Cultural Nuances

Its raining outside, so we aren't planning on leaving the hotel with the usual franticness that we normally have. Paul is watching Chinese cartoons, and managed to find an English program on the TV - a broadcast of the play Oklahoma with Chinese subtitles and the occasional voiceover. I imagined the voiceover saying "Western plays are very weird".

One time a couple of years ago my friend Lisa and I went to a Chinese restaurant for lunch. After we had finished, and I stood up to put my coat on the waiter walked up to me and said "You have great height". I smiled and thanked him for the complement, then left. Although I did take it as a complement, I really did not understand the depth of it until I came here.

People are obsessed with my height. The other day Paul and I were at Tianenmen Square standing at a fence taking in the scenery. A man road by on a bike and instead of watching where he was going, he was watching me and veered into traffic in the other lane. A little further on a lady stopped me and asked if she could take a picture of her 3 year old daughter with me. There have been numerous other people snapping my photo along the way, too. It wasn't until Paul's friend David was with us that I understood why they keep taking my photo. David translated a conversation he had with someone, and the person asked if I was an athlete. I was quite chuffed with it, considering how dreadfully out of shape I am!

After I few subway rides, I learned to duck to avoid hitting my head on the way out. I cannot walk under trees as the branches are not cut high enough for me. Once of the funniest moments of the trip so far was when I ducked to avoid hitting my head on a sign, then made Paul take a picture. It took a bit for him to get the picture set up, and as I was standing under the sign countless people walking by turned around, pointed at me and laughed. I've been having a lot of fun with this!

One of the first things I noticed when I got here is how devoid North America is of smells. When Paul and I first arrived and were wandering around the neighbourhood, I could notice a smokey meaty smell as we walked down a couple of different streets. For the most part I don't miss the blandness of North America.

On Tuesday when Paul and I got to the Olympic village I had to go to the washroom. I went to use the port-a-potty and as I opened the door I noticed that there was no toilet, only a hole in the floor. I had a few seconds to learn how to squat to pee. I had two concerns over the whole experience - peeing on my shorts and falling in the hole. There was sudsy water in the hole, so the experience was not that bad.

My next experience did not fare so well. There was no sudsy water, and as I squatted all I could smell was raw sewage. After a couple of dry heaves I decided I did not have to go that badly and would opt to hold it until I had the urge to "p*ss like a racehorse". On a happy note, I still have not fallen in the hole. I have learned to bury my head in my shirt to breath while going to the washroom to avoid projectile vomitting all over it.

I have also become adept at haggling. Paul, David, and I were walking down a huotong full of vendors. I managed to avoid most of them by flashing my wide dimply smile and saying "no thanks". We managed to get through most of the street without stopping. Then as I walked by one vendor, the girl was asking me to come look at things. I flashed my best dimply smile, and she grabbed my wrist. She seemed very sweet and entertaining, and I did not have the heart to be rude to her so I went into her shop. She showed me various paintings so I asked her how much a particular one was. She pulled out her calculator and said "Normally the price is 900 (Yuan) but because you are very beautiful and very nice I will give it to you for 325. Where are you from?"
"Canada"
"Oh, since you are not American or Japanese, I will give it to you for 300"
Just then David popped his head in the door to check on me.
"Oh, since you have Chinese friend, I will give you Chinese price of 275. Final offer"
"No, I really do not want the painting, but thank you"
"Ok, ok, 225, best price"
"Really, I do not want the painting but thank you"
"Ok, you tell me how much
"Really, the painting is nice, but I just do not want it."
"Tell me how much"
At that point Paul and I started to talk to each other in French to outsmart her. She watched us for a couple of minutes, then joined in the conversation. We laughed.
"ok, 100"
"no, no that's too low. This is real silk with nice rice paper and a stamp of authenticity on it.'
"I really do not want the painting"
"Ok, 125."
"ok"

To tell the truth, I really did not want the painting and I felt I could have gone much much lower, but did not wish to insult her. What I really paid for was the memory of my first experience of haggling and the memory of how entertaining she was.

Well, I have so much more to say, but the staff want to clean the room, and I need to go find some coffee.

Never accept rides from strangers

Yesterday, Lori and I were off to meet David to see the Temple of Heaven and the Pearl Market.

Unfortunately, the diving event from the day previous saw us get back to the guest house at a very late hour so we had very little sleep the night before. In order to prepare ourselves for the day, we decided to trek on out to Yong' anli to Starbucks for a coffee to help begin the day prior to meeting David at the Temple of Heaven in Tiantin Park.

Once we finished our coffee and pastry (the guesthouse was too full for us to have breakfast there) we hopped on the subway and went to Qinan Lu by Tian' an men square to get on the bus to go down to the park. As is usual, I got all turned around and decided that we should walk down Qinan Lu to the park. On our journey, a man with a pedicab stopped with a placard advertising Temple of Heaven for 30 yuan. Lori and I discussed, we were already a little late for meeting David, so we decided to hop in and let him take us for a ride. Once in the pedicab, the man turned his cab around (he was going in the opposite direction) and started to take us for our ride.

As we travelled down Qinan Lu, the cabbie decided to turn into an alleyway (hutong) off the street. As we approached the alleyway, I though 'neat looking place but this is not the right direction'. Lori must have been thinking the same thing, because just before he entered the hutong Lori started poking him in the back and saying 'hey, hey this is not the way. With that, the cabbie turned around and continued down Qinan Lu.

As soon as we started back down Qinan Lu, I pulled out my cell phone and called David, forget roaming charges, safety is more important. David asked where we were and I had no clue, so David asked to speak to the driver, I handed the driver the phone and David must have given him s**t because he started to go in what I thought was the right direction. Then he spoke to a cabbie buddy who had followed us from where the cabbie picked us up. As I realized something was afoot, our cabbie stopped at an intersection and told us to get into his buddies cab. At this point, I had, and especially Lori had had enough and we bailed without paying.

Out on the streets of Beijing, not really knowing where we were, I called David again and he told me how to get to him by subway (our guide book was wrong in its directions). Once we managed to make it back to Qinan Station, we made our way to David and began a beautiful day in the Temple of Heaven and Tiantin Park.

At the end of our adventure in the Temple of Heaven, we decided to go for a walk and grab a late lunch. While walking through the park, incredibly beautiful, we realized the the marathon will be coming through the park as we noticed the blue guide line on the ground. This marathon is going to be distracting for viewers because some of the sights that will be in the background are breath taking.

After an amazing lunch of spicy bean curd, baby bok choy and mushrooms and spicy mongolian beef, we walked up to a bus station and saw a little more of Beijing life that I don't think a lot of tourists get to see. We walked past a hutong that was an entire neighbourhood and looked amazing.

A little further on, there were some workers returning a hose to its storage place after watering the gardens on the street.

After a nice little bus ride on Beijing Public Transit (The TTC could take quite a few lessons from Beijing) we went to a condo complex that resembled a 5 star resort and had coffee and relaxed as we had been on our feet for the last 9 hours, minus an hour for lunch.

Lori and I were both falling asleep and decided not to go to the Pearl Market but to return to the guest house for the night.

When we got off the subway at our stop, we walked out and saw that the corner was lit up very nicely, I pulled out my camera and turned it on, but it decided it was enough for the day and shut itself down, my battery had died.

I have charged my camera, am charging my cell phone and will be charging my MacBook very soon.

Another day another adventure.

By the way, today's adventure will be in the Beijing rain and I found a Starbucks closer to our guest house rather than traveling across to the other side of the city.

More to come.......

A few more pics for those who asked.

Coffee Time

On the first morning, Lori and I were greeted at the guesthouse with a wonderful Chinese breakfast accompanied by watermelon, cantalaupe and that prized liquid, coffee. As we ate heartily, we both managed to consume 3 to 4 cups of this most delicious liquid gold. The next morning, to our caffine craving bodies dismay, we discovered that coffee was not served during the week and the breakfast became more traditional Chinese. The foods are excellent, unfortunately, I don't know what any of them are called, except for our favourite 'pancake' for which I am eternally grateful to Eddie for introducing me too.

So, yesterday, me in my Olympic Canada polo shirt from the Bay and Lori decorated with Canada temporary tattoos (being hairy has its advantages), we decided to make the trek out to Guomao on the other side of the city and get some Starbucks before heading out to the Olympic park to meet David and walk around the park before we saw our Gold Medal diving event. 

Unfortunately, I led us out the wrong exit and we happened upon a place called O'Briens, so we ventured in and to our surprise we found a restaurant full of westerners. Oh well, you can't always be embedded in one culture no matter where you are in the world. We proceeded to order our coffee and when it finally came, we were more than upset to discover that for half a cup of coffee, we were given the honour to pay this lovely Irish establishment 30 ($5.00 CAD) yuan for a half cup of coffee.

After our coffee experience, we wandered into the Silk Market, which was attached to the same restaurant.

Once inside the silk market, and after walking by a policemen with a sign that read 'Foreigners, protect your personal belongings' we ventured down a few aisles stacked with stalls of people hawking 'designer' goods, calling out sir or lady or, the best yet, ooh Canada, Canada. With plenty of foreigners around and wearing some type of garb displaying either the name or the symbol of their country, it was very impressive that the only country they called out was Canada. As Lori put it, its because they know how nice we are and we are good marks for them to pull us into their shop and buy something.

After venturing up a few floors and making a purchase, we tried to leave as quickly as possible. As we made our way down escalators, through aisles being requested to stop at a keepers stall, arms grabbing at you (reminiscent of a scene from Roman Polanski's 1965 movie Repulsion), we found ourselves twisted around in directions and heading towards the staff area of the silk market. Finally, Lori to the rescue, she spotted an escape route, right into the entrance of the dreaded 'half cup of coffee for 30 yuan' O'Briens. None the less, out we went.

After our experience of having arms grab at us, we decided we needed a real coffee to calm our nerves. Nothing like caffine to sooth the nerves. Luckily, just around the corner and down the street a little bit was Starbucks, where for 21 yuan, I managed to acquire a venti iced brewed coffee and for 31 yuan, Lori managed to purchase a venti cappucino. I am so glad Starbucks is standardized around the world.

With coffee in hand, we walked down the street to sit in the shade and consume our coffee away from the scorching heat. At this point, it was only 11:15 and we did not have to meet David until 1:30. With this time allotment in mind, and not having any sense of where the Olympic Park is in any real sense of spatial awareness, we managed to stay in the shade for an hour people watching.

As we sat, it became obvious that we were not the only ones who were people watching, this became evident when a gentleman, riding a bicycle with a pull cart in the back laden with goods for delivery, was watching us and almost ran into the barrier that separates the bicycle lane from the cars and sidewalk, not to mention that people also challenge the bicycles in their own lane.

Anyway, it is now 6:20 and I must sign off as today is destined to bring more adventures as we are off to meet David and do some more touring and shopping.

Beijing Day 1

I still cannot sleep. I will report to you that the insect that was keeping me awake was a beetle of some kind. As I was writing the last blog, it flew up onto the laptop screen. After a bit of a struggle with trying to get it off the screen, the beetle met an untimely (from its perspective) fate with my slippers. Paul's phone is still vibrating, though.

Day 1 we got up, made our way through the licorice door, and had breakfast. Following breakfast we decided to go out and explore Beijing for a while. We got to the subway and tried to order a refillable transit pass that Chunling had told us about. The subway attendant did not speak English. We thought we had finally explained what we wanted through the use of hand gestures. I handed the girl a 100 Yuan note, and she gave me a look of horror. In the end I wound up buying a one way far, which costs 2 Yuan, with the 100 Yuan note. Paul did the exact same thing. On our return trip we managed to figure out what the pass was that we were looking for, and bought one each using much smaller bills.

We then made our way to Tianamen Square and wandered around for the afternoon. It is getting late, I am finally sleepy, so I will have to stop writing now. As an apology for cutting my story short, I will leave you with a few photographs from day 1:

My Silence is Broken

My intentions to blog every day were good, but the reality wasn't so good. It took me a couple of days to adjust to Beijing and we have been scorchingly busy since we got here. I should actually be sleeping right now, but someone sent a text to Paul so his phone keeps vibrating and there is this strange Chinese insect that keeps flying around the window that must have the wingspan of an eagle, based on the sound it is making! With all that racket, I am finding it very hart to sleep. Plus, I am on a bit of an adrenaline rush having just come back from watching Andre Despatie win the silver medal! So I thought I would try to tire myself out by writing an entry or two this evening.

The flight over was long, but uneventful. At 12:43 in Chicago we found our gateway to the other side of the world and boarded the plane. They did not actually have a safety video on our flight, the safety instructions were done "old school". After listening to the flight attendant botch the instructions for about 5 minutes we taxied down the runway and left for the other side of the world.

About half way over I got really really cold and could not get warm despite huddling under a blanket and drinking hot beverages. At around 7:45 they showed the position of the plane, so this would explain my sudden journey towards hypothermia:

The picture I did not manage to get was the one that showed the temperature outside the plane was a balmy -56 degrees celsius. To add to my torture, they flashed up how long we had been on the plane, and how far we had left go to. After fretting about the fact that I was unable to go outside for the next few thousand miles, I decided to pull out my IPod and listened to jazz to put myself to sleep. But in the end we made it safely, and as Paul had said in his earlier blog, the staff on the flight were excellent. They managed to keep a smile on their faces despite the fact I kept ordering coffee in order to stay warm.

We arrived in Beijing and found a taxi. The driver could not speak any English, so I pulled out the handy flashcard that Chunling wrote out that said "Take me to the guesthouse at **address witheld**". The driver had to phone the guesthouse to get directions, and eventually we arrived. Chunling's father was there to greet us and help us get settled. I must thank them again for all their assistance as there is no way Paul and I would have been able to find our way here and get checked in with the amount of Chinese that the two of us collectively know.

We wandered around the area for a while to keep from going to sleep too soon, then decided to have some supper. We decided to go to the restaurant at the guesthouse. As we made our way around the corner, we found the entrance that contains what we now refer to as the licorice door. Paul and I ordered our meals by pointing at the pictures on the menu. After eating supper, we went to bed, and that was the conclusion of our journey to the other side of the world.

I'm awake now

Well, as Lori said in her last update, we arrived safely in Beijing after the most incredible flight I have ever been on.

We left Toronto on Friday in the morning, nice and sunny and light. We landed in Chicago in the same kind of weather.

In the early afternoon, our flight left Chicago for Beijing. When we boarded the plane, all the shades were pulled down and that was kind of strange to me because I love to look out the window and see what is passing beneath us, if we can.

As the plane took off and the captain announced our flight path, I realized, we are going to be in daylight and sunshine until the Saturday night, after we arrive in Beijing.

The flight went as normal until the most amazing sight happened. Out the window, we could see ice floes in the Arctic Ocean as we made our way through the Northwest Territories, out over the Ocean and through Alaska and on into Siberia.

It was amazing watching the scenery switch from ice floes to barren Siberian Tundra, absolute beauty of a kind I had never seen before.

When we landed in Beijing, the airport was awesome. It is huge an there are signs everywhere in Chinese and English.

Once we cleared Customs, we had to take a train to another terminal to collect our baggage. Once we had baggage in hand, we were finally able to go outside for a cigarette. It's amazing, in a country full of smokers, you can not smoke in the new buildings. I was impressed with this, but it did make me more anxious for a cigarette. I didn't really want one until we were on the ground in Beijing 13 1/2 hours after leaving Chicago.

We managed to find the taxi rank, after a cigarette or two, and had to queue up for our taxi.

The taxi ride was a little long but interesting. On our way to our guesthouse, we passed the Olympic site (very far off in the distance) and were able to see the National Stadium (Birds Nest), the torch and the Media Pagoda.

We are staying off the beaten path, which in our opinion is great.

The area we are staying in is a fascinating area in the west of Beijing close the Olympic Baseball Stadiums.

We get to witness everyday Beijingers going about their everyday life.

Once we were checked in to the guesthouse, we decided to explore our neighbourhood a little. After our little tour, we decided to head back to the guesthouse and have some dinner in the restaurant.

The restaurant is in a little courtyard and has these amazing coverings over the open door that remind me of the long thing strings of licorice I used to eat when I was a kid, we now refer to this door as the licorice door. At times it can be very challenging to navigate as the licorice will get all tangled at the bottom and you don't see it until you spread the licorice and try to walk through, only to be caught in a tangle of licorice. As this has happened a few times, Lori and I think that they do it on purpose just laugh at the silly westerners.

Everyone in the restaurant is amazingly friendly.

They sat us at our table with our menu and as Lori and I were looking at the pictures of food and the English names, a little 10 year old girl came over said 'what do you like', of course, my reply was pancakes (Chinese pancakes with spring onion and garlic, fried and very very good). She giggled and went back to her mother at the next table. She kept coming back to us and speaking to us in English and laughing and giggling and dancing around. She told me her name was Lili and asked me what my name was (Lori thinks this was her pick up line) so I said, my name is Paul. It took her a few tries and she finally got it.

Lili was as sweet as you could imagine and little girl to be and so full of energy. Her mother was equally as nice and, at seeing our please willingness to interact with Lili, encouraged her daughter to ask us more questions. When Lili and her mother left the restaurant, they wished us a good night in English and Chinese.

On Sunday we went to pick up our tickets at the will call window for two of our events, but lo and behold, befuddled Paul forgot to bring all the correct information. So, after walking around the outside perimeter of Tian 'an men Square (from the opposite side of the street) we decided to head back to the guest house, go to an internet cafe and find the directions in my email (we didn't have an internet connection in the room at this point).

Off we went to the internet cafe we had spotted when touring our neighbourhood the day before.

After waiting for a Dutch guy to finish his one fingered emails and uploading photos, we were finally free to get the directions to where the will call window was. Back on the subway we go.

We took the subway further than we had been earlier and followed the directions to a 20 building complex of highrises that Jan Wong wrote about in Beijing Confidential, we had to go to the SOHO complex.

The Beijing subway is a fascinating place. Each of the new cars has these electronic subway maps of the line you are traveling on and the light indicators turn red as you pass a station. 

Lori and I were standing in the subway, there is no way to get a seat, and at this one stop a man, his wife and their baby got on, the baby was so cute and adorable. The man was holding his son and some nice gentleman stood up to give him a seat. As he sat down the baby started looking around and playing with a lady's purse who was sitting beside them. After a little while, the baby started looking around the subway and turned, as he turned he spread his legs and out fell everything he owned (peepee and testicles) through a slit in his pants. Thanks to Jan Wong (Red China Blues) this bit of culture shock made me laugh instead of being mortified as I would have been in Toronto. Thanks to Jan Wong, and Laura for lending me the books, my shock was non-existent.

Off we went to SOHO and found our will call window. Once inside, the guy was helping an Australian and then turned to us and asked for our confirmations. Being anal, I pulled out my portfolio for the trip, went to the folder for the will call window, pulled out my papers with my confirmation numbers highlighted for the events that I was picking up tickets for. The guy turns to this Australian gal and says to her, with a sense of relief 'you see, this is what you need, your confirmation number. I can't read your confirmation number and that is why I can't find your tickets'.

The guy brings us our tickets and very proudly pulls out the closing ceremony tickets and explains that they are green for the jade of China. Then he hands over the other set of tickets for the decathelon and asks us to check them to make sure they are accurate. 

What a great sense of completion in planning the trip. We now have all the tickets for our events.

We then wandered around SOHO for a bit and found this cool little coffee shop and had some coffee, there was no plain coffee, it all came with alcohol in it. Very good and very relaxing. There is nothing better than sitting in a restaurant/coffee shop drinking a coffee and having a cigarette.

Off we went to the CBD (Central Business District) to see the amazing architecture of high rise buildings. But wait, I had to stop, here I was in Beijing, China and I was stopped by a Cartier store, then Dolce and Gabana, Armani and Louis Vuitton. A very nice surprise. I felt like I was at home.

After some walking around, navigating the streets, crossing the road in Beijing can be an extreme sport, unless you put yourself into the middle of a crowd of locals. The taxis, busses, cars and the worst of all, bicycles are all mad drivers here. It is amazing.

Back to the guest house for a quiet dinner and off to bed, still feeling done in by the jetlag.

Going to dinner, of course, the licorice door got me again, almost tripping me, I think the staff do it just to laugh at me because they know I will never be able to properly navigate the door.

Monday brought a whole new day and I will leave that update to Lori.