Thursday, September 25, 2008

reason 481 that I simultaneously love and hate China:

Today I bought a DVD of Wanted (possibly one of the greatest movies ever), and a pomegranate, for five kuai each, ( .75 cents), only to arrive home and find that a) the pomegranate was far from ripe, and b) the movie was entirely in russian.

Moral: You can get anything for dirt cheap in China, but nine times out of ten it takes at least a few purchases before you get the right thing.

Funny thing about jing weather that I have learned in the last week is that Asia does not believe in Fall. last week it was 85, this week it is 4o. Yesterday it actually felt like Seattle: drizzling rain, freezing cold. It was a rude awakening to what is in store for me in the next 6 months. I have absolutely no concept of how cold it is going to get - 20 below means nothing to me since I have never lived anywhere really cold (yes it gets that cold in Jing). Farther north its even worse -- The festival that I really want to go to in January - the Harbin Ice Festival (google it), can get to 40 below because it is right on the border with Russia... probably pretty near Vladivostok dad, I don't know if you ever had to go there in the winter or anything.

Was supposed to meet up with Emma last night but she went MIA while I was I luckily had other friends from Qingdao who were at Kokomo so I just went over there to chill with them. There was a good latin band playing a mix of Buena Vista Social Club and then really loud other spanish songs so it was a weird mix. We rambled around from there to the opening of a new club at which we stayed approximately three minutes until we saw the menu and realized that a shot was 180 Kuai. ($25). Then we went to Bellagio, a dessert place, and I got a fantabulous passion fruit ice cream creation which reminded me of when we used to make passion fruit sauce at the Hodges in NZ. Steffan got a towering monstrosity of shaved ice and pean paste / other strange asian things, and proceeded to eat almost the whole thing. Impressive.

I also had some inexplicable problem with getting things from the plate to my mouth even though I had only had two drinks, and they had been early in the night. First I blamed it on the chopsticks and rice, buuuut then I did the same thing with my ice cream so I guess I'm just a klutz, luckily the three others were much farther along the drinking line than me so they really didn't seem to mind I was using my shirt as a tablecloth.

Friday:

I am leaving for Vietnam in 3 hours!! I also just learned that tropical storm something-un-pronounceable may make my life a rainy hell while I am there. I am hoping this is not the case but the weather on my dashboard shows ominous thunder and lighting clouds every day for the next week in both Hanoi and HCMC.

The actual schedule of my trip is kinda up in the air now because I am planning on riding the train from Hanoi to HCMC (40 hours) because I was too cheap to pay for a flight, and I will probably choose a few places to stop and get off along the way - Hue sounds cool and so does Hoi Anh.

Then I'm hopefully going to have at least two days in HCMC to explore at the end of the trip and maybe go on a tour of the mekong river delta which is supposed to be a world of floating markets and stilted houses and awesomely cool.

Ciao

Monday, September 22, 2008

Qingdao is my new favorite city

OK.

I have been reeeeeally bad about writing in this. Reason: my boss has be doing a completely pointless task: looking up the contact info for 2,000 companies so that he can make some other poor minion cold call all of them - possibly the most retarded idea on the planet. Anyway, I have been doing that for the past week and a half nonstop.

Short summary of last week:

Did lots of work, and drank lots of contaminated milk (something I leaned this week). Apparently there are 60 people in the hospital from drinking bad milk from a chinese dairy that had mercury or something in their milk... lucky for the government only foreigners drink milk, so at least they killed off people they were already trying to get rid of. Sidenote: behing me Adam is listening to the titanic theme song and whistling along. he now tries to justify it by saying it is the piano version, not the one with that "woman-with-the-big-nose". Now he is humming very badly.

ok now on to the part that is actually interesting, because really, lets face it, I do a lot of the same things over and over again in the Jing.

QINGDAO BEER FEST!!!!!!
Firday:

Frantically pack / try and get my life together enough to leave the office early to go to the airport for a 6:30 flight (the train ride is 5 hours so since I only have two days flying looked like a better option). Keep frantically rushing around. Rush Rush Rush. Finally, at 3:30, I finished everything I had to do and started to turn my thoughts to the wonderful weekend ahead of me, when I noticed a flashing button on my screen. New Message. Fuck. From a boss. Even more fuck.

Hey Liz you there?
Yeah X, whats up?
I have a quick task for you to do for me.
Ok, what is it? (it better fucking be quick..I'm leaving in 30)
Can you make the screencast into a presentation for a client by Sunday?
WTF.
Yes of course X, let me just pack my computer into my bag and take it on my nice vacation with me so that I can work all weekend so that you can go to the New Jersey shore.

So I set off to the airport with a considerably heavier bag than I was planning on. Also, because of my attempt to get some of it done in the office I left way to late and had to take a cab all the way to the airport: 150 kuai, thats like 10 toaster ovens or enough top ramen for 2 months.

Next step: get cab from airport to hostel

Got into Qingdao only to find that no one had ever heard of my hostel, or the street that it was on, and that the number I had taken from the hostel's website didn't work. So I sat trying to have a really bad convo in chinese with the policeman to explain to him that it was a place where young international people went while the cab driver looked on, vocally expressing his disgust with this stupid foreigner. Finally the policeman realized where I was going and told the cabbie. This theme of no one having ever heard of the hostel reoccurred all weekend.

Get to the hostel, do about an hour of work, get a call from Jeff to tell me the other two can't come, so its just me and him - completely not what I wanted for the weekend. We tried to go out but I just really wasn't in the mood cause I was so pissed it was just me and him for the weekend. Only bonus of the night: eating Chuar at a street stand after the clubbing idea fell through.

Chuar stands are just a rickety old grill and a few tables set on a street corner and are usually packed with chinese people eating, playing cards and drinking. All of the different foods are on skewers and you can point to the ones that you want them to cook for you. After grilling them they finish it off with a salty/spicy powder that makes it almost impossible to taste the thing you are eating. I had green beans and roasted garlic. It was awesome.


Man cooking Chuar on the streetcorner

Saturday

Woke up, realized that the electricity is turned off, because it is china and the city cant produce enough electricity for everyone so they randomly shut shit off from time to time. Had some grub then took a good look at the city, which was exponentially more beautiful than Jing. Qingdao used to be a german colony, so the european / german architecture is still very clearly visible in the city. It also has the tree lined streets of a european city, and hills, something that is sorely lacking in Jing. Our hostel was at the top of a hill in an old observatory, so we had an amazing view out over the city and got the full benefit of the breeze coming in from the ocean. I cant even begin to express how amazing it was to see the water after two months of landlocked-ness.
After breakfast we made friends with a big fat german dude, and two colombians who seemed cool, and went to the Beerfest with Jeff and big fat german dude at 2ish. I was very confused at how empty it was since I was expecting Oktoberfest style crowds, i.e, not being able to move as early as 9 in the morning). Turns out chinese don't show up till 6 or 7.


Its at the fairgrounds so there are an abundance of rides and flashing lights and people yelling. I don't recommend it for epileptics. There was also more food than I have ever seen in one place at one time, and of every variety you could possibly want - squid, prawns, bread, cotton candy, and lots and lots of Chuar. Met up with the Colombians, and drank some more... I was getting a bit sauced at this point so I had a long discussion with them about Colombia and latin america and how awesome it is and how everyone should go to Colombia...which now I am really excited to do at some point.

Met up with more new people - Ashley and Charlene, friends of Martin, one of the Colombians. Jeff was at this point completely blacked out, so I left him with the others and went with Ash and Charlene to go meet the rest of their friends. On the way we ran into a security guard with a segway and convinced him to let us ride it around in circles for a while.

Once we met up with their friends crazyness ensued and the night went into full swing. One of the guys in the group got up on stage and started belting out chinese songs to the delight of the 99% chinese crowd, and us girls went up too and completely got in the way of the chinese dancers . We also inadvertently advertised for a cigarette company by dancing in front of their booth for a while. This became really wrong when we realized that the little packets we were throwing into the crowd were free cigarettes. Finally managed to get everyone out of the gates and into cabs when it closed at 1o. Went to a delish seafood restaurant and were joined by Steffen, who somewhere along the way had the good fortune to come across a giant inflatable beer can - This became another addition to our company.

I think Qingdao Beer Festival is the best place to experience chinese hospitality. As you can see from the pics below, we made friends with many middle aged, shirtless chinese men over the course of the day. My favorite were the guys at the restaurant who sat me down at their table and proceeded to make me gambei my way through all of their beer. Gambei means cheers, but it literally translates to "drink to the last drop", so it means you have to drain your beer.

My protest that I couldn't chug beer fell of deaf ears and every time I took gulp of beer the guy next to me immediatly refilled my glass to the top, sometimes before it had hardly left my mouth.. They also made me eat Abalone.. which I did so as not to be rude. It was chewy and tasted like ocean. I saved the shells because at the time I thought they looked really pretty... I just took them out of my bag and they smell like rotting fish, as do the rest of my clothes.

More pics from the night:
The Yoda adorning the very messed up ears was a gift from MacDonalds, and the other pic is of Charlene mid-fall on top of Mortiz

Sunday:

None of the cab drivers knew my hostel, so after leaving the club I just went and stayed with the rest of the girls at their hostel since they had free beds. We all decided to go to the beach the next morning, so this made it completely necessary for me to find my way back to the hostel to get my suit. After asking 10 cabs I gave up completely. I could kind of tell where I was in relation to my hostel so I just started walking in the direction I thought it would be in.

On the way I went through one of the most chaotic street markets I've ever been to, that extended for probably 3/4 of a mile up a hill on narrow rabbit warren streets. The streets were so narrow that the umbrellas from the sellers on wither side met in the middle and made the whole thing feel like you were walking through a tunnel of food, smoke, cooking, and chinese people. Every five feet there were people cooking various concoctions - I had more Chuar, and some fried bread with banana in the middle. Qingdao is known for its seafood, so there were huge open vats of clams crabs, fish and prawns, all still alive and moving around. The grossest things were the big trays of brown maggots, which people fry and eat, that were feebly rolling from side to side.

The little things in the bowls are live scorpions. Turtle and scorpion stew, yum yum.


After about 30 mins of wandering through winding neighborhoods where everyone stared at me as though they had never seen a foreigner, I made it back to my hostel, changed and set out for the beach with everyone.

The beach was so much better than I was expecting, having heard horror stories about polluted chinese beaches. It was beautiful, but unfortunately my camera was out of batteries at that point. The beach was in a bay slightly north of the city so you could just see the skyline in the distance. There were traditional chinese fishing junks pulled up on the beaches and bobbing in the water, which although not clear, at least didn't look all that polluted. The breach was pretty crowded with old chinese men in speedos (not a pretty sight), but there was still room to breathe. The water was the perfect temperature and the bottom was sandy and shallow. Just tasting salt water made me feel like I was home again.

After a few hours of sleeping and swimming it was time to go back to the hostel and unfortunately pack to go home. I for one was not ready to leave this sunny, unpolluted, wonderful city and go back to monolithic rainy Jing... but at least I'm going to Nam in four days.

Sorry this is such a long post. In the future I'll try and post more regularly when I travel.

Caio

Saturday, September 13, 2008

New Day, New Cell Phone

Up until last night I could say that I had never lost a cell phone. Stolen yes, broken yes, but never lost, which is amazing with the amount of things I lose. At least it was only a 300 kuai cell phone.

Went to Viks last night, complete shit show.. My bright idea to spend less money on alcohol was to buy the fifth of vodka down in the apartment complex store and drink some of that and a few red bulls before going out... Great CMC style plan... but the result was that I still drank the same amount when I was out and ended up just way to drunk. In typical me fashion, I ended up making friends with a random group of guys with a table. They were all from different countries in africa and I kinda felt like I was in Lord of War or something (in a completely non-racist sort of way,I am well aware that all africans are not war lords). There were two girls at their table already who gave me evil stares the whole time I was there.. I bet they thought that I was trying to steal their men....not so, I just wanted their alcohol, my mind tends to one track there first before mistering around.

Then I lost my phone. I have no idea when. Ernest said that I fell on my bag and broke it or something.... so maybe I broke the phone then, its a bit hazy.

Woke up still completely shwasted at 11 and went to carrefour to buy a new phone. After a 45 minute attempted and failed conversation in chinese about how I wanted to keep my old phone number (because it is already on my business cards) I bought a sweet phone with a touch screen!! the first nice phone I have ever possessed. I had to change my number though which sucks cause now all my b cards have the wrong number. They are sweet though and say Module Lead... I'm uber excited for the first time I get to give them to someone!!!!

Philosophical Section:

I really like all of the people I have met over here but the more people I meet and the more time I spend with them I realize how amazing everyone I knew in the US was. I'm never going to meet someone like Jess, who lights her face on fire taking a shot, or someone like Gardiner whose wit sent people to counseling in middle school. Unfortunately this means I am still spending way too much time on Facebook and Skype living vicariously through everyone back home. I still would much rather talk to Jess on Skype for 10 minutes that hang out with my friends here for a whole night. That sounds bad.. they are all really cool, its just no one can replace the people back home. I guess its the: "make new friends but keep the old, one is silver and the other's gold" sort of thing. (yeah girl scout songs).

Peace

Thursday, September 11, 2008

And so it goes..

Very boring week here, just working and sleeping. Up until yesterday I hadn't been paid yet over here (since pay comes every month), so I have been exceedingly broke and unable to do anything. Luckily I finally got paid and was able to pay adam back all the money I owed him, which was an epic sum. I also can't go anywhere on the subway because I have managed to lose my subway card (second time), but I can still ride the bus because they are always so crowded that no one notices if I don't beep in. If I get caught i'm sure the penalty is forced "re-education through labor" for the rest of my life, probably not the best gamble for the 2 kuai savings on bus fare.

I'm also slowly starving from lack of food since I am too lazy to go to the grocery store. I have now run out of every possible food source and for the past two days I have been living on eggs, which I can buy downstairs, and Tahini. Tomorrow I am going to force myself to do an entire day of cooking and shopping so I don't get scurvy from not eating enough green things.

This week is the mid-autumn festival (Moon Festival) and so everyone is giving moon cakes, the traditional present. These are little round cakes with some sort of paste inside, usually red bean paste or lotus root paste. One of my favorite books as a kid was about the moon festival, so I'm pretty psyched (the real reason might be that we have no work on monday!). I was planning on going to the beach or Shanghai since we have a three day, but I learned ten minutes after dropping my passport off at the Vietnam Embassy that you can't travel anywhere in China without your passport, and mine will be out of commission for the week. I would LOOOVEEE to get out of the city and breath clean air for a few days but I guess I'm stuck staying here instead; I think i'm going to become an artiste over the weekend. I drove by an art gallery yesterday that said: "Invisible Art Installation: You Come in and See Nothing" I don't know if it was just a bad translation or some new modern art ploy.

Anyway, thats about it - still going to the Qingdao Beer festival next weekend, although unfortunately emma dropped out and now its only jeff and I, which is going to be awkward because of previous bad decisions, hopefully it will still be fun, i'm excited to see the ocean and drink beer, I don't think anything could ruin that.

Ciao

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Gossip Girl is Back!!

The best show on the planet is back and now I can download it because the chinese government has decided itunes is no longer subversive!!!! I'm trying to get Adam and Shobhit to watch it with me, but they are resisting my amazingly well crafted arguments. Shobhit says he will only watch it if the narrator, Kristen Bell, becomes a cast member that he can actually see, instead of just listening to her voice. I also just learned from his google search that she became a veggie at 11, how admirable of her.

The first episode was decent, the usual: adultery, sex, expensive clothes, and of course, Chuck Bass. I'm looking forward to episode 2 which I am currently downloading. It says it is going to take 4 more hours.... hopefully I will not be so excited that I stay up until it is done..... but that may happen, and I feel like being tired from watching gossip girl is an even worse excuse than being tired from being out too late drinking.

Now after disclosing that I watch one of the most worthless and indulgent shows on the planed I feel the need to immediate counteract this with a pretentious literary discussion.

List of the "Best Books in the World" ( *for my sister)

Cannery Row - Steinbeck
On the Road - Karouac
Endurance - Lansing
1984 - Orwell
Collected Short Stories of Pushkin - Pushkin
Freakenomics - Levit
War & Peace - Tolstoy
Madame Bovary - Flaubert
THe Count of Monte Cristo - Dumas
and of course... Head First Java

*I compiled a list of books for my sister to read since she and I have different taste and both want to branch out. I'll post her list below mine since I have the utmost confidence in her taste in books as she is a librarian and likes to read. I left some of my favorite books off of this since she had already read them, but to supplement the list, the "Best Books in the World" also include: Hamlet, The Drifters, The Far Pavilions, Anna K, Brothers K, and Animal Farm.

My sister's List (that you should also read:


1. Animal Dreams - Barbara Kingsolver
2. The House of the Spirits - Isabel Allende
3. Obasan - Joy Kogawa
4. Savage Inequalities - Jonathan Kozol
5. Desert Solitaire - Edward Abbey
6. The Edge of the Sea - Rachel Carson
7. Prisoners Without Trial - Roger Daniels
8. Wild Swans - Jung Chang (ok, this should wait till you're somewhere where it's not banned)
9. People's History of the United States - Howard Zinn
10. In the Time of the Butterflies - Julia Alvarez

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Justification for going home for xmas

I said that I was not going home for xmas... but my desire for in-n-out overcame my desire to lounge on a beach in thailand. I'm kidding, I'm not completely heartless, seeing my family is really my number one reason for coming home. Here are some others in no particular order:

1. In-n-out
2. Blackbird Toast / Soup
3. Clean ocean air
4. The water
5. Mattress that is not a box spring (it actually bruises my ribs, no joke)
6. FRIENDS
7. Jalepeno Poppers from San Carlos
8. Ferry
9. Double Tall Nonfat Latte w Irish Cream
10. Gordo & Slink
11. Seattle / Browers Fries
12. Ovens / Dishwashers / Driers
13. T&C lunch breaks with the dancers that turn into all day and night adventures
14. The Pub
15. Hot tubbing with Gardiner & Anna
16. Having a selection of non-asian men to choose from at midnight on New Years Eve.

I am very excited for all of the above.

Right now my plan is: Thailand 18-23, stopover in Seoul for 10 hours (i'm really excited to explore), Seatown 24-30, SF 31-4. If you are going to be in any of those places any of those times lets get loooosthee.. I need to stop talking like an aussie. I think their slang might be better than ours though - Especially the blanket kangaroo noise of Yeeeeooooooww, which can be used in every situation; there is also an accompanying dance.

Fun site of the day: Getmooh.com
this site is awesome, I am going to use it next time i need to get off work early or something... ooops sorry Ray, but adam has burned down our apt, I have to go.

Other useful knowledge of the day, more for people from BI since we all actually do outdoorsy things, between campaigning for Obama and shopping at Whole Foods: The Ten Essentials. I've heard many different lists over the years, but I did some digging around today and this is I think the most pertinent to the PNW. I think you many be able to substitute sunscreen for space blanket since we have no sun, unless you are going snow climbing, then its pretty important and you should also bring an ice axe.

Ten Essentials:

1. Water / Treatment device (there is always so much water around that a treatment device is probably the best call)
2. Map
3. Compass
4. First aid kit
5. Knife w multiple functions / blades (preferably one with a corkscrew for opening your end of hike wine and beer)
6. Light / extra batteries
7. Fire starter / matches
8. Extra clothes, especialy a hat and gloves / Space blanket
9. Sun protection
10. RAIN GEAR / poncho / tarp

I've already told Nat that we are hiking in the snow to the hot springs out on the olympic peninsula..... i'm pretty stoked, but I think it will be a hike on which all the ten essentials are actually essential since A. we have bad luck, B. people from Seattle are not used to the snow and anything could go wrong, and C. it is winter in WA, you never know, I don't really want to die. We are also going to bring the 11th essential: beer since it will be cold out... forget the fire.

Weekend is already over

I really don't like having to think of titles for each post. Each post is about lots of random shite so an "overarching" title is a little hard to come by unless you work making advertising slogans and are good at catchy taglines for useless crap.

Now reading: War and Peace, Larissa Volokhonsky & Richard Pevear translation. I should say continue reading since I read a few hundred pages in SF before I left for china but the book was too heavy and big to put in my checked luggage. This is supposed to be the best translation, and so far it is much better than the last copy I read which was a really old translation that probably missed the eloquence of Tolstoy's style. I also read Anna K by them, and it was fantabulous, so I'm very excited for this translation.

Last night I went to Kro's Nest with the Iveys and had real pizza for the first time in a month - it was amazing. I had pepperoni and then got to do my customary explanation of why I eat pepperoni and bacon. I need to coin a new phrase for my dietary habits because its really an annoying five minute explanation that I and kinda sick of repeating.

Afterwards I had a tug of war between going home and not spending money since I really don't have any until I get paid on the China side, or going to an ATM, running my US side dry and going out with Em, whose plan for the evening includes white rabbit, which only gets good after 4 in the morning. I decided that you only have saturday every six days so the right decision was to go. Most of the night was uneventful and even boring since I was sober and didn't like the music they were playing at White Rabbit later, but the Hip Hop concert we went to first at Star Live was AWESOMEEEEEE!!!

There were two acts and it was all in chinese so I understood nothing, but the crowd was really into it so we were too. The fist group was three guys who just rapped to beats by a DJ, a lot of which were pulled from US songs, and then the second group had a backup band and sang over that. T he frontman for that one puzzled me for a long time because I could tell he wasn't entirely chinese but couldn't figure out what he was, later we learned that he was half Chinese half Swedish. Strange combo. They also freestyled for a while and beatboxed... all in all it was wickedly tight / off the hook. I wonder what they are rapping about though since they can't criticize the government at all. A lot of Hip Hop comes out of criticism for the system and the man, so I feel like it must be tough to be so limited is your lyrics.

Rest of the night was blah, the only highlights were onion rings at Nashville and watching Gossip Girl at 6AM when I got home.

This morning I woke up and met the Iveys again at PangJiaYuan market where we shopped for a few hours. I got an awesome ring.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

trapeezing tortugas take flight

This was a subject line I got on an email yesterday. 

I saw white people in my apt complex yesterday!! I did a huge double take, a very noticeable one.. it was a group of five really good looking guys so I'm sure they thought I was blatantly checking them out or something - great - maybe this complex isn't so bad after all, I need to start reading outside more so I can meet some of these elusive attractive white men without chinese girlfriends. 

link for the day : Cool Beans

ok.. damage to the phone from last night, which was epic: someone named Yalf, who thinks I am going to an open bar BBQ with him tonight, and Mari, which is my drunk shorthand for Mariel.  

I experienced one of the most morally questionable points in my life though last night.  I realized I was pre-gaming, by myself, while watching Schindler's List. 

Went to Saddle in SanLiTuar again, drinks were half off. woot. On the way there the cabbie in the car next to me stated singing my darling Clementine at the top of his lungs, probably for my benefit, and was really excited when I rolled down my window and joined in.  After Saddle there is a long progression of bars, and an attempt to go to Vicks, only to get there and then be too cheap to pay the 50 Kuai ($6) cover.  Instead we headed across the street to Alpha for 80s night.. and the night gets a bit blurry....Kebab Stand...my only jean skirt rips all the way to the top while climbing onto a stage w Mari....get convinced to stay despite said ripped skirt because luckily the rip is right over the pocket so I was still somewhat clothed....all decide to wake up early in the morning and go to a pool party... somehow get home. 

Really though, so far Beijing is like college, just with way more traffic and pollution (I know, I know, LA is pretty bad in these two categories too)

Woke up, have done nothing all day except for discover that adding bacon grease to eggs makes them 10 times better.  I bet bacon grease makes everything better, I should make a book: Cooking With Bacon Grease - Gourmet Adventures of a Vegetarian

Toodles

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Friday has come..woot

Watch This: Daily Show - Palin (if you watch the daily show you have already seen it. John Stewart is indeed a national treasure.

Just finished reading The Long Walk by Slavomir Rawicz. It was an amazing story. I would definitely recommend it; their journey was of the same caliber as Endurance, (Ernest Shakleton) - the epic journey their crew made from the antarctic to South Georgia Island.. think Eight Below but the dogs become food....

I Survived my first entire week back in the office after working from home for three weeks. It might almost be better not to work from home because i'm so much more excited for the weekend now, and waking up at 7 every day definitely curtailed my expenditure on alcohol.. which is a good thing because I spend far too much money on that. I am keeping a spreadsheet of my accounts, so I know. I think the need to put everything in spreadsheet form and analyze it with in-sheet equations may be the mark of a CMC student. I also learned other useful things too, like the economic effects of overdeterrence for cannibalism etc..

Speaking of cannibalism, I watched an awesome episode of the IT crowd a few days ago where Moss thinks he is signing up for a german cooking class but really he has answered some german dude's add looking for someone to eat. Great show, I highly reccomend it... but I think you can only get it in the UK or off of youtube.

I was supposed to leave for the beach today, but I have way to much work this weekend, so I had to cancel. Hopefully I can go next weekend. Im going to go to the pool with Alicia sometime this weekend though hopefully to tan.

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

I want to live in a Hutong



Although my apartment complex is supposedly one of the nicest in the city, and has a patch of greenery, and there are ferraris in the parking garage I still fucking hate the place. It is a soulless russian compound and I am planning on escaping as soon as I possibly can.

I realized just how much I hate it last night when I went to an apartment warming party at this awesome Hutong up in the north section of the city. This place was SO cool. It was a traditional Hutong, so one story, with a central courtyard surrounded by rooms (I will post pics shortly). The central courtyard had a little table to sit at and a BBQ for grilling and the whole thing was very cozy and authentic chinese, unlike my apartment complex. It was in a traditional Hutong area; a labrynth of narrow alleys connecting the different houses, usually crisscrossed with laundry and overgrown with vines. It is also a better area of people my age because you can bike to all of the major bar streets. They had decorated the place really well and had hung up prayer flags, which their neighbors were angry about because it could be a sign of them supporting Tibet, heaven forbid.

They have an extra room that I could move into right now, but I paid my rent through october and It would be an extremely low move to ditch out on Adam and Shobhit without warning.

Back to the night:
Veronica met up with me at Dongjiamen station and then we went together to try and find his apt.
I think we must have gone through at least 50 large beers, which are each only two kuai, so it didn't set them back too much I think. We played some classy card games, also known as Kings Cup and Indian Poker.. the later was an awesome game requiring even less mental capacity than Kings Cup if that is possible. All you do is draw a card, stick it to your forehead while making indian war sounds, and then bet sips of beer on whether you think your card is the highest or not.

We also played Wii for Baijio (I spelled that wrong) shots for a while... but that was nasty. I won a free breakfast at Rickshaw off of Jeff so I need to claim that pronto... since I have a love affair with rickshaw food.

At 2 in the morning we went for Tuar (things on sticks) (I was supposed to be asleep at this point), eggplant on a stick, bread on a stick, chicken feet on a stick - you can really get anything on a stick in china. I left in the middle of the meal since I was so exhausted and had quite the interesting cab ride home. Kind of on the scary side in a funny way actually, but not as bad as when we hit that pedestrian in SF. My cab driver kept saying I was Hen Piaoliang (means pretty) the whole way home ... all thirty minutes of it, and then when I went to get out of the car in my parking garage at Pinguo, he grabbed my arm and said I love you like 8 times in english and wouldn't let me go.. it was annoying since I was already in a bad mood from being tired and knowing I had to get up in 6 hours. I think I just made an indiscriminate angry noise, yanked my arm away and marched off.

Michael is my boss

I thought it would be time to honor you with some choice quotes from my office life. Keep in mind these are all from my boss.

From email response:
"It won't bring them any consequence if their decision blocks our
mission critical cheese from outside access for a few days, of
`coz they won't care."


he then goes on to quote a chinese proverb:
It seems more likely we are a victim of
certain subnet blocking, just as a old Chinese saying, when the
city gate catches fire, the disaster extends even to the fish in
the moat


From weekly memo:
It is a great challenge to many of us. However, we can imagine how a client would choose someone to work with them who can't build an effective communication with them?! What if we are the client, can we hire someone who can only speak some dialect from a remote African area?


It gets worse:
And I certainly do not want to get that feeling again, because we, the XX team, is a far better team than any of those so called great software companies. We have talents, we have passion, and mostly importantly we are a team. No one should have the privilege to look down on us.


Then, here is a fun excerpt from an MSN conversation in which he asked me to test a jewelry website we are working on:
Me: I don't know how to buy diamonds either since I've never bought one, but I can check for bugs
Boss: After this, u will know, it is something you will have to know in the future
Me: haha.. we will see. It depends on how much money I make
Boss: well not ur money, ur future husband's money
Me: WTF?? hahah (I did not actually say that)


Further proof that my office is the office: we have a weekend outing to watch the mummy 3, even though 3 engineers already replied to the thread saying it was so boring they fell asleep. We also get a "present" at the movie... which I have no doubt will be popcorn.

Now that we are on the subject of quotes, I will share a few of my all time favorites from my all time favorite movie. If anyone can guess the movie you get a prize -and it won't be popcorn, I promise. I don't know what yet, but it will be shiny. This contest excludes all of the people I know who also love this movie (Jess).

"Stop talking Mika or i'll put you back in the trunk"

"What are you going to do?" "What I do"

"Get in the trunk" "Aaaa i'm not getting in there, there's a dead man in there"


Here is another ridiculous one from Three Musketeers:

"Athos it is your wife I tell you" repeated D'Artagnan. "Do you not remember how the two marks agree?"
Athos: "And yet I should have thought the other was dead - I had hanged her so thoroughly!"

My favorite part of the book is pages 250- 253, where Athos locks himself in a innkeeper's cellar and drinks and eats his way through the entire thing. I'f I could reproduce the entire three page section here I would, but that would be a lot of typing.

I'm going to the beach in two days! i'm going to get bronzed!

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Reflections on the First Month (coming soon)

I guess I never filled this in and now it is reflection on the first month and a few weeks.  

When I first got here I was pretty dubious about whether I would like China or not.  It was a actually very different than what I had been expecting.  It did not feel like a foreign country to me, but more like I was living in chinatown and knew the rest of the city was somewhere, but couldn't find my way back there. I think this is because there are so many american restaurants here, like Pizza Hut and KFC, that I still feel like I am somehow in the US. I really didn't like that at first, although on the flip side it is very fortunate because I can get any food I need, even cheetos, but not in-n-out. Another reason for this is that the architecture is not vastly different than it is in the US. Because industrial China has been built in the fast 30 years, it could be any city in the US. Once you start looking at the cultural sites this is clearly not true, but if you stay downtown you tend to forget this. It is very different from in a european city, where the architecture is so different that you are constantly reminded you are in a culturally different place.

I was also a little homesick, which I expected since in Prague I missed people for the first month. My parents are out sailing in BC (British Colombia for those of you who don't know Canadian lingo) and I would LOVE to be out there with them despite all the alternator and engine problems they are having. I haven't been able to spend a whole summer on the boat in years - the past summers its been a few weeks here and there between jobs and traveling. There in nothing better in the world that packing a bag and casting off from civilization* for a month or two. I had a completely different set of clothes that I would take with me, summer hippie clothes, but most of the time I just wore a swimsuit anyway, and no shoes, there is nothing better than dock planks and bare feet. I would pack a obscene quantity of books or just bank on the "take a book, leave a book" at Refuge Cove having something good and devour them at an alarming rate over the course of the trip, I would be Palin's nightmare. Actually, my whole family would be Palin's nightmare. I bet my sister, a librarian, my mom, an ex-Planned Parenthood volunteer, or my dad, a generally ridiculously well informed farmer (ha), would kill her with vicious rhetoric. Anyway, this is supposed to be about China, not about how I miss Desolation Sound, and hate Palin so i'll shut up.

* our boat is not roughing it, I have a door on my cabin, and we have two heads. BUT it still is a sailboat, so much better than all you noisy pig boaters with your trailer park dogs and outboard dingy motors that are larger than our engine.

I also miss everyone from CMC, and had a great flashback session looking at the 6:01 pictures people have already posted from last night. Some people I miss more than others, and strangely I miss a lot of people I didn't think I would, and the some people, who I was really tight with, I don't miss at all. Then there are all the outside CMC people that I know from home, abroad and SF. I miss all you guys too, luckily i'm coming back to The Rock for xmas so i'll get to see everyone; I'm pretty fucking excited for that.

Enough sap, unless you know me really well you probably didn't think I was capable of it. haha. I remember from freshman year I told Chels I was nervous since a bunch of the guys were coming to the dance show we were having, and she looked at me in shock and said: "Mundty... you have emotions???" haha, I guess I've changed a lot since then though. Many thanks to everyone who made me better at that..

Now that I have a bunch of friends here its much more fun. The pollution is back, so now the city isn't quite as nice as it was during the olympics, but the fact that I know my way around more now makes up for that. I could see myself spending definitely a year here, and maybe two, who knows, it all depends on the people I meet.

So I think that is a pretty good summary for now. My parents will be pleased at this post, as they said that they thought my blog was to party-heavy.

Anyone who wants to come visit, I would be ridiculously ecstatic to show you around my new home, maybe make sure you are one of the people I actually miss though first. (I'm kidding, I love everyone who flies across and ocean to see me). I know most of you are Ibanking and so won't have vacation until you die from muscle atrophy in your cubicle.... but if you ever do get vacation... asia is awesome, and cheap. I recommend it.

Peace

Monday, September 1, 2008

September!

Just finished reading: The Three Musketeers by Dumas. This book is great as long as you love action movies or are a guy. I think the Count of Monte Cristo by Dumas is better though.

Starting to read: The Long Walk, true story about two Polish men who escaped from a Soviet labor camp in Siberia and walked all the way to India across the Himalayas. So far so good, but last night it made me dream that I was a French POW in WWII.

Anyway, back to life;

I'm going to Vietnam in 3 weeks!!!

The weather has been spectacular here for the past three days...I had forgotten what the sun looked like when it was not obscured by a layer of smog. Although to be fair, I have had it pretty easy the past month because of the Olympics: In August this year there were 16 days of "excellent" air quality, last year there was 1.



I finally made it to the llama temple on Sunday, but only lasted there an hour or so because it was so hot outside. Llama temple is a fully functional Buddhist temple, so it was packed with chinese people praying and burning incense. It was really cool to see them pray because it was much more interesting that watching catholics sit in their pews, but I felt very awkward being there since it was so obvious I did not fit in. Since I am atheist I am a tourist to all religions, but I felt much more like a disrespectful foreigner here than in the cathedrals in europe.

It was such a nice day out that I asked Alicia, who grew up in Beijing, where a good swimming pool was. I guess I probably should have specified a good tanning pool. She gave me the name of one and I set off on the subway to find it. I had no idea where I was when I got off the subway so I asked a woman on the street, and luckily enough she was going there with her daughter, so I just waled with them. I payed my 30 kuai, changed, and then armed with my tanning oil, sunglasses and a book went to to what I thought was an outdoor pool. I was sadly mistaken... It was a indoor, lap swim pool. I must have looked so funny standing there dejectedly in my sunglasses and bikini while everyone else was in swim caps and goggles.

Came back to the apt very hot, sweaty and not tan, and crashed on my bed for a while until Adam came home and I could grill him about his third date with the chinese girl he's been seeing (I am living vicariously through him since there are no men in beijing). Apparently he agreed to work at her school teaching english on the weekends.... its really ridiculous the things guys will do for girls, like one time when someone created an entire pool party just because he wanted to hang out with a girl..... it was an awesome pool party though.

Anyyyyway... i'm already getting excited to eat in-n-out over xmas break.... its going to be a long three months of anticipation.

Caio