Daylight savings time, who needs it? The sun rose this morning at 4:30AM.
My summer classes start on Monday. I'll be taking 4th year Chinese, which according to my Chinese roommate is “extremely hard.” Oh yeah, I've got a Chinese roommate because I recently moved off-campus. My program arranged the accommodation: I'm living 5 minutes from the classroom in a very dididaodao (authentic) apartment building.
The apartment is 15 stories and fairly nice. All of the tenants here would probably refer to themselves as laobaixing, “Old Hundred Names”- just average, working Chinese. My roommate is in his 20s- he looks after ACC's Internet. He's a friendly guy, and spends most of his time in his room playing FIFA, smoking, and listening to American pop music.
As for the new place's amenities, there are some charms and drawbacks. It got repainted a few weeks ago, so it looks nice and spiffy from the outside. And the inside is in good condition (although the pollution makes dusting almost futile). There's a common room with a TV, and a kitchen with a fridge. I've even got my own single bedroom.
There are some interesting quirks though. When the residents of neighboring apartments cook, I smell it. The hot-water heater for the shower requires an incomprehensible pattern of switched knobs and turned dials. Whenever I lock or unlock my door, I need to set the handle into a different position depending on whether I'm unlocking or locking, outside or inside.
I've also met a few little neighbors. I left my window open last night and woke up with 5 new mosquito friends on the ceiling. And just as I was writing this I killed my first cockroach!
Well, I'll miss living in my dorm room, whose door was about a 5 second walk from my classroom. But, I'm looking forward to 24-hour homework help from my Chinese roommate, as well as getting a feel for the real Chinese style of living.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes: back in Beijing
In the short month that I've been away from Beijing, a lot's changed. Nothing too big, just little things that show China rushing to modernize and prepare for the Olympics. I read that China's sinking 25 billion yuan (about 3.5 billion US dollars) into Beijing. So what's that buying?
Well, almost every major highway/street is lined with flowers. Two days ago my taxi driver was bragging about it. “Do the roads in your country have this many flowers?” No, I said, I didn't think they do. He beamed with pride.
Also, nearly every building has been pressure-washed or repainted- including the apartment I'm renting. When I left, the building wouldn't have stood out in any 3rd world country or war zone. Now it resembles any mid-rent apartment building near my Ontario suburban home.
Almost 50% of the restaurants have new signs. The old signs were pieces of painted plywood that were usually painted with some grainy Chinese characters and perhaps an unappetizing-looking dish or two. The new signs are the sleek, modern, self-contained lights: like the big McDonald's “M” logos that light up from the inside.
Some restaurants haven't adapted yet- they never got the chance. A whole line of dingy “xiaochis” (direct translation: small eat) has closed, one of which I used to eat at everyday after working out at the gym. I'd place my order in the crammed restaurant sitting at a table of 4 with three Chinese construction workers, then listen to the peasant girl waitress yell out my order in her village's dialect to her family members upstairs working the woks. Sometimes, I'd have a rote conversation with the construction workers, who'd ask me what my salary was (currently: 0), ask me how much cash I had on hand (usually not much) grunt, and then pay the dollar or so that my meal cost. Now, these authentic parts of China will probably be replaced with a glitzier, classier restaurant, or maybe even a block of condos.
For the past three days, I've been touring Beijing with my mom and sister. It's been a great chance to tour around the city again and see the changes. In sum, nothing here is fundamentally different- the traffic's bad, the pollution's noticeable (worse than before)... but from the fresh looking buildings to the rows of freshly planted trees, Beijing has a shiny new veneer.
Well, almost every major highway/street is lined with flowers. Two days ago my taxi driver was bragging about it. “Do the roads in your country have this many flowers?” No, I said, I didn't think they do. He beamed with pride.
Also, nearly every building has been pressure-washed or repainted- including the apartment I'm renting. When I left, the building wouldn't have stood out in any 3rd world country or war zone. Now it resembles any mid-rent apartment building near my Ontario suburban home.
Almost 50% of the restaurants have new signs. The old signs were pieces of painted plywood that were usually painted with some grainy Chinese characters and perhaps an unappetizing-looking dish or two. The new signs are the sleek, modern, self-contained lights: like the big McDonald's “M” logos that light up from the inside.
Some restaurants haven't adapted yet- they never got the chance. A whole line of dingy “xiaochis” (direct translation: small eat) has closed, one of which I used to eat at everyday after working out at the gym. I'd place my order in the crammed restaurant sitting at a table of 4 with three Chinese construction workers, then listen to the peasant girl waitress yell out my order in her village's dialect to her family members upstairs working the woks. Sometimes, I'd have a rote conversation with the construction workers, who'd ask me what my salary was (currently: 0), ask me how much cash I had on hand (usually not much) grunt, and then pay the dollar or so that my meal cost. Now, these authentic parts of China will probably be replaced with a glitzier, classier restaurant, or maybe even a block of condos.
For the past three days, I've been touring Beijing with my mom and sister. It's been a great chance to tour around the city again and see the changes. In sum, nothing here is fundamentally different- the traffic's bad, the pollution's noticeable (worse than before)... but from the fresh looking buildings to the rows of freshly planted trees, Beijing has a shiny new veneer.
Monday, June 2, 2008
Update from the road
It's been almost a month since I left Beijing and began journeying south. I'll do my best here to sum up those travels.
Part One: Ich Ben Ein Beijinger
My tour starts and ends in Beijing, and a month ago, that's where my two former high school classmates Brett and Neil met me. Showing them around the first Asian city made me realize two things: I like Beijing, and I know a lot of good Beijing food.
Maybe they're related. I didn't convert quickly to a fan of Chinese food, but after four months of culinary trial and error, I'd compiled a mental list of good restaurants where for delicious, diverse, and authentic Chinese meals. So in between visiting the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and the 798 art district. I took them to every delicious hole-in-the-wall eatery that I knew of. And only once in 7 days did we eat at McDonald's.
After that week in Beijing, we took a night train to Shanghai. This is a popular way of getting to and from those cities- trains leave every 7 minutes. It's a 12 hour ride, and my friends and I slept on bunk beds in an air conditioned, 4 person cabin. Even better, it saved us the cost of a night in a hotel. Not bad for half the price of a plane ticket.
In Shanghai, we took a day to explore the famous Bund street, which is a riverside boardwalk lined with old buildings with European style architecture. Visible on the other side of the river are the ultramodern skycrapers of Shanghai's financial district. In the midst of this contrast was the hubbub of thousands of tourists and vendors, this month's sign of the apocalypse went floating by: a giant Samsung boat, which had no windows, no cargo, and no passengers, just a 100 foot long, 30 foot tall "Samsung" sign.
To take a break from Shanghai's breakneck pace, my friends and I took trips to placid Hangzhou and Suzhou. Those two cities, reknowned as China's most beautiful, are only a few hours away from Shanghai. Hangzhou is famous for its West Lake, whose surrounding gardens and treelined boulevards are so idyllic that it seems more like a Florida resort town than China. Suzhou is known as China's Venice- even thouggh there's only one tiny section built on water. However, the most interesting (and risky) part was this: we all rented bikes and exploring Suzhou through the eyes of one of the many moped-driving or bike-riding citizens.
After exploring those two cities, we returned to Shanghai on May 14th, and as we boarded a flight to Bangkok, I said goodbye to China for two weeks.
Part Two: "Sorry guys, I don't speak Thai." - Thailand
I'm getting on the plane from Hong Kong to Guilin... look forward to finishing this post from the hotel tonight
Part One: Ich Ben Ein Beijinger
My tour starts and ends in Beijing, and a month ago, that's where my two former high school classmates Brett and Neil met me. Showing them around the first Asian city made me realize two things: I like Beijing, and I know a lot of good Beijing food.
Maybe they're related. I didn't convert quickly to a fan of Chinese food, but after four months of culinary trial and error, I'd compiled a mental list of good restaurants where for delicious, diverse, and authentic Chinese meals. So in between visiting the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and the 798 art district. I took them to every delicious hole-in-the-wall eatery that I knew of. And only once in 7 days did we eat at McDonald's.
After that week in Beijing, we took a night train to Shanghai. This is a popular way of getting to and from those cities- trains leave every 7 minutes. It's a 12 hour ride, and my friends and I slept on bunk beds in an air conditioned, 4 person cabin. Even better, it saved us the cost of a night in a hotel. Not bad for half the price of a plane ticket.
In Shanghai, we took a day to explore the famous Bund street, which is a riverside boardwalk lined with old buildings with European style architecture. Visible on the other side of the river are the ultramodern skycrapers of Shanghai's financial district. In the midst of this contrast was the hubbub of thousands of tourists and vendors, this month's sign of the apocalypse went floating by: a giant Samsung boat, which had no windows, no cargo, and no passengers, just a 100 foot long, 30 foot tall "Samsung" sign.
To take a break from Shanghai's breakneck pace, my friends and I took trips to placid Hangzhou and Suzhou. Those two cities, reknowned as China's most beautiful, are only a few hours away from Shanghai. Hangzhou is famous for its West Lake, whose surrounding gardens and treelined boulevards are so idyllic that it seems more like a Florida resort town than China. Suzhou is known as China's Venice- even thouggh there's only one tiny section built on water. However, the most interesting (and risky) part was this: we all rented bikes and exploring Suzhou through the eyes of one of the many moped-driving or bike-riding citizens.
After exploring those two cities, we returned to Shanghai on May 14th, and as we boarded a flight to Bangkok, I said goodbye to China for two weeks.
Part Two: "Sorry guys, I don't speak Thai." - Thailand
I'm getting on the plane from Hong Kong to Guilin... look forward to finishing this post from the hotel tonight
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