Thanksgiving in Beijing

I never, in my wildest dreams, imagined that I could have a Thanksgiving holiday as amazing as the one I just had in a country other than the United States.

November in America is a wonderful time of year. Christmas is almost in the air, and everyone is just waiting for the extended break they know will come in December. But the fourth Thursday each November has its own magic. Here in China, we don’t see anything of the American holidays. There weren’t any pumpkins out in October, and there haven’t been any turkeys decorating store fronts here. However, somehow the students of CET found a way to bring holiday cheer into the Land of the Rising Dragon.

It all started on Thursday, we all got up and Jamie and I decided to go for a swim. We swam for about an hour and after being really tired went to English club. English club is a club for Chinese students to meet and interact with English speaking foreigners. While there Jamie got a call that there were some students playing football, so we decided to introduce the Chinese to some good old Thanksgiving Football.

After the game, we went inside to help the women cook. It was kind of funny actually, because all of the guys were playing football, and all of the girls were cooking dinner. Haha. Funny. Anywho, we went inside and had the womenfolk put us to work peeling potatoes and buying groceries they forgot. After doing manual labor for a while, they told me they required liquor, so I went and bought some.

By the way, cheap American wine has nothing on cheap Chinese wine. I can get 1.5 liters here for less than 3 dollars. And get drunk off of only 1 liter!

Anywho, needless to say, I was pretty well drunk long before dinner started. When we finally sat down at the dinner table, and all the food was out, one of the Chinese teachers said “他喝醉了” (He’s Drunk) to which I replied “不是啊！！！还没有啊！！” (NO I’M NOT!!! NOT YET!!!) I’m not entirely proud of the situation, although it was pretty damn funny.

I should make it clear that the entire dinner, enough for more than 40 people was entirely organized by CET students. Sophie Xiong, who’s uncle actually owns the restaurant on the first floor, allowed us to use his kitchen to cook in. All the food was bought by CET students (although CET did give us some money to buy it) and it was all cooked by CET students. On top of that, there were 18 pies made for the situation, all of which were entirely handmade by Rachel. She is a goddess in my book.

So we had quite the feast on Thanksgiving: turkey, chicken, mashed potatoes, mashed sweet potatoes, au gratin potatoes, broccoli and garlic, mac & cheese, other assorted pastas, wine, brandy, pecan pie, apple pie, pumpkin pie, and many other dishes that I can’t even remember. The night was amazing, the food was amazing, the people are amazing, and I’m just so damn thankful that I had the experience.

I’m thankful for the friends I’ve made, the level of awesomeness they possess, and the experience of a lifetime that I’ve had here in Beijing. I get a little teary now thinking about it, but I’ve only got about 2 weeks left with these fine folks who I probably won’t ever see again. So I hope they can know how thankful I am for knowing them, and how thankful I am that they’ve colored my experience here with hues of joy, confusion, excitement, frustration, drunken rage, uncontrollable hilarity, and everything in-between. I can’t express what I’ve gained from my stay here, but with only two weeks left to know these people, I feel like I can only be sure of one thing: my time here with them has not been nearly enough.

My Roommate's House

On this past Sunday, I had the honor of visiting my roommate’s home in Chaoyang district and having dinner with his family for his birthday. I was surprised by a few things that night, some of which I want to share.

First, China truly is a place of rapid growth, this is most visibly seen in developing places like Beijing and Chaoyang being a hub of commerce is a great example. On either side of the hutong-like housing that my roommate and his family lived in were giant neon covered buildings that demanded your attention and your money. However, in-between was the small rundown abode of my friend. This very visible and clear separation between development and ownership of money was almost staggering.

Second, was the utter squalor. My roommate’s house, the place he’d grown up in and lived in for the 20 years of his life was smaller than the suite I lived in last year at Kalamazoo. Not smaller by a little bit, but about 1/3 the size. His entire life had been experienced in that place, and he’d not known what it was like to live in a more grandiose, or to me normal, room until he moved to college. He shared a room with his parents, and his bed was a table with a blanket on it. I can’t imagine what it would have been like to live in such a constricting place, and I can only guess at what he must think about me and how I seem to spread out over our dorm room like a blob with all of my stuff.

Third, was the complete and utter warmth with which his family accepted and welcomed me into their home. I was given every luxury they had to spare. Our meal was full of meat, an expensive alternative to tofu and vegetables, and all of the seats I used had cushions on them. Not only that, but the stool I was seated at was directly in front of the electric heater that I’m sure they use sparingly and was larger in all dimensions than the small uncomfortable looking wood blocks they were using. They demanded I eat more food, drink more beer, and tell them more about America.

I’d been told to expect all these things, either by my roommate or by my Chinese teachers, but still the huge disparities and wild exaggerations still caught me off guard. I talked to his parents and him for several hours while we feasted on dumplings, chicken and tofu. We talked about our new president, new opportunities and mistakes made by both America and China.

What was most interesting and most striking however was something seemingly small and insignificant that my roommate’s dad said to me. He told me he was afraid that when I came to their house he was afraid I would 看不起 (kan4bu4qi3) them. I’d learned this grammar structure before, but I wasn’t aware of the special meaning behind this phrase. 看 means to look 不起 means to not be able to afford. So the three together effectively mean “Not able to afford looking at.” It means colloquially, to look down upon someone because of their poverty. I told him that that would be impossible for me to do, mostly because the food was so good! But joking aside this really struck a chord with me.

China is full of those that are in extreme poverty. They know it, and yet they still live on in a happy existence with none of the amenities we believe are necessary for life. When he said that he was afraid I would look down on them because of their poverty, it made me very sad. It made me sad that he assumed I would do that, but it made me sadder because if I didn’t know them at all, I probably would have.

I don’t know what that means for me now, but I do know that it changed something, fundamentally. I had a similar experience this summer working in a factory for my dad, watching and befriending people who lived paycheck to paycheck, often because of circumstances far beyond their control. These are still people, and they never asked for this kind of life.

Staggering experiences aside, my roommate’s family is amazingly gracious and I had one of the best meals in China at his house. I only hope I can repay them in the future for the gift that they gave me.

Although, I still think that eating the bones as well as the meat, especially with chicken, is weird as hell.

Shanghai!!! Hangzhou!!!

Well then, I’ve been very effectively neglecting writing in this for a long time...

The last month and a half, I’ve been living in China, and it’s been amazing. Between travelling and bar hopping, sight-seeing and eating the cheapest tastiest food ever, I haven’t had very much time to write down any of my thoughts.

Ok, that’s a lie, but at least I’m honest.

So then: China. China is beautiful and the people here are amazing. The students that I’m studying alongside are fantastic and the roommates that we were assigned are really friendly and a great help when we are doing homework! The food here is cheap, rarely makes you sick (unless you eat American food), and very tasty. It seems like no matter what I’m doing here it is something new. Just riding the public bus is sometimes a little confusing and new, even if it’s a route that I’m fairly familiar with. The constant newness is excellent because I was afraid before I got here that I would settle down into the slovenly apathetic way I live in Kalamazoo. Here, that’s not possible.

Now, it would be impossible for me to remember everything that I’ve done since the last time I wrote, so I’m going to start with our trip to Shanghai and Hangzhou two weeks ago. We got up early on a Saturday morning after a long night of drinking and dancing to catch our train. Thankfully, none of us were too hungover, so we only left 30 minutes later than planned, which put us a full hour ahead of schedule. We grabbed a taxi, which was a pain in the ass because for some reason everyone and their mother, literally, were exploring CNU that weekend. We think it might have been a family weekend or something. Anywho, we eventually escaped from the frantic confusion that was CNU and got into a cab on our way to the train station. Sadly, we didn’t have enough time to eat breakfast, so we were all pretty hungry by the time we got on the train.

On the train, we found out that Dave had packed a box of ritz crackers, a jar of peanut butter, and a jar of jam. Those mini PB&J’s were some of the best things I’ve ever tasted. After eating we slept, a lot. The trip was a total of 13 hours, so we decided to spend the majority of it unconscious. When we all finally woke up about 7 hours after the beginning of our ride, we explored the train a little. There were several sleeper cars, the eating car, and then the seat cars. We had soft seats, which were pretty much like airplane seats except with about 3 times more leg room. We went to the food car and got some of the most…interesting food I’ve ever eaten. Imagine airplane food, except a little more questionable as to what it is you’re actually eating.

When we got off the train in Shanghai, we realized that we didn’t actually know how to get to the hostel we were staying at. Nor did we write down an address, or a phone number, or anything except for the English name, which wasn’t very helpful. We knew that Dave had a confirmation email with all the information in it so we went to a travel agency in the train station and asked if we could use their computer. They basically refused to help us in any way unless we booked a new hotel room through them, so we left discouraged. We spied a pizza hut across the road from the train station, and that sounded pretty good after the train food we’d eaten a few hours earlier, so we decided to eat first and then find an internet café. However, due to my awesome Chinese skills, II happened to see a 网吧(internet bar) sign right before we got to the pizza hut, so we went there first.

After we wrote down all the information for all of our hostels we proceeded to spend far too much money on some pizza and fries and corn chowder. It was delicious. We got to the Hostel a while later, and watched an episode of Dexter before going to bed. As a side note, I want to mention that I’ve become obsessed with the Shotime series Dexter. It’s about a serial killer cop who runs around cutting people into pieces like a psychopath. Awesome.

The next morning, on Sunday, I was awoken at 6am by one of the Hostel staff. He informed me that my friend had been asking for me and was in the bathroom. I arrived to find Alana collapsed by a toilet, and apparently she’d been vomiting the entire night and had gotten one hour of sleep. So we called an ambulance and then in broken Chinese told the Paramedic that we wanted to goto an international hospital. I got to ride in my first ambulance in Shanghai, woo!! I also got to watch as the paramedic installed an IV into a crying disoriented Alana who wasn’t quite sure how she’d gotten onto a stretcher and into an ambulance.

When we got to the hospital Dave and I were immediately separated from Alana and were not able to reunite with her until the administration was sure of how we were going to pay for the services rendered. Luckily, Dave had his parent’s credit card, so we didn’t have to worry about spending all of our money on saving Alana’s life.

We got into the ER that Alana had been wheeled into. A doctor who almost spoke Chinese was there and we explained to her that we didn’t think it was food poisoning as we’d all eaten the exact same foods and that we didn’t know what could have been wrong with her. They gave her an anti-nausea shot and started her on some antibiotics while also taking a blood sample. We waited and eventually an orderly came and wheeled her away to the ICU. Almost immediately after she was admitted there, another orderly came and got her out of her bed into a wheelchair for her to have an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed nothing wrong so we came back and waited for the results of the blood work.

It came back showing that her white blood cells were abnormally high, as well as something else which I couldn’t figure out what it was but both indicated that she most likely had an infection of some sort. They gave her more antibiotics and said that hopefully she’d be able to leave before nightfall. Sadly that turned out not to be the case. I headed back to the hostel and picked up Dave’s laptop and cleacned up a little bit and then Dave and I sat for the next several hours alternating between playing card games and watching Dexter. We played Gin Rummy to 1000 points. We tied at the end at 1005 and had to play a death match winner takes all. It was epic. We ended up having to spend the night and Dave got the chair while I got the floor. I’m not sure who was more comfortable.

The next morning she was feeling much better and after a few more tests and finishing an IV, she was allowed to leave. We went back to the hostel and had a celebratory nap because none of slept well the night before. That night we decided to go to The Bund with our fellow Kzoo cohorts who happened to be in Shanghai at the time. It was damn pretty. We were going to do a cruise down it, but I ate some bad gelato and ended up having to find a toilet right as we were supposed to be boarding. Alana, as she’d just been discharged, decided that she wouldn’t board either, so we got to look at the Bund from the edge, rather than from within it.

The next day we went to the Jinmao tower, the second tallest building in Shanghai. It used to be the tallest, until a year ago when they built a new tower right next to it that is taller. To go to the top floor costs money, but the floor right below the top floor had a bar and was free to visit. When we arrived, it happened to be happy hour, so we got several martinis. The view was fantastic and the ambience was very relaxing, a nice alternative to the nasty emergency room we’d been at just a day before.

After drinking for a while, we decided to goto the sex museum of Shanghai. More of a tourist trap than anything else, this exhibit was still fairly interesting. There was a statue there that had an erection larger than Alana. I laughed hard. After that we went to the French Concession and ate a meal that was far too expensive for what we got, but was still really good.

The next morning we got on the train to Hangzhou, a city known for the giant lake at its center. Now being from Michigan, the lake there didn’t seem too big, but I guess things are different in China. It was very pretty, although I probably would have enjoyed it more had Dave not gotten sick.

I want to say now, that buying tickets in China is the stupidest most irritating thing on the planet. In order to buy any ticket, you must do it either at the station, or from a travel agent. You can’t buy it yourself online or over the phone unless you are very fluent in Chinese. Most websites charge you a ridiculous amount of money as a “service fee” or you just can’t find the ticket you need regardless of availability. The entire system is really backwards, and getting anywhere is almost impossible. That being said, we were unable to buy tickets from Hangzhou to Beijing in Beijing, so we had to wait until we arrived in Hangzhou to purchase them, and by then, most were sold out. We were VERY fortunate to pick up some soft seats, as they were almost sold out. However, it wasn’t without much difficulty that we even picked those up as we had to go to 3 different places to find them. At the station we couldn’t figure out the cryptic way to purchase tickets, and people who we asked to help demanded a ridiculous service fee. At a travel agency listed in our guidebook, they told us they only sold airplane tickets, and couldn’t help us get train tickets even though the book said they could. Sorry, had to rant.

At the hostel we played a lot of pool, and it was impressed upon me just how horrible I am at that game. There was also a little white satanic dog that bit everything it could. It was actually kind of funny. After checking out the lake, and playing even more pool we headed back to Beijing.

All in all the trip was interesting, and even though we didn’t get to do everything we wanted to because of the detour to the hospital (we wanted to goto 4 places and only ended up at 2), I can’t say that it was anything other than fun. I had a great time and got really close to Dave and Alana which makes everything worth it because they’re awesome people. And besides all that, now I know how to deal with hospitals in China, a useful skill to have I think.

Love and miss all of you and hope you’re doing well!!

Silk Streets, 啤酒，and Hunting for Victory

The few days after our arrival were a blur of excitement and exploring. After our first orientation and placement exam we went to the Silk Street Markets and practiced our haggling skills. Getting a transportation pass was somewhat interesting, but very useful as it allows us to move anywhere in the city for cheap and very efficiently using either buses or the subway.

Silk Street one of the most interesting places I have ever visited. It was originally literally a street full of markets, but now is in a multistoried building that dwarfs the surroundings. On each floor are vendors’ stalls selling all sorts of wares. From clothes to embroideries to hats to jewelry, anything can be found there. At the Silk Street Markets we all got ripped off for our first purchase, but later learned how to really bargain. We all could still use a little work on it, but I’m sure we will be going back very soon. It was Jamie’s birthday, so we bought him a fuzzy and warm Communist hat for the winter. Hopefully he will be brave enough to wear it.

The day after Silk Street we had another Orientation and met our Chinese roommates. My roommate’s name is Yue Wenlan (岳文岚) and he is a very tall big Chinese man. He is very friendly however, and enjoys playing 16-bit fighting games and ping pong. He took me to the 首师大 (equivalent of CNU) cafeteria and treated me to a meal of very spicy Kung Pao Chicken.

Afterwards, Stephanie, Alan, Stephanie’s roommate and I all went to the bar. We went to The Rickshaw, near Sanli Tun. It was half-off beer that night, so we all drank as much as we wanted. For a large stein of Qing Dao beer, it was about 1.10 American Dollars, normally it is about 2.20. We met Alan’s old expat friend Florian at the rickshaw and told stories deep into the night. Then, a little drunkenly, we took a cab back to CNU and went to bed.

The next day we had a scavenger hunt that had to be completed throughout the city with our roommates. We got into groups of 4 or 6 (2 Americans and 2 Chinese or 3 Americans and 3 Chinese folk) and began planning what to do. It was interesting because all of the Chinese roommates were very excited about the scavenger hunt and wanted to win, their American counterparts however, were very happy to follow and just enjoy the sights of the city. Due to this, there were a few roommates who were very disappointed with their final placement.

Our team set off to complete objectives that needed the entire group such as group pictures at famous places. After we had completed those, we separated into 3 groups, each set of roommates, and completed specific objectives. In the end, we were able to complete almost every objective and only had to worry about the last thing: a group performance. We decided that we would do a duet rendition of 看过来, a famous song in Chinese. The original can be found here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3PXVCwlBIA. Our performance was unmatchable, and when all was said and done, we stood victorious. We were given a 200 kuai gift card to a Korean barbecue restaurant as a reward, and feasted very well that night.

The Land of the Rising Dragon

China, a mystical land where wonders are created, armies clash and mystical masters of the Dao control the elements. The home of paper, noodles and more recently, the Olympic games. Some fear this place for its alien characteristics, while others believe it too far or too expensive to visit. Some however, choose to delve deep into the treasure that is 中国 and embrace the rich cultural heritage that comes with it.

I began my journey at 3 AM on August 26th of 2008. After a short night of restlessness, my cellphone alarm jolted me from my sleep and began what would be one of the longest days of my life. After an hour drive to the Denver airport and a quick greasy bite to eat at the terminal Burger King I was boarding my flight to Chicago, Illinois. While boarding and during the flight, thoughts raced through my head: Will I like China? Will I remember any Chinese? Will my Chinese roommate be awesome or awful? Will my 13 hour plane ride get shot down somewhere over Siberia? All these things and more shot back and forth through my thoughts and it seemed almost impossible for me to find any peace. Thankfully, the short night's sleep allowed me to lose myself in dreams, but still it seemed like the negative thoughts of the future would never leave.

When I awoke, I was landing in Chicago and it seemed like the months I passed in Colorado working in the factory and generally messing around had occurred years ago. The two hour plane ride and the the knowledge that my impending future was upon me was enough to drive all thoughts of my great summer far from my mind. When I disembarked, I only had to walk a few hundred yards to reach my next terminal, the one from which I would board my plane to Beijing. There familiar faces greeted me as Ajka had already been there for a while and Jamie had just arrived. Eric was also with us as he had also flown in from Denver. The four of us decided we needed to eat and we went to the closest "pizza" place we could find (as Ajka demanded she eat some CHICAGO pizza). There we found that the pizza was abhorenntly small and noot entirely appetizing so Jamie and I decided to get sandwiches instead. Being that it was in an airport we were dismally overcharged. While sitting and chatting we invariably spoke about Chinese and our trip, and were overheard by a gentleman from Hong Kong. Sitting in the Airport cafeteria, he talked with us a little in Chinese and us with him in broken pseudo-chinese. He laughed and was very excited that we would get to see his country, and demanded that we visit Hong Kong, Shang Hai, and Xi'An. We agreed to his request and after finishing our meal returned to the terminal.

I advised the others to change some of their American money for Chinese RenMinBi and they did so. We still aren't really sure what kind of exchange rate they got, but I'm convinced that it wasn't very good. Afterwards, more students from Kalamazoo started to arrive for our group flight to Beijing. Also, we talk a little with the other students who were going with us to China as they were the only other people in the terminal who were not Chinese and under the age of 35.

We were all very confused when the people at the desk demanded we hand over our boarding passes and passports for a "final check." They said that if we didn't do this we would not be able to board the plane. This wouldn't have been a big deal, except that they didn't announce the need to do it until all of the Chinese people were already in line and we ended up near the back because we didn't know what was going on. I was not pleased.

Afterwards, we boarded our plane and got to know the people we would be sitting next to for the next 13 hours. I was sitting next to a girl who was also a student with CET but was going for the Chinese Language program instead of the Chinese Studies program. She was very nice and we talked a bit about how nervous we were, how exciting this was, what our expectations were and generally were able to relieve some of the nervous tension we'd both accrued.

I then slept for about 6 hours.

I awoke to the rustling of the flight attendants as they came around with our first meal. I don’t really know what it was, nor do I think that anyone really wanted to eat it. After I had finished it, Kung Fu Panda came on the TVs and I watched it. I found it humorous, as I’m sure others did as well, that this movie was shown. When it was over a bowl of Ramen was served to us (United Airlines brand, woo!!) and we all ate the first Asian—albeit a fake type—food that would be a precursor to many more. For most of us it gave us pretty bad stomach aches, and I took more than one trip to the bathroom because of it.

I slept again for 2 hours.

Movies kept playing, mostly ones I didn’t want to watch. Made of Honor, Nym’s Island, and some other movie were all being played while I had slept of while we roamed the cabin talking to each other about what we were going to do in China. We met many more people who were doing the Chinese Language program and talked to them about how sad we were going to be that we spent all this time getting to know them and would then be separated from them due to our difference in programs and thus locations.

The hours dragged on as we talked with one another. At one point while I was talking to Alan, an older Asian man approached me. He suddenly appeared when I turned around and actually kind of frightened me. He was a professor out of Wisconsin, but was Chinese by birth. We spoke a little in Chinese and English about what China meant to students and him and the future and near the end of it, I was made sorely aware of my incompetence with the language. I was fairly embarrassed by the whole ordeal so I retreated further aft in the airplane and discovered a large group of Kalamazoo students talking to a Chinese girl.

Her name was Yu Miao and she was a twenty-four year old electrical engineer who was visiting her family in China. She was very interested in all of us and we had a very good conversation with her in broken Chinese and much English. She was very excited to teach us new phrases and learn English words from us. Near the end of it some of us had exchanged information with her and we went to return to our seats because the movie that had just begun was Iron Man.

After watching that magnificent work of art, it was nearly time to land and we began our descent into the unknown-ness that was China. Landing was confusing because the airport is actually outside the city. So there was no sight of buildings or anything as we began our descent. All we could see were trees and fields and it was very disorienting and unexpected.

We disembarked from our plane and began to follow the mass of people who snaked their way to the Chinese entry area. We had our passports and entry documents checked and proceeded to the baggage claim. While there, the cutest drug dogs I’ve ever seen came and sniffed all of our carryon luggage. Jamie’s bag was flagged as suspicious and they began rifling through his belongings. It turns out that the drug dogs are trained to seek out and flag Jamie’s grandmother’s homemade oatmeal cookies as they disrupt the public order. We waited a long time to get our bags, and the dogs came and sniffed his bags again and again the officers came and inspected his luggage. We got our bags and headed for customs.

Customs was abnormally lax, and we seemed to get through it in a matter of minutes. We left the terminals area and went down into the main entryway where we met our CET guide Wan Zhun. She got us all together and made sure we had all made it, although a few of us hadn’t. We then boarded a bus and got our first views of Beijing.

Beijing is a massive city with beautiful modern architecture. There are many hundreds of trees and parks and so many people that it’s mind-boggling. I’ve been informed that the trees and parks are entirely new, and that even 3 months ago they hadn’t yet been put in. The sheer speed with which this city is able to change is absolutely amazing, and although a bit disorienting at times, has as of yet been a very interesting and enlightening experience.

When we arrived at 首都师范大学 (Capitol Normal University) at the 国际文化大厦 (International Culture Plaza) we realized how lucky we were. The building is more like a hotel than anything else and we are given rooms with air conditioning, a color TV, a computer, a private bathroom, and only one roommate.

We checked in and made friends with people we didn’t already know. We explored the building a little and were told to arrive bright and early the next day for an orientation and then a placement exam, all of which would take several hours. But that couldn’t quell our excitement, as we had finally arrived.