Monday, August 31, 2009

Lots of Days In Summary

I am going to write in short blurbs. I wrote this entry last night, then the internet in the web cafe went down. It was actually somewhat entertaining, because though I lost this entry I did get to see an amazing show when all of the World of Warcraft addicts got angry at being disconnected. I thought a riot was about to erupt, there was so much yelling and waving of fists and brandishing of empty water bottles at computer screens. I just sat there and played solitaire waiting for the internet to come back while they endlessly typed passwords and hit reconnect every 10 seconds, all the while screaming into microphones "Can you hear me now? The internet is down! I don't think I'm connected to the voice server... can you hear me NOW... how about NOW?" After half an hour I went home and resolved to write a concise version today.

First and perhaps most important was Bob's departure from Hangzhou. I felt a pit of sadness erupt when I finally saw Kate and JJ off after my going away party, and it only deepened when Anita left. When I saw my mom, dad, and brother for the last time for months I felt like the pit in my stomach couldn't get any worse. When Bob left, I realized that I was truly alone. I kept telling myself it was like the other times in China, but in reality it isn't. I had the option of readily available American culture in immediate interactions with Americans should I need it, but this time around I only have the comfort of Chinese friends. I have noticed that I miss small things that I didn't know I was so addicted to before. I miss sarcasm, inside jokes from youtube videos, talking about which football team was favored to when what, and dozens of other small pop culture points that just can't be understood by foreigners. I am happy over here, there is no doubt about that, but I am also very aware of a certain emptiness. Something is missing. I am not sure who or what it is, but something is missing.

I went to Beijing last week, but most of the trip was spent eating and sleeping. I started getting sick before getting on the train to Beijing, and it only worsened once there. I ate a lot of great food (yes, I have pictures and videos), and in between meals I basically slept. I think in retrospect that I got hit by the flu, and I hope that was the case, because then I am immune for later this year. If I am not immune, working with 60 kindergarteners will definitely give it to me.

I have been busy the last few days finalizing preparations for beginning work. I went through the health check, registering at the police station, and the preparing of lesson plans for classes this week. There are so many stories I am neglecting, but after a few days have passed they don't seem as amusing as when they first occurred. I can't wait until I get internet in my apartment so I can update frequently and truly share my experience in China.

Students arrive tomorrow, and I am very nervous. Apparently Bob crashed and burned in one of his three college classes, and instead of focusing on his success in the other two I am worried about his failure in the one. I have discovered, after much preparation, that kindergarten is going to be much harder than teaching college ever would be. Especially since I am working for the foreign branch of the most exclusive and famous Kindergarten in Hangzhou. I didn't realize how well known it was until I started telling people the name, and after many of the same responses I am starting to feel the pressure.

Thankfully, the faculty has all fallen in love with me. They are all just amazed by my Chinese, and think I am just the best thing since sliced bread. The first day I met all the teachers we were supposed to meet at the school at 8:30, but my coworker decided not to come. He had many excuses including back pain, headache, our contract not saying we start until the first, and being tired, so I just let him stay at home and sleep and rolled in by myself. After 4 hours of the Chris Marco show, I called him to wake him up and meet us for a big lunch in our honor. At the lunch (which I got LOTS of videos of) we ate at an epic Chinese version of Benihanas. I am stating now that anyone who visits me in Hangzhou must go with me to this restaurant. It is pricey in Chinese terms, but it was so nice and so amazing. All the main teachers were at the lunch, and I basically did all the talking and impressing since my cooworker does not speak Chinese. I was his translator for the meal.

The headmaster has told me that the faculty likes me, which came right after dinner and was said in a very direct way as if to criticize my coworker Phillip. In addition to what had already occurred, it turns out that the Chinese people have a lot of trouble understanding his English. He was hit by a car 15 years ago, and after a 10 year recovery when he speaks he sounds very much like Ozzy Osbourne. I must admit I have trouble understanding him at times, too. I am not sure English teaching was the best career choice for him, but I'm committed to helping him as much as I can. Our headmaster is already attempting to get him to work at the branch below us instead of our branch, so we'll see how things work out in a few weeks.

Aside from that, I've been frequenting karaoke places with friends in the last few days. I have learned many new Chinese songs since I came to China, and I've been totally dominating the karaoke scene. I'm pretty much awesome.

Monday, August 17, 2009

The Return to Crazy Fat Uncle Joe's House of Noodles and Fixin's Featuring Lil Wayne and Lil Jon

We finally made our return trip to my favorite restaurant in all of Hangzhou. The name started out simply as Fat Uncle Joe's noodle house, but it has since evolved to being so much more. After ordering he yells the orders back at the kitchen, yells any modifications to the kitchen, yells at the kitchen to hurry up, and in general just yells at the kitchen. It is so entertaining, and that in conjunction to the full view of the kitchen through the big windows means dinner and a show!

This is the legendary place that serves the best green been dish in the south, along with a whole assortment of great spicy foods and noodle dishes. We introduced some of our friends to this place, and the result was eating 5 meals in the last 3 days there. They liked it just a little bit.

We also went out to karaoke and to a tea bar, but those pale in comparison to the glory of food (obviously). The karaoke itself was quite fun, but was mainly me singing Chinese songs. Every now and then the Chinese friends would sing with me, but they all seemed so uncharacteristically shy. Bob and I noted the price of imported liquor, and decided we have to go back since it's the only place you can get a bottle of American alcohol at a reasonable price without going well out of your way. That means better karaoke stories hopefully coming soon.

The tea bar was a bit of a let down, when we got there they were near closing so the selection was limited. We decided on cold iced Chinese teas, and drank them with whatever food products we could force them to bring us. The Chinese were excited about the tea, Bob and I just needed to eat something.

A small side note, as I was on my way to the webcafe to compose this I got to witness a sting on local cart vendors. They are not legal when selling fruit and other food, and when the police showed up they flying in every direction. It was pretty crazy, I'd never seen the police actually crack down on the street vendors before. This means no more salmonella pears. Damn.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Karaoke Ambush

With Bob now in China, it seemed the time was right for our first big night out in China. The plan was originally dinner and a movie, but that changed to dinner and a bar after dinner took a very long (though enjoyable) amount of time.

We ended up at a seafood restaurant for dinner, though when it came time to order we discovered that none of us Chinese or American much cared for seafood or knew how to order it. Undeterred, I was elected captain of ordering food as usual and proceeded about the business of selecting my culinary desires.

This restaurant, however, was different from normal restaurants in that it had no conventional menu. Instead, Culinary Captain Chris had to go to the front of the restaurant to look at the displays of fresh ingredients and already made dishes to make selections. Luckily the waitress had suggestions, as I didn't know which of the 15 fish options displayed before me were good and didn't know how any was prepared. I have pictures to document the entire trip, and perhaps the best part was her convincing me that ordering a duck would be a great idea. The whole thing came to the table, and we got some good pictures of our Chinese friends and us trying to figure out how to eat the duck head.

After dinner, we decided to head to a bar to see a concert. One of the friends we were with had sat next to a musician on a train a month prior, and he had told her his band would be playing at a concert downtown on the very night we were out, so we decided it was worth the trip to go check his band out. Bob was conquered by time difference tiredness and didn't make it, and thus I was the only white person on this adventure. In fact, I was the only white person I saw in the entire bar despite it being very nice and seeming to cater both in higher price and decoration to western tastes. I should have immediately known that being the only white person would have implications for what would happen later in the evening.

The music was great. We arrived in time for the second set, which was mainly them singing covers of American songs. When we entered they were singing Sweet Child of Mine as their closing song for the second set, and I must admit they sang it quite well. After a short break they returned, and the third set was them taking requests written on napkins from the audience. My friends of course asked me what some of my favorite songs were, and we started writing them down to turn in. The first we requested was played, so we requested another. This one was turned down, and my friend didn't understand and really wanted them to play it. The last requested song they played was "Hotel California", the only English song that was requested. It is worth noting that Hotel California (加州旅馆) is insanely popular in China, the entire audience sang along while they played it. After Hotel California, they proceeded to take requests only on the condition that you come up and sing instead of them. The people who came up to sing were, surprisingly, quite good. Meanwhile, my friend still wanted them to play my song, so while a guest singer is singing she goes up to the lead singer (the guy she knows from the train) and asks him to play the song for me. He sees that I am a foreigner, and laughs and decides it will be the next song.

This is where things took a turn.

The being the only white person came back to bite me at this stage. He prefaced the next song with, "This is for our foreign friend here tonight, we are glad he came out to hear us. This is 月亮代表我的心, and he is going to come sing it with me." I did a double and triple take and decided I could not handle this. Backing out was not, however, an option. I went up and told him I only knew the chorus, not the verses in between. He told me no problem, we'd just do the chorus, he'd sing a verse, then I'd do the closing chorus. The 'quick' version felt anything but quick though. I started the chorus with him, and then he dropped out leaving me singing alone in front of shocked Chinese people. They didn't think I actually knew the song apparently, and didn't know how to react. After I finished the chorus there was insane applause as he started the verse, and then as the applause calmed down he urged me to finish the verse with him. I proceeded then to kinda make noises to go along with the tune, but I really had no idea what the words were. This part, for me, was extremely embarrassing. The crowd didn't seem to mind though, because as soon as I got to the chorus they erupted again. After I finished singing there was a good amount of applause, and I apologized into the microphone for only knowing the chorus and not the verses. Hearing me SPEAK Chinese and not just sing a memorized song made them even more crazy. The song after was the last song, and so I got to leave before too many people came up to swarm me with attention.

And that was my night in China.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

The Return

Blogspot, I have discovered, is blocked in China for the moment. As a result my mother will be posting my bloggings for me. I have taken pictures to document my journey so far, but I will not be able to post them until later. The room I'm staying in does not have internet access, so I am using a computer at the local web cafe. Once I get internet I will be able to email pictures from my own computer, and then my mother will have to figure out how to use technology to upload pictures for me.

The plane ride was glorious. I had no waiting time in Newark, as soon as I got to the gate I saw that the plane was already boarding for Shanghai. There was no one to either side of me on the plane, and I got to lay down and sleep for most of the ride over.

Once I got off the plane, however, an epic fiasco began. I had thought my preparations were thorough, and that by giving ATT extra money for international service they would provide said service. I was wrong to assume that things worked the way they should. I discovered that my phone did not have service. I didn't panic yet, as I figured my contact would be waiting to pick me up with a "Chris Marco " sign just outside the gate. I was wrong about that, too. I began to panic, and went to figure out the public phones. I bought an IC Card required to use the phones, but that didn't seem to work either. On closer inspection of the back of the card, the card told you (after you paid for it) that it could only dial other local Shanghai numbers. My contact's numbers were all Hangzhou cell phones. I went to the information desk and bought a SIM Card (expensive) to put in my cell phone. I called my contact, but I couldn't hear what he was saying and he couldn't hear me. I called a friend, and asked her to find my contact and let him know that I was here.

After her playing middle man for a bit and doing some research, she tracked down my contact and he called me. He told me not to move, and 20 minutes later found me at the information desk. He apparently had gotten lost in the airport, and for some reason went to the gate where the flight from Los Angeles was coming in. We took the bus back to Hangzhou, and the troubles only deepened.

I had asked David, my contact, many times if he would get me a reservation or if I should reserve a place for myself. He assured me not to worry, and that he would get a place for me. As it turns out, he hadn't made a reservation, just gotten the prices of several places. Every place we went to, as a result, had of course filled all the cheap rooms, and only the expensive ones were left. We went to the dorms I had stayed before, and after 30 minutes of David yelling in the local dialect and walking back in forth between 2 administrative buildings to talk with different people we finally got me a dorm room. It turned out to be pretty inexpensive, and it is pretty fun being back in the place I stayed last summer, but the process of getting there was quite a headache.

The other problems I've run into involve Wells Fargo conspiring to try and keep me from getting money. I advise anyone thinking of coming to China to not use Wells Fargo. They are dumb.

Problems aside, it has been pretty awesome being back. I've kept a positive attitude, and the difficult experiences are nothing compared to the awesome ones.

I opened my first Chinese bank account, got swarmed by people in Auchan who were impressed by my Chinese and wanted to tell me all about the house appliances I was looking at, and learned that a Papa John's had been put in next to my gym. I found my old roommate and celebrated his birthday with him, met up with my old best friend, and had countless reunions with people I don't remember in the cafeteria. It seems like every other time I walk around campus people I don't know come up to me knowing my name, it is a rather interesting phenomenon.

I got my gym card and went to my first workout, and the people at the gym are all excited to have me back. The entire trip so far has felt like some sort of an odd homecoming. The food has been great as well. I have already experienced a lot of my old favorites, but I will spare you the food stories until I can upload pictures.

There have been changes as well, but nothing too drastic. The Papa John's was a nice change, on the other hand the random guy sitting outside this internet cafe with cages full of frogs for sale is not quite as welcome. I'm already falling into the rhythm of "this is China" and not even thinking twice about weird things I see on the street. The insanity has begun.

I think today, right now in fact, I am going to explore B and Q. If I recall correctly it is an Ikea competitor, and I am going to go jump around on the beds until someone yells at me to stop.

CHINA