Civilize Chaoyang

Chances are, if you’ve ever used an escalator, you know the unwritten rule: walk on the left, stand on the right. Chances are, if you’ve used enough of them, you’ve run into a few people who don’t abide to this standard. Chances are, you’ve wished you could tell them what you think of them. And chances are, also, that you’ve only merely cleared your throat as you climbed the stairs behind them.

Here in China, it’s a bit different. While this may be the rule, its likelihood of happening is the exception. So fine, that’s annoying. Of course that’s annoying. But I wouldn’t write a blog post about standing on the left. No, the phrase of the day would be “becoming civilized,” and thanks to a campaign in one district of Beijing, that’s what the end-goal is.

“Civilize Choayang: Magnificent With Me!” the slogan goes. Aside from the clear Chinglish (really? A district-wide campaign couldn’t afford an editor?) there’s something else that’s lost in translation. The idea of a city being “uncivilized” seems a bit harsh. We couldn’t have gone with “modernize?” Even “beautify?” But no, the effort to “civilize” Choayang district goes beyond the beautification efforts that sprung up, even the addition of new subway stops and manicured parks. It means, by and large: no spitting. No cursing loudly. Use escalators in the proper fashion. Stand in line when waiting for the bus or subway. In general, shape up.  

Among my friends, it’s become the running joke. “I was walking the other day in one of the less-civilized areas of Beijing…” a story will start. Recently on an airplane, my friend turned to me and pointed at the man pushing past those waiting to get off the plane, holding a bag over his head. “Look at that uncivilized man” she scoffed. We’ve managed to incorporate the word into our everyday vocabulary. If we had a nice day, filled with a manicure and dinner out, we’ve had a “civilized day.” If we’re swamped and exhausted after too much shoving and pushing at the Zoo Market, we’ll say we can’t wait to get back to “civilized China.” My friend Ryan, has taken it one step further. Fluent in Chinese, he’s able to directly whisper the phrase into the ears of strangers on the subway as they shove him to get on. “This is Civilize Choayang, what do you think you’re doing?” He’ll scold. He’s the enforcer. He’ll climb stairs behind people, whispering the phrase. “Civilize Chaoyang. Civilize Chaoyang.”

I’ve heard in Shenzhen, another city in China, the campaign has started there too. They’ve taken it one step further though, and actually allegedly have “Stand in Line Days” where everyone practices queuing up for the subway, instead of the mass pushing that usually occurs. Ryan swears someone will throw up a hand signal, and everyone will line up. Like I said, he’s the civilization enforcer, so I believe what he says.

I wouldn’t want anyone to think that this is somehow a condescending look at traditional Chinese culture. This isn’t an expat-lead initiative, by any means. The signs are everywhere. In fact, the other day I heard a story from someone I was on a trip with. We were trading terrible taxi-driver stories, and she mentioned that recently she had told her taxi driver, in English, to “fuck off.” To her surprise, he apparently understood the phrase. He looked at her, scowling, and sharply said “Where are you from? Because this is civilized Chaoyang.”

So there you have it. We could all learn a lesson from the Civilize Chaoyang campaign.

Chi le ma

We breathe. We sleep.  We eat. It's no wonder that food is such an important part of every distinct culture. To the Italians, food is life – mulling over its flavors and sensations with each course and subsequent glass of wine.  It's not just Italians, either: my best friend, Maya, has told me repeatedly that she has no need for a scale because she just uses her Jewish grandmother as a gauge of her weight. "You're looking great!" Grandma Esther says, and Maya knows she's put on a pound or two. "Maya, you look terrible" and Maya shrugs, realizes she must have lost some weight recently, and tries to fend off the fried potatoes that are inevitably coming her way. The French, the Thai, the Spanish -- we all have our distinct foods, special recipes, and shaped palettes.

It will come as no surprise that the Chinese are no different. I am constantly asked if I like Chinese food and what my favorite dishes are. There are noodle shops, dumpling places, and small restaurants crowding every block. In the morning, food stalls pop-up to make what my dad calls the "Chinese egg-McMuffin" and other fried breakfast specialties. The stands are plentiful - as are the convenient stores that double as fast food places during lunchtime. Recently, I commented to Emily on the vast number of these stores in China.  She responded, “It’s China. There is just a lot of everything here." Yet it seems like the restaurants, no matter how plentiful, are always packed around meal times. There may be just a lot of people here, but there also seem to be a lot of people who love to eat. Going out to eat, you'll see parties of five crowd the center of their table with at least 15 dishes of piping hot food, which are constantly replaced by new dishes of piping hot food throughout the meal.  When they're done, multiple full plates remain as everyone has gotten more than their fill. It's a matter of pride: if there's leftover food, then the host of the meal has accommodated for everyone and done his best to make sure the guests were well fed by the end of the meal. During the meal, there's a certain amount of force-feeding that goes on.   It is considered polite for the host to literally place food on other's plates (or bowls, as the case may be). It's very Italian. "Mange, mange!" It's very Jewish. "Are you eating? You're too thin - eat!" It's very, very Chinese.

I can sum it up best with a Chinese phrase I recently picked up from a coworker. I've been wanting to pick up some Chinese slang, so she told me that instead of greeting someone with the traditional "Ni hao ma" (literally translated, it means "are you good?”) I should say "Chi le ma." “Chi...as in chi fan, or 'eat’?" I asked. Yup. The phrase translates to "Have you eaten?" and it's just another way of saying "what's up?" "So let me get this straight -- you're constantly asking each other if you've eaten?" Yup. Constantly. You walk in a room - "have you eaten?" You come back from a lunch date - "have you eaten?" I found this hilarious. A culture where everyone is keeping tabs on if everyone else has eaten. I was laughing about it with a few friends the other day, one of which is Chinese-American. "I can't believe it's true." I laughed. "Wouldn't you get annoyed if every friend and coworker were constantly pestering you about when you last ate?"

"In my house, we don't say 'I love you'" she explained. "We make each other food. I know a fight is over when my dad starts cooking for me, and my mom asks me what I want to eat." '"Chi le ma' is a way of saying we care."

Emily put it best. "The Jews and the Chinese - not so different, huh?" It's true, and it can apply universally. Food is love.

Same same?

The Chinese have Beiber-fever. They're into the Twilight series, and
can't get enough of the TV shows "Friends," and "The Big Bang Theory." At least
someone's watching "The Big Bang Theory." The other day, my Chinese
coworker Michelle was quizzing me on American culture. She wanted to
know if "Desperate Housewives" mimicked real life at all. "Hardly." I replied "Nobody is
like that." Of course what I meant was that nobody spied on their
neighbors, had multiple affairs and lived with such ridiculous
scandal. Michelle laughed and agreed, underlining how crazy and
surreal it would be to have such a huge house and garden, so far from
your neighbors.

The point is, when it comes to Western culture, the Chinese are slowly
buying in. Of course McDonalds and Lady Gaga are old hat. (Side note:
if you haven't seen this clip, it's an absolute must. The band in the
beginning is managed by my good friend Emily's roommates.) Most
Chinese have picked up on our fast-food, our music, and our TV. Yet
there are some subtitles that are still, well, a bit off.

Case in point: the cafe/bakery combo. The Chinese aren't known for
their desserts, to put it nicely. Maybe it's the lack of butter, maybe
it's the general distaste for anything too sweet, but every pastry
I've tried has made me wish that I'd just stuck to a bag of M&Ms.
This, however, hasn't stopped the rise of cafe/bakery combinations
that can be found on nearly every block of the city. The smell is
incredible and they offer free Wifi for the price of a dry donuts. So
tempting, and yet so disappointing. They're incredibly popular, and if
you sit there long enough, you'll see packs of young people coming in
and buying not one, but a tray full of pastries. Let me back up: when
you walk in the door, you're offered a tray to put your goodies on.
I'd usually choose one (very carefully. Many are filled with things
like tuna or "pork floss" so you have to choose wisely). My Chinese
counterparts would choose six or seven. I've watched girls who are
smaller than I am carefully eat entire pans of cake, along with
several donuts and a small tart. After sitting and staring, I've
developed a theory: Chinese pastries are devoid of all fat and
calories. This leads them to be A) terrible and B) guilt-free! It's
how these women are able to down six or seven in one sitting and
remain model-thin.

Example #2: the subtitles. Most people know that it's easy to get a
boot-legged DVD here in Beijing. They're everywhere and they're
incredibly cheap. While they aren't dubbed, they do come with Chinese
subtitles. During the movie, when a cultural reference is mentioned
they usually put a quick Chinese explanation on the bottom of the
screen, followed by the English word. Or they try to. The other day, I
was watching a movie where one of the main characters described
himself as "in a pickle." On the bottom of the screen, I could see a
few Chinese characters and then the English words "Pickles the Frog."
Who's Pickles the Frog? Should I be embarrassed not to know the
reference, or curious as to the plot of the movie that my Chinese
counterparts must be watching?

Finally, there's Halloween. This holiday hasn't caught on at all. In
fact, the only references to Halloween could be seen at Western-style
grocery stores, or bars catering to the expat crowd. That was it -
though it didn't stop Beijing from being the single greatest place in
the world to buy Halloween costumes. Why, you ask? Because my Chinese
peers insist on wearing bunny ears and panda paws all the time. Why
wait for once a year, when you can dress up every day? So, sure, when
we took the subway on Halloween, we half-posed for sneaky camera
pictures taken of our ridiculous costumes. I was the "Year of the
Rabbit," Emily dressed up as a popular Chinese cartoon character. But
I'm willing to bet that had we'd not been foreign, the costumes would
have been regarded as totally normal. Fashionable, even.

There was a phrase that was popular in Thailand that I picked up when
I was backpacking there. They boys at the center used to say it all
the time. "Same same." As in "Food here, same same America?" It was
everywhere, and because of the popularity many vendors even sold
tee-shirts with the saying on the front. Some took it a step father
adding that things were "same same but different." I can't think of a
more appropriate phrase for what I'm trying to describe. Bakeries,
movies, western culture in general is same same...but, well,
different.

Chinglish

One of the single greatest things about living in a foreign country is the language barrier. Yes, there are times when I wish that I could just explain to a cab driver the general vicinity of my destination, or ask a waiter to describe a dish, but seeing things like "a friend boiled," or "a Jew's ear" (what happened to the other one??) on a menu makes up for this entirely. Speaking little to no Chinese makes doing every day tasks an incredible adventure, and usually a hilarious story. There is now "the time I tried to order soup," "the time 10 waitresses surrounded my table, trying to figure out what I wanted," and "the time I tried to find the subway station, but instead was pointed to an actual Subway sandwich shop." Classics. Most of these stories are created when I do things alone, as luckily most of my friends here are conversational, if not fluent. For the first couple of days I was here, I followed them around wide-eyed as they did things like get me a metro card and put money on my phone. Now, I'm more independent and trying to play that role for my parents.

As most know, I was living in China for about three weeks before my parents were able to join me here. In those three weeks, I'd managed not only to become employed (easier than ordering off of a menu. Within five minutes of posting my resume, I had a phone call setting up an interview. The next day I had a job and the day after I began to tutor English) but also to pick up a few key "survival phrases." This has allowed me to have many one-sided conversations, and also was the inspiration for the game I like to play, called "Guess the Answer." Here's an example
Me: I want a vegetable dumpling. Without meat.
Them: *speaks for a good twenty seconds, gesturing to various dumplings*
Me: Yes.

Now, unless they had simply said "Ok," or "Don't have," I wouldn't have been able to understand them. So, instead I "Guess the Answer." In this case, I like to imagine that they said "Well, we do have non-meat dumplings, but they've been sitting in the sun all day, and we're about to throw them in the garbage can over there. I really wouldn't eat them if I were you, but if you say 'yes' right now, I'll be convinced to let you have them."

I love having one-sided conversations. I also love nodding wisely, pretending I understand what they are saying completely. I manage to fool old ladies, who just want an audience in an elevator, but I also think I've managed to fool my parents. The minute they saw me direct a cab ("Straight. Straight. Straight. Right turn.") they were convinced I had become a conversational speaker in less than 30 days. My dad, especially, thinks I'm a prodigy child. Every time I point to a menu and say "that" he yells "She's done it again! Amazing!" It's really flattering, but I think they might be overestimating my abilities a bit. The other day he asked me to open a bank account for him. Unless he doesn't want meat in his bank account, I don't think I can help him out.

Sometimes I can't help but to wish we all spoke the same language. Things might be a bit easier if I weren't mute and illiterate, but I sure as hell wouldn't have snagged a job in less than a day just because I spoke English, and there's no way that my bootleg version of "Black Swan," would have read "Black Sean." For now, I'm just not willing to give these things up.

Something to declare.

In a few hours, I’ll be leaving Thailand on a 16 hour journey to Beijing, China. I guess nobody said getting to China would be easy. In fact, the difficulty of it all is what has inspired me to write the following blog post. While I should be reflecting fondly on the past few months which were both incredible and surreal, it happens to be Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of fasting, repenting, and general ill-feelings. Plus, if you happened to glance at my post on food, entitled “Food Frenzy,” you’ll know that I don’t do well when I’m hungry. I’m pissed. So in a couple of hours, they’ll ask me at customs if I have anything to declare. Yes, in fact, I do.

            I have a lot to declare. Namely, China: it should not be this difficult to enter you.*** My poor parents have been stuck in moving purgatory because of a supposed hold up on their visas since the beginning of September. I was supposed to be leaving Thailand to visit them in their well-established three bedroom Chinese apartment, but they aren’t living at home in D.C. anymore and they haven’t yet moved to China. They’re living at a hotel in Virginia. Can you imagine thinking you were moving to China, only to actually move to Virginia? So, China, if you think you can scare them from moving just by having a bureaucratic mess interfere with them getting hold of visas, you can think again. My mother did not make 10 dozen deviled eggs for her own going-away party just to sit in temporary housing thirty minutes away. My father did not spend countless hours repeating simple Chinese phrases in our basement just to order Chinese broccoli in Chinatown. No, China, you will tell the visa-handler (I have no idea if this is a real position, but I imagine a crotchety old man sitting in a dark room, stamping visas at random) that unless he intends to reimburse us for a slightly insane Costco run followed by hours of slave-labor-finger-food preparation for said going away party, he will just have to grant my parents the access they desire.

            Also, I’d like to declare that my 30 day visa, for which I paid 150 dollars, does not seem like a fair trade. You said I could “simply extend my visa in China,” although I think that there was something lost in translation in this exchange. Typically, the word “simply” implies that this will be done with ease. Looking ahead, I can’t imagine it will be, although I do anticipate spending a large sum of money in the process. It would actually be simple, China, for you to extend my visa now.

            Finally, I’d like to declare that by insisting we put the family cat in a 30 day quarantine, you now have her blood on your hands, if it comes to that. Many people I’ve spoken to think the cat will be fine. Those who think that have never actually met the cat. This is the same creature that has been known to hide under the couch for days at a time, leaving only to stand in the hallway, growling at any passer-by. She will forgo food if she thinks danger is lurking, and to her, any footstep is a sign of potential danger. She’s not exactly “adaptable” and if you kill her during this quarantine, it’s on your hands.

            So when I get to the airport, maybe I will stand in the line for those who have “something to declare.” I realize that this isn’t entirely the point of this distinction in customs, nor is it the best use of my time to spend my last day in Thailand brooding over these things, but I guess I have next Yom Kippur to repent about that one.

***That’s what she said.

Urban Light

I really have been doing more in Thailand than just eating, I can assure you. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of beginning to volunteer with an organization called Urban Light. Started by a woman from Maryland, the organization serves as a respite center for Thai boys who are forced to work in Thailand’s booming sex industry at night. I originally typed the work “prostitute” as an explanation for the boys work, but deleted it – as even seeing it on a screen feels a little too creepy. The boys range in age from the mid-teens to early twenties. They come from the Akha village in the north, but most have been here in Chiang Mai for years. For the most part, they seem as well-adjusted and stable as any, though their lives outside the center are anything but.

The center, originally started as a tutoring program in a local coffee shop, now does a whole lot more. Urban Light provides the boys with a place to shower, a hot lunch, a way to learn English and general life skills. When the boys are sick, the staff takes them to the clinic. When the boys are really sick, they visit them at the hospital, making sure they’re receiving the best care and sending hugs from the other well-wishers. The organization provides rent for the boys who are not of-age to get a legal job, and job opportunities for the older ones. Because none of the boys can afford a private school during the day, Urban Light also provides the fee and needed encouragement for the boys to enroll in a GED program.

If this seems like a shameless plug for the organization, it isn’t – but it should be. Never before have I seen a team of people more invested in what they do. While Alezandra, the founder, fundraises in the United States, two young women named Hazel and Aw act as case managers, coordinators, and house moms all in one. When one of the boys, Ado, had a motor bike accident, Aw was dressing his wounds the same day that Hazel had made a dentist appointment for him to replace his lost tooth. Of course, Urban Light took on the bill. A few nights ago, Hazel couldn’t sleep. With a one-year-old baby in the house her sleeping patterns have been off lately. At 2:30 am she took her motorbike out for a 20 minute drive, visiting the bars that many of our boys frequent. Like any good mother, she scolded the boys for being out so late and told them to go get some sleep. They’re characters, both of them. They also happen to be unbelievably gorgeous: reason enough for a 16-year-old boy to visit the center daily.

The boys themselves are in a league of their own. They’re polite, often exceedingly so, in their attempts to humor me while I try to contribute in some meaningful way.  When they let me make lunch, I burned myself and any bystanders with splattering oil. Charlito, our best cook, quickly took the wok from my hands. When I tried to buy the boys ice cream pops from a man who had stopped in front of the center, they had beaten me to the punch and had no problem explaining that no, the brown popsicle is not chocolate, it’s brown bean. Pink is not strawberry, it’s sticky rice. And white, well, it’s not vanilla, but it’s some sort of Thai leaf. I don’t know what I’d do without them. For the record, I ended up choosing sticky rice and it wasn’t half bad… if you ignored the floating bits of rice.

They treat me like I’m slightly incompetent when it comes to navigating day-to-day life in Thailand, and they’re kind of right to assume I am. What I can offer is a command of the English language. They’re great students and through my teaching I’m able to learn about their lives in the village before they came to Chiang Mai, and their lives now. It isn’t too often that when you ask a boy to write a sentence in the past-tense he chooses “I used to ride buffalo.” Isn’t it always the case that the students end up teaching the teacher in the end? This is no exception.

Currently the center is under two feet of water due to recent flooding in the area. If you’d like to make a donation to Urban Light, please visit: http://urban-light.org/about.html

Food frenzy

Genetics can be a wonderful thing. There are those traits we inherit that make us realize how fortunate we are. Thanks to my mother, I can carry a tune, for example. Plus, I’m not sure which side of the family I should thank about the fact that I never had to endure braces. Being 13 was awkward enough; at least my teeth were straight. However, there are those traits that we could live without. Namely, thanks to my mother, I have one serious flaw: I do not cope well when I’m hungry.

There was the time, working in Kentucky, that I began to get extremely snippy with a customer around lunch time and physically had to remove myself before I ended up saying something that I’d regret. I was actually being genuinely mean to a woman who was not only old enough to be my mother, but was doing absolutely nothing wrong. “One Subway sandwich, please,” and I was back to normal. There was also the time, more recently, that I completely snapped at Shira in Phnom Penh, Cambodia for no other reason than we hadn’t eaten a real lunch. I literally stopped walking in the middle of a busy intersection, threw down my arms, and snapped. I think my head might have spun around three times too, but that might just be my memory taking creative liberties. The point is: one quick stop at a noodle shop later and I was back to my cheerful self.

It’s a very, very good thing, then, that in Thailand I am rarely (read: never) hungry. The question I get most from family and friends is “how is the food?” so let me tell you: I am living a foodie’s dream. If you are under the impression that Thailand is a country where the air smells consistently like mouth-watering Pad Thai, you can’t walk two blocks without being offered a fresh fruit shake, mango sticky rice, or a homemade spicy papaya salad – I want to set the record straight: you are absolutely right. That is an entirely accurate depiction of this country. The other night, I went out to hit the ATM at a nearby road and ended up sampling stir-fried morning glory, made insanely spicy and insanely wonderful. I’d been down that street a few times, but apparently never around dinner time – when small stalls pop up and everyone is stir-frying, blending, or deep-frying something delicious. In a way, I guess, it’s a bit like the food trucks at lunch time in downtown D.C., but a thousand times less pretentious and cheaper. I wonder if I could get them to Tweet their locations…. Either way: I’ve “mmed” my way through colorful curries, eaten my body weight in Tom Yum Soup, and tried something wrapped in a banana leaf that was delicious, and still has yet to be identified. Oh, and the prices. How can you turn down the made-on-the-spot roti when it’s about 50 cents and filled with bananas and chocolate? You can’t, you wouldn’t, I promise.

So even though there are, of course, pizza places every once in a while, even falafel to appeal to the Israeli crowd, I’d rather overdose on Thai food for now. In fact, I went to trivia at an Irish pub the other night with friends (that’s right: friends. I threw that word in just to brag a bit) and came to the realization that fish ‘n chips will always be just fish ‘n chips. I’d choose a spicy curry any day and be content with the fact that overpriced, bland, food will still be there in a couple of months.