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August 31, 2005
The Westerner's Discount
Today was the first day that Steven and I did not have a guided tour of some part of the city so we were finally on our own to explore a bit. This was a mixed blessing as all of sudden we realized we had no idea where to go / what to do. I wanted to head back to the supermarket to pick up a few necessities (sponges, air freshener, Raid to kill the oversized insects that like to hang out by the water cooler--you know, the basics) so we ambled out down the street. It was lunch time and we were hungry so we decided to stop into a random food spot on the way.
Most places I've been to so far have a picture of the dish next to the chinese characters so even if you can't read the menu, you can always point. This place was the exception to the rule though and we were left at a loss for words. As our waitress approached the table and started speaking a mile a minute, I simply started laughing. Steven speaks a great deal of mandarin and was focusing on picking up what she was throwing at us, but several points must have been lost in translation. He ordered some random dish that he knew of and then looked at me with a quizzical eye. I asked him if he could manage to order me something with chicken and rice and he said sure. Side note- one thing I have noticed so far is that the chinese in Guangzhou barely ever eat rice. They seem to either eat noodles or simply go without a starch during most meals. Not what I expected... So anyhow, Steven does his best to order me some grub but got frustrated when the waitress didn't seem to understand. He said one last phrase and she walked away. When I prompted him for an explanation of the discourse, he said that he told her, "Whatever is fine." I laughed once again and waited anxiously for whatever might be brought over to the table.
About 5 minutes later they brought over a tasty looking pork dish and Steven dug in happily. Another 5 minutes went by and I began to wonder what was taking so long. After *another* five minutes of me watching the rest of the place eat I began to wonder, maybe "whatever is fine" meant "don't worry about bringing him anything." This theory made me chuckle once again but after another few minutes they brought over a bowl of rice, some unidentifiable piece of chicken, and a random green-ish sauce. Better than nothing! It was pretty bland all around but suited my needs just fine. Interestingly enough, since Steven spoke a bit of chinese with them, they apparently trusted his ability to use chopsticks. I, on the other hand, was brought a full set of western silverware including knife, fork and spoon since I sat to the side clueless during the ordering fiasco. How humiliating!
Anyhow, I began to wonder-- how much is this chicken special going to set me back? As we brought the bill up to the register I took out a 10 yuan bill, figuring that it was more than enough. So far our lunches had all been in the realm of 5-8 yuan so 10 seemed like a safe bet. The guy rang us up and together we somehow racked up a bill of 36 yuan! Outrageous! Unfortunately we were left with no choice but to pay and walk out (most likely never to return). As we attempted to figure out what happened, I reasoned that we were given the "westerner's discount" of the meal x 200%. I was instantly re-motivated to get a mandarin tutor as soon as possible. The kicker of it all is that despite getting ripped off severely, we still only spent the equivelant of about $2.25 each. Ha!
Posted by awolfe at 11:26 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
August 30, 2005
Banquet #1
Tonight I had the pleasure of attending my first Chinese pseudo-banquet. After being led around to various city sights by "Icy" and "Go-Glo" (no, seriously), Steven and I met up with the other ~20 teachers in the English department for a nice dinner. A minibus took us out to some fancy-shmancy seafood restaurant where we had a private room and an entire fleet of 6 or 7 waitresses catering to our every need. The meal started off pretty tame with some fresh fruit (papaya we think?) and chicken-based soup, but after that it was game on. I was relatively daring and had eel, goose liver, some type of water worm, crocodile, and taro root.
To be honest, pretty much everything there was excellent. I could do without the liver, but besides that, the meal was top shelf. All of the teachers seemed incredibly entertained every time we asked what a dish was and they gave us the description. I have no doubt in my mind that they got a minor thrill in attempting to gross us out. Alas, we were too brave! One of the teachers (named "Viscous," if I'm not mistaken) pointed out that people in Guangzhou will eat anything. I'm pretty sure he means it. One of the students actually dictated to us an old maxim of sorts that roughly translated into the fact that people in Guangzhou have three priorities (in order of importance):
1. Good food
2. Good job
3. Good love
Interesting order there, no? As someone who is perenially hungry, I can't say I'm too disappointed.
This being a chinese dinner banquet, it had to involve alcohol. For those of you who took my advice and read Hessler's "River Town," I was preparing myself to drink heavily on crappy grain alcohol in order to prove my worth. For better or worse, it did not quite work out that way. Apparently it is tradition for the oldest staff member to identify the alcohol of choice for the entire meal. Luckily, it turned out to be a somewhat bland red wine. Every person at the table received a small-ish wine glass filled about halfway and the toasting began. One of the department heads stood up, said something in mandarin or cantonese (who knows), proclaimed "Gampei" (the Chinese equivelant of cheers), and drained his glass. Everyone else followed suit so I guess the games truly began there.
Slowly but steadily everyone at the table either stood up and made a public cheers or walked over to one corner and had a small toast with one or two others, always followed by draining the entire glass. This must have been where the waitstaff really earned their keep because they had to frantically run around and constantly refill every glass as soon as possible, lest someone miss an opportunity to participate in a toast. The fellow who chose the wine was also celebrating an impending retirement and was the source of a few dozen glasses. I got the feeling that everyone was obligated to toast the man and get him as drunk as possible. Unfortunately for them, this guy had been around the block and could handle his liquor quite effectively. He simply smirked, clinked glasses, and threw back the contents of the glass without missing a beat. Consequently he was also the one shouting out across the room for additional bottles to be opened.
I was getting ready for a marathon night of drinking, a la "River Town," but in the end I did not have to go to extremes. Thanks to the valuable skills I acquired at the University of 44 Home Ave., I was well equipped to handle it. Steven does not drink very much though and was starting to sweat it out, both literally and figuratively. Suddenly out of seemingly no where, the waitresses cleared the last main dish, brought out watermelon slices, and took everyone's wine glass away. Just like that, it was all over! I did manage to give two toasts before they cut us off though which was quite fun. While I couldn't understand what everyone was saying on the way home, Steven told me that they were chuckling about how several of the smaller female teachers were really drunk by the end of the meal. Ha! Of course the moral of the story is that tofu can be extremely difficult to eat with chop sticks (whole different story...).
Posted by awolfe at 12:14 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 29, 2005
"Authentic" China
I've spent the last two days being led around Guangzhou by small groups of students. I'm pleased to report that I encountered my first amusing English name taken on by a Chinese person: Icy. I asked her if she was cold and she gave me a perplexed look, most likely because it was about 95 degrees and humid, and responded with an emphatic "no." Anyhow, I got my first taste of what I think of as authentic China today as we passed by a Buddhist temple buried in the midst of various shopping malls and skyscrapers. I expressed interest in going in and they reluctantly agreed to take me and my roomate in. I got the impression that they saw no reason to go but I wasn't going to back down from this one.
Being the nerdy academic that I am, I was really excited to see the monks at work. The historian, musician, and religion-scholar in me all got a minor lesson in observing a particular Buddhist ceremony for the dead. Apparently those who have recently lost a family member undergo a specific ritual involving a certain number of bows and chants in front of a specific statue. The incense-filled temple, supposedly from ~960 c.e., was a welcome respite from the dirty shopping area and street peddlers.
The idea of authenticity got me thinking about a couple of things: First, it must be really frustrating to grow up in China and have to learn thousands and thousands of years of history. We get off super easy in comparison. 400 years?? Pshh! That's nothing.
Second, it's no secret that China demolished the large majority of its historical artifacts during the process of modernization and urbanization. Apparently it is a largely Western concept to preserve elements of history and culture since we make a concerted effort to save almost everything now. The East, on the other hand, has had to rebuild some of their more famous landmarks and buildings since they were bulldozed or allowed to decay to nothing over the past few centuries. For instance, the image we have of the Great Wall is entirely rebuilt to what it probably looked like when it first went up. The question then begs, how much of what I will see here is untouched history? Unfortunately, it is difficult to tell.
Third, Guangzhou is absolutely full of American products, or at least reasonable facsimiles thereof. We went to the largest bookstore in the city today and they had a small section of English books. You could buy almost any selection from the "Chicken Soup for the..." series, yet they were clearly knock-offs. There were major typos, grammatical errors, and syntax issues that would make any native English speaker chuckle. Downstairs in the store were movies and I saw my first batch of blatantly pirated DVD's. No surprise there, but it's still odd to see "Enemy of the State" without Will Smith on the cover and costing the equivelant of $1.50. There are also "Levi" Jeans, "Rolex" watches, and "Nike" products which are all clearly not legitimate. I find myself questioning almost everything I see with an American brand name on it.
Lastly, I did my first major food shopping today and discovered that all supermarkets here are more or less Walmart-like stores where you can buy anything. Wedding ring? Supermarket. TV? Supermarket. Chainsaw? Supermarket. Interestingly enough, the closest market to the school (where we live) is called the "Trust Market." Steven and I were wondering if the produce would be decent and edible when we finally reasoned that if you can't trust the trust market, who can you trust?
I'm hoping to get some pictures up here in the near future but I have yet to find a wifi zone to connect my laptop so until then I'm stuck with this crappy pc and a chinese version of windows.
Posted by awolfe at 7:20 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 28, 2005
First Impressions
It only took about 27 hours of travel time, but I am officially here now in Guangzhou. The flight itself was actually pretty painless as I slept for a large chunk of it. I have to say, Singapore Air gets two thumbs up from me for excellent food, great service, over 60 movies on demand, and the ability to play super mario brothers (where is the warp zone in world 4-3? I couldn't remember). The layover in the singapore airport was also pretty amazing. They have two different spas, a free movie theater, a pool on the roof, beautiful gardens, and free internet kiosks.
Singapore airports 1, American airports 0.
After being treated to breakfast by singapore pia-er James Young (thanks James!), my roomate Steven and I got back on a plane for a quick 4 hour jaunt up to China. I expected mountains of paperwork and annoying lines to get through customs, but everything actually went off without a hitch. I could be mistaken, but it seems like they couldn't have cared less.
So first impressions:
*Guangzhou is just about as hot/humid/dirty/loud/busy/big as I expected. This is not necessarily a good thing, but I was prepared for it so it wasn't a total shocker.
*I fully expected everyone to stop and stare as I walked around, but it hasn't been too bad. There is definitely a decent amount of gawking going on, but I don't think I'm turning heads as much as I expected. That being said, I have only seen about 4 or 5 caucasians here (compared to the thousands of Chinese) and they were all tourists at a museum that didn't speak English.
*Things here are very different (duh). Going to the supermarket today was quite an eye-opener. How exactly does one prepare starfish? Snakes? I have no idea.
So far I have managed to avoid the inevitable and have not gotten food sickness yet. Steven and I both know that it's only a matter of time though and I would almost prefer that it happen now as opposed to later. It's frustrating eating and drinking, all the while thinking, "I wonder if this'll make me ill." I've been trying to follow the travel clinic's rule of no-fruits-or-vegetables-that-don't-have-a-skin-you-can-peel-off, but I also have no control over what goes into food at a restaurant. It also gets to the point where I don't feel like being paranoid for an entire year so we'll see how long it lasts. For lunch today I had an amazing veal dish as well as these cucumbers covered in some un-identifiable sauce that was pretty darn tasty. So far so good.
I didn't know what to expect with my apartment, given the multitude of disastrous stories that I heard about last year, however things seem like they're in good shape. My bed is super hard but I think maybe that's standard over here. We have yet to figure out how to get hot water so I took a very quick shower this morning. VERY quick. I have yet to use the "eastern" toilet (a.k.a. hole in the floor), though I'm sure once I do I will devote an entire post to the experience. We are lucky enough to have a solid library of old books left by former pia-ers, so I should be sufficiently amused for a while. I never got around to reading "I, Claudius" before, but this just might be the year!
So far the biggest difference I have noticed is with smells. Besides the chinese writing everywhere, I could be in any big city... except for the new smells. Walking on the street, going through the supermarket, passing by restaurants, and exploring campus has all brought about brand new scents (or should I say odors?). Now if only I could pinpoint the slightly unpleasant one in my apartment, I would be a full step happier...
That's about it for now. I've been so busy and have already experienced so much that it's tough to remember everything. It's time to go search out my dinner, but I'm sure I will post again soon.
Posted by awolfe at 6:50 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
August 25, 2005
Final Pre-flight Thoughts
I am just not good at packing. I discovered this a few weeks ago when I showed up in D.C. with only 3 socks. It was reinforced yesterday as I tried to pack for the year. At this point it will be a big surprise when I open up my bags in Guangzhou to find out what actually made it into the luggage.
I am going to miss Thanksgiving this year. Manchester Road Race + Extravaganza at the Siegel's = Fun.
I have no idea how I'm going to amuse myself for a gazillion hours on this flight. There had better be amazing movies.
There is an open invitation for anybody and everybody to come visit in Guangzhou. It may not be easy to get over there, but once you do, the beer is actually cheaper than the water.
I have barely even thought about actually teaching, which, conveniently enough, starts in a few days.
My reading habit is sure to come back to haunt me this coming year. Those who know me well know that I read far too much for my own good. Is it possible to survive a year without Barnes & Noble? I am unsure.
I am super excited to not be taking any classes this fall. After Undergrad and Grad school, I think I'm finally ready to not write any more papers for a while.
This feeling will probably wane rather quickly and I will be pining away to be in class again sometime in October.
Special shout-out to 95 Oondeenay: you guys provided me with a year of entertainment and support and I had an excellent time living with ya'll. Don't forget about me.
I'm torn right now as to whether I should pick up a martial art again over there or pick up a new hobby like rock climbing.
I am very curious as to whether my subscription to mlb.com will work in China. With the 12 hour difference, I'd be watching games during morning classes. That's not a problem, is it?
Dad- keep me informed on baseball news.
Mom- try not to worry too much.
Ilana- keep on rockin' in the free world.
Posted by awolfe at 9:54 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
August 24, 2005
Taking the plunge
I've been ruminating on the subject of leaving for China now for a long time. It elicits an incredibly exhilirating feeling that alternates between excitement and intimidation. This should come as no surprise to anyone, as I am going off to a very foreign and misunderstood part of the world for an extended length of time. What I have realized of late is that it's not actually going to China that fuels these emotions at all; on the contrary, it is the transition of going through a major change in my life.
Having heard all of the PiA alums speak during our spring orientation about how the experience changed their lives forever, I should have been prepared for this. I realize now that I am standing on the precipice overlooking a bold new adventure that will inevitably change the course of my life for decades to come. The reason it is slightly unnerving is that as I take the plunge and head over the edge of the cliff to get things started, I have no idea where I will be or what I will be doing when I actually hit the bottom. I fully expect that a year (or two) in China will alter my general weltanschauung. I also now anticipate that doing PiA will change what I do afterwards. Maybe I will teach in Asia for a few years. Maybe I will end up doing something more business-related. Maybe I will drop everything and go work for the C.I.A. or something. Regardless, there are any number of avenues that I may take after this is all said and done.
On the more detail-oriented side of things, I am fully immersed in the packing stage of this experience. I won't lie--it's not fun. How exactly do you decide what you will and will not need over the course of the next year, in a place that you have never been before? As my good friend wrote while packing for a year in Italy, "It's funny how the things we probably use the least suddenly elicit our attention when we are about to part with them for any lengthy period. That ratty old shirt with paint stains all over it; that magnet game you have on your desk that has provided endless hours of procrastination; the rubber band ball that you have been working on for years: all are beckoning me to take them along for the journey." I now find myself evaluating clothes, minor electronics and travel supplies to determine if they make the ultimate cut. Sure I haven't used that maglight at all in the past year but I might just need it in China, right? I will consult my Magic-8 ball as I finish doing laundry...
Posted by awolfe at 9:59 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
August 18, 2005
Skype
I haven't really used it yet, but everyone's raving about Skype--a new program that lets you speak for free over the internet (www.skype.com). For those of you "hip" to this kind of thing, my skype name is ariwolfe (I know--tough to remember). Feel free to give a holla...
Posted by awolfe at 12:56 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
T minus...
7 days and counting. Weird.
I am in the midst of trying to pack up my life in Boston, move half of it to my folk's place in West Hartford, and then repack for a year or two in China. It sure is a good thing I'm sick! The next few days should prove to be entertaining though as 3/4 of my best-friends-old-housemates from Wesleyan are in town to see me off. 44 Home reunions generally = madness, so wish me luck with everything--I just might need it.
For those of you interested in sending me amusing and/or harassing pieces of snail mail, my contact info for next year is as follows:
Ari Wolfe (that's me)
c/o The Affiliated High School of S. China Normal University
1 Zhongshan Dadao West
Shi Pai, Tianhe District
Guangzhou, Guangdong
P.R. China 510630
p.s.
If anyone has a Chinese Z-class work visa with my name on it, I'd love to take it off your hands, because I don't have mine yet.
Posted by awolfe at 10:41 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack