China

I went to China from Dec. 24 to Dec. 29. At my university, I was a guide to 18 visiting teachers from China, so they invited me to visit them. They picked me up at the airport, some traveling up to 10 hrs to meet me. They planned my entire trip, four cities in four days: Shanghai, Suzhou, Nanjing, and Changzhou. Though I brought a lot of money, they insisted on paying for my hotel, meals, and travel.


Interestingly, there were Christmas decorations everywhere; sometimes, it almost seemed as if there were more than there was in Canada. Quite a few people were wearing Santa hats and most places were coated with decorations. Apparently, there's a bit of controversy over this in China as it's perceived as Westernization (when I entered at the airport, I had to sign that I wasn't bringing in porn, drugs, or anything "deleterious to the morals of China" or somesuch).

Starting off in Shanghai, we walked through the dirty, crowded streets and found the hotel. It was great to see everybody again. We then went to a nearby restaurant. "What are those carts?" I asked my hosts, about a group of street merchants with huge, hand-pulled carts gathered on a corner. "A kind of fast food", they told me. Suddenly, this was literally true as the cops arrived: the guys grabbed their carts and scattered with amazing speed. Everybody laughed. The restaurant was festooned with decorations. Despite a waitress (in a santa hat, natch) openly investigating the contents of her nose, the dinner was great. The fish, freshly killed, was especially delicious. When my host asked me if they have such good beer in Japan, I couldn't help noticing and, yes, pointing out, that it was Suntory we were drinking.

After dinner, we went for a "must see": a night stroll along the HuangPu river. It was quite beautiful. I remembered suddenly that it was Christmas Eve. We went shopping through the street market and I was happy to find an interesting experience I had been warned of (by friends and Wikitravel): a young lady planting herself in front of me, asking in English, "Hi! Where are you from?" Apparently, the scam is to lure you into a teahouse, order some "cheap" food and then pull the old switchereoo on the menu, footing the unwitting foreigner with the outrageous bill. So, I replied to her in Japanese. She knew that too: "Sabishii", she replied while pointing to herself. "Lonely, lonely", she helpfully translated, apparently doubting my Japanese heritage.

The next day, we shopped a bit in Shanghai and I saw a second version of this. We'd be talking, and a guy would wander over and stand there, staring at us and listening to our conversation. I had heard a bit about this, but I couldn't help but burst out laughing how nonchalantly one guy did this. After a while, these guys would ask what you wanted to buy or where you wanted to go and offer their services as a guide. Some people worked really hard to try to get the job, so I felt a bit bad, but my hosts just brushed them away.

Another thing that was interesting about the market was how many people could suddenly speak English when they saw me. "Hello! Hello!" "Come in" "Look around" were the words of the day. However, I appreciated that people tried to speak English and appeared to really want to in contrast to Japan, where the popular reaction to English might even be called fear. Anwyay, I saw a great pair of black silk pajamas, but didn't get them as they were slightly small and regretted it ever since as I wound up looking for them (and trying to explain what they were in my crap Mandarin) in every city. I did however get a great pair of black silk kung fu-styleees.

Then, it was on to Suzhou, which was a really cool city. There was a bit of a trendy area with a lot of younger people (I have especially fond memories of the two girls who smiled and waved while enjoying lollipops. Yes, I know. But it's true), which was cool. Girls' syle in China now is cowboy boots and tight jeans, which works for me. Another great memory was myself and two teachers riding a tricycle built for two (the driver convinced us we could fit) through the lively streets. The next day, we went to no less than three cultural attractions: The Tiger Hill (the #1 sight in Suzhou, it's a kind of pagoda), Hanshan Temple(another pagoda-like structure, with lots of open parlour rooms and a nice garden), and The Humble Administrator's Garden (it seemed that a lot of the English naming and and on the signs was direct translations via the dictionary, leading to some awkward "The Verdant Pond of Viewing Many Lotus Roots" type-English). Though they were all great, the highlight was definitely the latter.


The weather was perfect and it wasn't too crowded. The garden was large and we just wandered around enjoying it. At one point we just sat at a kind of gazebo, not talking, just resting. A really good memory.

That night, we left for Nanjing. As I sat on the train studying my Mandarin refresher, a cute girl sitting next to me basically poked her head in and made comments. "Ni hao", I greeted her. She turned out to be pretty nice, and had good English (the result of being an exchange student).

Though Nanjing was great for the fact that I got to see my friends again, the weather was really foggy and they weren't from that city, so there wasn't much to see. I did some shopping and got a hanko (name stamp) made for a friend in Japan. As we were walking through the shopping area, who did I see but the cute girl again, our meeting awkward this time due to the presence of some guy who was probably her boyfriend.

I took a train alone to Changzhou (one of the teachers paid a small fee for a ticket to ensure I got on the train okay!). This is notable because the trains were like the situation you see in films about travelers through India or something. Everybody fights for a seat, ticket or not. Those without seat tickets or luck stand, for up to three or four hours! I should mention at this point that, when I walked through the train station (and for most of my visit), I was the object of unabashed stares. I had read that this was true of Japan a few years ago - and it's still true to an extent - but this was more straighforward.

Changzhou was almost as cool as Suzhou. We went to a spicy food restaurant where we had "gong fu" (kung fu) tea. This was a tea kettle with an elaborately long spout. Pouring it was an art, so it was something to see. Also, due to my plan to eat as many offbeat/unusual things as possible while I can, I had ...worms. Or, at least, some kind of bamboo bug. Take a look. They were pretty dry - almost dusty. The restaurants were truly luxury: at least one waitstaff per person, constantly bringing food, refilling your tea, refilling your beer... it was nuts. "Eat more, eat more", the teachers urged me. After all, "you are a man!". I laughed: in Japan you have to drink to prove you're a man, here you have to eat. I've gained so much weight since coming to Japan it's unbelievable.

Speaking of Japan, whenever I brought anything Japanese up, there would usually be an uncomfortable silence. Some of the more easygoing people would just admit, "Actually, we don't like the Japanese". This did not surprise me, given the history between the two countries (and Japan's reluctance to admit any culpability). I had an interesting conversation about this with a cool guy who was my guide in the morning. He stated his opinion that, if Japan admitted it's cultural debt to China (language, politics, food, probably even racial/heritage), then Japan would have to accept China's Confucianist "respect your elders" doctrine and admit they were second to China. An interesting theory, to be sure. I only saw a few Japanese tourists in Suzhou, but most of my Japanese co-workers told me, "I wish I could go with you" when I told them I was going to China.


There were a few interesting cultural points brought to the fore in Changzhou. For example, waiters would suddenly bring a fork and knife before the meal, apparently convinced by my foreignness that I couldn't use chopsticks. Though well-intentioned, I never used them. Another weird point was the exaggerated explanations of one of my hosts. Showing me around the hotel room, she pointed to the TV, explaining, "this is a TV". She also showed me an amazing invention: "This is a telephone". I remembered back to our meal when she had introduced me to fish: "This is a fish". At the time, I wasn't sure if she was, unsure of her English, practicing. Or maybe she wanted to say "This is _the_ fish", "This is _the_ TV".

Also, as mentioned prior (nose-picking waitress), the etiquette was a bit different. The rumors I had heard about people spitting everywhere were true. Check out this sign from my floor at an upscale hotel in Changzhou: Yes, that "no phlegm" rule has gotta be worth a star or two to Lonely Planet.

After the meal, we went to a dinosaur park. My host called me over, "Look! Come here!". I came over. It was a fossil. "It is a fish", she told me. I looked at the plaque. It said "Fish". I thought to myself, "my life sometimes is unbelieveably strange. How can I make money or create something useful from these experiences?".

At the park, it looked like all the English signage had been corrected by computers. That is, it would be (relatively) gramatically correct and correctly spelled, but still unusual English. There was a no-photo rule, but I still remember how something or other had been listed as going on for "one-handed years". There's a really good joke in there somewhere. Some other offbeat English I saw:

Sorry, I guess you can't see that red sign on the left. It says, "Crb pink and small basket from southing. Dumpling Med weth the orary and digestive glands of a crab and Zhenjiang. Dumpling stuffed with The ovary And Digestive Glands of a crad" (sic).

I also had to buy a tube of Darlie, the toothpaste formerly known as Darkie. I was reminded of when I first saw the Whity store in Japan. I feel guilty for even wondering if the Whity store ever sold Darkie at one point. I do.

After the park, we went shopping for a few things I wanted to buy: black pajamas, a black jacket, black sheets, and black towels. After being told that I wouldn't be able to find these things because, "In China red is luck and black is....unluck", I wasn't able to find these things. There was also a Borat-like approach to escalators that we won't get into here.

The teachers offered me five (!) seperate jobs, teaching English at their respective schools. Though, as noted, the Chinese seemed like eager English students (as opposed to some "Eigo kirai" (I hate English) students here) and everybody was totally kind, I don't know if I could hack the governmental limitations, the lack of personal space, or the spitting. I will definitely try to go back to see more of China: Beijing, Xian, Dalian, etc.