dinner out and beijing
i'm going to eat supper in half an hour. i have more than a half an hour's worth to say, but i'll see what i can pound out before i go.
yeah. SO much more than half an hour's worth. it's been a big week.
i guess i'll start with thursday.
sometime last week, a couple of my students cornered me into going out to dinner with them. well... i wanted to go, but i was hesitant. they tricked me into saying yes:) anyway, alice (the mary kay rep) and a guy in her class wanted to take me out. they asked what my favorite chinese food is. dumplings maybe? i said. i dunno. fabulous. you're free tonight? uh... i guess so. we'll take you out to eat then. what time? they asked. frick. ok. how about 6?
so at 6, i met with alice and guy-whose-name-i-forgot-to-ask-for. i assumed they were dating, because in china... well, girl/guy interaction is different. if you see a girl and guy walking around alone together, the odds are excellent that they're dating. not that i'd seen these two alone together, but... come on. alice was saying "WE'd like to take you out." as must be obvious by now, i later found out they're not dating:) sorry. that was a random sidenote.
alice hailed a taxi for us just outside the gate and we took it to a place that's supposed to have some of the best dumplings in town. this was my second trip out with no other native-english speakers, my first being on my second day here. alice and the guy paid for EVERYTHING for me. alice did the ordering for all of us at the restaurant, because here, you don't order individually. you order main dishes and everyone shares. she ordered really really good food:) and LOTS of it. one of the best meals i've had here, for sure. usually, when we teachers go out, because of our limited language skills and lack of experience at the establishments, we order at least one or two really crappy dishes:) not this time, though. we got three types of dumplings, a veggie dish, and a soup. this was my first real chinese meal. i say that because we didn't split the check. and alice kept piling more and more food on my plate:) anytime it began to empty a little, she'd dig out some more dumplings and fill me up. when we'd eaten maybe half the dumplings, she insisted on ordering MORE. holy crap, alice. i think we have more than enough already. she would yell her order across the whole restaurant at the waitstaff. nathaniel said she was probably showing off that she was out to eat with a westerner:) at one point, she said to me, "in class, we are teacher and student. but out of class, we are good friends." yes alice. we are friends:)
after dinner, alice and the guy decided that since i was american, i must want to go out for coffee. of course, i don't like coffee, but i thought, what the heck. it won't kill me. so we went out to a bar that served coffee. the bar was empty except for staff and us. alice ordered for us again. the guy got orange juice. alice got hot chocolate. i got coffee. we sat and ate and talked about learning english and america and whatever. then a young woman went up on a little platform with a guy and a guitar and live music started. the woman started by saying, "hello. what's your name?" i was turned around in my chair to see her, but it took me a second to realize she was talking to me. duh. who else would she be talking to in english. "uh... helen." "oh. nice to meet you helen. this first song is dedicated to you." hahaha:) so she sang a song in english for me:) we stayed for maybe four or five of her songs. when i left, she said goodbye to me and said how nice it was meeting me.
i got home around 9:20 to discover that at 7:30, about 20 students from one of my classes had come over to meet with me:) they'd come to my apartment. i'd totally forgotten that i told them i'd meet them then and there. so darnell entertained them for AN HOUR AND A HALF, because they kept insisting that i'd be back at any moment. holy cow:) i'm such an ass. i can't believe i forgot that. that was horrible:)
that night, alice also gave me a teachers' day gift (that was friday) from all my classes. it's a big bag of packages of traditional medicinal chinese teas. it's mostly whole flower heads and tree bark, but hey. it doesn't taste bad:) very nice.
friday, we went to beijing. beijing was... well, the contrast between there and here was really off-putting. partially because we did a lot of "western" things while we were there. i could've waited a few more months before my first mcdonald's trip, but you know. you go with the flow, do what the group wants. um. yeah. i got to use my atm card and credit card for the first time since i've gotten here. there's no atm in shijiazhuang that accepts my atm, no one takes credit, and only one bank cashes travellers' checks. can you believe that? it won't be an issue once i start getting paid, but this first month has been kinda tough. so rock on for atms. i finally found some postcards, so once i find stamps and a post office, i'll send those off:) if you want a post card and haven't given me your address yet, you can go back to that one post i made and add your address.
the touristy stuff we did was tienamen square, the forbidden city, and the temple of heaven. these were much cooler than the buddhist thing we did the week before, mostly because they're more or less intact. um... cool, but not my highlights of the trip. worth seeing, but... i dunno. maybe i still haven't read enough chinese history. i need to do more of that.
i did have highlights, of course. after the forbidden city, we decided to walk to a street that's supposed to have a bunch of western-style restaurants. keep in mind that nothing in china is TRULY western. to get to this street, we took an alley that cut through beijing. fricking coolest alley i've ever been through. not touristy at all. it felt more like "home" (as in shijiazhuang) in that you felt like people were staring at you more, not used to seeing westerners. it was... it was people living. it was normal chinese people living, sitting outside without their shirts, talking to each other. i thought the alleys in london were neat, but this was so much better.
once we were through, we walked a bit and got to a lake-type thing that was kinda cheesey. boats shaped like swans and stuff. a big sign reading "river romance." *gag* but this was where we were going, our street. we walked around to where the street began. at the "mouth" of the street was a big group of adults, mostly older men, slowly doing ballroom dancing steps without partners to unlikely music. this, this right here, was perhaps my highlight of the weekend. it was strange. it was otherworldly. it was out of a movie, to see these old men gliding around in perfect syncronization, arms poised in the air for invisible partners. it was very like a fairy tale. i wanted to stay and watch, but we were all very hungry, so we left the dancers. the street was fairly unremarkable. lots of nicer, hip looking restaurants. the whole street is new as of the past few years. we walked until we found a place with seating on the roof. looks good, we said, and we ate there.
it got dark as we ate. in the middle of the meal, the christmas light-esque lights that were strung everywhere were switched on. very pretty. by the time we left and began walking back, the whole street was lit up with neon and christmas lights. even on the far side of the water. there were points of lights on the boats, too, which suddenly didn't look cheesey to me:) all of this took my breath away. i told darnell, if i ever get married, i would come here for my honeymoon. i know this was just an imitation of places like this in europe, but still. unbelievably cool and romantic.
crap, it's time to go. quickly to finish...
in celebration of the street being so beautiful and romantic, i drank a bottle and a half of beer, then ate a three inch long beetle called and "earth dragon." it was cooked, but it had all its legs and everything, and i ate them all:) i have a picture. i'll post it soon.
so now i have to go and leave my life up till now at that. yeah. crap. i was going to reply to comments too. later tonight, i'll try to do that.
yeah. SO much more than half an hour's worth. it's been a big week.
i guess i'll start with thursday.
sometime last week, a couple of my students cornered me into going out to dinner with them. well... i wanted to go, but i was hesitant. they tricked me into saying yes:) anyway, alice (the mary kay rep) and a guy in her class wanted to take me out. they asked what my favorite chinese food is. dumplings maybe? i said. i dunno. fabulous. you're free tonight? uh... i guess so. we'll take you out to eat then. what time? they asked. frick. ok. how about 6?
so at 6, i met with alice and guy-whose-name-i-forgot-to-ask-for. i assumed they were dating, because in china... well, girl/guy interaction is different. if you see a girl and guy walking around alone together, the odds are excellent that they're dating. not that i'd seen these two alone together, but... come on. alice was saying "WE'd like to take you out." as must be obvious by now, i later found out they're not dating:) sorry. that was a random sidenote.
alice hailed a taxi for us just outside the gate and we took it to a place that's supposed to have some of the best dumplings in town. this was my second trip out with no other native-english speakers, my first being on my second day here. alice and the guy paid for EVERYTHING for me. alice did the ordering for all of us at the restaurant, because here, you don't order individually. you order main dishes and everyone shares. she ordered really really good food:) and LOTS of it. one of the best meals i've had here, for sure. usually, when we teachers go out, because of our limited language skills and lack of experience at the establishments, we order at least one or two really crappy dishes:) not this time, though. we got three types of dumplings, a veggie dish, and a soup. this was my first real chinese meal. i say that because we didn't split the check. and alice kept piling more and more food on my plate:) anytime it began to empty a little, she'd dig out some more dumplings and fill me up. when we'd eaten maybe half the dumplings, she insisted on ordering MORE. holy crap, alice. i think we have more than enough already. she would yell her order across the whole restaurant at the waitstaff. nathaniel said she was probably showing off that she was out to eat with a westerner:) at one point, she said to me, "in class, we are teacher and student. but out of class, we are good friends." yes alice. we are friends:)
after dinner, alice and the guy decided that since i was american, i must want to go out for coffee. of course, i don't like coffee, but i thought, what the heck. it won't kill me. so we went out to a bar that served coffee. the bar was empty except for staff and us. alice ordered for us again. the guy got orange juice. alice got hot chocolate. i got coffee. we sat and ate and talked about learning english and america and whatever. then a young woman went up on a little platform with a guy and a guitar and live music started. the woman started by saying, "hello. what's your name?" i was turned around in my chair to see her, but it took me a second to realize she was talking to me. duh. who else would she be talking to in english. "uh... helen." "oh. nice to meet you helen. this first song is dedicated to you." hahaha:) so she sang a song in english for me:) we stayed for maybe four or five of her songs. when i left, she said goodbye to me and said how nice it was meeting me.
i got home around 9:20 to discover that at 7:30, about 20 students from one of my classes had come over to meet with me:) they'd come to my apartment. i'd totally forgotten that i told them i'd meet them then and there. so darnell entertained them for AN HOUR AND A HALF, because they kept insisting that i'd be back at any moment. holy cow:) i'm such an ass. i can't believe i forgot that. that was horrible:)
that night, alice also gave me a teachers' day gift (that was friday) from all my classes. it's a big bag of packages of traditional medicinal chinese teas. it's mostly whole flower heads and tree bark, but hey. it doesn't taste bad:) very nice.
friday, we went to beijing. beijing was... well, the contrast between there and here was really off-putting. partially because we did a lot of "western" things while we were there. i could've waited a few more months before my first mcdonald's trip, but you know. you go with the flow, do what the group wants. um. yeah. i got to use my atm card and credit card for the first time since i've gotten here. there's no atm in shijiazhuang that accepts my atm, no one takes credit, and only one bank cashes travellers' checks. can you believe that? it won't be an issue once i start getting paid, but this first month has been kinda tough. so rock on for atms. i finally found some postcards, so once i find stamps and a post office, i'll send those off:) if you want a post card and haven't given me your address yet, you can go back to that one post i made and add your address.
the touristy stuff we did was tienamen square, the forbidden city, and the temple of heaven. these were much cooler than the buddhist thing we did the week before, mostly because they're more or less intact. um... cool, but not my highlights of the trip. worth seeing, but... i dunno. maybe i still haven't read enough chinese history. i need to do more of that.
i did have highlights, of course. after the forbidden city, we decided to walk to a street that's supposed to have a bunch of western-style restaurants. keep in mind that nothing in china is TRULY western. to get to this street, we took an alley that cut through beijing. fricking coolest alley i've ever been through. not touristy at all. it felt more like "home" (as in shijiazhuang) in that you felt like people were staring at you more, not used to seeing westerners. it was... it was people living. it was normal chinese people living, sitting outside without their shirts, talking to each other. i thought the alleys in london were neat, but this was so much better.
once we were through, we walked a bit and got to a lake-type thing that was kinda cheesey. boats shaped like swans and stuff. a big sign reading "river romance." *gag* but this was where we were going, our street. we walked around to where the street began. at the "mouth" of the street was a big group of adults, mostly older men, slowly doing ballroom dancing steps without partners to unlikely music. this, this right here, was perhaps my highlight of the weekend. it was strange. it was otherworldly. it was out of a movie, to see these old men gliding around in perfect syncronization, arms poised in the air for invisible partners. it was very like a fairy tale. i wanted to stay and watch, but we were all very hungry, so we left the dancers. the street was fairly unremarkable. lots of nicer, hip looking restaurants. the whole street is new as of the past few years. we walked until we found a place with seating on the roof. looks good, we said, and we ate there.
it got dark as we ate. in the middle of the meal, the christmas light-esque lights that were strung everywhere were switched on. very pretty. by the time we left and began walking back, the whole street was lit up with neon and christmas lights. even on the far side of the water. there were points of lights on the boats, too, which suddenly didn't look cheesey to me:) all of this took my breath away. i told darnell, if i ever get married, i would come here for my honeymoon. i know this was just an imitation of places like this in europe, but still. unbelievably cool and romantic.
crap, it's time to go. quickly to finish...
in celebration of the street being so beautiful and romantic, i drank a bottle and a half of beer, then ate a three inch long beetle called and "earth dragon." it was cooked, but it had all its legs and everything, and i ate them all:) i have a picture. i'll post it soon.
so now i have to go and leave my life up till now at that. yeah. crap. i was going to reply to comments too. later tonight, i'll try to do that.