Unrequited Chinese Hug Affairs

Occasionally I feel that my China experience has been a string of awkward conversations and events. I romanticize home as a place where one does not often have to think about the proper reaction to, for instance, receiving an impromptu gift of a vacuum packed whole chicken; or, trying to read the awkward smiles in our dinning group as they explained that the soup I just ordered for us is traditionally only for pregnant women. While these these memories make me giggle, there are a few moments that actually make me physically cringe, the majority of which involved my very American custom of hugging.

With the exception of young lovers on the subway and in dark corners of parks, and perhaps grandparents with babies, Chinese people don't really hug. Greetings are typically a handshake or a nod and a hello. That is not to say there is no physical contact, quite the opposite in fact. Female friends walk arm and arm down the sidewalk, stroke each others' hair, and hold hands. Male friends might throw an arm around a friend's shoulder, or lay a hand a buddy’s thigh while seated. But the big, warm, welcoming, so happy-to- see- you- I -just- can't- contain- myself American hug, just doesn't happen.

I recall one unfortunate hugging event in Dalian when I was teaching. First let me say that considering the proximity of our ages, I was already informal with my students. We would occasionally eat lunch together in the student cafeteria and chatted informally outside of class. And since I taught at a branch campus nearly an hour away from my apartment, I rarely saw my students outside of that distant campus. So, one weekend when I saw this particularly outgoing (dare I say favorite) student in the middle of the Saturday shopping crowd in downtown Dalian, I was surprised. For a split second I lost my cool and gave him a big hug! He on the other hand remained rigid, neither concave to accept the embrace, nor convex to avoid it. His arms were clamped firmly to his sides and his face shown a look of sheer panic. The embrace lasted about a half a second, as I regretted it the moment I committed. This wasn't the first time one of these unrequited hugs occurred. I have had similar experiences with both females and males and I thought my past misfortunes had cured me of such moments of American caprice. In fact, I think this self restraint has seeped into my behavior with foreign friends, ironically making ME the non-hugger!

My friend has pondered the same cultural difference, but from the Chinese perspective. He speculates Americans' hugging custom is a function of our small population [in comparison to that of China]. He reasons that the tradition developed from pioneer days when two people might have come upon one another in the wilderness and embraced out of relief from solitude. Thus the hugging trend began. While I find this to be slightly oversimplified, I'll grant that we hug more than our crowded UK and European neighbors with whom we supposedly share other "western" customs. Even the French "bises" keep you at a greater distance than any style of an American body to body hug!

This leads me to my next awkward hug experience that recently occurred with one of my Chinese roommate's suitors. After an evening out of barbecued meat, beer, and banter, "Old Zhao," as my roommate affectionately calls him, said that he heard that Americans hug. Then he asked me if I could teach him HOW to hug! It was only then that I realized the complexity of this custom. Who can you hug, under what circumstances, and how? The answers are something like: definitely not your boss, not the first time you meet, and .....there are many options.

How to hug? Who goes under? Who goes over? Do you cross? Pat or no pat on the back? Squeeze? How tight? Where does you chin go? When you think about it, hugging can get slightly mechanical for us too. If you linger a moment too long in a hug, it could be misinterpreted as an advance. There are best friend hugs, family hugs, lover hugs, and sweaty sporting event hugs. Girls often do the one armed side hug at formal events so as not risk wrinkling or smudging all that they've prepared. Guys do that slick handshake into a hug and slap on the back combination.

I chose not to attempt to explain all this to Old Zhao at 11:00 PM on the sidewalk outside the rowdy smokey restaurant. Instead, I taught him the crisscross, slight squeeze, with a pat on the back hug, and added the caveat to not use it the first time he meets someone.

Safe?

Spring Festival Was a Blast!

Though I have spent two years in China now, this was my first chance to experience the entire Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) season. This post is delayed because, as the title demonstrates, I have found it impossible to come up with an original way to describe Spring Festival. If you are living in China, this is old news. But for those who have never experienced the tumultuous weeks of Spring Festival, read on...

Spring Festival shares a common quality with Christmas in that the expectation is to return home to pass the holiday season one's family. And as the capital, Beijing is much like Washington D.C. in that holidays mean a mass exodus from the city. Yet, while D.C. drains via freeways and airways, Beijing's population gets pumped out one train full at a time. According to the Chinese Rail Ministry's numbers, (as reported in China Daily) nearly 5 million of the China's 1.3 billion people are on the move via rails in the first 10 days of the holiday season. You can imagine the fear/anxiousness/dissatisfaction related to buying train tickets that pervades the holiday season. For example, when two friends/acquaintances run into each other, a common greeting is, "Have you eaten yet?" Yet, in the weeks leading up to Spring Festival, the question changed to "Have you bought your tickets yet?"On the street, in grotty noodle shops, and around the office, I could count on overhearing conversations about buying train tickets. I heard accounts of marathon queuing sessions, counterfeit tickets, black market tickets systems, fights at the ticket counters, and even confessions of general discontent with the country's governance, precipitated by these travel troubles. Most of these conversations end with everyone shaking their heads and grumbling, "tai ma fan," meaning "too much trouble/hassle."

After witnessing all this, I became terrified to even attempt a trip during the height of this period. Instead, I stayed in the ghost town university district of Beijing. Part of me assumed that I would pass the most significant Chinese holiday with Chinese people. But, by the time the big day arrived, any Chinese friends I had made in Beijing had returned to their home towns. I had a couple of offers to return to home towns to pass the holiday. However, one was impossible because it necessitated plane travel and my passport was locked up in the visa office over the holiday. The other was from a dear male friend who said that, though he would like to invite me to his home, doing so at Spring Festival would send the wrong message to his family! So, while I regret not being able to give an account of a family celebration, I can describe my enjoyable experience with some great foreign friends as we celebrated our version of Chinese New Year’s Eve.

We were set on eating dumplings, the traditional food eaten at New Year’s celebrations. I was never sure why this was so until a friend's uncle explained that in traditional Chinese folklore monsters ate everything except flour based foods. Thus, the tasty meat and vegetables are encased in protective unappealing dough to keep for humans only. (Though, the story was in Chinese, so I may have missed some details. Please feel free to set me straight.)

After stuffing ourselves with dumplings at a modest restaurant and celebrating a bit with the owners, we took to the streets with fireworks and "baijiu" (see the previous posts to know why this is actually a terrible combination). The atmosphere outside the restaurant was frigid and fanatical; explosions of light and sound came from every direction. Taxi drivers hauling inebriated passengers dodged erupting roman candles placed in the middle of the street. Pedestrians took cover in alleyways as rolls of firecrackers hung from trees fired without warning. Yet despite the peril and noise, I met no Spring Festival Grinches. There must be something about the power to create minor explosions that makes for inquellable smiles for even the most experienced merry makers. Through the strobe effect of firecrackers I watched childrens' expressions flash between glee and horror as they clasped their hands to their ears.

We made our way to the Drum Tower square and set off our own fireworks along with hundreds of other jovial Beijingers (including a surprising amount of foreigners, whose presence I attribute to the one line in the English events magazine article suggesting that the Drum Tower district was the place to be for New Years. If it was a conspiracy to keep us all in one place, it worked well!) The tradition of lighting fireworks at New Years stems from the now loosely held superstition that racket scares away monsters and evil spirits making for a clean start for the new year, void of hassle from ill intentioned ancestors lurking about.

The highlight of the evening came at midnight when Beijing citizens simultaneously lit their most expensive fireworks and the whole city spewed bright colors and sulfurous smoke in unison. Our crew was separated in the confusion and chaos but rejoined at club to dance away our numbness from the cold and take shelter from the explosions that continued for the rest of the night.

While setting off fireworks is technically only legal on two nights of the holiday season, the noise in my apartment complex continued day and night for two weeks straight. Here are a few video clip, just to show you how close to buildings, people, trees, cars, these big explosives are being lit.

Here are two clips from midnight. Notice the nonchalance of.....everyone about getting scarily close to these explosions.


This is a clip from my apartment window. And yes those sparks are really falling that closely.

Baijiu and Obama back to back

Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) has arrived. Heavy duty fireworks and firecrackers are exploding everywhere day and night. The university through which I ride my bicycle to work every day is eerily devoid of students, with only broken suitcase handles and wheels littering the ground as evidence of their mass holiday exodus home. And, restaurants everywhere are hosting Spring Festival banquets for companies and institutes all over Beijing. The need for these events can be compared with the obligatory company Christmas parties in the US. In the US, these company parties are awkward. People are forced to dress up and talk to each other about non-work related things, drink, but not indulge. The whole thing is a tightrope walk between business and pleasure. However, with all the lines of “professional” behavior slightly skewed in China, I got the feeling that these banquets in China are actually enjoyed!

Our institute’s celebration was a family affair that began in a banquet room filled with balloons, confetti, and plates of sunflower seeds and candy on the tables for munching. Staff members brought their wives/husbands and children to watch performances of our institutes’ own employees in a kind of talent show. One researcher joined his daughter in a magic show complete with a release of a parakeet (which then took 10 minutes to catch). A five year old boy showed the crowd of 100 his Taekwondo moves. A group of male post-docs performed a skit with jabs about how little money they made. Their female counterparts performed a dance routine in cut off jean shorts and tall black boots. Others sang Chinese pop songs on a Karaoke screen or performed a more traditional poetic story in the style of San Ju Ban (Three and a half sentences). The top prize went to the administrative and research staff that performed a Spanish conquistador partner dance with costumes and recorded blaring brass music. After the performances we were invited to play Chinese chess and word puzzles and then make our way to a nearby restaurant where the real party began.

Our group occupied about 20 round tables, which amounted to half the restaurant’s open first floor dining room. I sat with some of the researchers' wives and their children. The kids continued their song, dance, and martial arts performances throughout dinner despite reprimands from the adults! After a half hour of eating, the higher-ups began circulating the tables toasting their colleagues with “baijiu” (white rice alcohol that tastes like paint thinner ) and things started to get rowdy. You see a toast in China is not a sweet speech followed by a sip of champagne. Rather, it is a boisterous demonstration of thanks or good luck followed by a shot of 60 proof alcohol.

Lets again picture the stuffy holiday parties in the US where everyone is holding it all in. If someone does accidentally loosen up after a few trips to the bar, stories of their rowdiness and dirty dancing will float around the office in whispers for weeks. Now, imagine a party with no pesky Puritan roots to hold you back! Chinese drinking culture is such that one loses more face by turning down a challenge to drink than by getting completely blitzed and making a fool of himself/herself. (I say herself, but actually I do not fully understand how women fit into drinking culture in modern China.) In his book Rivertown, Peter Hessler recalled (hazily I am sure) a similar banquet with his English department where he and a friend felt no regrets about diving over tables and shooting each other with rubber band guns!

When my boss and another important staff member circled round to my chair and poured me a glass, I found myself caught in a tangle of tacit cultural expectations. I knew that it is disrespectful and even condescending to turn down a drink. Yet, I also knew that it is common for Chinese women to shy away from alcohol and toast with tea or soda instead. And finally, my Midwest roots were telling me that I should probably not be taking shots with my boss, period. I made a split second decision to file myself into a totally different category of “only foreign girl in the room” and threw one back. In the after burn I caught a thumbs up from my boss as he moved on to the next table. Whew.

The waiters brought bottle after bottle of baijiu and the noise level of our side of the room rose. I sat uncomfortably as I thought about how much we must have been disturbing the other customers sitting a mere ten feet way. Just when I thought about asking my friend if we were being too loud, the director picked up a bullhorn to announce the top prize winners of the raffle! The other customers seemed neither surprised nor offended. I guess by now I should know that hot, loud, jovial places are just where Chinese people would choose to be for the holidays.

A few students and staff stopped by my seat to chat in a mix of slurred English and Chinese. Whether it was the alcohol or the freedom that comes with speaking an opinion in a foreign language, one man felt free enough to explain the significance of this night to me. He claimed that one could “lose” oneself for the night. He described this as the one time a year when all is forgotten and forgiven. “You can say anything!” And most importantly, by drinking with his staff, the boss shows a bit of humility allowing him to reconnect with his employees.

Slightly buzzed from the cultural overload and the baijiu, I looked at my watch and remembered that the 44th US Presidential Inauguration was to take place in two hours. Being an hour's subway trip away from where I said I would meet my friends to watch, I excused myself from the party, which I later learned had continued on to a Karaoke bar. As our group walked to a bar promising a CNN live feed, we realized that while we all shared excited feelings about the big event, I was actually the only American in the group.

The bar was packed and just as loud as the Chinese banquet. But, instead of bullhorns and toasts, it was Beijing x-pats competing with each other and the CNN commentators for a bit of air time. An old Chinese man in a Mao cap circulated through the crowd selling his handicrafts and took a moment to watch the screen himself then confirming with those around him that the event was somehow connected to “ow – ba – ma.” The crowd quieted a bit at the sight of Carter, booed at George W. Bush, and cheered with the emergence of Michelle Obama. I stood beside Italians and English during the oath, an American for Aretha Franklin’s song, and Canadians during Obama’s speech. It is not until one spends an election or an inauguration abroad that one realizes how closely the rest of the world follows US politics.

I fell asleep at 4AM trying to process it all.



Here is a video just to give you a taste of the political and social vibe of the (mostly young) Beijing x-pat crowd. The second video is just proof that not everything is censored in China. This was the bit of the speech that was edited out on the Chinese stations but came through clearly on CNN.

Latest language gaffe/near miss with humiliation

As an intern, anywhere really, one is constantly anxious about how to slip into the social scene at the office/company. If you have an intern, know that he/she is over thinking every action so as to avoid being both completely overlooked or in the spotlight. This internal tension (no pun intended) increases when the job lands the intern squarely in a foreign culture where he/she cannot even rely on gut social instincts. While I am constantly strategizing about how to ease into the social scene here, I am never actually confident about how my actions are being interpreted. With such deliberation to say and do just the right thing, you can imagine what affect one major gaffe might have on my psyche.

While my Chinese vocabulary continues to grow, I am still very capable of making grave and humiliating mistakes. I had a close call during a series of email exchanges with a PhD student here at the institute. We bumped into each other outside the institute and he invited me to the public oral defense session of his thesis. There is a specific word for oral defense of one's thesis, "da bian" (答辩) which was new to me when he spoke it. I attended the session and managed to comprehend only the gist and not a single detail of his extremely technical presentation. Afterward I confidently typed up an e-mail thanking him for including me and asked him how he thought his "da bian" had gone.

However, due to my dearth of Chinese character recognition, I used the characters "大便," which is also pronounced "da bian" but with slightly different tones and unfortunately means..well... excrement (to put it gently)! I was one mouse click away from thanking him for inviting me to his defecating session and asking him how he felt about it had gone.

I swear Chinese is a code not a language!

Beijing Roast Duck (all of it)

A visit from important foreign guests to the institute warranted a trip to eat the all famous, “Beijing kao ya,” or Peking Roast Duck. Our group of ten headed to a famous roast duck restaurant near the Olympic village. The place was packed with waitresses in Qing Dynasty costumes with walki-talkies and headphones. The walls were covered in pictures of foreign guests and dignitaries that had dined there during the Olympics. I noted that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo represented the Philippines as well as one could with a whole naked duck in the foreground. We were ushered to the private “Putin room,” complete with Chinese and Russian flags as the table centerpiece and pictures of Vladimir Putin and his entourage enjoying roast duck. We ordered two entire ducks prepared with the “Putin” menu.

This restaurant was obviously still riding the Olympic theme. First to arrive on our table was a small plate of fried duck skin intricately woven into the shape of the neighboring Olympic bird nest. Next was a simulacrum of the Olympic aquatic center which took the form of duck skin chunks suspended in a rectangular mass of translucent gelatin. The jiggling mound was set atop a base with a blue twinkling light bulb making it glow aquamarine. I tried a cube as it glided past me on the rotating glass Lazy Susan. It tasted exactly like what you might expect if you ate a big spoon full of the semi-hardened grease that pools around your turkey a few days after Thanksgiving.

The waitress announced the name of each in Chinese as she placed them on the table. First was the usual, duck meat served with sweet hoisin (thick dark and sweet) sauce and spring onions all to be rolled up in thin crepe-like pancakes and eaten like tiny burritos. Undeniably delicious! Then, a plate of fleshy floppy “duck feet” arrived. With a little encouragement from my boss, the other American at the table and I lifted the wilted webbed bits of flesh from the plate with chop sticks, dipped them into mustard sauce, and plunged them into your mouths with a cringe. We both reached for our beer and gulped to forget the soft crunch of flavorless cartilage. I understood the next few dishes as announced, “duck liver,” “duck hearts cooked in Chinese white liquor,” “duck neck,” “boiled duck head,” (which was split in two for ease of eating I suppose). But then there was one dish announced that was beyond my vocabulary and visual identification. I turned to my boss and said, “I don’t’ know that one.” He laughed out loud and said, “And nor can I tell you.” There was an awkward silence as he thought for a moment and then said in English, “The Chinese have a special word for this too, “Duck Precious!”

I tried everything and at the same time tried not to think about what effect the layering of such new cuisine in my stomach might have later.

One version of a Beijing Christmas

Holidays are slightly daunting here. I suppose they are daunting anywhere if you don’t have a family on which to rely to fill that day on the calendar. But as a foreigner in China, to celebrate is more of a decision than an expectation.

China has picked up on the marketing potential of Christmas. While a Beijing Thanksgiving could have passed without my knowing, the reminders were everywhere for Christmas. Shopping malls have 60ft decorated Christmas trees outside and Holiday season sales. Though, these sales are overlapping and muddled with sales for the quickly approaching Spring Festival (Lunar New Year). Since both holidays are dominated by red it is slightly unclear what is being celebrated. Western restaurants, cafes, bars, and hotels put up English signs featuring their set menus for Christmas dinner and the servers pressure you to make reservations. Businesses of all genres decorate their storefronts with paper Santa Claus cutouts, tinsel garlands, and even fake spray snow in a can. Supermarkets sell fake Christmas trees that come pre-decorated if you want. I am sure that here in Beijing one could also buy a real Christmas tree for a price. Christmas music is common in establishments and unfortunately on cell phone ring tones, but not nearly as ubiquitously as in America.

All this hype gives one a sense of urgency about making some kind of plan. My choices were: shell out 1000 Yuan ($150)a head for a luxurious dinner, pay 200 a head for a Japanese buffet, join some friends for drinks at their apartment and then go out on the town, make dinner at a friend’s oven equipped apartment, or eat dumplings with my Chinese roommate. I chose to spend Christmas Eve out on the town and Christmas day cooking and baking in the much coveted oven.

Chinese don’t spend Christmas with their families and most foreigners don’t have families here, so Christmas has become an excuse to hit the clubs and bars. After all, what’s Christmas without a Rudolf character piloting a Congo line of scantily glad, glow stick waving, Chinese girls around the dance floor to a blaring remix of “Celebration?”

Christmas day, on the other hand felt much more wholesome. My English friend brought his mother’s Christmas recipes and three of us worked together to create a feast of stuffed apples, stuffed peppers, roast potatoes and carrots, salad, and half a turkey. The other half apparently went to another foreigner at Wal-Mart who also seemed overwhelmed at the idea of a full-sized turkey in her toaster oven. We added mulled wine, cheese, and apple pie to the menu and ate and drank ourselves into that familiar holiday digestive state somewhere between fulfillment and misery. The night finished with a scrabble game and a Skype call to my family to share in their real-time holiday.

Just before going to bed on Christmas Eve, I put Santa Claus hats stuffed with goodies and chocolate outside my Chinese and Italian roommates’ doors. My note in Chinese said that it was from Santa Claus (literally “Christmas old man”) but I think my poor Chinese calligraphy must have given me away. My Chinese roommate saw right through it and put a note on my door in English that read: “thank you, nice is young santa claus. I hope you next year more beautiful." I have no idea what that means, and it might be an insult. But, I think she liked the chocolate.

Merry belated Christmas all and Happy New Year!

Apartment Hunting

My employer paid for my first week here in a in a modest hotel until I could find an apartment. I used the entire week apartment hunting within a 3 mile radius of the institute. My criteria were simple: close to work and subway, clean, and at or below 1500 Yuan (~200 dollars). I began with the help of a Chinese friend at the institute. We looked at Chinese versions of Craig’s List and also expat websites like Beijinger. Though all the listings were advertised as individuals’ posts, we quickly realized that they were actually “middle companies.” The way my friend spit the out the word, “zhong jie,” made it sound like they were something obscene and abhorred. We scheduled a few visits on a Saturday and hit the neighborhood on foot. After just two calls, my name and number was out. No sooner had we finished one visit when my phone would ring with another company offering to show me a room. The mystery voice on the phone would instruct us to meet him at a certain corner/bus stop etc. We would arrive at the corner and locate a slightly sleazy looking man wearing a cheap suit jacket and black leather shoes. Upon seeing a lost looking blond, he would jump up from his resting squat and lead us to the next room, chain-smoking all along the way. As we walked I struggled to stay close to my friend and the middleman, bobbing and weaving around cars, carts, people, trees, and various gross things smeared on the sidewalk. The first day I mostly listened, memorizing the standard conversation as I knew that the rest of the week would be a solo adventure.

Over the course of a week I looked at about 20 apartments. These places ranged from disgustingly dingy first floor slums, to dazzling newly refinished hotel-like rooms. If the other renters were home I tried my best to size them up quickly. Some were foreign students: Italians, Japanese, Kazakhstanis, Americans, and one German. All of those places were either too expensive or meant speaking to much English. Other prospective apartment mates included an older bachelorette with a hyperactive three year old niece (that told me I was beautiful and then threw candy at me), a young family that swore they would never be home, a middle-aged couple with a chain-smoking husband, and two young Chinese guys with a bio-hazard for a bathroom. One middle company sleaze-ball took me to an apartment and then admitted that he didn’t actually have the keys. He said he would see if anyone was home and I expected him to make a phone call. Instead, I watched in disbelief as he scaled the barred windows and peered into the second story apartment to get someone’s attention. I told him to forget it and left him hanging.

Finally, I met one middle company guy at about 9:30 on the last night of my free stay in the hotel. As we walked he suddenly stopped and pointed to a Jeep Cherokee that seemed to appear out of nowhere, suggesting that we ride to see the apartment. I hesitated; I hate these judgment testing moments! It’s a little like when an unleashed barking dog charges you in a public park while the owner runs after yelling, “He won’t bite!” You think, I don’t want to overact, but I don’t want to get mauled either! I was thinking, I don’t want to freak out and offend these guys, but I also don’t want to lose my internal organs tonight!

I peered in at the driver, a geeky looking college kid with glasses and a friendly grin. He addressed me in Chinese and explained that he could give me a lift to his friend’s apartment with the spare room. “I know where it is…it’s just down the road… I can just walk,” I said. “Suit yourself” he said, “But it's cold and I can’t park here.” A response with any more pressure to get in the car would have blown the whole deal for me. But, that was just enough indifference to make me try it. I got in, one hand on the door handle ready bolt if need be and at the same time thinking that if they were really going to steal my kidney tonight they would have found a way to keep me from jumping out [insert mother’s cringe here].

The young guy turned out to be extremely nice and he was indeed actually helping his friend. The three of us talked about the global financial crisis, NBA stars, and how cold it gets in Beijing in winter. He drove through a security gate and deep into low rise apartment complex to the foot of building number 22. The front was lined with hundreds of bicycles ready for the morning commute. The balconies were decorated with laundry, cabbages, sausages, leeks, and garlic braids, all hanging out to dry. The stairwell was normal for this price range: dirty, dark, unmaintained, and like it might lead to a prison cell. I was comforted that we stopped to get keys from the landlord on the first floor. The door opened to a warm, spotless, well lit, newly refinished, sizable three bedroom apartment that smelled like someone had recently cooked something tasty. The current renter, a young Chinese woman, was away. But a quick glance at her shoes, kitchen utensils, stocked refrigerator, and absence of filth was enough for me to think we might be more compatible than the screaming child or the stinky Chinese boys. The landlord couple came up to visit from their apartment on the first floor. He was a cute reticent old man with a Mao era hat. She was a typical middle-aged, plump, ruddy faced loud mouthed nosey woman, who I am sure would push me out of the way on the bus any day. They asked questions about my experiences in China and complemented my Chinese. They explained that they were “lao Beijing ren” (Beijing born and raised) and their old neighborhood was in the same place before it was leveled to make way for this apartment complex. I took it all hook line and sinker and put down a couple hundred Yuan for the key.

I left feeling a sense of achievement for independently securing a decent room, under budget, and all in a foreign language. I celebrated with a bowl of noodles and a chocolate bar. But, when I contacted the folks helping me at the institute to tell them the good news, my pride and satisfaction turned to angst and dread. They wanted to come and help with the contract signing, meet my landlord, check on the apartment, and barter yet another lower price. I knew what was going to happen. My bubble of ignorant trust was about to be popped! They would tell me that I was paying too much, these people were cheating me, my future roommate was probably not even living there, and I should not have made such a hasty decision. All these things passed through my mind too, but I was tired and trusting and went with my gut.

As predicted, what seemed to me like a simple six month agreement to exchange money for a place to sleep and a hot shower turned into hours of discussion. Voices were raised, teeth were sucked in dissatisfied, and the smiling faces of my landlords were twisted into disgust and distain. But, I know that all this is necessary. Nothing in China is ever as simple as I feel that it should or could be. My friends know this system and can predict the 110 ways I could be taken advantage of later. I know that this flagrant display of skepticism and distrust are normal in these negotiations. But, after almost two years it still makes me uncomfortable! As I followed the fast loud conversation, I wanted to scream, “I don’t care what you think! This location is convenient, the place is clean, I’m under budget, and if things get ugly at least I’ll have something to write about!” But, I kept respectfully quiet until the contractual negotiation/shouting match subsided and I got the cue to sign. I felt somewhat vindicated in that after all that the landlord wouldn’t come down on the price. My friends were not satisfied, but were luckily too busy to insist that I keep looking for something cheaper.

While I am truly thankful for their help and local perspective, I recognize that our objectives are different. I am personally willing to pay a small premium just too keep the pleasant and polite comfort bubble intact. When I see my landlords playing with their grandchild outside, they will smile and ask me if I have eaten yet. And, I can smile back and continue to think of them as a sweet “lao Beijing” couple that may actually have my best interest in mind.

What is Midwest Culture; A call for your comments

All this moving around has sparked some new observations and has me wondering; what is it about trying to maintain a Midwest character in China that is so exhausting and futile?

During college I was convinced that the Midwest was the most generic place on Earth: flat, no wilderness yet no cosmopolitan areas either, strip malls, K-marts, gray skies for half the year, corn fields. Picturing it? If you grew up in rural or suburban Midwest you were stuck being aware of all the extreme hobbies and cultural scenes of the rest of the country, yet had to make do with what the region could provide. You could only go so far into these interests before you either had to settle on something else or bail for one of the coasts or Rockies.

My friends were all from places that I imagined to be more . . . authentic. I listened to my friends' hometown stories with envy. In Marion, Virginia they had southern accents, bluegrass, and hometown doctors that cross-country skied to the office in the winter. I am sure there were grassroots revolutions started in the coffee shops and vegetarian joints in Amherst, Massachusetts. High school students in Seattle, Washington knew how to deal with both glacial crevasses and inner city scuffles. And in the tiny hamlet of Pultneyville, New York, old ladies will interrupt your long run to taste test their homemade cookies. I spent my summers in Alaska, Idaho, and Washington, hoping to gain some kind of character that I thought the Midwest had shorted me on. So, I was surprised and even delighted in China when a friend from California paused after something I said and exclaimed, "God you're so Midwest!"

That got me thinking. What exactly is that Midwest character? I thought there was none. But, the Beach Boys Sing about it: "The Midwest farmers' daughter's really make you feel alright..." So, there must be something distinct there right?

Here are some undeveloped thoughts:

Is it for better or worse, that the Midwest feels a bit generic?
In her song entitled Iowa, Dar Williams sings, "Way back where I come from, we never mean to bother; we don't like to make our passions other people's concerns. We walk in the world of safe people and at night we walk into our houses and burn."

Is it that people are friendly, or that they keep to themselves?
After a flight of unwelcome chatter on a plane, my sister-in-law's friend said that he appreciates Ohioans as seatmates because Ohioans will always say hello, but still let you read your book.

Or, is it some obsession with a constant hyper-awareness in social interactions. With tedious utterances of "Sorry" and "Thank you," a good Midwesterner is continuously aware of how to help others while simultaneously staying out of their business and never, ever, inconveniencing.
Author Jonathan Franzen captures this in The Corrections, as he describes his main character's visit to a museum in St. Jude. I did not bring the book to Beijing so I cannot quote it directly. He explains perfectly the constant awareness with which everyone moved about the exhibits. Each person will pretend to view the display even after they have lost interest, so as to not pressure those ahead of them. If those ahead of them are also good Midwesterners, they have a guilty fear about lingering too long which becomes activated by the tacit signals from the people behind them. The whole system works very well.

Or, does it have something to do with a balance of restraint and indulgence. My friend told me that is his father, a good Midwestern man, could never bring himself to give his cat straight kitty treats, but rather mixed them with the other less decadent cat food.

Here is call for your thoughts and suggestions from Literature/music/films/comedy and your own musings. I need some material. So please, give me Garrison Keillor and the lot. What's your Midwest description? You can email or comment.

Beijing Beginings

After a longer than planned, but wonderful summer and fall in Ohio, I finally made it back to China in early November. I can say with relief that the contrast between the first few weeks here in Beijing and my first weeks in Dalian are positively disparate. I shudder to think back on how I began my first experience in China: heartbroken, friendless, speaking zero Chinese, illegally hired, and having lost my luggage. Any situation here will have to be an improvement on those first lonely and confusing weeks.

In contrast, this time I was met at the airport by some friends of a Chinese friend in America. They drove me to dinner (which was spicy boiled duck heads, duck liver with sour garlic sauce, and beer) and then on to the institute where I will be working as an intern. Still waiting for me there at 9:00PM were two researchers who took me to a nearby hotel. The whole 48 hour travel experience ended with all five people escorting me to the door of my hotel room, and me feeling ridiculous and guilty for all the undue attention.

The institute where I will be working is a full hour by subway from the cultural epicenter of Beijing. But, I am solidly in the university district which makes the place feel alive and young. The street on which the institute is located I have deemed as “recycling row.” It's chaotic traffic is dominated by second hand furniture vendors and recyclable collectors on load bearing tricycles. If it were not so cold, I could stand out there and watch the impressive loads of cardboard, old box springs, Styrofoam, and plastic bottles go by for hours. This stark contrast between the new research complexes with their million dollar budgets and the old neighborhood where it’s still worth one’s time to collect waste materials, seems to encapsulate developing modern China in one city block.

Thus far everyone at the institute has been exceedingly welcoming and helpful and I am breathing a huge sigh of relief! Let the Beijing chapter Begin.