Trip to Dongguan, Part II, and Life's Little Hick-ups! - originally published 03-24-05

Life can be like that, a bout of hick-ups out of nowhere! Yesterday and today can be counted - or should I say: discounted - as two of those days. Yesterday morning, I hurt my knee when I fell with my bike, (yes, I know, I did not mention that in my report yesterday, but I thought it was no big deal right after it happened, which in itself, it was not) - you know those dumb falls: driving really slowly in front of the school building and sliding off the asphalt with the front wheel into some tree box , conveniently situated right between the snack booth and the bike racks, and not being able to get the wheel out of there again, so the stupid bike just kicks to the side and you fall, as simple as that! Then I had a major headache for the better part of the rest of the day. And just when I thought the headaches would let me off the hook, I bruised my head in the late afternoon, while trying to squeeze by a stupid pillar, and negotiating some more rough pavement and hitting my brow against a brick pillar. On the bright side though, my bike did not incur any scratches or nicks from those two adventures. To sum it all up: I would have done better staying in bed and not going anywhere!This morning, I could not take a shower, because the electricity went out, so there would have been no way to dry my hair. This afternoon, I could not take a shower, because there was no water. Go figure....Oh, and I forgot a minor inconvenience in this concert of inconveniences: that I'm also plagued by some kind of allergy since this morning: my nose is running nonstop, but just the right nostril, and it tickles like hell. I have no idea why - I want to believe that it will all go away by tomorrow morning. There is a German childrens' song which goes: Heile, heile Gaenschen. Heal heal, my little duckling, and it ends with "in 100 years, all will be gone." So there is hope! You want to see my 'bo bo'? Ok, here it is, have a look: Yes, I know, it looks bad enough! It also hurts when I put balm on it and touch it. I figure by tomorrow, it will be green and black, instead of purple and blue, and maybe a little less swollen. You can see where the impact was, right at the outer end of my eyebrow, at the temple. Ahh, and just for laughs, should I mention that my legs are properly sore, because I climbed that darn Chang Cheng, (Great Wall) all the way up to the highest point, and where the steps are the steepest. I should do this every day, I am sure that would get me back in good shape! I walk around like a stick manneken, and going down the stairs hurts, too! Ouch! Now, you can all feel a little sorry for me, it will help with the healing process! Thanks! I'm done whining!I wanted to tell you more about Dongkeng and my visit down there. Dongkeng is the name of the part of Dongguan where our laboratory will be located.Ed found a new building near the center of Dongkeng, not too far from the City Administration Offices. It is a small, single building, on a street with offices and commerce. The owner had this 4 story house built for his son, so that he might install his own business in there, and use the upper levels for his private home. I have no idea why the son does not want to use it, but it is our gain, as it fits our needs very well. We can have our laboratory on the first three levels, and the employees' quarters on the fourth level (yes, it is customary in China to provide housing for one's employees). The top level is just a third of a level, because there is a roof garden up there, so we can have a private little studio/bedroom up there, for private usage when we are in Dongkeng. It is just a shell at this time, completely unfinished and quite rough looking, though. (For those of you who want to see the pics, go to my flickr pictures website, by the name of velvetpaws999, same as my email here.) We will proceed with the finishing of the building as soon as we have our paperwork advanced sufficiently so that we can get a building permit. This process is roughly halfway accomplished by now, and Ed will hopefully get the most of it done when he returns there next week. We will all be able to compare the 'before' and 'after' pics! I myself am curious to see the difference it will make! It can't possibly go into the wrong direction, considering its present state! Ed and I both wondered where all this junk came from and why it was up there. Not so much the remaining, unused bricks, but lots of other stuff, which you cannot make out in detail on the photos. Also, the Chinese seem to not worry about pouring a smooth concrete floor to begin with, it is all wobbly everywhere, even on the concrete stairways, which will make for more work before one can put tiles or any other surface treatment down. But that shall not be our problem, right!? Right! We will have a nice view from our office windows, a canal and across from there, a modern school building. After the inspection of our future lab, we took a stroll down main street, to see what all was going on in our neighborhood. We had a blast! I could not take pictures fast enough, left and right, so many things and events were taking center stage all over the place! One picture I never managed to take was four people on one little scooter! Threesomes are already impressive, but wait till you see a foursome! Well, I saw lots, but each time one came along, they had zipped past by the time I armed my camera! I am determined to shoot nothing but foursome scooter pics next time I get down there. I am convinced that sooner or later, those will become outlawed by the local authorities, as they should be! It is a dangerous way to travel! But go and explain that to the Chinese!Let me show you some of those Chinese pick-up trucks, too, and you tell me if you are not plain jealous of these beauts! Just imagine we would all drive around in the good ole US of A with such trucks, and imagine the parking lot in front of Lowes or Home Depot filled with them, it would be hilarious! Why would we worry about emissions safety inspections! Heck, we'd have lots of other things to worry about before we got to that topic! And I doubt that we could haul more stuff on a Ford pick-up than what these guys pack away on their home built monster trucks! And, perk! - no need to worry about that luster paint job getting a scratch from the cargo! Notice also: no steering wheel! Just a handle bar! Looking at them, I realize they could have all played in Mad Max, there would have been no need to modify anything on them at all! The streets of Dongkeng are very busy, from early morning to late at night: lots of street vendors with fruit, food, and also services, like knife and scissor sharpening, key copy service, bike repairs are all ambulant down there. And if sales appear a tad sluggish, no problem! You can hire some sales boosters: acrobats! They will help draw a crowd in no time, guaranteed. Of course, it does not necessarily help sell more, from what I could observe, but at least we can have a good time while we are not doing good business! The other sales trick that they like to use a lot and generously is the "high-tech" tool, called a microphone and a good amplifier. Boy oh boy! The most favored mode of usage is on 'echo' mode. Each syllable will bounce off the buildings at least 15 times, in cascading and weakening waves. You get the impression that you are in a Carney ghost ride, except it is not dark there. We attended a sales pitch of a "snake juice" vendor. That's what I baptised the stuff, maybe it is rather "snake wine", lol.This beverage is supposedly good for male vigor. Indeed, males of all ages stood around and gawked, in rapture from the promises echoing off the walls of the supermarket behind the sales table. I did not see anybody buy a bottle though- maybe they do that in secret, behind the supermarket, after the sales pitch is over? After all, who wants their neighbors to know that they could use a little snake juice picker upper? That's what I thought!In the early afternoon, the streets were swarming with blue-white bike riders, coming from several directions, across busy intersections. I also had noticed these blue and white outfits here in Beijing, so I assume, this is the national student dress code. For about half an hour, wave after wave of students dashed down the streets and around corners, progressively thinning out as they got further away from their points of departure and towards their individual residential quarters. I think we should introduce the use of bicycles for students in America, too. We would see the numbers of overweight students fall drastically, and no more heart diseases and weak muscles for the youngsters! And even if they did eat some junk food, they could pedal it off! Maybe we should create an incentive for the parents to not drive the kids around in their cars: some tax deduction if they can prove that they let their kids ride to school on a steel donkey! Or better yet: get some rapper idol to ride around on a bike in their video clips, I'm sure that would do the trick! We could get really creative around this topic! Well, that's all for tonight, folks! More in the next installment, tomorrow! The weekend awaits me, and I will go see Evelyne from the airplane. She has returned today and called me to invite me over to her place tomorrow after work. I am sure we will have a good time together, as she promised we would cook some Chinese food together! Zai Jian! Take care y'all!

Trip to Dongguan, Part I (originally published 03-23-05)

I have no idea what the stars had in mind for me today, but not much went right, for sure!A day with a big headache today! It started right away this morning: in class, I was no good, I might just as well not have been there. Yesterday afternoon, I had rehashed all the new vocabulary, written each one at least ten times in my exercise book, and what for? Nothing had stuck, the headaches took it all out!In the second block of lessons, one of my classmates remembered that he had some headache pills in his traveling kit, and two pills popped into my mouth, together with half a bottle of water, managed to clear that head of mine up again, about another hour later. It felt like being let out of some invisible prison! Everybody else was more or less sluggish today, too: they were tired from yesterday's climb up the Chang Cheng! Call it the Great Wall in English! (See!? Not what you were already thinking!) And one third of the class had not even bothered to show up at all today!Then, as I pedaled homewards on my little red bike, fighting against another nasty cold and strong wind, I neglected the big brick pillar, as I wanted to maneuver the bike between the big yellow trash dumpster in our yard, right by the bike sheds, and said brick pillar: I hit it with the handle bar, and this made my bike tilt and kick me, or more precisely, my head, right into that darn brick pillar. Result: a big gash over my right eyebrow, bleeding like a pig- it also gave a big 'clank' as I hit that hard stone! Maybe my head is now slightly cracked? I would not be surprised at all! Who knows? I can't believe how much blood was flowing down my face, it dripped all over the yard. Now there are traces of my DNA stuck to those old courtyard tiles, big splotches that were red at first, but look quite brownish by now. I stopped the bleeding by pressing a Kleenex, all wadded together, to my head for a while. Then, I managed to carry the bike upstairs and washed my face and hands, to get rid of all that caked-on blood of mine! What a mess! Well, now, I look like I had a big fight with some nasty guy or thug or other - oh well, I can always say that the other guy looks much worse! That'll help! So, you see?! I should have stayed in bed this morning! But other than that, all is hunky dory! And there is hope that I'll survive, so don't buy flowers and cards just yet!Actually, what I really wanted to write about today was my trip to the south of China, to the city of Dongguan, in Guangdong Province. This is where Eltek is planning on setting up its Chinese laboratory, so Ed was there to work on the registration of our business in China. It is a multi-step process, and somewhat lengthy, but we are getting through it one step at a time. I had not yet been to our new location, although I had been to Dongguan once before. However, that time, neither Ed nor I knew that we would choose this place for our Chinese laboratory place. We had thought of Shunde initially, another city not too far from there. However, luckily for us, we changed to Dongguan, as it has better connections via rail to Hong Kong, as compared to a ferry service in Shunde. Real estate is also still lower here, which serves us well, not to mention that this city is extremely more dynamic and modern. I got a good feeling from being there, right off the bat, when we went there last year to buy lab equipment from a local manufacturer.The trip to Dongguan started out with a taxi ride to the airport in Beijing, then 2 hours of waiting for check-in. So I found myself a spot to sit down and open my study books - not an easy task in Beijing Airport, as there are no seats anywhere, except in the gate areas. I managed to claim a smooth, stainless steel surface at the side of the check-in counters, at the very end of the row of counters. I guess, they had a little space left over, too much to ignore and too little to squeeze another desk in, so the just built a smooth surface there. It suited me just fine: I popped my butt right on to it, then dumped my backpack and got out my book and exercise pad, and a pen. With my feet conveniently propped onto my suitcase in front of me, on the floor, I decided I could survive there for those 2 hours to kill. I had just begun to immerse myself into my Chinese vocabulary, when I felt a pair of eyes poking me in the back of my neck. I turned around and looked straight at a young guy, standing on the far side of that metal surface I was sitting on, leaning on his elbow and trying to peek into my books. As I looked at him, he smiled and stepped back a little. The classic 'ni hao' brought him back again, and he answered me, too. Then, he asked what I was doing there. "Homework, Chinese language studies", I replied. "See? Here!" And I let him have a look at what I was writing. He seemed to have nothing better to do, so he took the book and read over what I had been writing. By now, he had come out from behind the counter space and sat down next to me on the box. He volunteered to tutor me through my last lesson, and we repeated it together, quite well actually! I felt we had spent some quality time together, but it was already late enough to hurry to the check-in. Those lines were packed! As I finally got to the counter, there he was, and chucking those pieces of luggage onto the belt that carried them off to the planes. So that was his job here! He saw me and waved at me, with a big wink-wink of his eye to boot! Nice fellow! The young woman at the check-in talked to me in English right away, I guess it is obvious that I am a 'lao wai', I could not pass for a Chinese woman if I tried! But I teased her anyway: "how did you know I can speak English?" I asked her. She laughed and said "you look like you can".She offered me to sit in the emergency exit row, and pointed towards my legs, with a big grin. "Thanks for taking care of my long legs, I like that!" I told her, and she laughed and nodded: "yes, long legs!" Once on board, I settled in my aisle seat in the exit row, enjoying all that space in front of me. Just as I was doing a good and thorough stretch, one of the flight attendants walks up to me, and after the 'ni hao', says in English: "Do you speak fluent Chinese?" "No, why?" "Because you are in the emergency exit row." "Yes, and so?" "Oh, if you do not speak Chinese, you must move to another seat." "You are joking, right!?" "No, not joking, you must speak Chinese, can you say something, please?" Well, taken by surprise as I was, nothing Chinese came to mind, no matter how hard I tried to scrape my meager Chinese linguistic possessions together. So, I tried for a charming smile, and saying, "please, I think I can handle the exit very well, should that be necessary. Just let me stay in this seat, please!?" Oh no, this one is Mrs. Perfect, and she cannot just pretend I can speak fluent Chinese, or, she could pretend she did not notice that I was not Chinese. or that she had asked me about my Chinese language skills - no no, she declared she was going to find another seat for me! I turned around to look for myself: aaarrrghh! This plane was already totally full! But then again, she would probably make me swap seats with somebody! Rats! I did not want to give up this nice spot, just because I could not speak fluent Chinese! I decided I'd just go for it straight, and told the attendant exactly that. "I WANT TO STAY HERE! I DO NOT WANT TO SIT SOMEWHERE ELSE, PLEEEEEEAAASE!!!" I think I must have reached her deep down inside, or, she forgot, or she pretended to have forgotten, or nobody wanted to do emergency row exit duty - whatever it was, she did not return to chase me off my seat - the minutes ticking away and the captain announcing to all sit down and buckle up. Saved by the bell! I kept my seat! Yeah! The other two people, next to me in the exit row, were both Chinese, so I figured they would know what to do should we crash land! But anyhow, chances are, that in case of such a predicament, there might be no need for that skill, as usually planes do end up in little pieces and with no survivors who might want to use the emergency exit! So what is all that joust about anyhow! Don't worry, be happy! And let me sit in my exit row seat! Now that we were airborne, I got out my exercise books again, to make good use of the three hour long flight. My row neighbor, in the window seat, who had been reading a newspaper, turns his attention to me: "Are you studying Chinese?" comes the question. "Looks like it! I am just a beginner!" And on the rim of his newspaper, he starts to write down little exercises, which I know all too well, from daily drills: a e I o u, ai ei ou ao, an en on un, ang eng on gung, and so on, neatly written one below the other, and he pushes it over to me, ticking his index finger on them. I understand and oblige: "here, read those for me!" I do the exercise, he is happy. Now, he wants my book. He thumbs through it. Aha, very good! comes his assessment. Well, I am happy that he approves of the teaching methods of our university! The young woman in the middle seat looks over, too, and they start talking together about me and my studies, as I can tell from looks in my direction and lots of pointing to my books. She is very cute and smiling. The two of them keep talking about texts in my book, with such deep interest as if they themselves were going to study Chinese, too! For the next two hours, I have two tutors who have nothing but my best interests at heart, and are very tough and unforgiving on my attempts to squeeze out of a question of vocabulary here or a spelling exercise there. No way, I have to do each and all of them! I surrender! Ok, let's do the entire lesson one more time! And off we go for another round! So, I make a mental note to myself: A great way to practice Chinese is to fly around China aboard airplanes, non-stop! Way more efficient than attending classes with 15 other 'lao wais' who don't know how to pronounce anything any better than I do! Or, maybe I should live in a Chinese airport! Remember the movie, where a Russian guy gets stuck in an airport in the USA, because his papers are not clear? Well, just like that guy!Evelyne, the Chinese woman's English name, promises to stay in touch with me and keep tutoring me after she gets back from her one week trip, so now I look forward to seeing her again in Beijing this coming weekend. Ahem... (clearing my throat), yes... there was something else I wanted to say, right? Oh yes... THE trip to Dongguan.. Well, you'll have to read up on part Two to get to that. Right now, I think I am done for today!Good night, y'all!

The Mail Woman Always Sorts Twice!

Hello, all my dear friends, I know, I have been neglecting you, so sorry! I have a valid excuse, however: my studies of Mandarin! Yes, I am not done yet, still lots of things to learn before we can see the light at the end of the Chinese tunnel! You might want to know how things are going in that department. Oh well, like a roller coaster. There are days when I actually feel, or even am convinced that I can hold a small and simple conversation and get some meaningful ideas across to my conversation partners, and on those days, I feel proud of myself and very satisfied that I must have already accomplished something. Then, the very next day in class, all the mental lights start flashing and then go out, and darkness and confusion take over. It feels as if I never heard of Chinese before - all the words I learned and knew yesterday have vanished in a thick fog of uncertainties. That is the most frustrating feeling one can ever know. I wrote the list of new words several times, I memorized them, I read them out loud and all was well, then I close the book and want to write them one more time, and they have all vanished. Very strange!Our home room teacher keeps telling us we need to study more, but I have a feeling that a break now and then is far healthier than pushing the study part to the extreme. Chinese teachers are like that: a good student will die studying and fight for the last vocabulary with her or his last breath!Well, I decided this is not what I need, I need a day off! So, this afternoon, instead of being a good student and doing my homework, I just went out and looked at CDs and DVDs, to find some entertainment and change and refresh my mind. I bought a Chinese song/video CD by some singer who used to be very popular here some years ago. Our pronunciation teacher had a song of his on his exercise tapes, entitled "Friend". He promised to teach us this song. The CD I found has the Karaoke feature on it, so I can see the Chinese text on the screen and learn it. I also bought a video: Henry and June, a great movie about Henry Miller, his wife June and Anais Nin's adventures together, based on their writings. It is a beautiful movie, and I highly recommend it!
I also purchased an album by the good ole Rolling Stones, their top 20 songs. These, my friend Lisa and I played this afternoon in my place, and on maximum volume, just to give back a little to my neighbor friends, who have been wrecking my nights' sleep for the past 2 weeks, with jack hammering through the night in their newly renovated apartment next door. This, too, was a highly satisfying activity! We danced around and relaxed, and sang along as loud as possible, too.
On the creative side, I also have not told you yet about Ed's and my cultural adventure in Dongguan while I visited Ed there. The Crown Prince Hotel has what they call the "Opera House Club Prince", a very large theater. Actually, it is large by its dimensions, the auditorium and stage in size comparable to the Fox theater. The layout of the seating is, however, so different that only a relatively small number of patrons can find a place in there: they have tables with benches for guests, each table arranged in a separate booth. This takes up a lot of space! The only places where I had seen this kind of setup, is in Paris, in the Pigalle nightclubs, where they present striptease shows and such, plus a variete program of magicians and acrobats. Here, this venue presents some kind of dance and song show, with various artists. Ed had mentioned it to me before I got there, saying how grandiose these shows were: great dance numbers, great music, formidable acrobatics..., and that we had to make sure we could go while I was there with him. So we made reservations for a table for the Saturday night show.
One basically has to rent a table for the show, and the price includes service and dinner. Depending on what level of ticket one buys, they will bring food until one has exhausted the value of the tickets purchased.
The show starts of with a series of songs, presented by one female and two male singers, who take turns singing for us: first the one singer, then he takes over as the MC, while the girl sings, then the second guy gets his turn to sing song number 3. All of them are on the front stage, while in the background, and on several levels, all kinds of other actions are occurring: people jumping, rolling and running all over the place, in wild bric-a-brac of costumes of all colors and creations: from pseudo Roman Empire style soldiers with plastic swords and each with 5 medium-sized flags on 3 foot poles planted in the back of their pants, via young, seductive females in red, long dresses slit open on the side all the way to their butts, are trying to dance to some very confusing choreography, to acrobats doing forward and backward rolls and flip-flops all over the stage, whilst our brave singers are standing in a shallow water basin, protected against wet feet by a set of rubber boots, the whole theme set against a thin curtain of water falling down from above. I don't know if you get the mental picture!Add to that, scenes with characters resembling Disneyland figures, a yellow pig, a blue dog, a duck with its oversized head gear pushed back too far, probably because the actor inside the costume needed to be able to see something! Some
Alice in Wonderland in a red dress, dancing with some Peter Pan-before-his-nose-grew-long type of puppet, in between the individual song numbers. And when they insert a passage with music from Shiloh Ranch, I suddenly get the feeling that the air is getting thinner in that place, and I have to leave quickly, before mental suffocation sets in. Even Ed who told me how grandiose this show was, has no idea anymore by now what the heck is going on in his favorite Chinese opera, but of course, he pretends it is wonderful, at least that is what I interprete from his mimics and hand signs with which he tries to communicate with me over that mind numbing cacophony of noisy music and drum rolls. I only want to flee from the scene of crime, so I wave Ed goodbye and vanish as fast as I can make it out of there.
Even before I reach our room, I have decided that I won't mention it later on or discuss it with Ed if he won't bring it up. Ed did not bring it up.....
Let's close the chapter "weekend in Dongguan".
Today, I finally got the postcard which Ed had posted from Hong Kong about two weeks ago. Not that this postcard took so long to get here, oh no. It took me so long to find it. This afternoon, Lisa and I passed by the guards' booth, where the mail for the entire little city block is stored in wooden boxes, sorted by building numbers. My building has the number 801. For the past two weeks, ever since Ed had mentioned the postcard, I had been checking out the contents of our box, and to no avail. Today, there was a uniform-dressed lady in the booth, sorting mail and re-arranging the furniture which had been sitting on the sidewalk for the past two days, due to renovation work inside. She wanted to know where I live and then pointed to the corresponding box, with the 801 painted on it. As I sorted through the stack, I recognized most of the pieces from previous screenings. Some mail seemed to have gotten stuck in there for many months, their addressees having moved away or, who knows - ignoring the very existence of this mail depot. Well, still no postcard from Ed in the box! Just for good measure, I decided to also go through the stack for 802, but the post lady told Lisa that mail for 801 was only in the box reading 801 on it. At the same time, I see her taking some envelopes from one box and stuffing them into another. So, with Lisa's help, I inquire why she just swapped mail boxes for these pieces, if they were supposed to be for this box, not that ? I find out that these belonged into the other box. Now, I ask her how then I could be certain that my postcard was not also stuck in any of the other boxes instead? Oh no, she says, that can't be, because I live in 801, so therefore, my mail will be in the box marked 801. Fine, I say, but I just saw her swap other pieces of mail from one to the other box. Now, how is she so sure that my postcard does not also need swapping, because it ended up in the wrong box? Oh no, that can't be, she repeats, because I live in 801. It is a hopeless undertaking! I decide on a different strategy: I will just inspect the other boxes myself. The postal lady does not like this too much, I can see from the way she looks at me, just a tad disgusted. This, however, is not enough to deter me! I keep digging through the other boxes, one after the other, and at box number 4, I catch a glimpse of a big, red postcard sticking out from the stack. I pull it out and what do I see? My name is on there! Aha! I wiggle this corpus delicti right under Mrs. Postal Worker's nose: Ha! What have we here? Does this say my name here? Now she is at a loss how to explain the whole situation. I smile at her and ask Lisa to please convey to her that, should this happen again, I will have to give her a good spanking! Lisa reluctantly and blushingly obliges me, and I can see from Mrs. Postal's facial expression that she is actually pondering whether is might be worth her while to misplace the next postcard, too! Lisa, however, is quite embarrassed. As we leave, she waits until we are out of earshot, then says: "Oh Moneva, you are crazy! But it worked, you found your postcard. I don't know how you do this. You just talk American to the Chinese, and they don't understand you, but you get what you want". I reassured Lisa that this way, we are even!
In class today, our teacher distributed questionnaires. It seems the university officials wish to know how we feel about our classes. Hence, they handed us an 8 page questionnaire, saying: Dear Friends, we are doing a research in order to help you with your Chinese learning and to improve our teaching environment. This questionnaire is part of our research. All your information will be kept strictly secret. Note: Your natural and instant reaction is expected!Hmmmm, let's see...
Let's begin:
1. I learn Chinese for my further studies in China. (So far so good)
2. I study Chinese, because I am interested in China. (OK...)
3. I study Chinese, because I want to understand the Chinese culture. (Yes, that too.)
4. I study Chinese in order to be better educated to serve my country. (I beg your pardon?)
5. I study Chinese as I want to think and behave as Chinese do. (Ahem, yeah, I was going to mention that)
6. I came here since my country encouraged me to come and paid my tuition. (No, not really!)7. I study Chinese, because the Chinese in my country have made a great contribution to the richness of my country. (Ahem, yeah, Chinese restaurants!)
8. People in my country should make a greater effort to meet more Chinese people. (Where? In my country or your country???)
9. I want a Chinese roommate when I am in China, and even after I go back to my country. (I think we will have to talk about that a little more first, ok!?)
10. Generally speaking, the Chinese people I have met are trustworthy and dependable. (True, just not the one who now has my little red bike, not that one, nope!)
11. It is possible for me to fall in love with a Chinese boy or girl. (Hey now, wait a minute, what's that got to do with my studies????)
12. I like participating in Chinese parties. (Yeah, Campay!)
13. By bringing their traditional Chinese folkways to the world, Chinese have contributed greatly to our way of life. (I am confused, still thinking about that boy or girl thingy from above!)14. Chinese economic development has made great contribution to the world economy. (OK, can you help me remember what the purpose of this questionnaire was? I seem to be confused, just a little!)
15. Chinese traditional virtue beliefs are positive to modern world. For example: filial piety, self-cultivation, hard working, thrift, kindness, etc. (ahem.. nice to meet you, too.. what was your name again?)
16. China is much better than what I thought before I came here. (What AM I thinking?)
17. We can learn better life style from Chinese people. (This is all a little too fast for me!)18. Although I don't know China's actual economic situation, I feel that the economic level of China is the same as my country. (No, it is better, I am from Africa!.)
19. According to what I have seen here, I feel that China is a democratic country. (Do you REALLY want me to elaborate on this ? No you don't!)
20. Chinese have set good examples for us by their family virtue, such as remaining a devoted couple to the end of their lives. (Right, and by aborting any child over the count of one per family)
21. Chinese people have every reason to be proud of their economic development. (That, they do and what was the purpose of this questionnaire again? Please remind me!)
22. I have a lot in common with Chinese. (Indeed, I do: ears, nose, arms, feet...)
23. The people in my country have a lot in common with Chinese people. (No, most of them are much fatter.)
24. I am an extroverted person. (Oh yes, that I am! I'll mark 6 on the scale of 1 - 6 for this one)
Thanks!
(Come again?????)

FIRE!!!! in the Classroom and One Happy Teacher

Oh, happy day! We finally hit pay dirt! I had everybody talking and going for it today! Yeah! Yippee yeah!!
Let me remember how this whole thing got going�. I think I wrote something on the black board about English studies�. It went like this: English is a world language.
That inspired one of my students, Henry, (also known in our class as �hungry Henry�, lol) to state that he felt Chinese should be the world language, and if that was not so right now, it was going to be in the future. I asked him, why he thought that. His answer: Right now, America is the number one country, but one day, China will be the number one country. And then, everybody will have to speak Chinese.
I said: �China will be number One one day, yes, but English will always be the world language number one.�
That was all I needed to do to put the torch to the dry hay stack!
We had everybody up in arms, talking loudly and all at once, AND, believe it or not! In ENGLISH!!! Because they were talking to me, so they needed to make themselves understood. They wanted to convince me that I was wrong, and why Chinese will become world language. Their main argument: There are more people in the world who speak Chinese than any other language, so by numbers, we will make everybody change for Chinese. After that, we looked at economic patterns, such as which economies are the ones where people speak English, and where do they speak Chinese. We found out together, not only that it is already a fact of life that all western countries have opted for and are practicing English, but also that there is a country called India, which rivals China in numbers and has two official languages: Hindu/Hindi and English. So, that settled that.
Then, we talked about the big population in China and whether that is a problem or a boon. They, of course, brainwashed as they have been, like most of the rest of us, think it is a doom. Personally, I explained to them how we can consider it a boon. Well, it gave them lots of things to think about this weekend.
We also discussed the idea of how much impact one single individual can have on a community, a country. They believed they could have no impact whatsoever, being only one insignificant person. I asked them whether they thought Confucius had been born famous. They conceded, no, he had been a normal person at birth, and he became famous because of his concern for the Chinese education system, and not overnight, but little by little, all along his life time and beyond. We found a new meaning to the term �yi ge ren�, meaning �alone�, or �one person� in English: One person at a time, each person her/his contribution.
We learnt the phrase that Kennedy coined: �Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country!� I noticed thoughtful faces on some of the students.
Ah, in one word: I had a happy day, you cannot believe how!
Then, we talked about exchange student programs, because most of them would love to go abroad to study in a foreign high school. To my surprise, I discovered that money was not the hindering element at all! All their parents have money. I tallied up for them what to expect if they were to go to high school in Saint Louis. The school tuition of 6,500 US bucks seemed peanuts to them. I was slightly surprised. They assured me their parents would have that money, no problem at all. Then what is the problem, why don�t they all go? Well, they have no connections to America, they know nobody! Some of them told me how one or the other of their good friends was sent to England to study three years, and it cost their parents (hold on to your seats, now, please!) 1 million 400 thousand RMB to pay for those 3 school years, tuition, room and board! Divide by 8 and you get the dollars: One hundred seventy five thousand US Dollars!!! For 3 years of school! Yeah, I am typing this in all letters so you don�t get the idea I hit one too many zeros by accident. I was very �sticker shocked�! They all assured me that is the usual going rate. The rich Chinese parents are desperate to send their kids out to learn English and the Western style of life. And they have the money to pay for it! Well, I don�t know about you, but that was news to me!
So, you can see for yourselves what a productive day we had today in class, I�d say it was beyond average productive. On the small talk side, we also had the topic of who has a girl friend and who has not, lol. Seems that our two �hunks�, Victor and Kobe, have so many girlfriends, our classroom would not be big enough if we invited all of them.
To see how they all activated their brains to use that vocabulary they have accumulated in English, and probably use it for real for the very first time in their lives, given the fact that I am �first contact� for all of them, I�d say they did amazingly well! We agreed that since they could not travel to America to practice English there, I was the best bet for them to do so right here, their little piece of America right in the middle of Rizhao/China. Alright, that was my Saturday morning. Now, my family is standing in front of me, practically on my feet, waiting to finish this journal entry, so that we can all go to the sea side and have a good time on the beach.
I got to get going! Take care y�all and have a great weekend yourselves! I will think of you!

AWOL and other Miscellaneous Crimes

Ahhhh, the surprises that each day can bring here! One would never guess! That is the good part, actually, one of the many good parts about this job: lots of unpredictable situations.... Today in class, we finished off the American Short Study, the 13 founder states (who by the sayings of half my class had mysteriously turned into 15 for about 10 minutes or so)... we established the list and wrote them all on the blackboard, so we realized that they were actually 13, like yesterday.... what a relief! Then, we were off to discover the meaning of all the English names my students adopted for themselves. The Chinese NEED to know what is in a name, it is of utmost importance to them. So, I had waded through several websites and collected the meaning of all their names, then presented them neatly in a table, alphabetical order and all. From my observations, most were happy with what they discovered: the "glorious", the "loved by the Gods" the "Victorious" and so on, they beamed and looked quite content! Then, it was time for the break: 9:15 till 9:30. At the end, most students were back in class, but some arrived about 5 minutes later. However, we were still 4 short. Where the heck did they go? Nobody could find them anywhere. We picked up our classes: next subject: Build a detective story.Who done it?Mrs. McDonald was found dead this Monday, at 9:00 am, in her home. What happened? How did she die? Was it murder? I explained to them what we were going to do, and I asked them to form groups of three students. Well, that did do no good, as nothing happened. I looked around: what is the matter? Don�t you understand "group"? or "three students"?Ahhhh, now it came out! They balked at the other requirement I had given: each group must have at least one girl or one boy in it. NO all girls or all boys groups!They tried to argue the point, but my position was: "I can make the groups for you, or you do it yourselves. You have 10 seconds to make up your mind which way we are going to handle this. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6,.... "Ok, ok, Mona, we will do it!" "Thanks, folks!! wheeeew!" Nothing is ever simple!So, after 5 minutes, we had 2 groups of 3 folks each. The rest of my 12 present (and by sheer coincidence, we had 6 boys/6 girls) were sitting around loosely, no group in sight. "What is it this time?" "We don't want to make a group, we want to work like this"... "Ah no, sorry, no can do! You have 10 more seconds now, and I am counting 10, 9....8... 7... " It worked this time, and we finally had our little groups set up. Oh well, groups is too much of a description here... I'd say, rather some vague approach in the approximate same area of the classroom. I managed to make them join the same table and sit down together. 30 minutes later.... finally... we were on to the next step... explain how to proceed with our task. "Ok, you are all working for the FBI, and you are teams of detectives leading the investigation in this case. You will ask questions, then find the answers to those questions and thus, manage to build your case.' I gave them examples of what questions to ask: Who called in the death of Mrs. M.? Who found her? Where was she found? Why did that person who found her, show up at her place at 9 in the am? Did they know each other? How old is Mrs. M.? Was she married? Does she have friends? Neighbors? Relatives? What was she wearing? Clothes? Pajamas? Nothing? (that gave rise to some cheerful snickers, lol).And so on.... "Now get going and don't let anybody know what you are doing, the other teams must not find out about your secret inquiry!"The buzz in that class room! All were so excited about how to figure out this case! I walked around from group to group to see how they were getting along, gave some advise, asking them more questions...I found that all groups had difficulties working in teams. There was Victor, who has a good level of vocabulary and knows how to speak quite fluently: He wielded the pen and wrote at top speed, while his two team mates were sitting there, looking on, their hands in their laps! I nudged Victor gently but firmly into a more open and cooperative mode, not easy to do, as he was determined to write a novel. I reminded him: "Victor, the idea here is to ask questions, write them down, then determine what would be a good answer... which then leads you to the next question, and so on... and each person in your team must find questions." Victor: "Yes, yes, I know, but I want to just write this one piece, I just have this idea..." Mona: "Yes, that is great that you have an idea, but the format here is questions and answers, not a story in story format". Victor:� Yes I know, but I want to just write this one part here." Mona: "Victor, you are the strongest in your team, you need to guide the other two and help them work with you, ok? They need your help, so stop now, and make a questionnaire together with them... now, Victor! PLEASE!" Ah, finally, Victor drops the pen and raises his head to acknowledge his other two mates. Ok, I think, we got them on track now... next team....the next team is overly zealous, all three write in their respective notebooks, but no communication is occurring. I inquire how things are going, and they all tell me they are doing the work. Well, wonderful, but you three need to write one inquiry together, not three!" Yes, but my idea is good... say all three like one. "Great, keep two of them for the next round another day, now we want one story, made up by 3 people, that is it, folks, ok?" As I make my rounds over and over, slowly, the inquiries are actually taking on a good shape, and the story lines evolve. Mrs. M. died in her bathroom, she was murdered by her ex-boyfriend who now hates her: he put poison into the hot water tank, and when she took a shower, the poison killed her by penetrating through her skin.Mrs. M. died in her kitchen, because her husband killed her with a Tai Chi sword. He dumped it in the trash can, but our detectives found the finger prints and arrested him. He planned on marrying his girl friend!Mrs. M died killed by her sister: she choked her with a pillow, then she tried to make it look like a suicide by slicing the dead woman's wrists... she hoped to inherit her fortune. We were having an exciting morning!In the meantime, about 20 or so minutes into the start-up of our adventure, I had locked the door to the class room, thus making sure that any hefty late comers would not just sneak in and pretend all was well in our little world. I never minded a little belated return, say, a grace period of 5, even 10 minutes on occasion... but half an hour?! No way! In the first days of our togetherness, they had the habit of not showing up at all after breaks, thinking it was my duty to go out and collect them all, one by one. I explained to them that they were not ABC students and thus capable of knowing how long lasted 15 minutes. So, they were expected back on time, all by themselves. This seems a novel idea to them, as they said without a bell to ring them, they would not know what to do. I suggested a look at their wrist watch instead, and that worked relatively decently, until today for our 4 vagrants.So now here was one of them, rattling the handle of the door, waving through the panes, signaling he wanted back in. I waved back at him, shaking my head, pointing at the clock, and signaling back: NO!Returning my attention to my work with the class, I noticed that now, he tried to pry open the windows, to climb inside, but that yielded no results. Again, he knocked at the door, but I instructed everybody to keep on working. They did. After about 20 minutes, Ed, our vagrant student, had decided he needed to write me a letter, which he pushed inside through the crack at the bottom of the door. A student handed it to me. I read: �Dear Mona Teacher, I�m sorry. I�m wrong. I know I�m not right. I�m not carefully. I want to go to Student English. I want to come in. Love from Ed.�
Aha, we are talking now! I read the letter to the class and consulted them: �What do you think? Should we let him in, or should he stay outside?� �Let him back in� was the consensus. So I opened the door and he sneaked back in. Then, another 30 or 40 minutes later, two more of our AWOLs showed up, and rattled the door handle to get in. Same treatment: entry denied. They attempted several more forced entries, but finally gave up and disappeared again. All others worked diligently until the end of our daily lesson. As they left, our two late comers, Harper and my favorite �Hungry Henry�, showed up again. I discovered them upon my return to the class for cleaning chores, writing on the blackboard, which they had neatly divided into two halves, one for each of them. Two further �Dear Mona� letters, in chalk this time. As they saw me, they said they wanted to write to me about this incident. So I invited them to use paper. At this point, I love paper trails, lol! It makes for a better detective story, ha ha ha. My two penitent students sat down and wrote me their excuses on a sheet of paper, while I got the digital cam out to take a pic of their chalk prose. Makes for good memories!Here is what they wrote:�Dear Mona, I�m too sorry. In this morning, I have no eat food. Because I�m get up the bed too late. I�m go to school. And go shop to eat some food. But I�m too slowly. At the end, I�m go to school. But I too later. I�m very very sorry to that. Please, you pardon me. But I think I can�t do that. Harper�And Henry:�Dear Mona, I am sorry. I know you very angry with me. Today I didn�t have breakfast first. I know I have a large mistake. I believe I won�t do it again. I am sorry. I am sorry. I believe myself OK. Thank you. Next day, I don�t do it again. I�m sorry to trouble you. Please, believe me. Henry�There you have it� my Watson/Holmes whiskers tell me something sounds set up in these two strikingly similar versions of �Im sooooo soooorrryyy! Letters�, wouldn�t you agree?I have not heard anything from Kobe, AWOL # 4. We shall get the latest scoop on that tomorrow.
All the others were so engrossed in their detective stories that they did not even notice the end of the classes roll around. We will have to finish this tomorrow. I�ll let you know what the outcome is going to be.
It occurs to me more and more that Chinese students have not the first idea about team work. As single children, they never learn to share at home, all is due them exclusively. And in their regular class rooms, with 70 or more students, they never get to do any team work, either, just individual memorizing of words, and exercise writing. Where is all of this going to lead China? People who do not know how to do team work will not be able to survive in corporate structures. Not to mention that is also not very positive for general life situations. These kids don�t want to help the weaker ones in school, for fear of losing an advantage. The idea here is: Why should I help you? It will make me look less outstanding! I am trying to instill in them the idea of the stronger taking care of the weaker, tutoring and helping them to be able to follow the flow of studies. They only go that route reluctantly, but they go, because I insist heavily. Interesting, how a society that declares itself to be communist begets little selfish �me-mehers�!
So, now I�ll have to prepare some more lesson material for tomorrow, and then, it�ll be the end of my day here!Be well y�all and enjoy your day!

Just another Limerick in the (Chinese) Wall

Hi everybody!How are you? For me, it is 7 am here in Rzhao, and I will prepare for class. We are going to attack the subject of limericks today. That is going to be interesting. And if we have any time left after that, we are going to look at the pics Patrick sent from Saint Louis, really funny ones! The series is titled "I love the South", meaning the redneck southern states of the US of A! You should see those pics!They are going to learn a whole new set of vocabulary with those, lol! Consider that teaching English in China basically comes down to putting the dictionary into their heads. They do not understand that vocabulary is just a tool, not the goal. So they often balk at anything more than treating a text as a means to punch words into the brain. I work on changing that, a difficult task. I love a challenge! Yesterday, I made them do a simple interview. I told them I want to know more about their city. So I prepared a questionnaire. Questions like: How many inhabitants are there in your city? do you have a river? Do you have theaters, movie theaters, museums, parks, etc...I also asked them if they had busses.... lol! Then I tought them the word "gazillion", lol. First, I asked the class all my questions, wrote them on the blackboard, and the answers, too. I had everybody write along. Then, I grouped them into teams of 2 and made them do the interview. Told them we are now in a TV show, one is the journalist, one the city official, guest of the show, and all others the spectators on the live show. So, all the teams had to come to the front of the class to do the interview. I also told them they had to rate each teams performance and write it down in a list, so we could tally it up at the end.You should have seen the mess at tallying! It took 2 of us almost an hour to write the table of ratings for 9 teams! The papers they used were merely scrap paper, and the writing method was all but a method, more in the vein of a messod, lol. They could not read their own stuff!Well, it was a worthwhile experience. They almost figured out everything that they had learned from it. So now, I made them a little memo paper about that experience. We will treat it today, first thing. Mona's teaching style.... so totally anti-Chinese style!
And the day after..........All right, this was an interesting day for all of us! This morning, it was so quiet in my class, before I even showed up, that I thought nobody had come at all. You have to bear in mind that my room is right next to my classroom, so there is only one door separating me from my work! As I stepped through that door at 8 sharp, I saw a very unfamiliar sight, more like a strange dream: all my students were lined up very neat and orderly, seated in proper rows of tables and chairs, their hands meekly before them, and their heads slightly bowed, all jabber mouths shut! I almost tiptoed to the front of the class, looked at them and greeted them: good morning, guys! "Good morning, Moneva" came the chorus' answer. Wow! I started class, expecting them to loosen up after a short while, but nothing! They kept put, being very polite and almost shy, doing their best to pay attention and being "good". Hmmmm... what should I make of this new and unexpected situation? Well, after some more minutes, I just couldn't take it any longer, so I asked them: "What is going on here today?" Answer: "Nothing". Aha..... I said: "Something is not right.... what is the matter with you?" "Nothing, really".... Hmmmm, nothing!?"You are so quiet, nobody sitting on the sofa, nobody chatting, nobody goofing off and nobody crowded right in front of me, so I can hardly move.... that is just not normal!" "No, no, really, nothing at all, Moneva, really!" I scrutinized them, one by one. No eye contact, all heads bowed. "Listen! Yesterday, you were my usual bunch of loud and jittery people, and today, you are sitting here like wax museum dolls!? I don't buy it!" Wo bu mai zhang! No matter what I tried, all I got were some shy laughs, heads still half bowed! The total mystery! Finally, I decided to just treat this as normal and proceeded with the first hour of classes. The revision of yesterday's interview work, and the paper I had prepared for them.R&R time rolled around, with a little overdraft at about 9:20. I went to the kitchen to get some tea and to chat with Lilian, my Chinese colleague. I told her of my "strange" or "estranged" students.She listened carefully, then got herself into a good laughing fit. "I know what it is!" she said."Yesterday, you announced to them that you wanted to work on Limericks, right?" I said I had announced that, yes. "There you have it! They are afraid." "Afraid????!!! Of what???" "Well, they now believe you will ask them to write a limerick themselves, and they don't know how to do that, so they are afraid! So they all behave!" Ahhh, I just hope you are now laughing as hard as I did when I heard that! I went back to my classroom, and I left them all to believe that sooner or later that day, their time had come, lol!We worked on one limerick, the most famous British one there is, I think: There was a young lady of Lynn.... you all know the story, right? With a lot of drawing of lemonades in glasses and straws and explaining that this is just a joke, not to be taken as the latest news flash from BBC News, they finally grasped the idea of a funny punch line and what a limerick is supposed to be. They just could not get over the idea that any person could "really, really" be that skinny! If you ask me, we will have to work on only another 500 or more limericks, before they will be ready to write their first home made one! So, I guess that will make for a well behaved class for the remaining 2 weeks of my teaching! Ahhhh, the power of 5 simple little lines in good English! I will make a limerick of this, I think it would be worth while, just to commemorate it! When I think that in only two weeks, our seminar will be over, I feel sad already. These students have grown on me in only such a short time. We go and hang out together after class, in the afternoon. Sometimes at the beach, but often, they just show up and hang around the courtyard, or in my room. I like it and don't mind at all. My hosts, An and Lilian, the owners of this little private school, will take me on a trip to An's family in Heilongjian Province, after we finish the summer sessions. That is the outer most north-eastern Province. We will probably go there for 2 weeks. At the end of that trip, I think I'll be headed back to Beijing a little early. I'll be back in Saint Louis on September 18, if all goes as planned. I will miss my new home here in Rizhao, Shandong Province. That is how I feel about it, my home in China, and my family in China. If possible, I'll come back next year and do it again! Alright, I should be headed for bed now, it is 3:30 in the am, time for a little xiuxi xiuxi! Tomorrow, we have classes! And as usual, be well y'all!
Have a wonderful evening!

Now that I've been back for 2 years, how are things ?

Well, nothing much, to say the truth... I am back in the good ole US of A, and a little bored, to be honest, lol (I am always honest, too much so for the taste of some folks I know!)I am in the process of ripping out 50 % of my house: the half of the 3rd floor, the half of the second floor, the entire stairwell, and the foyer on the first floor!
My house is 100 years old, a solid brick Victorian Tudor construction, and it deserves that somebody (pointing finger at my humble self) should update it thoroughly and give it a new spanking outlook for the next 100 years to come: so that means, besides new walls: a totally revamped and upgraded electric system, and believe you me, it needs it: when we checked out all our circuits, we discovered that of the 40 circuits, number 18 had about 60 % of all electrical connections on it! Scary, you might say, and I could not agree more! Next, we tear out all the old radiators and go exclusively central air and heating. That means, we also revamp and overhaul our heating system at large: our heating and cooling room in the basement looks more like a strange powerhouse with stuff going and coming in and from all directions, very confusing indeed. There has to be a way to simplify that, and I will find out how.So, new energy efficient furnaces, one for each level in the house, then, while we're at it (a dangerous expression that one!!!) also we will throw out the old hot water tank, and replace it with a modern flow-through heater per floor and per bath (3). What else? Oh yes, new wood floors on levels 2 and 3: 2 gets a solid oak parquet, and 3 gets a solid bamboo parquet, very nice, I love that!And of course, we put cable and phone connections just about everywhere, plus a huge new bathroom on level 2, complete with a super duper shower, a very nice Maax bathtub, and marble floors and the works! I design all of that myself, which is fun, I admit!OK, that was phase one, more or less....When I am done with all that, phase two will be the rip out of my kitchen, the tear-down of the wall between the kitchen and the dining room, to open up that space and integrate them into one new and more modern-family style space. All new and re-designed kitchen, close off one entrance, re-design also the adjacent breakfast room, new floors in kitchen and breakfast room.
And if I am not fed-up with all of that remodeling, I'll move on to the basement, where I will redesign my laundry room and give the basement a new floor, too: a nice, simple and utilitarian tile floor, easy to clean and durable. Voila, in case you wondered why I am bored, ha ha ha!!!NOT!!!

Mystery Dinner

Hi Everybody!
yes, it's me, remember? I know, I have not written in ages...

I am busy as can be with my studies. Just imagine, as a beginner, I have to memorize between 25 and 40 new words each day, between the 2 different lessons we have. On top of that, the hanzi writing of said words, read the texts of that lesson, assimilate the grammar, and then do homework. It is more than enough!
And as much as I really enjoy writing stories every day, it takes a chunk of my time, and before I know it, the afternoon is half gone, and still homework to do! So I had to cut short on my leasure activities.
Right now, I am revising all the vocabulary of 30 lessons. We will have our final semester exams on June 29, 30 and July 1st. After that, we still have 5 days of classes. Don't ask me why, I can't figure it out, either.... that's the Chinese way. Universal explanation for just about anything....

Well, Wednesday, I had an interesting day. At about 5 pm, the phone rang, and a guy was on the line, a certain Tony, as he introduced himself. He greeted me by my name and seemed to know me somehow. He suggested we meet for dinner together with his girlfriend, Miranda.
And what would be a time suitable for me? I tried hard to recollect who the heck is Tony, how come I can't remember him? Where did I meet a Tony? Nothing at all came to mind, while I told him that I'd be delighted to have dinner with them, and yes, how about 7 pm, outside the university gates? "OK, let's meet there at 7 tonight....."

I went early and hung around the gate, a little to the side, waiting for who would show up, and hoping to finally recover my lost memory on Tony. Finally, with about 10 minutes over the time,
I saw a guy steering his path towards me, and saying "hi" and "how are you, so nice to see you". Well, seeing him did not help at all, I could simply not make out how he knew me. I was certain I had never seen his face before. Yet, somehow, he seemed familiar! If only I could grasp the missing piece of the puzzle... but nothing... it remained elusive! I decided I was not going to ask him pointblank about my lack of recollection of our previous encounter, I was going to figure this out by myself.... hopefully!

After 5 more minutes, his girlfriend Miranda also showed up, released from her afternoon classes. I was absolutely positive that I had never seen her face before, either! But both seemed congenial and nice, so I decided to just keep going.

They suggested we go to a restaurant they had discovered some weeks before, just a few hundred yards from where we were, called Homecooking.com! It sounded like a very strange and funny name for a restaurant to me.... A "dot com"!?

It turned out it is a truly charming place, nice decor, nice food! We got a table right next to a low built fish basin, with gold fish and water plants, and a pleasant, gently splashing waterfall.

Dinner went very well.
These two, Tony and his girlfriend, Miranda, are just about the brightest students I have met in China. Charming, excellent English, and very ambitious, too. If they going this way, they will end up becoming very successful, in China or else where. They told me about their studies, their lives here, their families, some cultural background of their home towns. Tony wants to become the CEO of his own future online business, and Miranda wants to be an interpreter. They asked me lots of questions about my experience in China with our business, and my life in general.
We had a wonderful time and the restaurant was a good discovery for me, a Chinese restaurant with a huge assortment of quality dishes and a very pleasant setting. And all that inside campus of the university across the street from ours! We dined til 11:30 pm and hardly saw the time fly! Needless to say, I am glad I went! We decided we will do this again.

Well, even after we parted, I still had no idea why and how I knew Tony.
I needed to sleep over it and let my on-board computer, commonly known as brain, do its job of information retrieval. It worked...

Finally, as soon as I opened my eyes the next morning, it all became clear to me. No wonder I could not remember who the heck Tony was, leave alone his girl friend, Miranda. I had never met them before!

About 3 weeks ago, somebody called me one night and said he was a student at our university. They were making a video for a TV show, on the topic of foreigners studying Chinese in Beijing, and would I be willing to participate? I agreed. So then, a few days later, I got a message, convening everybody on their candidate list for a briefing that next weekend. Said Tony was not at that briefing, he had to be only in charge of making the contact calls.
It then so turned out that I did actually not qualify for that TV session, because they only wanted fluent speakers, not beginners. I thought it was no big deal, and quite understandable, as they were not planning on providing interpreters for this show. The format does not allow that. So I did not get to participate in the interview. I went home from the briefing and forgot the whole thing.

Anyhow, then I got a call from Tony again the following day, appologizing for having bothered me to go to that meeting. He said it was a misunderstanding on his part, as he had assumed my Chinese was fluent. Some classmate of mine had given him my number and failed to also mention that I was just a beginner. All that talking between Tony and myself only occurred over the phone. And we really only talked briefly.

So, then I got the phone call yesterday, and a Tony talked to me as if we had known each other forever, and said, "Hey how about dinner tonight?" LOL

Life’s Realities in My Face

There, now I proved it to myself: a week that starts off on the wrong foot usually will end up on the other wrong foot! (Is that already a saying, or did I just coin a new one?!)

This morning, looking out my kitchen window, I immediately noticed something was wrong down there: no red spot! Translate: My bicycle was missing! Stolen! I should have listened to my inner voice, which, by the way, is always right! But no, I had to see it for myself: they do steel bikes here! My little inner voice spoke to me yesterday, as I attached the heavy duty chain around the bike down in the public bike shed: “Look closely at this, Moneva! One hundred thousand and one dirty, black and ugly bikes, and here! - with an invisible sign attached to it: ‘hey, I’m over here! Come and get me!’ - one spanking red bike!” But no, I had to try it and get the evidence for myself! So, that’s behind me now. I am not really surprised, nor shocked, strange! I guess I wanted to really see reality of the bike thieving taking place. Late last night, when I came home, it was still standing there, at around 22:30. So, the thieves were at work between then and the early morning hours. I figure they can’t live all too far, as strangers to our place would not venture around in our courtyard at night. Oh well…
Materially speaking, it is not such a big deal, so I guess, I could just get another one and this time, stick with my “carry it up to my place” policy. Voila, that’s all there is to it!

Did I sum it all up, how this week turned out? My legs are totally sore from the Great Wall climb, my knee hurts from the fall, my eye is black and bruised from hitting that brick pillar, in class, on Friday, I really had enough of it and felt like just walking out early, to get some air. We have been in classes 4 weeks now, and we are in lesson number 10! There are about 20 to 30 new words we learn each day. The hardest part is that our teachers don’t speak much English, even when it comes to explaining the grammar… what explaining? They do not explain anything, we are supposed to figure things out on our own. Believe me when I say, it isn’t always easy!

I returned to our campus bookstore, to see what other products they carry in terms of CD based teaching materials. The answer is simple: They carry ZERO of those. Everything is still on cassettes! As I tried to explain to the store keeper that they might want to consider switching to CD support type teaching materials, as there are no cassette slots on laptops, I only got big head shaking as a response. “Meyo!” There won’t be any of that soon. The bookstore is government owned, and the old, communist mentality still reigns inside. Why should we care about selling our teaching materials, books and cassettes? We will just keep them sitting on the shelves! Take the cassettes or leave it!

Did I mention that we also will have mid-term exams, sometime in mid-April, I guess. So, I need to do a lot of writing of Chinese characters each day, to repeat the old lessons on top of the new ones. Hence, less frequent reports to you, my dears, as there are only so many hours in a day! I will try and keep everything in balance, but if push comes to shove, the Chinese must win!

This Friday, I had agreed to meet Evelyne, my new friend from the airplane to Dongguan. She called me in the morning and we agreed to meet at the subway station of Dongzhimen, and not at her offices, as we had originally intended. I just could not make myself take the subway and walk all those stairs and tunnels on my stiff, hurting legs, so I decided in favor of a taxi ride. Well prepared and armed with my dictionary, I hailed a cab and got on board. “Dongzhimen Ditie, McDonald’s” I announced to the fairly young driver. He looked at me inquisitively, so I repeated, more slowly: “Mac-Do-nald, ok? Mac-Do-nald!” He nodded, Ok, Ok, and off we went.
35 minutes later, we sighted the subway station, and right next to it, on the other side of the big plaza, though, the big Mc Do’s, with its sign dominating almost the entire neighborhood. As we sped past on the opposite, separate lanes, I pointed to it and declared “ Mac-Do-Nald! There!” Again, some nodding and some gesturing in big u-turn style movements. I interpreted that we needed to turn around somewhere so he could let me out on the other side of the street and would not have to cross the four lanes to get there. Fine with me, I thought. We turned and retraced our steps on the now correct side of the street… here comes the McDo’s. “Stop”, I say. He does not stop! “Hey, stop here! Stop!” No, he drives right past it! Swooosh!!!! I see it vanish as we now drive back where we came from. “Hey, the Mc Donald’s is over there!” I gesture backwards and try to get my message to the driver, gesturing for him to find the next exit out of these express lanes and get back to where I want to go. He gets the idea, and we do round number two. Here comes the turn around to get us back into the “good” direction…. Here comes the McDo…. Whoosh! Gone! Dammit! “Will you stop, let me out of here! There is the Mc Donalds, don’t you get it!?!” Well, by now, it dawns on him, why I am so excited by now each time we pass that particular spot by the road. And he declares, pointing back: “Mak-Done-Lao, Mak-Done-Lao”, with a strong accent which I believe he intends to be American! I am sure he repeats it so often, because he feels the need to educate me as how to properly pronounce the name of this establishment! The next time we finish the big tour, he actually stops by the curve and lets me get out of that “taxi infernal”. Communication, communication! As another valuable by-product, I realize that the supposedly international word "stop" has zero impact on a chinese cab driver. So if any of you ever want to get yours to stop, yell "ting" at him, with an uprise on the end of that mono-syllable. That will do the trick!

Once escaped from my infernal taxi, I walk over to the main entrance to the Mak-Done-Lao and look around: no Evelyne yet, I am a little early, maybe 10 minutes. The jingles from the big loudspeakers wash over the plaza: I’m loving it! The rest is Chinese… and it repeats endlessly. After about 20 more tours of “I’m loving it”, here comes Evelyne, finally and a little late. We recognize each other right away, which is not always evident, after meeting people in an airplane and then seeing them again only after several days. We cross the plaza which I now know by heart, and stir towards the subway station of line number 13, the very one that runs by my place. Evelyne lives in a condo at a subway station halfway between my station and the terminal, Dongzhimen. So, standing in front of the subway map, I point that out to her, and suggest that instead of driving all the way downtown, I could just have cut that trip in half and waited for her directly at her subway station. She laughs and says she was afraid I would get lost out there. Next time, we’ll do it my way.

We get off at her subway station, about 20 minutes later, in a suburban setting, 100 % Chinese, I believe. Little motorized rickshaws await us, on three wheels, with a little closed cabin mounted on the two back wheels. There must be at least 50 of them, a little armada of 3 wheeled boxes! The inside consists of a wooden bench with a colored fabric covering it.
We climb into one and get whisked away to a restaurant, where we will meet Evelyne’s friends for dinner. They are already waiting outside the place, and we do the introductions, all in Chinese! I am so proud of my small but nifty, new language skills. They are a not so young couple, maybe early 30s, fiancés, to be married in October. Another young girl joins us, she is maybe 20 and a student at the international Language Faculty, like me, but she studies Korean. She brought all her books, and while we chat around the table, she never lets up at looking over one more exercise and one more lesson revision. I will never be THAT studious! Her boyfriend is Korean, and she gets good practice of the language that way. I am sure that helps a lot, especially since he does not speak much Chinese, as she laughingly explains to us! The couple comes from Inner Mongolia for the woman, and Sichuan for the man. They both met in Beijing, while he was still a student. It is more and more customary in China to not get married right away, but to stay engaged longer and prepare a solid base for building a family. Now, the one child policy has been extended to a two child per family policy, but many couples still only plan on one child, as they prefer to put all their income into the education of a single child. This rule is not applied in the autonomous regions of China, where families can have as many children as they traditionally want.
We all spent a very animated and enjoyable evening together, with lots of dictionary wielding, electronic and manual ones, and lots of vocabulary trading, English-Chinese, back and forth. Evelyne tried to insist on my sleeping over at her place, but in light of her poor health condition, as she had caught a nasty cold two days earlier and was still suffering from it, I persuaded her that she needed to rest and not have to take care of a house guest this weekend. Reluctantly, and only with force persuasion on my end, she gave finally in and let me take a taxi back to my place. And that is when I saw my bike the last time, as I got home and walked past it in the yard. I promise, by tomorrow, Monday, I’ll be over my bike-mourning and not mention that pretty little thing again. Who knows, I might just get myself another one! We shall see…

That's half the bunch of us in class... 

My first Report from Beijing

All is well so far, I am making progress at installing myself in the land of the “Mandarines”. Let's see: in 2 days, I have managed to meet 3 guys who promise to help me: one on the plane over. His name is Pengsheng, or Paul by his American name. He is a professor of economic studies, at the University of Oklahoma, where he is doing 5 years, then back to China, to a city about 2 hours by train from Beijing, called Zibo.
He told me all his buddies from his old Beijing University now have important political positions in the Beijing government. If I need any help, I can call or write him, and he will do his best to help me out. Paul and I spent most of our time on the flight over discussing political and cultural issues. The one that got most heated, at least on Paul’s part, was the topic of the relationship between Taiwan and China. This is a very touchy subject for the Chinese, and they take anybody’s position about it very personal. They feel that Taiwan should and will be reintegrated into the People’s Republic, whether the Taiwanese like it or not. I beg to differ, at least as far as the methods of accomplishing this go.
Then, this morning in the internet cafe, I met Fey Yu, AKA Jeffery, a young student of Chinese, just graduating in his bachelor's degree, and he is assistant professor in the Language Institute, the very same one I will be a student in, too. He will help me find an apartment; he has also mobilized his buddies to that task. I'll meet him tomorrow morning, to set up a master plan for organizing the search. While staying at the MengXi Hotel, I corrected some erroneous English documents for them, unsolicited of course, brochures and such, which I found in the room’s informational folder. I took them to the assistant hotel manager, a young guy whose name is Water (don't ask me why, I have no clue, either). He was very happy about the good work I did for him, so he lowered my room rate considerably, to about 25 $ US/night, and he also promised to help me with finding an apartment.
Last night, as I could not manage to get online in my room, the technical manager came around and helped me with that. He brought his assistant along, and it took them til midnight to get me online. We had a good time chatting of this and that while they worked out the connection bugs. I must have been busy these 2 days, considering all I already accomplished or initiated here! And of course, my sweet friend Olivia, whom I have known over the internet, maybe short of 2 years ago, will help me this weekend, too, to go and look at available places she will have identified before then. And apart from all of the above, I have already managed to buy myself a cell phone, I know where the post office is, and I have done extensive shopping, all by myself, in the local supermarket. As you can see, I am not sitting around waiting for somebody to come and tell me what to do! More tomorrow! Be well y’all!

Finding My Apartment

Lots of things are happening here, it is so exciting!

Oh, maybe I start from almost the beginning. The day after I arrived here, I went to the internet cafe around the corner, to do some email.
There, I met a young man, 23 years old (young), who sat in the seat one over from mine. After about 10 minutes or so, he looked over to me, and I said hello.
He replied.
So I asked him if he speaks English, and he said yes, and he was obviously delighted to find somebody to do talk to in English.

So we struck up a conversation, the usual, where are you from, what do you do, and so on. I told him what I came here for and that I lived at the hotel, but needed to find an apartment. So he said, oh, I can
help you with that, and I said, great, thanks.

So the next day, we met and he showed me where the supermarket and the post office on campus is and we looked at the resident hotel on campus, too. They were booked full already.

This morning, we met again and he found some apartment addresses to go look at. He got the number and message from a message board at the university. It turned out that the guy who left the message is a real estate agent. He waited for us at the first place. It was a one room apartment, on the 6th floor, no elevator. The building was very dirty inside and outside, too, but that is very normal in the old parts of Beijing, and in smaller cities in China all over the place.
The staircase usually needs some fresh paint real bad, and some serious cleaning, too. But in the old communist mentality, who cares about the staircase, it is not ours, the apartments are not ours, so let it
all go to hell in a hand basket!

This first place, a one room apartment, had dirty walls, a black and white checkered vinyl tile floor with some dings in it, the bath room so small and cruddy, one person had trouble standing in it, leave
alone any desire to even try ever taking a shower there!

The kitchen consisted of a half bath size space, with a small table holding a 2 burner camping cooker. End of kitchen.
Rent price for this beauty: 1,700 RMB/month, plus utilities.
Jeff thought it was half good half bad, but he said there even could be worse.
The landlord and realtor said there was a Japanese couple who wanted it, too, so I told them to let the Japanese have it.

We moved on to the next place. Jeff said the realtor told him it was very nice and would cost 3,500/month. I said no need to go look, I will only spend 2,500/month tops, and I want two bedrooms if possible.
Jeff and the agent thought that this would be hard to find.
I said I want to give it a try, we shall see....
So the agent did some phoning around on his cell phone (he had 2 cell phones!), and finally came up with 3 more addresses to go look at.


First stop, a red brick building, the long, standard type, with several entrances. Staircase classic neglected, but not the worst. 3rd floor up. Double door system, outer is a metal safety door, inner a wooden one. Everybody seems to have this kind of entrance doors or similar around here.
The apartment looks clean, white, undamaged walls, a beige marble floor, the bathroom is ... oh well... Chinese!
The toilet needs a new seat (good idea anyhow!), some serious scrubbing (which the landlady promises she will do) and a shower curtain.
It is usual in the old style apartments to just shower in the toilet room, no separate stall for the shower, so all gets wet. You can sit on the john and wash yourself, AND clean the bathroom at the same time! Now I call that efficient! I had that in Russia, too, a long time ago in 81. So I am already used to that experience, for what I can remember of it!
The kitchen is larger, but nothing like a western kitchen. Well, it is big enough for some cooking, we shall see. Eating out is not expensive at all.

The two bedrooms are fine, one larger, the other a little smaller, and a bit entrance hall way.

The landlady wants 2,700/month. I tell her, I will give her 2,500 or nothing. She and the agent hee-haw around for a while, and I just wait patiently until they are done hee-hawing.

She says she needs 2,600/month. I say, she needs me to be her renter, because she will never get a better one after that. She says, she wants a renter for a year, and I tell her, don't worry about after 6 months, now you got me, and afterwards, I will help you find a nice next renter. So, she says, ok. We are ‘go’ for 2,500/month.
Done deal. We get the contract forms out. Now, I find out there is some extra charges, not included.

The trash service.... 20 RMB/month. I look surprised and look outside the window, and ask: what trash service? the peeps who come here to put all the trash all over the place outside?
They don't get it.....
So she starts again, about the trash service. So I explain to them that when next time I get here and there is no trash anywhere, I will pay the fee, until then, NADA. Voila.
So they forget about the trash fee idea. Next point. I have to pay for the Television. 15 RMB/month. I tell her take the television away, who needs it.
Then she says, it is a government fee, and if there is no television, I have to pay ..the television fee anyways. Very funny, that one!
We agree to the TV fee, and I tell her in that case the TV stays put where it is, though. She has no problem with that. Water, gas, electric, all extra, should be 100 RMB total/month. Ok, that sounds reasonable, about 12 bucks US!
Oh, there are 2 telephones there, and I should pay for them. Ah, now that is interesting... how so? Well the landlady has 2 separate phone lines in the apartment, and one I can use, but not the other.
Very funny. I tell her, she should take out her phone lines, as I
prefer to have my own line. She says, no.
I tell her, I pay if my name is on the bill, if your name is on the bill you pay.
She gives in. End of the phone lines discussion.
I tell her I want the toilet seat fixed right away, and the ceiling light in the hallway needs a glass cover. She says she cannot fix the ceiling light cover. I ask why not. She says she does not know where
it is. I tell her get a new one. She tries to convince me that is not possible. I look her straight in the eye and tell her, you buy the dam thing and you come with a screw driver and a ladder, and I put it up for you.
Now we are talking... she gives in and her husband volunteers to fix it for me.... some serious male pride at stake, I guess... I decide I'll let him have it his way. End of that issue.
So now we are back to the toilet seat... she says she can have it fixed but not right away. Why not? Because it takes time...
What is it that takes time? Oh well, it is difficult to get the old seat off and the new one on, that takes time. I look the husband in the eyes again and say: you just bring your screw driver, and I show you how fast I can take that seat off and put a new one on, I have experience in it.
He looks back at me and decides, he now can do it tomorrow. Thanks, that would be fine.
End of the toilet seat discussion, wheeew!
So, now we sit down and get the contract out. Jeff helps me line for line. The agent thinks that is not necessary, but I tell him I think otherwise. He rolls his eyes a little, wants to get on with it and to new customers. Well I beg to differ, he should earn his commission, right?
So here we go, line for line, sign for sign. Jeff suffers a lot with the translation, he never did any contract translating, and the terms are unfamiliar to him.
So when he describes some clause, I give him the proper terminology, so he can learn some new English words. We work our way through it.
One clause says, if I breach the contract, I have to pay the 6 months anyway. If she breaches the contract, she gives me 1o days notice and my money back. Well, that one I don't like so much. So I tell her, I
intend to stay there for the entire time, and not see how many times I can move. And she should consider the same thought. She says she will not breach the contract. So I make her write it in her own hand: I
will not breach this contract. Ok

On the extra fees, next to the TV fee, I make her write: as per government regulation, compulsory TV fee. She hesitates, but I nod, go ahead write it, so she sighs and writes it. I think it is a scam, they
always say it is the government when they want to have it their way. I just want her to be a little worried about what I am up to with this one. Those 15 RMB/month are not worth my time, really. But a girl
has to have a little fun with the locals, too...

We sign the lease, I get the keys and it is a done deal. Now we have to go pay the agent his fee at his office. That, too, was supposedly the government that says, Agents shall receive 50 % of one month rent as
fee. I know it is not so, because there are other agents that have a fixed fee. But the 16o US is not the end of the world either, and I don't feel like fighting over it. I just make him work harder to earn
it, voila, and I get even. He does not like being pushed around a little like that, but what can he do!

So, I tell the landlady, I want to move in tonight, please clean everything now, to make it ready for me, and fix the toilet seat.
She promises. We leave.
It is 3 pm and Jeff and I are really hungry, we had not had anything all day. We find a nice restaurant and celebrate my new apartment and Jeff's help with some delicious Chinese food. This meal is the most
expensive one I have had since I got here: for the 2 of us, with all the trims and plenty of dishes, we pay 75 RMB! Wow! (about 9.50 US)

It is 6 pm when we finally finish the late lunch, and with all we ate, we can easily skip dinner, lol.

We are on our way back to the apartment, because Jeff wants to show me the way from there to the university, which is really very near, walking 5 minutes across some semi-private streets or alleys gets us there in 5 minutes flat. The weather is nasty, the wind cuts our
faces like a razor blade, the government must be importing that wind straight from Siberia. And we have to lean into it at times to get moving! All the bikes are flat on the ground, all toppled over by those
nasty gushes of the Siberian storm.

We make it back to the hotel and are happy to be back in some warm place. For thanks, I hand Jeff a big American flag. He seems very happy with it, and I am very grateful. I could not have done anything this
fast without his help.

Now I will move tomorrow, that should be easy, I just have 2 suitcases and one mattress topper.

Then I will need to get some household items to make my new place livable: dishes, a pillow, towels and the like. It is going to be fun!

Getting Organized, looking for an apartment

Lots of things are happening here, it is so exciting!
Oh, maybe I start from almost the beginning. The day after I arrived here, I went to the internet cafe around the corner, to do some email.There, I met a young man, 23 years old (young), who sat in the seat one over from mine. After about 10 minutes or so, he looked over to me, and I said hello.He replied.So I asked him if he speaks English, and he said yes, and he was obviously delighted to find somebody to do talk to in English.
So we struck up a conversation, the usual, where are you from, what do you do, and so on. I told him what I came here for and that I lived at the hotel, but needed to find an apartment. So he said, oh, I can help you with that, and I said, great, thanks.
So the next day, we met and he showed me where the supermarket is, and the post office on campus, and we looked at the resident hotel on campus, too. They were booked full already.
This morning, we met again and he found some apartment addresses to go look at. He got the number and message from a message board at the university. It turned out that the guy who left the message is a real estate agent. He waited for us at the first place. It was a one room apartment, on the 6th floor, no elevator. The building was very dirty inside and outside, too, but that is very normal in the old parts of Beijing, and in smaller cities in China all over the place.The staircase usually needs some fresh paint real bad, and some serious cleaning, too. But in the old communist mentality, who cares about the staircase, it is not ours, the apartments are not ours, so let itall go to hell in a hand basket!
This first place, a one room apartment, had dirty walls, a black and white checkered vinyl tile floor with some dings in it, the bath room so small and cruddy, one person had trouble standing in it, leavealone any desire to even try ever taking a shower there!
The kitchen consisted of a half bath size space, with a small table holding a 2 burner camping cooker. End of kitchen.Rent price for this beauty: 1,700 RMB/month, plus utilities.Jeff thought it was half good half bad, but he said there even could be worse.The landlord and realtor said there was a Japanese couple who wanted it, too, so I told them to let the Japanese have it.
We moved on to the next place. Jeff said the realtor told him it was very nice and would cost 3,500/month. I said no need to go look, I will only spend 2,500/month tops, and I want two bedrooms if possible.Jeff and the agent thought that this would be hard to find.I said I want to give it a try, we shall see....So the agent did some phoning around on his cell phone (he had 2 cell phones!), and finally came up with 3 more addresses to go look at.
First stop, a red brick building, the long, standard type, with several entrances. Staircase classic neglected, but not the worst. 3rd floor up. Double door system, outer is a metal safety door, inner a wooden one. Everybody seems to have this kind of entrance doors or similar around here.The apartment looks clean, white, undamaged walls, a beige marble floor, the bathroom is ... oh well... Chinese!The toilet needs a new seat (good idea anyhow!), some serious scrubbing (which the landlady promises she will do) and a shower curtain.It is usual in the old style apartments to just shower in the toilet room, no separate stall for the shower, so all gets wet. You can sit on the john and wash yourself, AND clean the bathroom at the same time! Now I call that efficient! I had that in Russia, too, a long time ago in 81. So I am already used to that experience, for what I can remember of it!The kitchen is larger, but nothing like a western kitchen. Well, it is big enough for some cooking, we shall see. Eating out is not expensive at all.
The two bedrooms are fine, one larger, the other a little smaller, and a bit entrance hall way.
The landlady wants 2,700/month. I tell her, I will give her 2,500 or nothing. She and the agent hee-haw around for a while, and I just wait patiently until they are done hee-hawing.
She says she needs 2,600/month. I say, she needs me to be her renter, because she will never get a better one after that. She says, she wants a renter for a year, and I tell her, don't worry about after 6 months, now you got me, and afterwards, I will help you find a nice next renter. So, she says, ok. We are ‘go’ for 2,500/month.Done deal. We get the contract forms out. Now, I find out there is some extra charges, not included.
The trash service.... 20 RMB/month. I look surprised and look outside the window, and ask: what trash service? the peeps who come here to put all the trash all over the place outside?They don't get it.....So she starts again, about the trash service. So I explain to them that when next time I get here and there is no trash anywhere, I will pay the fee, until then, NADA. Voila.So they forget about the trash fee idea. Next point. I have to pay for the Television. 15 RMB/month. I tell her take the television away, who needs it.Then she says, it is a government fee, and if there is no television, I have to pay ..the television fee anyways. Very funny, that one! We agree to the TV fee, and I tell her in that case the TV stays put where it is, though. She has no problem with that. Water, gas, electric, all extra, should be 100 RMB total/month. Ok, that sounds reasonable, about 12 bucks US!Oh, there are 2 telephones there, and I should pay for them. Ah, now that is interesting... how so? Well the landlady has 2 separate phone lines in the apartment, and one I can use, but not the other.Very funny. I tell her, she should take out her phone lines, as Iprefer to have my own line. She says, no.I tell her, I pay if my name is on the bill, if your name is on the bill you pay.She gives in. End of the phone lines discussion.I tell her I want the toilet seat fixed right away, and the ceiling light in the hallway needs a glass cover. She says she cannot fix the ceiling light cover. I ask why not. She says she does not know whereit is. I tell her get a new one. She tries to convince me that is not possible. I look her straight in the eye and tell her, you buy the dam thing and you come with a screw driver and a ladder, and I put it up for you.Now we are talking... she gives in and her husband volunteers to fix it for me.... some serious male pride at stake, I guess... I decide I'll let him have it his way. End of that issue.So now we are back to the toilet seat... she says she can have it fixed but not right away. Why not? Because it takes time... What is it that takes time? Oh well, it is difficult to get the old seat off and the new one on, that takes time. I look the husband in the eyes again and say: you just bring your screw driver, and I show you how fast I can take that seat off and put a new one on, I have experience in it.He looks back at me and decides, he now can do it tomorrow. Thanks, that would be fine.End of the toilet seat discussion, wheeew!So, now we sit down and get the contract out. Jeff helps me line for line. The agent thinks that is not necessary, but I tell him I think otherwise. He rolls his eyes a little, wants to get on with it and to new customers. Well I beg to differ, he should earn his commission, right?So here we go, line for line, sign for sign. Jeff suffers a lot with the translation, he never did any contract translating, and the terms are unfamiliar to him.So when he describes some clause, I give him the proper terminology, so he can learn some new English words. We work our way through it.One clause says, if I breach the contract, I have to pay the 6 months anyway. If she breaches the contract, she gives me 1o days notice and my money back. Well, that one I don't like so much. So I tell her, Iintend to stay there for the entire time, and not see how many times I can move. And she should consider the same thought. She says she will not breach the contract. So I make her write it in her own hand: Iwill not breach this contract. Ok
On the extra fees, next to the TV fee, I make her write: as per government regulation, compulsory TV fee. She hesitates, but I nod, go ahead write it, so she sighs and writes it. I think it is a scam, theyalways say it is the government when they want to have it their way. I just want her to be a little worried about what I am up to with this one. Those 15 RMB/month are not worth my time, really. But a girlhas to have a little fun with the locals, too...
We sign the lease, I get the keys and it is a done deal. Now we have to go pay the agent his fee at his office. That, too, was supposedly the government that says, Agents shall receive 50 % of one month rent asfee. I know it is not so, because there are other agents that have a fixed fee. But the 16o US is not the end of the world either, and I don't feel like fighting over it. I just make him work harder to earnit, voila, and I get even. He does not like being pushed around a little like that, but what can he do!
So, I tell the landlady, I want to move in tonight, please clean everything now, to make it ready for me, and fix the toilet seat.She promises. We leave. It is 3 pm and Jeff and I are really hungry, we had not had anything all day. We find a nice restaurant and celebrate my new apartment and Jeff's help with some delicious Chinese food. This meal is the mostexpensive one I have had since I got here: for the 2 of us, with all the trims and plenty of dishes, we pay 75 RMB! Wow! (about 9.50 US)
It is 6 pm when we finally finish the late lunch, and with all we ate, we can easily skip dinner, lol.
We are on our way back to the apartment, because Jeff wants to show me the way from there to the university, which is really very near, walking 5 minutes across some semi-private streets or alleys gets us there in 5 minutes flat. The weather is nasty, the wind cuts ourfaces like a razor blade, the government must be importing that wind straight from Siberia. And we have to lean into it at times to get moving! All the bikes are flat on the ground, all toppled over by thosenasty gushes of the Siberian storm.
We make it back to the hotel and are happy to be back in some warm place. For thanks, I hand Jeff a big American flag. He seems very happy with it, and I am very grateful. I could not have done anything thisfast without his help.
Now I will move tomorrow, that should be easy, I just have 2 suitcases and one mattress topper.
Then I will need to get some household items to make my new place livable: dishes, a pillow, towels and the like. It is going to be fun!