So clearly it’s been awhile since my last blog post. This can be attributed to many things. Laziness, lack of time, or maybe I’m just too busy PARTYING YEEEEEEEAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
Haha no, I’m actually a very boring person.
Anyway a lot of stuff has happened in the past what… month? I have about 675 students and I had to test them each individually in oral English. I see each class once a week for 40 minutes with 45 students per class. Obviously this makes it a little hard to get them all tested in one class, so what I did was a spread it out over the course of 3 weeks. What I had them do was give group presentations like they were a news show. That added up to 165 performances that I had to watch by the students (and I had to try and stay neutral and fresh the whole time).
Grading each kid individually was pretty hard as well because sometimes they would forget their name tags or they would change their English name from what was on the sheet to something else (oh Yvette is now named Chocolate?). Quite difficult at times. Some of the performances were amazing though. Really funny. Obviously I don’t remember them all, but I definitely remember this one:
They’re staging a kidnapping with guns. They brought black BB guns to school (loaded) and were swearing and yelling like the police and stuff. The one on the left is threatening a baby with his handgun and the one on the right has a machine gun and it was just… it was intense. They even had like a kung fu part where they choreographed a beat down on the suspect (this once again reminded me of how 2/3rds of my students could kick my ass if they wanted to).
Anyway I was really not expecting a bunch of guns to come out in my class. After class was over I told them that in the US if they had brought a gun to school like (even a fake one, because the possibility of it being real is much higher in the US) that the police would be storming the school in all of about 4 minutes. If they’d waved it and pointed at people like they were doing, they would have been shot by the cops pretty quick. Obviously no one in China is even slightly worried about a student having a real gun because no one batted an eyelash at them having these weapons in class.
Then I took their machine gun and shot some stuff. It was pretty sweet. They also had a shotgun but not enough BB’s.
Have I ever mentioned how much the students effin’ LOVE Michael Jackson and highly choreographed dancing? There was going to be a massive school performance for the headmaster. Apparently he was coming to visit the school (he doesn’t actually go to our school, I don’t even know who the head boss of my school is, but the headmaster lives in a different city). Anyway, giving face and honor and being showy I’ve found is often more important than substance in China. They really really had to impress him so they kept canceling classes so the students could practice their performances and stuff. Personally if I were headmaster I would want to visit as a surprise and see what the school was like in action. I wouldn’t want to watch a whole bunch of performances to flatter and impress me, but whatever, to each their own I guess.
So here’s the students practicing, I wasn’t going to be there on the day of the performance because I had a Chinese test (thank goodness, cause they told me the day before that I was apparently also supposed to give some kind of performance? Like a skit? Or singing? Barf):
I was reading about music emergence in China the other day, I don’t remember where, but I found out an interesting little tidbit about this whole Michael Jackson thing. Apparently in the 80’s they wouldn’t allow Michael Jackson to enter China and give a performance because he was doing morally corrupt things. No, no, not socially unacceptable closeness with little boys, I’m talking about the crotch grab. They wouldn’t allow him to perform here because he would grab is crotch on stage. He was the cutting edge and really pushed the boundaries of obscenity.
Not only that, but Michael Jackson is basically China’s Buddy Holly but with the popularity of the Elvis. Like China was just opening up to Western influences by the late 80’s and if you look at who was hot at the time and who would be going overseas with their music, well… that’s Michael Jackson. That’s why they have what I would consider to be such an odd assortment of musical tastes that are extremely modern (yet slightly behind the most modern of modernity) and don’t seem to go to any time period prior to about 1984. That’s the extent of their rock and roll music history. It all starts with Michael Jackson. This is why they don’t know who the Clash, Ramones, Led Zepplin or any of the earlier rappers or anybody is. Oddly enough I haven’t even heard people here sing songs by the Jackson 5, just Michael Jackson. That’s how abrupt I would say the cutoff is around 1984. Very odd time warp kind of feeling sometimes, but I’ve come to understand a possible reason why it may be the way it is. So because of this I’m quite interested in when hip hop is going to be mainstream here. Right now it’s out there, but it’s not a dominant force by any means, just like in its early years in the US. I’m also interested in knowing if or when they will start making their own brand new styles of music that become popular among their own people and branch outward to other countries. I’d certainly be interested in hearing some kind of Asian infusion with reggae or something. That’d be pretty bizarre and new.
Click the capital letters for a clip of some Michael Jacksoning:
Here’s a scene the kids are reenacting from Forrest Gump:
However, what really got me from the performances was this couple. I was sitting there, completely baffled and amazed by what I was listening to. I was concerned that maybe I was listening to a recording and they were singing over it or something, but I wasn’t, it really was just these two girls being absolutely stunning:
I FORGOT THE NAME OF THIS SONG BUT THESE TWO GIRLS WIN THE PRIZE
On the day that the headmaster finally came, the students had to do extra special morning exercises. This was them running out to get to their designated spots on the field. I had a number of students quite upset about having to do these things to impress the headmaster. They felt it was unnecessary and was conflicting with what they were always told (study is most important etc etc). They saw no reason to do it and it was only making them behind on their homework. Still it was cool for me because I got to see this:
At the end they normally file back inside, but this time they filed along lines painted on the ground so they could have extra perfection:
Aright now for a little while I’m going to show a bunch of random kind of images that don’t really have a strong narrative element to them, they’re just related in that they happened in between about New Years and today (practically the end of January now, jeez).
I don’t know if I’ve shown the school buses that all the kids get on to go home at the end of the week. I thought it was a little silly that they’re all packed into these huge cross country buses (air conditioned I believe). I think it’s because they stay here for a 5 days so the need to bring more stuff than we do in the US.
But whether that’s the case or not, what the hell? We get crappier buses in the US than they do. Bench seats, sometimes three people to a two person seat, plus we’re all wearing our winter clothing which makes us 1.5-2 times larger than normal. Also the bus drivers in the US pull over and yell at us like “Don’t get into fist fights!” and “Don’t smoke pot on the bus!” and “Don’t make flame throwers out of spray deodorant!” etc. Darn kids these days don’t appreciate nothin’:
pbbbfffhahahaha
This is my Chinese class after it’s been pared down over the course of a semester (except obviously the girl taking the picture and our usual Australian guy who couldn’t come the last day). It started with like 12 or 13 people I think? Maybe? The average by the end was around 6. Not because Jade was a bad teacher, she’s awesome (I mean look, we’re drinking beer in class), more just because people are lazy I think. I think they want the afternoon off instead of going to class. Not that I blame them, it’s a pretty big hassle for some of us to go to class. Also a lot of people thought it was too far to go to class so they just opted not to. I’m trying to practice my chinese so as not to look like an idiot in front of Jade when I get back to class next semester.
“You were gone fo’ three months and you never practiced!?”
“Sorry!”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know!”
“You are a bad student ah! No mo’ action movies!”
Do you remember my post a long time ago that had the group of people dancing all odd? The first time I caught this phenomenon was in the post “INVESTIGATING THE LIBRARY AND THE CURSE OF THE GREEN HAT” (click it for the link, the video is in a link just below the Kumon picture). There was that group of people in the class next door to mine that was doing some kind of crazy dance. I want to know what this song is called. It’s possibly the most annoying song in the world, I want to be able to listen to it and finish the song. It gets stuck in my head all the time and I don’t know the words or what it’s called or anything so it just repeats forever and ever and I can’t finish it. This is the second or third time I’ve caught a company using it plus it’s accompanying dance to try and make their employees get all team oriented and pumped up for the day:
So one day I was sitting in the office and a loud honk happened outside. Then the honk just stayed continuous for about a 3 minutes. Just one big loud hoooooooooooooooooooonk. It eventually stopped, but I was curious so I walked out to see what it could have been. Turns out a semi took a corner too fast and rolled over. This is why I don’t like walking around near my school. It’s hella dangerous:
Oddly enough, traffic jams of shipping containers are kind of colorful from above:
There’s a secret teacher room near the cafeteria that I had always wished I could go in (purely because I wasn’t allowed in). I remember numerous occasions where I would always see tons of teachers go back there and they would laugh and sing and have a big party but then never invite us. It had been like that for months. Helen reassured us “oh don’t worry, it’s the same food as the cafeteria.” but it didn’t matter. I still felt all left out. Finally, finally one day we (Quentin and I) saw all the teachers go back into their special secret room. Then we got our own food in the regular cafeteria. Helen and May came to eat with us. Then a teacher came out (I don’t remember who) and was like “What are you doing?” and we were like: “Eating?” “Come on and eat with us in the back!” I was soooo happy. I was going to get to see the secret back room where everyone goes to have a good time! Yessssss!
So we went back there and it like a little restaurant with a big round table and stuff. They didn’t serve the same food as the cafeteria at all, it was a slightly better (Helen… what a liar…).
Long story short I got to have a new food back there that I hadn’t had before. The food in the center bowl is “Gou Rou” . Also known as “dog”:
None of the other teachers wanted to eat it and in fact wanted to send it back to the kitchen, but Quentin and I insisted and took the opportunity to finally take the plunge on officially eating dog. It’s kind of like roast beef, but more tender. It’s was really really tender actually. My enjoyment of it was a little difficult however because I mean… you know… it’s a dog. Dogs are to Americans what cows are to Hindus; they’re sacred. Not sacred in a religious manner, but still pretty much sacred. So putting it in my mouth and eating it was a bizarre experience. I don’t think I ever need to eat dog again, but now I can chalk that up to one more odd food under my belt.
Anyway moving on to something a little more appetizing.
I found cheddar cheese at the import store (Land O’Lakes, but beggars can’t be choosers), some sort of decent brand of sliced deli ham, sliced bread, and I even found mayonnaise! Therefore it was time to make a sandwich.
I was soooo excited to eat this sandwich. I melted the cheese a little tiny bit, spread the mayo, sliced it in half (diagonally of course), then I sat down to watch Demolition Man. What could be more wonderful?
Nothing.
Except once again the Chinese added sugar to something that’s not supposed to have sugar in it: Mayonnaise. AAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh I can’t win! They do it to hot dogs, popcorn, bread, even mayonnaise! *Sigh* What a letdown.
I’m joking, in actuality I liked it well enough. It tasted exactly like Miracle Whip. I don’t really like Miracle Whip, but the fact that it so perfectly emulated Miracle Whip was still a strong feeling of home. It’s just that it was less like “Ah yes, this reminds me of the good times back home” and more like “Ah yes, this reminds me of when something on the menu says it comes with mayonnaise but they actually mean Miracle Whip and they think you can’t taste the difference…” which oddly enough makes it feel more like home than the other way around.
You win this time China.
Here is the least appetizing picture of nachos ever taken:
Please google image search the word “nachos” to see what they’re actually supposed to look like.
At the import store I found some reasonable tasting salsa so I made Helen and May some really simple nachos. Just the cheddar, salsa, and chips. They loved it. I was so happy. I wish I could introduce them to the loaded nachos they serve at Mexican restaurants with sour cream, olives, guacamole, lettuce, beef or chicken, and tomatoes and stuff, but I don’t have the abilities.
Also I forgot that there was a microwave in the school, so I microwaved them in my room and ran half a mile down the stairs and through the school so I could serve it to them hot. Stupid me. Next time I’ll do it right.
For any Chinese person reading this that wants to make nachos (and you do) here’s how to do it. Everyone else can skip on to the next picture. Note: It’s not as hard as it sounds, I just had to be extra descriptive sometimes to try and counter all the problems I’ve seen people have before (I never thought they would be problems because I’m from a western society where we have all this stuff and know how to use it):
- Go to Olé.
- Go to the chips section. On the bottom shelves you will see corn chips. Get “La Tapatia Tostaditas Corn Tortilla Chips”. They have a red bag with yellow chips inside. If those aren’t there find some other kind of corn chip. It has to be a corn chip, not a potato chip or any other kind of vegetable. It must be corn. Also not a blue corn chip, make sure it’s white or yellow.
- Go to the jarring section. Find “Master Foods Tastemaster Medium Salsa Original Dip!” It’s a medium sized jar that has a tomato and a pepper on the outside of it. If they have a “Hot Salsa” version, get that instead.
- Go to the cheese section. Buy Land O’Lakes Sharp Cheddar Cheese. If it says “mild cheddar” don’t get that, that doesn’t have any taste. Get regular or sharp. Sharp is best.
- Spend too much money buying these things at the checkout counter.
- Go home; hopefully this doesn’t take you 3 hours.
- Cut some slices of cheddar that are no more than 1 cm thick. The way you cut cheese is by holding the block a very specific way. Hold it in your left hand like you’re looking at the wide side of a building, now turn it 90 degrees on its side and place it on a cutting board like that. Now place the knife’s blade onto the top of the block of cheese 1 cm in from the right side. Now press down as straight as you can with the majority of the pressure being on blade in the cheese, not on the handle of your knife. Don’t saw back and forth! That will screw up your cut and make it harder for the cheese to melt later! Also don’t push down too hard when cutting or you will screw up the cut again and it will also mess with your melting later. You should now have a slice of cheese. Make 12 to 15 of these slices
- Get a microwave safe plate and put a handful of chips on it. Try not to crush the chips as you do this.
- Put a few slices of cheese randomly on the chip pile.
- Add another handful of chips to the plate.
- Put a few more slices of cheese one the pile, preferably not near where the other slices were
- One more handful of chips on the plate.
- Take a teaspoon and get 5 or 6 spoonfuls of salsa on top of the chips. Drip it all over as much as you can.
- Put the rest of the cheese on
- Put it in the microwave for about 3 minutes or until the cheese is completely melted.
- Try to eat it hot, while the cheese is still all melty and liquidy.
Congratulations, you made and ate nachos, a classic Tex-Mex (Texas/Mexican) traditional food.
Trust me, you want to do this, you’ve never tasted anything like this before and I can guarantee you’ll enjoy it. I would love for this to become a hit in China. That would be very funny to me and make me extremely happy. Mostly because I like the idea of some American coming here after me going “Wth? How did nachos get here?”.
Next Up: We were taught that if a Chinese person puts something on your plate, you have to eat it or you will be insulting them. A seafood restaurant is probably the worst place for me to go with that rule being so important:
All the English teachers went out for a big lunch at a seafood place. I went with for a number of reasons: 1) I like going out to eat. 2) I want to be accepted and respected as a teacher by the other teachers and the school (something the administration tries its damnedest to make sure doesn’t happen) and 3) I figured there would be more than just seafood for people that were allergic etc. Turns out that was a western assumption. Mr. Yao bought some food specially for me because they found out I don’t like seafood. Very nice to take me into consideration (though I was begging them not to treat me differently). It was some really good food though.
Lessons I learned from this excursion? If I want to be treated as an equal I should not put myself in situations where I’m at a supreme disadvantage (such as overcoming my gag reflex at the thought of putting crustaceans in my mouth). Look at these things. They’re like a foot long with big spiky mutant shells that aliens have! I don’t even know what kind of animal this is and I ate it:
Some shots of the place where we ate and the port:
When I see two small children playing with blown up plastic bags on strings and thoroughly enjoy themselves, I get a little disgusted with some aspects of consumeristic values. Not that I’m not totally a hardcore consumer or that I preach anti-consumerism or that I think kids need to grow up in the woods living off the land or anything. I need this computer I’m on, I love movies, I love my Wii, and I like processed Oscar Mayer hot dogs with Heinz Ketchup. Also it’s not like I’m a parent so I really don’t have a lot of room to judge. It’s just that I when I see this and think of the parents who absolutely need to buy their 4 or 5 year old kid gigantic stuffed animals or a talking robot dog or other toys that only have one single use and completely limit imagination, I can’t help but feel a little… I’m not sure. I don’t know if there’s a word for it. It’s like ashamed/sad/disappointed/disgusted/hurt/something else I can’t put my figure on.
Wǒ de Bàba he Māma
My mom and dad came to China. It pretty much nervoused me out cause I kept thinking about my complete crap filled experience trying to get used to this country in my first couple months. How to use the bus, I could speak zero Chinese, no teachers in my school would look at me, I had no real support system built in yet, taxi drivers refused to take me to my school (still don’t, but now I can swear at them), etc etc. Horrible awful experience in the first couple months. Now I’m all good. It’s just that all I could think about was my parents experiencing the same thing, me losing them in a crowded market, and then them not being able to get home.
Of course, that was a rather ridiculous thing to think. It’s just that living in a port tends to skew your perpective of how easy it is to get from place to place in a city and how many people in the rest of the city actually speak English. If you’re someplace that has anyone my age instead of, say, a bunch of crusty old truck drivers and mechanics, then you’re a lot more likely to find someone that can help you out a little if you get stuck. If you live somewhere that taxi drivers believe they can get a fare nearby, you’ll also be fine. So I freaked out a little, though I found it was unnecessary after spending a few days with them.
So when they arrive in China they get a driver from Hong Kong to take them out to Da Mei Sha beach nearby(ish) where I live. I hopped a bus and went over after class.
“No Spieeing, No Littering, Uttermost Penalty ¥200″
I assume that the word “spieeing” applies to all the people I see spitting and peeing in public all the time. I’m sure these signs will act as a helpful reminder that spitting, peeing, pooping, and littering anywhere you want is a public health concern and brings the overall quality of life for everyone in China lower and lower.
Lol yeah right:
This is Da Mei Sha beach. I showed it once way back when I went to that Russian party in a club nearby. I finally have some photos of what it looks like during the day.
Just going to point something out, everyone in China seems to really love going to the beach (though not as much right now because it’s winter). Why is that?
Most Chinese people hate the sun because it makes their skin “turn black.” Before coming to China we were warned that almost all Chinese skin products have bleach in them so anyone who had issues with that (allergic reaction, indignation, etc) should bring their own.
Now, going on the idea most people in China seem to want to be more white, we can rule out that they go to the beach to sun tan. So why else do you go to the beach? To swim of course!
Except on average people here don’t know how to swim. I’ve had people mime swimming to me and they mime the doggy paddle. If they don’t know how to swim and they don’t like sun tanning, why do they go to the beach? I don’t know. Quentin had some white-foreigner-centric ideas of “white people do it and say that’s what you’re supposed to do on vacation; so that’s what we’ll do” but I’m not sure how much I buy that. Could just be that they really like all the fresh air or something. I honestly don’t know. I don’t understand this one yet. I’ve even asked my students why they like the beach and they said they don’t really know… :-/
People wanting to take their picture with white people at the beach isn’t helping the counter argument to “White people do it” however.
“Victory! I got three of ‘em!”
Emporer Palpatine’s summer home:
My parents and I walked around and found what appeared to be an abandoned/not yet fully completed, “Greek” themed outdoor shopping mall:
Hahaha what am I twelve?
This is Da Fan, the oil painting village. It’s like the art district basically. If you ever want a perfect copy of Starry Night or Napoleon Crossing the Alps you can find it here.
Seriously, they do a lot of Napoleon Crossing the Alps.
Also they do copies of family photos if you want that instead. I didn’t take a lot of pictures because I wasn’t sure how the artists would feel about me walking around taking photos of their stuff.
I think it’s very good idea to centralize all the artwork like that. It’s like the MCAD art sale but permanent. Art is a hard business because it’s hard to get your name out and so on and people don’t always need you. If you have a central location that everyone goes to for all their artists you’ll have a much much better chance of getting noticed and getting business.
The only problem was that all of it looked exactly the same as each other. There were very few people that were being truly creative and trying new things with their work. 98% of everything I saw was either ancient Chinese style or classical European (mtly European oddly enough). Very boring. I felt bad because the few artists I saw that were actually trying something new or different no one was in their store. Everyone just kept going over to the sofa paintings and hotel lobby pieces. Probably because it was more safe. Not many people in the world trust their own artistic tastes. This is why people would rather buy a print of a painting at Wal-Mart or Target than buy an actual original, sometimes less expensive, and wholly unique piece of work. If other people go “yes this is good artwork” by putting it in a store for you to buy, and you’re not confident in what “good art” is, then you’re more likely to buy the pre-approved piece than find your own. It’s just easier that way. Which is unfortunate but true by my observation.
What saddened me though, is that the arts are supposed to be creative. That’s the fun of them. Yet here I was staring at more copying. I understand they’re working artists and that’s where the money is here, but if you’re just doing what you’re told and not making your own things to also try and sell (so that people will come to you for your individual touch instead of just technical abilities) how are you any different from a mechanic? Or a plumber? Or a construction worker? Unfortunately it seems they will forever be craftsmen, not artists. It’s like they don’t even aspire to be the car designer, the city planner, or the architect. It’s a highly unfortunate set of circumstances and I really hope that those little glimmers of creativity I saw in there aren’t extinguished.
After the oil painting village we went to the Shenzhen Museum. As much as I complain about learning about history, I still like learning about it. Language, writing, art, culture, things like that. Here’s a cool wooden bowl. It was for holding flower petals I believe:
I’ve seen this style of bat on a couple of Chinese things. It’s a cool style, I like it, really curly. Different than usual ways I see them with their wings completely splayed all the way out:
“YAAAAHH!! *Dinga Dinga Ling!*”
If I had to be a member of any religion, I’d probably choose buddhism. I mean who wouldn’t? Siddhartha is a little uptight I guess, but I mean look at Budai, he just can’t stop laughing he’s so fat and happy!
These women make me smile as well:
“Hmm…”
“Hmmmm”
“HMMMM”
Okay now I’m not sure you’re ready for the natural history section of the museum or not. All of the taxidermy seems to have been done with around turn of the 20th century technology.
Let’s start things off easy with the vampire deer:
Now let’s move on to the crazy part.
“YEAH!”
Clearly I burst out laughing when I walked into that room. Man I love life.
Here’s a big horrifying monster:
The last part of the trip was room with some different contemporary paintings that were done in a ancient Chinese styles. This painting is of Shenzhen. The red and yellow building is a big landmark here. Either the museum didn’t pick up on the extremely obvious message, or China is getting much more open to hearing people speak. I like to think it’s the latter, but some news reports in the last few months suggest otherwise. All the other images in the room have those tall pretty mountains with mist in them, this one not so much:
Then my parents came over to my school. I had to hire a gypsy cab to do it because I tried 5 different taxis and none of them would take us (It really really sucks to get to my school). I was very proud of myself on being able to negotiate a black cab. I’m now not really afraid of them taking advantage of me cause I can hold my own with them. It’s really cool. Learning Chinese feels exactly like having a super power. Suddenly I’m able to do things I was never able to do before and people think that I can’t do. Gives me a lot of leverage, especially when negotiating prices.
I showed my parents around the school, kids popped out of windows and complimented me and tried really hard to see my parents. It was very cute. I remember one class two girls left to go get water, happened to see my parents and me standing there, then the rest of the class suddenly became very thirsty (in pairs). Quite funny. Then they met Helen and we dropped them off at their hotel. The next day they flew out to Xi’an, I was going to join them in 2 days.
Here’s kind of a cool picture of the construction going on next to my apartment at night (lots of yelling and waking me up every morning):
The next day I went to Hong Kong with a bunch of teacher friends and we had a good time. We went out for morning tea (which is dim sum, this region is the region to get dim sum, it comes from here). This is all of us in Hong Kong Harbor; you see why Chinese clothes don’t fit me?
So Hong Kong Harbor has it’s own Walk of stars like Hollywood. It’s called the Avenue of Stars.
Here’s me being a super huge dork:
I know everyone sees Bruce as the master, I understand his impact. People also think that Jet Li is really badass and cool, I agree. However, when I was young, I watched Jackie Chan. He was something I watched quite a bit of in my early teens. He’s funny and when he was young he was amazingly fast. He’s definitely gotten slower as he’s aged, but I’m rewatching his early stuff currently and am thoroughly impressed by him. His choreography is amazing. I’ve been studying the way he makes everything that every stunt man is doing absolutely important. He’s always moving and fluid and I only appreciate it more as I age and feel non-plussed by current action movies full of wire-fu and slow motion. So personally, seeing the star for Jet Li was cool and the one for Bruce was cool, but getting to put my hands in Jackie Chan’s often burned and mashed hands made me feel sooooooo nerdily happy.
On a side note, his ring and middle finger are really long:
Chinese Toys R Us:
“Wo Pung! Restock the Jenga Shelves!”
“*grumble* I’m so @%&! tired of restocking the Jenga shelves…”
Massive tree growing out the side of a building?
One thing that’s kind of cool that I kept noticing in Hong Kong were these gullies. They built these little channels that would go underground, down the stairs, sometimes running next to the sidewalk. It’s pretty cool. They would sometimes have water going through them. Like little underground man-made creeks:
Check it out, it’s a little bit of stereotypical Hong Kong:
So I’m gonna sign off now. I’ve still gotta talk about Xi’an but there’s not as much to talk about. This is what happens when stuff builds up for a month. My bad. Anyway tomorrow I leave for Harbin. I’m going go see the Ice Festival and (hopefully) stay in a really cool hostel.
Peace out!
