厕所在哪

Long time, no post. I have been really busy at work and on the weekends. During the weekdays I usually sleep in then go to work around lunch time and hang out at my desk, then start working on my lessons at 1PM when break is over. From 11 30 till 1, the room is dark. Chinese people, or at least the people in my division of Midea, turn off the lights so it's easier to nap. One of my students told me he took his "siesta" and I realized that the Chinese culture of a break is similar to a Spanish siesta in the middle of the day. They have a long break to eat, sleep, and do whatever they want.

Since I have not written for a week or so, I want to first discuss how I'm turning more and more Chinese. I have been tempted to use English phrases that have been awkwardly translated (for example, "Thank you". Answer: "Not at all") I have caught myself making a peace sign for pictures quite often...ughhhh, so Chinese. Who knows what else I'll pick up this year.

Nevertheless, let's get to the good part: last weekend... On Friday night I went to Guangzhou and stayed with some other AIESEC trainees-Katia, Lismain and Natasha. We met up with Kenneth and Alex and went to some "foreigner" bar. I felt like it could have been any pub in the US. The guy next to us was from Boston, another person from Florida, some German guys...and so on. The we went to a club and there were also some white looking girls there, probably from Russia (I know I distinguish between foreign and natives here in China, but it's just so RARE for me to see someone who is not Chinese!). All of the girls started dancing and eventually the manager came over and gave us a bottle of champagne. I don't have to buy it, the club owner supply it... (Courtesy of Drake). Nice. Then we took a cab home and guess what came next? We had McDonald's delivered to the girls' apartment! YES DELIVERED! For free! We had to pay for the food, but not the delivery! How did we order it you ask? Kenneth speaks Chinese so we just told him what we wanted and he ordered it over the phone for us :) That was my first experience with REAL Western food in China, and I have to admit, I had to add lots of salt to my burger and my fries (not salt like we have in the US, but more like sea salt). The food was similar to McDonald's in the US, but I don't want to eat anymore Western food...but it tastes so good!

The next morning I had to wake up early and come back to Beijiao to teach (yes, I had to teach last Saturday, but I can't continue teaching from Tue to Saturday, so I was able to move my Saturday class to Monday. Woo HOO!) After class, one of my students and new friends, Lily, and I went to the market by my house, bought food, then went to her house so she could cook me dinner! Allow me to mention the fish she bought. It was swimming around in a plastic pail until she ordered it, and the vendor butchered it right in front of us, scaled it, cleaned it off, and put it in a bag for us. Talk about FRESH. She made me hot pot which was DELICIOUS! It took a very long time to prepare everything, but the end result was so good! I also tried sweet and sour pork that she made, which was also very good (it's not crispy and really fried here). She bought extra 金针蘑菇 (Jīnzhēn mógu), my new favorite type of mushroom, to throw into the hot pot and of course I devoured the food. During the dinner I asked what the big deal was about "white beauty" and I finally was given a concrete answer. It's our facial structure, eyes and nose. One of the girls told me that Chinese people have very flat faces and they want to have more distinct bone structure. As for the eyes, they like big eyes with long eye lashes. A typical Chinese nose is flat, while "white noses" are more pointed out I guess. Interesting observations. At any rate, eventually I realized that I probably wouldn't make the last bus to GuangZhou, but when Lily found out how much I was set on going back, she asked her friend to drive me. The ride didn't turn out to me too long (shorter than the bus!) and then I took another bus ride to Katia's apartment. Of course we went out again on Saturday night but this time to a club called Babyface, and this time this club was not full of non-Chinese. We actually ended up spending a lot of time with some people from Beijing (drinking a mixture of Hennessey, tea and water that was yummy). Later we figured out they were part of some Beijing gang or something because when we left Babyface we went to eat "barbecue", and a fight broke out in front of the club. I saw blood and a knife. I guess what happened was that the guys from Beijing were friends with the club owner and for some reason they wanted to fight another guy who was with a girl, and he pulled out a knife and was swinging it around. A couple of people ended up getting cut (including the girl who tried to stop the fighting). Not only that, but someone said they saw her getting kicked because she was standing in the way, trying to protect the guy with the knife. What the ....!!?!?!?!??!?!? We stayed out of the way. Anyway the guy with the knife got into a cab but the Beijing-ers stopped the cab and started hitting it with plants and soil ripped out from the ground...and then the police came. We left as the cops got there, but I took a video of part of this action. Kenneth said if they saw me they'd throw my camera into the Pearl River (which the club was next to). Whatever, that didn't happen, but note to myself: Be careful when you're filming fights. On a side note, the "barbecue" was actually an Arabic stand where they made lamb skewers with some sauce. Lismain's new boyfriend from Saudi insisted we go there. I spoke in Arabic to him as much as I could, and I might ask him to give me lessons. It would be nice to speak Polish, English, Spanish, Italian, Chinese and ARABIC! Slowly but surely. Everyone keeps asking me if I'm learning Chinese...well I'm TRYING to, but I need to exert more effort for this task.

To continue, I received a gift from Lily's boyfriend yesterday and it was a pair of beautiful blue chopsticks from Beijing with little Beijing ducks to set the chopsticks on. Chinese people have a tradition of giving gifts, and I LIKE it! He also got my sister a gift. I'm not used to ALL this gift giving, but I definitely am not opposed to it. I have never met her boyfriend though. Lily says he is in the Chinese army and he works in Beijing. So does that mean he is Communist because he serves in the army? I think so...I sent him an e-mail to thank him, and he was really nice and told me if I ever need any help, Lily would help me. He also told me the chopsticks come with the two "Mandarin Ducks" because these animals are known to stay together, and if you give them to someone, it means they wish for you and your boyfriend to be happy and stay together. If you don't have a significant other, it could regard to your friends or siblings. On the note of helping me, Lily is going to help me today! She's coming with me to get my haircut! Since I don't speak Chinese, she will translate for me and I sent her pictures of what I want my hair cut to look like. I will also print some out and show them to the hair stylist.

I would like to mention Chinese "etiquette again". I have found out that people here do not really use deodorant, or guys at least. I guess the common consensus is that a girl should like a guy for his personality, and he should impress her with it, not with his scent. The girls here do wear some perfume though. Ok, well when it gets to be 90 something degrees here I think I will not like this no-deodorant opinion... The subway is air conditioned, but if you sit next to someone who hasn't showered in a while...I won't even go into detail. Katia told me that she knows someone who has never taken a shower. I was shocked at first, then I realized in old Chinese, rural villages, there is no running water, or actual showers, so when people come to bigger cities, they do not know how to use them. My view is if you can learn how to use a shower, please do. Please. Also let me mention the traffic in the subways. Once you get into the subway, it's like people turn into cattle. Everyone starts pushing and only thinking of themselves. Some people cut you in line, others take the seats that should be given to the elderly...it's very uncivilized.

Lastly, today one of my co-workers helped me translate basic phrases I have come up with which I might need or could be useful, and we wrote them into my notebook. A few times she went to Kingsoft (a program to put Chinese characters into Pinyin, or vice versa and translate them into English). A couple times she didn't even know the right character to use. So if for native speakers, it's not that easy to think of the Pinyin spelling then how is it supposed to be easy for people like me?!?!?! At least now I know how to say "Can I have the receipt" or "How much is it". Life is getting easier and easier! haahhaha! A lot of the time all of us just point and look confused, until someone figures out what we want.