Some time ago, I started looking around online for information about places to celebrate Christmas in Shanghai. It seems most hotels of a certain size offer some sort of holiday celebration, but their idea of what a Westerner wants from a Christmas dinner seem a bit off. All of the options were filled with lavishly tacky events and activities, and pathetic strings of adjectives. At least ten used the word ‘sumptuous’. Here are some of the particularly creative descriptions:
***A children's choir and violin music will entertain you while you dine in a casual atmosphere at our Coffee Shop. Every guest will be presented with a special gift. Buffet dinner is priced at RMB 198 net per person, half price for children under 12 years old. At our Banquet Hall, a Christmas Eve gala will take place. Traditional Christmas favourites, mystery entertainments and generous lucky draw prizes await you.
***With the breathtaking Shanghai skyline as a backdrop for an unforgettable holiday celebration rejoice in the holiday spirit with choir carols and Santa & Santarina delivering gifts to kids and greetings to all.
***Christmas is a season of peace, hope, harmony, joy, sharing and love ... Med_00, our Mediterranean restaurant will prepare a set of dinner for you and your beloved one on Christmas Eve. Of course, we didn't forget to prepare Christmas carols, lucky draws, gifts from Santa's magic bag and lots of fun, including live entertainment. A boogie Christmas Eve party with the hottest music is ready at Flanagan's (Lobby Level). All party tickets available in the hotel lobby from 9:00am-8:00pm, from December 9 onwards.
***Christmas is round the corner again! We have a sumptuous Christmas dinner and dazzling entertainment including games, a jazz show and lots of prizes. Our Thai-style massage, foot massage and facial treatment will help you find relief from fatigue and freshen up your body totally.
***Celebrate a crystal Christmas Eve at the Westin Shanghai. Enjoy a sumptuous buffet dinner, free flow of bubbly and selected beverages. Door gifts, party favourites, a lucky draw and live entertainment are waiting for you.
And my personal favorite:
***This year at the Purple Mountain Hotel Shanghai a brand new Christmas is waiting for you. Carols among dim candle light, in which the Virgin Mary stands up and moves towards you, holding the holy infant ... Santa Claus rushes in on his sleigh with jingling bells, delivering his first gift to you. The carnival begins. Opera, magic, acrobatics, Latin dance and a fashion show flood over in a feast for your eyes, while your stomach is being crammed with delicacies from across the world ...
Monday, November 26, 2007
Cultural Exchange
Near the start of the semester, Xueqin and I discovered a café across town from school, on the West side of the city where many foreigners seem to live and where interesting restaurants abound. This café is not only a peaceful study spot, it’s also home to a wonderful menu of western style foods, from breakfasts to sandwiches and salads and pasta and entrees. We took a few friends there a couple of weeks ago to get our fixes of BLT, mac and cheese, salad and apple pie, and yesterday decided to take our roommates out and give them a taste of American cuisine.
Five of us and two roommates (mine and Yazhen’s) ended up at the restaurant, and proceeded to try and explain the options to Xiaojun and Lifang, neither of whom had eaten anything that could be considered “Western” and didn’t come from a fast food place. In direct contrast to the general trend, the English menu had many more options than the Chinese one, onto which only a few western choices had been translated. In the end they asked us to order for them. We ended up getting them several dishes to share: a BLT, potato soup, fish and chips and apple pie. The result was an amazingly comical reverse of the hesitation and aversion to which we initially approached some Chinese dishes.
First to arrive at the table was the salad, which came free with the fish. Chinese people as a rule avoid raw vegetables, but both girls tried it, commenting at several vegetables they didn’t know could be served raw. Xiaojun bit into a carrot and immediately spit it out, making a face of half surprise and half disgust, which sent several of us into laughing fits. Lifang took a nobler stab at eating the salad, while Xiaojun ate some lettuce and concentrated on the soup.
Following our lead, Xiaojun picked up a knife and cut the sandwich in half for them to split. I think she liked the sandwich well enough, but we all noticed too late that Lifang was going at it awkwardly with a knife and fork, and had managed to mangle half and pull out the inside of the rest. When the fish and chips arrived (we were leaning toward pasta but figured that they were more likely to be comfortable with fish), Xiaojun ate several French fries and Lifang (who had initially said she really liked fish) picked at it a bit, but for a while it sat mostly untouched. Finally we figured out that they were having trouble figuring out how to eat it, as it was all in one piece, and hard to pull apart with a fork. Their fork skills were nowhere near as practiced as even the worst chopstick user when we first arrived, and they couldn’t get the hang of it, plus cutting with knife and fork was a bit too daunting. I took over and cut several pieces, instructing them to scoop rather than stab, and talking Xiaojun through cutting off a piece herself. Lifang was still having trouble, so I handed her the soup spoon and let her go at it that way. The apple pie was much the same, and Xiaojun ended up scooping bits of it onto the knife and eating off that. Overall an amazingly comical process to watch, though we felt bad we weren’t better instructors.
Perhaps the best was their reactions to some of the other food on the table. We knew better than to order them anything with cheese in it, but Yazhen had ordered a macaroni and cheese casserole and pressed them into trying it. Xiaojun politely chewed it and said that one bite was good, but it very much tasted of dairy and she wouldn’t want to eat a whole plate of it. Lifang ate some but made a face and declared the flavor to be “a little strong”. In the end, Lifang observed that she’d never thought to eat vegetables like lettuce and tomato raw, and never thought to cook apples, and yet we’d just given them a salad and apple pie!
Five of us and two roommates (mine and Yazhen’s) ended up at the restaurant, and proceeded to try and explain the options to Xiaojun and Lifang, neither of whom had eaten anything that could be considered “Western” and didn’t come from a fast food place. In direct contrast to the general trend, the English menu had many more options than the Chinese one, onto which only a few western choices had been translated. In the end they asked us to order for them. We ended up getting them several dishes to share: a BLT, potato soup, fish and chips and apple pie. The result was an amazingly comical reverse of the hesitation and aversion to which we initially approached some Chinese dishes.
First to arrive at the table was the salad, which came free with the fish. Chinese people as a rule avoid raw vegetables, but both girls tried it, commenting at several vegetables they didn’t know could be served raw. Xiaojun bit into a carrot and immediately spit it out, making a face of half surprise and half disgust, which sent several of us into laughing fits. Lifang took a nobler stab at eating the salad, while Xiaojun ate some lettuce and concentrated on the soup.
Following our lead, Xiaojun picked up a knife and cut the sandwich in half for them to split. I think she liked the sandwich well enough, but we all noticed too late that Lifang was going at it awkwardly with a knife and fork, and had managed to mangle half and pull out the inside of the rest. When the fish and chips arrived (we were leaning toward pasta but figured that they were more likely to be comfortable with fish), Xiaojun ate several French fries and Lifang (who had initially said she really liked fish) picked at it a bit, but for a while it sat mostly untouched. Finally we figured out that they were having trouble figuring out how to eat it, as it was all in one piece, and hard to pull apart with a fork. Their fork skills were nowhere near as practiced as even the worst chopstick user when we first arrived, and they couldn’t get the hang of it, plus cutting with knife and fork was a bit too daunting. I took over and cut several pieces, instructing them to scoop rather than stab, and talking Xiaojun through cutting off a piece herself. Lifang was still having trouble, so I handed her the soup spoon and let her go at it that way. The apple pie was much the same, and Xiaojun ended up scooping bits of it onto the knife and eating off that. Overall an amazingly comical process to watch, though we felt bad we weren’t better instructors.
Perhaps the best was their reactions to some of the other food on the table. We knew better than to order them anything with cheese in it, but Yazhen had ordered a macaroni and cheese casserole and pressed them into trying it. Xiaojun politely chewed it and said that one bite was good, but it very much tasted of dairy and she wouldn’t want to eat a whole plate of it. Lifang ate some but made a face and declared the flavor to be “a little strong”. In the end, Lifang observed that she’d never thought to eat vegetables like lettuce and tomato raw, and never thought to cook apples, and yet we’d just given them a salad and apple pie!
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Newspeak
Ever since week one of my Chinese study freshman year, when I learned that the word for telephone was “electric speech”, I knew I’d like this language. Chinese, as a somewhat limited language, without prefixes and suffixes and compound words, is full of wonderful words that have adapted with Western influences and changing technology. Here are a few examples of my favorites, see if you can’t guess what they are;
1. public together car
2. electric brain
3. ground iron
4. dry(v) dry(adj) vessel
5. Western red persimmon
6. foreign eggplant
7. soil bean
8. film appearance machine
9. exploded corn flowers
10. fire chicken
Answers:
1.bus 2.computer 3.subway 4.dryer 5.tomato 6.tomato 7.potato 8.camera 9.popcorn 10.turkey
1. public together car
2. electric brain
3. ground iron
4. dry(v) dry(adj) vessel
5. Western red persimmon
6. foreign eggplant
7. soil bean
8. film appearance machine
9. exploded corn flowers
10. fire chicken
Answers:
1.bus 2.computer 3.subway 4.dryer 5.tomato 6.tomato 7.potato 8.camera 9.popcorn 10.turkey
When in Rome
The Chinese have an idiom 入乡随俗 (literally enter the countryside, follow custom) which has a meaning effectively equivalent to “When in Rome, do as the Romans”. These past days I have both abided by that guideline and ignored it.
Thursday, several classmates refused to give up their annual turkey feast, and since cooking anything resembling Thanksgiving was impossible in our kitchen of two woks with electric stoves, a microwave and something that claims to be a toaster oven, we ended up going to an Irish pub, which had put out a pretty decent spread, and having a quite enjoyable meal, finished off with drinking beers from the convenience store outside the pub, because inside the prices were outrageous.
Friday a bunch of us went on a trip organized by our residential director Jeremy, to Anji, a nearby town surrounded by bamboo forest, where the bamboo fight scene of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was filmed. We stayed in a fairly modest hotel, where we were given dinner and allowed to make a bonfire. At dinner, each dish was announced to us as it was placed on the table, and as the second one hit, every one of us did an audio double take. Sure enough, the woman toting the plates around had announced that it was dog meat. I tried a bite, and it was ok, but a bit dry, and not as good as the rabbit they brought us. I mostly ate vegetables because I needed something a bit lighter.
Saturday we hiked around in the woods, and I was thrilled to have been able to find real whole wheat bread and to have bought real monterey jack cheese, and thus was able to have a rather authentic trail meal, supplemented by sharing some other people’s gorp and peanut butter. By the time we’d dragged ourselves home last night, I could do little other than shower and crawl into bed.
Thursday, several classmates refused to give up their annual turkey feast, and since cooking anything resembling Thanksgiving was impossible in our kitchen of two woks with electric stoves, a microwave and something that claims to be a toaster oven, we ended up going to an Irish pub, which had put out a pretty decent spread, and having a quite enjoyable meal, finished off with drinking beers from the convenience store outside the pub, because inside the prices were outrageous.
Friday a bunch of us went on a trip organized by our residential director Jeremy, to Anji, a nearby town surrounded by bamboo forest, where the bamboo fight scene of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was filmed. We stayed in a fairly modest hotel, where we were given dinner and allowed to make a bonfire. At dinner, each dish was announced to us as it was placed on the table, and as the second one hit, every one of us did an audio double take. Sure enough, the woman toting the plates around had announced that it was dog meat. I tried a bite, and it was ok, but a bit dry, and not as good as the rabbit they brought us. I mostly ate vegetables because I needed something a bit lighter.
Saturday we hiked around in the woods, and I was thrilled to have been able to find real whole wheat bread and to have bought real monterey jack cheese, and thus was able to have a rather authentic trail meal, supplemented by sharing some other people’s gorp and peanut butter. By the time we’d dragged ourselves home last night, I could do little other than shower and crawl into bed.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Hey, Cow
I’ve probably mentioned it before, but I’ve encountered a strange phenomenon walking or biking around in Chinese cities; as a foreigner passes people by, or as people pass on foot, on bike, or in cars, many will yell out “hello?”. I don’t know why this phenomenon is so universal, but it gets old quickly. If in America I called out “nihao” to an Asian, it would be unacceptably rude and considered quite racist. I’m often tempted loudly mutter “so obnoxious” or chase one of these people down and ask them why exactly they felt the need to call after me, not in a greeting form so much as a question, like one trying to get my attention or answer a phone.
And then today it dawned on me, that this is probably exactly their goal: just to provoke any sort of reaction or response, to get my attention. It puts me in mind of a game called “Hey, Cow” that is apparently played by high school kids in rural areas, who must get bored easily, because they’ll drive alongside a cow pasture and yell at the cows until they turn their heads. I learned of this game in a more amusing form: my freshman year I played on the ultimate Frisbee team, and one of our captains was nicknamed “Party Cow”. Several younger players had the idea of adapting the game to calling “hey, cow!” at him, and seeing how often they could get him to react. So, here I am a novelty, and I suppose people want to engage me in some way, whether their intentions are obnoxious or not.
I had a fun shopping excursion to French grocery store/superstore chain Carrefour today, perusing the books, tea sets, furniture, etc and picking up some groceries for a trip I’m taking this weekend. Grocery stores are always fun for Chinglish encounters, and I was not disappointed today: in a blatant appeal to consumerist nature, a sign over a display of snack foods asked, “Have you tried the new life?”. I also found a package labeled “Elaborate Bacon”, which struck me as odd; I can think of few grocery items less elaborate than bacon: there’s really only one way to cook it (remove from package and place close to heat source), and it generally consists of little other than cured pig meat. Elaborate yogurt would perhaps work, since it now comes with so many mix-ins and layers and on-the-bottoms. Elaborate Cake Mix is also a product I might understand, though I think it might defeat the purpose of buying mix, but bacon is generally a rather simple matter, so I have no idea what they meant. Perhaps the most entertaining translations were on the boxes of condoms at the check-out, one of which proclaimed that it was the “Extra Soldier” variety (this was not a brand name but a category, like “ribbed”). On a side note, Thursday morning seems to be “old-people-shopping-hour”, and I must say that the elderly in China have some of the worst comb-overs, toupees and grown-out dye jobs I have ever seen. There were several people I wanted to shake by the shoulders and ask, “Who do you think you’re fooling?”.
And then today it dawned on me, that this is probably exactly their goal: just to provoke any sort of reaction or response, to get my attention. It puts me in mind of a game called “Hey, Cow” that is apparently played by high school kids in rural areas, who must get bored easily, because they’ll drive alongside a cow pasture and yell at the cows until they turn their heads. I learned of this game in a more amusing form: my freshman year I played on the ultimate Frisbee team, and one of our captains was nicknamed “Party Cow”. Several younger players had the idea of adapting the game to calling “hey, cow!” at him, and seeing how often they could get him to react. So, here I am a novelty, and I suppose people want to engage me in some way, whether their intentions are obnoxious or not.
I had a fun shopping excursion to French grocery store/superstore chain Carrefour today, perusing the books, tea sets, furniture, etc and picking up some groceries for a trip I’m taking this weekend. Grocery stores are always fun for Chinglish encounters, and I was not disappointed today: in a blatant appeal to consumerist nature, a sign over a display of snack foods asked, “Have you tried the new life?”. I also found a package labeled “Elaborate Bacon”, which struck me as odd; I can think of few grocery items less elaborate than bacon: there’s really only one way to cook it (remove from package and place close to heat source), and it generally consists of little other than cured pig meat. Elaborate yogurt would perhaps work, since it now comes with so many mix-ins and layers and on-the-bottoms. Elaborate Cake Mix is also a product I might understand, though I think it might defeat the purpose of buying mix, but bacon is generally a rather simple matter, so I have no idea what they meant. Perhaps the most entertaining translations were on the boxes of condoms at the check-out, one of which proclaimed that it was the “Extra Soldier” variety (this was not a brand name but a category, like “ribbed”). On a side note, Thursday morning seems to be “old-people-shopping-hour”, and I must say that the elderly in China have some of the worst comb-overs, toupees and grown-out dye jobs I have ever seen. There were several people I wanted to shake by the shoulders and ask, “Who do you think you’re fooling?”.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Money and McDo
For a day or so this weekend I was plagued by the 50 kuai bill that wouldn’t go away. Before I explain, I’ll take a second to clarify terms associated with Chinese money, as I’ve been using various terms interchangeably without explaining. In banks and foreign markets, the Chinese currency is the Renmin Bi (RMB), or the People’s Money. The printed money is the yuan, and prices are generally listed with the character for yuan 元. One yuan is equivalent to ten jiao, which generally come in coin form, though occasionally are very small bills. The cent, called fen, is not used anymore, and though grocery store prices tend to include a hundredths place, they just round down at the checkout. Kuai is a spoken form of yuan, basically equivalent to saying “buck” instead of dollar, and mao is the spoken form of jiao. The difference is people rarely ever say yuan, and I never heard the term jiao until I looked closely at one of the coins. So when I write it’s really hard to talk about something costing 10 yuan, because I’m automatically thinking kuai.
Almost everything in China is done with cash, short of fancy hotels and restaurants. I even bought my airplane tickets in cash. The unfortunate situation is that most of my day to day purchases are about 5 kuai and under, but ATMs dispense 100 kuai bills, so we’re all in a constant struggle to not have to make the person selling you baozi for 2 kuai break your 100. Often we end up buying snacks and bus fare for each other, because it is rare that everyone has the right change. Chinese vendors, from bartenders to cab drivers to sellers of fried rice, are not only irritated to have to make so much change, but also very untrusting of the bills. Almost anyone will inspect the bill for its watermark, and some places with larger cash flow have money counters that also verify the authenticity of the bills.
On Friday I ended up getting passed a 50 kuai bill while we were making change for dinner. The bill looked as if it had been through the wash, and was a bit worse for the wear. Thing was, almost anyone I handed the bill to almost immediately rejected it as a fake, handing it back to me with a disapproving shake of the head and no explanation. The watermark was there, and to me it looked like any other 50 I’ve handled, yet two bartenders, a cab driver and the counter guy at McDonalds all refused it after very little inspection in some cases, and two rounds through the currency counter and an inspection in front of a light in another. I should have asked my roommate what she thought, but instead I took it as a challenge to find an opportunity to buy something in exact change and get away quickly. I know that raises all sorts of economic/existentialist questions about what is money; I mean, if I think it’s real, then to me it is worth 50 yuan, the trouble is finding someone else to whom it is worth 50 yuan, right? In any case it was more irritating than anything else, and I luckily managed to swap it out for a different bill at dinner the next night. The waitress made a big show of counting the money, and offered no objections to the bill, so I figured maybe I wasn’t such an idiot American after all, and perhaps people were just objecting to such worn-out money.
On the topic of McDonalds, I’d have to say I much prefer the Grille at Midd for late night satisfactions of cravings for greasy food (especially since good old 麦当劳, MaiDangLao, doesn’t have mozzarella sticks). Saturday morning at around 3:30 I found myself ordering food at a McDonalds for the first time in about four years. McDonalds prides itself in the fact that you can get an identical Big Mac at a restaurant in Shanghai and Seattle, in England and New England (tangent: I read an interesting article in Time or something over the summer about industrial food makers like Nestle and Campbells exactly fine-tuning their flavorings to the specific tastes of the region in which they’re being sold), so I cannot blame China when I say that the burger was quite unsatisfying. I remember a greasy burger dripping with special sauce and satisfyingly crunch iceberg lettuce. The burger I had was surprisingly tasteless, and I found myself thinking that I could be quite happy never eating one again. Not that I considered abstaining from McD’s a sacrifice: I not only object on principle, I rarely want to eat fast food. Still, it was an odd revelation to have in the middle of the night in a restaurant in China, that I have either lost the taste for it, or become immune to the manufactured flavor of uber-processed food, or they’re just not as good anymore.
Almost everything in China is done with cash, short of fancy hotels and restaurants. I even bought my airplane tickets in cash. The unfortunate situation is that most of my day to day purchases are about 5 kuai and under, but ATMs dispense 100 kuai bills, so we’re all in a constant struggle to not have to make the person selling you baozi for 2 kuai break your 100. Often we end up buying snacks and bus fare for each other, because it is rare that everyone has the right change. Chinese vendors, from bartenders to cab drivers to sellers of fried rice, are not only irritated to have to make so much change, but also very untrusting of the bills. Almost anyone will inspect the bill for its watermark, and some places with larger cash flow have money counters that also verify the authenticity of the bills.
On Friday I ended up getting passed a 50 kuai bill while we were making change for dinner. The bill looked as if it had been through the wash, and was a bit worse for the wear. Thing was, almost anyone I handed the bill to almost immediately rejected it as a fake, handing it back to me with a disapproving shake of the head and no explanation. The watermark was there, and to me it looked like any other 50 I’ve handled, yet two bartenders, a cab driver and the counter guy at McDonalds all refused it after very little inspection in some cases, and two rounds through the currency counter and an inspection in front of a light in another. I should have asked my roommate what she thought, but instead I took it as a challenge to find an opportunity to buy something in exact change and get away quickly. I know that raises all sorts of economic/existentialist questions about what is money; I mean, if I think it’s real, then to me it is worth 50 yuan, the trouble is finding someone else to whom it is worth 50 yuan, right? In any case it was more irritating than anything else, and I luckily managed to swap it out for a different bill at dinner the next night. The waitress made a big show of counting the money, and offered no objections to the bill, so I figured maybe I wasn’t such an idiot American after all, and perhaps people were just objecting to such worn-out money.
On the topic of McDonalds, I’d have to say I much prefer the Grille at Midd for late night satisfactions of cravings for greasy food (especially since good old 麦当劳, MaiDangLao, doesn’t have mozzarella sticks). Saturday morning at around 3:30 I found myself ordering food at a McDonalds for the first time in about four years. McDonalds prides itself in the fact that you can get an identical Big Mac at a restaurant in Shanghai and Seattle, in England and New England (tangent: I read an interesting article in Time or something over the summer about industrial food makers like Nestle and Campbells exactly fine-tuning their flavorings to the specific tastes of the region in which they’re being sold), so I cannot blame China when I say that the burger was quite unsatisfying. I remember a greasy burger dripping with special sauce and satisfyingly crunch iceberg lettuce. The burger I had was surprisingly tasteless, and I found myself thinking that I could be quite happy never eating one again. Not that I considered abstaining from McD’s a sacrifice: I not only object on principle, I rarely want to eat fast food. Still, it was an odd revelation to have in the middle of the night in a restaurant in China, that I have either lost the taste for it, or become immune to the manufactured flavor of uber-processed food, or they’re just not as good anymore.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Korean Food and Chinese Papers
Just a short entry to check in. Tonight I went out with a large group of classmates to a Korean restaurant, and we made our Korean classmates order for us, and so had our fill of spicy grilled and stewed meats, vegetable wraps and spicy pickled cabbage. We were also rather insistently presented with multiple rounds of Korean rice wine, so it became quite a renao evening (loud and boisterous).
Other than that, my day has consisted largely of writing an essay for my one on one class, describing the special characteristics of the second generation of nongmingong as opposed to the first, and watching segments of the BBC miniseries Pride and Prejudice, which I have not seen before. Nongmingong are workers who leave the countryside to work in urban factories, service jobs and construction, and face many of the same social problems as immigrants in America: their census status lists them as rural peasants, and thus prohibits them from enjoying social benefits of city life like education and medical attention, and also lowers their wages and work conditions. I’ve spent much of my one-on-one time learning about the conditions of the nongmingong (literally rural peasant worker) and the history of development which led to their existence. It’s quite an interesting situation. One of the other students here, a girl taking time off between her undergraduate and graduate studies, is pursuing Fulbright supported research on the status of female workers in this group.
In any case, I had a great night out last night, but have come back early tonight to get some decent sleep and finish watching Pride and Prejudice. Tomorrow I’ve got some reading to do, and I think I’ll bike over to a coffee shop near West Lake to get it done.
Other than that, my day has consisted largely of writing an essay for my one on one class, describing the special characteristics of the second generation of nongmingong as opposed to the first, and watching segments of the BBC miniseries Pride and Prejudice, which I have not seen before. Nongmingong are workers who leave the countryside to work in urban factories, service jobs and construction, and face many of the same social problems as immigrants in America: their census status lists them as rural peasants, and thus prohibits them from enjoying social benefits of city life like education and medical attention, and also lowers their wages and work conditions. I’ve spent much of my one-on-one time learning about the conditions of the nongmingong (literally rural peasant worker) and the history of development which led to their existence. It’s quite an interesting situation. One of the other students here, a girl taking time off between her undergraduate and graduate studies, is pursuing Fulbright supported research on the status of female workers in this group.
In any case, I had a great night out last night, but have come back early tonight to get some decent sleep and finish watching Pride and Prejudice. Tomorrow I’ve got some reading to do, and I think I’ll bike over to a coffee shop near West Lake to get it done.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Tea for Two
Posting this entry gives away some of the secretive process of buying souvenirs for some of my readers, but I think it’s just too good not to post. Last Sunday Xueqin and I went on our shopping excursion and ended up at a tea seller I’d heard was a good place for tea purchases. Hangzhou, is a city historically known for its silk, its tea, and according to my Lonely Planet guide, its wooden fans and scissors. The brand of tea associated with the area is Xihu Longjing, or West Lake Dragon Well tea, a type of green tea with a very clear flavor and slightly bitter taste. I plan to buy some Longjing to take home, as it’s very region-specific and practically synonymous with Hangzhou, and good to drink.
We entered the shop, which was filled with large glass jars of loose tea leaves. I am somewhat inexperienced at judging and evaluating teas, so I was needless to say at a bit of a loss, and explained to a helpful salesperson that I was looking for a good but not top quality Longjing to buy some gifts. His English, at least in terms of selling tea, was about on a par with our Chinese, so we had an interesting mix of languages flowing around as he pulled out a jar marked “68 yuan” (about 10 dollars), and explained that this was from the spring harvest and would soon be sold out, then brought us to a table with a small tea set and proceeded to serve us several rounds of tea.
First, he poured hot (but not too hot) water into a glass with the tea, then immediately strained the water, poured it into four small tea cups, and then dumped everything out, in order to wash the tea leaves and cups. He then repeated the process, allowing the leaves to brew only slightly longer, and presenting us with the tea to drink and comment on. I’m no expert, but it was good tea, and the bitterness was much more subtle than that of the teas I’d had before, which had steeped for long periods of time. He explained that the third or fourth cup usually has the best flavor, and that you don’t want to steep the leaves more than about five times. We smiled and nodded and pretended that this was the sort of thing that we knew about, and I asked about how the tea was sold.
Tea is measured by the jin, which I thought was a kilogram but in fact is 500g. I determined that it was possible to buy a half a jin, and asked for two half-jin boxes (no, not the frilly gift boxes set into the lined larger box, just the tea, thanks). I was already a bit bewildered by the measurements, which were not only metric but also Chinese, and which I’d never studied, so I kept asking about how much tea there was altogether, in each box, etc. I was convinced I’d accidentally ordered a very large amount of tea, but they reassured me that each box had 250g, and as I saw, each was about the size of a liter nalgene. Mistake there was, however, as I handed the cashier 100 yuan and received a blank stare. No, no, it’s 680 yuan. Excuse me? I looked again at the jar with the loose leaves. There, in very large print, the number 68 yuan. Beside it, in smaller print, was written “/50g”. I stopped dead, looked at Xueqin, and we both said something along the lines of “holy shit”. I mean I know good tea is expensive, but it never occurred to me that a mid-range tea at this place (the lowest price I saw was 20, and many were up to 180 and above) would cost 200 dollars per kilogram! Especially since I know a friend bought a half jin somewhere else for 30 yuan.
I offered some flustered apologies and explained that there was no way I could afford to spend 100 dollars on tea. The salesman, eager to be helpful, asked if I had a Visa card. I explained again that I was very sorry (the Chinese phrase is actually “I am embarrassed that I have made a mistake” and though it is used for any situation from stepping on someone’s foot to being late to meet someone, it was particularly fitting here) and the two of us left, still floored by the nonchalant way with which this very friendly guy about our age figured we could just drop that much money on tea. So sorry guys, no one is getting 50 dollars worth of tea, you’ll have to settle for either one cup’s worth of the good stuff or something slightly lower grade.
We entered the shop, which was filled with large glass jars of loose tea leaves. I am somewhat inexperienced at judging and evaluating teas, so I was needless to say at a bit of a loss, and explained to a helpful salesperson that I was looking for a good but not top quality Longjing to buy some gifts. His English, at least in terms of selling tea, was about on a par with our Chinese, so we had an interesting mix of languages flowing around as he pulled out a jar marked “68 yuan” (about 10 dollars), and explained that this was from the spring harvest and would soon be sold out, then brought us to a table with a small tea set and proceeded to serve us several rounds of tea.
First, he poured hot (but not too hot) water into a glass with the tea, then immediately strained the water, poured it into four small tea cups, and then dumped everything out, in order to wash the tea leaves and cups. He then repeated the process, allowing the leaves to brew only slightly longer, and presenting us with the tea to drink and comment on. I’m no expert, but it was good tea, and the bitterness was much more subtle than that of the teas I’d had before, which had steeped for long periods of time. He explained that the third or fourth cup usually has the best flavor, and that you don’t want to steep the leaves more than about five times. We smiled and nodded and pretended that this was the sort of thing that we knew about, and I asked about how the tea was sold.
Tea is measured by the jin, which I thought was a kilogram but in fact is 500g. I determined that it was possible to buy a half a jin, and asked for two half-jin boxes (no, not the frilly gift boxes set into the lined larger box, just the tea, thanks). I was already a bit bewildered by the measurements, which were not only metric but also Chinese, and which I’d never studied, so I kept asking about how much tea there was altogether, in each box, etc. I was convinced I’d accidentally ordered a very large amount of tea, but they reassured me that each box had 250g, and as I saw, each was about the size of a liter nalgene. Mistake there was, however, as I handed the cashier 100 yuan and received a blank stare. No, no, it’s 680 yuan. Excuse me? I looked again at the jar with the loose leaves. There, in very large print, the number 68 yuan. Beside it, in smaller print, was written “/50g”. I stopped dead, looked at Xueqin, and we both said something along the lines of “holy shit”. I mean I know good tea is expensive, but it never occurred to me that a mid-range tea at this place (the lowest price I saw was 20, and many were up to 180 and above) would cost 200 dollars per kilogram! Especially since I know a friend bought a half jin somewhere else for 30 yuan.
I offered some flustered apologies and explained that there was no way I could afford to spend 100 dollars on tea. The salesman, eager to be helpful, asked if I had a Visa card. I explained again that I was very sorry (the Chinese phrase is actually “I am embarrassed that I have made a mistake” and though it is used for any situation from stepping on someone’s foot to being late to meet someone, it was particularly fitting here) and the two of us left, still floored by the nonchalant way with which this very friendly guy about our age figured we could just drop that much money on tea. So sorry guys, no one is getting 50 dollars worth of tea, you’ll have to settle for either one cup’s worth of the good stuff or something slightly lower grade.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Armistice Day
Okay that’s not the topic of my post, I’m just recognizing that today marks the 89th (I think) anniversary of the end of the First World War, though in America it is only known as Veteran’s Day. Celebrate accordingly.
I thought I’d take a break from waxing intellectual/being an amateur social critic and let you folks know a bit more about my day to day life stuff. A few weeks ago I made a list of things I would like to do before leaving Hangzhou. It included, among other things, the bike around West Lake, a trip to a nice teahouse, the night market, an antiques market, a trip to a specific park, and a weekend trip to Suzhou. I’ve been gradually making my way through the list, and have taken care of a few things this weekend.
On Friday I went out to dinner by myself to a café/lounge in the West part of town, had a really nice salad and sat for a couple hours reading and having a drink. Later I met up with Jingbo whom I promised about six weeks ago I’d out to a bar with (I haven’t had any big nights out since). We went to a place called Paradise Bar that was less dark and crowded than some of the bars I’ve been to and had a nice live band. Turned out some of our classmates were there, and at one point in the evening we had about half the program in the bar. Through the night at two different bars, I managed to get free drinks from the bartenders, not sure if they were flirting or if we had translation problems, because as my friend Diana says, Asians don’t tend to make math mistakes: first I ordered a drink that should have cost me 22 kuai, handed the bartender 30 kuai and got back 28. Later Jingbo ordered (and paid for) a shot and a beer, and I ordered (and paid for) a beer, but two shots appeared on the bar. I shrugged, took the shot, and left quickly in case it wasn’t for me. I should mention that this kind of a bar-hopping night is really not part of my day to day life, but lots of fun on occasion.
Saturday I managed to get a large group together to go to Hangzhou’s famous Qingteng Teahouse, which was the perfect place to while away a Saturday afternoon without sitting around the dorm watching movies. The Qingteng Teahouse is gorgeous, with walk-through rock gardens, paper screens and traditional Chinese music performances. Chinese teahouses are places to congregate with friends to drink infinitely refillable tea, snack on food from a buffet included with the tea, and play cards or games or just relax and socialize for several hours. Each tea, it seems, has its own protocol and tea set: some came in covered cups to which the water was added directly, some came with small teapots and matching cups. I first ordered a Ginseng Wulong (Oolong) tea, which has a ridiculously complicated ritual: I received a wooden box, on which were placed a teapot slightly larger than a ping pong ball, a similarly sized empty pitcher, and two ceramic teacups, one of which was shaped like a tall shotglass and the other like a small bowl. The procedure is to pour the tea into the jug, then as you want to drink, pour some into the tall glass, put the small glass upside down on top, and then flip the whole thing over, carefully remove the taller glass and drink. When you run out of water you refill the teapot and start over.
It was all very cute and all, but I didn’t quite understand the point of the whole thing (except the part about pouring from the pot to the jug: you really don’t want that tea to steep too long: the ginseng was STRONG). In fact it was a little too strong for me, so I switched to a nice green tea, which came in a covered teacup. The only procedure for this one makes immediate sense to me: as you drink you do not remove the lid, but instead set is slightly askew in the cup, to allow the water through while trapping the tea leaves inside, thus eliminating the frustrating ritual of waiting for most of the leaves to settle, constantly spitting out the floaters, and doing the whole thing again when you refill the water.
Because three of my four classes meet on Monday, every weekend I have to prepare for several classes, and often write papers for my one on one or short essays for literature (the big essays are due on Fridays). This weekend I read for my literature class (“My Father’s Sickness”, by Chinese Modern Lit pioneer Lu Xun; imagine English literature was continuously written in Chaucer’s English, despite changes in the spoken form, and then somewhere around the start of the 20th century someone wrote something closer to the modern form, but with lots of Middle English influences. Now imagine you don’t really read English well. That’s what I’m up against.), read an article for my newspaper class (Darfur; this should be fun, as my professor, though great, always seems to have a very narrow view of world politics and the state of China in the world), and looked over a reading for my one-on-one. I have to familiarize myself with the contents, learn a few key terms, and memorize verbatim two sentences. Don’t ask me why, it’s just something we have to do every class. Unfortunately, the mark of good Chinese writing is writing extravagantly long sentences, and my teacher is a good writer. It’s too bad Faulkner didn’t speak Mandarin, is all I can say. I also have to study some vocab for dictation quizzes in both classes tomorrow.
This afternoon I’m going to get away from campus a bit and head to an antiques market with Xueqin. I’m sure they haven’t got too much authentically antique, which I probably couldn’t take home anyway, but it’ll be fun to have a look around, and maybe I’ll find some good Cultural Revolution memorabilia.
I thought I’d take a break from waxing intellectual/being an amateur social critic and let you folks know a bit more about my day to day life stuff. A few weeks ago I made a list of things I would like to do before leaving Hangzhou. It included, among other things, the bike around West Lake, a trip to a nice teahouse, the night market, an antiques market, a trip to a specific park, and a weekend trip to Suzhou. I’ve been gradually making my way through the list, and have taken care of a few things this weekend.
On Friday I went out to dinner by myself to a café/lounge in the West part of town, had a really nice salad and sat for a couple hours reading and having a drink. Later I met up with Jingbo whom I promised about six weeks ago I’d out to a bar with (I haven’t had any big nights out since). We went to a place called Paradise Bar that was less dark and crowded than some of the bars I’ve been to and had a nice live band. Turned out some of our classmates were there, and at one point in the evening we had about half the program in the bar. Through the night at two different bars, I managed to get free drinks from the bartenders, not sure if they were flirting or if we had translation problems, because as my friend Diana says, Asians don’t tend to make math mistakes: first I ordered a drink that should have cost me 22 kuai, handed the bartender 30 kuai and got back 28. Later Jingbo ordered (and paid for) a shot and a beer, and I ordered (and paid for) a beer, but two shots appeared on the bar. I shrugged, took the shot, and left quickly in case it wasn’t for me. I should mention that this kind of a bar-hopping night is really not part of my day to day life, but lots of fun on occasion.
Saturday I managed to get a large group together to go to Hangzhou’s famous Qingteng Teahouse, which was the perfect place to while away a Saturday afternoon without sitting around the dorm watching movies. The Qingteng Teahouse is gorgeous, with walk-through rock gardens, paper screens and traditional Chinese music performances. Chinese teahouses are places to congregate with friends to drink infinitely refillable tea, snack on food from a buffet included with the tea, and play cards or games or just relax and socialize for several hours. Each tea, it seems, has its own protocol and tea set: some came in covered cups to which the water was added directly, some came with small teapots and matching cups. I first ordered a Ginseng Wulong (Oolong) tea, which has a ridiculously complicated ritual: I received a wooden box, on which were placed a teapot slightly larger than a ping pong ball, a similarly sized empty pitcher, and two ceramic teacups, one of which was shaped like a tall shotglass and the other like a small bowl. The procedure is to pour the tea into the jug, then as you want to drink, pour some into the tall glass, put the small glass upside down on top, and then flip the whole thing over, carefully remove the taller glass and drink. When you run out of water you refill the teapot and start over.
It was all very cute and all, but I didn’t quite understand the point of the whole thing (except the part about pouring from the pot to the jug: you really don’t want that tea to steep too long: the ginseng was STRONG). In fact it was a little too strong for me, so I switched to a nice green tea, which came in a covered teacup. The only procedure for this one makes immediate sense to me: as you drink you do not remove the lid, but instead set is slightly askew in the cup, to allow the water through while trapping the tea leaves inside, thus eliminating the frustrating ritual of waiting for most of the leaves to settle, constantly spitting out the floaters, and doing the whole thing again when you refill the water.
Because three of my four classes meet on Monday, every weekend I have to prepare for several classes, and often write papers for my one on one or short essays for literature (the big essays are due on Fridays). This weekend I read for my literature class (“My Father’s Sickness”, by Chinese Modern Lit pioneer Lu Xun; imagine English literature was continuously written in Chaucer’s English, despite changes in the spoken form, and then somewhere around the start of the 20th century someone wrote something closer to the modern form, but with lots of Middle English influences. Now imagine you don’t really read English well. That’s what I’m up against.), read an article for my newspaper class (Darfur; this should be fun, as my professor, though great, always seems to have a very narrow view of world politics and the state of China in the world), and looked over a reading for my one-on-one. I have to familiarize myself with the contents, learn a few key terms, and memorize verbatim two sentences. Don’t ask me why, it’s just something we have to do every class. Unfortunately, the mark of good Chinese writing is writing extravagantly long sentences, and my teacher is a good writer. It’s too bad Faulkner didn’t speak Mandarin, is all I can say. I also have to study some vocab for dictation quizzes in both classes tomorrow.
This afternoon I’m going to get away from campus a bit and head to an antiques market with Xueqin. I’m sure they haven’t got too much authentically antique, which I probably couldn’t take home anyway, but it’ll be fun to have a look around, and maybe I’ll find some good Cultural Revolution memorabilia.
Friday, November 9, 2007
Measuring Up
I’m sorry I haven’t posted in a while, I haven’t really been up to much of note this week, and the most exciting thing I did was go out to eat really good Italian food for a friend’s birthday. Since that has very little to do with China, I felt a full account was unnecessary.
I thought I’d take some time to write a bit about Chinese language, as it’s what I’m studying here and therefore what I spend a lot of time thinking about. So here’s my primer on Chinese measure words, or “amount words” as they are called in Chinese. Measure words are not entirely foreign to English speakers: we wear a pair of pants, buy a head of lettuce, watch a set of television and discuss an item or article of business. We also have the ones that actually indicate quantity, such as pound, bouquet, bale, bunch, cup, bag, dozen, etc. In Chinese, however, any time you quantify a noun, you need to use a measure word. Though the general word “ge” will work for most things that don’t have a particular word assigned, there are more specific words assigned to various types of items. Many are concrete, like a cup of coffee or an envelope of letter or a gram of rice. But there are also more abstract ones, for example, “ben” is for things books and things that are bound, “zhang” is for things that are flat like paper, pictures and tables, and “liang” is for vehicles.
There is generally a rule governing when to use what measure word, whether or not is immediately obvious. For instance, the word “tiao” applies to fish, pants, roads, string and rivers (things that are longer than they are wide). Much like English, “jian” applies to clothing like shirts and jackets, as well as business or tasks, and means “item” or “article”. “Ke” is used for teeth, pearls, stars and, by extension, satellites. The rule for that one is things that are small and round.
Sometimes looking at a list of items a word quantifies raises more questions than it answers, and it often helps to look at the meaning of the word itself. Perhaps my favorite is “ba”; the list of words to use with “ba” includes sugar, knives, brooms and hair; ba means “to grasp”, and so measures things that come in handfuls or things with handles. “tai” means stage, platform or station, and measures performances, engines and computers. Still others seem obscure but are actually quite literal. The word “chuan” means to conspire or gang up, or to run about from place to place, among several other unrelated meanings. It is also a measure word for kebabs and keyrings. Turns out the original meaning of the word is “to string together”, and the character 串is a pictograph.
Some measure words are ridiculously practical and translate poorly, for instance there is one for regularly scheduled public transportation, one for instances, and one for a class or field of study (that’s a semester-long class, not to be confused with one sitting of class, which is measured by a different word).
So the next time you put on an article of jacket and get in a vehicle of car to drive down a length of road to go to a house of restaurant and buy several plates of food, just be glad you’re not doing it in Chinese.
I thought I’d take some time to write a bit about Chinese language, as it’s what I’m studying here and therefore what I spend a lot of time thinking about. So here’s my primer on Chinese measure words, or “amount words” as they are called in Chinese. Measure words are not entirely foreign to English speakers: we wear a pair of pants, buy a head of lettuce, watch a set of television and discuss an item or article of business. We also have the ones that actually indicate quantity, such as pound, bouquet, bale, bunch, cup, bag, dozen, etc. In Chinese, however, any time you quantify a noun, you need to use a measure word. Though the general word “ge” will work for most things that don’t have a particular word assigned, there are more specific words assigned to various types of items. Many are concrete, like a cup of coffee or an envelope of letter or a gram of rice. But there are also more abstract ones, for example, “ben” is for things books and things that are bound, “zhang” is for things that are flat like paper, pictures and tables, and “liang” is for vehicles.
There is generally a rule governing when to use what measure word, whether or not is immediately obvious. For instance, the word “tiao” applies to fish, pants, roads, string and rivers (things that are longer than they are wide). Much like English, “jian” applies to clothing like shirts and jackets, as well as business or tasks, and means “item” or “article”. “Ke” is used for teeth, pearls, stars and, by extension, satellites. The rule for that one is things that are small and round.
Sometimes looking at a list of items a word quantifies raises more questions than it answers, and it often helps to look at the meaning of the word itself. Perhaps my favorite is “ba”; the list of words to use with “ba” includes sugar, knives, brooms and hair; ba means “to grasp”, and so measures things that come in handfuls or things with handles. “tai” means stage, platform or station, and measures performances, engines and computers. Still others seem obscure but are actually quite literal. The word “chuan” means to conspire or gang up, or to run about from place to place, among several other unrelated meanings. It is also a measure word for kebabs and keyrings. Turns out the original meaning of the word is “to string together”, and the character 串is a pictograph.
Some measure words are ridiculously practical and translate poorly, for instance there is one for regularly scheduled public transportation, one for instances, and one for a class or field of study (that’s a semester-long class, not to be confused with one sitting of class, which is measured by a different word).
So the next time you put on an article of jacket and get in a vehicle of car to drive down a length of road to go to a house of restaurant and buy several plates of food, just be glad you’re not doing it in Chinese.
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
West Lake
I’d like to take some time to tell you all a bit about the city I am in. Hangzhou is about a three hour drive inland from Shanghai, the capital of Zhejiang province and home to about 6.5 million people (I’m not sure how the census works here; like any Chinese city there are lots of unregistered workers who are officially country peasants and travel home every new year). The city has been in continuous existence for over 2200 years, and was once the home to the emperors of the Southern Song dynasty. Hangzhou has long been an exporter of tea and silk. Marco Polo famously declared it to be the most beautiful city in the world, and though he embellished his descriptions somewhat, it is still known today as a city of great beauty.
Of course, due to rapid modernization and the utilitarian lack of architectural aesthetic, most of this beauty remains concentrated around West Lake, the landmark which truly sets Hangzhou apart. Located in the Central, Southern part of the city and backing up against the mountains that take up Hangzhou’s Southwestern edge, the lake was once home to the emperors, courtiers and merchants who held Hangzhou’s wealth. Today the Eastern bank holds a paved tourist walkway with benches, pavilions, teahouses, tour boat docks, etc. Across the street are Starbucks, Dairy Queen, and several other Western Chains and high-priced international restaurants. This part is also home to the Xihu Tiandi, roughly “West Lake Heavenly Place”, a park-like set of sidewalks that sits on the lake and houses upscale restaurants and bars, and yet another Starbucks. On weekends I like to wander through the pedestrian parks, watching old men argue or listening to street performers with traditional instruments.
I hadn’t spent much time along the other parts of the lake, and this weekend the weather was spectacular, so I decided to change that, partly because my literature class is reading a story set in 1920s Hangzhou and centered mainly around West Lake. On Saturday I rode my bike (yes, I used the pedals, not the battery) around the lake. I started off going over a bridge and tree-lined road to an island in the Northern part of the lake, which is home to several historic villas and a Chinese restaurant called Louwailou that has been around for over a century and is mentioned in the story. I then went on to the street that runs along the North shore, which was beautiful and lined by parks along the lake, and fancy hotels along the other side. There are two artificially constructed causeways that go down the West side of the lake, but one is pedestrian only, so I biked the beautiful Yanggongdi, home to more historic villas and parks and museums. Around the South end I passed the pagoda I visited several weeks ago, and then on to Nanshan Lu and the wide sidewalks I’d walked so many times. Along the way I saw lots of couples posing for wedding photos (a big part of Chinese weddings is the photos, taken in different scenic locations and in traditional as well as modern outfits). One pavilion had at least four couples, just standing around in their wedding garb. The ride was a great way to get outside for the morning, and I discovered some very pretty looking parks I’d like to go back and visit.
In all, I was left with a great sense of mixing the old with the new; with the exception of the smorgasbord of brand-name store fronts, which are presented tastefully, West Lake preserves a sense of peaceful beauty, and even the boats are more picturesque than tacky, though I don’t anticipate getting on one any time soon. The lakefront is undeveloped except for the landscaping, and almost entirely public (there are a few villas and places like the pagoda that have entrance fees). I think my favorite thing to do is sit at a park bench or outdoor teahouse, casually perusing my Lonely Planet, reading or playing cards.
Of course, due to rapid modernization and the utilitarian lack of architectural aesthetic, most of this beauty remains concentrated around West Lake, the landmark which truly sets Hangzhou apart. Located in the Central, Southern part of the city and backing up against the mountains that take up Hangzhou’s Southwestern edge, the lake was once home to the emperors, courtiers and merchants who held Hangzhou’s wealth. Today the Eastern bank holds a paved tourist walkway with benches, pavilions, teahouses, tour boat docks, etc. Across the street are Starbucks, Dairy Queen, and several other Western Chains and high-priced international restaurants. This part is also home to the Xihu Tiandi, roughly “West Lake Heavenly Place”, a park-like set of sidewalks that sits on the lake and houses upscale restaurants and bars, and yet another Starbucks. On weekends I like to wander through the pedestrian parks, watching old men argue or listening to street performers with traditional instruments.
I hadn’t spent much time along the other parts of the lake, and this weekend the weather was spectacular, so I decided to change that, partly because my literature class is reading a story set in 1920s Hangzhou and centered mainly around West Lake. On Saturday I rode my bike (yes, I used the pedals, not the battery) around the lake. I started off going over a bridge and tree-lined road to an island in the Northern part of the lake, which is home to several historic villas and a Chinese restaurant called Louwailou that has been around for over a century and is mentioned in the story. I then went on to the street that runs along the North shore, which was beautiful and lined by parks along the lake, and fancy hotels along the other side. There are two artificially constructed causeways that go down the West side of the lake, but one is pedestrian only, so I biked the beautiful Yanggongdi, home to more historic villas and parks and museums. Around the South end I passed the pagoda I visited several weeks ago, and then on to Nanshan Lu and the wide sidewalks I’d walked so many times. Along the way I saw lots of couples posing for wedding photos (a big part of Chinese weddings is the photos, taken in different scenic locations and in traditional as well as modern outfits). One pavilion had at least four couples, just standing around in their wedding garb. The ride was a great way to get outside for the morning, and I discovered some very pretty looking parks I’d like to go back and visit.
In all, I was left with a great sense of mixing the old with the new; with the exception of the smorgasbord of brand-name store fronts, which are presented tastefully, West Lake preserves a sense of peaceful beauty, and even the boats are more picturesque than tacky, though I don’t anticipate getting on one any time soon. The lakefront is undeveloped except for the landscaping, and almost entirely public (there are a few villas and places like the pagoda that have entrance fees). I think my favorite thing to do is sit at a park bench or outdoor teahouse, casually perusing my Lonely Planet, reading or playing cards.
Thursday, November 1, 2007
Waiter, What's this Ghost Doing in my Soup?
A nice humor entry that does not revolve entirely around my own cultural and linguistic blunders; yesterday, Yazhen informed us that her roommate had discovered a mushroom in their bathroom. Mushroom is “mogu”, but Xueqin and I heard “mogui” which means monster or evil spirit (I also have a theory that this is the source of the name of the creatures in Gremlins). Knowing Chinese girls to scare easily and be superstitious about things like ghosts, we thought nothing of Yazhen’s matter-of-fact tone. There’s a ghost in your bathroom? Interesting… In fact when I came back from fall break unannounced and took a shower, I think Xiaojun got a bit of a fright, herself. Of course we figured out the mistake pretty quickly and alternatively laughed and cringed at the thought of either toilet intruder, sympathizing about the icky bathroom growth and wondering where to find a fungicide.
After a great day of no class and a few leisurely hours in a teahouse with a buffet, compliments of the school, five of us went out for Sichuan hotpot at a nearby restaurant. We ordered vegetables, meat, dumplings, tofu, potatoes and two kinds of mushrooms. We had a good laugh over the mogu/mogui story, and by then of course the wrong association was already cemented. Near the end of the meal, Huijuan took a ladle and started sifting through the pot, and after a minute declared that there were no more demons in the hotpot. I wish I knew the word for “exorcism”.
After a great day of no class and a few leisurely hours in a teahouse with a buffet, compliments of the school, five of us went out for Sichuan hotpot at a nearby restaurant. We ordered vegetables, meat, dumplings, tofu, potatoes and two kinds of mushrooms. We had a good laugh over the mogu/mogui story, and by then of course the wrong association was already cemented. Near the end of the meal, Huijuan took a ladle and started sifting through the pot, and after a minute declared that there were no more demons in the hotpot. I wish I knew the word for “exorcism”.
Boo? Bu
Most of the time in China if you want to say an especially foreign word or proper noun, like a brand name, celebrity, or place, you can approximate it in Chinese sounds and it is often right (there are official transliterations for almost everything) Example: ka-bu-ji-nuo=cappuccino, ta-mu-han-ke-si=Tom Hanks, fu-luo-li-da=Florida. Sometimes we can guess, but luckily I remembered this dangerous exception before using it yesterday; you can get a really close approximation to “Halloween”; ha-luo-yin, but this word does not mean a holiday where kids wear scary outfits and beg for candy; it means “heroin”. Yes, that was a word I learned over the summer (For anyone who’s curious, an-fei-ta-min is amphetamine). The word for Halloween is not transliterated, and is something like “Spirits Holiday”.
I read somewhere that a bar in town was having pumpkin carving and spiced wine, which sounded like a fun and relaxed thing to do, and several friends had planned to go. I invited my roommate, who on hearing the word “pumpkin” knew exactly what I was talking about and was eager to go. I set about figuring out whether or not I could put together a costume, settling finally on a candy corn, wearing various layers of white yellow and orange over a red skirt. The outfit was big and not really recognizable as candy corn, and about five minutes before walking out the door I changed into some rolled up jeans, threw a belt over my white shirt, took off one earring, tied my hair in a scarf and became a pirate instead.
Unfortunately when we got to the bar it was just a bar with lots of foreigners in strange clothes, and especially since my roommate isn’t big on the bar scene and I was in the mood for something calmer, I bought her a coke and me a beer, and we hung around but left about an hour later when things started getting rowdy. It was actually a really fun night, explaining to Xiaojun about Halloween and chatting with her and my friends. When we got back, since she’d let me pay for the cab and drinks, Xiaojun took me across the street for some midnight snacks: Sichuan barbecue (spicy grilled veggie kebabs), and some bready things. The snack was excellent, partly because for dinner I’d finished off the peanut butter and crackers I’d treated myself to and had a few handfuls of Xinjiang raisins, and we had some excellent roommate bonding time.
I read somewhere that a bar in town was having pumpkin carving and spiced wine, which sounded like a fun and relaxed thing to do, and several friends had planned to go. I invited my roommate, who on hearing the word “pumpkin” knew exactly what I was talking about and was eager to go. I set about figuring out whether or not I could put together a costume, settling finally on a candy corn, wearing various layers of white yellow and orange over a red skirt. The outfit was big and not really recognizable as candy corn, and about five minutes before walking out the door I changed into some rolled up jeans, threw a belt over my white shirt, took off one earring, tied my hair in a scarf and became a pirate instead.
Unfortunately when we got to the bar it was just a bar with lots of foreigners in strange clothes, and especially since my roommate isn’t big on the bar scene and I was in the mood for something calmer, I bought her a coke and me a beer, and we hung around but left about an hour later when things started getting rowdy. It was actually a really fun night, explaining to Xiaojun about Halloween and chatting with her and my friends. When we got back, since she’d let me pay for the cab and drinks, Xiaojun took me across the street for some midnight snacks: Sichuan barbecue (spicy grilled veggie kebabs), and some bready things. The snack was excellent, partly because for dinner I’d finished off the peanut butter and crackers I’d treated myself to and had a few handfuls of Xinjiang raisins, and we had some excellent roommate bonding time.
Culture Shock
I’ve mentioned before that Chinese people will often be very happy to help, whether or not they know the answer to what you’re asking; a ticket guy at the airport directed me to three different check in windows before grunting and telling me to go to the information counter. A related issue to this is the fact that Chinese people enjoy talking about their country to foreigners, though many Chinese people, especially college students, haven’t done much travel at all. When I was at the conference in Chengdu, one of the student volunteers, on hearing I was studying in Hangzhou, said “Hangzhou is very beautiful, especially West Lake”. This is about word for word what you’ll hear from anyone who knows Hangzhou. I agreed, “Yes, have you been there?” “No.” The thing is he didn’t say “I hear it’s beautiful there, how do you like it?”, his tone was as if he wanted to explain to me how great the city was, when of course I know it much better than he does.
This is an offshoot of a much bigger phenomenon in China, which I believe comes from a combination of a propagandizing culture and a strong history of rote education and straight memorization of quotations by famous scholars and historical dates. A newspaper article detailing the outcome of the 17th National Congress will repeat in summary everything that Hu Jintao spoke about, but offer no discussion on the substance of the material, past policies, etc; it seems what matters is knowing what was said. People rely on set associations and generalizations to form their opinions, and at times this can be uncomfortable for study abroad students.
When my roommate thinks of an American, she thinks of a white person. This is true for most people I’ve met; Americans are white and rich, and because white is beautiful and rich means you must be smart, Americans are better than other people. Because it is the most developed country, America is better than China. These are sentences I have heard, word for word, from roommates, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, random people on the street. In Kashgar I was approached by a man asking where I was from. He asked if America or China was better. I said I couldn’t make a comparison between the two, hoping he’d let the conversation drop, but he insisted that America was better, because it was the most developed country in the world. Others have encountered “all Americans are smart”, “Americans are taller and whiter than Chinese people, so they’re better”, etc. Last night I was getting a snack with my roommate and the vendor commented about all Americans having money. I called him on it, saying “not necessarily”, and proceeded to mention that though Americans make more money, things also cost a lot more, and there are plenty of poor people. This ridiculous idolization of things American is frustrating, especially since it’s so single-minded and widespread, especially among some college students who love American culture. I think next time someone asks I’ll say I’m Canadian or English, see what different reactions I get.
The race thing is big, and a lot have people have commented on how strongly a lack of diversity has influenced people’s thinking. Some people here have just said point-blank that they hate black people, and hate Japanese people. Having studied a bit the emotional wounds a culture can suffer and the extent to which past violence can feel very real to people in present day, I’m willing to be a bit understanding on the Japanese thing, but it’s really hard for the Asian-Americans in our program. Bamu is Japanese-American, and when people don’t assume she’s Chinese and our guide, they often give her a hard time for being Japanese. If people ask where we’re from and we say “America”, they then point to her and ask where she’s from; of course these white girls look American, but you don’t. My roommate asked me if I saw someone like Bamu or Shushan on the street in America, would I assume they were foreign? Partially because of the culture, it’s hard for some people to understand that a Chinese or Korean or Japanese person growing up in America would consider themselves first American and then something else; you are ethnically Chinese, and therefore you are Chinese. I asked one of my teachers over summer school, who teaches at UCLA, where she was from, and she said that it’s really hard to answer, because she grew up in Taiwan but her parents or grandparents were originally from somewhere in mainland China, which culturally would be considered her “老家” or her home town, though she’d never been.
This is an offshoot of a much bigger phenomenon in China, which I believe comes from a combination of a propagandizing culture and a strong history of rote education and straight memorization of quotations by famous scholars and historical dates. A newspaper article detailing the outcome of the 17th National Congress will repeat in summary everything that Hu Jintao spoke about, but offer no discussion on the substance of the material, past policies, etc; it seems what matters is knowing what was said. People rely on set associations and generalizations to form their opinions, and at times this can be uncomfortable for study abroad students.
When my roommate thinks of an American, she thinks of a white person. This is true for most people I’ve met; Americans are white and rich, and because white is beautiful and rich means you must be smart, Americans are better than other people. Because it is the most developed country, America is better than China. These are sentences I have heard, word for word, from roommates, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, random people on the street. In Kashgar I was approached by a man asking where I was from. He asked if America or China was better. I said I couldn’t make a comparison between the two, hoping he’d let the conversation drop, but he insisted that America was better, because it was the most developed country in the world. Others have encountered “all Americans are smart”, “Americans are taller and whiter than Chinese people, so they’re better”, etc. Last night I was getting a snack with my roommate and the vendor commented about all Americans having money. I called him on it, saying “not necessarily”, and proceeded to mention that though Americans make more money, things also cost a lot more, and there are plenty of poor people. This ridiculous idolization of things American is frustrating, especially since it’s so single-minded and widespread, especially among some college students who love American culture. I think next time someone asks I’ll say I’m Canadian or English, see what different reactions I get.
The race thing is big, and a lot have people have commented on how strongly a lack of diversity has influenced people’s thinking. Some people here have just said point-blank that they hate black people, and hate Japanese people. Having studied a bit the emotional wounds a culture can suffer and the extent to which past violence can feel very real to people in present day, I’m willing to be a bit understanding on the Japanese thing, but it’s really hard for the Asian-Americans in our program. Bamu is Japanese-American, and when people don’t assume she’s Chinese and our guide, they often give her a hard time for being Japanese. If people ask where we’re from and we say “America”, they then point to her and ask where she’s from; of course these white girls look American, but you don’t. My roommate asked me if I saw someone like Bamu or Shushan on the street in America, would I assume they were foreign? Partially because of the culture, it’s hard for some people to understand that a Chinese or Korean or Japanese person growing up in America would consider themselves first American and then something else; you are ethnically Chinese, and therefore you are Chinese. I asked one of my teachers over summer school, who teaches at UCLA, where she was from, and she said that it’s really hard to answer, because she grew up in Taiwan but her parents or grandparents were originally from somewhere in mainland China, which culturally would be considered her “老家” or her home town, though she’d never been.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)