Mid-Autumn Festival

20 September 2009

Happy birthday to Mizmom from Shanghai. That is, happy shengri to Mizmom. Also, a belated and blessed Rosh Hashanah to all. May peace and forgiveness guide you through the High Holy Days.

So, yesterday, we strolled over to the International Students area to meet the same guy who took us to China's Got Talent. We loaded up on a bus full of kids from Baoshan Campus (one of our university’s three campuses [campi, Stewbot/Magistra?]). They had all decided to take one seat each, which meant, instead of them moving to be with their friends, we got split up into seats next to a bunch of people from Turkmenistan. This would have been fine, had they been the least bit personable, which they weren’t. No worries. Anyhoozers, we dunder-headed American students were under the impression that we were going to some sort of University Togetherness Day, but it turns out that yesterday was the Mid-Autumn Festival, which is a big deal here. So first we drove for half an hour to this really old district with a beautiful house. It was a more traditional Shanghai street, and I, along with John, Wayne, Rob, Ned, and a few other international students (liuxuesheng) participated in a tug o' war with the residents of the street. They beat us the first round, which remains entirely puzzling, because, in the next two rounds, we rendered their efforts into tiny, mote-like particles. We then shuffled inside for arts, crafts, and dancing. I should have liked to participate in painting a few characters, but since my arrival, the locals have decided I am a wonderful target to practice their shoving on. The photographers and video cameras following our mostly white crew around all day didn’t help my matters any. I believe they were in league with the folk from the Metro and RT Mart. Well, as it turns out, the entire day was a publicity stunt for the University and the communities we visited. I suppose it’s nice to do what I can for the University, though this was twice in a week. They should spread their exposure out so the people don’t get tired of looking at a load of quailoumen (honkies). We left the quaint street and ventured to a fairly new apartment complex.

Writer’s/Editor’s/Witness’/Concerned Individual’s Side Note:
Now, when I say “apartment complex” I do not mean one tower of roughly 20 stories. To the Chinese, that is but a child’s afternoon with a set of Legos. No, no; their idea of an apartment complex is 10 to 12 buildings of roughly 40 stories each, and, say, four to six rooms per floor. These buildings are set about a beautiful communal garden/playground/park in a roughly ovular, mostly amoebic fashion. They are, as my generation says, hardcore.

We were greeted there, taken to an activity room in which they showed us the flowers that women from the community cut and arrange weekly. In the next room, lay a pretty parlor piano; Louesa and I naturally had to investigate a potential musical outlet. She sat at the piano and played a few notes. I can only muster one image vivid enough to truly describe the violent flood of aforementioned photographers into this small sitting room, and, regrettably, it only applies to LOSTies.

-This is where those who don’t watch LOST ought to skip ahead past this segment-

Here goes. Recall the scene toward the end of season 3(?) in which Desmond and Charlie head to the underwater station to discern whether or not the large tanker on the horizon is paid by the penny of Penny Widmore. Charlie discovers that it, in fact, is not her boat. –LAST CHANCE TO STOP BEFORE THINGS ARE RUINED—Before he can escape, though, Crazy Fellow From Earlier blows the porthole to the next life and gallon after gallon of salty ocean cascades into the tiny room and offs poor Charlie.

Guess who got shoved around again. This time it was into a table. Eventually, Lou looked back at me and told me to play some, so I moved forward to sit down at the bench. I have never in my life seen a room clear so fast. Turns out they just wanted to see a pretty white girl exhibiting a bit of talent. As soon as short and scruffy moved in, it was as if the ebola virus had been released in that room. Turns out that my beard, fascinating as it may be, is not suitable to be on the six o'clock news. We spent some time with a host family and eventually went downstairs to the communal basement, which was revealed to be a top of the line recreation center. Oh man. Great pool, nice gym, and a cool ping pong room to boot. We ate all manner of things for dinner (it was a smorgasbord buffet) and then went back to the common room where Lou and I were shoved to the front row seats, and lucky John got dropped in the middle of four Irish girls, also on the front row. We settled in to watch the coming variety show. It was so much fun. There was a "clown" which was actually a Chinese man dressed like Charlie Chaplin who did all sorts of hilarious things and acrobatics. Then Lou and I got dragged from our seats to compete in a three-legged race against two of the Irish girls. We lost. Could be that my left leg is kind of messed up right now. Could be that I'm terrible at three-legged races; just ask anyone at Eakin Elementary between the years of 1995 and 2001. We just ended up hopping 3/4 of the way, ha. Then we watched some adorable little girls perform the Swan Dance from Swan Lake, wicked crazy acrobats, and then some dancer/acrobats that were good. Then we had to leave again. We headed to another festival. Upon following our teachers (laoshimen), we discovered that we had been dragged to yet another version of China's Got Talent. Joy. Eventually, we couldn't take anymore evidence that China, in fact, has no talent and gave our seats to some older women. They were very grateful, and showed us by thanking us and then shoving us out of the way to get the seats. This was the nth time I'd been shoved by someone half my size that day. Joy. We made our way out to the street and moseyed about for roughly an hour. On our way back, we got stuck in the midst of a dazzling parade where--guess what happened--I got shoved around by myriad pint-sized Chinese folk. We made it out and found the rest of our group and went to the front/first stage to watch a few of our fellow students perform. Remember the Irish girls I mentioned earlier? Well, the one called Katie and I had become fast friends. She begged and pleaded with Lou and I to join their traditional Irish dance on stage. For some reason unbeknownst to any sane person, we agreed. They went through a couple rounds on stage then beckoned us on. We traipsed up the steps, joined hands, and began our jig. Despite our best attempts at imitation, our clumsiness had to have made Everard Grindley shiver in his grave. I am so ashamed. It was loads of fun, though. They swore their friendship forever for "mortifying" ourselves on stage for their sake. We all left shortly after the Turkmenistan kids caused a miniature dance party at the festival. The bat-kaka insane Chinese teacher I described in the last post danced with my fellow students and a couple of kids that got tossed onto stage by their families in a hilarious, rhythm-less fashion that one would expect from a loony. And I do mean “loony” with an appropriate amount of respect.

That concludes the dreamlike day that was the Mid-Autumn Festival in Shanghai this Year of the Ox.

I am truly sorry for all of these posts being so delayed, but, to write about events, they must happen. In addition, I have to take the time to actually sit and write them out. Then there’s a whole mess that involves my horrid penchant for being scatter-brained and forgetting to actually post my writings. So this brings me to a question and an uncharacteristic streak of democracy:

Would you, my doting fans and admirers, prefer more day-to-day, everyday-life-in-China posts, major events (they seem to keep occurring, and I don’t foresee an end), or a mixture of both?

Please submit your opinions in the form of a comment. Thank you all.


Signing off from Cheery China,

Toufa (hair, esp. of the head)

Some pics around Shanghai

China (Supposedly) Has Talent

15 September 2009

After class one uneventful, yet fateful Tuesday, my classmates and I met a man who has since changed our lives and perspectives dynamically. This is not a man of great stature physically or within his own career. However, he makes up for his size and average success with a spunk only matched by that of an epileptic Cocker Spaniel. He is a giant of both gumption and lung capacity. He is in his mid-sixties, yet can go to bed after midnight and wake up by 6:00 am. He has the patience and endurance to stand the entire length of a bus ride across Shanghai in a single go without shouting at a single driver. He can quote the whole of Confucius’ writings in half a breath at a pace of 500 meters. He is: Zhang Laoshi the Miniscule and Mighty.

Now that introductions are complete, it is upwards and onwards with our selves. We met the soon-to-be-infamous Zhang Laoshi (laoshi is a title meaning “teacher”; in China, titles come second) outside a tepidly tedious Tuesday teaching session. He began spouting out English at a breakneck pace; at least, we’re all pretty sure it was English. Most of his words were tied together tighter than a Boy Scout’s best knot. We snagged enough word pairs to discern that he wanted us to go with him to the TV station that night to help out some Thai students that also go to Shanghai Daxue (university). We spent the rest of the day lazing about our rooms and cavorting in Shanghai. At half past six, seven of our group of ten showed up outside the International College, prepped and ready to appear on local Shanghai television. As I didn’t quite mention earlier, we had convinced ourselves that we were going to be on the 11 o’clock news or something as part of a University plug or something. Zhang Laoshi passed out our first gift from the University—awesome red and gold polo shirts. Please me dear, fellow meiguorenmen, (meiguoren=American person; -men=plural) a show of hands from those surprised by the colors. We loaded up on the bus with an Optimus Prime load of Thai students, and headed for the TV station. When we got there, we started to revise our hypothesis a bit. This place was beautiful. Certainly not your run-of-the-mill, Podunk local cable station. We moved inside, still only mildly confused. Then we started to see various groups of similarly dressed people in the lobby. We revised our hypothesis further. A variety show on which we were guests perhaps? Uh oh. We speak Chinese with half the talent and ¼ the vocabulary of a 2 year old. We moved into the actual studio. What in the name Elizabeth Windsor had we gotten ourselves into?! This place was, as the youngsters used to say, “off the heezy”. That’s “gnarly” for those of you from the 90s; “boss” for the 80s folk; “solid” for the 70s groovesters; and “a despicable, tasteless display of The Man subjugating the People with mindless corporate pig programming” for the 60s kiddos. This was the real deal. An actual TV show that was actually going to be shown live that we were actually going to be on stage for. This was actually getting real. Zhang Laoshi started flitting about, shouting alternately in Chinese and English. By the looks on the faces of the Thai students, he was making about as much sense in one as in the other. We gradually discovered that a famous Thai brother and sister (our age) were going to be competing on the show. We also, after much exertion, found out that they are students at our university: one in Master’s, the other Bachelor’s. He began babbling back and forth again, we became perplexed yet again. Then he pulled out a camera and started handing out posters and our school flag and we gathered that we were to be photographed to chronicle the event. Stewart and I were told to be in front and hold the flag (more likely than not because of our beards; this will come into play shortly). Zhang Laoshi bounded around the theatre seats we were in and jumped in the picture frame. The other laoshimen were lucky enough to snap the shutter on a rare breath. After pictures, we grabbed one of the Thai kids who spoke English well and he began translating for us from a less—excitable—teacher. We were going to be cheering for our fellow students from the stage, on camera roughly 80% of the time. Cool. We could cheer for an hour or so while sitting in the stands on stage. This could be fun, terrible, or both. All were acceptable. Zhang Laoshi finished taking his breath for the next seven days and began gesturing violently while doing his verbal tarantella between languages. Our Thai translator grabbed enough to tell us what the gestures meant: four of us were to be placed up front, right on the railing to be seen standing, cheering, and generally doing our best Zhang Laoshi impressions. The four students picked? Louesa, the pretty American girl; Wayne, the tall, good-looking white fellow; Top, our robust Thai translator; and *drumroll please* me, short and scruffy. Who saw that one coming? -No hands this time- The show got underway after a bit of instruction (in Chinese, of course) about how to act and the distribution of materials for following said instructions (bangymajogger noise sticks). The show began, and, believe you me, it was a doozy. I mean it had all the works: outlandishly garish outfits, smarmily attractive male and female hosts, mildly famous judges, and all manner of ado, to-do, and ruckus. The first duo was a European fellow and a young Chinese lady. Not fantastic, though not bad. They had an excruciatingly long talk with the hosts, judges, and what I assume were there families that would have rivaled The Bold and The Beautiful in terms of melodrama. Our students were next. They were unimpressive. The brother performed some acrobatic acts that any construction worker could imitate without dropping a hammer and the sister sang well, but unmovingly. To the whities, at least. The Thai lot went bonkers. We stood through the remainder of the show in relative states of excitement. The first couple won. Our classmates lost. Badly. Ouch. We returned to our rooms in some state of confusion and general obliviance. Oh. I believe I forgot to mention the true framework and purpose of the show. Have you heard of America’s Got Talent, starring such judges as Sharon Osborne and David “The Hoff” Hasselhoff (just to reinforce the point about moderately famous people)? This show spawns from that very genealogical line, and, thus, we initially dubbed it China’s Got Talent. However, after viewing the entire program, we decided that that was a thoroughly improper name, and have been referring to it in varying degrees of the opposite.

That’s the run of this event. Look out soon for the next post. Should be right behind this merry adventure. My love and affections to those of you who are consciously aware of it. To the rest, the same. I’m not picky. J

Sayonara, biéntôt, and arrivederci

Emperor Norton II, Emperor of the United States, Protector of Mexico, Assigned Look-Afterer of Luxembourg

P.S. I have found a new hero/role model/all-around nutter to admire. His name is Emperor Norton I. Check him out on Wikipedia and join the following.

Getting Settled

Have I only been here a week?! Hardly feels that short of a time. The lot of us were talking it over and the general consensus is that it feels as though a month has passed. The only noticeable difference is that none of us can speak enough Mandarin to get us slapped. We can order a few dishes (from notes), ask for our bill, and ask for the price on something only to have it written out on a calculator. Hmmm…new stories. So many to tell. I suppose I’ll go with the most exciting one first. It involves a lovely little store called RT Mart. RT Mart is the most convenient convenience store ever. To give you all a picture, if WalMart procreated with a CVS and raised the offspring in Beijing, the result would be RT Mart. And now that we’ve got a bit of background, it’s onwards and upwards to the main event:

6:30. Wednesday 2 September 2009. It’s only our second day in this utterly foreign country. My three suitemates and I had all woken early after a 19:30 bedtime the previous evening, and decided we could use a few things at RT Mart. We’d visited the night before, but were in a small rush to really move in and get slightly settled, so hadn’t purchased much. After a miniature excursion in the wrong direction, we set off on the correct bearing. It’s 7:15. The main street outside our dormitory was busy, but people somewhat obey the traffic laws, so the crossing wasn’t too difficult. We easily made our way to the glorious store itself, and strode inside. It was surprisingly busy for it being only 7:25, but we don’t take much notice. Suddenly, just as we reached the escalators (flat conveyor belts at a ~20° angle) to the first floor, Chinese starts spilling over the in-store PA announcing one word we understood: promotion (that’s a sale for those of you Stateside). Diminutive, graying women and middle-aged men start flooding the store. Bedlam ensued. All four of us began being shoved out of the way for carts and baskets and entrances. We made our way upstairs, drinking in the chaos and indulging in the accompanying rush. As we entered the main portion on the second floor, the situation became even worse. Chinese men and women were shouting and bellowing at cashiers, each other, and even products (true story). I waded through the stature-deprived crowd toward a large stack of dish/hand towels (I needed a towel and wasn’t going to attempt to find a real one without knowing Chinese in this hotpot of insanity) and grabbed four nice, yellow-striped towels. Then it was back across the rushing river of Shanghaiites to grab some shampoo (forgot mine; yes, Mother, I know you pointed it out). Once more into the fray. This time we got to ride the current through the Tetris-style locking in of carts to the back of the upstairs to find surge protectors (they act doubly as power converters). No problem there. A nice man even showed us some that were on sale and had two in one package. Now we had to pay. The problem with that is that one can only purchase certain things upstairs. In order to buy most things, one must journey to the first floor and go through one of the 30 lines (that are always full). We looked ahead of us at the maelstrom and found the cause of all this mayhem: a sale on…I kid you not…rice. Ten-pound bags of rice for 10 quai or something ridiculous. Honestly worthy of an evacuation style rush, but surprising for the unpredictable predictability of it all. Go figure. Anyway, we (too) politely pushed our way through the crowd toward the downstairs escalators. They were packed. We made it on with a relative few problems (we did stop to consider the extremely cheap beer for a moment, enraging those behind us. Whoops). The bottom of the escalators was a scene unseen by any man in the West since 1964 when John, Paul, George and Ringo were causing every girl between the ages of 15 and 26 to pass out cold on sight. Arguments erupting over the tiniest bump or protocol infraction. Even I was dragged into the fray. Due to one of the aforementioned altercations in front of me, I was unable to disembark from the escalator in a rapid enough fashion to please the lady behind me. Now, I’m not a big guy, but I’m built like a Scot, and don’t move easily, especially at the physical behest of the generally petite population. However, this 4’ 7”, 82 pound woman managed to hit me with her cart strongly enough to knock me into a display stand and knock the phone I was holding out of my hand and onto the tiled floor. Say hello to a cracked outer screen for the duration of the trip :/. The eventful portion of the story ends here. We made it out alive. The checkout line was a cross between a fracas and a melee. We returned back to our dormitory around 8:10 or so, ready to face the day ahead.

Later that day, we took care of a few logistical things such as phones for the rest of the group and the finding of a wonderful Mediterranean/Chinese crossover place that served up a tasty lunch for dirt cheap.

That’s all for this post, but there will be more very soon. Promise.

Stay Classy, America,

Topher

In the Beginning

This is the first post from…China!!!! I’m here and have been for a few days now. It’s taken a little while to adjust, but I believe I’m getting the hang of things here in the Orient. It’s only been four days so far, and I’ve already done so much. Where to begin….? Ah yes! The flight:

4:51 is early. Terribly early. But I was willing to take the hit on account of that’s the time I needed to be up for my flight to Atlanta and eventually Shanghai. Stewart and I roused and dressed ourselves, blearily preparing to face the two days of flying ahead. Airport on time? No issue. Checking luggage? Pas problem. Heartfelt (albeit short) goodbyes? Pie. Security? Astonishingly easy. This is the point where I began to feel some trepidation. I have not been through airport security once without setting something off, having my bag run through a couple times, or being stopped and scanned myself. However, I was willing to accept this event as the start of something new. We got to the gate and hooked up with our fellow expatriates with plenty of time to board. We were seated and ready to takeoff ahead of schedule. This was another new occurrence, and now I knew something was wrong. My fears were confirmed as the pilot crackled over the PA of our little aircraft (that comes into play shortly) and announces that there is an immense amount of fog in Atlanta, and, though it is landable, no new flights are allowed to take off for the airport until runway space is cleared. Drat. The pilot raises our hopes a bit by calling it a “short” delay and saying we’d probably get preference because we were fueled and ready ahead of schedule. That was when he took a lighter to our Hindenburg of Hope. He told us it would be at least an hour until we could leave Nashville. For those of you who don’t know, I had a small window of leniency (sometimes called a short layover) between my flights. Our Nashville plane was originally intended to land at 8:37 and the flight for Shanghai was intended for departure at 9:45. Not much, but enough time to cross 5 concourses and board the plane without too much hassle or hurry. Well, I fell asleep and we took off with me out like a light; thanks Mizmom & Pops for 19 years of flight experience. Our plane made great time to Atlanta and we landed without issue. However, once we’d already taxied to the gate, we were informed it would be another 20 minutes to get a parking spot, even though there were plenty of open spaces. Time was crunching. Yikes. Like a sign from the airport gods, though, Stewart received a text telling us that our plane to Shanghai had been delayed to 10:00. A new sun shone. We weren’t out of the woods yet, however. The plane finally parked, docked, and began to unload. Four of us dashed straight off the plane and up the ramp. Now, remember how I said the plane was small? One of Stewart’s carry-ons was too large and had to be stowed. He got to wait impatiently for it, but, when offered a companion to stay with him, he shouted like that wounded friend in every war movie: “Go on without me! I’ll make it on my own!” Our hearts were heavy, but we had zero time to waste. We set off at a power-walk that rivaled that of a suburban mother in a velour tracksuit. Motoring along the airport corridor, we rounded the corner that took us the Halliest of Halls: the Concourse Connector Tunnel. John, Jason, Sarah, and myself set down the escalator at full tilt and hit the floor with a hefty momentum. Our hopes to catch a tram were dashed by a mocking sign of 1 minute, 32 seconds. Too long to wait (or so we thought). We pressed on, ticking off yard after yard of our 4000-foot journey. Passing Concourse B, we saw that, again, we had just missed the tram. Onwards. Keeping our gait, we hit Concourse C. 30 seconds. We three males decided that we could be halfway to Concourse D before the train even arrived and nearly there before it could park into the next terminal. Sarah had had enough; she dropped out of our race against the moving sidewalks and waited for the train. Pfft. Women. Onward we sped. Concourse D. 9:35. Time was whipping away. Then, like The Lady of the Lake rising from the deeps of her soggy abode, the doors for the tram opened. We lunged aboard at the first door only to find…..STEWART!!! He had made it, and, better than that, caught us. Still no sign of Sarah, but this was the boost we needed: a ride down the final 1000 feet and a comrade reunited with us. Oddly enough, though, the train hadn’t begun to move in the time it took for our reunion to cease. We should have been well on our way by now. “Is the train working?” we each wondered aloud in our own manner. John and I looked at each other decided to give it 30 seconds and then boot it. Ten seconds passed. 20. 30. Gone. We detrained, Stewart quickly taking the lead at full sprint, overlarge overnight bag clasped in both hands going left-right, left-right, left-right in front of him. We all followed suit, hitting the moving sidewalk at full tilt. There it was: Concourse E. The terminal from which all international flights originate and terminate. We were here. Almost. Up the escalator, two steps at a time. Checked the sign while running, and hurried past the food court. Down the hall, past the bathrooms, a cheer and fist pump from the janitor. As we made our final turn (a left turn, if I remember correctly) the PA crackled to life and named each of us still missing. No mention of Sarah. Did we hear that right? No time to worry now. Silly girl just had to wait for the train. Pfft. Women. We quickly indentified ourselves, scanned our boarding passes, and implaned. We’d made it. We spotted Louesa, who had wisely moved her flight from Nashville up an hour (mental note for next time). Now we could worry about Sarah. Had she made it? They were about to close the doors. There wasn’t anything we could do. And there she was. Nestled between two older Chinese women. I suppose waiting can pay off. Pfft. Men. We found our seats, Stewart and I settled in next to each other, and steeled ourselves for 15 hours in an aluminum bird over the continental US, Alaska, the Pacific Ocean, and Japan. Mission accomplished.