The Return

With some help from a certain cousin who works in IT, I can now get through the Great Firewall and semi-regularly update my blog again! So after this long, long hiatus, I present to you another list of stuff about China, this time in line with the title of my blog:

Auspicious Learnings from Wise and Ancient Middle Kingdom

1. Cultural Sensitivity

When speaking Chinese, I no longer have a subonscious urge to say "please," "thank you," "hello," or any other polite phrases. Also, I reflexively replace my shoes for plastic slippers when entering a home.

2. Spirituality

I have attained a zen-like state. When crossing the road, my eyes glaze over and I walk at a slow, even pace while cars whizz past me; when walking down Huaihai Road, I no longer see or hear the vendors trying to sell me "bag, watch" or "hasheeshmarijuana."

3. Physical Health

Dumplings fried in a crusted, ash covered wok and manhandled by a man with grubby hands don't faze my stomach. Sometimes I even drink a glass of water, too (not the hot water, its cloudiness scares me).

4. Energy Conservation

The mystery of when there is and isn't hot water no longer bothers me. Cold showers are fine, too.

5. Artistic Appreciation

I spend several minutes marveling at the magnificent Shanghai skyline on the rare day it's not obscured by yellow smog.

6. Frugality

Spending over $3 on lunch or over $6 on dinner is a wild splurge, and more than a $1.50 for any kind of beer is horrible gouging. Also, I spend an extra five minutes just to bargain something down from $1.25 to $1.00.

7. Marketing

In the true Chinese tradition, when selling things (English lessons, for example) I can instantly come up with a litany of indignant complaints and reasons why I can't work cheaper, and then make a convincing argument that I'm actually doing them a favor by giving them a special low price.

8. Martial Arts

I can push and elbow my way into or out of a People's Square subway car without breaking a sweat, and sometimes I'm even able to get a seat.

9. Assimilation

I ride a rusty bicycle with a basket on the front.

10. Multitasking

And I can ride it through traffic in the rain while holding an umbrella.

~fin~

That last one took me a while to perfect... it's harder than it looks, especially when there are a dozen other cyclists eight inches from you banging their elbows into yours. Anyway, Shanghai's been good these few months. My classes aren't too hard and none of the professors ever take role, so this is a relative vacation from the non-stop pressure of Croft. My zither-ing is getting slightly better; I've been taking lessons for about two months now and I'm getting slightly better. I can shoot toothpicks right now, but my teacher promised that if I work hard I should be able to shoot swords in about a year.

I recently started tutoring English to three businessmen in their mid-20s. One of them is super serious and wants to talk about things such as global warming and the housing shortage in China. The second likes to talk about music, drinking, tell jokes, and ask what life in America is like. The last guy likes to look desperately lost and nervously utter sentences in broken English while scribbling down English words with notes in Chinese. So it's a pretty eclectic bunch, especially considering my zither teacher is there half the time because she's married to the nervous guy, and kind of a surreal setting (we meet in the corner booth of a greasy downtown McDonalds). But I get $25 bucks a week (that's only about $8 an hour), so it's extra money for the weekend. They want to be my friend (which is fine but they ain't gettin' free English lessons) so they invited me out to a bar two weekends ago. It ended up being pretty unique place; the decor was Tibetan, the music Michael Bolton, and the menu beers and hookah. Hoping to impress them with something new, I ordered a hookah and taught them all how to smoke. There was a fatal flaw in my plan, though; hookah's like breathing air when you smoke a pack of Chinese cigarettes a day. At least they said it tasted nice.

Also, on an unrelated yet still exciting note, I got to participate in the grand opening of the People's Republic of China's first ever Krispy Kreme! Finally, a place other than McDonalds where the Chinese can get their saturated fat fix. Here's a journal I kept of the events as they unfolded:

It started at 7:40 AM. My chest and face were being tenderized by the
elbows and knees of schoolgirls and businessmen alike as we swayed to
and fro while riding Line 3 into the city. From there, I disembarked and
changed to Line 8, where it took all my strength to cram my way into a
subway car; the interior gave no respite, however, as wave after wave
of Chinese continued to push their way into the car until there was literally
no room left for another person. After the doors opened and closed
several times, chewing on the passengers closest to the door before
spitting several back on to the platform, the train rolled forward. Twenty
minutes later we reached my destination, and I finally was able to take a
deep breath, though not too deep lest I further injure the ribs that had
cracked under the extreme pressure.

With the worst part of my trip behind me, I slogged my way through the
rain to Krispy Kreme. It was 9:30. I took a seat on the second floor,
but only briefly, as the corpulent, sideburn sporting assistant manager
tersely ordered me in broken English to wait in line downstairs.
Untill 11 AM. Waiting in line was not all that big of a deal. It was in the
30s and raining, but this was Krispy Kreme we were talking about,
and in a land where rice pap and bean paste are the tasty desserts
around, this was nothing to take lightly. I kept my self occupied by
reading Haruki Murakami's "Kafka on the Shore."

Some time later, a guy with a weird smirk showed up and tried to cut
in line. Everyone had a number (the first 200 people got a FREE
SURPISE!) so nobody had any patience with this guy. Soon, some
Krispy Kreme clerk was summoned, no doubt questioning his decision
to work there if he was gonna have to deal with this BS every day, and
started yelling at the guy to leave. The Chinese aided in the poor clerk's
efforts by ignoring the guy and whispering "diu ren" and "I blame society"
and stuff until finally a real security guy showed up and roughly escorted
the guy away. Like I said, Krispy Kreme in China is serious business.

Around ten someone set up a white tarp/tent thing and tied red and green
balloons all over it, and photographers and boring-looking Chinese bureacrats
began to gather under the tarp and stand around in their stuffy, dull manner.
Then out of nowhere, a young woman with a mic appeared dressed in Krispy
Kreme regalia, the same woman with the same voice who hosts all of China's
corporate events and mid-Autumn festivals and mall publicity stunts and tries
desperately to interact with the crowd with cheers and countdowns and with
the microphone amp turned up way too high. Anyway, the woman's there and
she proceeds to introduce a representative from the Jing'An district government,
the balding and stressed-out store manager, some more Chinese people who look
like investors, the leader of the Shanghai Coffeeshop Commission (Donuts Divison),
several members of the Politburo, and Hu Jintao. Then the manager gave a listless
speech in English that the Chinese people all talked over, and retreated back into
the store to brace for impact.

The MC girl's shenanigans were followed by something I like to call a Chinese drum
roll. It's a bunch of Chinese people in traditional dress standing on what looks like a
parade float. The way they're arranged, they could be mistaken for some sort of choir,
except instead of singing they used drums, gongs, and cymbals, and instead of delicate
harmony there's raucous noise (think of the instruments the Whoville children get in the
Grinch). After that cacophony subsided, the hyperenthusiastic MC lead a dramatic
"SAN!"
"ER!"
"YI!"
countdown, which culminated in the traditional Chinese grand opening, the confetti-
filled cannon blast. The MC went nuts in rapidfire Chinese as the cannon went off and the crowd's ears rang as little bits of red and green plastic fluttered down through the acrid
smoky air. Then the doors opened and it was near-riot mode as people nervously shoved
each other through the donut shop's tiny door.

And that's the story of the first Krispy Kreme opening in China.

I got a dozen donuts and ate almost all of them myself. Other than that those fun misadventures, there's not too much to report. I'm heading back home on January 26th, and I'll be there for about three weeks. I hope to be heading up to Oxford for a visit on an early February weekend. After that, it's back to China with my Dad to do a bit of travelling. My camera's broken, but I've taken a few pictures that I need to upload and post on here, so hopefully those will make it on here before I head back to the States.

Zaijian!