Happy New Year Bangkok

Watching fireworks going off everywhere in the city, I couldn't believe it's New Year's eve of 2008, and I am in Bangkok. It actually feels chilly, and I have to have my sweater on today, just like a Thai, when it's 26 degrees centigrade (78 F). Brent questions how I would survive after returning to New York. I don't know, but I will worry about it when it happens. I am preparing myself for the hot season here starting March, when it's going to be 40C (100F) and muggy everyday.

We celebrated New Year's eve at home with my cousin's family and a friend. Brent whipped up his specialty - spaghetti. It was pretty good despite of the poor quality electric stove and having only one pot to cook with that sticks all the time. The two little boys had the grandest time, doing ninja moves on each other, chasing each other non-stop, and taking turns to get shoulder rides from Brent.

2007 was an eventful and interesting year. It started with my never-going-away hand, arm, and back pain; improvement after staying home for a month and physical therapy; worsened pain after returning to work. This pushed me to seriously consider a career change. It wasn't an easy decision. I was quite good at what I did in my profession after all these years, and doing anything else would mean retraining and a big loss on income.

It would be impossible to live in New York on our savings. It would burn up so quickly that I would be forced to go back to the profession that hurts me so much in no time.

After two months of painful search for tenants for our apartment, we packed up and left for China.

There were highs and lows in our time in Asia, but for me, the highs are far outweighing the lows.

Lows:
1. Bureaucracy in visa office in China. But I heard that the American consulate in London is no better.
2. Mosquitoes, my #1 enemy while traveling, were having a feast on me in Yangtze south. Even in our apartment in Bangkok, once I forgot to put repellent on, I got ten bites in 10 minutes typing an email.
3. Rude drivers in Qingdao, could easily claim lives or limbs. I was angry everyday when I went out, as everyday I almost got hit. Bangkok has a lot more cars, but I feel so much safer. People actually yield.
4. The stares I got from women in China when I was walking with Brent, made me feel very uneasy. I no longer get stares in Thailand.
5. True, things don't always work properly here. Internet is slow, despite a high-speed plan. Taxis don't stop or refuse to take us when it's empty, is mind boggling.

Highs:
1. Generous uncles and aunts allowed us to stay in their homes in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Bangkok while we were traveling and searching for places to settle.
2. Cousins who kept their eyes out for apartments, patiently translate for us when I would call frantically in a taxi and couldn't communicate to the driver.
3. Reconnected with some friends whom I haven't seen for 19 years. I do feel having lived two lives already.
4. Visited some incredibly beautiful places in inland China, which I never knew existed before.
5. Met some very wonderful friends in Qingdao. Ran into a woman I met at a conference 15 years ago in Minnesota, then of course, a big dinner was waiting for us in her home.
6. Translated a contract for the 2008 Olympics sailing competition. Very proud to say that I have done something for the Olympics.
7. Having cousins spontaneously visit us when they were on their honeymoon in China.
8. Sharing meals with total strangers. Actually we didn't share, but our neighbors would offer for us to taste their food because we were so curious about what they were eating.
9. Have met some wonderful people in Bangkok, most of whom have lived in this region for many years. We are often invited to dinner in their homes, and learning the tips about living here.
10. While Brent was getting his $3 haircut in downtown Suzhou, I was teaching two young conscientious washers English phrases that they could use with their foreign customers. Teaching is fun when your students want to learn.
11. A Thai woman stopped me to ask for directions, and I understood and answered her.
12. 13. 14... The list goes on and on. I'd just stop here and provide links to places we visited but haven't posted pictures or forgot to bring our camera when visiting.
http://outdoors.webshots.com/album/134379031GuYEYl
http://www.thaiwaysmagazine.com/krabi/krabi_attraction_muang_county.html#ao_nang


By now, I still don't know what's next for me in terms of career. Learning Thai is fun and keeping me busy. Teaching Chinese to kids once a week is rewarding but not sufficient. I have a lot of figure out in the year to come.

Christmas in Bangkok

Picture 1 - Pristine Singapore
Picture 2 - also Singapore, Arab Quarter


I can't believe it's Christmas! It's been so long since I last wrote.

It's 33 degrees Celsius and sunny and it's the first warm Christmas I've ever had. I am very thankful for that.

Think back to the dreadful hand/arm injury and seemingly never ending physical therapy and acupuncture, which couldn't take away my pain, to a life away from computer, I am thankful.

Some have asked how my hand and arm is - I am mostly without pain, as long as I don't stay on the computer for more than half an hour or carry heavy stuff.

So many things happened in the last month and a half, so it's hard to remember to write down everything. I don't have the opportunity to write therefore less chance to injure myself again, because Brent has been working a lot (hogging the computer).

I am happy with the progress I've made in my Thai. I have been chatting with the cleaning lady, the taxi drivers, and the landlady. I can't understand everything they say, but I get the gist of it.

The shopping malls have been blasting Christmas music and singing about the Savior is born, without the worry of political correctness. It's ironic, since most people here are Buddhists. On the other hand, this music just becomes background noise, without meaning. Words have no meaning, without a personal relationship.

We were in Singapore three weeks ago for our second "visa run", and met up with an old friend Tara from New York. Tara is a scientist, and has moved to Singapore earlier this year. She noticed that in the highly educated science community, a lot more people are confessing Christians. Even in the society in large, people are not marginalized if they believe in God. In the States, in New York in particular, people were shocked that she believes in God, because she's a scientist, as if they should be mutually exclusive.

It rained hard in Singapore the first day we got there. As we always bring rain with us, it's become something to laugh about. It is as pristine as I remembered it 10 years ago, but I only went to the pristine places then. This time, thanks to my walking fanatic husband, we walked through Little India and the Arab Quarter, which gave me a glimpse of the "cultured" parts of Singapore, which actually makes it more interesting. Brent enjoyed the wide sidewalks and mostly clean streets, in contrast to Bangkok. On the other hand, he grew tired of it after four days and commented he was happy to be back in Bangkok afterwards. For some reason, December is the busiest time in Singapore and all the low to mid range hotels were booked. There were some very "reasonable" hotels, turned out to be in the Gaylong district - redlight district. I refused to stay there. My cousin was shocked that Singapore has redlight district. Human beings nature do not change even with an efficient government. We need a lot more than government and policies.

I was impressed by Singapore's recycling effort. See picture. And another picture that you would think belongs to New York City:)

I am getting to know my classmates who take Thai lessons with me. One bright eyed young woman is worth writing about. Anita is 22, from Ohio. She lived in northern India for a year, working with YWAM doing social working with some very poor women. She went back to the States for a year and waitressed to save up money, and came to Bangkok in October. She plans to stay here for two years, working with young women who were trafficed into prostitution because of poverty. This particular group is from Isan, a region very poor and looked down by Bangkok people. Many man and women came from Isan to work in Bangkok, to make some money to send home. Many women were tricked into coming to Bangkok, thinking they would be maids or factory workers, but only found out what their job would be after being locked up by the trafficers after they got here. Many of them have children back home. In order to pay off their debt, they feel they have no other way out except to do what makes the most money the fastest. Besides selling their bodies, they are often abused by their "customers" and forced to use drugs, which becomes an addiction which requires them to make more money to feed the addiction. Anyhow, Anita has never gone to college, and she had decided since high school that she wanted to find where her passion is, before wasting money in universities. She lives like a local, with no air conditioning in her place, as was in India.

We went to a couple of friends' home for a Christmas party last night (Christmas Eve) and met a group of Cubans. I chatted with a young Cuban woman. She's a musician and plays flute in a band. She just came to Thailand 3 to 4 months ago. When she heard that I came from China, she lamented - I wish my country is like yours! People in Cuba are so oppressed and blinded by Castro that they have nothing left by the end of the month, financially and emotionally. But at least Castro allows them to dance. This group exhibited the Cuban salsa, which has four pairs of dancers and they switch partner every few seconds. It's amazing to watch. The other Latin people who were not Cuban had to be kicked out, because they had no idea what to do!

Time to quit writing, before my hand starts to hurt...

What does a French, an Austrian, a Chinese and a Japanese in common?

Sawadii Ka!

We say ma, ma, ma, ma, ma together. All these "ma"s have different tones and mean different things. We are in the same Thai language class.

I've been learning Thai for 6 days now, and I can finally say a few sentences and initiate a simple conversation with the cleaning lady. It's been frustrating not being able to communicate, and I feel really good about learning the language of the land.

We have 8 students in the class, but the four of us women like to hang out a little afterwards and have lunch together, and complain about how difficult it is to learn Thai. Both the Japanese and I have arrived in Thailand 1.5 months ago, and the French has been here for 2 years and the Austrian has been here for 9 years and finally decided to learn Thai. The French has been working in Asia for the last 10 years and lived in Vietnam for 4 years, China for 2. She never learned Vietnamese, but could understand and speak a few words, so it's even more confusing to her because the same sound means different things in Vietnamese, Chinese and Thai. She recently quit her job and is taking some time to learn Thai.

It's fun to share the cultural differences. One story the French told us happened at her company here in Thailand. The French usually greet their friends and family with kisses, but at business settings, they just shake hands. But since everyone is far away from home here, they kiss each other too, even with clients. But once some clients came and one guy is the president of the company, who is a really big shot, so they would kiss him, but just to shake hands. Her Thai female coworker thought kissing was the proper French way, so when the clients were leaving, she went ahead and kissed the president. The president was so kind that he turned around to my French classmate, and said to her, "let me kiss you too then", so he kissed her too, to save any embarrassment the Thai women would have. I don't know if anyone ever explained to her when it's proper to kiss and when it's not.

"Face" is very important here, and that's why Thais are always smiling and being very polite to each other, though there must be ways to put each other down too. So the difference between Thailand and China is - the Chinese would rip you off with a straight face, the Thais will rip you off with a smile and you walk away happy!

We visited a small mission church last weekend. There were mostly Thai, with a temporary American pastor, so a translator is needed. There were also a couple of Americans going there regularly. They were in the process of hiring a Thai pastor and one candidate was available. One American lady asked - "since some of us here don't speak Thai very well, is he (the candidate) willing to learn English?" What a strange request! I almost blabbed out - maybe it's time for you to learn Thai! It's his country you are staying in.

5-star service

A week ago, I arrived at the building by motorcycle taxi, a thrilling thing to do in Bangkok. It wiggles through all the traffic jams. Three men with umbrellas came up and shaded me from the sun and escorted me through the automatic door. The lobby smelled like lavender.

Is this Mandarin Oriental? Nope. It's a hospital. I never thought I would smile going to a hospital. I went for a routine procedure. In New York, I would have to set an appointment 1-2 months ahead of time. Here, I called the day before, and I went in the next day. All the staff were in clean and neat uniforms and smiled at me. I checked in at the front desk, just liking checking into a hotel. When I got to the destination, someone came up and smiled and asked what I was there for.

I have no insurance, and have to pay out of my own pocket. The procedure cost less than $90, and the doctor's fee was $17, less than my co-pay in NY. In NY, they would send a thousands of dollars bill to the insurance company, to cover everything plus the doctor's insurance against lawsuits. And the doctor informed me that I would know the result in one hour (vs. a week in NY), and they have a cafeteria downstairs. I was guided by a nurse's assistant to where I could see the escalator to the cafeteria. There are shops and bookstore along the way. The cafeteria had healthy salad or burgers for the farangs (foreigners), and noodles, curries etc.

My result was questionable, so the doctor had her nurse check the schedule of the specialist. I got an appointment for that day, at 6:15pm.

I never thought I could smile going in and out of the hospital, but I did.

My cousin's wife's parents lived in California. Her father came down with liver cancer and passed away within weeks. She was going to bring him to Bangkok for treatment, (her mother always comes to Bangkok for medical treatment) but he deteriorated so fast that they didn't have a chance. He stayed in Stanford Hospital, and the daily rate was $6K+. If not for medicare, he couldn't even receive morphine in the end of his life.

What about the poor people here? I heard they can go for free care in public hospitals. The wait is a bit long, at least they will be treated. No wonder people take their king so seriously here. He is a respectable man and visits remote places where no other officials would remember. Before any movie or show starts, people stand up to a song that's written for the king.

In China, a continuation of the story of the maid's son - he is in that good province level high school and is working hard. He gets up at 5 am every morning, and when his mother called him one night at 11, he still had an hour to go, and he needed to do his laundry. By hand of course, no washing machine in the dorms. I hope he gets into university...

Picture time - this is sunset at the end of monsoon from our window.

Hello Bangkok!

We left Hong Kong on a very "peaceful" note. We packed and repacked out luggage and weighted and calculated carefully which ones to check in. We were able to fly without paying any penalty! I love Hong Kong every time I go there. Good food, polite people, endless shopping... even though I hate shopping.

We have been staying at my aunt and uncle's house and received numerous generosity from them and cousins. We spent the last four days searching for an apartment. They said we could stay in the house for as long as we want. It is a big house but it is in the outskirt and if you don't know what traffic jam is until you come here. Last night, we saw the biggest monsoon in our lives. It poured and poured and didn't stop till 11 am this morning. Brent went out for a walk (I didn't like walking in dirty flooded streets, I mean really dirty as tons of street dogs roam around), and at one point of the street, it was connecting to the swamp and flooded and fish were swimming on the street river. Anyway come back to the traffic - we had dinner with two friends (will talk about them next) and one offered us a ride home as it was pouring and he lives 10 minutes away. It's usually a 30 minute drive, it took us over 90 minutes to get home.

Back to the apartment search. The house we are staying in is a big old house, and no internet (I'm in an internet cafe in THE MALL) and it has a yard like a tropical jungle. I stood in front of the door talking to my uncle for two minutes, and got a mosquito bite on my toe! I put repellent on mind you. Dangee fever is bad right now and the mosquitoes carry them feed during the day too...

OK, apartment. Since the dollar has devalued to the Baht, the rent here is more expensive than before, to Americans. We looked at so many apartments and our head spinned. Nice ones are expensive, even the ones that are not cheap would have roaches or crumbs on mattress. Ha, shows us that we don't have kids. Or some are in sleazy streets with tons of bar-girls hanging out. We received quite a bit of help from my cousins and their friends, as we don't speak Thai and less people than foreigners think speak English to a level that can understand our needs (such as wired high speed internet, not wireless etc). One friend Sam took us across the river to the building he used to live in. And then my cousin's wife called two days ago and said Sam mentioned a friend Ray in their church has two apartments for rent, though they are far from public transit, he would rent them out to us for cheap. Ray wasn't around till yesterday to show us the apartments. One of them was a penthouse unit with great view. He would rent it to us at less than 1/3 of market price which meets our budget! It's more than what we could have imagined or asked for. God is good!

Ray is a business man and used to be very superstitious (in his own words). When he heard about any new pretty temple coming up, he would go to pay respect. Then something happened to his family two years ago and he became a Christian. He sees now that all his possessions are gifts from God, and he gives them out generously and doesn't hold back. So we hope our friends come to visit and stay with us, that we can spread this grace around.

Goodbye China, hello and goodbye Hong Kong

It was a whirl wind of two weeks of traveling in China and then HK. Went to the "river south" of China and saw many beautiful things. Also got giant mosquito bites. They had to eat too. I was "glad" to contribute to their reproduction.

Felt good to leave China, only because the girl at the airline counter would give us a break, and we got a luggage overweight penalty that amounted to half of my plane ticket! I kept on telling people, please please don't give me anything, I can't carry it. Everyone said, oh, just a little something, then it added up and they charge by the kilo!

HK is much more organized and civilized. I hate to be singing praises to the Queen but we don't need to worry about being hit by a car any more crossing the street. The cars actually stop for the lights.

Miss China for its prices. HK is much more expensive.

People think it's so "cool" and romantic to travel around for a year. Actually it's a lot more pain then we realized. We thought we carefully picked out what is needed for a year, but since we weren't sure where we'd really be (though Thailand preferred, but there has been visa difficulties to the foreigners), we had to pack up quite a bit. Then there's weight limits. In Asia, you can only check in 20kg! (a little over 40 lbs) It's not easy task, but when I see how Americans pack their cars to the rim to travel, I wonder if they can survive this. There's something to be said about minimumlism (I made up that word).

Leaving very early AM tomorrow for Bangkok. Now Thailand doesn't allow anyone going in without a plane ticket leaving the country, I had to scramble to buy tickets going to Penang, Malaysia in 4 weeks. The joy and challenge of this trip!

Good-bye Qingdao and on the go again

We packed up and left Qingdao on September 20, on a stormy rainy day. The big tropical storm hit Qingdao the night before and many roads were flooded. We asked the hotel staff (the building we stayed in is part hotel and part apartments) to book a taxi the night before for us. After the boys loaded the car with our luggage, they were soaked already. Five minutes into the road, the driver started her business talk - "Let's set a price! Look, the roads are all flooded and it's hard to drive. Give me Y150." I replied, "are you kidding! this is an over the top price!" She came down, "OK, 130." I said "that's still over the top". She said "my car's starting price is 10, not 7, and it's Y1 extra for each km". I didn't say anything, just hoping to get to the airport on time. Good thing we started early. Roads were truly flooded, and she was constantly on the phone talking to other drivers inquiring road condition. The radio was saying not to hit the break in the water, just let the car slide, so it wouldn't halt. Many cars halted in the flood. So, it took an hour to get to the airport instead of half an hour. I gave her 130 and let her know that though it was over the top, it was a difficult drive.

Bargaining is a very big part of most Asian life, and it's fun when you shop, but it is not when you are under the pressure to be somewhere before a certain time!

We stopped in Shanghai for a day and then went to Nanjing to visit my aunt and cousin. My cousin's daughter is in Junior in high school. This part summer vacation, she was in school most of the time studying second year university chemistry, so that she can take part in the high school chemistry competition next year. Many students are studying some college subjects at this point. Some parents send their kids, they are all only-childs in their family by the way, to other countries (like America, Europe and Singapore) for a year of study. It's shocking to me to learn that because most parents I met before hold on to their child so tight and don't want their child to leave their sight, yet these parents are willing to let their child go to a faraway land and they won't see them for a year. When these students return to China, they have to repeat that same year because China's school covers so much more material and subjects that they wouldn't be able to follow. My cousin's daughter didn't want to go because she didn't want to be a year older than her classmates when she returns. Now she's regretting a little after seeing her friends return. But too late now!

the hardworking and the smart

It's hard to get hold of the computer to blog these days as Brent has been hogging it, actually he has been working hard.

The first picture is my college classmate whom I haven't seen since I left China and continuously invited me to visit him in Jinan. Jinan is a city full of springs, and by the Mother River of China - Yellow River. It turned out that he's actually very busy. He works basically seven days a week. He manages large engineering projects and often goes on business trips. However he squeezed time to show us around Jinan. He treated us to dinner the first night, but after he sent us to the hotel, he went on to interview someone whom they wanted to hire, at 11PM at night. It's definitely a different business culture. His colleagues took the engineer candidate to dinner, and they drank beer. When they were half drunk, the candidate signed the contract. As the chief, my friend needed to show up to work out the logistics. Chinese is all about food!

The second picture is hard to see clearly. It's supposed to be that way, as the man is setting up an illegal net to catch the sparrows. The net lines are so thin so it's hard to see. And he set it up in front of the trees because he knows the birds would fly to land on the branches. One sparrow was already caught!

The third picture here shows some workers making a road in the Yellow River park. They do everything by hand. This looks like as back breaking as building the Great Wall. (well, Great Wall has much larger stones actually) The dinner we had the night before probably would cost their whole month's salary.

Visa extended

After waiting for another two hours in the visa office, we got our turn. Besides for forms we filled in, the woman gave me a blank piece of paper and told me to write a statement that we wanted to extend our visa. She said the policy is to only extend 1 month, unless you are visiting "direct relatives" - parents, children or spouse. I wonder if I could have lied, but it's really a bad idea, as lies will come back to eat you.

I have posted some selected pictures. They are in random order and I don't want to hurt my hand to organize them. So bare with it!

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8CcsWbZsyZsTe

The smart, the dumb, and the expats

- The smart
This picture was taken at No. 1 Bathing Beach in Qingdao. There's no room to put down a towel or swim. Suppose there are only 0.1% people are smart, how many smart people can you pick out from this crowd? And this is only a small fraction of the Chinese population. Therefore I have to agree with a couple of friends' opinion on "Olympic math" which I mentioned in a previous posting. They think this kind of education is only used to allow kids to be a step ahead of others, because there are too many people to compete against. It doesn't really give them more knowledge, nor necessarily help them think better. One friend who is a high school chemistry teacher said that the chemistry the students learn today is much inferior than what we learned in our days. The education system now only emphasize on certain subjects like math just to make their students having higher scores than others. In the old days, only the cream of the crop could go abroad to study. Now, mostly kids who can't get into good universities here go abroad, if their parents have the money to pay.

- The dumb
I walked into a high end furnishing showroom, which has Italian design kitchen, bath and room furnishings. I was particularly intrigued by some toilets, especially the ones that looked like having very small water tanks. I asked the salesman if the volume is an issue. He replied no. He told me that the workers who put these up in their showroom, thought these were real toilets, so they started using them! Of course it's not connected to the sewage. They were ordered to pour the waste out and the contractor company had to buy the used toilets. These workers all come from the countryside, and none of them has a toilet at home or even has used one.

- The expats
I've met a few expats from all over the world who work and live here. I'm fascinated by them. One young man came from Wales, Mr N. He was a physics grad from Manchester, but couldn't find a job. After working as a pub chef for a year, he couldn't take it any more. He got an opportunity teaching English in Chengdu, China, and came happily. He subsequently got a job in the English magazine here, and teaches guitar part time. He loves Qingdao. I called this magazine two weeks ago and asked them if they need a freelance translator, they said sometimes. I went in and met with one of the young American editors and had an interesting chat. To have an English magazine is a huge challenge, which I can't go into details. It's a money loosing business, but the chief editor is a persistent person and wants to make the magazine a success. After being closed down for no reason twice, (he was still paying his Chinese staff salary during the close down), it has the status of the only official English magazine in town.
Another Mr Z from Germany is a character. He doesn't read or speak much Chinese but he's adventurous. He tries all kinds of food - he just points and then we eat. Two Sundays ago we went to a Korean restaurant and he ordered everything on the menu and claimed they were all good. It turned out to be either pig feet or some quite spicy food. I was ok with that, but most people didn't eat much. I heard a story about him from someone else. Once Mr. Z suggested to the group that he knew a good Israeli restaurant and has good Jewish food. A friend Ms. C who is a local here had never heard of it in her life. So they went. Ms. C thought it's strange since it doesn't look like anything Israeli though she has never been to one. She saw the sign of the army and thought it's a government owned restaurant. Mr. Z pointed to a symbol and said it's a Jewish symbol. But Ms. C said it's a symbol for the founding date of the military. The waiter came and gave them the menu. He got impatient and left after waiting for a minute while these foreigners discussing about what to order. After waiting for half an hour, the waiter never came back and some people got impatient so they all left! So now everyone is a little weary when Mr. Z suggests a restaurant:) But he did take us to a fantastic gelato place.
Then there's the lively French girl Madame A, who is selling French wine here. It's a lot of work and the distributor she's working with doesn't have too much experience. They work six days a week and the distributor's two male staff live in the office. The distributor was somehow responsible for her housing and they tried talking her into sharing the same apartment with the guys and live in the office. She of course insisted that she's living elsewhere and her husband was arriving. She speaks excellent Chinese. Her husband who is an English teacher in France just landed last week and got a teaching job that night!

je suis verte!

We went to the "Entry/Exit Bureau" today trying to get our visa extended. Everyone has to get a number and wait to be called. There were several people working there but seemed only one person was taking paper work. Only three numbers were called in half an hour. Our ticket said there were 33 people in front of us. But it seemed that when many numbers were called, no one showed up. And then there were many people who didn't have the correct number would go up and got served. I told Brent to go up and just ask, he wouldn't do it. I noticed a white guy who spoke very good Chinese went to get his number, but they stopped giving out numbers because it was late. He wondered around and then went to one of the desks and handed in his paper work and he got served! I was so mad and I dragged Brent to go up to another person but that person said she didn't handle paperwork, and pointed to the desks next to her. A few minutes later I told Brent to go up by himself to try to put in the paper. The person pointed to the number above her head indicating that he needed his number ticket. I was holding it at the time. I was convinced that she saw us together before and that's why it wouldn't work.

I suspicion is not without evidence. We met a French girl yesterday who's selling French wine in Qingdao. She said she noticed that she's treated a lot better than the locals. But the people who get treated worst are Chinese decent who don't speak Chinese much. A friend of hers who's born and raised Chinese-French was treated very rudely here. I notice that I get stared at a lot here when I am with Brent, especially by women. I don't get looked at when I'm alone, nor does Brent get stared at as much.

OK, after two hours of waiting, I decided to stand right in front of the desk where one guy was working. There were many numbers that were called but no one showed up. He waved to us to go up. After handing in our paperwork, he asked how long I wanted extension for and the purpose of our trip. When I said traveling, he told us that we need financial proof that we have $100 per day for the extension period. Of course we don't have our bank statement with us! I was so mad!!!!!! Brent was mad too that there are no regulations written out anywhere including the application form. Hmm, he only tasted what we went through most of our lives here.

Otherwise life is not that bad here. A few photos to bring a smile:

1. ET lives here.
2. If you can read Rule #3, it says don't relieve your bowel in the cave.
3. My newly wed cousin and his bride spent their honeymoon in China and came to visit us. We hiked LaoShan together. Great time!

Life in Qingdao

A few pix to show you what life is like in Qingdao:

1. A coastal park - Qingdao has a pretty rocky coast. There are beaches too but with loads of people.

2. People are quite laid back here. They hang out on the streets at night and some just sit down and watch TV together. The TV here is in a store showing some soap, and this guys are glued.




3. My make-shift laundry hanger.


4. View from our apt window.

life essentials?

Someone asked me what I do all day long.

I sip beer and sleep, and do nothing. Not quite! There are endless household chores. The life essentials in America don't really exist here.

I clean a lot, because it's a small place so if I don't cleanup, it gets cluttered.
Other things I do everyday is shopping for living essentials.
Things that we get used to and they don't have here. The apt has
nothing other than furniture. So I bought hangers, dish drainer,
lots of cleaning products. Everyday I need something so I go buy
them, as long as they are not too expensive. The washing machine
doesn't have a dryer (they do have combo units in China) so we have no
where to dry our clothes. The rack is kinda expensive and I can't
take it with me. I've bought lots of stuff for the apt that I can't
take with me. Today I bought two empty broom poles and put them up between the open closet doors and between a chair and the window to make hanging racks.

One of my cousins from Toronto just got married and they came to China and Thailand for their honeymoon. They decided to hop on the plane to come visit us. We made two "beds" by pulling down the couch cushions on the floor. I don't think they slept very well but we had a grand time getting to know each other. We went hiking yesterday in the hot weather, and went through some really cool caves. Some people were curious where my cousin is from because he doesn't speak Chinese much. They have a strategy - when they bargain prices they tell them they are Koreans (my cousin looks Korean to a lot of people even in Canada), but when they need help, they say they are Canadians! When they were in Xi'an and were looking for the bus that goes to the Terracotta Warriors, they asked a police. The police asked "what kind of person are you?", he replied Canadian. The police gave them a ride to the bus stop!

There are 100,000 Koreans in Qingdao and they melt into the Chinese society. Most of them speak Chinese fluently and send their kids to Chinese schools. So they are expected to be able to help themselves, I think. On the other hand, my friend here told me that Koreans are not too well regarded by the locals. Many factory owners exploit the local workers, and many open up "businesses" that lure young women into prostitution. Maybe I have work to do here, and not need to go to Thailand. I need to investigate.

I need to paint my skin...

We talked to an Australian who's teaching science in a private school here. He confirmed that anyone but east Asian looking people can easily find a lucrative teaching job here. When he was teaching in Beijing, he had this Uzbek girl and a Russian teaching English, with very bad accent. An other African man claimed he's African American and got a good teaching job. He was caught after a while because someone who was smart caught him teaching the wrong thing. I confirmed with another American who's teaching international school here that the Korean and Japanese parents don't want their kids to have English tutors who are Asians.

We also learned that Americans who returned home after living in Beijing for a few years were told by doctors to quit smoking. They said but we don't smoke! It's from the polluted air.

June 26, 2007 - White skin won and Chinese Mermaid

I didn't type that wrong. Brent didn't win a Chinese Mermaid.

There's a Starbucks downstairs in our building (yes, they have it every few blocks here too) that had been renovating and looked like opening today. We saw some people there and went in to the front room where there were chairs and speakers. Brent was aggressively walking ahead of me as I thought it was staff only. A young woman came out smiling and said "hello" to Brent. Brent of course asked what is going on and she said it's "friends and family" day, and it'll open tomorrow. She then asked Brent what he wanted and she could bring it out to him for free. Brent shamelessly pointed to the Mango smoothie on the poster and said he'd like to try that. She came out and said they didn't have Mango today so she made him a banana chocolate mocha. I can swear that if I had walked in by myself no one would have come out and offered me free drinks.

P.S. Brent met a Linux "friend" he met on-line here last night and this guy is teaching English here. He said a lot of girls would want to be his girlfriend if Brent is teaching!

We also saw a kite that is a Chinese mermaid - global concept localized!

2007-07-25 almost feeling like home

We came to Qingdao last week and found it to be a much more comfortable city to be in - it's a mid sized city by the ocean, so it's more relaxed and much cooler than Shanghai. We stayed in a dump the first night. I booked it over the internet - it looked nice. But only when we got there, we knew we couldn't stay there for long. It's in a nice looking commercial building but the hallway stunk. Then the bathroom is a little bigger than 1 sqm with the shower head right above the toilet. When I showered, the drain didn't go down much so it flooded, with water going between the door slit into the room.

We gave in to a conventional hotel the next day. We spent three days looking for an apartment. It turned out it's very hard to find a furnished place for short term. Some places are spacious and nice inside, but in market areas that smell like rotten vegetables. We finally narrowed down to two places, both near the beach and has ocean view. One is much bigger than the other but less clean and more expensive. It took us another day of contemplating to decide to take the studio, the smaller of the two, in a cleaner building.

We went back to Shanghai to pick up the remainder of our luggage (Brent's books and hardware etc). They only allow 20kg per person within China, so we got a hefty fine. Shanghai was so hot that we didn't go anywhere. Brent tried to get money out of a Chinese bank but it ate his card for a while then eventually spit it out. We then took a bus to this large mall where there is Citibank and HSBC. Citibank gave him an error and then we went to HSBC machine in Carrefore, it ate his card! We called the number and they said our bank indicated something was wrong with his card and they couldn't return it to him! We were going to go to Bar Rouge which a friend recommended to see the night view of Bund, but we were worried that we would have trouble getting cash in the future so we'd better budget ourselves. In any bank that allows foreign cards to get money, the max for the day is 3000RMB - about $420. And we can't necessarily find a bank that takes foreign cards everyday.

We flew back to Qingdao last Saturday and moved into our apt smoothly. We spent the next few days cleaning. The landlords didn't clean much even though it's a nice apartment.

We enjoy the sea breeze occasionally in our apt and we take walks often to the boardwalk (actually cement walk and no beach). Loads of tourists come here everyday as this is the escape for summer for many Chinese. We can see the harbor where the Olympics sailing competition will be held next year from our window. I bet the rent is even worse next year.

We tried to extend our visa while in Shanghai. We had to go to the "ENTRY-EXIT bureau". After we spent money to take the visa photos, and filled out the forms, and waited in line, we were told that we had to have a temporary residence permit from the local police station. We had never heard of such a thing before but the lady said it's required for all foreigners. I asked a woman who had a Singapore passport what this was - she said it is required if you stay in private residences. If you stay in a hotel, they have already registered you and the police do checkups.

So after we moved in, we called the police station but the person who's in charge wasn't in till Monday. She turned out to be very nice and reasonable. We got that done smoothly and she kindly introduced us to the police who's in charge of our area, so that if we are in any sort of trouble in the future, we talk to him. Hopefully not.

home coming and the dilemma of white skin

July 17, 2007

We've found a short term apartment in Qingdao. It took a lot of work. We arrived late Saturday night and the first night in an apartment I found on the web was horrible. We looked at a few more on Sunday and it was discouraging. Well, it's just normal local living - small bathroom with a water heater and a shower head above the toilet. When you shower, it splatters everywhere. Then we found one very nice studio and a pretty nice two-bedroom. Of course the 2BR is more expensive. It took us a lot of negotiation and relooking at the places to make a decision. We are going with the studio.

We went to Tianjin, my home town last Wednesday. I totally couldn't recognize the place. My college friends told me to stay in our university inn and it's pretty cheap and clean. When we got there at 11pm at night, they took a look at Brent and said they don't take foreigners! They said the rooms are not up to foreign standards. We were so shocked but there's nothing we could do. They told us to go to Expert Hotel (hotel for foreign teachers and professionals). We got there and there was no vacancy! The receptionist told us to try another hotel outside the university. He was so kind to call for us and found they have vacancy.

We met a real estate agent in Qingdao who also is a head hunter to arrange foreign teachers to teach English. I told him I'm interested in teaching. He said no parents would want me to teach because I look Chinese. It doesn't matter what people's skill levels are, the parents believe in white skin. He knows an Australian guy who was a pizza deliverer who's a high school grad, but when he gets to Qingdao he's so welcomed by parents and makes so much money and has different girlfriends every month that he doesn't want to leave. There were some Philipino teachers had a hard time finding a job because they look Asian. It took them a long time to prove how good they are.

3rd grade math exam and fake eggs

My high school friend's son is going to third grade (yes he is 9 years old), in one of the best schools in Beijing. Not only you need to pay to get in this public school, you also need to know someone. If you don't bribe the teacher who is in charge of your class, when your kid has a fight with another kid, the other kid wins. But despite that, they get a superb education. He's in the Olympics math class (like American AP), and these are two of the 16 questions in his final exam. I can't solve them:
1) given a sequence of numbers in which ith is the sum of i-1 and i-2, and where first 2 numbers are 1 and 3 (which makes it different from fibonacci, where 1 & 1 are first two)
1, 3, 4, 7, 11, 18, ...
what is the remainder of the 40th number in the sequence when divided by 5?
2) consider the number whose digits are the sequence of the squares of the natural numbers:
1, 4, 9, 16, 25, ... --> 1491625...
what is the 100th digit of this number?

Also, some smart #%#@% want to make a profit at the cost of the health of others - they make fake eggs - they look real, except they are plaster. My college friend bought some eggs from Walmart (yes they have Walmart here) and at least one of them is fake. Walmart apologized and said this is only from one of the suppliers and it's not common, so they sent a whole case of eggs to her and asked her not to publicize it.

We are happy to retour Forbidden City at our own pace this time, with much less people.

A few pix to start

we fell in love with LiJiang, Yunnan province. It's over 2000 m above sea level, clean air and blue sky. The old towns and minority people are really charming.

Sticky hot Shanghai

If you haven't taken a public bus in China, you haven't experienced it. It's hot and sticky to begin with - 34 c and 99% humidity, and the bus is packed to the very last step that the driver let people on from the back door. Today Brent had the ultimate China experience - getting on a bus during rush hour, with millions of other Chinese. It was painful for him, but this is everyday life for most Chinese.

Oh, my aunt's maid's son got into the best high school in the county! Very happy for her. He got such a good score that she doesn't need to pay Y30,000. Another girl she knows has to pay Y66,000 to get in because her score wasn't good enough. Her family can't afford it, but they will borrow money to get her into this high school.

Tour scams

June 30, 2007

Joined a tour group to the Stone Forest. I asked before I booked the tickets that we are only going to stop at two jewelry shops. We ended up spending half an hour each in two jade shops. Then after Stone Forest, which was one of the big world wonders, we stopped at a Chinese military folk medicine institution to get FREE foot massage - it turns out that the doctors would listen to our pulses and tell us what disease we have and would prescribe medicine that is proprietary and we could only get during this trip. My massager who is a military guy tells me I have vein disease because my legs are showing red and even black veins. I would need surgery in the future. But if I use their medicine to soak my feet for three months, then all the problems would go away. The president of their institution is so famous that many important people come to seek cure from him.

We sticked to our ground and didn't buy any medicine. One couple listened to them and spent over Y1000 on the feet soaking medicine.

on my mind this morning

I woke up again at 5 am. Very mad at Brent because he was working last night until 11. I wanted to sleep at 10, because I knew jetlag will get me up early again. So I have a headache again from not enough sleep.

My aunt and uncle have a house keeper or maid. It's very common and affordable in developing countries to have a maid. Just as the States use cheap immigrants in manual labor fields, so does China use immigrants from the country side as domestic workers. It works out well for both parties economically, but makes family life so difficult. She's from the countryside with 4 siblings. I don't know how that was possible as she's my age. She has a 17 year old son who is going to high school this year. She has been working as a domestic worker (I don't need to worry about political correctness here so I'll just type maid in the future) for 7 years. Her sister has been raising her son for the last seven years. Her husband works as a construction worker and was also in Shanghai before. But for the last year he's been working in Beijing so they don't see each other much at all. Because of the large population, it's even more competitive to get into a good high school meaning possible college education. There are 12000 students compete to go into better high schools, but there is less than 500 can be accepted. To enter college, they have to get much better scores than the kids in the big cities as they have a fix quota for many more people. You could however, to enter a good high school with score less than ideal. The best high school requires a score of 640, you could get in with a 630 if you pay 30000 Yuan. That's a huge sum for many, but since it's their only hope for college education, the parents work very hard and save very hard to get their kids in, if they even get 630. And you have to fill out which schools you want to go to even before you take the entrance exam provincewide. So it's guess work. The district looks at your selections after the exam. If your first choice school requires 640, your second choice requires 620, they will put you in your first choice because they can make money out of you. And you have no say in it. Or you go to a "bad" school then you'll never get into college. Bad schools here don't have guns, but just bad quality of education.

Her son goes to a boarding school as many country kids. Not the English type preppy boarding school. They live there so they can study. They get up at 5 am and study till 11pm. For the top 30 students, the school give them special treatment hoping they can enter good high school therefore college. The special treatment is to have teachers teach them on Sundays as well. So they go to school 7 days a week. They have a 15 minute lunch break, which doesn't allow them to eat much. It takes the 15 minutes to walk to the cafeteria and get food and walk back, and then the next class starts. He often eats rice soup since it's quick. He has stomach problems, and he's only 17! The students don't even have time to do laundry or even take a shower. By the time you take off your clothes, the bell rings for the next class.

In the restaurant or shops we went to, I often saw help-wanted signs. They want nice looking people age 18-25. Equal opportunity and ACLU doesn't apply here. There are too many people for too little. The maid told her son, if you want to be like your dad, don't worry about studying so you can have a easy life (childhood), but if you want to be in an aircond office in the hot summer, you better study hard. He chose the latter and I sure hope he gets into a good high school (he'll take the exam early July). His parents work too hard.

June 10, 2007 - Third day in Shanghai

It was a pretty good flight, considering we got the first row behind the headboard seats. It was a full flight from Chicago to Shanghai.

We have pretty bad jetlag - got up 3am the first morning then 5 this morning. It's hot and muggy here. But it's nice for the first time on vacation, we don't actually need a schedule and just go wherever we feel like that day. Today Brent is going to work most of the day as the house is empty (my aunt and uncle are on vacation so he can use the internet connection and the office space etc). I'm going shopping, which I never do on other vacations or even in NY.

There are so many nice pretty clothes here, and some tacky ones too. We went to Zhongshang Park mall yesterday and went to this trendy restaurant for lunch - there's a special for Y25 per person all you can eat appetizers. Turns out very very slow. We ended up only having a pot of tea (which was Y28 but very nice) and three dishes in 1.5 hours and paid a la cart and got up and left. We couldn't wait any longer. We ended up going to the Bund (Wai Tan) and it is totally different from what I remembered!

You can really live large here too. There are so many expensive things too. There's a Gorgio Armani at the Bund. All the tri-band cell phones are $200 (US) and up. That's a lot considering the average wage here.

I tried to put this on my blog, but can't get into the website. Wonder why...