18: Club Propaganda

In China, there is no minimum age for drinking or smoking (or anything else as porn and voting are extremely limited), so last night was the night I took advantage. I went with a group of people to a local club called “Propaganda” (ironic, I know) as most of us don’t have class until late on Thursdays.

The Setting: Ladies’ night. The girls paid ¥30 ($4.41) and the guys ¥60 ($8.82).  Propaganda is divided into three levels. The uppermost was a lounge area with a pool table, the middle a bar, and the basement a dance floor, which is where the nine of us spent most of our time. They tended to play mixed American and European dance music (the DJ was pretty good), and they love Lady Gaga; we probably listened to all of The Fame during our four-hour stay. Like most dance clubs, the lights were out, strobes were on, and the heat was up. Oh, and it was open bar.

The People: If you’ve heard the expression “white guys can’t dance,” you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Chinese guys sporting jeans and blazers awkwardly sway side to side with their hands above their heads, hoping to attract the ladies (Chinese women, on the other hand, tended to dance pretty well). The barkeeps buzzed all night long. People pulled at their shirts to get their drinks in, ignoring all formalities of a queue. There was no organization to this chaos.

The Experience: Most people in my program are 20, ie still unable to drink in the States. Though I too am 20, I didn’t have the strong desire to get shit-faced within the first half-hour of drinking. Nevertheless, three shots of tequila, two martinis, and three beers later, I was pretty drunk. I danced with everyone—Chinese and American—and had a fantastic time. There were a few times when I had to ask my American friends to assist pulling me away from Chinese men, but I’ve had to do that regardless of what country I’m in. The nice thing about Chinese guys is that they are more respectful than American men. They won’t grope you or try to make a move without fairly blatant permission, which makes them excellent people to dance with (minus their inability to, you know, dance).

No Mom, I don’t have a hangover. Yes Mom, I’m safe. No Mom, I didn’t go home with anyone but the group I left with. Yes Mom, I’ll probably do it again.

17: School Has Begun

“This would NEVER happen in America!” Anna stormed through three more aisles, dragging her new comforter, pillow, and laundry basket behind her. Zack and I followed, hoping to navigate the Caraway (a four-story tall Walmart equivalent where everyday is Black Friday) to find a check out line. After wandering around the store for a half hour trying to pay, we had been rejected from two registers and sent upstairs. There, four lines had formed, each at least 40 minutes long. Anna dropped her things. “Fuck,” she said, “I need a beer.”

School has finally started, and in the past three days, I’ve had six hours of Chinese class. Surprisingly, I am picking up on it really easily, especially vocabulary. The teacher, Liao Li Xiaona, even asked if I had taken Chinese previously. I guess I just have fantastic Chinese friends at home who rub off on me!

More than anything, I am struggling with pronunciation. Most of the time, it feels like there is a big sock in my mouth impairing my ability to speak Chinese. I intentionally speak slower than other students in my class, but that has proven to be an effective technique to learn the words faster. Tones are another issue. They are easy enough to remember with pinyin (Chinese sounded out into western characters; ie gǒu (dog) instead of 狗), but when I start constructing sentences it’s easy to forget them. Locals can’t understand me yet, but I’m well on my way to making sense .

The adjustment gets better and better every day as I meet new people. Having a small Chinese class seriously helps, because forcing nine people into a room for three hours at a time forces you to befriend everyone. I also have started meeting locals, which has resulted in the opportunity to expand my knowledge of the cool spots to hang outside of Beida.

A week from today, I start my internship. I have to apologize, because I told my readers the wrong name. It’s called Time Out. Apparently, and this is just hearsay, they send interns out to “fact check” their articles. In other words, they give interns tickets to events, pay for visits to bars, and take them out to coffee shops to review the local areas. I am not going to want to come home if this is the case!

Speaking of wanting to come home, I am wishing that I was raised in China right about now. Everyone is so nice and the food is so good; the only things that I would change are safety and environmental conditions. Pretty much, all my friends and family need to move here to experience what I’m going through right now.

16: The Silk Market

I slept eight hours last night, 21:30-5:30!! It is the first time I’ve gotten a full night’s sleep since the beginning of the trip; this makes for a very happy Burger.

Yesterday, my tour group of about ten geared up with a PKU student, Ben, and two exchange students who had been here over the fall, Zac and Mac, to explore the subway system and go out to the world famous Silk Market.

While getting on the subway, a man approached me and asked something in Chinese. Ben sheepishly translated, “He wants to take a picture of Zac and you.” Zac is 6’3 with platinum blonde hair; I am 5’1” with red hair. The man squeezed himself into the middle of the two bizarre Westerners and, with a flamboyant “CHEESU!”, Ben snapped the picture. The man, though I never learned his name, tagged along for the majority of the subway ride, flaunting his digital camera and awing at the Beida students. I’m excited to learn Chinese so I can speak with the locals!!

The Silk Market is famous for its knock-offs and haggling. Westerners shop at the Market hoping to find goods at cheap prices. Unsurprisingly, the shopkeepers prey on the tourists, hiking their unmarked prices up an acceptable bid in the West. They thus target the culture shocked and easily persuaded sightsee-ers, and 20-somethings are perfect.

I was with Michelle, Andrew, and Kim. Michelle attends Columbia and speaks Cantonese fluently. Andrew is ethnically Han Chinese, but he was raised in the States; his speaking ability is limited, despite a few semesters of training at Boston College. Kim (one of my roommates), with her long blonde hair and blue eyes, and I, with my short red hair and green eyes, became targeted.

Everywhere we went, Andrew and Michelle were left unscathed as people grabbed out for Kim and me. “Hey pretty girl,” shopkeepers yelled in their best English, “you like scarf? You like Burberry?” “You want Versace T-shirt?” “You see underwear now?” Offended when we walked by without acknowledgement, Kim and I said “duibuchi (sorry)” and “buyao (I don’t want it)” over and over again.

I came to the market with the intention of buying some gloves. My hands are small, almost children’s sized, so it is difficult to find a pair that fits me in the US. After trying on several, I picked out some black leather gloves with a wooly inside. VERSACE reads across the outside, though the chances of my Silk Market purchase being authentic are less than zero. The strategy for purchase was thus: I picked out the gloves, left the stand, got my Chinese-looking friends, and then haggled.

When I told the shopkeeper, a woman about four years older, 3” taller, and far shrewder than me, let out a horrified whine when I told her I was going to get my friends. She said, “No! You talk with me! Here, I give you good price!” She whipped out her calculator and wrote, ¥400, which converts to $58.80. I scoffed and walked away, intent on getting Michelle and Andrew.

With their help, we were able to talk it down to ¥85 ($12.50), but we could have probably gotten lower had Ben been with us.

As I found out during lunch, another student had not been so lucky. The BC boy, whose name I can’t recall at the moment, set his sights on a gong, and fell in love. Egged on to haggle and buy it, the American college student approached the retailer, who started the price at ¥850 ($125). In response, the boy started his bid at ¥350. He haggled it all the way down to his initial bid, and took the gong successfully.

Later, as he boasted his haggling skills, Andrew took out his phone and informed the buyer that he had spent $51.47. Realizing the rate of exchange, the college student slumped. To add further insult to injury, we asked Ben, the PKU student, what he thought the gong was worth. Shrugging, Ben guessed, “No more than ¥50 ($7.35).” The overpriced gong became the joke of the night.

I am finding that I really enjoy the company of my latest tour group. Everyone is supportive but laid back. We tease each other (How to pick up a saleslady at Silk Market? “Heyyyy nice gongs!”) and laugh about it, experiencing China not only through our own, but one another’s lens. I am really happy here.

Classes start today. Here is my schedule thus far:

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Chinese: 9:00 -12:20	Internship China in the Developing Economy: Late	Chinese: 9:00 -12:20	Internship Sino-American Relations: Late	Chinese: 8:30 -10:30

I’m a bit nervous to try and get everything done on time, but I tend to do pretty well in school so hopefully I’ll be able to manage it.

Pictures posted on Facebook! See my “Beijing is Awesome” album or try to use this link.

15: First Impressions

As some of you may know, WordPress, the hosting site for abroadburger.wordpress.com, is blocked in China. Many thanks to Aaron for copying and pasting my posts!

14: Twenty Hours to Take-Off

So this is it, my last day in the States.

A large part of me still doesn’t think that this is real. PKU has seemed like something very far-off since last February when I began to work towards attending; I’ve been working towards this goal for about a year. And I leave tomorrow. Weird.

Haircut

I’ve done some last minute preparations: haircut, ipod playlist, getting some Yuan, etc.  I’ve been going to bed around 4AM so maybe the jet lag won’t be too bad. We’ll see.

Tonight, my family is taking me out for kabobs because I know I won’t be able to get them in China. I’ll miss them so much!

As many of you have pointed out to me, there have been some developments with Google and China. Here’s the summary: Google noticed that some Chinese human rights protesters’ Gmail accounts were being hacked into. In response, Google cited that this was a violation of freedom of speech (remember this?) and have decided to lift all filters on the search engine.

This could be a huge step forward for the Chinese government, as per American ideals, but it could be troubling for me while I’m over there. If I can’t access my Gmail account, it will be difficult to have any communication with most of my friends (Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites are also blocked). We should watch closely to see what happens!

I will not be able to update when I get to China because I will have to pay for internet to be set up. I will be sure to update during orientation!

PS: it’s 1º in Beijing right now. I’m going to die.

13: All by Myself

Aaron left about an hour ago to go back to Atlanta. I’m all packed for Beijing; I don’t really have anything left to do.

My flight on Thursday was changed. My itinerary is as follows:

WASH/DULLES to BEIJING departing Thursday, January 14

UNITED  897

Depart: WASH/DULLES 12:23 PM Arrive: BEIJING 10:15 PM Seat(s):

STOPOVER Equip: PLANE CHANGE AT NRT MP miles: 8082

\

The stopover is in Tokyo.

Time to kill some time…

12: Chinese Cooking for Dummies

Tonight, I opened my Chinese Cooking for Dummies cookbook and decided that it was time to attempt Chinese cuisine. Big mistake.

The goal: Cook Shanghai fried noodles and potstickers for six people in the course of two hours.

The chefs:

Aaron and Burger

The result: 3 hours in a kitchen, 12 shredded potstickers, 31 really good potstickers, lots of Shanghai fried noodles, a half pound of extra plain Shanghai noodles, and a huge mess.  I’m exhausted!

This was a good experiment though. In reading through a majority of the cookbook, it made me aware of just how much sesame and nuts the Chinese use; I’m in trouble (for those of you who don’t know, I have an anaphylactic reaction to both foods). I will hopefully have my own kitchen so that I can learn to cook for myself. I won’t be able to go out to restaurants until I know the language better. Living in China will be quite the change.

11: Lazing About

Since Israel has been cancelled, Aaron and I haven’t had much to do. Luckily, my brother got a PS3 for the holidays so we’ve been goofing off on Dragon Age and Fable: The Lost Chapters. For someone who’s not a gamer, the past few down/game days have been really nice.

Also, since I used to live in this area (Northern Virginia), I’ve caught up with a few friends! I spent about three hours with Ting in the mall and then had a three hour dinner with the Willmotts. Catching up is nice and I’ll be lucky enough to have some friends in the area while I’m home for the summer .

That’s all for now. Oh, and for those of you who haven’t seen Avatar, it isn’t overrated. Think Pocahontas with blue people à la George Lucas. IMAX 3D if you can .

10: A Day in New York City

Aaron and I went out to New York City today. We mainly meandered into the city to check out the 5th Avenue sales (we didn’t buy anything; surprised?), but we ended up wandering into Times Square.

Grades brought happiness. I know I have an "A" in econ too.

On the way out, I got my grades, found a heads up penny, and the train doors stopped right in front of us! It was my lucky day!

So we  decided to buy three lottery tickets. I’m sad to say that we had no luck on all three scratch-offs.

Sadly, we couldn’t hit any of the wonderful shops suggested to us in the last post and we’re leaving tomorrow. However, we couldn’t resist eating some proper New York pizza! IT WAS DELICIOUS!

As always, we took pictures .

Aaron at the VERY crowded Mac Store

No words.

That tiny thing at the top of the sky scraper is the stand for the 2010 ball

Giants Suck

You would too.

We leave for DC tomorrow to play tourist! Updates soon.

9: Merry Christmas and Sad News

I found out this morning that my passport is at the Chinese consulate. I sent it to Mom to get my Visa, and after she dropped it off at the consulate she didn’t think to go back and retrieve it. Because today is Christmas and then it’s the weekend, I wouldn’t be able to get my passport until Monday; my flight is Sunday.

We’ve tried everything; there is no way for me to go. Aaron has decided that he won’t go either.

Instead of going to Israel, we will spend a few extra days in New York and then figure out what we will do with the remaining time we have of winter break. Suggestions? ♥