t overwhelming. It is a walkable city; take the bus if that’s what floats your boat, but if you have some time you might as well use your own two feet.

Xi’an is a city that lives for the night. The setting of the sun is countered by the lights of the city at night. As the sun goes to sleep, the city is just waking up, embracing the night with open arms. An area not lit up is difficult to find, at best – the world is all bright colors, neons, and flashing lights. The city beautifies itself nightly with its stunning light displays.

Xi’an is a city with a long history, spanning 2,000 years or more. It is home to one of the most renowned historical sites in all of China – the Terracotta Warriors. Some 2,000 years ago (story time), Emperor Qin died. While he was alive he apparently thought he was extraordinary and wanted to continue feeling extraordinary in the afterlife. So what do you do? You get buried in a massive tomb with thousands of life-size terracotta warriors to guard you and continue to serve you on the dark side of the moon. Thus the Terracotta Warriors came into being. I read that each of the thousands of warriors has a unique face – pretty unbelievable, considering the sheer numbers of soldiers. There are other attractions, too – the city is littered with 1500-year-old pagodas and embellished with a thriving Muslim community and one of the oldest mosques in China. It is also the site of Chiang Kai-Shek’s abduction by a Manchurian warlord.

In short, I have learned that I cannot rely on exchange programs to pick cities for me. Lille was nice, but I would’ve been happier in Paris; Chengdu is the Manhattan of China, when I would have much preferred Xi’an. I came to Xi’an and I fell in love. I could see myself living here, working here, forming lasting relationships here. I could start a life here – not in Chengdu, where the streets are crowded with shops crammed as close together as possible, but here in Xi’an, where I can stretch out my legs and have a conversation with someone who’s actually taller than me.

I also learned that I need to get out of Chengdu as frequently as possible. I crave the sun and need to go somewhere I can see it. The rest of the semester will accordingly be packed with weekend excursions out of the city – the next two weekends are already accounted for, and right after that we’re getting another week-long break, which I hope to spend in Lhasa. At least one other weekend trip is planned for April, and International Labor Day (in May) will be spent in Beijing. Then the program will end and I’ll be off for my international adventures.

Even though my program still has another two months left, it feels like it’s nearly over.

Pictures (potentially out of order, as usual):

1. The general craziness of the Xi'an train station

2. The Terracotta Warriors!


3. More Terracotta Warriors.

4. Last Terracotta Warriors picture. I promise.


5. Bar street, not far from our hostel. The lights were really quite lovely, but unfortunately, this picture fails to capture it. Also, there were more and better lights throughout the city, but I didn't have the presence of mind to photograph them.

6. The minaret of the Great Mosque in the Muslim Quarter which, as the free pamphlet we got told us, is "cleverly disguised as a pagoda."

7. The ceiling right inside the minaret

The Second Sex

Having spent a little bit of time in China, I think it’s time I wrote a post on Chinese women. Well, I plan to talk about the men too, but my focus is mainly on the women.

One of the things that greatly surprised me here was just how affectionate young couples are with each other. Before arriving in China, it was my impression that China was rather stuck in its traditional roots. That is, polite, conservative, and exceptionally modest. Much to my surprise, though, the streets are littered with couples – and they don’t even make a play at trying to hide it. They cuddle, hold hands, and wrap their arms around each other in plain view of everyone (and we’re in China, so everyone encompasses a lot of people). This tends to give the impression that the entire country is coupled up, and I, the lone foreigner, am the only single female in the entire country.

As far as these relationships go, the men are very protective of the women. They reserve seats on the bus for them; they carry their bags; they shield them from the crowds; they pay for everything. They do their best to ensure that their female counterparts are as sheltered as possible and have to do absolutely nothing even minimally strenuous.

In terms of appearance, I think many Chinese males take greater care with their looks than American ones. There are some crazy hairdos out here – a whole head of Asian hair sticking straight out from their heads, like a gigantic Asian afro. It must take hours to do. And just imagine trying to sleep! The girls are gorgeous and glamorous, every last one of them. They all wear boots, and if they happen to not be wearing boots, they’re wearing heels. Their hair is beautiful, done up in some complex design that I couldn’t mimic if I tried. They’re all fashionistas; I’m not even sure the girls in Europe are stylish on this grand of a scale. On top of all that, they’re unbelievably slim. And utterly ageless. The 30-year-olds look like they’re 20. It’s crazy.

Another interesting observation: I have not yet met a Chinese male that does not smoke. However, I have never seen a Chinese woman smoke. Why this is I cannot fathom; I’ll have to ask a Chinese person before getting a definitive answer. However, for some strange reason, only the men smoke. Never the women.

Now, back to the dating scene. I have been informed that people here date to marry, unlike many Americans, who date to date. There is a huge push in this country toward marriage, and the population acts accordingly. So (forgive me, my experience in this particular category is rather limited), as far as I have seen, when a Chinese woman finds a man expressing any interest, she latches on to him and holds on for dear life. The girls are quite persistent and tend to ignore disinterested hints. For example, consider exhibit A, currently dating one of my fellow USAC students. A was very quick to declare her love for this fellow, whom I shall henceforth refer to as B. A also told B that she would wait for him – that is, for him to go back to America, finish school, do whatever he needs to do, etc. B, on the other hand, was very clear that once he’s gone, it’s over.

Or consider C, who was invited once by another USAC student (henceforth referred to as D) to spend some time with him. D decided he wasn’t interested; C didn’t get the hint. Some time later, they exchanged a series of text messages along these lines:

C: I would like to improve my English. Could you help me by being my language partner?
D: I’m afraid I can’t. However, I have a friend who is willing to help you out. Why don’t you get in touch with her?
C: Great! I’m so glad you are able to help me with my English.

As the exchange most likely occurred in Chinese, I find misinterpretation unlikely.

The last thing I’d like to mention is a note on body types. For example, consider me. No matter how much weight I lost (not to worry, I’m not planning on it), I would probably still only ever fit in to size 5 pants, which is not an issue in the slightest. This, as we have seen, is largely a function of my American hips. Chinese women, on the other hand, have very slight frames. When they are fully filled out, they’re still usually only about a size 0. Regardless, many of the Chinese women I know are still quite fixated on their weight (it seems to be the same the world over – or at least in America, France, and China). That being said, women under about the age of 40 or so are all still super-skinny. Even over the age of 40, they’re not overly large; some of them have just filled out a little bit. On the other hand, once men hit the age of 20, they’re allowed to fill out. In fact, I haven’t met many Chinese men over the age of 20 who aren’t a bit chubby.

It’s all very curious.

Pictures (at last! Sorry to be so slow):

1. The beautiful baozi of deliciousness, from my favorite baozi stand (three for just one kuai!). I often get a few on my way to school. I'll write more about these marvelous creations in further posts. Probably with another picture.i

2. The guqin I've talked so much about!

3. This is the kitchen Liz and I scrubbed for hours. If you look closely, you can see a black travel mug to the left of the sink. I also take this to school with me every day, generally filled with tea. This is the second best purchase I have made in China (the best being my space heater).

4. The end of the Spring Festival is celebrated with a Lantern Festival. This is a picture from Chengdu's.

5. Lovely shot of the living room. If you look past the stairs, there are two doors. The door on the right (it's open) is my room. The one next to it is Liz's room.

6. A truly excellent shot of my room and desk... er, bed. Sometimes it's hard to tell the two apart. Especially since I don't have the former.