Faith in Humanity? Restored, for the moment.
Friday night, I was on my way to Strollers, a bar about 1km from the hotel where I'm staying. I went to meet L. there, and I got into a cab and asked the man if he could take me to Bu Xing Zhi Jiu Ba, the Chinese name for this place. He said, "Hop in, I'll take you." It turned out he didn't know the place, but I said, "It's pretty close, I should be able to tell you the way." He started chatting, asking me where I was from. "I'm American," I said.
"American!" He said, "Congratulations, American!" He paused a moment, then said, "Where in the U.S. are you from?"
"I'm from the Northwest U.S.," I said, "Oregon - the state north of California," I added, in my traditional 'patter' - almost everyone in China knows where California is. San Francisco! Los Angeles! Chinatown! What dreams are made of!
"Northwest, eh?" he said, then continued, "I understand America, you know. China's very corrupt. The Communist government is no good for the people here. I understand America!" he repeated. "I know why you went in and attacked Iraq. You Americans' Lai Si (the Chinese name for Condoleezza Rice), I know who she is. I understand it all!"
I decided to go ahead and say it. "You know, Lai Si, she's my boss."
"What? What boss? What do you mean?"
"I'm an American diplomat," I said. "So Lai Si is my boss."
"Wow.. a diplomat! Congratulations, American. That's a very good job." They often refer to me, the cab drivers, as simply "American" when we haven't introduced ourselves. "You know, the Communist government - you understand Communist?" he checked. This guy was good with languages and good at reading people - he could tell when he hit a word I didn't know.
"North Korea, Vietnam, China, Cuba... Communist!" he repeated carefully. "Got that now? But you Americans, you're Democratic" - he said it carefully so that I could hear the comparison in the two words and understand where he was going - "You have the choice of your leaders, not like here, where the government just decides everything for us without us having a say."
"Well, yes, but some of us didn't choose our current leadership, and some of us don't agree with everything that the current leadership does." We'd pulled up in front of the bar by this point, "This is it," I said. He smiled and pulled out a cigarette, lighting it for me as he spoke. This was a true laobaixing - the Old One-Hundred Names - sharing a prized cigarette with me.
"Yes," he said, "but at least you have the freedom to criticize the government if you don't like what it's doing. Here we don't have that freedom."
I nodded sadly, sighing agreement as I smoked (because you should smoke a cigarette given to you by a laobaixing, it's only polite). "Here's 10 yuan," I said. The meter said 8. He went for change and I said, "You can keep the change."
He smiled, not getting offended even though many might have been - he really did understand Americans. "That's nice of you," he said, "But even if you make more money than me, it was an 8 yuan fare and I owe you 2 yuan change. It's only fair - that's the way it should be, fair. You pay what you owe, nothing more."
I nodded understanding, and smiled. "Thank you, that's very fair of you. I wish you a peaceful road ahead," I said, a traditional Chinese wish, “一路平安.”(yi lu ping an) I got out and finished smoking the cigarette outside the bar while he pulled away, on to the next fare.
Right now, I feel very stressed, and embarrassed, and not at all like the little hottie in my user icon. Right now, I've got a cold sore on my lip, something I've never had before.
Let's get it straight right now: China doesn't have an easy cold sore remedy like Campho-Phenique. I may (may) have some back in Beijing, but certainly not here with me. So, after dinner with friends tonight, I went to Tai Yuan Jie (the shopping street near the hotel) and went into the Watson's chemist. Watson's is a chain that I think I remember seeing in Australia, but in any case, it's made its way to China and is the closest thing that modern urban China has to a Rite-Aid, Walgreen's, or (just for those of you who grew up in the Northwest U.S. in the 80's) Payless Drugs.
I looked around first, hoping that maybe by some miracle there *would* be Campho-Phenique. I was already nervous enough as it was to ask about this, and I didn't know how to say it in Chinese. I found a clerk who wasn't doing much of anything over near the women's cosmetics, and asked her. "Excuse me, I'm sorry to trouble you; I've got this - thing - on my lip, it's not a pimple, and I don't know how it's said in Chinese, and I don't know what medicine I can take for it. Can you help me find something?"
She obviously didn't know what it was; I wouldn't have, either, I've never had one before now, and I had to look it up online to figure out what it was for sure. She called her co-worker, a young man slightly older than her. "Da Ge," she said, "Big Brother, this woman is looking for some medicine, I'm not quite sure what she means. Can you help?"
He looked at me expectantly, cocking his head to listen carefully to my Chinese, because I know my tones aren't perfect. I went through my "not a pimple" song-and-dance again, and he took me back over to the section where I had originally looked the hardest, it being things like cough drops, cold remedies, and other 'winter-illness-related' products. "Mei you le," he said, there's no more.
"Oh," I replied, "well, I hate to bother you, but do you know the brand name, and do you think you might write it down for me? Or if not, perhaps the name of this problem in Chinese, so that I can try to buy it somewhere else? I wanted to buy it here, but I really need the medicine soon."
He thought for a moment, and then said something unintelligible to the female colleague, who had (in typical Chinese fashion) followed us over to look even though she had said she had no idea how to help me. She replied and I heard the words for "medicine shop" which mean a Chinese herbal medicine store. Then he turned back to me and said, "You can come with me. There's a traditional medicine shop around the corner, I'll take you and help you buy something for it."
I was stunned and extremely grateful. I thanked them both profusely, and as I started to follow him out of the store, the girl patted me on the arm as I pulled my glove on. "Don't worry, honey, he'll take care of you. And when you go to that store, don't let them sell to you for too high a price - chances are they'll see you're a foreigner and try to raise it too high!" She grinned impishly, stating aloud something I already knew to be true but hadn't yet heard a Chinese actually admit to, and I nodded understanding. "Not too expensive!" she called again as I followed him out of the store.
It was a cold, clear night, and as we walked down the shopping street I realised he hadn't put on any coat, and was just wearing the long-sleeved T-shirt of his Watson's chemist uniform. "Aren't you a little cold?" I asked, trying to sound extra-worried in order to show that I was truly concerned and grateful for him going out of his way. He shook his head that he wasn't, and didn't say much, which seemed to be his style. "Last time I was here on this street, about 8 months ago, there were nothing but blanket vendors and people selling goods in booths on the sidewalk," I mentioned, gesturing to the brand-new, shiny neon-sign-filled shopping street. "It's changed so much." He nodded again, and I started to wonder if he could actually understand my Chinese, if my pronunciation was so horrible that I'd suddenly become unintelligible.
We arrived at the store. "Hello," he said, striding in with a purpose and asking the first woman behind a counter, "need to buy some cold sore medicine." She pointed him toward another counter farther back, where he repeated the same. The woman looked at my lip, nodded curtly, and in one smooth turn-and-sweep sort of motion she made a 360-degree rotation while grabbing a small white-and-green box. She indicated that this was what I needed, and he asked how much (even though I could have done that, I held my tongue). She told him it was 17 kuai (about USD $2.12) and he asked me if that was too much. It probably was, but I was so grateful to have something that I would pay it. I nodded assent to the purchase, and he helped me pay, get my little receipt, go back to the counter and show the receipt (when you're supposed to grab the purchase, but I'd already picked it up because I didn't understand the system) and ask her for a little bag to carry it in.
He smiled on the way out and I said, "Thank you SO much!" He replied with the traditional Chinese, "bie keqi," or "don't be polite," the equivalent of "you're welcome." I went on to add, "How can I ever thank you?" and he smiled and switched to English and said "No thanks!" Which I knew he meant in the same way they all say "don't be polite." He smiled, then, and carefully intoned, "See you tomorrow." I beamed from ear to ear, and he turned with a little wave and strode off purposefully back toward his workplace. As I walked along toward home, a bit more slowly, I was suddenly so overcome by what this young man had done for me. He had seen someone who was in need of help, had a language barrier and was perhaps a little scared and/or embarrassed, and he had taken it upon himself to see that that person was helped. He got me all the way through the process, didn't just get me there and abandon me. I felt tears welling up in my eyes, and I thought about it for a long time as I ambled along, taking in the flashing neon and the crisp newness of the sidewalks in the shopping street, and letting the tears flow at the kindness of a stranger in a land of millions.
Perhaps this was some of my own good karma coming back around upon me; the times at work that I've helped someone through a tedious process on the computer to make sure that it worked for them like it ought to; the times in downtown Portland where people have asked me for directions and I, having not had anything else in mind to do, haven't just told them how to go, but have walked them right to the front door of their destination. Whatever the origin, I was truly grateful for the help, and my faith in humanity was, at least for the moment, restored.