On Christmas day, I woke up and looked out onto the bay on which Nick’s family lives, Stanley Bay. There were people swimming, windsurfing, and sailing while a warm breeze came off the ocean. Although it was the first time I had spent Christmas away from my family, I felt alright. There were no presents, not a trace of holiday cheer, but I felt relaxed and at home nonetheless.
Around noon we headed to the top of the mountain that dominates Hong Kong Island. This area is known as The Peak, and we were going to visit some family friends of the Kent’s for a Christmas lunch. The family was extremely nice for welcoming me on such short notice, and the meal was very good. The family had a daughter who had just started attending Yale, and had been a classmate of Nick’s when they were in grade school. Two maids worked at their house, and they prepared the meal and served it to us. I was intimidated by the whole aspect of having maids…but two? It was really an eye opener as to the type of lifestyle many people lead in Hong Kong.
Shortly after arriving, I realized that my entry into Hong Kong had just voided my Chinese Visa, and that to re-enter in China I would have to get it renewed or get a new Visa. I went to the Chinese consulate, and the place was absolutely swamped. I waited for 4 hours in the consulate, even taking a nap on the floor. Finally it was my turn and I filed my request…it would take until the 30th to be ready. My CCTV show on Hainan Island was supposed to start shooting on the 1st. It would be tight.
On the 26th a massive earthquake hit Taiwan, and severed several of the fiber-optic cables that connect East Asia to Europe and America. The internet stopped working for two days, and after that, we were only able to access Google (search links didn’t work), and for some reason, Facebook. This caused severe problems throughout the region, causing international bank accounts to be inaccessible, online transactions to be impossible, and online communications to be unusable.
I was able to explore much of Hong Kong over then next few days as well as meet up with Anne Cheng, Betty Hu, Remus Wong, Wesley Yu, and Jiyoung Byun, all former classmates of mine at Choate. I went to some of the club and bar districts with them and discovered how expensive the nightlife was compared to Beijing.
With Nick and his father, I was able to take quite a few nature walks along the back side of Honk Kong Island (the opposite side of the famous skyline). The difference between the two sides is staggering…high rises and office towers on one side, and forests, beaches, and small secluded fishing villages on the other.
On the 29th I met up with Ned Gallagher, Director of Athletics at Choate. He was starting his sabbatical, taking a world tour. His stop after Hong Kong: Australia, then onto Singapore, India, Egypt, and Spain. We talked about my experience so far and about old and new times at Choate. After a nice lunch at a sushi restaurant, we bid each other good luck.
That day I was supposed to pick up my new Visa from the consulate, but I was unable to withdraw any money to pay for it (pay by cash only) because the banks were still affected by the earthquake. I would have to wait until Tuesday (Monday was New Years, a public holiday). I called CCTV and told them about my situation. They said that Tuesday would be too late and that they would find a new “husband” for Terry.
Now free from that commitment, I had the opportunity to spend more time in Hong Kong with my friends. Nick left on the 3rd, and I went to stay with Wesley. I was able to meet many members of Wesley’s immediate and extended family, including a cousin who is studying at Imperial College in London as an Environmental Engineer. At some of his family meals, I was able to try Shark Fin soup, which was very good. I don’t think that I would eat it by choice, though, after I saw a TV program that explained how the fin is acquired and the rest of the shark disposed of.
I had been in contact with Cummins Guangzhou, and had scheduled a start date of January 7th.
The day before I left for Guangzhou, I took at trip to Sai Kung. It is a medium sized fishing town, its harbor filled with fishing boats and junks. Along the side of the water front, several small fishing boats were tied, selling fresh fish and shellfish. The customer would point to the fish he or she wanted and the boatman or woman would take it out of the water, scale it and filet it while it was still alive, and then send it to the customer in a net on the end of a pole. The customer would then put money in the net and the boatman or woman would take it and return change if necessary in the net. All along the waterfront were seafood restaurants, with tanks of their seafood on display outside.
My trip back to the mainland was uneventful and my new Visa worked without a hitch.
I was picked up by two guys named Ryan and Long He at the train station. They took me to get dinner and then to buy some items for my apartment. I had to buy sheets, a quilt, and a pillow, as well as some toilet paper, shampoo, and a tower. The apartment turned out to be literally across the street from the office, and it was in great shape. Later in the evening, Sunny, the head of the Guangzhou Office, came by to see me.
The next day I came into the office to meet the 30 employees. They all seemed very nice. The office itself was built only a couple of years ago, and had a very modern feel. I was given my own cubicle and started to figure out what had to be done with the employees’ English.
Before I could formally start working, however, I had to go to a hospital to get a physical examination done. The hospital was located on an Island in between the main city of Guangzhou, and the district of Pan Yu where I was living and where the office is located. At the hospital, I had to go through a very complex process just to get a physical check-up. First, I was made to register at a registration window where I had to fill out a contact information form. I was then given a plastic card with a barcode (much like one you might use to open a room at a hotel) and a slip of paper. I found the “body inspection” building and went in to register. I then had to return to the main building where I originally registered to pay the bill. Following that, I returned to the “inspection” building and gave them the receipt for my payment. After that they took a sample of my blood and then had me go to a series of stations where doctors checked my vision, my circulation, my blood pressure, my throat, my lungs (they took some x-rays without providing me with a lead apron!), as well as my height and weight. The only problem I ran into was that I couldn’t read some of the colorblindness cards at the vision station, but I told them I already knew of my condition. They said my results would be ready in a couple of days and I headed home.
To test the English proficiency of the employees, I developed a series of tests for them, including ones that tried their speaking, reading, writing, and listening abilities. For the speaking test, I had them describe the country they would visit if they had an all-expenses-paid-for trip to anywhere, and why they wanted to go there. The most popular choices were Canada, America, Japan, and France. For the reading segment, I had everyone choose from an Easy, Medium, or Hard passage according to what they thought they could do. The Easy was two basic sentences, the medium was a short paragraph with some dialogue, and the hard was some literature with multiple-word metaphors. They read the passage and tried to answer the questions I made for it. Only one member of the staff could understand the metaphors. For listening, I read a paragraph out of one of the Cummins annual letters and asked a series of questions about it. For the writing segment, I asked everyone to write a paragraph (somewhere between 100-200 words) discussing “The effect of banning motorcycles from the downtown area in Guangzhou and how it affects you personally. Express approval/disapproval, and also talk about problems it causes/fixes.” I got some very telling results from that. On top of the tests, I also interviewed them and got a sense of their English experience and aspirations.
The employees were all very busy so it was difficult to test them all effectively. Also, many of them must go out of the office for part or all of the day. I got all 30 of them done in about 5 days. After that, I organized them into different levels based on test results and my own thoughts on their interviews.
My first weekend in Guangzhou, I was introduced to the city on Saturday by Mini Zhao, the Human Resources director at Cummins Guangzhou. She took me to the major shopping areas as well as Sun Yat Sen University. Her husband works at Guangzhou TV, and I got to meet him as well. In the evening, I was invited back to her mother-in-law’s house for dinner. There, we picked up Mini’s daughter, Yoyo, who is 5 years old. The three of us then went to the Pearl River, which winds through Guangzhou, and took a walk along its banks. I was able to practice my Mandarin with Yoyo, who is learning it as well.
On Sunday, I went out with a fellow named Tom from the office. We were on a mission to see how hard it would be for me, as a foreigner, to get a second-hand motorcycle. He brought along his best friend who is a motorcycle engineer. We went to a district about 20 minutes by bus from Pan Yu that had dozens of second-hand and new motorcycle dealers. We eventually found out that there were many steps I would have to complete to finally get one. First of all I would have to register in the city as a temporary resident (which I think I am supposed to do anyway), and then I have to obtain a license (this is the hard part) by either passing the license test and waiting a month, or figuring out how to go to another city and buy one. Then I would actually have to buy the bike, which would cost about 5,000 yuan. The motorcycles in China are all capped at 150cc’s which means they usually cannot surpass 90 km/h on the road. There are no Harley type ‘choppers’ on the roads. All the bikes are extremely utilitarian, and can be seen being used for carrying passengers and various goods. I am still interested in getting one, but it may be too difficult to obtain a license. I might have to settle for a bicycle.
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
12/4 - 12/24 Christmas Eve
In the beginning of December I met a guy called Diego who works at a new Chinese Language institute in the Guo Mao (World Trade) area of Beijing. He is originally from Ha’erbin in the north of China. I went to meet him at his office and to interview for free Chinese lessons as their first student. He initially found me through one of my ads in That’s Beijing, and asked me to come try out his company’s new Chinese course for free. He confided in me later that the only reason he was a recruiter for the company was to meet new people, primarily foreigners. I spent a couple days at his office trying his company’s language software, and hanging out with his afterwards. I was eventually told that in order for my study there to be completely free, I would have to find some other people willing to try the program as well. Since I didn’t know anyone who wanted to learn Chinese, I went and talked to the boss of company to see what I could work out. I brought their advertising pamphlet with me and showed him all the mistakes they had in English on it. I also mentioned that there were several errors in their language software, and that if they took me on for free, I would help them to correct their advertising English and also refine their software with some of my Java skills. The boss offered me free Chinese lessons as long as I would help critique their teaching and lessons.
I spent more time with Diego and he eventually disclosed that he was gay and living with an American boyfriend. I went to Diego’s house and met the American, Devin. The two also had a small dog named Subway….it was named this because Diego found her in a subway, abandoned. Also staying at their house was a guy named Lisu who was temporarily homeless and a former classmate of Diego in Ha’erbin. I stayed overnight with them a few times and slept on the floor with Lisu. (Well, not literally with him…he had his own patch of floor in the second bedroom while I had mine in the TV room)
Since my rent was expiring on the 7th, I went out with Lisu to look for apartments in Beijing. We tried to find some near the subway, but they tended to be very expensive. The ones that were affordable often had leaking ceilings, no western toilets, or extremely old appliances. Over the next few days, we worked our way farther away from the center of the city. We found a place about forty five minutes outside of the main city, literally next to a train station. The apartment was big…2 bedrooms, a kitchen, nice bathroom, and it was very clean. The rent was a bit expensive, but it would get us much more than in the city. Unfortunately, the commute was too much for me, and I was still unsure of what job I would be taking.
4 days after my rent expired at the music school, I paid my overflow and went to live with Diego, Devin, Lisu and Subway. I slept on the floor in their TV/living room. To earn my keep, I walked Subway every day while they went to work, did some shopping for them, and washed the dishes.
One night when I came home to the apartment, I found Diego sitting on the couch with blood running down his face and onto his shirt. There were also some splattered on the wall. Devin had answered the door and his face was all bruised. They had obviously had a fight. I asked if everyone was okay and if I could help. They said they’d be alright and I went to have a late dinner. When I came back they had showered and were in a slightly better mood. Lisu had luckily decided to stay at another friend’s house that night.
Lisu and I did a bit more house searching over the next few days. I rejected my job offer to teach Korean students how to write English essays because I didn’t think I’d be reliable enough at them moment because I didn’t have a solid home of my own.
I received a call around the 12th from a woman at CCTV inviting me to participate in the shooting of a show on Hainan Island. The show was going to be a reality TV show about weddings and honeymooners. I was to choose someone to be my “bride” so I chose Terry, my best friend in Beijing. We were filled in about what the show would involve later in the week at one of the CCTV offices in Beijing. It would involve Terry and I having a mock marriage, while a handful of other couples actually got married, and then having a series of fun competitions against them later on. The contests included things like charades, as well as weird concoctions like: I would boost terry up the side of a palm tree to grab a small sack of 10 Taiwanese tobacco leafs, then she would place them in one of two bowls on the ground, from which I would pick the leafs up in my mouth by doing pushups and placing them in the other bowl….meanwhile she would be wrapped in a blanked for however long it took me to complete the transfer. Once I was done, they would unravel her (she would be dizzier the farther she had been wrapped) and then she would have to hit several marshmallows into my mouth with a badminton racquet. The fastest team would win. We would not be paid, but given plane tickets and accommodations for the tropical island.
For the first time since I started coming to China in 2004, I went to the cinema. I went with a new friend I made who works at the World Wildlife Foundation in Beijing. She took me out with a bunch of her friends to see a movie called the “Knot” in English, but which is actually translated literally into, “The ballad of cloud and river”. It is a love story set in Taiwan and China during the 1940-60’s and includes scenes of the Korean War.
I went to a few Christmas parties, one with my soccer team, where we sang a semi-drunken rendition of Yellow Submarine with lyrics about the Barbarians Soccer Team, one with my second-cousin Adam Harr, held at his house, who I discovered was living in Beijing, and one with my friends Lac, Terry, and Caroline.
During the pre holiday season, I seem to have run into many of my fellow teammates from the Barbarians Soccer Team, at restaurants, cafes, and bars.
Just after the 2 month mark of my stay on the 19th of December, Diego and Devin had another disagreement. This one was actually quite a bit worse than the first one. Some keys were thrown away, someone was locked out (along with me), I helped him get in by appearing to be alone (all with good intent!), one stole 3000 yuan from the other, each threatened to withdraw all the money from the other’s bank account, passports were stolen, wallets were hidden, cigarette cartons were thrown out of the window, someone was pushed on the ground and cut their hand, someone picked up a small coffee table and hit the other with it, I was splattered with yoghurt (that was the extent of my physical involvement). These types of things went on for some time (until 4:00am, to be exact), and eventually I stashed all my gear in the guest bedroom (again, Lisu fortuitously had been staying over at his friend’s house for a couple of days), and locked the door. Diego locked himself in the other bedroom, and Devin went to sleep in the TV room. Over the whole course of the ordeal, I had threatened to leave the apartment and sleep on the street at least 5 times, putting on all my winter gear and strapping on my backpack. This always made a lull in the fighting… as I made my way to the door each time I told them how childish they were being, and how things could be solved by talking it out (neither would listen).
The next day I called my contacts at Cummins Guangzhou and told them that I wanted to get a plane ticket to Guangzhou as soon as possible, and that I would be interested in starting my job there as an English tutor as soon as possible as well. They booked me a plane ticket on Southern China Air for the following day, and said they would start my authorization process immediately towards becoming a temporary employee there.
I packed almost all my stuff into my one trekking backpack and left a bag full of books and clothes at Diego and Devin’s house. (I talked to them in the morning and told them what I had decided to do and wished them luck with their relationship). I strapped on my computer bag and tripod and headed onto the street.
Luckily Terry was flying to Hong Kong the next day as well, so I planned to stay overnight at her place and catch a cab with her to the airport in the morning.
That night, I called up a friend of a friend, a woman named Mariana, who I had wanted to see for quite some time. Unfortunately she moves around quite a lot, and I had been previously unable to meet up with her. I got her on the phone and explained my situation, and we agreed to have dinner, along with a young woman who was staying with her, near her home in the San Li Tun bar district.
I thought I would call my host family from 2005, because their house was en route to where I would be meeting Mariana. I still had their phone number in my wallet from 2005 and gave it a try. My host father picked up and said I should come over for a bit before my dinner. He said that his son and wife were both still at school and at work, but that I might get to see them if they came home early. Their house was much as I had remembered it, and pictures of me still hung on their walls. My host father had recently gotten a new job at Eurocopter as an engineer, and my host brother was devoting his entire life to studying for his college entrance exams. When I arrived, my host father was so excited that he called his wife at work and I got to talk to her for a bit. Neither she nor her son returned before I had to leave though, so I promised them I would come back when I returned to Beijing. Apparently the only time I will be able to see my host brother is on Sunday because every other day of the week he is at school from 6:00 am until 9:00 pm preparing for his exams!
I had dinner with Mariana, and found that she is a really nice woman. She took great interest in my travels and endeavors, and offered me a place to stay if I ever needed it in Beijing. I would like to have spent more time talking to her, but I suppose I can do that when I return to Beijing.
The next day I got to the airport early with Terry and waited about 4 hours until my flight. I finally was able to board, and we took off from Beijing.
The flight was short, and I was picked up at the Guangzhou airport by a nice guy called Vincent who works at the Guangzhou Cummins office. The weather was worlds better than what I had left in Beijing. I stripped down to a t-shirt, removing the sweater, scarf, winter jacket, and gloves I had needed up north.
The ride from the airport to the Cummins office was long and we arrived at nightfall. I checked into a room Cummins had reserved for me at a hotel near the office, and immediately attempted to connect to the internet. The hotel was supposed to come with free broadband internet, but I, along with an IT guy from the hotel, attempted to connect for 2 entire hours without success. I eventually gave up and went outside to look for an internet café. I finally found one and tried all my friends in Hong Kong to tell them I was going to try to come in the next day by train. Luckily I was able to get a hold of a couple of them, and at least get their cell phone numbers. Vincent took me out for a late meal at 11:00pm (almost unheard of in Beijing), and I found the food quite different and tastier than the food I had gotten up north. Well, Canton is known for its food.
The next day I figured out which bus I needed to get on to get to the train station. I was unsure whether I would be able to get a ticket or not without reserving one, considering it was a Sunday, and also Christmas Eve. To my relief I was able to get a ticket and hopped on a train at noon. I called my friend Sharon Ng from the train and told her when I would be getting there, and she was nice enough to offer to pick me up, since I would be pretty lost on my own. The train ride was fast (around 2 hours) and comfortable. I struck up a conversation in Chinese with the guy sitting next to me and we talked about computers and cameras the entire way.
I arrived in Hong Kong and headed into Kowloon with Sharon. I called my friend Nicholas Kent (roommate in China, summer 2004) and arranged to stay with him for a while. He lives on the opposite side of Hong Kong Island, so another one of my Choate friends, Clement Cheng, met up with me and Sharon, and took me across the harbor and stuck me on the right bus headed for Nick’s place.
I eventually arrived at nicks place in one piece and had a relaxing Christmas Eve with him and his parents.
I spent more time with Diego and he eventually disclosed that he was gay and living with an American boyfriend. I went to Diego’s house and met the American, Devin. The two also had a small dog named Subway….it was named this because Diego found her in a subway, abandoned. Also staying at their house was a guy named Lisu who was temporarily homeless and a former classmate of Diego in Ha’erbin. I stayed overnight with them a few times and slept on the floor with Lisu. (Well, not literally with him…he had his own patch of floor in the second bedroom while I had mine in the TV room)
Since my rent was expiring on the 7th, I went out with Lisu to look for apartments in Beijing. We tried to find some near the subway, but they tended to be very expensive. The ones that were affordable often had leaking ceilings, no western toilets, or extremely old appliances. Over the next few days, we worked our way farther away from the center of the city. We found a place about forty five minutes outside of the main city, literally next to a train station. The apartment was big…2 bedrooms, a kitchen, nice bathroom, and it was very clean. The rent was a bit expensive, but it would get us much more than in the city. Unfortunately, the commute was too much for me, and I was still unsure of what job I would be taking.
4 days after my rent expired at the music school, I paid my overflow and went to live with Diego, Devin, Lisu and Subway. I slept on the floor in their TV/living room. To earn my keep, I walked Subway every day while they went to work, did some shopping for them, and washed the dishes.
One night when I came home to the apartment, I found Diego sitting on the couch with blood running down his face and onto his shirt. There were also some splattered on the wall. Devin had answered the door and his face was all bruised. They had obviously had a fight. I asked if everyone was okay and if I could help. They said they’d be alright and I went to have a late dinner. When I came back they had showered and were in a slightly better mood. Lisu had luckily decided to stay at another friend’s house that night.
Lisu and I did a bit more house searching over the next few days. I rejected my job offer to teach Korean students how to write English essays because I didn’t think I’d be reliable enough at them moment because I didn’t have a solid home of my own.
I received a call around the 12th from a woman at CCTV inviting me to participate in the shooting of a show on Hainan Island. The show was going to be a reality TV show about weddings and honeymooners. I was to choose someone to be my “bride” so I chose Terry, my best friend in Beijing. We were filled in about what the show would involve later in the week at one of the CCTV offices in Beijing. It would involve Terry and I having a mock marriage, while a handful of other couples actually got married, and then having a series of fun competitions against them later on. The contests included things like charades, as well as weird concoctions like: I would boost terry up the side of a palm tree to grab a small sack of 10 Taiwanese tobacco leafs, then she would place them in one of two bowls on the ground, from which I would pick the leafs up in my mouth by doing pushups and placing them in the other bowl….meanwhile she would be wrapped in a blanked for however long it took me to complete the transfer. Once I was done, they would unravel her (she would be dizzier the farther she had been wrapped) and then she would have to hit several marshmallows into my mouth with a badminton racquet. The fastest team would win. We would not be paid, but given plane tickets and accommodations for the tropical island.
For the first time since I started coming to China in 2004, I went to the cinema. I went with a new friend I made who works at the World Wildlife Foundation in Beijing. She took me out with a bunch of her friends to see a movie called the “Knot” in English, but which is actually translated literally into, “The ballad of cloud and river”. It is a love story set in Taiwan and China during the 1940-60’s and includes scenes of the Korean War.
I went to a few Christmas parties, one with my soccer team, where we sang a semi-drunken rendition of Yellow Submarine with lyrics about the Barbarians Soccer Team, one with my second-cousin Adam Harr, held at his house, who I discovered was living in Beijing, and one with my friends Lac, Terry, and Caroline.
During the pre holiday season, I seem to have run into many of my fellow teammates from the Barbarians Soccer Team, at restaurants, cafes, and bars.
Just after the 2 month mark of my stay on the 19th of December, Diego and Devin had another disagreement. This one was actually quite a bit worse than the first one. Some keys were thrown away, someone was locked out (along with me), I helped him get in by appearing to be alone (all with good intent!), one stole 3000 yuan from the other, each threatened to withdraw all the money from the other’s bank account, passports were stolen, wallets were hidden, cigarette cartons were thrown out of the window, someone was pushed on the ground and cut their hand, someone picked up a small coffee table and hit the other with it, I was splattered with yoghurt (that was the extent of my physical involvement). These types of things went on for some time (until 4:00am, to be exact), and eventually I stashed all my gear in the guest bedroom (again, Lisu fortuitously had been staying over at his friend’s house for a couple of days), and locked the door. Diego locked himself in the other bedroom, and Devin went to sleep in the TV room. Over the whole course of the ordeal, I had threatened to leave the apartment and sleep on the street at least 5 times, putting on all my winter gear and strapping on my backpack. This always made a lull in the fighting… as I made my way to the door each time I told them how childish they were being, and how things could be solved by talking it out (neither would listen).
The next day I called my contacts at Cummins Guangzhou and told them that I wanted to get a plane ticket to Guangzhou as soon as possible, and that I would be interested in starting my job there as an English tutor as soon as possible as well. They booked me a plane ticket on Southern China Air for the following day, and said they would start my authorization process immediately towards becoming a temporary employee there.
I packed almost all my stuff into my one trekking backpack and left a bag full of books and clothes at Diego and Devin’s house. (I talked to them in the morning and told them what I had decided to do and wished them luck with their relationship). I strapped on my computer bag and tripod and headed onto the street.
Luckily Terry was flying to Hong Kong the next day as well, so I planned to stay overnight at her place and catch a cab with her to the airport in the morning.
That night, I called up a friend of a friend, a woman named Mariana, who I had wanted to see for quite some time. Unfortunately she moves around quite a lot, and I had been previously unable to meet up with her. I got her on the phone and explained my situation, and we agreed to have dinner, along with a young woman who was staying with her, near her home in the San Li Tun bar district.
I thought I would call my host family from 2005, because their house was en route to where I would be meeting Mariana. I still had their phone number in my wallet from 2005 and gave it a try. My host father picked up and said I should come over for a bit before my dinner. He said that his son and wife were both still at school and at work, but that I might get to see them if they came home early. Their house was much as I had remembered it, and pictures of me still hung on their walls. My host father had recently gotten a new job at Eurocopter as an engineer, and my host brother was devoting his entire life to studying for his college entrance exams. When I arrived, my host father was so excited that he called his wife at work and I got to talk to her for a bit. Neither she nor her son returned before I had to leave though, so I promised them I would come back when I returned to Beijing. Apparently the only time I will be able to see my host brother is on Sunday because every other day of the week he is at school from 6:00 am until 9:00 pm preparing for his exams!
I had dinner with Mariana, and found that she is a really nice woman. She took great interest in my travels and endeavors, and offered me a place to stay if I ever needed it in Beijing. I would like to have spent more time talking to her, but I suppose I can do that when I return to Beijing.
The next day I got to the airport early with Terry and waited about 4 hours until my flight. I finally was able to board, and we took off from Beijing.
The flight was short, and I was picked up at the Guangzhou airport by a nice guy called Vincent who works at the Guangzhou Cummins office. The weather was worlds better than what I had left in Beijing. I stripped down to a t-shirt, removing the sweater, scarf, winter jacket, and gloves I had needed up north.
The ride from the airport to the Cummins office was long and we arrived at nightfall. I checked into a room Cummins had reserved for me at a hotel near the office, and immediately attempted to connect to the internet. The hotel was supposed to come with free broadband internet, but I, along with an IT guy from the hotel, attempted to connect for 2 entire hours without success. I eventually gave up and went outside to look for an internet café. I finally found one and tried all my friends in Hong Kong to tell them I was going to try to come in the next day by train. Luckily I was able to get a hold of a couple of them, and at least get their cell phone numbers. Vincent took me out for a late meal at 11:00pm (almost unheard of in Beijing), and I found the food quite different and tastier than the food I had gotten up north. Well, Canton is known for its food.
The next day I figured out which bus I needed to get on to get to the train station. I was unsure whether I would be able to get a ticket or not without reserving one, considering it was a Sunday, and also Christmas Eve. To my relief I was able to get a ticket and hopped on a train at noon. I called my friend Sharon Ng from the train and told her when I would be getting there, and she was nice enough to offer to pick me up, since I would be pretty lost on my own. The train ride was fast (around 2 hours) and comfortable. I struck up a conversation in Chinese with the guy sitting next to me and we talked about computers and cameras the entire way.
I arrived in Hong Kong and headed into Kowloon with Sharon. I called my friend Nicholas Kent (roommate in China, summer 2004) and arranged to stay with him for a while. He lives on the opposite side of Hong Kong Island, so another one of my Choate friends, Clement Cheng, met up with me and Sharon, and took me across the harbor and stuck me on the right bus headed for Nick’s place.
I eventually arrived at nicks place in one piece and had a relaxing Christmas Eve with him and his parents.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
12/3 Sunday
I slept at Colms place last night. I thought about going to a hotel to write my blog, but decided that it would be too tight with my upcoming soccer game.
I joined the Barbarians 11-11 A team for a second time to play soccer against a Japanese team. We tied them, but played horribly. We should have beaten them easily. It was our last match of the season, and we ended up in 2nd place in the 1st division of the Club Soccer league.
Terry came to watch the second half of the game, and afterwards we went out to have dumplings and warm soy milk.
I joined the Barbarians 11-11 A team for a second time to play soccer against a Japanese team. We tied them, but played horribly. We should have beaten them easily. It was our last match of the season, and we ended up in 2nd place in the 1st division of the Club Soccer league.
Terry came to watch the second half of the game, and afterwards we went out to have dumplings and warm soy milk.
12/2 Saturday
Today we had the Amazing Race for Cummins employees. In the competition, people are given clues to go find different locations and once there receive another clue about a new location. One team wins by making it to the final destination. The race was fun, and I was assigned to stand at two of the clue points and help direct people to the next ones.
I returned to Zhongguancun to get my phone. They had unlocked it, but in order to use it, I would have to enter in a pin number every time I turned it on.
I bought a bootleg copy of Windows XP Pro sp2 for 5 yuan without bargaining in order to install the Asian Language pack function on my computer. I had forgotten my own Windows XP cd at home.
I returned to Zhongguancun to get my phone. They had unlocked it, but in order to use it, I would have to enter in a pin number every time I turned it on.
I bought a bootleg copy of Windows XP Pro sp2 for 5 yuan without bargaining in order to install the Asian Language pack function on my computer. I had forgotten my own Windows XP cd at home.
12/1 Friday
I went to Zhongguancun to attempt to get my cell phone unlocked. It was hard to find a place where they could do it, and they said that they’d have to keep my phone overnight because it was more difficult than most to unlock.
I went to Du Xiao Chen’s house, hung out there with him, and had dinner with his family.
I went to Du Xiao Chen’s house, hung out there with him, and had dinner with his family.
11/30 Thursday
I stayed overnight near the office at San Yuan Qiao, and got back to my place in the morning. Using a single 20 yuan bill, I was able to take a ten minute cab ride to the subway station, a 15 minute subway ride, eat breakfast at a stall on the street, and take a 45 minute bus all the way back to my place.
I spent much of the day talking on MSN, catching up with people from the states, and also talking to new people I have met in China.
I went to the small restaurant I frequent for dinner and had egg soup and steamed dumplings.
Finally my Construction Bank bank account is working again.
I spent much of the day talking on MSN, catching up with people from the states, and also talking to new people I have met in China.
I went to the small restaurant I frequent for dinner and had egg soup and steamed dumplings.
Finally my Construction Bank bank account is working again.
11/29 Wednesday
Today I went shopping for some warm clothing. To do this I went to Du Xiao Chen’s place where he showed me some good clothing shops. I bought a sweater, some long athletic pants, and a sweatshirt.
I figured out a good bus route to get to the subway from the music school. The route takes around 45 minutes, where as a taxi takes 10, but it only costs 1 yuan.
Later I went to do a test run of a social activity that the interns were doing at Cummins. It involved going to various places in Beijing and doing activities there such as taking pictures with a certain monument. The game is based on something called Amazing Race.
I figured out a good bus route to get to the subway from the music school. The route takes around 45 minutes, where as a taxi takes 10, but it only costs 1 yuan.
Later I went to do a test run of a social activity that the interns were doing at Cummins. It involved going to various places in Beijing and doing activities there such as taking pictures with a certain monument. The game is based on something called Amazing Race.
11/28 Tuesday
I went to have lunch with a girl named Wen Yang from Hai Nan, the Hawaii of China. She is currently interning at a law firm in Beijing. We went to a Cantonese restaurant and had a really good meal. We had some leftovers so I took them back with me on the bus. At the exchange station, there was a beggar asking for money, so I gave him my leftovers instead. Wen Yang commented that there are beggars in Beijing who are really millionaires trying out a different lifestyle or something. I find that hard to believe.
In the evening I went to play 5 on 5 soccer at Chao Yang Park with the Barbarians. There were about 4 tiny soccer pitches for 5 on 5 soccer near the east entrance to the park. The games are short, having only 15 minute halves. We played two teams, winning the first and losing the second. By doing this, we secured 3rd place in the 1st division of the league.
In the evening I went to play 5 on 5 soccer at Chao Yang Park with the Barbarians. There were about 4 tiny soccer pitches for 5 on 5 soccer near the east entrance to the park. The games are short, having only 15 minute halves. We played two teams, winning the first and losing the second. By doing this, we secured 3rd place in the 1st division of the league.
11/27 Monday
I went to see my old host family from 2004. The son of the family is named Du Xiao Chen, and we still recognized each other. The family still lives in the same apartment, although they renovated it to make it nicer and feel more spacious.
Du Xiao Chen and I tried to go out to play ping pong but there were no centers left that had tables. We tried at least three places that had had ping pong tables in 2004. They were all devoted entirely to pool. Apparently it’s the new fad.
I ate a nice meal at their house before returning home.
Du Xiao Chen and I tried to go out to play ping pong but there were no centers left that had tables. We tried at least three places that had had ping pong tables in 2004. They were all devoted entirely to pool. Apparently it’s the new fad.
I ate a nice meal at their house before returning home.
11/26 Sunday
Colm, Terry, Lac, Caroline and I went out to lunch at a Dim Sum restaurant. Colm also brought a long a couple who were moving to Beijing soon and were in the process of looking for an apartment. The husband works for a partner of Cummins called Foton which makes industrial trucks.
In the evening I went over to my Malaysian friend’s apartment next-door. He had a bunch of friends over, mainly fellow Malaysians and a couple Singaporeans. They made dinner together, and we ate some delicious dishes from both Malaysia and Singapore.
In the evening I went over to my Malaysian friend’s apartment next-door. He had a bunch of friends over, mainly fellow Malaysians and a couple Singaporeans. They made dinner together, and we ate some delicious dishes from both Malaysia and Singapore.
11/25 Saturday
In the evening I headed to a hutong near the Lama Temple to go to a Thanksgiving dinner party. It was a woman’s house named Susan Jakes who is a reporter for Time magazine here in Beijing. The party was large, and there were tons of lawyers and journalists there. I was able to meet tons of interesting people, including a woman who works at the Canadian embassy, an environmental lawyer (also a beginning squash player), and a woman who runs an abroad program for American students that focuses on kung fu and Chinese language. I also got to eat another Thanksgiving meal, which was quite good.
11/24 Friday
I called up some of my family in the states to with them a happy thanksgiving. The connection seems to cut out very often when using Skype Computer-to-phone. When I was calling Pittsburgh it seemed to cut out whenever people were poking fun at China, so we though maybe someone was tapping in on the conversation from the censorship bureau. It was probably just a very busy internet time in China, making the connection more unreliable than usual.
I posted some ads in That’s Beijing about language exchange, and have been getting tons and tons of requests to meet up and practice Chinese/English. I have already added a number of Chinese people on my MSN messenger, and talk to them when I go online in Chinese.
After the phone calls I went on a long bike ride in the morning, around north west parts of the 3rd and 4th ring roads.
I finally got a massive load of laundry done for 3.5 yuan. It is now drying on racks on my porch, probably getting filthy again from the Beijing air.
For dinner I decided to try a tiny restaurant (seats about 7) near the school. I had dumplings and meat buns (6 yuan all together) and they were delicious, especially after being dipped in a lot of vinegar. After dinner, I dared to buy a sweet potato from a woman on the street. She was cooking a bunch of them on something that basically looked a trashcan fire with a grate for a lid. When I pointed to the one I wanted she scooped it up and weighed it with a handheld scale and charged me 3 yuan for it. I had picked out a small one (which was still pretty large) and the woman started complaining that foreigners such as me who are big and have lots of money come here to buy just one and the smallest one at that. I bought an apple for 1 yuan a little farther down the street.
Later I posted an ad on That’s Beijing about finding a travel companion for the spring. I am now thinking of traveling to all 23 provinces in the spring, spending 3-4 days in each, for a totally of 2-3 months. I will take trains, buses, motorcycles, boats, whatever is most convenient and cheapest. I will find places to sleep, even if I have to pay a family some nominal fee to sleep on their floor. I am not sure these plans are very realistic, so I will consult with other foreigners and Chinese who have traveled around China.
I couldn’t finish the massive sweet potato. Maybe it’ll be for breakfast.
I posted some ads in That’s Beijing about language exchange, and have been getting tons and tons of requests to meet up and practice Chinese/English. I have already added a number of Chinese people on my MSN messenger, and talk to them when I go online in Chinese.
After the phone calls I went on a long bike ride in the morning, around north west parts of the 3rd and 4th ring roads.
I finally got a massive load of laundry done for 3.5 yuan. It is now drying on racks on my porch, probably getting filthy again from the Beijing air.
For dinner I decided to try a tiny restaurant (seats about 7) near the school. I had dumplings and meat buns (6 yuan all together) and they were delicious, especially after being dipped in a lot of vinegar. After dinner, I dared to buy a sweet potato from a woman on the street. She was cooking a bunch of them on something that basically looked a trashcan fire with a grate for a lid. When I pointed to the one I wanted she scooped it up and weighed it with a handheld scale and charged me 3 yuan for it. I had picked out a small one (which was still pretty large) and the woman started complaining that foreigners such as me who are big and have lots of money come here to buy just one and the smallest one at that. I bought an apple for 1 yuan a little farther down the street.
Later I posted an ad on That’s Beijing about finding a travel companion for the spring. I am now thinking of traveling to all 23 provinces in the spring, spending 3-4 days in each, for a totally of 2-3 months. I will take trains, buses, motorcycles, boats, whatever is most convenient and cheapest. I will find places to sleep, even if I have to pay a family some nominal fee to sleep on their floor. I am not sure these plans are very realistic, so I will consult with other foreigners and Chinese who have traveled around China.
I couldn’t finish the massive sweet potato. Maybe it’ll be for breakfast.
11/23 Thursday
I went to find a tripod for my camera. Terry has a photographer friend at CCTV and she called him up and asked him where I could get. I rode a motorcycle for the first time in my life to get there. The building that I went to was entirely devoted to photo/video, with hundreds of stalls filled with cameras, tripods, shooting accessories, costumes, photo paper, and anything else photo/video you can think of. I found a really sturdy all-metal tripod for around 40 USD.
Cummins had a Thanksgiving party for its employees in the evening. I helped set it up, and got to enjoy some of the turkey. As you can expect, it wasn't anything like home.
Cummins had a Thanksgiving party for its employees in the evening. I helped set it up, and got to enjoy some of the turkey. As you can expect, it wasn't anything like home.
...
For the month since thanksgiving day, I have been very busy. I will now take the time to give you all a summary of what I have been doing since then…some entries may be short.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
11/21 Tuesday
I finally told my land lady about a mysterious brown liquid that was spreading across my kitchen floor and towards my living room. She said that a repair man would come look at it today or tomorrow.
I went to interview at an English school in the Korean Town of Beijing, in an area called Wang Jing. The school, called Top Academy, is mainly for Koreans, and teaches other subjects such as Chinese and Math.
It was very hard to find, and I took an eerily-empty public bus to the stop that the school was located at. There were Korean restaurants all over the place, and tons of signs that were written in Korean.
The interview went well, and they said they’d call shortly about employing me.
I took the bus back to the station and continued home on the number 13 subway line, and then on the number 2 line to the station that is located below the music school. I took a cab from there and returned home.
I went to interview at an English school in the Korean Town of Beijing, in an area called Wang Jing. The school, called Top Academy, is mainly for Koreans, and teaches other subjects such as Chinese and Math.
It was very hard to find, and I took an eerily-empty public bus to the stop that the school was located at. There were Korean restaurants all over the place, and tons of signs that were written in Korean.
The interview went well, and they said they’d call shortly about employing me.
I took the bus back to the station and continued home on the number 13 subway line, and then on the number 2 line to the station that is located below the music school. I took a cab from there and returned home.
11/20 Monday
I could barely move in the morning from playing soccer.
While I lay in bed, I worried that I would find a band of taxi drivers camping out in front of the school gate, waiting for my return, and I would still have no money to pay the driver I had run away from last night.
The first thing I had to do was get some money. I went to the Construction Bank again, but the ATM still wouldn’t allow me to withdraw any money. I talked to the manager there but he was really unable offer me any advice other than to wait. I decided to give up on the Construction Bank and biked to a Bank of China farther to the east. I knew the surcharge would be large, but I desperately needed the money.
After finally withdrawing money I went shopping for clean drinking water, a new phone card, and food.
I spend the rest of the day recuperating from the hectic weekend.
While I lay in bed, I worried that I would find a band of taxi drivers camping out in front of the school gate, waiting for my return, and I would still have no money to pay the driver I had run away from last night.
The first thing I had to do was get some money. I went to the Construction Bank again, but the ATM still wouldn’t allow me to withdraw any money. I talked to the manager there but he was really unable offer me any advice other than to wait. I decided to give up on the Construction Bank and biked to a Bank of China farther to the east. I knew the surcharge would be large, but I desperately needed the money.
After finally withdrawing money I went shopping for clean drinking water, a new phone card, and food.
I spend the rest of the day recuperating from the hectic weekend.
11/19 Sunday
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I woke up early to catch an 8:50 train out of Datong, and stopped to get a meager breakfast along the way to the train station. Noticing it was 8:48, and Chinese trains do start on time, I had to run to the station and through the gate to hop on the train. The doors closed about a minute after I got on. It was a good thing I didn’t have to carry any luggage.
We had seen a group of American students at the Grottos, but hadn’t made anything of it. It turns out that my assigned seat was directly across from theirs. There were two boys and a girl. I introduced myself to them. They turned out to be University of Chicago students on a term abroad. They were all from the US, but the girl, Angelica, was an American born Chinese, and still had relatives on the mainland of China. They had been enjoying their time in China so far, but their program would be ending on the 8th of December. We talked and played cards for much of the long train ride back to Beijing.
We arrived in Beijing at around 1:30, and I caught a ride with them back to where they were studying, in the west of the city, and continued on to the music school. By the time I reached my place, it was already 2:30 and I was supposed to be at the soccer pitch at 3:30.
I rushed and got another cab to the pitch. I didn’t know where the field was, and since my phone was dead from the weekend in Datong, I had to borrow my cab driver’s to call one of the guys on the team. Upon arriving at the field, I realized I didn’t have enough money to pay the cab driver. I had to run to the pitch, and after introducing myself to the rest of the Barbarians, I had to ask for some money to pay off the driver.
I realized that I hadn’t eaten any lunch, and that my breakfast had consisted of some pieces of break and a small bottle of orange soda. I would have to play on an empty stomach.
I didn’t tell everyone that I hadn’t played in over 3 years, and they put me on as a starting player at center back. I had good confidence that I remembered how to play though. The other center back was a guy from Germany called Christoph; it turns out that most of the players on the Barbarians are foreigners from Europe and America. I had a great game, stayed in the entire game, and ended up bloodying up both of my knees. We won handily, 6-2, against a Chinese team called Snickers, obviously sponsored by the candy bar manufacturer. There was one white guy on their team and when I asked him how he communicated with his team mates, he said, “I don’t, I just score goals.” I am not sure how well that works out, but it may help explain why we beat them so badly.
We all went out after the game to a pub and Christoph was nice enough to buy me a pint of Guinness. We stayed there for a while watching soccer, and later headed home.
I was almost totally out of money at this point (I had kept the change of what one of the Barbarians had given me so I could pay him back with a solid 50 yuan bill), but knew that I would be able to get some cash out at a 24 hour ATM near the school. As it turns out, there was a problem with the electronic communication between the bank and my account in America. I was unable to withdraw cash, even though other Chinese customers were able to. I was really stuck, and I could only pay the cab driver 20 out of the 27 yuan I owed him. We stayed in the cab for a while unsure of what to do, and he was getting mad. I didn’t have any money in my apartment, and I wasn’t sure if anyone would lend me money at the music school. I decided to see if my landlady was in, or if my Malaysian neighbor was there. I told the cab driver to go back to the music school, and I told him that I would go in and see if I could get some money. He wanted me to leave my back of soccer equipment, in addition to my camera, in the car as security of my return. I told him that I would return repeatedly, and finally got out with all my stuff. I went inside and couldn’t find my land lady or my neighbor. I went into my room to frantically scavenge for semi-valuable stuff that I could give the driver in exchange, but could only come up with some food items and 1.20 in loose change. After about 10 minutes of looking, I went back down to the gate of the school, carrying a back of offerings, but found that the cab had gone. I felt really bad, and knew that I had marred the face of foreigners across the city. Luckily, I didn’t have to deal with the problem any more. I was dead tired from a long weekend and a 90 minute soccer game.
The brown liquid I discovered on Thursday in my kitchen is advancing farther towards my living room, and giving me less space to move around in my kitchen
11/18 Saturday
We arrived in DaTong at around 7:30 in the morning. Before getting off we ate some food on the train that we’d packed.
DaTong is known for being very polluted as well as extremely cold. Ali brought along filter masks for all of us, and some of us donned them as soon as we got off the train. It was indeed freezing cold there, and I borrowed a second jacket from Lac to wear underneath my 130rmb main jacket (bought this week at a supermarket). I had luckily been wearing my hat all day, and was able to keep my head warm.
In the street right outside the station was a motorcycle-on-taxi accident, and of course both vehicles were left sitting in the middle of the street, blocking most of the passage. Luckily it was still early and there was not much traffic buildup because of it.
After looking for about half an hour, we found a cheap but comfortable hotel to bed down in that night. The man at the front desk was downing some 120 proof alcohol at 8:20 in the morning. The place stank but it was really cheap, coming to 35 yuan a night per person. We got 2 double bedrooms and a triple to accommodate everyone. We dumped most of our stuff in the rooms and set out to do some sightseeing.
There were swarms of cab drivers who offered to drive us to go sightseeing, but we ended up taking a bus to the Yungang Grottos, one of China’s world heritage sites (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1039). The bus ride cost 2.5 yuan for each of us and lasted about an hour long.
I was very sad not to have brought my camera along, but hopefully the great Buddhist carvings out of the rock face will survive for a long time and I will be able to return. For being over a thousand years old, the statues have stood up relatively well to the wind and rain that they have been exposed to. Recently, I suspect, they must endure much acid rain as well.
After the grottos we at some cut noodles, which are thick noodles cut with a knife and mixed with vinegar, in a small shop near the bus stop. I really like the noodles, but was the only one to finish an entire bowl.
We returned to the center of Datong, and started to look for a bus that would take us to the Hanging Monastery, which was located around 90km away. Unfortunately, we were unable to find an appropriate bus and hired two cabs, after much haggling, that would take us there, wait for us, and take us back for around $30 a car.
The ride was long, and we thought we’d be killed on multiple occasions as we went into the oncoming lane to get by slow trucks while rounding extremely sharp, blind corners. We eventually arrived in one piece, and were amazed at the monastery that was literally hanging several hundred feet up on the side of a cliff. Again it was painful not to have my camera along with me to capture the splendor of the scene.
While purchasing our admission tickets to the Monastery, there was an option to buy “insurance” should the structure collapse or should we lose out footing and plummet to the rocks below. The insurance cost 1 yuan, and we were wondering if, should we actually die, they would send a 1 yuan bill to our parents in the post. A couple of us bought insurance for fun, but I didn’t because I really couldn’t afford it.
Fortunately it didn’t matter that I didn’t buy insurance, as I survived the ascent and entire tour of the monastery. The structure was pretty firmly secured to the rock face, with massive wooden beams stuck into the rock supporting a couple small buildings. The passageways were extremely narrow, and we were all suffering from some vertigo as we filed along a couple hundred-foot drops.
The monastery was situated in a river gorge that had been recently dammed about a thousand meters upstream of the monastery. I am pretty sure the monastery used to be only accessible by water, but am not sure why they dammed the river. There is now an enormous set of steps one must climb to get to the entrance of the monastery.
We had another perilous journey on the way back to Datong, and made it back just as the sun was setting. You could not see much of the sunset, however, because it was too muffled by the smog.
At a large restaurant near our hotel, we all got a room and ate a decent dinner. We looked for some type of nightlife in the city, but were unable to find it. We assumed that there either was none, or that we were in the totally wrong part of town. Instead, we went to a pool saloon and played for around an hour before heading back to our hotel. We fell asleep pretty quickly after such a long day.
11/17 Friday
In the morning, I rode my bike to interview at an English School called Oriental Youth group. The bike ride took about half an hour, but I was bundled up and comfortably warm. I met the woman who I had been in contact with over email at the classroom space they owned in an office/apartment building. She was extremely nice, and told me all about the teaching methods they use, but how they are small and can only afford to pay teachers 100 yuan and hour. They are opening more branches and constantly getting more students, so she told me that they would probably be increasing the salary in 2007. The teaching methods seemed like really nice ones, ones that would be very comfortable and fun for both the teachers and the students. For example, at the beginning of every class for the younger students, the teacher leads the children in singing a western children’s song. Because of this, I had to sing at the interview, and chose Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Apparently she thought it sounded good enough. The rest of the interview went well, and she said that I should call her if and when I move from the music school, because I might be moving closer to one of the school’s new branches. She also said she might need me as a substitute teacher sometimes. I biked home and had lunch at the school cafeteria.
Later in the evening, I went out to have dinner with Caroline and Terry as well as one of their co-workers from the office. We went to an Italian restaurant and had pasta and pizza.
I then decided to go say goodbye to everyone at the train station before they took their 11:30 train. Caroline, Terry and I met up with the rest of the group and headed to the Beijing train station on the subway. They all had backpacks packed for the weekend, with extra clothes and food, because apparently Da Tong is very cold even though it is almost level with Beijing on the map.
On the subway ride, Lac told me that actually there was an earlier train on Sunday from Da Tong that could get me back to Beijing at 1:30. My soccer game would start at 4:00, giving me enough time to get back to my apartment to get my soccer kit. They also told me how much I would be missing if I didn’t come, and that they were going to see some famous World Heritage Sites. So as we were arriving at the train station by subway I decided to go along with the group. I didn’t have time to pack anything obviously, and would have to survive with what I was wearing at the time. I didn’t have my camera or anything I would normally bring traveling. Luckily I had been wearing my warm hat all day, and had my 130 yuan fake down jacket on. I also didn’t have very much money and didn’t even have a train ticket.
We asked about buying my ticket, and they said it could be done on the train. At around 11:05, we headed to the gate and tried to get through the gates to get on the train. Caroline was the first one to try to go through, and was stopped. The woman said we had gone to the wrong station! Our tickets were for the Beijing West Station, and we were at the normal Beijing Station. Having 25 minutes before our train left, we frantically asked what could be done, and they said we could not exchange out tickets and would have to try to make it to the correct station before our train left. We ran out of the station to the street and tried to get into two taxis to go to the West Station.
At this point, we experienced something like a living nightmare. It was corruption and capitalism at its best. The drivers knew that we were in a rush, and someone told them that we needed to make a train at the West Station in 25 minutes. The first set of taxis we got into wanted an additional 250 yuan per taxi for them to get us there on time. We refused and got out and went to another set of taxis, knowing we might get there on time on a normal taxi ride. The same thing happened in the other taxis, but for maybe 200 yuan. The taxi drivers were all yelling at each other, telling each other that we were stuck and that we urgently needed to catch a train. We ran down the street with our bags and hailed another pair of cabs off the street. We told them to go quickly, but before they left, a cyclist headed down from the other cabs and pulled alongside the two taxis telling the drivers of our plight. We were all terribly flustered at this point, and were yelling at the cab driver not to listen to the cyclist and to just take us to the station. It soon was 11:15 and we hadn’t started driving. Finally we told the last pair of drivers that we would give them a bit of extra money if they got us there on time. We set off and watched the clock tick past 11:30 a couple of minutes before we got to the station. We had missed our train.
We got to the station and ran to the terminal just to check if our train had left already. Indeed it had. We asked the people at the gate what could be done, and were escorted to the ticket office. Apparently there was another train scheduled for 12:15 to Da Tong, but it was running an hour late. We inquired about getting refunds for everyone who had already bought tickets, and they said the best they could do would be to give us a spot on the next train, but they couldn’t guarantee that they’d get beds. We decided to try to catch the late 12:15, which would apparently be getting in at around 1:20. The people at the ticket desk stamped and signed the old tickets so that we could get on the next train.
We all went to the terminal to wait for the train. The place was absolutely packed, and a security guard, upon seeing us, went over and roused some people who were sleeping across some benches so we could sit down.
We had been sitting for around 15 minutes when there was some commotion in another row of benches. There seemed to be an old woman attacking a security guard, and another old woman grasping her arm trying to hold her back. We watched in amazement as she grinned and spit at the guard and tried to attack him with her free arm and legs. The fighting continued with the woman restraining her friend and the guard attempting to calm her down. Soon enough a ring of people had formed around the fighters, and they were all looking in to see a piece of the action. The security guard kicked the woman brutally a few times on the shins but she kept on coming at him and grinning. We were beginning to think she was deranged.
In all probability, this woman was a vagrant who was attempting to sleep in the station because she didn’t have a home of her own, and had been unable to present a valid ticket to the security guard when he asked her for it.
Eventually the guard went and got a length of plastic cord to bind the woman up. It was hard to see through the thick ring of people, but the guard pushed the woman on her knees and began to tie her hands up behind her back. He had been calling for help the entire time, but we hadn’t seen any more security arrive.
Off to the side, a child started crying because of the commotion, and her mother approached her and smacked her brutally on the face in order to make her shut up. Of course this made the child cry even more, and the mother slapped the child again.
At long last, a bunch of paramedics came and took the woman away. They were probably taking her to an insane asylum or something worse…
We got on the train at around 1:00 am and couldn’t find anywhere to sit or sleep. We were made to buy tickets again to supposedly supplement our old tickets in order to get some beds in one of the sleeping cars. We were given hard sleeping bunks, stacked three high, six to a room, and about 72 to a car. I took the top bunk and got almost no sleep. My neighbor, a Chinese person about 2 feet away from me, was snoring so noisily that I didn’t fall asleep until around 4:00 am. I got up a few times and descended the three bunks to sit by a window in the passageway; it was cooler there, and I could watch some of the night scenery go by, dimly illuminated by light cast from the inside of the train.
Later in the evening, I went out to have dinner with Caroline and Terry as well as one of their co-workers from the office. We went to an Italian restaurant and had pasta and pizza.
I then decided to go say goodbye to everyone at the train station before they took their 11:30 train. Caroline, Terry and I met up with the rest of the group and headed to the Beijing train station on the subway. They all had backpacks packed for the weekend, with extra clothes and food, because apparently Da Tong is very cold even though it is almost level with Beijing on the map.
On the subway ride, Lac told me that actually there was an earlier train on Sunday from Da Tong that could get me back to Beijing at 1:30. My soccer game would start at 4:00, giving me enough time to get back to my apartment to get my soccer kit. They also told me how much I would be missing if I didn’t come, and that they were going to see some famous World Heritage Sites. So as we were arriving at the train station by subway I decided to go along with the group. I didn’t have time to pack anything obviously, and would have to survive with what I was wearing at the time. I didn’t have my camera or anything I would normally bring traveling. Luckily I had been wearing my warm hat all day, and had my 130 yuan fake down jacket on. I also didn’t have very much money and didn’t even have a train ticket.
We asked about buying my ticket, and they said it could be done on the train. At around 11:05, we headed to the gate and tried to get through the gates to get on the train. Caroline was the first one to try to go through, and was stopped. The woman said we had gone to the wrong station! Our tickets were for the Beijing West Station, and we were at the normal Beijing Station. Having 25 minutes before our train left, we frantically asked what could be done, and they said we could not exchange out tickets and would have to try to make it to the correct station before our train left. We ran out of the station to the street and tried to get into two taxis to go to the West Station.
At this point, we experienced something like a living nightmare. It was corruption and capitalism at its best. The drivers knew that we were in a rush, and someone told them that we needed to make a train at the West Station in 25 minutes. The first set of taxis we got into wanted an additional 250 yuan per taxi for them to get us there on time. We refused and got out and went to another set of taxis, knowing we might get there on time on a normal taxi ride. The same thing happened in the other taxis, but for maybe 200 yuan. The taxi drivers were all yelling at each other, telling each other that we were stuck and that we urgently needed to catch a train. We ran down the street with our bags and hailed another pair of cabs off the street. We told them to go quickly, but before they left, a cyclist headed down from the other cabs and pulled alongside the two taxis telling the drivers of our plight. We were all terribly flustered at this point, and were yelling at the cab driver not to listen to the cyclist and to just take us to the station. It soon was 11:15 and we hadn’t started driving. Finally we told the last pair of drivers that we would give them a bit of extra money if they got us there on time. We set off and watched the clock tick past 11:30 a couple of minutes before we got to the station. We had missed our train.
We got to the station and ran to the terminal just to check if our train had left already. Indeed it had. We asked the people at the gate what could be done, and were escorted to the ticket office. Apparently there was another train scheduled for 12:15 to Da Tong, but it was running an hour late. We inquired about getting refunds for everyone who had already bought tickets, and they said the best they could do would be to give us a spot on the next train, but they couldn’t guarantee that they’d get beds. We decided to try to catch the late 12:15, which would apparently be getting in at around 1:20. The people at the ticket desk stamped and signed the old tickets so that we could get on the next train.
We all went to the terminal to wait for the train. The place was absolutely packed, and a security guard, upon seeing us, went over and roused some people who were sleeping across some benches so we could sit down.
We had been sitting for around 15 minutes when there was some commotion in another row of benches. There seemed to be an old woman attacking a security guard, and another old woman grasping her arm trying to hold her back. We watched in amazement as she grinned and spit at the guard and tried to attack him with her free arm and legs. The fighting continued with the woman restraining her friend and the guard attempting to calm her down. Soon enough a ring of people had formed around the fighters, and they were all looking in to see a piece of the action. The security guard kicked the woman brutally a few times on the shins but she kept on coming at him and grinning. We were beginning to think she was deranged.
In all probability, this woman was a vagrant who was attempting to sleep in the station because she didn’t have a home of her own, and had been unable to present a valid ticket to the security guard when he asked her for it.
Eventually the guard went and got a length of plastic cord to bind the woman up. It was hard to see through the thick ring of people, but the guard pushed the woman on her knees and began to tie her hands up behind her back. He had been calling for help the entire time, but we hadn’t seen any more security arrive.
Off to the side, a child started crying because of the commotion, and her mother approached her and smacked her brutally on the face in order to make her shut up. Of course this made the child cry even more, and the mother slapped the child again.
At long last, a bunch of paramedics came and took the woman away. They were probably taking her to an insane asylum or something worse…
We got on the train at around 1:00 am and couldn’t find anywhere to sit or sleep. We were made to buy tickets again to supposedly supplement our old tickets in order to get some beds in one of the sleeping cars. We were given hard sleeping bunks, stacked three high, six to a room, and about 72 to a car. I took the top bunk and got almost no sleep. My neighbor, a Chinese person about 2 feet away from me, was snoring so noisily that I didn’t fall asleep until around 4:00 am. I got up a few times and descended the three bunks to sit by a window in the passageway; it was cooler there, and I could watch some of the night scenery go by, dimly illuminated by light cast from the inside of the train.
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
11/16 Thursday
Today I emailed more resumes out to people who were interested in my ads, and received another call about being interviewed. I retooled my resume to sound more appealing to English schools and people wanting an English tutor.
I went to Xue Yuan Lu by bike to get some more clothing (underwear, socks, gloves) for the steadily cooling weather, as well as a soccer ball and two belts. I managed to get a Chinese brand soccer ball for only 20 yuan, and it was quite good quality. The clothing was quite cheap as well, and I got 4 pairs of underwear, 3 pairs of socks, and a pair of heavy gloves for 50 yuan. The belts were more expensive at 70 for both.
Anywhere I ride my bike, I can usually find a safe place to secure it, and at most shopping areas there are “bike guards”. These people watch over shoppers’ bikes in exchange for .5 yuan when you leave. I do have a lock for the bike, and always lock it even if there is a guard looking after it. When I return to my apartment, I always bring my bike in the elevator up to my room and put it on my screened in “porch”.
Upon returning home from my shopping, I went to my bike repairman on the corner and had him inflate my new soccer ball. He did it for free and said I could come back for anything I needed help with.
In the evening, I took my soccer ball and cleats to the small Astroturf soccer pitch the music school has and practiced my juggling, dribbling, and shooting in preparation for my upcoming weekend match.
I was invited to go on a weekend excursion with my friends Lac, Caroline, Terry, and Ali to Da Tong in the Shan Xi province, from Friday to Sunday by train, but had declined because they said I wouldn’t be able to make it back in time for my soccer game. I had also scheduled to have a sushi lunch with my Malaysian next door neighbor on Saturday. I told them to take some good pictures to show me.
In my apartment, I found that there is something leaking from under the counter in my kitchen. It is sort of a brown liquid and I have no clue where it’s coming from. I am hoping that it will just dry up overnight, and that it’s nothing toxic.
I went to Xue Yuan Lu by bike to get some more clothing (underwear, socks, gloves) for the steadily cooling weather, as well as a soccer ball and two belts. I managed to get a Chinese brand soccer ball for only 20 yuan, and it was quite good quality. The clothing was quite cheap as well, and I got 4 pairs of underwear, 3 pairs of socks, and a pair of heavy gloves for 50 yuan. The belts were more expensive at 70 for both.
Anywhere I ride my bike, I can usually find a safe place to secure it, and at most shopping areas there are “bike guards”. These people watch over shoppers’ bikes in exchange for .5 yuan when you leave. I do have a lock for the bike, and always lock it even if there is a guard looking after it. When I return to my apartment, I always bring my bike in the elevator up to my room and put it on my screened in “porch”.
Upon returning home from my shopping, I went to my bike repairman on the corner and had him inflate my new soccer ball. He did it for free and said I could come back for anything I needed help with.
In the evening, I took my soccer ball and cleats to the small Astroturf soccer pitch the music school has and practiced my juggling, dribbling, and shooting in preparation for my upcoming weekend match.
I was invited to go on a weekend excursion with my friends Lac, Caroline, Terry, and Ali to Da Tong in the Shan Xi province, from Friday to Sunday by train, but had declined because they said I wouldn’t be able to make it back in time for my soccer game. I had also scheduled to have a sushi lunch with my Malaysian next door neighbor on Saturday. I told them to take some good pictures to show me.
In my apartment, I found that there is something leaking from under the counter in my kitchen. It is sort of a brown liquid and I have no clue where it’s coming from. I am hoping that it will just dry up overnight, and that it’s nothing toxic.
11/15 Wednesday
My interview at the English school in Jian Wai Soho was scheduled at 1:30, so I left my apartment early, expecting the worst of the traffic. I ended up arriving at the school half an hour early, and was joined in the elevator by another man who was going for a 1:00 interview. He had taught English before in China and I asked him about his experience and what to expect in the interview. He told me not to worry and also gave me some more suggestions for my demo class.
They had me do the demo class before the interview, and I was ushered into a tiny classroom of seven post college-age looking girls. During my demo class, I had the girls describe their desk mate’s appearances, describing noses, ears, eyes, teeth, lips, and hair with simple adjectives that I wrote on the board. I used an example sentence to set the grammar structure. The class lasted about 10 minutes before I was done, and the girls kindly pointed out, at the end, that I had smudged my face with the black dry-erase marker. Over all, the class was pretty fun, and describing other people’s appearances can always be humorous.
After the class, I was taken in to do a short interview with the woman who seemed to be in charge of the school. We talked about working hours, pay (120 yuan an hour), teaching experience, and my Chinese. The interview seemed to go well, and the woman said that I would be contacted when they needed a new teacher.
I hadn’t yet had lunch, so I headed to another building in the Jian Wai Soho complex to have Ramen noodles at a Japanese restaurant. I enjoyed a large bowl of curry udon with vegetables.
In the evening, I went shopping for soccer equipment in Wang Fu Jing. I first went to a high end place in the Oriental Plaza Mall, but decided that their equipment was much too expensive. I decided to go to an enormous Chinese sports mall just off the main street instead, and was able to find some really good deals. I discovered some really good German-made shin-pads, whose package was torn and therefore discounted for 69 Yuan, as well as some good knee high soccer stockings.
Since it was getting late, and I was in the area, I stayed over at Colm’s place. He wasn’t feeling too well, so he went to sleep early while I watched 21 grams.
They had me do the demo class before the interview, and I was ushered into a tiny classroom of seven post college-age looking girls. During my demo class, I had the girls describe their desk mate’s appearances, describing noses, ears, eyes, teeth, lips, and hair with simple adjectives that I wrote on the board. I used an example sentence to set the grammar structure. The class lasted about 10 minutes before I was done, and the girls kindly pointed out, at the end, that I had smudged my face with the black dry-erase marker. Over all, the class was pretty fun, and describing other people’s appearances can always be humorous.
After the class, I was taken in to do a short interview with the woman who seemed to be in charge of the school. We talked about working hours, pay (120 yuan an hour), teaching experience, and my Chinese. The interview seemed to go well, and the woman said that I would be contacted when they needed a new teacher.
I hadn’t yet had lunch, so I headed to another building in the Jian Wai Soho complex to have Ramen noodles at a Japanese restaurant. I enjoyed a large bowl of curry udon with vegetables.
In the evening, I went shopping for soccer equipment in Wang Fu Jing. I first went to a high end place in the Oriental Plaza Mall, but decided that their equipment was much too expensive. I decided to go to an enormous Chinese sports mall just off the main street instead, and was able to find some really good deals. I discovered some really good German-made shin-pads, whose package was torn and therefore discounted for 69 Yuan, as well as some good knee high soccer stockings.
Since it was getting late, and I was in the area, I stayed over at Colm’s place. He wasn’t feeling too well, so he went to sleep early while I watched 21 grams.
Saturday, November 25, 2006
11/14 Tuesday
I went exploring on my bike, realizing the true convenience of it. No more waiting for and squeezing onto buses and no more paying for taxis. I can see why there are literally several million bikes out on the streets here in Beijing.
You must be sure to get into bike lanes on the roadways, otherwise you’ll be battling cars for room, and it is always safest to go on the inside of a bus that has stopped, rather than around its outside if it happens to suddenly turn into the street again. Luckily, even if you do go on the outside, the buses are very slow to accelerate so you can usually avoid being hit.
There are all sorts of people you see when biking. There are guys on sleek road bikes that you’d find in the US, there are people that go silently by on electric powered bikes, there are school kids on mountain bikes bought by their parents, there are old women on rusty leisure bikes, there are struggling men on old flat-bed tricycles carrying enormously tall loads of trash or produce, there are delivery boys carrying boxes of food or electronics, one hand on the handlebar and one to steady the package. We are all helmet-less, on missions of varying degrees of urgency.
I stopped at a bike repair joint on the corner of a road near the music school to get my tires inflated, my brakes tightened, and an electronic noise maker installed for 10 yuan. The man was extremely nice, and impressed by my Chinese. He was especially pleased that I bought the noise make from him. In fact, he did all of my repairs for free after I bought it.
I prepared for my interview tomorrow, and looked up online how to teach a demo class of English, as they would be expecting me to teach one.
You must be sure to get into bike lanes on the roadways, otherwise you’ll be battling cars for room, and it is always safest to go on the inside of a bus that has stopped, rather than around its outside if it happens to suddenly turn into the street again. Luckily, even if you do go on the outside, the buses are very slow to accelerate so you can usually avoid being hit.
There are all sorts of people you see when biking. There are guys on sleek road bikes that you’d find in the US, there are people that go silently by on electric powered bikes, there are school kids on mountain bikes bought by their parents, there are old women on rusty leisure bikes, there are struggling men on old flat-bed tricycles carrying enormously tall loads of trash or produce, there are delivery boys carrying boxes of food or electronics, one hand on the handlebar and one to steady the package. We are all helmet-less, on missions of varying degrees of urgency.
I stopped at a bike repair joint on the corner of a road near the music school to get my tires inflated, my brakes tightened, and an electronic noise maker installed for 10 yuan. The man was extremely nice, and impressed by my Chinese. He was especially pleased that I bought the noise make from him. In fact, he did all of my repairs for free after I bought it.
I prepared for my interview tomorrow, and looked up online how to teach a demo class of English, as they would be expecting me to teach one.
11/13 Monday
Today I acquired a bike from Terry. She decided it was too cold by now to be biking. I took it all the way back to the music school from the Cummins office, riding on the side of the fourth ring road, avoiding stopping buses, turning taxis, and grocery-laden people along the way. As dangerous as it may look, I found that as long as I stay alongside another cyclist or in the middle of a pack, the motor vehicles are much less likely to attempt to run me over. Bicycles are extremely cheap, and to buy a new from a large store costs about 200-300 yuan, and second-hand ones can be gotten for 30-80 yuan. There are bicycle repair stands all over Beijing, with men who will tighten brakes, inflate your tires, replace your seat, or bend your wheel back to normal, all for pennies.
I began my search for some exercise, and chose soccer because I packed a pair of cleats. I looked up some teams in Beijing, and sent a couple of emails out. I almost immediately got a response from at team called the Barbarians, and was invited to join them in a game on Saturday. I accepted and got some of the details. Here is the Barbarian homepage: http://www.beijingbarbarians.com
I began my search for some exercise, and chose soccer because I packed a pair of cleats. I looked up some teams in Beijing, and sent a couple of emails out. I almost immediately got a response from at team called the Barbarians, and was invited to join them in a game on Saturday. I accepted and got some of the details. Here is the Barbarian homepage: http://www.beijingbarbarians.com
11/12 Sunday
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I am getting tons of responses for my online post at schools all over the city already.
I went out with my Malaysian friend, Jason, from the music school to a place called Xue Yuan Lu, or University Street, where tons of students from nearby colleges go to hang out and shop. The trip was four quick stops on the bus, and cost only 1 yuan. The food selection there is pretty good, with multinational restaurants, and the main shopping building on the 4th ring road has hundreds of stalls selling all sorts of clothes and accessories.
On the way out of the shopping center we stopped to try some food from a stall, picking out some small egg-sandwiches for 2 yuan a piece, and a couple sweet rice balls for 1 yuan. The egg sandwiches were good, but the rice balls were pretty bland. We asked the woman about the rice balls but she said she didn’t make them and had gotten them somewhere else; she was only responsible for the egg sandwiches.
In my apartment, I sat down with all my teacher advertisement responses in my email mailbox and sorted them out, sending my resume and picture or my phone number to some of the places.
At night I decided to take a walk with my camera, and headed over towards the Olympic construction zone where they are building the main stadium, the Bird’s Nest, and also an indoor stadium that is enclosed by something that looks like bubble wrap. The construction site is about a 10 minute walk from the gates of the music school.
I walked down the main street dividing the zone after slipping through a security checkpoint with a crowd of Chinese people. About a third of the way across the site, I took a right hand turn down a smaller street that headed towards the bubble wrap building. The street was lined with temporary dormitories for the construction site workers. I think that the construction workers usually do not own their own homes, and move with the housing provided by the construction company. The rooms looked small, and several people were bunked up in each room. I saw bands of the workers heading out into the streets around the site, and more returning to their beds. The street became dirt, and soon I was standing 75 yards away from the bubble wrap building. I stopped to take some pictures, and turned to the bird’s nest stadium which was farther away. There were still people working on the Bird’s Nest, and erratic flashes from torches and sparks lit up the side of the metal structure. I continued down the main street and turned off again, this time closer to the bird’s nest. I was able to get up pretty close to the nest and take some pictures of it. There were constantly dump trucks and construction pieces barreling up and down the street, kicking up tons of dust that got into my eyes.
On one of the curbs I saw something really gruesome: a dead mouse with blood coming out of its mouth. There were no marks on it as though it had come to this end from some disease.
I left the construction site and returned home to work on the pictures I had just taken.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
11/11 Saturday
Today I woke up well rested from staying in Lac’s place. I had taken advantage of his nice shower the night before, and had the most terrific looking bed-head when I walked out of his guest bedroom. I went with Lac and Ali, who lives close by, to meet up with Caroline and Terry for breakfast. They were going to head out to the Great Wall while I looked for a job in the nearby district of Jian Wai SoHo. It was very fortuitous that I had to stay at Lac’s, because I had been planning to go English-teaching job hunting at some point over the weekend, and now I was presented with the perfect opportunity to hit Soho. I went to a copy center, hand wrote (neatly) some English teaching experience into my resume, as well as my China contact information, and had a pile of 12 copies in no time. I went to the two largest buildings in Soho, and first found the place that had been recommended by my Chinese teacher, Yue Laoshi, called Vivid English Club. They ended up being the most enthusiastic of the bunch, and said that they’d call within a week. I found a couple of other places, but only managed to hand out 2 more resumes. I then needed to head back to my apartment to recharge my cell phone, as it had completely died.
I took the subway from Soho in the east, past Tian An Men square, and transferred in the west to the ring line. I then took that to the point directly under the Music School, and got off there. I looked for a bus at several stops that would go my way, but none ever appeared. I ended up walking from the second ring road to the fourth ring road, the equivalent to about an hour and a half of brisk paced walking.
I posted some advertisements of myself as an English teacher online for free at a site that does classifieds for the Beijing area, and am hoping that there are many people who check the site regularly.
More about my shower: steadily flowing hot water is hard to obtain in my shower. First off, I realized that igniting the hot water heater with the shower was not possible, and that I would have to do it with one of the sinks. This is due to the fact that I have on-demand hot water, with the heating unit stationed in my kitchen. My first successful shower was had by igniting the heater using my kitchen sink, shutting it off, and then running back to the shower. This shower lasted 3 minutes before the heater turned off. Later, I realized that I could ignite the unit with the sink that was actually in the bathroom, but that the heater would shut off immediately after I turned off the tap.
I can now have a decent shower by letting the bathroom sink run just enough to keep the heater going. Unfortunately, the process decreases the strength of the shower because the two are on the same pipe.
I took the subway from Soho in the east, past Tian An Men square, and transferred in the west to the ring line. I then took that to the point directly under the Music School, and got off there. I looked for a bus at several stops that would go my way, but none ever appeared. I ended up walking from the second ring road to the fourth ring road, the equivalent to about an hour and a half of brisk paced walking.
I posted some advertisements of myself as an English teacher online for free at a site that does classifieds for the Beijing area, and am hoping that there are many people who check the site regularly.
More about my shower: steadily flowing hot water is hard to obtain in my shower. First off, I realized that igniting the hot water heater with the shower was not possible, and that I would have to do it with one of the sinks. This is due to the fact that I have on-demand hot water, with the heating unit stationed in my kitchen. My first successful shower was had by igniting the heater using my kitchen sink, shutting it off, and then running back to the shower. This shower lasted 3 minutes before the heater turned off. Later, I realized that I could ignite the unit with the sink that was actually in the bathroom, but that the heater would shut off immediately after I turned off the tap.
I can now have a decent shower by letting the bathroom sink run just enough to keep the heater going. Unfortunately, the process decreases the strength of the shower because the two are on the same pipe.
11/10 Friday
I went out for a sushi dinner with Lac, Terry, Caroline, and a guy named Ali from Germany. Very good sushi for 5 people was, in total, a little over $60. And that is considered expensive.
We went to a bar called Browns until around midnight. The crowd there is really weird, consisting of older white men, and mid-thirties Chinese women.
It was too late for me to return to my dormitory, so I went and stayed at Lac’s apartment. His place has two bedrooms and is really nice.
I stayed up late talking with him and have come to really respect what he’s done with his life.
He is 26 years old, and is opening a consulting firm in China as soon as the government gives him a permit. Right now he is running a consulting firm but it’s pretty much under the counter. He is completely self built, and started his company a year and a half ago by using the money he made off of renting out an online server and going in on e-commerce. From there he now has several employees, a business partner in Africa, and a number of clients.
He was born in Vietnam, but his family was kicked out and sent to a refugee camp in Hong Kong when he was young. They moved to Canada, and he went through the public school system there. His main language is French. He got 2 masters degrees at Canadian Colleges, and didn’t go to grad school.
All this, however, isn’t what impressed me the most. Lac has been traveling ever since he got out of college. He has gone to every country in Europe except 3, and has also been to countries in South America, Africa, and much of Asia. He has been allowed to do this through his e-commerce business (all he needs is an internet connection), and through the money he makes off of it. He has traveled much of the world, and plans to do more soon, as soon as his firm is up and running. He is leading a very simple life right now, and will soon be working entirely for himself. He is not interested in how much money he makes, just so much as he’s making something. And just so much as he’s making a service in the business world.
Lac also has a great taste for film, and showed me his small but astoundingly good looking set of foreign films (as in, foreign from Hollywood).
We went to a bar called Browns until around midnight. The crowd there is really weird, consisting of older white men, and mid-thirties Chinese women.
It was too late for me to return to my dormitory, so I went and stayed at Lac’s apartment. His place has two bedrooms and is really nice.
I stayed up late talking with him and have come to really respect what he’s done with his life.
He is 26 years old, and is opening a consulting firm in China as soon as the government gives him a permit. Right now he is running a consulting firm but it’s pretty much under the counter. He is completely self built, and started his company a year and a half ago by using the money he made off of renting out an online server and going in on e-commerce. From there he now has several employees, a business partner in Africa, and a number of clients.
He was born in Vietnam, but his family was kicked out and sent to a refugee camp in Hong Kong when he was young. They moved to Canada, and he went through the public school system there. His main language is French. He got 2 masters degrees at Canadian Colleges, and didn’t go to grad school.
All this, however, isn’t what impressed me the most. Lac has been traveling ever since he got out of college. He has gone to every country in Europe except 3, and has also been to countries in South America, Africa, and much of Asia. He has been allowed to do this through his e-commerce business (all he needs is an internet connection), and through the money he makes off of it. He has traveled much of the world, and plans to do more soon, as soon as his firm is up and running. He is leading a very simple life right now, and will soon be working entirely for himself. He is not interested in how much money he makes, just so much as he’s making something. And just so much as he’s making a service in the business world.
Lac also has a great taste for film, and showed me his small but astoundingly good looking set of foreign films (as in, foreign from Hollywood).
11/9 Thursday
I slept better last night.
First thing in the morning, I located my landlady and told her about my horrendous showering experience. She came up and looked, told me to never touch the red lever again, and said that someone would be up to fix it in the afternoon.
I went to the internet center at the school and arranged to have my room granted internet access. There were all these various different types of internet connections one could get, ranging in speed and monthly bandwidth. I took the standard package of 2000mb/month, as I would only be using it for viewing text based web pages.
In the afternoon, the repairman came to fix my pipe, and replaced the valve unit. He said my hot water would work too.
I met a guy who lives next door to me. He is a Chinese from Malaysia, and is in his last year here at the music school. He is now preparing for his final concert in opera singing.
First thing in the morning, I located my landlady and told her about my horrendous showering experience. She came up and looked, told me to never touch the red lever again, and said that someone would be up to fix it in the afternoon.
I went to the internet center at the school and arranged to have my room granted internet access. There were all these various different types of internet connections one could get, ranging in speed and monthly bandwidth. I took the standard package of 2000mb/month, as I would only be using it for viewing text based web pages.
In the afternoon, the repairman came to fix my pipe, and replaced the valve unit. He said my hot water would work too.
I met a guy who lives next door to me. He is a Chinese from Malaysia, and is in his last year here at the music school. He is now preparing for his final concert in opera singing.
11/8 Wednesday
I couldn’t sleep last night, so I slept through both lunch and breakfast at the dining hall.
I did more shopping for my place at a large super market, and returned in time for dinner at the dining hall.
Later that night, I decided it was time to try the shower. I was not convinced that I would get hot water in the first place. I turned it on and let it run, with the ‘hot’ knob on full throttle. The water remained cold for about four minutes before I decided that something was wrong. I tried turning a red lever on the cold hot-water pipe. This is where my evening got ugly.
The valve burst, sending the lever flying across the room, as well as dozens of small bits of rusted pipe, carried by a jet of water. I tried to stop it with my finder but it was coming out too fast and just sprayed all over the place. I eventually got my hands on the lever, and jammed it back in. I was soaked and shivering at this point. The water still trickled out and I had to apply pressure to the handle to keep it from shooting out again. I thought I might end up there all night holding the lever in, but luckily I was in reach of my towel rack. I grabbed one of my hand towels and made a bandage around the lever and pipe. It held, but water had already soaked the towel and it was pouring out through the threads. My land lady had showed me where the main water pipe was, so I dashed there and looked for a switch off knob. I found it, and with quite a large amount of force, managed to close the valve. There was still water in the system, so it continued to leak for quite some time. I decided to deal with the rest in the morning.
I did more shopping for my place at a large super market, and returned in time for dinner at the dining hall.
Later that night, I decided it was time to try the shower. I was not convinced that I would get hot water in the first place. I turned it on and let it run, with the ‘hot’ knob on full throttle. The water remained cold for about four minutes before I decided that something was wrong. I tried turning a red lever on the cold hot-water pipe. This is where my evening got ugly.
The valve burst, sending the lever flying across the room, as well as dozens of small bits of rusted pipe, carried by a jet of water. I tried to stop it with my finder but it was coming out too fast and just sprayed all over the place. I eventually got my hands on the lever, and jammed it back in. I was soaked and shivering at this point. The water still trickled out and I had to apply pressure to the handle to keep it from shooting out again. I thought I might end up there all night holding the lever in, but luckily I was in reach of my towel rack. I grabbed one of my hand towels and made a bandage around the lever and pipe. It held, but water had already soaked the towel and it was pouring out through the threads. My land lady had showed me where the main water pipe was, so I dashed there and looked for a switch off knob. I found it, and with quite a large amount of force, managed to close the valve. There was still water in the system, so it continued to leak for quite some time. I decided to deal with the rest in the morning.
11/7 Tuesday
Today I moved in to my apartment!
I unpacked most of my stuff and decided to try my bed.
You cannot believe how incredibly comfortable a bed feels after almost 3 weeks of sleeping on the floor. I lay in it all afternoon.
11/6 Monday
I went to meet Yue Laoshi, the Chinese teacher who taught me Chinese during my summer 2004 trip abroad, and my 2005 term abroad at the China Music Conservatory. I took the subway to the #13 line and headed to the north west of the city. The #13 line is more modern than the inner city lines and uses electronic ticket readers very similar to those found in Japan. The main lines in Beijing still use paper tickets and paper-tearers, and don’t have electronic ticket dispensers. From the station I took a cab to the Music Conservatory. The cab driver didn’t know where the Conservatory was, but after pulling out his taxi bible, with all possible destinations in it, we found it.
When I got to the school, I found that I couldn’t get in the main gate due to the construction. It seemed that the entire campus was under scaffolding, and the sound of construction was everywhere. I located yue laoshi, and talked to her for a while about housing and my future plans.
She showed me my housing option, which would be in the main dormitory building on campus. My apartment was on the 17th floor (out of 20) and had a kitchen, living room, bathroom, bedroom, and a small windowed/screened-in balcony. I would be paying 2,400 yuan for the month, plus the electric and water bill. It didn’t seem cheap at first, but compared to the states, it is the equivalent of paying about $10 a night, a bargain.
When I got to the school, I found that I couldn’t get in the main gate due to the construction. It seemed that the entire campus was under scaffolding, and the sound of construction was everywhere. I located yue laoshi, and talked to her for a while about housing and my future plans.
She showed me my housing option, which would be in the main dormitory building on campus. My apartment was on the 17th floor (out of 20) and had a kitchen, living room, bathroom, bedroom, and a small windowed/screened-in balcony. I would be paying 2,400 yuan for the month, plus the electric and water bill. It didn’t seem cheap at first, but compared to the states, it is the equivalent of paying about $10 a night, a bargain.
11/5 Sunday
After waking up, we went out to lunch with Caroline, Terry, and Lac at a Dim Sum restaurant. The food was pretty good, but I still prefer my favorite Dim Sum restaurant in Beijing: Jin Ding Xuan.
I went with Terry to try to find some new clothes, since we both packed extremely light and knew we were in for a really cold winter. We went to a shopping area called Xi Dan, which is only a couple of stops away from Wang Fu Jing to the west. However, we ended up not buying anything because we were too overwhelmed by the swelling crowds, the yelling salespeople and the enormous amount of low quality stuff that might fall apart within a week. The stores farther down the main street were predominantly shopped at by Chinese people, and we didn’t see a foreigner the entire time.
I went with Terry to try to find some new clothes, since we both packed extremely light and knew we were in for a really cold winter. We went to a shopping area called Xi Dan, which is only a couple of stops away from Wang Fu Jing to the west. However, we ended up not buying anything because we were too overwhelmed by the swelling crowds, the yelling salespeople and the enormous amount of low quality stuff that might fall apart within a week. The stores farther down the main street were predominantly shopped at by Chinese people, and we didn’t see a foreigner the entire time.
11/4 Saturday
We slept in and had a relaxing weekend-day reading and talking.
In the evening, we went to dinner at Outback Steakhouse with Caroline and Terry, as well as 3 people in the television business. The woman, Mei Xue, who was with us when Colm was acting in the CCTV show, brought along two of her friends, one a dancer, and the other a TV producer. The two dancers were quite young, at 22 and 24 years old, and the director was around 40. They all decided to go home after dinner (at the director’s bidding).
Because half our party had gone home, we decided to go out and try a club called Mix. This was a large club with three dance floors, enormous screens showing music videos, and bartenders who spit fire and threw it as well. It was very cool.
In the evening, we went to dinner at Outback Steakhouse with Caroline and Terry, as well as 3 people in the television business. The woman, Mei Xue, who was with us when Colm was acting in the CCTV show, brought along two of her friends, one a dancer, and the other a TV producer. The two dancers were quite young, at 22 and 24 years old, and the director was around 40. They all decided to go home after dinner (at the director’s bidding).
Because half our party had gone home, we decided to go out and try a club called Mix. This was a large club with three dance floors, enormous screens showing music videos, and bartenders who spit fire and threw it as well. It was very cool.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
11/3 Friday
After getting a good 10 hours of sleep, we woke up at 11:00.
We ate breakfast, woke up, and prepared for the day until around 2:30, when we headed over to Terry’s apartment to prepare for a Friday movie night for Cummins employees. Her apartment is very well suited for parties as it is one big, long room, with an inlet for a kitchen and two small rooms coming off for the bathroom and the laundry room. We borrowed a projector from the office, and hooked it up to Colm’s laptop. We shown the projector directly on one of the large white walls, and arranged her two large couches to make an amazing home theater setup.
After the festivities, Colm, Terry, Caroline and I went to have dessert at Bellagios and were there until around midnight talking.
We were thinking about going clubbing but found that we were too exhausted, so we decided to go get massages instead. I decided to try a male masseuse, which apparently many guys will not do, and found that they can apply more pressure in the massage, which I liked. Girls seem to be better at pressure points and smaller things, but guys can really exert more force.
We ate breakfast, woke up, and prepared for the day until around 2:30, when we headed over to Terry’s apartment to prepare for a Friday movie night for Cummins employees. Her apartment is very well suited for parties as it is one big, long room, with an inlet for a kitchen and two small rooms coming off for the bathroom and the laundry room. We borrowed a projector from the office, and hooked it up to Colm’s laptop. We shown the projector directly on one of the large white walls, and arranged her two large couches to make an amazing home theater setup.
After the festivities, Colm, Terry, Caroline and I went to have dessert at Bellagios and were there until around midnight talking.
We were thinking about going clubbing but found that we were too exhausted, so we decided to go get massages instead. I decided to try a male masseuse, which apparently many guys will not do, and found that they can apply more pressure in the massage, which I liked. Girls seem to be better at pressure points and smaller things, but guys can really exert more force.
11/2 Thursday
I showed Colm the dumpling place I have been going to near the Peninsula Hotel for lunch. The meal was cheap and good.
After lunch, Colm and I went to the Hilton hotel a few buildings down from the apartments in the Oriental Plaza complex. We ordered some tea and sat down in some comfy chairs to relax and get some work done. Colm caught up on events in America and in the world with a couple of magazines, while I plugged in my laptop to catch up on some missed reporting.
At around six o’clock Colm met and interviewed a boy who is interested in going to Choate. He is currently in an international school in Beijing as a 9th grader, and would like to transfer this year to choate or go next year to repeat his freshman year. His father was the “father of the internet” in China according to Colm, and owns Yahoo China as well as a few other dot coms. I met and talked to the boy with Colm after the interview. He seems very nice, and a good fit for Choate. He enjoys ping pong and swimming. We were also able to meet with his parents and answer their questions about Choate. He seems to have been very well raised, and his parents want exactly what Choate can offer him.
We stayed at the Hilton a while longer reading and writing before we went to have dinner. We watched a movie called ‘Click’ with Adam Sandler, and even thought I only watched the first and last 20 minutes of it, because I was online in the other room, I found it quite entertaining.
After lunch, Colm and I went to the Hilton hotel a few buildings down from the apartments in the Oriental Plaza complex. We ordered some tea and sat down in some comfy chairs to relax and get some work done. Colm caught up on events in America and in the world with a couple of magazines, while I plugged in my laptop to catch up on some missed reporting.
At around six o’clock Colm met and interviewed a boy who is interested in going to Choate. He is currently in an international school in Beijing as a 9th grader, and would like to transfer this year to choate or go next year to repeat his freshman year. His father was the “father of the internet” in China according to Colm, and owns Yahoo China as well as a few other dot coms. I met and talked to the boy with Colm after the interview. He seems very nice, and a good fit for Choate. He enjoys ping pong and swimming. We were also able to meet with his parents and answer their questions about Choate. He seems to have been very well raised, and his parents want exactly what Choate can offer him.
We stayed at the Hilton a while longer reading and writing before we went to have dinner. We watched a movie called ‘Click’ with Adam Sandler, and even thought I only watched the first and last 20 minutes of it, because I was online in the other room, I found it quite entertaining.
11/1 Wednesday
Apparently the ‘candy bombs’ were a big hit.
Today I went with Colm to Zhong Guan Cun. We brought his Palm smart phone in hopes of it getting repaired. We were also looking for some cool gadgetry.
We found a place to get his phone repaired after visiting a couple stores. The screen wasn't working, and all of the other vendors said it was broken, but the guy at this final place opened it and reconnected a cable in a few seconds and voila it worked! It still needed work, and the man agreed to do it for a very low cost. He also replaced the phone’s scratched casing for Colm.
Pirated software lives on. After asking around, we finally found a guy who would give us a copy of XP Pro for around 15 yuan, but made us promise we wouldn't tell anyone (especially the authorities!!). It appeared, because they took so long to get it to us and it was on a CD-RW with the key written in magic marker, that they had just burned the disc on some computer in another part of the building. Colm needed a copy to attempt to restore his old laptop computer. He had lost the disk, but still had a legitimate CD-key.
I bought a mouse pad for 3 yuan. It is extremely flimsy and of poor quality, but it does the job.
We found a really cool gadget that can play scrolling pictures on an LCD screen like a picture frame. There were many models but we eventually picked a Philips one because it was high resolution and bright. Colm ended up buying it, fulfilling his requirement to walk out with at least one cool piece of technology.
Coming home from Zhong Guan Cun, we went looking for an inflatable mattress (for me and future guests at Colm’s) but ended up at a camping store which was very expensive. I hardly even knew that camping was something that was done in China, and to find such a store devoted to it (it looked like a small version of a Trail Blazer) was a real surprise. Apparently there must be a market for the stuff.
Colm invited a friend to come along to a restaurant from Singapore next to his apartment building called My Humble House. It was anything but humble, and the food was really good. The desserts are all served with a steaming chunk of dry ice that is floating in water. The friend who came along used to work at Humble House, but now is working at IBM. She takes English classes near the apartment, and seems really nice.
Today I went with Colm to Zhong Guan Cun. We brought his Palm smart phone in hopes of it getting repaired. We were also looking for some cool gadgetry.
We found a place to get his phone repaired after visiting a couple stores. The screen wasn't working, and all of the other vendors said it was broken, but the guy at this final place opened it and reconnected a cable in a few seconds and voila it worked! It still needed work, and the man agreed to do it for a very low cost. He also replaced the phone’s scratched casing for Colm.
Pirated software lives on. After asking around, we finally found a guy who would give us a copy of XP Pro for around 15 yuan, but made us promise we wouldn't tell anyone (especially the authorities!!). It appeared, because they took so long to get it to us and it was on a CD-RW with the key written in magic marker, that they had just burned the disc on some computer in another part of the building. Colm needed a copy to attempt to restore his old laptop computer. He had lost the disk, but still had a legitimate CD-key.
I bought a mouse pad for 3 yuan. It is extremely flimsy and of poor quality, but it does the job.
We found a really cool gadget that can play scrolling pictures on an LCD screen like a picture frame. There were many models but we eventually picked a Philips one because it was high resolution and bright. Colm ended up buying it, fulfilling his requirement to walk out with at least one cool piece of technology.
Coming home from Zhong Guan Cun, we went looking for an inflatable mattress (for me and future guests at Colm’s) but ended up at a camping store which was very expensive. I hardly even knew that camping was something that was done in China, and to find such a store devoted to it (it looked like a small version of a Trail Blazer) was a real surprise. Apparently there must be a market for the stuff.
Colm invited a friend to come along to a restaurant from Singapore next to his apartment building called My Humble House. It was anything but humble, and the food was really good. The desserts are all served with a steaming chunk of dry ice that is floating in water. The friend who came along used to work at Humble House, but now is working at IBM. She takes English classes near the apartment, and seems really nice.
Delay
Whoa sorry about the delay. I have been moving around quite a lot, settling in again, and looking for a job. I will resume posting again!
Friday, November 03, 2006
10/31 Tuesday
I was able to get to Kai Fa Qu today in around 25 minutes, without encountering much traffic.
When I got to the Cummins Kai Fa Qu office, I was told that I would be going out to do some community service for the company. I was literally handed an English text book, told what the last lesson taught was, and sent to the classroom. I had no idea what level these people were at, whether they were used to doing just oral practice, or what things I needed to focus on with them The students were a bunch of around 30 of Beijing’s senior citizens. I had fun teaching them, and also realized just how complicated English can be. For example, I tried to explain the use of the word ‘like’, but was pretty lost for words. I also further realized how ridiculous some English words sound through attempting to teach their pronunciation, especially, "U-m-b-r-e-l-l-a-". I taught for almost 2 hours.
After returning from the classroom, I ate lunch in the company canteen. The food there was extremely healthy and good, including vegetables, fish, tofu, and rice. Even before I saw the sign on the door that said 'canteen' as I was leaving, I thought of the place as a canteen. It just had a 'canteen’ aura...a very cheap and efficient setup but substantial healthy food for hard workers.
I went with a couple of the workers after finishing lunch, to the workshop floor where they had a ping pong table. They played doubles, and I paired up with the man who had driven me to teach English. I was rusty, and he wasn’t very consistent, so we ended up losing pretty badly every time.
After ping pong, I learned how to assemble, clean, and calibrate a fuel injector for a 6-cylinder Cummins 1600 Horse Power engine. A fuel injector pretty much looks like an enormous bullet, and delivers a squirt of fuel into the cylinder of the engine, where the fuel is ignited, and the explosion pushes the piston down. I was given a special pair of clothes and shoes to enter the fuel injector workshop. I had to bathe the injector in an enormous tub of pure gasoline at one point while cleaning it, and was nearly up to my elbows in the black stuff. I helped the young guy teaching me how to work with the injector with his English, focusing on some of the technical terms for the parts.
I returned home by taxi. Unfortunately the traffic was terrible, and it took over an hour to return home. I slept in the car.
At night, Colm and I went to the Cummins office building to help the interns complete the 200 'candy bombs' we bought the candy for on Sunday. We placed them on all the Cummins employees’ desks for them to find the next morning.
When I got to the Cummins Kai Fa Qu office, I was told that I would be going out to do some community service for the company. I was literally handed an English text book, told what the last lesson taught was, and sent to the classroom. I had no idea what level these people were at, whether they were used to doing just oral practice, or what things I needed to focus on with them The students were a bunch of around 30 of Beijing’s senior citizens. I had fun teaching them, and also realized just how complicated English can be. For example, I tried to explain the use of the word ‘like’, but was pretty lost for words. I also further realized how ridiculous some English words sound through attempting to teach their pronunciation, especially, "U-m-b-r-e-l-l-a-". I taught for almost 2 hours.
After returning from the classroom, I ate lunch in the company canteen. The food there was extremely healthy and good, including vegetables, fish, tofu, and rice. Even before I saw the sign on the door that said 'canteen' as I was leaving, I thought of the place as a canteen. It just had a 'canteen’ aura...a very cheap and efficient setup but substantial healthy food for hard workers.
I went with a couple of the workers after finishing lunch, to the workshop floor where they had a ping pong table. They played doubles, and I paired up with the man who had driven me to teach English. I was rusty, and he wasn’t very consistent, so we ended up losing pretty badly every time.
After ping pong, I learned how to assemble, clean, and calibrate a fuel injector for a 6-cylinder Cummins 1600 Horse Power engine. A fuel injector pretty much looks like an enormous bullet, and delivers a squirt of fuel into the cylinder of the engine, where the fuel is ignited, and the explosion pushes the piston down. I was given a special pair of clothes and shoes to enter the fuel injector workshop. I had to bathe the injector in an enormous tub of pure gasoline at one point while cleaning it, and was nearly up to my elbows in the black stuff. I helped the young guy teaching me how to work with the injector with his English, focusing on some of the technical terms for the parts.
I returned home by taxi. Unfortunately the traffic was terrible, and it took over an hour to return home. I slept in the car.
At night, Colm and I went to the Cummins office building to help the interns complete the 200 'candy bombs' we bought the candy for on Sunday. We placed them on all the Cummins employees’ desks for them to find the next morning.
10/30 Monday
I was supposed to start work today, but because of all the impending political activity (the Africa Summit), the traffic would be extremely bad getting out to Kai Fa Qu early in the morning and it wasn’t worth it.
I slept in, and then went out with Terry to help guide the mayor of Columbus around the Forbidden City. It was his last full day in Beijing, and he was taking a quick tour of some of the sights.
When I arrived at the entrance to the Forbidden City, I didn’t have enough money to get into the city (the group was already inside) but a random man outside of the ticket office lent me 10 yuan so I could afford to get in. He must have seen me trying to get a student discount with my Choate I.D. card (“Chinese students only!”), and heard that I didn’t have enough to pay for the full ticket. I was extremely impressed by his generosity, and when asked how I could repay him, he jokingly said, “Send it in the post!”
After the Forbidden City, we took the Mayor to Silk Alley. I told a girl at a tie shop there, on the ‘Silk’ floor, that the mayor was my father, and saying that helped him get a better price on a bunch of silk ties. The people running the shops always appear to appreciate when someone knows how to speak Chinese.
I went with Terry to see where she and the other intern live. The apartment is conveniently located right behind the Cummins office building. Her apartment was pretty nice and very large, complete with a full kitchen and laundry room. The only problem she had encountered was that brown water was coming out of her sink when I visited her, and sometimes she has no water at all. Also, the windows seem to leak a lot, and she has to sleep on the couch, away from her bed next to the window, in order to keep warm.
I went to a nearby dumpling restaurant with her and ordered 60 dumplings with various fillings. We finished them all. After walking that off for a bit we went to a nice dessert place called Bellagios which is Taiwanese. There we shared an enormous strawberry-yoghurt smoothie.
I slept in, and then went out with Terry to help guide the mayor of Columbus around the Forbidden City. It was his last full day in Beijing, and he was taking a quick tour of some of the sights.
When I arrived at the entrance to the Forbidden City, I didn’t have enough money to get into the city (the group was already inside) but a random man outside of the ticket office lent me 10 yuan so I could afford to get in. He must have seen me trying to get a student discount with my Choate I.D. card (“Chinese students only!”), and heard that I didn’t have enough to pay for the full ticket. I was extremely impressed by his generosity, and when asked how I could repay him, he jokingly said, “Send it in the post!”
After the Forbidden City, we took the Mayor to Silk Alley. I told a girl at a tie shop there, on the ‘Silk’ floor, that the mayor was my father, and saying that helped him get a better price on a bunch of silk ties. The people running the shops always appear to appreciate when someone knows how to speak Chinese.
I went with Terry to see where she and the other intern live. The apartment is conveniently located right behind the Cummins office building. Her apartment was pretty nice and very large, complete with a full kitchen and laundry room. The only problem she had encountered was that brown water was coming out of her sink when I visited her, and sometimes she has no water at all. Also, the windows seem to leak a lot, and she has to sleep on the couch, away from her bed next to the window, in order to keep warm.
I went to a nearby dumpling restaurant with her and ordered 60 dumplings with various fillings. We finished them all. After walking that off for a bit we went to a nice dessert place called Bellagios which is Taiwanese. There we shared an enormous strawberry-yoghurt smoothie.
10/29 Sunday
I slept in until 12:00.
At around 1:00 I went walking around Beijing with one of the Cummins interns, Terry. We tried to find Hou Hai Park to sit down and eat/talk, but ended up finding Bei Hai Park instead. At that point we had been looking, without a map, for around two hours, and were desperately hungry. So, we found a random restaurant and ordered some noodles. I got tomato and egg noodles, while she got beef noodles. We decided to head back home after that, as it became apparent that our search would be futile (we asked quite a few people on the street where Hou Hai was, and all pointed north and said it was far away).
After returning from our walk, we sat down in Wang Fu Jing to wait for the other intern, Caroline, and Lak. After around half an hour, they showed up. We all went shopping for candy to put on 200 peoples' desks in the Cummins office, as part of an effort to improve office relations and social life (it’s just a start).
After our shopping, we decided to go try a famous dumpling restaurant called Din Tai Fung. It was a long taxi ride, but well worth the wait. The service was excellent and the food delicious. The dumplings were a bit too rich for my liking, however. We ordered and ate every type of dumpling on the menu. Some of the dumplings (they demonstrate when they bring them out), are eaten in a special way. One, you put in soup and eat, while another you eat plain, and another you are supposed to use soy sauce and/or vinegar.
I had a quiet evening at home, reading, and watching some TV.
At around 1:00 I went walking around Beijing with one of the Cummins interns, Terry. We tried to find Hou Hai Park to sit down and eat/talk, but ended up finding Bei Hai Park instead. At that point we had been looking, without a map, for around two hours, and were desperately hungry. So, we found a random restaurant and ordered some noodles. I got tomato and egg noodles, while she got beef noodles. We decided to head back home after that, as it became apparent that our search would be futile (we asked quite a few people on the street where Hou Hai was, and all pointed north and said it was far away).
After returning from our walk, we sat down in Wang Fu Jing to wait for the other intern, Caroline, and Lak. After around half an hour, they showed up. We all went shopping for candy to put on 200 peoples' desks in the Cummins office, as part of an effort to improve office relations and social life (it’s just a start).
After our shopping, we decided to go try a famous dumpling restaurant called Din Tai Fung. It was a long taxi ride, but well worth the wait. The service was excellent and the food delicious. The dumplings were a bit too rich for my liking, however. We ordered and ate every type of dumpling on the menu. Some of the dumplings (they demonstrate when they bring them out), are eaten in a special way. One, you put in soup and eat, while another you eat plain, and another you are supposed to use soy sauce and/or vinegar.
I had a quiet evening at home, reading, and watching some TV.
10/28 Saturday
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I decided to go to Tian An Men square to look around and to do some photography. It was a nice day with a surprisingly blue sky. The square was crowded as usual, but it was packed into a slightly smaller space to make room for 2008 Olympics exhibits. There were two massive models of some of the Olympic Complexes, as well as two massive displays for the 5 Chinese mascots, all Panda Bears, with the names BeiBei, JingJing, HuanHuan, YingYing, and NiNi. All of their names combined say “Beijing Huanying Ni” which means “Beijing Welcomes You”.
Also occupying the square was a large billboard advertising the Africa Summit in Beijing. The Chinese are courting the Africans for their untapped mass of natural resources, which China is currently in need of. Throughout the city, lights have gone up, displays and billboards have been erected reading, “Africa: Friendship, peace, cooperation and development".
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I met the mayor of Columbus, Illinois for a dinner of Peking Duck with Colm. The dinner was held at a Famous Peking duck restaurant called Chuan Ju De in Wang Fu Jing. The family that started the business used to prepare Peking Duck for the emperor. Because the mayor was a Foreign Dignitary, we were able to get a special room designated for government officials. Columbus is interested in doing a sister city program with a city in China, and the mayor toured about 7 different cities during his stay. The sister city program is one that encourages cultural exchange and understanding.
After saying goodbye to Colm, the mayor, and his entourage, I joined up with the Cummins interns, Terry and Caroline, as well as their friend Lak, who is Vietnamese. We went to a Halloween party at an apartment owned by a couple of British guys working in China. The apartment was really hard to find, and after getting off the taxi, we accidentally ended up looking in the Korean sector of the area for a good half an hour. Addresses in China can be really confusing, and most security guards at the gates have no clue of their surroundings. They are only there to stop and question suspicious looking people trying to enter into the apartments. Finally, after having 4 security guards collaborate, unsuccessfully, to figure out where we were going, one of the owners of the apartment found us.
The party was fun, and people had some really funky costumes including a straw/grass man who was wearing, well, straw and grass, a guy who had strapped a functioning fog-maker to his butt and was wearing a gas mask, and a guy who had dressed up in Cultural Revolution gear. Yet again, we were costume-less, but I had my Mao bag which was good enough.
After the party, a bunch of us went to an underground club called Vix. The music was decent, and the place was packed with costumed dancers. We got too tired to dance at around 5am, and returned to our homes by taxi. Outside of the club, my ears were still ringing and I was half deaf for a while (I think I will give my ear drums a break for a while). On the way home I could already see people starting to work at construction sites, and opening up their small shops. I tried not to wake Colm when I got to the apartment.
10/27 Friday
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Today was an especially crazy day.
Colm took off from work today because he was invited to act in a TV show for CCTV (China Central Television). The TV series that Colm was invited to be on is called "Waiting at the Airport" and is about things that people do/see while in the airport. In this particular show, Colm would be playing the part of an American who came over to meet a Chinese girl he had met online. The driver took us to Kai Fa Qu, where the studio was. The studio happened to be right near the Cummins Distribution center in Kai Fa Qu.
We came to an enormous complex that looked like an airport terminal (how fitting). It was very hard to find the entrance to where the studio was, as most of the building was unmarked and abandoned looking. Finally we saw a bunch of people standing outside a door in the rear of the complex, and asked them if the place behind them was indeed the studio. They said it was, and Colm and I got out and went inside. The inside of the building, as we entered, was totally gutted, aside from some rickety tables and chairs set up on the floor. We were taken upstairs, only to meet more dimly lit gutted space plus a few doors opening into smaller rooms. Through one of the doors was something that resembled a dressing/make-up room. There, where it was better lit, we put our stuff down and were introduced to the director and some of the actresses for the show.
Colm was given the script for the scenes he would be doing, and we were both taken aback by the amount of lines he would be memorizing. Mind you, the script was all in Chinese. Some of the characters were ones that neither Colm nor I had ever seen before. Colm's friend, Mei Xue, who teaches at the School of Dance in Beijing, came along and was able to help him with the script. Colm managed to talk to the director about the length of his lines, getting permission to simplify and shorten many of the tougher parts. For the next hour or so, Colm studied his lines and practiced them with some of the actresses.
The set, which was on the ground floor, could be seen from an overlook on the second floor. It looked like an airport, complete with VIP lounge, restaurant, bar, duty free shop, snack shop, travel agency, and police station. There were airport signs hung out all over the place, pointing in the direction of luggage, terminals, gates, bathrooms, and security. At one point, when I was actually on the set, I had to wonder if it really had been a scrapped airport. The building even had the look of an airport, and the signs looked authentic enough. The duty free had real wine bottles in it, and the snack shop real food.
When Colm started shooting, the crew moved the cameras and lights to the Police Station section of the set. After that, they moved to the travel agency, and the bar. In the police station, they shot a couple scenes in which Colm had to be crying (trying to locate the girl he met online), so they put some drops in his eyes that induced tearing. They tried to shoot in smaller clips so that Colm could memorize his lines more effectively. Colm proved to be a good actor and was able to perfect the clips after a couple of takes.
I talked with one of the male actors who asked if Colm had ever been in any movies in the US. We also talked about my experience in China so far, and how I learned to speak Chinese.
As I mentioned before, the complex looked abandoned, and I was very surprised that CCTV had a studio in such a dilapidated building. I was more surprised, and horrified, however, to find a bucket of dead fish in the bathroom. This further set the studio, in my mind, into the ranks of 'ghetto'.
At around 7:00 pm, I went with Colm’s driver to Dominos to get pizza for the 2 Cummins interns who had come to watch, as well as for Colm and myself. I wanted to order 4 pizzas but ended up getting 5 plus a sampler box of appetizers. There was a promotion going on that gave you 2 free pizzas if you ordered 3, or 1 free pizza if you ordered 2, so I had to either get too little or too much. We could always eat the leftovers for breakfast/lunch/dinner over the next few days.
Colm ended up acting for over 8 hours (we got there at around 1:00, and got out after 10:00). I was tired from just watching and taking pictures. The other actors and actresses would have to stay until around 2:00am in order to finish the particular episode of the show.
After leaving the studio, Colm, the interns, and I went to a club that was holding a masquerade night (a pre-Halloween celebration), but we didn't have any costumes. The lack of costumes didn’t matter as long as we paid for tickets. There was free champagne with the entrance charge, and the place got drunk bone-dry by around 1:30.
After dancing until around 2:30, we ate leftover pizza out of the back of Colm's driver's car. We saw the interns off, and returned home tired and content.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Just a Note
Somehow, access to charlesinea.blogspot.com has been blocked from the apartment complex. I am not sure if it works elsewhere in China, but it may have gone on their bad list for some ridiculous reason. I am still able to edit and upload new posts to blogger.com, but I cannot view my own page.
10/26 Thursday
I now have Skype, and have purchased a Skype phone, so I can call the States using VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol), which is really cheap ($.02 per minute). I spent my entire morning trying to download the program because the file kept of getting timed out due to a slow connection. I had to try about 7 different download sites before I could establish a strong enough link.
In the afternoon I took the subway out to Jun Shi Bo Wu Guan, or the Military Museum, but I was heading for the park behind it, called Yu Yuan Tan. After skirting some incredibly daunting and massive military buildings around the museum, I came to the park. As I had remembered from the year before, this park was a hot spot for kite flying and dog walking. All sorts of dogs were there (I saw a Jack Russell Terrier last year there), and there were tons of kites in the sky, some of which looked like airplanes, and others were more traditional, brightly colored with streamers. There is a massive bell there with the national anthem inscribed on it, March of the Volunteers, complete with notes. Written by Tian Han (lyrics) and Nie Er (music) in 1935, the anthem recalls the bravery of the Chinese people in defending their nation during the 1930's against Japanese invasion in the northeast. The song was banned during the Cultural Revolution, but was later reinstated as the national anthem.
On the way home from the park, I stopped at Xiu Shui Jie, the Silk Market. Here I was able to buy my Skype phone and a little mouse for my computer (the mouse says 'Sony' on it, but there's no way it's real). I was able to bargain both down from 450 yuan to 220. Luckily, both pieces of hardware work.
Colm and I went out for another foot massage today but at another place near the apartment complex. This place was a bit less upscale, but not sketchy, and it was cool because you get to watch a movie during the massage. They have a selection of about 200+ DVD's in the lobby to choose from; of course they are all bootleg, but they work. Colm and I watched Formula 51, in which Samuel L. Jackson is a drug chemist escaping a female assassin in Britain. It was pretty funny.
In the afternoon I took the subway out to Jun Shi Bo Wu Guan, or the Military Museum, but I was heading for the park behind it, called Yu Yuan Tan. After skirting some incredibly daunting and massive military buildings around the museum, I came to the park. As I had remembered from the year before, this park was a hot spot for kite flying and dog walking. All sorts of dogs were there (I saw a Jack Russell Terrier last year there), and there were tons of kites in the sky, some of which looked like airplanes, and others were more traditional, brightly colored with streamers. There is a massive bell there with the national anthem inscribed on it, March of the Volunteers, complete with notes. Written by Tian Han (lyrics) and Nie Er (music) in 1935, the anthem recalls the bravery of the Chinese people in defending their nation during the 1930's against Japanese invasion in the northeast. The song was banned during the Cultural Revolution, but was later reinstated as the national anthem.
On the way home from the park, I stopped at Xiu Shui Jie, the Silk Market. Here I was able to buy my Skype phone and a little mouse for my computer (the mouse says 'Sony' on it, but there's no way it's real). I was able to bargain both down from 450 yuan to 220. Luckily, both pieces of hardware work.
Colm and I went out for another foot massage today but at another place near the apartment complex. This place was a bit less upscale, but not sketchy, and it was cool because you get to watch a movie during the massage. They have a selection of about 200+ DVD's in the lobby to choose from; of course they are all bootleg, but they work. Colm and I watched Formula 51, in which Samuel L. Jackson is a drug chemist escaping a female assassin in Britain. It was pretty funny.
10/25 Wednesday
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I decided to go to Tian Tan, or the Temple of Heaven, by public bus. The bus was easy to use, and only cost 1 yuan. It was pretty slow though, so I think the subway is a much better option. Unfortunately, the subway doesn't go down to that area.
At Tian Tan I walked around the entire park, which is 273 hectares, and saw people practicing Tai Chi, Kung Fu, and various traditional Chinese instruments. At one point I thought I heard repeated gun shots, but no one seemed to be scared by the noise, and as i approached the the source, i eventually saw that it was a man with an enormous whip breaking the sound barrier with each snap. At one point he took up another whip and was doing them both at once, making twice the amount of loud reports. There were many poor people there collecting bottles from tourists so they could bring the plastic back to a recycling center
and make some money. This seems to be the main collection system for plastics and other recyclables, and I haven't seen a formal recycling service yet. The man in the picture, a bottle collector, has a little bird with him, to which he was whistling earlier, and it can be seen hanging in the blue cloth-covered cage above him (well, no, you cannot really see it, but it's in there). Many people bring their caged birds to the park, and you can hear them all singing in areas where they're hanging.On the bus ride back, I stepped on a woman's foot by accident, but ended up talked to her for a while after apologizing. I guess that's one way to meet people!
I went to a dumpling shop for dinner, across from the prestigious Peninsula Hotel in Wang Fu Jing, and had some shrimp wonton soup. The soup was terribly plain, but after adding a touch of soy sauce and some chili paste it was very good. I usually go to this restaurant at around 9:00, and by then they've sold out of most of the things on the menu.
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