You See What I See

Jay vs Chinese International Post - Round 3

I have been away for over four months and have had no success in getting any physical materials into or out of the country via the postal system.  Not a big deal, except for the fact that I have business to attend back home that requires documents to be sent about.  Plus, I would like some pop-tarts and the power adapter for my electric razor.  And my Xbox 360.  And my cat.

Anyway, I will try once again to bend the postal system here in China to my will, and hopefully the world can have some non-digital proof that I am yet alive.  Not that I'm sure I want the world to have it...

In other news, I have recently completed a move to a new apartment, a mere one floor below my previous place.  It is largely an empty shell, but it is tremendously spacious.  I have one room that I use entirely for drying clothes and I've still got more raw space than I really need.  As much as it seems odd for one person to have so much room, it is my most sincere wish that the school doesn't try to squeeze another teacher in here.  Bathroom-sharing here would displease me.

In the next post, expect some woes, but not too many woes.

Culture Stress

The experience of living in abroad has it's own little version of the stages of grief, made up of the following : Honeymoon, Frustration, Understanding, and Acclimation.  Much like the stages of grief, the stages shift around quite a bit, and you don't necessarily always progress through them linearly.

More and more, the Honeymoon stage seems long gone.  No surprise and no distress about it, but the "everything is fun because it's new" part of the experience has just kind of faded away.  Most days I spend shifting between Frustration and Understanding.

Today, however, seems to be solidly Frustrating.  I've said it before, but ultimately everything here is more difficult.  First, because of the obvious issue of the massive language barrier, and second because everything is just naturally more difficult in one of the poorest parts of a developing country.  After awhile, there's a lot of stress involved in doing seemingly simple tasks and that stress can get to be a little much.  

I think the only thing that can possibly make me feel better is if I go out and find a hamburger.  Fortunately, I know a place.

Here come the men in blur

In case you haven't heard, they sell DVDs of dubious origin here in China.  

One of the teachers passes a street vendor selling the all the latest and greatest, including a compilation disc that  includes 10 or so big films, the highlight of which is Men in Black III.  Of course, this close to the film's release, he can only assume that this is the bootleggiest of available bootlegs, but at 6 kuai (appx 1 USD,) the price is right.

He gets home, expecting to find a lousy, video cam-captured version, and - in fairness- that's what he finds.  But he also finds that the cameraman has tried to capture the full movie-going experience for his at-home audience by recording the 3D version of the film.

Going to the theater is expensive here, but in all honesty, it's nice to know that you are definitely going to get to see the movie you've paid to see.

...I feel like maybe I just jinxed my next trip to the movies...

It is always, ultimately, about ducks.

Posting from a -surprise- fairly spotty connection, so I will be brief.

Today I saw three of the scruffiest-looking ducks rampaging across an untended veggie stall.  It was harrowing.

S.O.S.- The tiger needs a family

This situation is not a surprise to most of the people that would read this blog, but I'm hoping maybe by posting here I can reach the right person.

Here's the thing; I left a cat back home in Phoenix when I left for China.  I love the little guy, and he's been through a rough time lately, and the people I left him with can no longer keep him.  I absolutely need to find someone willing to take him in, as I don't want him to go to a shelter.

I've knocked on a lot of doors without luck, but this thing really needs settling for good.  If you read this and can help, let me know.  If you read this and can't help (directly), please, please, please see if you know someone who can.

Me, illuminatin'

Guiyang is a...thickly peopled city, with approximately thrice the population density of Phoenix, and the skyline reflects the premium on horizontal space.  The school I teach in is on the 13th of 26 floors, and my apartment is on the 7th floor of my residential unit.

Elevators are are often slow, unreliable, packed to capacity, or strangely absent (sometimes you can see a hole in the wall where one used to be, though!) so I spend a lot of time on stairs.  In what I'm assuming is a cost-saving measure, no stairwells that I'm aware of in Guiyang are always lit, or even lit throughout nighttime hours. Instead, stairwell lights are generally linked to sensors.  Back home, motion sensors seemed to be the usual go-to sensor for security and what-not, but not here.  These sensors are dependent on sound.

But it's China, and many of the sensors are improperly or inconsistently calibrated (or just plain broken,) meaning most of my trips up or down stairs requires some combination of the sound of my footsteps, the sound of me whistling, the sound of me shouting, or the sound of me clapping.  Not every sensor responds to the same sounds, and not every sensor responds every time.

Today I got tired of waiting for the notoriously slow elevators at school, so I decided to fly down the steps.  Around the 5th floor, I picked up a tail; a 5 or 6 year old girl from the school on that floor.  Chinese children seem to be insanely reckless, and even though I was descending at a nice clip, this little girl thought she had something to prove by stomping down right on my heels.

I guess I had something to prove too, because instead of letting the little girl pass me, I thought it would be more fun to let her chase me.  At the 5th floor, the stairwell is no longer on an exterior wall, but entirely dependent on the stairwell lights for illumination.  It can get a little terrifying.  But me and the little girl were racing, and a little darkness wasn't a big deal, until partway down the third floor when it was clear no more lights were going to be turning on.  I clapped.  She shouted.  Nothing; just blackness below.

Well, I'll tell you-  I hesitated for a moment, and I think the girl did too.  But then I went for it.  I pounded down 2 and half floors in almost total darkness, hoping that nothing unexpected had found its way onto the stairs.

I made it to the lobby unharmed.  I went and had KFC for lunch.  The server tried to speak to me in English, but I confidently maneuvered the conversation with my limited Chinese.  I drank a big Pepsi and I thought about how fun it is to live in China.

It wasn't until much later that I wondered if the little girl on the stairs safely made it out of the building or was swallowed up by the darkness.

That Time of Year-

First, I just want to wish all the Phoenix Comicon folks good luck with this year's festivities.  I hope I won't be missing out on the next one!

So, what's new?  Well, I got myself a Hoover Ball, and already all the male teachers are hooked.  Was there ever any doubt?  The bad news is it's been storming all week, and no one wants to go outside in it.

Pretty soon I'll fire up a post about some of the challenges of my language-acquisition experience.  This...isn't easy.

Challenge: Accepted

Mid-term in the Middle Kingdom

I don't know exactly how many students I have, but I suspect the number approaches one hundred.  The time has come to write their progress reports, and my first obstacle is converting all the documents into something my computer can read and edit.  This is going to be a tough slog.

The school recently provided me with a DVD player for my apartment, but I don't have any DVDs...well, except for the first season of My Little Pony given to me as a gift by one of my fellow teachers.  I guess that it will be my company while I work.  I will keep everyone posted on my sanity levels.

More commanding!

Commanding Elevation

Sorry again for the short post, but I'm still without the internet at my place.

A couple of weeks ago I climbed to the highest point in Guiyang and took some photos.  This is not the best one I got, but it is interesting in that you can see in the distance a new city basically being built from scratch.  I've been through it once or twice, and it's like a post-apocalyptic ghost town; bunches of empty skyscrapers, and wide, empty streets.  Apparently the government is trying to re-center the city away from "old" Guiyang, and move it out there.  I guess we'll see how that goes.

Internet is still down (as is my hot water- Thanks, China!)  So I can't post anything comprehensive.  The best I can offer is another photo.  Also, my exasperation at having a class in which one student got a 6% and another got a 96%.

Hanoi!

We had intentions several weeks ago to try to get to Thailand for a holiday, but it proved cost-prohibitive.  Instead, we have arrived in Hanoi!  The internet is pretty sketchy here, so I'll keep it brief for now.

Enjoy a photo!

Hoofin' it

Finding new things to see or do can be tough without the help of a native Guiyanger, but I've been trying my best to hunt up new sights by just walking all over the place.  The nice thing is that it's a pretty small city, area-wise, and the weather is pretty decent lately.  The bad news is that we are up in the mountains, and the terrain is not by any means level.

What I've been told about exploring is that it's generally a safe policy to walk wherever you want, unless someone yells at you. So far, so good.

I'll post some pics of my trekking adventures, but first I wanted to share that it looks like I have the video situation sorted out!  Enjoy a sample!

Potpourri

I don't really know how the schools work here in Guiyang, but something happened that resulted in a 7-day work week for me.  Anyway, I got some rest and I'm working on getting my apartment cleaned up after I just tornadoed into it every night for the last week.

As my brain is a little to squishy right now to write much and the internet is behaving too poorly to post too many pictures, you're getting a whopping TWO new photos now!  Hooray!

History

I don't know if I'll ever get over how deeply saddened I am by the events that brought me to China.  That being said, tonight I had drinks with a man that marched at Tiananmen  Square.  

That's something.

Cool, Cool Guiyang

Spring seems to have finally sprung in the land of precious sunlight.  The birds are swimming, the bees are singing and everywhere Chinese people are playing badminton and taking pictures of the blossoming flowers.  Guiyang is not what I would ever call a "clean" city, but it is certainly working on being properly beautiful now that the winter is fading away.

I remain a tad under the weather, a result - I imagine- primarily of working in a school, far from the familiar germs of the grown-up world in the U.S..  I thought I was pretty much ready to put my winter cough to bed, but last night I was treated to a vivid dream about suffocating, and I woke up to totally blocked sinuses.  I took a shot of Nyquil and a dash of "Chinese medicine" - a mysterious powder I'm supposed to mix with water and drink three times a day- and woke up coughing up all kinds of green goop.  Within about two hours, everything seemed more or less cleared up.  Bottom line- I have no idea what's been going on with my respiratory system since I got here, but I'm totally jazzed about being actually "healthy" at some point while I'm here.

I walked quite a bit today, including a short hike up a little mountain near the school.  While crossing through the intervening neighborhood, I saw a mother holding a little girl over an open sewer so the girl could relieve herself.  It was not the first time I saw something similar happening today.

On the way back, my hiking companion and I were stopped so we could be photographed with a Chinese gentleman.  His female companion (wife?  girlfriend?) spent a fair few moments pointing the lens of the camera towards her own eye, displaying it to us, the prospective photo subjects, via the lcd viewing screen.  It was a great example of the big Jinx on China.

I haven't yet figured out how to upload videos from my camera, but when I do, I have a great one involving me and a taxi and a somewhat irregular series of movements through traffic.

That surprise I alluded to several days ago?  Well, the situation has changed a little, but the news is still big.  and cool.  and amazing.  It involves a week-long holiday at the end of April.  Any guesses?

My Neighbor Laowai

One of the fun things about being here in a less-developed part of China is that foreigners are still fairly uncommon, so we catch a lot of attention.  People shout "Hello!" at us in the streets pretty much every day, we get eyeballed quite a bit, and every so often we get a round of drinks at the bar.  Following is a fun instance of being special because I'm not Chinese...

Yesterday I found the Totoro store.  I was wandering around near school when I found a little shopping complex with a store entirely dedicated to merchandise based on Hayao Miyaziki's My Neighbor Totoro.  The shopkeepers made quite a fuss over me, going so far as to mime how I might use the Totoro oven-mitt.  As I was leaving, I was asked if I would take a photo with the shopkeeper in front of a giant Totoro mural.  Apparently they don't get a lot of Western shoppers.

Anyway, I totally neglected to get my own photo in front of the mural, but I did nab one outside the store.  I know Gemini loves Totoro, so I'll try and get back and get a proper picture.

Another Birthday Surprise!

Today was Jenny's 5th birthday.

Jenny is a charming little girl who I'm pretty sure has a severe case of ADHD.  She's smart enough, but she doesn't really play ball with the whole classroom thing and usually spends most of the lesson either on the floor, behind my cabinet, or with her arms wrapped around one of my legs.  One of her favorite things to do when asked "Jenny, how are you?" is to yell "I'm a Jay!" or, alternatively "I'm a sandwich!"; at which point she laughs her fool head off.

In a delightful turn of events, Jenny gave ME a birthday present:  as she was demonstrating her mastery of the concept "I'm angry!"  Jenny socked me solidly below the belt.  In honesty, I'm kind of surprised I went this long without a taking a shot in the crotch, but I was still hoping my streak was going to last.  The class spent the rest of the lesson working quietly on a cut-and-paste worksheet.  I was somewhat concerned about giving them scissors.

In other news from tonight's lesson, Charlie declared- in Chinese- that I am a butt and that he is a butt, and, eventually, that his present condition (how are you?) was "tired, hungry, and," again in Chinese, "butt."

A Fantastic Birthday Dinner, and Surprises on the Way...

A friend of the teaching staff had a birthday today, and we celebrated with cake and presents at the office, followed by dinner at a restaurant next door to the school.  This was easily the nicest restaurant I've been to so far in China - we ordered using an ipad, if that gives you any indication- and we managed with a few gift certificates to have a 5-person dinner, with drinks, for about 20 dollars total.  Go China!

A birthday surprise was revealed during dinner, a surprise that will involve me- and thus, all of you- in the near future.  What could it be?  Stay tuned for mind-blowing amazingness!

Yet another Chinese thing happens...

I walked out of school today to find a man with about a 10-foot length of scrap metal, trying to dislodge a blanket that was draped over the electrical cables stretched between two nearby buildings.  He didn't really seem too concerned about anything short of his goal of retrieving this blanket, which seems to be the way the Chinese in general think.  At any rate, he managed to free the blanket from the first tangle of cables, only to have it fall onto a single, thinner cable below.  Without pausing to reassess the new circumstances, the man tugged at his makeshift hook again and ripped the cable free from one of the buildings.

Well, he got the blanket down, but at what price?!?

The Greatest Meal on Earth

I haven't been here that long, but sometimes I feel very comfortable and very at home.  I can get to and from work, I can get most of my essentials pretty easily, I have friends, and -of course- I have the internet.  I can't really manage a lot of semi-complicated tasks, and -I found out yesterday- the book store is pretty much useless to me, but mostly things aren't THAT bizarre.

But then, China every once in awhile needs to assert its Chinese-ness.  I'll reserve for a time when I have pictures a post about the meat-market I found while wandering through the alleys of downtown Guiyang; for now, I'll just tell you about my dinner last night.

I was with another teacher last night, wandering around, and we decided it was time to eat.  Often we'll try to go somewhere with a menu that has pictures, but last night we sort of allowed ourselves to be enticed into an establishment that didn't have this foreigner-friendly feature.  It started off harmless enough, as we stood outside this particular restaurant while I tried to skim the menu posted outside for anything I recognized, until a representative of the establishment took notice and came out to try to talk with us.  My spoken Chinese is extremely rudimentary, so my companion took the lead.  Unfortunately, we just couldn't seem to get much sorted out.  Over the course of a few minutes, at least three other employees came outside to try to communicate with us.  At some point, the other teacher managed to convince them to bring us a menu.  I can recognize a handful of characters regarding food items, but I couldn't figure anything out this time.  At the point we all probably should have realized that our efforts were in vain, we decided to finally go in and just let allow whatever was going to happen to happen.

What followed was at least another five minutes of ordering, including fruitless referencing of a Mandarin phrasebook,  at least one apology from what appeared to be the restaurant's owner ("Sorry, my English....no.") and quite a number of pantomimes of animals (including: cow, pig, and fish!)  

Eventually, we did manage to get served a decent meal, and while the ordering process had been quite an adventure, what really topped off the whole experience was what happened in the lobby about halfway through the meal.

The other teacher and I were chatting when my eyes were drawn to something behind her.  In mid-sentence, I stopped and said "I need you to look at the floor, right now."  There, in the center of the lobby was an big fish, flopping purposefully across the floor.  Wherever it had come from was obscured from my view, but it had managed to carry itself a good 6 feet, given the trail of water behind it.  In my heart, I wanted more than anything to see it reach whatever destination it intended for itself, but -alas- a waitress stepped up and wordlessly, expressionlessly, bent down, picked the fish up, and deposited back from whence it came.  The waitress then returned to work as though nothing had happened.  I was a little too shocked to be certain, but I'm pretty sure she didn't run off to wash her hands. 

And that's sort of been my experience in China.  Nothing ever goes quite according to plan, and nothing is ever quite a you'd expect.  Something, somewhere is always just a little off and it never seems to be in the way that you might anticipate.  

I think my plans for the day included climbing a mountain and people-watching.  Wish me luck!

A few more images...

What's behind the door?

I sometimes feel a little rude for snapping pictures of all the insane things that make up day-to-day life here in China, so I try to shoot with a little bit of circumspection.  As I sneaked my camera out to capture this guy, he meowed loudly and knowingly.  His vigilance is unparalleled.  All hail the convenience store Guard Cat!

Precious Sunlight!

This monkey will take your stuff

We'll have to reboot the whole system!

I am furiously getting my new netbook reconfigured before I have to use it for work this weekend.  Electronics are one thing that are certainly not cheaper in the People's Republic, but I was able to do all right getting a pretty affordable replacement for my wayward machine.  I even tried my chops at haggling - though through a Chinese interpreter - and I was able to drop the price of my machine an extra 100 Yuan (about 15 bucks.)  In the end, I got an extra 5 percent off just by asking for it.  Not a big deal, but a small victory.

Monday, as I said, was gorgeous.  The sun was out all day, Guiyang dried out, and it was practically hot outside!  I didn't need to wear more than one pair of socks, and I even shed a sweater before the day was out.  Not bad.

I spent the day with one of the other teachers and Qinling Park, a nice little bit of green space and mountainery in the middle of the city.  Here's the big deal- they have monkeys, monkeys just running around.  The monkeys have over time become quite accustomed to humans and are just fine about getting close to -and aggressive with- people.  I was happy to have my camera at the ready just after one monkey decided he wanted some purple soda more than one of the park-goers did, unfortunately my internet connection is going incredibly slowly tonight and I haven't been able to successfully post a picture despite about a half an hour of trying.

Hopefully I'll be able to fire up a picture or two tomorrow, but then it's the weekend when I work basically 8-8 both days.  After that, I think I may have a couple of free days to get recalibrated, get some pictures posted, and generally take a little breather.

In the meantime, I'll just share a little bit about the streets of Guiyang.  On one of my earliest nights here, myself and few of the teachers walked by a little alley where people were selling puppies.  Since then I've come to find out that this is a place where puppy salesman often come with their cuddly wares.  Apparently, one can purchase a puppy on the street here for as little as 150 Yuan (about 23 dollars.)  That is, of course, unless there are people there just trying to get rid of puppies they can't afford to take care of, then you can get them for even less.  Cute and sad, all at once.

Bad news, everyone!

We got spoiled by a positively gorgeous day on Monday, but I can't post pictures right now because my netbook was stolen last week!  Terrible!  Hopefully I will be back up and running before next Monday!  Miss you all, and thanks for the comments.  I will do my best to comply with requests!

We interrupt this gloomy winter for a little sunshine!

I'm busy lesson planning this afternoon, but I wanted to post a couple of quick pictures of a sunny day in Guiyang!  These were shot from the hip, so apologies for the quality!

China giveth...

Things are usually pretty great for me here in China, but as I said in the last post, nothing can really be relied on here.

Last night a pair of other teachers and I went out for dinner with the aim of going to one of our favorite street vendors.  Unfortunately, they had completely packed up their tents and tables and disappeared.  Will they be back at some point?  Have they quit the food-service industry?  Did they find another location?  We may never know.

But that's sort of how it goes here.  Sometimes things go really well, and sometimes they don't, and there doesn't seem to be any explanation.  For instance, yesterday I actually did get to take a nice, long, warm shower.  Today, my hot water cut out mid-shower.  Is my hot water heater broken?  Is there some setting on it that's wrong?  Is there a certain amount of time (+24 hours?) that I need to wait between showers in order to have hot water?  Most importantly, this was not a problem when I got here- it only manifested in the last 5 days or so.  What happened?  Who knows?

At any rate, I started this post by saying things are going great, and they are.  I'm well-paid for what I do, my job is enjoyable, my coworkers are fun to be around, food and most necessities are exceedingly cheap for someone with my salary, my apartment is HUGE, and everything around me is just generally pretty amazing.

The thing is that I'm about to post some pictures of my bathroom, and it is a pretty dire place.  It makes me sad, and it should make you sad, but I don't want anyone to worry too much because most everything else is just fine.  The Chinese just don't quite seem to understand bathrooms, is all.

Maybe I'll just leave you all alone with this picture for a little bit.  Stories of joy and wonderment to follow!

From The Land of Endless Summer...

I'm told "Guiyang" means "precious sunlight," and I don't know if I've ever heard a more appropriate name for a city.  In the month I've been here there have been two days in which the sun dared poke its head from behind the clouds, and neither time was it for very long.  It seems to be always drizzling or foggy out, and oftentimes I can't see the mountaintops surrounding the city. 

On the bright side, it seems like Spring will be arriving soon.  The days have been warmer than in the first few weeks since my arrival, and there doesn't seem to be quite as much need for me to wear all the clothes I own in order to go outside for the day.

My apartment here is on the 7th floor, and it has a MASSIVE patio area that seems like it will be ideal when warmer, dryer weather comes around.  As for now, it's just somewhere I can stick my head out and see how bad the weather is for the day.

Weather issues aside, I'm having loads of fun.  I had my first week of teaching my own classes just last week, and it really is a fun and -mostly- easy job.  The kids are pretty adorable, and they often show me a lot more affection than is probably necessary.  Still, it's hard to turn down free candy in the middle of a long work day.

Right now, I'm sitting on my bed with a bottle of peach juice, wondering if my water heater is working properly so I can have a nice, long shower.  I guess this demonstrates two lessons I've learned about China so far: 1.  The orange juice here is VILE, and 2. You can't ever really count on anything.

I miss everyone a bunch!  Make sure to post comments!

Here's a view from my place on one of those precious-few, semi-clear days.  Can't wait to send pics on a totally clear day!

Out for a walk one day when I spotted this piece of architectural nonsense.  I can't explain it, and I'm not sure anyone involved in the construction of this building could either.  Madness.