It's a Bus-age Wonder

Yesterday morning, I was a little worried I had absolutely nothing to write about today. Now, I feel like I have to pick and choose which parts of my weekend to talk about. 

Yesterday began with a trip to the fabric market, or as I like to think of it, the Achilles heel of my shopping willpower. I had one last piece of nice fabric that I'd picked up on my last trip that I wanted to have made up into a jacket. Of course, while I was there, I bought three more pieces of fabric. But they're just remnants! They're tiny! I can stuff them into my shoes to bring them home! I don't need to bring home my socks...

After my narrow escape from the fabric market, I headed out with my flatmate and another coworker for a little pampering. We got facials. I say facial, but in addition to all the attention paid to my face, I also got my back, arms, neck, and scalp massaged. It was decadent and extremely relaxing. I will not tell you what I paid for it, because it will make you cry. Sorry.

Just as we were coming out of the spa, I got a call from another friend asking if I wanted to see Men in Black 3 later that evening. I weighed it against my other option: going home to watch BBC mysteries and surf the net in bed. So, we made a plan to meet for the movie. It gave us a little over an hour to get dinner, so we walked up Tianhe Beilu to a Bavarian German restaurant whose name is eluding me at the moment. I had German potato salad and a mango smoothie. Then it was down and over to the Grandview where I watched Will Smith take out some alien baddies with his usual summer blockbuster energy (sidenote: man, the summer of 1969 is a really busy time for time travelers). The movie let out just as the very last buses were running, so I ran and caught one home and fell into bed. That was yesterday.

Today I got up and paid the rent, cleaned my apartment a bit so our real estate agent can show it to some prospective renters (even though we're not leaving until late July?), then met another friend for lunch at the cheap Italian place (again, the name eludes me). It really isn't half bad for the price point, which is way, way cheaper than any other foreign food place in town (including McDonald's). We had basil pasta, garlic bread, seaweed salad (yes, you read that right), a 9-inch Hawaiian pizza, and chocolate mousse cake all for a little under 10 USD. Seaweed salad, by the way, is regular garden salad with dressing, with a scoop of Japanese sushi-restaurant style seaweed on top. It actually wasn't half bad. After lunch, we decided to swing by Starbucks, as my friend had a buy-one-get-one card. The nearest Starbucks was packed, so we walked a block to the next one, which was also packed, so we crossed the intersection to the bigger one, which wasn't so bad. We both had the mango hibiscus juice tea. It was good.

Finally, I got around to the real task I needed to accomplish this weekend, which was to head to the coach station and buy bus tickets for my weekend trip. My flatmate and I are going on a three day trip to Yangshuo (you may recall, I was there in October, but my flatmate hasn't been). Last time, a coworker who had been before arranged everything, so all I had to do then was give her some cash and show up at the appointed time. This time, I am the designated ticket-buyer, so I had to brave the fun of a major transit station. 

The Tianhe Coach Station is at least easy to find, as it is right outside of the identically-named subway station (last stop on Line 3). It's two storeys tall, and there are helpful bilingual signs that direct you to the ticket windows on the first and second floors. That's where the bilingualism ends, though, as all of the bus information is in Chinese. No matter, I thought, I can read this. This is basic stuff! I can even read the sign about which ticket windows accept bank cards (about 4 out of 40 windows, so bring cash). 

First, I direct my eyes to the scrolling red text of the giant electronic signboards and locate the "out of province" buses. I patiently wait for the whole cycle to run through twice. Hmm. I don't see my bus listed. Well, maybe I misread the sign downstairs and I need to use the first-floor ticket windows. So down I go. Nope, those are definitely not right. Back up the escalator, and another scan of the signs. Still no dice. I wander over to a large poster of bus numbers sorted by province. Yangshuo is in Guangxi, and isn't listed as a destination. Huh. Wait a tick! I say to myself. I bet Yangshuo isn't the terminus of the bus. It probably goes all the way to Guilin. So really, I should be looking for the bus to Guilin. I don't see that one on the big signboard, but I do see it listed on the poster. 

Finally, now that I've been wandering around the bus station for about fifteen minutes, I get in a ticket window line. It's not actually a peak travel time, so my line is only five people deep and moves quickly. When it's my turn, I bust out my best Chinese (what? full sentences? ha. Only silly foreigners use full sentences) and ask for the Friday night sleeper bus to Yangshuo. Turns out there's a really late one, but I know there's an 8:30 one, so I ask and ahah, there it is (at the ticket window, there's a computer screen facing you, which shows you all the ticket information: destination, bus type, ticket type, departure time, and price). I ask for two tickets, hand over some cash, and ticket victory is mine. 

Oddly enough, I feel as though my trip to the coach station would have been faster if I didn't speak any Chinese. I probably would have just hopped in a line and blundered through. On the other hand, my confidence level was high, and it all went quite smoothly, so I'm calling it a win. I even handled the unexpected "is the second passenger a child" question.

So that was my weekend. I'm a bit tired, and I've got homework to do before class tomorrow (Ahem. All of my former students will laugh at me, but I actually forgot how annoying it is to have to dedicate some homework time. But! The teacher in me knows the benefit of doing it). One last thing, though, before I go. This Saturday is the Dragon Boat Festival, which honors the noble suicide of Qu Yuan, a Warring States-era poet. I suggest celebrating with a boat ride and some zongzi. 

To the Nines

I feel like complaining about the weather again would be repetitive, so let’s consider my moaning and groaning about the continued heat and humidity, and my impeding electric bill, said and done. Onwards!

In other news, I learned how to peel a dragonfruit.

It’s been a good week in eating. First, I enjoyed a delicious red dragonfruit. I love summer, just for the fruit. All along the street I can buy little peaches, plums, bananas, green oranges, lychee, and mangosteens.

Round lasagna. You eat it like pie.

Then yesterday, I made lasagna. It was delicious. If you’ve never gone to the effort of making your own béchamel sauce for your lasagna, I highly recommend it. It came out so velvety and flavorful (want a funny mental image? Okay, imagine me, making white sauce in a wok, stirring it with chopsticks). On the side, we had some sour ginger carrots. I made this recipe up, guys, and it’s delicious. You should try it. Just shred a carrot or two on a box grater, then in a lidded container mix 2 tablespoons sugar, 1 tablespoon salt, a quarter cup of white vinegar, a cup of warm-hot water, and the juice and pulp of a piece of fresh ginger the size of your thumb down to the first knuckle. Swirl until everything is dissolved and toss in the carrots. The liquid should cover them. If they’re not, adjust proportionally. Leave them in the fridge overnight. Drain them and eat within a week. Zingy zesty yum.

Follow the yellow brick road! 

This week’s day-off outing was to Up Down Nine Street (上下九路步行街), a pedestrian shopping street near the Changshoulu metro stop on Line 1. It’s the usual chaos of clothing stores, shoe stores, shouting salespeople, aggressive flyer distributors, foreigners, and visitors. It’s not quite up to the level of Beijing’s Silk Market (then again, what place is? What Hilter was to despotic dictators, the Silk Market is to tourist shopping opportunities), but it is good fun, nonetheless. I didn’t buy anything, but I did get a pedicure and take pictures of the interesting older architecture of the area, as well each of the statutes of traditional life dotting the road.



I thought about continuing on to the jade market area, since it is at the same stop, but I wanted to get back so I could eat leftover lasagna and write this post and get cracking on my real task for tonight. My homework. Yes, you heard me. I have homework to do. Say what you will about my tendency to procrastinate, but I finally got around to signing up for a Chinese class in my free time. Yes, I’m aware that I’m leaving China in less than a month and a half. At least I am doing it, right? Actually, I feel like I’ve done surprisingly well achieving some of my goals for my time here. But, that’s a topic for another post.

A Pizza Hut, a Pizza Hut, Kentucky Friend Chicken and a Pizza Hut.
McDonalds! McDonalds! Kentucky Fried Chicken
and a Pizza Hut.

This Week in History

Oh what a week! We had the anniversaries of the opening of the first drive-in movie theater, the Queen's sixty years on the throne, D-Day, and the Tiananmen Square incident. Good thing so much is going on in history, because I've done nothing.

This did nothing, either, because it never happened. Got that?

Well, ok, not nothing. I don't really know why I have the idea in my head that I need to do something "big" in order to make my week exciting. This week was a good example of what my day-to-day life in Guangzhou has been. On Thursday I taught four year olds about shapes, on Friday I went to a Teacher Workshop about teaching functional language, on Saturday and Sunday I taught the bulk of my classes and tried out a cheap and delicious Vietnamese restaurant in the Yangji area, on Monday I did administration and prep work, and Tuesday I had a picnic in Yuexiu Park. Today I did laundry, walked to the fruit market selling avocados for 12 kuai each, and wiped the entire kitchen down with bleach (days like this make me wish I had an ayi). I also finally noticed that we hadn't flipped our living room calendar page since March. Oops.

Laziness is its own reward.

Admittedly, part of why I try to do something notable each week is so that I have something interesting to write about here. I feel a bit narcissistic when all I have to write is complaints and boring recitations of my normal and rather uninteresting life. But, the only people who read this are my family, right? So you're used to it. On with the drivel!

It's summer in Guangzhou.

Yesterday's picnic was a chance to reconnect with some of the other teachers who arrived last July. There were eight of us who trained together, and three of them work at the same center as me, but the other four are scattered through the city. We've done some things together throughout the year, but we wanted to make sure we had one last get-together before our contracts are up in July. So, we managed to find a time six of us could make, and we met for a picnic in the park. It was quite fun. We found a spot in the "woods" part of the park and shared bread, cheese, grapes, chips, quick pickles, garlic peas, cookies, and banana chips. Then we walked around the park a bit and moaned about the heat and humidity. I am so looking forward to Maine summer. I've got Castlebay's Looking Home stuck in my head every time I think about it.

Now I'm thinking of Schooner Fare's Roots and Wings.

That's all I'm going to torture you with this week. Before I go, though, the answer to last week's photo challenge! Did you figure out what these are?

Sweet Dreams

They're ceramic pillows! The children's area had one you could try out. You know? They're surprisingly comfortable. Maybe that's what I'll bring you all for souvenirs.

It's Good to Be King

Another week; another weekend; another chance to take a day trip to a new place in the city. This week I finally got around to checking out the Museum of the Mausoleum of the Nanyue King, which is just across from the main gate of Yuexiu Park. Ready for a 100 word history lesson?

西汉南越王博物馆

It's the second century BCE. The Han Dynasty rules from its capital in Chang'an. Like other large Chinese dynasties, however, the Han have some difficulty controlling the far-off edges of the empire. In the south, throughout what is now Guangdong, Guangxi, and Yunnan provinces and northern Vietnam, the Nanyue Kingdom is ruled by five generations of the Zhao family. Zhao Mo is the second king of Nanyue and when he dies in 122 BCE, he gets buried in style. We're talking a suit of over 2,000 jade pieces sewn together with silk thread, jade carvings, bronze and pottery goods, a chariot, ten attendants and four concubines. The tomb was discovered in the 1980s by construction workers.

the excavated tomb

Okay, that's all the history I'm going to make you sit through. You can start paying attention again. I'm afraid my pictures are terrible because I forgot my camera and had to use my phone's tiny camera, but I have a guessing game for you and a bad joke for you to make up for it.

First: the guessing game. There is a lovely collection of 200 of these at the Museum (not from the tomb, just sharing exhibit space). So, who can tell me ... what are they?

Hint: you own one. It just looks different.

Now, the museum was quite nice, and looking at artifact after artifact after jade disk after incense burner is a grand tribute to the artistry of people in times long past. But, clearly, the best part of any museum is the children's area. There was a station to make your own rubbings!

Here's my coworker making a rubbing!

There was sadly no paper left in the bin, so we hunted through our purses like the female pack-rats we are for paper we could use. I, curses, had just cleaned out my purse, and all I could find was one sticky note and the receipt from my trip to the bank last week.

This reminds me of girl scouts.

In the gift shop was the usual assortment of jade, sandalwood, ceramics, kitschy playing cards, and not-so-handmade handicrafts. I bought some postcards. I've begun to think about what little trinkets I'll be taking back to my friends and family. Most of you are easy, but some of you are darn hard to shop for (I'm talking to you, Dad. If only I could find a Chinese plumb bob).

Did someone say jade?

Last, but not least:  a joke. If you laugh at it, you may be the first (cracks me up, though, which doesn't say much about my sense of humor...) What sound does a three-legged pot make when you hit it?

DING!

人山人海

I'd like to teach you a Chinese idiom today. Unlike many of the idioms my various Chinese professors tried to teach me, this one is actually quite useful. Here it is: 人山人海(ren shan ren hai). What does it mean? Well, literally, 'person mountain person sea,' and as a comprehensible English phrase 'people from the mountains to the sea,' and thus you can see it is meant to describe large crowds of people.

I read today that the UN's State of World Cities report for 2010 pegs the population of the Pearl River Delta (that's basically the triangle formed by Hong Kong, Guangzhou, and Macao, plus the outlying areas) at approximately 120 million. That's right. The urban agglomeration I live in has a population 3.5 times that of all of Canada. I know I complain a lot about the endless city, the pollution, the crowds, the noise, &c. This is why.  I'm not sure I could ever acclimate to this life (certainly not in one year).

Let's take a little stroll.

So to get away from the skyscrapers for a little while, today I hopped a bus to Xiaozhou (小洲). Xiaozhou dates to the Yuan Dynasty and is notable for its old network of canals and its newer artsy vibe. You can get there on a Guangzhou city bus in about 45 progressively bumpy minutes. I enjoyed watching the scenery change from skyscrapers and wide roads to crumbling little shops and narrow streets.

boats in a canal

Once in Xiaozhou, I felt very out-of-place, wandering at random down little side alleys and gardens, but I also immediately spotted one other foreign visitor and a group of Chinese tourists, so clearly the locals must be used to having strangers poking around.

a gate

Time for the photo tour! Pull up a chair and settle in.

Here, have a fake stump.

Xiaozhou is full of those tiny narrow alleys that squeeze between buildings and make me feel like I'm in a maze. A really cool maze, where you turn a corner and find four old ladies playing mahjong under a slowly turning fan (but they didn't want me to take their picture).

That tiny white sign is advertising broadband.

There are also little landscaped gardens that just pop up unexpectedly. As it was two o'clock-ish, there were of course people taking a siesta in the shade. It's 90 degrees today.

I wish I was that comfortable sleeping in public.

Formal Chinese-style gardens are growing on me. Normally, I find controlled nature to be a poor substitute for the heart-crushing beauty of the real thing, but many of the Chinese gardens I have seen have a way of feeling like human space molded to fit nature and not the other way around. Also, pagodas make me think of lazy afternoon tea on a warm day. This fits my mental image of my perfect sepia-tinted life as a lady of luxury and leisure in the early 20th century (why not the 18th century? you who know me may ask. The 18th century is lovely, yes, but in my perfect dream past life, I want to be able [or nearly able] to vote).

Back on topic. Xiaozhou has an eclectic blend of architecture and architectural adornment. This ranges from the traditional:

This could be any time in the last century, if it wasn't in color.

to the traditional in an entirely different sense:

Well hello, Comrade Mao

to the quirky and modern, which reflects Xiaozhou's current reputation as an artistic village.

It's an eagle? Watching TV? Whatever, it's cute.

And winding like milky green ribbons through all of this are the old canals, crisscrossed by numerous bridges, some no more than plywood covered bamboo poles and others sturdy and solid stone.

Not the prettiest, but the easiest to photograph.

And that was my visit to Xiaozhou. It was midafternoon, so I didn't get to try any of the little local eateries. I was tempted, though, because I saw one of my new vocabulary words advertised at one: 毛血旺(mao xue wang). It's preserved duck's blood and eel stew (and is actually a Sichuan specialty). Any takers? Alright, yes, I was kidding, I am not at all tempted to try that, any more than I am tempted to try the famous Cantonese dish "Tiger fighting Dragon" (it's a braised snake and cat combo). My interesting food item of the day was this:

Look, Ma, it's 5% juice. That's healthy, right?

"Pear and Sea Coconut Drink," with bonus  red date and Chinese wolfberry flavors. Sadly, it mostly takes like sugar. Way too much sugar. Under the sugar, you can taste the pear and the red dates (aka jujubes). I'm still not entirely sure what a Sea Coconut tastes like, but thanks to Wikipedia I know it comes from an endangered tree native to the Seychelles and is used in both Traditional Chinese Medicine and Cantonese cuisine. I also learned that a wolfberry is the same this as a goji berry, and that goji berry is a modern loanword from the Chinese name for the fruit, gouqi (it's a superfruit! it needs an exotic name! we can't call it a wolfberry, those are so common they grow on hedges in England!).

I also managed to get my hands on a bag of mini marshmallows at a quite low price last time I was at the Park'n'Shop (I've decided my preference of Park'n'Shop over the other international stores is that the name reminds my subconscious of Shop'n'Save, which is associated with childhood memories of Damariscotta). So, what's a former girl scout to do with a bag of mini marshmallows? Grab a toothpick, a candle, a Hershey's bar and the closest thing to graham crackers she can find (uh... oat biscuits) and make s'mores.

S'MORES, FTW

Ah, delicious. I'm looking forward to some camping in August, but I'm also aware that I may be planning too much for August. It feels so far away, because it's when I'll be home, the concept of which seems so far away, but in reality it is getting quite close. My contract ends in less than 50 days, and I'm beginning to feel the internal twinges of 'oh, I'll miss this when I'm gone' (usually food related moments). It's not enough to change my mind and stay, though. I am looking forward to August -- a reenactment, a baby shower, hopefully a new job, blueberry season, and maybe some camping/time up to camp. Yeah, it's going to be good.