My Blueberry Eggs

My time in China has come to an end.

糟糕！Shhhhhhhiiiiiiiiittttt…. The past four months have flown by

I went here to learn the language and immerse myself in the completely within the culture, I did that.

I went here to go on an absurd legal drinking filled 4-month bender and to do ridiculously stupid things without ending up in a Chinese prison, check

I came here to explore all of the regions of China and Shanghai I could (with much more exploring to follow in my future), check.

I came to eat as many indigenous and regional foods that I could, never turning down something I have never tasted, check.

I went here to get with a Chinese chick, I even did that.

I also have grown up a little bit. Straight Whiskey has become my drink of choice when going out, my love of jazz has grown exponentially, I’ve found that I am a lot more willing to do things after I have had a double shot espresso, I freaking love Belgian beer, I got good at dancing (I still dance like an idiot at most times, but who really cares), I got to really know two of my best childhood friends from Chicago, Flans and Elliott, and I grew my first beard, Oh and what a gloriously disgusting beard it was.

There are some thing’s I will just never forget about this trip (aside from all the culture mumbo jumbo). Whether it was eating Flans’ blueberry eggs and jamming with Max and Ben on guitar till the sun comes up, the smells (Good Lord the smells. Never have I been to a place with so many air pockets of smells, both great and unbelievably horrible, as the back gate of our campus), A-Baring at the our sweet gazebo ‘play spot’ home of many of wine-filled pass outs, going to a sex toy mall with Elliott and being mature enough not to have a dildo fight until an hour into our visit, hangin out at the Uhyger market and eating mutton, whooping some ass in badminton, dancing the night away to Mike Null and the Soulcasters at the House of Blues and Jazz, going out and eating meat skewers and speaking Chinese at 4 am on a Monday with a group of drunk migrant workers, watching OSU-UW upset at Bubba’s, blackout dancing to a Talking Heads concert DVD, or dressing up as Santa and drinking bloody mary’s with a bunch of Singaporeans. Shanghai, China sure has been good to me.

I know I was hating on Chinese people last week, but for the most part I have had really great experiences. The hospitality shown by my friend’s Chinese roommate Ding last week was a perfect example. He invited me Flans and Henrick to his small apartment on the other side of Shanghai for a dinner cooked by his dad. It was hands down the best meal I have had here in China.

The spread was unreal. On the menu, and entirely cooked out of a closet sized kitchen, was stewed pork belly, pounds of lightly pickled cucumbers (which was so good I got the recipe for em), green beens, ginger chicken and potatoes, roasted duck, potato salad, fish soup, and even the Shanghai famous hairy crab. It made the Thanksgiving dinner we had here look like a bitch. His parents toted on us like we were princes. They ate in a separate room from us, refilled out beer and wine whenever they were anywhere close to empty, scooped the sublime crab roe out of the crabs for us and refused… and I mean refused, to let us help clean up in any way. To top it off we finished the night eating dozens of ridiculously sweet Chinese oranges and listened to some of Ding’s extensive collection of American CDs. It was a fantastic cap to an unreal trip.

Last week it was 6o degrees and I wore shorts to class, then it snowed 2 days ago. This week snow took down the Metrodome and God knows it’ll be cold in NJ. God I miss America. And whodathunkit but the Badgers had the best season in a decade…and I missed it. Who gives a shit though cause I’m headin to the Rose Bowl for New Years!!

We have really just been trying to soak everything in these last few days. Immersing ourselves in this culture has brought nothing but love from all of us in the 4 months we’ve been here, and I think that we all really have realized that. This city will not look the same the next time I’m here ( and I WILL be back) as it is growing and evolving at a ridiculous rate. I think that’s why I have loved it so much; this city of 22 million freaking people is the future of China.

Tonight should be a total shit show over here and will make the 14-hour plane ride tomorrow a lot more interesting. As the past four months have flown by, and kinda like Ace and Gary, so will I as I say Zai Jian to Shanghai. 在见上海。 在见中国。

WEIRD THINGS CHINESE DO

( I Wrote this on Thursday)

I’ve been saving this post for the end of the trip, and was going to title it ‘Interesting Things Chinese People Do’. Due to the fact that I got pick pocketed today by some weasley mo fo, I’m going to take this more as an opportunity to vent on how much Chinese suck. I mean…I was having a great day.

I interviewed the owner of my favorite Texas BBQ place for a Globalization paper and had a big ass beer with him, I had a really fun night last night, and the weather is beautiful outside. I really had no reason to complain.

Getting off the train, I decided to treat myself to a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich that I lot of people really like to eat and I have never had it before (its on a bomb ass roti bread like the ones at Flat Top grill, but its super greasy and cooked in the bacon fat, probably the reason its so great). I was crossing a busy intersection and was jamming out to Sting’s I’ll Be Missing You with one iPod headphone in my ear. As I crossed the busy intersection, I was juggling a book and the hot bacon, egg and cheese in my hands. When I went to throw out the wrapper for the sandwich in the trash, I noticed the headphones weren’t plugged into my iPod anymore. A little Chinese girl came up to me a minute later and told me in Chinese that someone had taken my iPod out of my peacoat pocket. FML. And thanks for stopping him little Asian girl.

So I am taking this opportunity to bash on Chinese people for a little bit. Its how I feel at this certain point.

Now I’m not going to rant on the obvious things. Yes, they have a ridiculous infatuation with Lady Gaga. They chain-smoke like no culture (maybe the French) that I have ever been around. Their dental hygiene is borderline nasty (apparently because the water has no fluoride in it) They play WOW, World of Warcraft, in droves and into the early hours of the morning, its really sad. They are horrible, I mean HORRIBLE drivers, (taking DWO to a whole new level I didn’t know existed). And they really can’t hold any of their liquor…..that felt a little better.

But here are the main things I will touch on.

1. Many of them wear glasses frames with no lenses:

Now, I thought this was just something that wannabe trendy hipsters do so they look even more artsy than they are. Like it wouldn’t surprise me if my friend Drew DeGennaro attempted to wear these frames this summer when he was trying to be all Bohemian and shit while living the trendy life Brooklyn. Here, they take that fashion idea and run with it. All the while looking a little bit douchier.

Now my tutor Alice, who I really love and who has helped me through a myriad of challenging homework assignments, wears these frames. Yet, half the time she wears real glasses to help her vision. Why wear the just frames?? I really can’t answer that.

2. They don’t sweat.

Except for my Issues in Modern Chinese Society teacher, Wei Wei (and I only count him as half Chinese cause he went to school at Loyola in Chicago), I really can’t think of any time when I saw a Chinese person was noticeably sweaty.

And it got HOT when we first got here in September. I mean go through 3-4 shirts a day because it was so hot and sticky (God can only imagine how many shirts Hodge would go through if he was here. He goes through 2 before we go out at night, FWI… Every Night). It’s a humidity that puts the August heat in NYC to shame. It was truly unbearable. And you could never find a sweaty Chinaman. When playing basketball, no one is sweating. When we play badminton, and when I played Elliott’s roommate Eric in badminton too, only the white boys were sweating. It was something that was truly unexplainable.

3. As a result, they like luke cold water/ beer

Now I’m a guy who puts ice cubes in every drink. I need it all ice cold at all times. Drinking beer and water that is sweating is sacrilegious, but it happens all the time here and was super noticeable in the hot heat of September.

4. After using the bathroom they don’t use soap.

There is a reason SARS spread so quickly here. THEY DON’T WASH THEIR HANDS AT ALL AFTER USING THE BATHROOM. People still walk around with facemasks on their faces (maybe because of the SARS or the horrible air quality that, since the expo closed, is slowly killing me), yet they don’t wash their hands after shitting. Which takes me to my next topic…

5. They have horrible bathroom traits.

When they poo they wipe then put the tp in a trash can next to the toilet. Try going to the bathroom in 100 degree weather with 100 % humidity at 4 in the afternoon, all with a full can of hot doodie wipes next to you. It’s horrible.

They consistently miss the urinals. I don’t know exactly how this is possible, but every night, I can count on our communal bathroom to have a ridiculous amount of pee on the floor. I mean, I stepped in it this morning when I wasn’t paying attention. They even put signs in public bathrooms reminding them to take their time and make sure that they are finished before walking away… I haven’t even mentioned the chronic splatter pooer on our floor. The Picasso of Chinese roommates. I’ll save that story for a rainy day though.

6. Juice doesn’t exist in this culture.

I mean, they have juice, it’s just not juice. It is like flavored sugar water. Cranberry juice, grape juice, apple juice all taste really bad here. Like jolly ranchers mixed into water. Don’t even get me started on Orange Juice. They take tang and add real (or at least I hope it is) orange pulp. They market the product as fresh OJ. I just want Simply Natural OJ sooo bad.

The other week, Elliott and I were eating at our local dumpling place and ordered the good old Chinese American (and Panda Express) classic of Orange Chicken. Only we found that what we got was Tang Chicken. The fluorescent Orange sauce has put me off on the stuff for the rest of the trip.

7. They ride escalators but don’t move.

Yes, I know, this happens in America too with fat lazy people, it can be seen as super Amerrrican. But with the amount of people traveling on escalators here, and I mean hundreds at a time, it can become overwhelming. Trying to catch a train or even get into a train station can take way longer than it should as you are on an escalator that you can’t move on.

8. College students act like American 7th graders

This was really the most surprising thing that I have encountered on the entire trip. Having been to Japan, I expected the openness and almost kinkiness that the culture of Japan exhibits. The Japanese love to party and drink and eat and drink some more. They are truly the cooler Asians. Yet, the Chinese have a very puritan lifestyle.

They have spent their entire middle school and high school life focusing on the GaoKao, the national entrance college exam. They spend their entire careers spending their time studying from 8am – 10 pm. School is a prison. The pressure is so great on these kids that they don’t have social lives. NONE.

They take their college careers as a time to talk to girls for the first time, have their first kisses, hold hands, look at porn for the first time, consider masturbating for the first time and cuddle/spoon. It was really a shocking find and almost a huge disappointment of this trip.

Take this all with a grain of salt though, I still freaking love China and have had the time of my life here (up until 7 pm this evening). But with less then a two weeks left here, I know I’m going to miss the shit out of it.

Yeezy Taught Me.

Drew