March 28, 2010: Mordor, a Mao, and Another Odd Bus Ride

If you felt that the Eye of Sauron felt a bit stronger Saturday, it was because my ring and I crossed over into Mordor. It was totally inadvertent, I assure you. My new personal assistant Leanne, a student-worker in the International Office and a total sweetheart, said she would take me to the biggest supermarket in Deyang. So Saturday morning, along with her friend Song, we embarked upon the bus. After a trip around downtown Deyang, we ended up at our destination…Wal-Mart!!! At home, I don’t go to Wal-Mart because of their corporate political outlook, anti-unionism, and exploitation of workers. But, well, we were there, and I didn’t think I should be rude to Leanne and Song. So I, in my Che Guevara t-shirt, entered the Gates of Mordor. I promise I won’t do it again.

Back in the Shire, after stowing my purchases from the Dark Side in my apartment, told Leanne and Song that lunch was my treat and they were to pick the place. They took me to have fish in a little place in the ‘hood. Each table had a whole in the center with a gas burner in it upon which a metal bowl sat. Seasoned oil in the bowl was brought to boil as a whole fish, chopped into pieces, was dropped in, along with vegetables. I was given a less spicy broth to put the pieces of fish and veggies in, but it was still HOT! Yes, Sichuan cuisine is spicy. It was good though. As we walked back to my apartment, Leanne said she wanted to clean it. Now my apartment needed dusting (I had bought Pledge and a dry mop in Mordor), but it wasn’t that bad (see picture). I figured it wasn’t a diss. Leanne is just that sweet and helpful. Have at it, I said. She and Song mopped and dusted the floors and furniture. I’ve met so many truly nice people in China.

How many people can fit on a Chinese bus? I found out the answer today – as many as the bus driver will allow! I rode downtown today on a double-decker bus (I stayed downstairs). Apparently school is also held on Sunday morning because there was a horde of kids leaving the big middle school on the route to downtown. A horde got on the bus. Yet our Ralph Kramden still kept letting people on the bus at the next stop, despite my telling him "Dude, enough already!" He stopped admitting more riders only when the door would not close. Yet another adventure in Deyang bussing which I survived!

I made amends for going to Wal-Mart by going to my preferred supermarket, “Deyang People Market.” Later, when strolling around a place which had a lot of knick-knacks, toys, sundries, and miscellanea, I found a Che Guevara coffee mug! Of course, I bought it. Wait, it gets better – I saw a mao! He came up to me as I “kitty, kitty-ed” and almost let me pet him.

Tomorrow, I introduce my students to Johnny Cash…

March 26, 2010: Odds, Ends, and TGIF!

I'm so glad it's the weekend. After a bit of warmer weather, it got cold again. People who know me know I like colder weather. However, it's one thing to be able to enjoy nippy weather then be able to go into a nice warm building. It's another thing to have to make a fifteen minute walk in said nippy weather then to have to go into an unheated building to teach for up to four hours at a time. I have never felt so cold in my life. This is the building I teach in. Those open balconies you see are not separated at all from the inside corridors. That cold air just blasts on through! I can only guess what summer will be like...

I saw this bird one day while walking through the neighborhood I mentioned before. I had to walk over to take a closer look. It's a large, beautiful black and white bird chained to a perch. Made me so sad to see it chained up like that.

On a lighter note, the babies and toddlers here are beyond adorable! The parents and grandparents love it when I wave at their pride and joy and say, "Hello babee!"






Some more scenes from the 'hood.:

March 23, 2010: Another Mission Accomplished

Another bus ride downtown! The Ralph Kramdens of Deyang are virtuosi of the horn as they maneuver around the streets of the city. I love how they don't slow down when some slow-moving vehicle is in front of them. Nope, they just lay on that horn! When I was waiting at the bus stop to go home, some moke was walking in the middle of the bus lane, oblivious to the bus horn blaring at him and to the shouts of waiting passengers (including me). He finally moved away.
I opened a bank account today so my paycheck can be direct-deposited. Armed with a piece of paper saying in Mandarin that I needed to open a bank account (I had a Chinese colleague from the college write that out), I marched into the China Construction Bank. Once again a pretty young woman who spoke some English helped me out. I now have a Chinese ATM card!
I ran a few errands before going back to a little sushi bar I had eaten at Saturday. A delicious shrimp tempura sushi dish costs 12 yuan ($1.75!). I walked back to the bus stop through one of the many shop filled streets you find in Deyang. I passed a little restaurant. There, picking at leftover greens on the ground, was a chicken. I wanted to yell, "Run, little chicken, run! You could be tomorrow's special!"

March 22, 2010: No More Aching Back!

Saturday, after getting my cell phone set up (ET called home Sunday!), I asked Zhou You Feng if there was a supermarket nearby. I hoped to find peanut butter which wasn't at my local supermarket. Helpful as usual, she directed me to one. Actually I had been in the first floor of the building which had all kinds of little shops (mostly knock-off design clothes, shoes, etc.)on it. I went up the escalator to the store. It was big (that's what she said...) with a large housewares department, as well as the usual supermarket stuff. Whilst in the bedding department, lo and behold, it saw a long rectangular, molded latex foam pillow. It was thick and cushy...Eureka! I could use this to sleep on on my plywood board, I mean, mattress. I took it home and put it under the sheet where I could lie on it (15 years of Claudia cuddled against me under the covers means I don't move around much at night!). It worked! Yay! Thanks, Bu Xie! But no peanut butter!! :-( Please work on that, Bu Xie.
Here are some more pics of downtown Deyang.

March 21, 2010: Happy Birthday Claudia!

Happy Fifteenth Birthday, little girl! Your mom misses you.

Bu Xie, Zhou Yu Feng, & (hopefully) Relief for My Back

This is Bu Xie ("You're Welcome"), my good luck New Year Tiger (if you haven't figured it out, it's the Chinese Year of the Tiger). I don't know why he has a fish on his nose, but, anyway, I bought him in beautiful downtown Deyang, and he seems to have brought me luck!You see, I went downtown to explore and get international cell phone service. I rode the bus from the apartment complex to downtown (left). Riding in a bus, car, or taxi here in Deyang is an experience. Memphis drivers are models of caution and decorum by comparison! Along with said motor vehicles, there are bicycles, motorcycles, motor scooters, bicycle rickshaws, and pedestrians all in the same street! Horns are honking and lanes are changed constantly. You cross the street at your own risk because the bicycles, motorcycles, motor scooters, and bicycle rickshaws are apparently immune from traffic lights. I've sworn at many a one who has almost mown me down (swearing in a country where nobody understands you is fun ;-)!). When I rode in the taxis to and from Shifang, the cabbies must have wondered about my gasps, whispers, and muttered oaths as we narrowly missed disaster at each turn!
Anyway, having survived the bus ride, I wandered around and did some shopping. Bu Xie was my first purchase.Later I bought some shoes. My Chinese shoe size is 36! I'm a US size 6N, but here I have big feet for a female. In any case, the shoes are cute (sort of Mary Janes but soft leather uppers) and comfortable and fit.
Cell phones are big here (just like the US), and there were scads of cell phone stores big and small downtown. Blaring loud pop music outside the stores' entrances apparently is a marketing ploy whose appeal alludes me. I settled on (or Bu Xie led me) to a very large China Mobile store staffed with young ladies in uniform. I, the Meiguoren (American), walked in. Of course everyone looked at me (I'm used to it now). A pretty young girl asked in English if she could help me. I tried explaining that I wanted a plan so I could call from China to the US (and call locally). The girl, whose name is Zhou You Feng, and I went back and forth with her good but still limited English and my very limited Mandarin ("I don't speak Mandarin" is my best phrase in Mandarin) and a bit of drawing. There was soon a small crowd of young sales associates gathered around us, Zhou You Feng giving them play by play in Mandarin. I decided to say that I needed to call my mother back home since family, especially mom, is very important in China. Bless her heart, Zhou You Feng offered to let me use her cell phone to call my mom (I told her it was late at night back in Memphis)! To make a long story short, it turned out my Motorola Razr could work with a new SIM card. My angel Zhou You Feng guided me through all the rather complicated process. After getting the SIM card, she walked with me (carrying my shopping bags) the several blocks to the CM location where I needed to set up a long distance account. We talked on the way over about me teaching English in Deyang and her wanting to study more English (she didn't have time with her job). I told her that her English was better than a lot of my students (Truth!). In the end, Zhou You Feng and I exchanged cell phone numbers. She said to call her if I needed help with anything, and I told her to call me if she wanted to practice English. What a sweetie! Xie xie ni!
Gang, I'll tell you about the potential solution to my back breaking hard bed problem later...

March 19: The hood

The weather has been lovely here for the past few days -warm and sunny. For the first time I didn't have to wear a sweater and a shawl in the classroom nor have to blow on my hands to keep them warm (I felt like Bob Cratchit at times!). Anyway, during the very long break between my Friday classes -9:50 am to 4:20 pm!- I went out into the neighborhood next to my apartment to go to the great little bakery I had found. This neighborhood is awesome, full of little shops, restaurants (sort of), street vendors, you name it. The first time I went was last Sunday when I took these pictures. Some of the shops are obviously chain or franchise like the one I went in which was like a much larger Claire's Boutique (if Claire's also had office/school supplies and socks and clocks...). It had Hello Kitty! stuff (Hello Kitty! is big over here. Yay!)! Other shops are open fronted, Mom and Pop kind of places.
Pineapple on a stick is big around here. Street vendors, like the one in this pic, sell them. They are cut in a quite artful spiral kind of shape.
(to be continued later...I'm really tired!)

Still March 13: I was right!

Okay, I go to the hotel restaurant for dinner. It was busy but still plenty of tables open. I get taken to a VIP dining room! There I am -- one person at a table for eight. Anyway, I had very good (and spicy!) Kung Pao chicken. When I left the restaurant, I went outside to see the back garden (pictures later). After a bit, I went up to my floor. Guess what? Yep, there was a young lady staffer ready to escort me to my room. Maybe this is like that Fawlty Towers episode -- they think I'm the hotel critic! j/k. Very gracious people (above, hotel garden at dusk).

Added March 19, 2010:
I've finally got internet in my apartment. Here are some more pictures from Shifang.

March 13: Toto, I don't think we're in Memphis anymore.

Greetings, dudes and dudettes! I'm at a "Western" hotel in Shifang (a sub-division of Deyang) that has free internet in-room. I decided to spend the week-end here since the promised internet connection at my apartment is not. Oh, I'm complaining loud and hard about it...we shall see. Anyway, I put quotes around Western when referring to this hotel because none of the staff speaks above minimal English (probably less, if any, French, German, Spanish, etc.) and the beds are the Chinese version of Western, meaning a box-spring. Period. Yep, you're pretty much sleeping on the equivalent of a sheet of plywood. I have the same set-up in my apartment at the college. But I forgive this since I was able to catch up with "Lost" (my brain is being blown) and "The Office" (love Andy and Kevin's "second breakfasts." He's a big Hobbit!). And the staff is so nice and helpful. What's odd is that, when I came back from walking around the part of Shifang near my hotel, there was a young lady staffer by the elevator on my floor to go with me to my room and open the door. She had an earpiece so I think that the front desk staff watched for when I walked into the lobby and called her to say that the clueless Meiguoren (American) chick is back! Seriously, nice people. Glad I know how to say "I don't understand" and "Thank you!" (I say that a lot.)
I had the breakfast buffet here at the Hongda Golden Bridge Hotel. I want my Special K and bagels! I don't think I can get use to veggies at breakfast. Thank goodness for the watermelon and "coffee cake" (closest description I can think of). I selected something that looked like a miniature version of Jack Aubrey's beloved "Drowned Baby" ("Drowned Preemie"?). Looked like a bun but white and glutinous. Not to my taste -- too doughy.
Saw my first Chinese cats today! One let me pet it. The mao (cat) said "meow." I miss my maos!
Folks, this isn't "tourist China" here. This is industrial, earthquake stricken China. The air is a solid here. I might as well take up smoking. To be continued...

March 3, 2010

I'm leaving for Deyang, China tomorrow! It will be a trip of 9,558 miles, a flight time of 22 hours and 29 minutes. I'll be there for almost a year.
These are my furry kids Sami, Claudia, and Sashi (l-r). My mother will be keeping them. I'll miss my babies. Claudia will be 15 years old this month. I'll worry most about her.