My Chinese Baba is a Sketchy Old Man

Today was, on the whole, a very nice day. We rose with the dawn for a tour of Beijing, which included Jianshan Park, Tian'anmen Square, and Wang Fu Jing. Jianshan Park is very beautiful, with huge crowds of people doing tai qi and playing badminton and hackey sack. My favorite was an old man doing tai qi in his wheelchair, waving his arms around with an expression of dead seriousness on his face. Tian'anmen was rather dull, as it's just a big concrete area with pictures of Mao here and there, similar to everyplace else in Beijing. There wasn't time to view his body, as the line was very long, so we just stood around complaining of the cold until we were allowed back on the bus.

Wang Fu Jing was fun. As far as I can tell, it's just a sort of restaurant and shopping area, kind of touristy and full of white foreigners. We had an unremarkable lunch in the food court, then visited the foreign book store. Here's what I love: English. The foreign bookstore had a lot of interesting choices for children's books. For instance, I did not expect to see so much E. Nesbit. Also: why Jo's Boys instead of Little Women? It was amusing to compare the "Classics" section, all Tolstoy and Wilde and whatnot, and the "Modern Fiction" which was all Danielle Steele and romance novels and so on. I wanted to get a Chinese copy of Harry Potter, but I couldn't find them. Instead I got This Side of Paradise and a book of short stories by various authors, which should hold me for awhile. It's funny how quickly I've adjusted to the money system. My books were each 30 kuai, which is enough for two good meals, and I was a bit ashamed of the expense before I realized ... that's less than $3. I absolutely love China.

The bad thing, however, was meeting my Chinese Host Family. By which I mean, my Chinese Host Middle-Aged Man. We're supposed to be two students to a family, but my "Gege [elder brother]" had not yet arrived in Beijing, so it was just me. And this guy. And the silence. And the (to an American) awkward questions such as "What is your father's salary?" And the silence. And the rapid, slurred, thick-accented Chinese. And the awkwardness. Me. And my Zhongguo Baba.

After what seemed like an eternity, he finally left and I let out a huge sigh of relief. I had respirated too soon, however, as a few minutes later he was back, my Gege in tow. He proceeded to tell my Gege, whose name I don't remember and whom I shall simply call Gege, all about how terrible my Chinese is and how he (Gege) will have to help me all the time. It was all I could do not to burst into tears. Furthermore I had no one to go to dinner with because EVERYONE ELSE went to dinner with their Chinese families and came back replete with jiaozi and full of high spirits. I dined on bananas, Nina's oranges (which her Chinese Family gave her), Lili's chocolate (which her Chinese family gave her) and yogurt, and sunflower seeds.

Telling my irritating story to all my friends and eating my peculiar dinner cheered me up a great deal, however, and we watched Corpse Bride and I kept expecting it to be in Chinese, and all was well.

I know I really ought to go out a-drinkin' with my classmates, but. I'm already in my pajamas, it's 11 o'clock, and they're planning on having Bai Jiu, which I hear makes you go blind. I haven't been out to a single bar yet, although last night at the disastrous Hot Pot restaurant* I did have half a Yanjing Pijiu [beer] (O vile concoction!) Another time, perhaps.

*Last night twelve of us went out to a Hot Pot restaurant, which is when there's a hot plate in the middle of the table with a pot of boiling broth in it and you stick taro and fish heads and mutton and cow stomach in it until it's ready to throw away. I ate a fish head. I felt its eye like a bubble tea bubble explode EYE-ISHLY on my palate, and then I picked its bones out of my mouth. I'm sorry; what was that, Aunt Carol? The Italians fed you bunny? FISH HEAD. OH YES. Even Yanjing Pijiu cannot wash that away. Plus it was so spicy I thought steam would come out of my ears. Plus I spilled most of my sauce on myself. However, as I sat there with my comrades, speaking our pidgin Chinese and knowing we'd be sick upon the morrow, I was completely happy. At that moment, there was nowhere I'd rather have been than Beijing.


Tomorrow: homework, convocation, and possibly ... going to the bank!