ChinaBlog MiniTrip Day 2

Hangzhou. The most beautiful city in China is right now the most humid city in China. Actually, I can't confirm that, but it's in the top ten, or maybe the top ten of beautiful cities in China. It's 75 degrees with 430% water in the air. It's so humid you have to wear a face mask to keep from swallowing passing fish. After disembarking our train we herded 18 people through the complex and crowded station to a well-marked line of taxis. There was one set of directions between the throng of us, so we each took the phone number of the hostel, intending to contact the front desk and have them tell the cab driver where to go. Well, imagine the poor guy behind the counter who gets 6 simultaneous phone calls asking for directions. Only one cab made it unscathed, and it happened to be the one I was in. We began as an intimidating line of aggressive (more so than Beijing, it seems) blue and silver Hundais, and then one after another dropped away, taking wrong turns, stopping in wrong places, and getting forced onto conveniently placed dirt flipping ramps designed to throw wayward speeding Hundais onto large parked panel trucks. With explosions. Without a single incident, the Hundai we were in arrived at the hostel with us alone and confused, because none of the people in our cab had the check-in information. Ten minutes later, the next cab arrived, it's contents shaken, singed, and bleary-eyed. A third cab approached with its roof caved in, missing five hubcaps, but still operational. The last cab was being pushed by some nearby old Chinese men. We never saw the rest.
--Our hostel is situated right across the street from West Lake, a grand central lake in the middle of Hangzhou. It is famous across China for it's 'eight scenes', fixed picturesque spots with names like "Autumn Breeze over Moonlit Water" and "Melting Snow with Flakes of Sea Cucumber". They are designed to be seen on specific days throughout the year, based on their titles. They were made hmbafld years ago, and are the reason Hangzhou is pushed heavily by the Chinese government as a tourist spot. There is no construction in this city.
-- We took some time to eat breakfast, shower, walk around the lake a bit, and shower. On our itinerary was a visit to the Chinese Academy of Art, which has its impressive campus just down the road from our hostel. We put our stuff in the rooms, showered, gathered our cameras and cell phones and maps, showered, and left. Getting 18 people into cabs on the street is hilarious and exhausting, but we somehow managed. They had some showers in the dorms at the Academy, so we went there first to clean up, and then perused the interesting architecture, art, and gardens of the scenic place. We spent a good 2 hours there, including visits to nearby Porsche, Aston Martin, Maserati, and Ferrari dealerships. The Michigan people were completely astounded at these vehicles, and I began to realize just how skewed my perspective on cars really is.
--After piling everyone into the backs of five frantic people-movers, we returned to the hostel to shower and get ready for dinner. We're going out to a specific restaurant to meet up with someone who is going to give us a personal tour of the famous Hangzhou bamboo factory on Tuesday morning, and it's a really fancy place. I've been told that it might be expensive, which means dinner might be 10 bucks instead of 5. And we have to dress up, which means I'm going to be wearing a polo shirt with jeans. I know, you're having trouble picturing it. Anyway, maybe I'll be able to give an update when I get back. Hope all is well back home.
**UPDATE**
--The aforementioned West Lake in the center of Hangzhou has several small islands, the largest of which is connected to the shore by a short bridge, and is covered in restaurants. At the point furthest into the lake, there is a very famous old eatery, and that's where we ate dinner, split up in two private rooms. The food was good, we sampled a lot of different dishes (and drinks) similar to the ones we've been having all throughout the trip, and the menu wasn't as strange as I've been told it might be in this part of the country. Our dinner was huge, magnificent, and 600 Yuan for 9 people. That's 67 Yuan per person, divide by 7, carry the one, jump around in a circle, and it comes out to about $9.50 a meal. I'm not usually one to say 'I told you so', so I'll just say 'look how amazing I am', and assume you're capable of reading between the lines.
--One of my roommates was anticipating his birthday last night. It came at about midnight. Maybe exactly at midnight. But we haven't gotten to that part of the story yet. In any case, when we emerged from the restaurant several days after arriving, we were confronted by the quaintest wooden Chinese gondolas in all the land, brought there by blind monks plank by plank, and operated by University PHD students. 10 of us couldn't resist celebrating early out on the water. It was still very hot, but on the lake there was a bit of a breeze, so we were immediately rewarded for our impulsiveness. We split into two boats, and the two Physics majors deftly sped us out to one of the islands in the middle of the lake with just one fixed oar each (it actually looked impossible to keep these things from simply drifting in large circles, what with the Physics problems of always paddling on one side of the boat, but these guys' advanced degrees had given them tremendous control over our world's natural forces). When we got there, it was clear that this was the Hangzhou equivalent of "Makeout Point". The couples among us melted quietly into the foliage, and the rest of us spent 20 minutes exploring this little place Tom-Sawyer-Island-style. There were all kinds of ancient structures covering the island, so it was a stretch to see everything before we had to leave again. The student drivers had to get back to their labs. It was a beautiful, relaxing, utterly pleasant hour spent out on the water, and would be the last moment of peace for the rest of the night.
--Still hours away from midnight, the next stop, after a hostel shower, was an en masse stampede to a local deserted jazz club. We heard everything from old standards to Dean Martin to Eric Clapton, all crooned out by a 70 year old woman and her two sons on piano and upright bass. There was also sax player and a drummer, but they were small and plastic and covered in multi-colered lights. The saxaphonist was especially accurate and on beat. One of our bunch, during a band break, was coaxed onstage to play piano for us, and we got the whole bar (just the group of us, really. I said it was deserted.) to sing Hey Jude while he accompanied. He'd never been to a bar before, is the youngest of us （at 19）, and after being the center of attention sat down at the table and confidently ordered a Long Island Iced Tea. He took one sip and crumpled to the floor. We had to carry him home. Those who didn't head back went with the rest of us out to the most Dance-iest Asian-ist Asian Dance Club you've ever seen. I felt like Sydney Bristow, or maybe Marshall, as the Michael-Jackson-green laser light show pounded us into the floor one heart-stopping beat at a time. There were no inked-up, besuited mobsters in this club for me to remotely access hard drives from using stylish infrared glasses. Instead there was just the bunch of us jumping and dancing and having a grand old time until midnight rolled around, at which point I had a beer with everyone, said happy birthday to my roommate, showered, danced some more, and finally came home to shower. My clothes still haven't forgiven me. So that was my night. If they're all like that on this trip I'll smell like smoke until my birthday. We'll see.
-c

ChinaBlog MiniTrip Day 1

What image forms in your brain when you think of Chinese trains? Nope. Wrong. Well, I'm sure some of them are like that, but not this one. This particular train would make Germans sit down in their liederhosen and wonder where it all went so verdammt back home. "Ach, Kleissl, es tut mir lied! Diese bahn ist so gross und schnell und modern. Wir sind dumbkopferin!" Yes, they are female Germans. Now you're guilty of two stereotypes...what's he talking about? Nevermind. The train is very big, fast, and modern. It has all the expected conveniences, like air conditioning, ladders that fold into the wall, a little table with a rose on it, and a dining car that serves fired wife buffer. In fact, there were several dishes with fired wife on the menu. This train must have a high employee turnover rate. In all seriousness, we never figured out what they exactly meant to write instead, and none of us were brave enough to order a fired wife, because we DID figure out that every time they wrote 'fired', they meant 'fried', and, well, to be honest I'm still not sure which is worse. Instead I got the shrivled pork peppers, which was some kind of delicious beef dish with yams. The woman behind the counter spent a good five minutes digging through what can only be described as a trash can to find the hand-written English menu, so I guess we were lucky to have any idea whatsoever what we were asking for. We've all found that simply pointing at random to an all-Chinese menu will invariably get you a dish of steamed sea cucumber entrails. While that may be fun and adventurous once, its not very filling, nor exciting, the tenth or eleventh time. I've heard that Shanghai has the strangest food in China, so I'm looking forward to a change.
I think this is all I can write with my thumbs at this time. I need to go to bed so I can be up in time for our arrival in Hangzhou at 7am. We'll spend two nights there before we move on to Shanghai. More later!
-c

MiniTrip to Hangzhou & Shanghai

I'm going on a little trip for the next five days. We're taking a sleeper train from Beijing to, supposedly, the most beautiful city in China. It's called Hangzhou, and it's one point of a triangle of cities that includes Shanghai. The third city is called Suzhou, and I know literally nothing about it. They're all an hour away from each other. By train, and we'll be romping around the three of them for the next few days.im not taking my laptop, but if I have Internet access, as I do now, I can write on my phone and still be able to post. So, off we go! More later.
-c

ChinaBlog Day 17

"This reminds me of President Bush's memorial address after Hurricane Katrina." My professor, Robert, was being facetious. We stood in a small group on the sidewalk when he said it, winding down from an experience so overwhelming that, for once, all of us were rather at a loss for words. His comment was the first to put the sounds into some semblance of perspective for this Westerner. I wanted my head to keep ringing with the power of the noise. I wanted the silent aftermath to stretch on for weeks. But eventually, as it always does, the quietness dissipated, and the everyday sounds of city life wound up once again. But for 15 minutes this afternoon, every single person in China, native and foreign, was united.
--I was thirsty. I wonder if I'd have even noticed all the commotion had a combination of dust in the air and boredom with purified water not sent me out to the courtyard from our sheltered little studio. A man in a parked truck just inside the gate was leaning on his horn. He seemed to be having an argument with another car driving past our complex outside. A small group of local artists huddled in their doorway looking out upon the din. With (really for the first time here) a note of trepidation, I poked my head out the gate. The driver continued on slowly, still blowing his horn. BEE-BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. BEE-BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE. BEE-BEEEEEEEEEEEE. One short, one long. One short, one long. The truck driver responded in kind. And then I began to hear it.
--The car horn is an integral tool to navigating this city. Unlike back home, it is rarely used in anger, but more commonly to warn of coming danger. The beeps of taxis can often be translated into English as "excuse me, coming through, right behind you." Or, perhaps, "you need to stop or we will crash." They are frequent and pervasive.
--So I at first ignored the noisy background to this strange automotive dialogue. But after a moment I began to realize that not only the courtyard truck driver and street-cruising car, but a taxi down the street, some other unseen vehicles in the nearby village, and cars and trucks speeding by on the airport expressway had voices in this extensive nonverbal exchange.
--I felt a wave of pressure on my face as I realized exactly what was going on. Within the full breadth of my hearing, people driving in cars honked their horns, and people on the street stood mourning, sobbing, silent. One hour ago, the entire city; no, it was clear, the entire country of China stood still, listening to the loud, mournful wail of every car, truck, rickshaw, and bicycle in the most populous country on Earth. Waves of compassion and unity were palpable, within the crowded urban streets of Beijing, within the small villages of rural China, and within every person crying quietly on the streetcorner. This was a moment of silence. This was a roar of solidarity. For a full 15 minutes, 1.2 billion people said goodbye together.
-c

ChinaBlog Day 16

Ugh. Sick. That’s what I’ve been doing since Friday. I’m allergic to my down bedding, so I wake up every morning with about an hour of sneezing. I’ve gotten used to that. This is different. On Friday I arose with the kind of sore throat that portends an uncomfortable immediate future. Sure enough, by Friday afternoon I was surrounded by a snowy-white meadow of used Kleenex. In two days I went through three boxes of tissue. And that’s not including the half roll of toilet paper I resorted to, MacGyver-style, when the first box ran out. I have sneezed and wiped my nose so many times that you can see the cartilage. When I get back home, everyone is going to call me Michael. Jackson. Sorry, I’m really out of it.
--Because of this issue, I’ve been holed up in my room for almost three days now. It’s been ok, what with the internets and the Googles and the Skypes. I’ve felt very in touch with the world I’m unable to visit. I just longingly stare at it out my 12th floor window from bed. Then I sneeze, cough, have a seizure, and blow my nose. One more to the pile. It was really the smell that made me open the window, and imagine my surprise when a big clod of dirt flew into the room and landed on my computer. Did I mention I’m on the 12th floor? Wait, let me check. Hmm…sick, tissue, internets, longing stare, oh yes. There it is. 12th floor. 12TH FLOOR. The wind is so strong that it picked up a clod of dirt from the tree farm next door, lifted it 120 feet into the air, through my open window, and deposited it square on the keyboard of my laptop. I think the odds of that happening are, like, 100:1. Maybe even 200:1. I don’t think it’s done anything bad to anything sensitive. Time will tell.
--Now I’m going to go to sleep again. I’m almost the last person in our group, and certainly in this apartment, to get sick like this, so not only was it bound to happen, but I kind of know what's in store. Everyone keeps telling me to just sleep it off. 24 solid hours of rest has been the cure for many people so far. If you insist.
-c

ChinaBlog Day 13

I can’t shake the feeling that I’m walking around in the birthplace of modern China. Or maybe the birthday of modern China. In about a year and a half, modern China will be wrapped up in a blue or pink blanket, snuggled in a diminutive rolling crib, it’s exhausted mother reaching out in vain for one tiny hug as this critical newborn is wheeled out of the delivery room to the intensive care unit. Modern China is a preemie. And right now it is in hour 40 of a very long and tumultuous delivery process. It began with the 1979 water breaking, followed by an early 1980s 80 mph rush to the hospital in a middle-of-the-night taxi. After a 1990s Emergency Room arrival and check-in process, the year 2000 brought modern China into the delivery room, and it is still on its way out. If you’re wondering, modern China’s mother is Communist China, who was left with this child after a recent on-again, off-again, love/hate relationship with the United States. The father’s not around much, but he sends money every month in the form of business and trade. It’s still unclear how much he’s going to be involved in raising the newborn. I think mom is going to have quite a bit of say in that.
--What brings this up is looking at my Beijing apartment complex on Google Earth. It’s the only finished project in a sea of muddy construction sites. As you walk the streets in my neighborhood you feel as if you’ve stepped into Chicago circa 1895, just as the greatest and most influential high-rises in the world were taking shape. They’re still around today, defining the Windy City’s culture and presence. Beijing will be similarly affected by the development we’re watching right now. As more and more rural families, or, more often, family members immigrate to the cities (I use this word carefully, because it is just as difficult culturally, economically, and especially legally, to move from the countryside to the city in China as it is to move from one country to another), the hope is that this explosion in building will match the explosion in urban population. But adolescence is a universal concept, and most likely young modern China will follow the well-beaten path made by every other volatile urban environment as it goes through development and understanding of its place in the world. If it doesn’t end up squatting in an abandoned warehouse with a $20-a-day drug habit it will be better off than most. After years of Failed Urban Nations doing stint after stint in rehab, promising they want to get better, giving hope for a new future only to relapse and end up back on the street, expectations for newborn modern China are preemptively low.
--But here’s the punchline: preemie newborn modern China is not a child, but a baby Elephant in a person-sized world. It is going through all of these developments on a scale unheard of in history. Modern China is bigger than any civilization ever to walk the earth. When modern China wants it’s bottle, where will we get enough milk to feed it? It’s not its fault that it will be hungry after such an ordeal. How will we find a bed for it? What room will it sleep in? It’s a staggering problem for one set of staying-together-for-the-kid parents to deal with. They’re just not that into each other, and having a baby the size of a small car in the house with them isn’t going to settle things down. The one hurt most by this situation is the calf, destined to live in a household where neither parent truly accepts it. Somehow, it will have to find a way to fend for itself, and maybe grow up to be a contributing member of society. The odds are not in its favor.
-c

ChinaBlog Day 11

Sorry if the previous post seemed crass and insensitive. I am only just now learning the extent of the damage. At the time I was just writing what I experienced. Now I read it knowing the magnitude of devastation and feel guilty. But this is the story of what happened to me, and all I can write is what I felt at the time given the information I had available, which was pretty much none. I certainly don't want to be making jokes about this disaster. I hope you all understand my intention with yesterday's post. Thanks.
-c