Day 35 - Mexican food in China?
The big crackdown came this week. Hangzhou police started cracking down on
pirated DVDs here. Today, they are back. I forgot the Chinese saying,
but it was pretty good about Chinese policy versus local business. I have
so many thoughts about this, but I won't go into them now.
On Wed., I organized an evening outing for our classmates to the Maya Bar in
Hangzhou. It is the only Mexican bar here. I chose the place because it
had a Chili Night. For 30 RMB, we got a huge bowl of chili. The only
disappointment was the lack of guacamole. =) We also ordered some nachos
and some of the other students had chicken burritos. Everything was really
really good. I decided to take some pictures. They turned out alright --
It was a low light situation and I hate flash. I made the best use of the
light we had, but it doesn't always work out. Sorry about the poor quality
of the pics.
height="375" alt="Judith and I!" />The
entire setMy brain is full this week. The afternoon one-on-one lessons have been
super helpful. I'm feeling more confident every day with my Chinese
speaking and listening. A bit more details on this -- I've decided to take
the approach that I need more listening. By listening more clearly, I can
understand what everyone says -- then I can respond slowly, but I can work
on that.
I really need a nap, but I haven't been able to fall asleep lately. I've
been waking up thinking about the Chinese I've been learning, watching
Grey's Anatomy on DVD, tossing and turning, etc. Luckily there is no plans
for the weekend besides having a suit made and shopping a bit.
Until next time
This past weekend. Day many
This morning, I got up a bit late. My apologies for not posting as
frequently. I have another post with pictures ready to go. Anything you
want? Any particular picture subjects?
So, this morning - after my shower, I hear fireworks. I finished getting
ready and the fireworks continued. I mean -- full blast "grand finale"
style for 10 minutes straight. I head out to school and the neighboring
building was having its grand opening. The fireworks continued until I
stopped and watched. About 20 minutes of straight firework action. Really
awesome. 8:40 AM on Monday morning.
This weekend I went to the Night Market with Simone, Judith, Guy, and
Tristan. I picked up a watch. I bargained him down a bit and got a decent
one. Pretty funny really.
Saturday, I went with Helga and Martina to the Silk Market and ended up
having a suit made. The total cost was 1060 RMB. I have to go back on
7/31 to get it adjusted. =) can't wait. Not much else this past week.
The other post will tell more.
Until next time
Day something over a month
I've begun to have private lessons for 2 hours at a time in the afternoons.
I must say that these are much better than 4 hours of group lessons. My
teacher, Mike, is extremely good at getting me to understand the listening.
We discussed what kind of problems I was having and he is extremely
accommodating. The only problem is that it requires tremendous
concentration. 2 straight hours of concentration is evil on the mind.
I've also started to become more confident in speaking to non-school related
people. I even argued with the bank teller because she would not accept one
of my $100 bills to exchange - because it had writing on it (stupid American
banks). That's 800 Y!!!! So, I took the stack of RMB and went through,
grabbed all of the ones that had writing and told her that I could not
accept them because I didn't know if they were real. BTW - this was all in
Chinese. =) She gave in and exchanged the RMB for ones that weren't
written on. I feel satisfied.
This past weekend I went to Tong Xiang, about an hour away from Hangzhou by
van.bus. This is the aforementioned teacher mike's hometown. We headed up
on Saturday afternoon and stayed until Sunday morning. It was a much
smaller town than Hangzhou - probably 100K people or so. It is difficult to
tell. We had tea and dinner with his father. The food was pretty good.
Very filling. I especially liked the mushroom soup. Afterwards, we headed
out to a disco with one of his friends. This was interesting and a fun
time. Had a few drinks and then headed out to this restaurant for late
night snacks. Mike ordered this huge bowl of spicy soupish stuff with ....
Stuff in it. After digging through the mess, there were chicken feet, fish,
shrimp, frog pieces, tofu, east melon, and potato. Very good, nice and
spicy. I loved the frog the best. =)
In other news, I have 2 new roommates. Martina is a German woman that has
been speaking and studying Chinese since 1986. Helga is a Dutch woman who
has never learned any Chinese before. They are very nice. =) We have
some other new students as well. Tonight, we are headed to the Mexican bar
to have food and drink. Probably a bit too much drink, but whatever - it is
fun.
Some other things I have recently learned
- Wells Fargo Visa debit cards work here. Thank goodness
- the only bikers that wear helmets are the Pizza Hut delivery guys
- Bank of China doesn't accept USD with writing on it
- Expat magazines are the best thing ever
- Finding shirts your size takes patience, ingenuity, and money
- the decision to again become bald is a difficult one. I haven't decided
yet
- Chinese don't sweat - they just get sick.
- Bats are neat animals
- Humans are even neater
- They don't sell vinyl records in Hangzhou
Until next time
Day 29: Lotii, Lotus, or Lotuses -- you decide
The lovely world of China. Life seemingly revolves around work, tea, and flowers here. Throw in a little play and you'll have a Chinese life.
Yesterday, my class and I ventured to the Hangzhou West Lake Lotus festival. The entire West Lake park was filled with lotus. The discussion in my head began to argue about "what is the plural of lotus"? Lotii? Lotus? Lotuses? According to a cooking website, the plural is Lotus. According to a car manufacturing website - Lotii. I like Lotus the best. So, Lotus it is. The lotus were in full bloom. Interesting plants really --they grow in water and we can eat their roots and their buds. Basically the flower grows, petals fall off, and the inside is edible -- There are these beans that you can eat raw or boil. I heard they are good. Street vendors have started selling them, so I'll pick a few up soon.
The entire park was beautiful. I hope you enjoy the pics.
height="375" alt="Lotus flower" />The entire setIn other news, class has been going a bit better. I'm made my frustrations clear with the staff and they seem to be addressing it a bit. I've also changed to the following: 9-11 AM - group lesson with Mike (he speaks English extremely well) and 1-3 PM - private one on one lesson with ???? This will last until August 17. At that time, I am planning on going to Tibet for 10 days. I'm looking for a Mt. Everest base camp excursion right now. I will back in Shanghai the 28th of August and then in Chicago on the 30th.
A few interesting things happened this week. Monday or Tuesday I was walking down the street and was curious as to why the main road was pretty empty. I live right off a very busy street (4-5 lanes one way) and usually it is a huge traffic jam. I kept walking to school and discovered that water was shooting from the middle of the intersection. I've seen water mains break before -- no big deal, but what I could not understand is that there is no construction safety for the public. A large mass of people were standing around the whole checking it out. I wandered over and checked it out for a minute -- I probably could have jumped in the hole if I wanted.
Funny. It was about as bad as the guy hammering bricks into the walkway down the same road last week -- he was swinging a sledge hammer knocking down a wall into the walkway. No regard for the pedestrians -- just swinging away and bricks were flying across the walkway. The pedestrians had to manage themselves as to how to get around his swings.
Finally, last night I went to a club. My friends Lily and Jennie and I went out to eat at the Banana Leaf -- a place that supposedly has great curries. Ate there -- decent. I'm not a fan of bone-in chicken, but China is. Afterwards Jennie wanted to go clubbing. I'm up for it of course. =) We ended up at some place called the "Happy Hour". At first, I thought they were going to take me to a fancy club where everyone "looks good" and "acts worse". Nope. 10Y to get in and *bam* *bam* *bam* -- sounds like good techno. Walking in, the Communist policemen looked at me like I was out of my mind. But, I had two beautiful Chinese women with me - so I felt much more comfortable. We had a drink and then headed out to the dancefloor. I think everyone stared at me for 20 minutes. I was head and shoulders taller than most everyone. =) All of the sudden, the music moved to something really slow. It was time for a break! Seriously - they took a 15 minute intermission where people slow-danced on the dancefloor!!!! Shocked, I had another beer (I called it fizzy water - because the beer is so tasteless and weak). The dancing resumed. I had an amazing time and Jennie promised to take me back. The club reminded me of Joe Carroll's place near Milwaukee quite a few years ago. Not dirty, but not clean and fancy. Just -- raw. DJ + lights + sound + people. That's it. I was disappointed that I could not order a mixed drink. I'll be back there even though I was weirded out by the Communist policemen standing around the dancefloor randomly flashing their flashlight at people.
One final note -- I can't read my blog, so I don't know if I have mentioned this. I found beer. Decent beer. It has an odd after taste, but it is made by a German. 1828 is the name of the place and they homebrew their beer here in Hangzhou. It is very decent and they have burgers to go along with it. Paul, the manager, is super friendly. I will be frequenting this bar much much much more. =) They have both light and dark and at 55Y per 1.5 liter, it is a good deal.
Day ?? -- I think 23
Sorry for the long absence - I've been sick and quite busy.
So, I've been here for just over three weeks. Is it what I expected? Yes, and a bit more. I felt slightly confident in my Chinese language skills. At least enough to order a bite to eat, use the taxi, and order a beer. Maybe have a simple conversation. After three weeks, I must say -- I am ignorant. Don't get me wrong - I have a better grasp of Chinese than, say, my mom, but I am having a difficult time.
This weekend, I have had a case of the self-doubts. It happens from time to time. I'm feeling like I am not progressing well enough in class. I'm learning words, learning characters, but I just don't have the verbal stuff down....i.e. I can't hold a freaking conversation. I can slightly get by with the taxi drivers and a few of the local shops I frequent. But in all reality - I am mute and deaf to the world here. I went to buy some movies today and felt more confident when I told the shopkeep to leave me alone. But still - the self doubt in me says "you should be much further along than this". I have a couple of ideas of what I should do -- the first being to upgrade 2 hours of my lessons to private tutoring. This will cost a bit, but whatever. I need pure verbal skills. The second is to find a language partner. The problem is that I need someone who speaks as much English as I speak Chinese. I was talking to someone for a bit -- but she speaks English very well -- and it was difficult to communicate in Chinese -- so much so, that we kept defaulting to English.
So, I'm setting up a couple of goals for myself for the next week.
1) I bought Dan Brown's "Da Vinci Code". In Chinese. I am going to start translating it. Yes, it will be difficult. But I think this will enhance my reading comprehension three fold.
2) Start studying more. I'm almost done with two separate projects outside of Chinese -- once these are off the table - I can focus more on studying.
3) Learn how to use my computer to write hanzi. Sorry, Zhang Laoshi -- I haven't written yet cuz I'm dumb.
4) Eat better. I've fallen into the "buy some cheese and crackers and eat it for dinner" mode. Yeah -- not good. I just feel so sick all the time otherwise though -- western diets corrupt the body.
5) Ignore shopping. Even though I'm going to have a suit made next week. My roomie and I were speculating the cost of a custom made suit in America made from the material we found here. We estimated about $2500. I'm hoping the wonderfully, nice, old shopkeeper (he looks 110 years old) will hook it up -- he has probably been in business for 90 years.
6) start excercising. I think i might join the boxing club. it is cheaper than the workout facility. plus the workout facility has nothing more than a few hamster wheels and free weights - plus it runs $40USD/month.
Ok. Back to the regularly scheduled program.
Last Monday, my class and I went to a tea village southwest of Hangzhou. I was pretty frustrated by the whole unorganization of the process. We were supposed to leave at 1 PM to have lunch there. The van was not available. 2 PM rolls around -- we are still waiting (after having been told 1:30, then 1:45). Finally leave at 2:15. By this time, I was starving and grumpy from not eating all day. I sat in the front seat -- and low and behold - the driver doesn't know where he's going! He speaks no English, so I gave up trying to direct him via the map. After a while, we finally get there. The food was ready for us -- slightly cold of course. It was decent, nothing special though. A bit expensive for what we received. As is life. Afterwards, we all headed to the shopkeeper's place to buy some tea. Everything is sold "per jin" -- 1 jin = 1/2 kilo = about 1.1 pounds. They had 4 varieties: 800 Y; 700Y; 200Y; 100Y per jin. We decided to purchase a jin of the 200Y kind. Ian and I split this with Miikka and ended up with 5 canisters of really nice tea.
Entire Tea Village setAfter the tea village, we headed to a bamboo forest. By this time, everyone was cranky -- the 8Y entry fee didn't make things better either. Luckily, I was able to go off by myself for a while and enjoy nature. This really made me miss both Denver and my hometown. Very rarely does a person get time with no one around here. I loved this place. The bamboo forest seemed slightly manufactured though. The bamboo was real, yes -- but it seemed like the forest was planted there and maintained as a bamboo forest. Regardless, it was nice.
Entire Bamboo Forest setA bunch of other stuff to say, but I'm tired now. Hopefully will update tomorrow. Until next time.
Day 19: This past weekend
This past weekend my classmates and I went to a couple of places.
Friday, we went to the Chinese National Tea Museum.
It was a tourist trap basically. They had some really neat tea-based items and a short walk through, but the shop at the end was quite expensive. It was extremely hot outside so we went home pretty quickly, especially since we all had a big weekend coming up.
Saturday, we headed to Lily's hometown near Qian Dao Hu - 1000 Islands Lake. This was another tourist trap, but it was extremely beautiful. Once you got over the heat, everything was really nice. We ate a lot of spicy foods here. One of the dishes was bone marrow. I wasn't a fan, but some of our group liked it. The hotel was quite nice too. Nothing major, just another hotel. I was surprised at the cost though -- all of 400 Y for all of the meals, bus trips, hotel, everything. Quite nice to spend 50 bucks on a weekend.
Qian Dao Hu visit Flickr setChinese National Tea Museum visit Flickr set
Day 18: Post 2-Recent Discoveries
1) Mastercard is not universally accepted. Worldwide - my butt. I can't
even buy a cell phone at China Mobile with the credit card. Cash is king
here.
2) Cingular. I love thee. But - you are really putting a crimp in my day
to day activities. You PROMISED me to send the unlock code a week ago. You
CHARGED me about $100 for tech support since I am calling from China. I am
starting to become angry.
3) China beer is poor quality. The whopping 2.3% alcohol content is low
enough that Diet Coke has more. I admit, though, their liquors are HARD.
Most of them come in 1.5 gallon jugs of 50% liquor for 20 Y (3 bucks).
OUCH. They don't taste the best, but they don't mess around. BTW - those
of you that know me well, know that I love the taste of beer. I miss you
Colorado brewers!
4) Internet service is good, but the big red firewall blocks many sites.
I'll go more into this much later when I have more details. But, suffice it
to say - I can not read this blog easily. In fact, if I mention things
repeatedly or make a mistake - please email me. I can not check on this
every day without dealing with getting around the firewall.
5) I do a lot of reading when I don't have the pressure of homework on me.
I've finished "Benjamin Franklin: An American Life" by Walter Isaacson and
am part way through "The Singularity" by Kurtzweil. I will finish that one
and probably another by the end of the summer
6) My Chinese is getting better. I'm working hard on it, but it is getting
much better. I just need to get out more and work with someone one on one.
Day 18: Racism
I almost didn't bring this up, but I must. I have been experiencing a bit
of racism directed towards myself since I arrived in China. I'm sure
someone out there will say "come on, give me a break" or "you are a white
man, how could anyone be racist towards you?"
2 Saturdays ago, I was walking down Nan Chang Lu (think North Michigan Ave.
in Chicago - but in Hangzhou) trying desperately to find groceries and this
man walks up to me angrily and spits on me. I mean, hock a loogie and spat
on the side of my face. Then he shouted something and walked past.
Normally, I would have had a slight confrontation - but I was in such shock
that I wiped it off and kept walking. I wish I could have understood what
he said -- or remembered it. I was so angry that I grabbed a taxi home at
the next block and went home. I stayed in the rest of the night. The
gentleman appeared to be a rural farmer (nongmin, which is commonly used as
a racial slur here towards rural, uneducated people - but it is the proper
name for a farmer). He did not dress like a Hangzhou-ese nor did he look
like one either. Regardless, I was put off.
The "fat and 'hen da'" comments aside (hen da = very big), I can deal with a
lot. I understand that I stand 6' 3" and weigh close to 260. I am a big
man. I am not worried when local people gawk and stare. I'm used to it by
now. Little children are the best. I usually bend over and say "Ni hao"
and they hide. I guess they aren't used to seeing a large white man say
hello? ;)
I wish I knew more Chinese slang. I am called so many names that I don't
quite understand what all of them mean. The ones accompanied by a nasty
"You must die" look are typically shouted at me. I ignore them, playing
ignorance (who wants to see me get deported for assaulting a much smaller
gentleman?), but after they follow me down the street (sometimes pushing or
poking) it does become quite irritating and frustrating.
The final "complaint" if you will, is the belief that white people are
inherently rich. I just had a gentleman try to unlock my phone and charge
me 400Y (50 bucks). I can buy a new phone for that. Merchants try to
milk every last cent from me. I have seriously argued over 2Y (25 cents) in
a price. I do it for language practice, but they are seriously trying to
milk every cent. Another merchant used to carry Diet Coke. Like the only
place within walking distance to have it. As of last week she refuses to
carry it. I asked her in my broken Chinese if Diet Coke will return. She
angrily commented something along the lines of "find it somewhere else".
Now, I love my Diet Coke (thanks mom!), but nowhere carries it. My fellow
student and I would spend many yuan at this place buying just diet coke (I
usually bought some other stuff too for school). She despises me when I
come in -- her smile turns upside down into a frown! As is life. I found
a new breakfast place where they love me.....but they just raised the price
of my normal food from 2Y 2m to 2Y 6m. No kidding. Do I buy that much?
Did they mischarge me the past week? Did I mispay? I mean -- in all
seriousness, something like this in America would be about $3 (24 Y), but
the principle of the 4m change (5 cents) is irritating.
In my lifetime, I could never understand the racism others have felt, but I
have experienced my own kind here.
I am *not* saying that all Chinese are like that. It is typically nongmin,
older ladies and gentlemen, and young men (looking like they want to start a
fight). The majority of Chinese are extremely nice and friendly. Like
the wonderful produce woman who suggests new fruit everytime I stop by. Or
the Li-Ning employee who always smiles and tries to help me find "da de"
clothes (bigger!! - I wear a 3-4X here). I love it here, and I will love
it more when I know the language better.
BTW. Happy Fourth of July to those Americans out there. We had school
today. ;)
