A lost day

On the day of our departure for Yangshuo my friend Charlotte and I went to the airport excited about vacation.  Our flight was supposed to leave at 11:45am and 8 hours later we were finally boarding the flight.   By the time we actually boarded and the plane took off we had been in the airport for over 10 hours.

When we checked in they told us the flight was delayed but they couldn't tell us anything else.  We decided the gate could probably tell us more so we went through security.  The gate didn't know anything and said to check back in 5 hours.  MAYBE they would know something.  To us this was unimaginable.  If this happened in the states there would be some PO'd people.  But it really surprised me that it could happen in China.  Chinese are not the kind of people who would patiently wait in an airport without knowing anything.  For all we knew we'd continue to wait and the flight would be canceled.  After exploring the airport more it seemed that all flights were delayed due to weather and some people weren't quite so calm.  We got 2 free meals and thought of ways this could be worse.  There was nothing planned for when we arrived so we weren't missing anything.  We waited patiently.  At 1am we woke up the poor little man assigned to answer the doorbell at our guest house.  The next morning we woke up to a beautiful view and a nice breakfast.

Texting with Zhōng gúo rén

I get some funny texts from my Chinese 'friends'.  They're not all friends - a couple are people I met on the street and for some reason thought it was a good idea to share my phone number with them.  A lot of the time they don't use it.  Sometimes they do use it and provide me with a little entertainment.

My private student sends me some good ones that usually need explanations.  Especially this one:

HIM:  Double you have a free time?  May I cover you
ME:  Wo bu ming bai!  (I don't understand!)
HIM:  My work need, so I have cover US gril.

He works for an online newspaper / news station.  So what he really meant was they needed to interview a girl from the US.  He finally called and passed the phone to his colleague for the interview.  
A while ago I met a college student near my apartment.  He wanted me to help him with his pronunciations so he could pass his next English proficiency test.  His English was pretty good.  I gave him my phone number.  Our first few texts were about the weather and how hot the summer is going to be.  This was my favorite one:
'Teacher Joy...with this hot weather..ready to tears and pray to god...Amen..'  
HUH?!
Then the the next day it was raining and he sent me this.
'God bless you..it's raining'
We didn't text for a while after that. Then I got a goodnight message.  I wrote back xie xie (thank you).  This is what he sent back:
'Thanks for your chinese response.  And good night again with the same best wishes for you, and wish me would hearing from you soon, my message teachter...Joy....'
I didn't respond.  A few days later I got this:
'Hi, Joy.  How about this days?  It's a long time I haven't hearing from you after your 'xie xie'.  I know I'm not intriguing becouse of my poor Chglish...but I'm trying to improve it everyday.  and expect a little help from a nice teacher named Joy.'

I know a lot gets lost in translation when you can't converse in your native language but he must know how he sounds.   I feel that personalities do come out even in the language you're trying to learn - even if it's a different personality than your native language personality.  So I'm not sure I like this personality of Gao So Ray.

I've realized some of these texts are too good not to share so this will not be my last post about texting.

My 100th post!!!

I left Chicago nearly 6 months ago.  Time is flying.

In honor of 100 posts I'm proud to say I've moved into phase three (Adjustment)!  Do I permanently live in phase 3?  Nah.  I still have bad days but the things that annoy me are less prominent.  I am now annoyed with them like I'm annoyed with people who walk slowly down Michigan Avenue or people who don't return the weights at the gym.    They are normal everyday occurrences - people walk slowly, kids go to the bathroom anywhere they want, sidewalks are not just for walking, and life is too short to wait in line. 

I've settled into a nice routine with Chinese classes, going to the gym, studying, writing, teaching, tutoring, and making a couple Chinese friends.  To blend in more I've started pushing people out of the way, starring at foreigners, and carrying an umbrella just for the sun.  I take each day as it comes and deal with what the day brings as it's brought.  I've figured out what's a priority for me here and what I don't need.  I've realized that this Chinese life I have is not bad at all.  I work 2.25 days per week. When I'm not working I don't do anything that I HAVE to do, I do things I want to do.  I'm not tied to my phone or emails.  Life is good! 

Next up:  8 days in the beautiful town of Yangshou.  I am taking my paid vacation time.  When I get back I have 3 fun weeks of classes left (review week, exam week, party week).  Then another 10 days off before I start back up with week 1 of 24.

Here's a few of my favorite posts from the past 100!

You're going where?

Where in the world is Cambodia?

I'm a teacher

You call this driving?!

I'm surprising myself

The Great Wall

It's not ok to smoke near firecrackers

Wuzhen

The honeymoon phase is over

You're rude!

You're rude!

I just have to laugh at this article.  It's a great example of how China contradicts itself.  It's an article about American sports becoming more popular in China.  However, some parents are against hockey because they think it's a 'rude' sport.  It makes me laugh that a Chinese person would complain about anything being rude. THEY'RE rude.   I would say they can be the definition of rude.  They spit constantly, blow their nose with no kleenex, they push and shove without saying sorry, they throw trash on the ground, they cut in line, they smoke in the elevator, they don't give pedestrians the right of way, they drive on the sidewalk, they stare and point at foreigners, they shout at the wait staff in restaurants etc.  These are all examples of what we would call RUDE in America.  And they don't want to play hockey because it's rude? It makes me laugh.

I suppose a fair question would be 'do the Chinese think they're rude?'.  Some I've spoken to do think Chinese people are rude - specifically in Xi'an.  Overall I don't think would consider themselves a rude society.   The next question - do we consider hockey to be rude? Well, sure but no one would actually call it that.   Everyone knows what they're getting themselves into - it's the way the game is played and no one takes it personally.  I think it's a bit ironic that the rude Chinese people don't want to play the rude sport of hockey.  Especially because neither would actually call themselves rude. 

Disclaimer:  Since I think I have a few Chinese followers now I want to make sure to say I am meeting incredibly kind and generous locals.  I haven't actually had a conversation with anyone I don't like (except maybe my stalker - more on her another time).  I'm sure if I had a conversation with the woman that pushes me out of the way to get on the same bus I'm getting on she would actually be a very sweet woman. 

5 days, 1 Chinese class, 21 English classes, and 1 suitcase to pack till vacation!

I'm so excited about vacation!  Each semester I have a week of paid vacation to use so I'm taking my time starting Monday. Since I have Monday through Thursday off every week it works out to be about 10 days off.

I am headed to a small town outside of Guilin called Yangshou.  It is in the south of China. My friend Charlotte will be traveling there with me and then heading back to Xi'an after 3 nights.   This area of the country looks beautiful.  We found a great hostel with lots of activities (rock climbing, bicycle tours, kayaking, bamboo rafting, caving, tai chi classes, Chinese classes, cooking classes, calligraphy classes, and Chinese massages) . I'm really looking forward to spending time in a new town and taking time to do more relaxing activities than climbing the Great Wall. 

The population of Yangshou is 300,000.  It is surrounded by rivers and mountains.   Other than maybe going to even smaller town I don't think I could get much different than Xi'an.

Troublesome, taxing tones

This learning Mandarin thing is really tough!  It's not that I can't memorize the words or the sentence structure - if that's all I had to do I'd have so much confidence and fluency. 

It's these darn tones.  When I started memorizing words I did pay attention to the tones but the poor little markings were quickly forgotten because I just wanted to grasp onto the word.  Now I'm realizing that's not enough.  Sometimes when I say a word to a Chinese person it takes them a minute to process it and then they say it again with the correct tone.  It kind of makes me want to scream sometimes.  Most of the time they're not being stubborn - they really have no idea what I'm saying with the wrong tone. 

Sometimes words with different tones are similar.  For instance mai.  mǎi means to buy something.  mài means to sell something.  If you put them together it means business.

But most of the time I feel like they're completely different words.
Here are 4 examples of the different meanings of shi:
1st tone = poem
2nd tone = 10
3rd tone = history
4th tone = forms of to be
 
I'm going to quote a blog that quoted another blog on learning tones so you get an idea of what the tones are supposed to sound like:

Once you learn how to say each tone, then associate some emotion with each one. For example, here’s my own personification and characteristics for each tone:

1. 1st tone = transcendent, helpful, simplicity.
   I love words that have the first tone because of their simplicity and how easy they are to sing out and pronounce correctly.
2. 2nd tone = insecure, unsure, questioning.
   I sympathize with words that have the second tone because I’ve been unsure and insecure myself. I don’t blame them for sounding like questions.
3. 3rd tone = mischievous, mean-spirited, illusive, like a bird you’re trying to watch but he dives into the water and pops up where you aren’t looking.
   I hate words with the third tone. They take more work and more time to pronounce. They change depending on the words near them. They seem to exist only to make my life more difficult.
4. 4th tone = angry, demanding, impatient.
   I also like words that have the fourth tone because I can shout them out. These words give me a chance to vent. Usually, as a default, if I don’t know the tone of a word, I’ve found I’ll say it as a fourth tone involuntarily.

My problem with tones is most apparent with my private student who actually told me my Chinese is bad.  That was a blow to my Chinese ego.  In my defense his English is far from perfect and he doesn't quite know how to express himself in English.   I speak an ok amount of Chinese with him but he has a hard time understanding me.  I know now my tones are everything.  Back to the beginning.

Tones aside - but still high on my never ending list of Chinese to study - I am making progress.  It's most apparent when I see my students every week or the cleaning woman that comes to my apartment every other week. I understand more of what my students are saying and I speak a bit more with my cleaning woman.  I get frustrated when I feel like I should know it all or I meet a situation where I miserably fail at my attempts to speak.  I need to focus on the fact that I am making progress every day.  Progress a little bit at a time is like watching water boil (especially in a Chinese kitchen.  AT LEAST 30 minutes!).  Eventually the water always boils and progress has been made. 

'Cooking'

I've started to cook more for myself. Sometimes it's easier, a bit cheaper, and definitely healthier. Chinese food can be healthy because they use a lot of healthy fresh foods. The problem is they pour in a lot of oil (A LOT) and MSG. The stores sell jugs of oil that are probably 3-4 gallons big. Considering I never add oil to my food in the states, unless I'm eating out and it's unavoidable, my body is probably not the happiest it's been.  In the past couple months more often than not I wake up with a bit of a stomach ache.  Don't get the wrong idea, I still love Chinese food - especially in Xi'an -  but I need some control over what is going in my body.    If you know me at all and my huge salad a day habit this has been a pretty drastic change.  I don't cook anything involved.  I've always been the laziest 'cook' and it's no exception in China - especially with the kitchen facilities I have to work with.

I go to the store, buy a few veggies, a bag of eggs, and steamed bread.  I've seen more and more edamame around so I'm assuming this is the season.  It's always been my favorite but boiling it has been a change.  I'm a big fan of the frozen Trader Joe's edamame.  Sometimes I buy rice but I rarely have the patience to make it.  See - I'm a lazy 'cook'.

Yes the eggs break in a bag but an entire bag is usually less than $2.

In Ancient times...

Every time I have even a short conversation with a Chinese person I'm amazed by how much they know about the history of their country.  It is very humbling.  They have 4,000 years of history to learn.  In the US we have barely 300 years of history.

I hated history in school. It was always my least favorite subject.  Even simple questions about presidents or states are hard for me to answer.  It's embarrassing.  Obviously I couldn't walk around Chicago and say 'In Ancient times....' but I don't know anything about dates or much history about the buildings or the river or even the famous fire.  I have immeasurable respect for the Chinese people.  I don't think I have met one person who doesn't at some point in the conversation say 'In Ancient times...'.  

Obviously when I was in school I didn't think I'd be traveling the world or living in China one day.    The old story about digging a hole to China just made it seem even further away and out of reach.  But if I could go back in time and have a chat with little Joy I would tell her to pay attention in history class because she might find it interesting.  The world is huge and knowing the history of your own country shows a sense of pride to be from that country.

On the other hand the Chinese history is a wonder in itself and there's not much in comparing it to American history.  It seems the Chinese people have never done anything on very small scale.

Regardless of who's history is more interesting or spans a greater amount of time, it's a bit sad that I'm going to leave China in 8 months knowing more about Chinese history than I know about my own country.  

Scams in Beijing

I was going to skip this post but I think it's an important topic so I decided to revisit my Beijing trip posts.  Scams happen a lot and if I can help someone else then great.  If you don't want to read this whole post the bottom line is don't trust anyone in Beijing.

Scam #1 happened to my friend - who is Chinese. They hired a cab driver for the day to take them around.  The cab driver said he would take her and her friends to a great restaurant. They went to this 'great' restaurant, had some ok food, and got the bill for 1000 RMB.  The restaurant claimed the fish they ate was rare and very expensive.  She paid it.  The cab driver then started crying and saying his mom had just died.  He called them another cab and left.  When I was talking to her months later she still wasn't convinced it was even a scam.  She asked me if I thought his mom had actually died.  SCAM!

Scam #2 happened to me on my first night in Beijing.  I had read about University students convincing tourists to give them money for art projects.  I met one of those guys.  As soon as he told me he was a student I walked away quickly.   As I was walking around Beijing looking for my friend sans cell phone.  This group of 3 started talking to me. One said she wanted to practice her English.  The other girl was her older cousin.  The guy was the brother who supposedly spoke worse English than I spoke Chinese.  Initially the younger girl had said she wanted to practice her English and I was starting to blow them off.  Then the older one was talking to me and she was nice and interesting.  She convinced me to get a drink with them.  I was sick of walking around and a drink with some nice people sounded good.  We went to a place that they knew - had a drink, some tea, some snacks, and they sang a little karaoke.  When the bill came I did reach for my wallet because I didn't want them thinking they had to pay the entire bill (as the Chinese always do).  Stupid me - the bill was coming my direction whether or not I had reached for my wallet.  It was nearly 800RMB!! That's $114USD.  Impossible.  They had a breakdown ready.   The tea one of the girls was so in love with cost 800!  Right.  I lied and said I didn't have that much money.  The girl said we could split it and the rest is a blur.  I was so confused.  Look how nice these people look:

They wanted to go get food and I said I had to go.  Nice to meet you, bye bye.  I wasn't completely sure it was a scam until I really thought about it on the way back to the hostel.  I'm sure the girl didn't go pay her half of the bill, I'm sure she went and took part of my money.  I often wonder what their story really is and how often they do this.  I noticed on the way out of my hostel the next morning that there's a sign to be careful of this scam.  I definitely learned my lesson and I really don't trust anyone in Beijing.  Especially taxi drivers.  I find comfort in the fact that the Chinese get scammed / ripped off as much as the foreigners.  Beijing is an awesome city just be careful!

A day as a tourist in Xi'an

Xi'an is famous for the Terracotta Warriors.  Chinese and foreigners come from all over to see this recently discovered history.  In 1974 a farmer was digging a well and came across this astounding discovery.  I finally made it out of Xi'an to see what everyone was talking about.

I had the privilege of going with my friend Andrew (an American who I met in Cambodia while we were getting our TESOL certification) and his parents.  I was able to join them for an entire day of Xi'an sightseeing.  We started out on the city wall.

Then we went to the Wild Goose Pagoda and visited the temples. Andrew rubbed the buddha's stomach for good luck.

The Warriors are about an hour outside of Xi'an.  There are mountains out there!

The discovered figures include warriors, chariots, horses, officials, and musicians.  The best preserved ones are colored so it is assumed that all of the warriors were originally colored.  There are 3 pits and all together archeologists estimate there are about 8,000 total figures (most have not been uncovered yet).   In 210-209 BC the First Emperor of Qin Dynasty (at age 13) ordered this army to be built so he could be buried with them to help him rule in the afterlife.  He didn't want any 2 warriors to be the same. Sounds like he also invented the phrase 'go big or go home'. 

They are still uncovering more and more warriors.

It's a fascinating story - especially the story of the farmer that discovered them but thought it was bad luck to find pieces of bodies.  He threw out the pieces he found first.  He didn't become famous until 1998 when President Bill Clinton said he wanted to see the Terracotta Army and meet the farmer that discovered it.  Since that day everyone wants to meet the farmer.  On most days he can be found signing autographs in the gift shop.   It was well worth the wait and this vast discovery did not disappoint.

For dinner we had 18 different kinds of dumplings.  They were beautiful and delicious.

The day ended with an authentic Chinese stage show.    Not only was it visually beautiful but the music and dancing was pretty amazing.

Thanks for a fantastic day Gestons!!!

**If you want to read more about the Terracotta Warriors I found a really interesting article that goes into the life of the farmer and archeologist.

Everyone's doing it

It seems umbrellas are the 'in thing' to carry. They don't care what handbag you have on your arm it's what kind of umbrella you're holding.  Umbrellas can be used almost all the time.  Rainy days of course, but they're even more important on sunny days.   I think they're disappointed on cloudy days because there's no reason for an umbrella.

I think umbrellas are annoying to carry.  Especially in China where it could get snagged on a wet power line randomly hanging where everyone walks with umbrellas.  Yikes.  I do want to spend a few extra RMB for a pretty umbrella though. Maybe I won't find it so annoying if I'm carrying one more stylish.

Happy 4th of July!!

Having already lived through the 4th in China there was nothing particiulary patriotic about it.  Why would there be since I'm not in America?  I saw a couple Americans and we exchanged Happy 4th's!

I found it interesting in Chinese class that the Chinese people are aware it is our Independence Day.  The 'zhong guo du li ri' (China's Independence day) is October 1st.    The way in which they celebrate their day sounds a lot like how we celebrate ours- everyone is really happy, no one works, and there are a lot of fireworks.  Fireworks are hardly just an Independence Day tradition here but it'll be interesting to see if they bring out anything different on October 1st.  I will be paying extra EXTRA care where I'm walking.

I hope everyone had a great Independence Day!  On this day I remember how truly grateful I am to be an American.  We are so lucky to be born in a country where we can do and become what we want, a country with so much diversity, and a country with English as our native language.  I have so much to be grateful for and being in China on the 4th is even more of a reminder.

HAPPY 4th!!!