This is mostly coming "straight from the horses mouth" if you will, so I'll allow myself some leeway.
I have noticed for some while that foreigners - as frightening as they might have originally been considered - are representing something of coolness here. It is true that I'm being stared at a lot, but 95% of the time - this is with some sort of admiration. A lot of Chinese - mainly young people and children - just love to communicate with foreigners, even if that means just saying "hello" or "how are you?".
In my case, there's the added advantage of the protruding belly - it seems like Chinese people just cannot get enough of the Buddha thing I have going - this might just be the thing that keeps getting me all them free drinks.
This is one with the clubs, and the dancing - copied 1-to-1 from MTV, all apart of feeling closer to western culture. They see a foreigner in a club, and they expect her/him to automatically pull out some serious MTV dancing routines.
With that, and maybe because of that - Chinese men fear nothing more than a foreigner man next to their girlfriend.
Teach (my teacher of the last few weeks) is 26, coming from a city in Henan (just north east of the area I'll be traveling). Her big dream is to open a Bar of her own when she's 35. In the meantime, she really enjoys teaching Chinese to foreigners. She started with this accidentally, by helping out a foreigner woman on the street, and now left her hotel-job to join this school and teach me (yes, I was the first experiment).
Teach says that it is quite difficult for Chinese men to accept that she is working in the vicinity of foreigners. She was recently on what might be considered a first date. All was going well until the guy asked her what she was doing for work.
She told him she was teaching Chinese (bad move), and he asked "Chinese? who are you teaching Chinese? ..."
And there you go - this was the end of it.
Generally speaking, it seems that most of Chinese men will find it very difficult to live with the fact that their wife-oriented girlfriend or their wife will have work that puts them in touch with foreigners.
And this can be pretty tough for women that have passed 25, and are fearing getting to 30 without marriage - becoming what is known as 3S ladies - originally coined for Single, Seventies (born) and Stuck, but we can generalize by replacing Seventies with Thirties (age). See here.
The foreigner thing is rather a singular case of a broader picture - not unfamiliar to men all around the world - we (men) being jealous of capable independent women. The point just seems to magnify itself and be crystal clear, rather than sub-conscious when it comes to the foreigner issue.
I said wife-oriented girlfriend before, as this apparently can be quite specific. As teach says (she can say it, as she was quite in love with a married-man with a 7-yearold daughter), girlfriends and wife are separate things here.
Creating a family is an expectation and tradition, and both men and women feel the pressure to get there in their 20's (the law actually forbids women to marry here before they're 20, and men before they're 22 - but nobody seems to care). So they opt to quickly find someone suitable for starting a family, but then many times find other forms of fun or love outside the nest.
Not highly surprising, when you hear about the expectations from Teach's last boyfriend. That boyfriend comes from a small city in Guizhou province. For context, here's a quite from Lonely Planet: " Poor Guizhou, always the short-end-of-the-stick southwest China province. A much-quoted proverb has it as a place 'without three li of flat land, three days of fine weather, or three cents to rub together', Ouch. "
The guy is now "making it", jumping between Kunming and Chengdu (capital of Sichuan province). The guy was expecting Teach - if they were to be married - to go and live with his family back in Guizhou, while he will continue working (and partying) between Kunming and Chengdu. (she said "no" by the way)
This is quite the norm in many cases - not something that was never heard of. While Teach is really fond of drinking and bars, she's not really into the club thing. She has a friend though - a married man, with his wife and daughter leaving in some remote town while he's working the Kunming-Chengdu line. She says that he really likes the clubs, and has numerous "close" female friends.
You're getting the picture, but this is just one woman telling a story, so I asked for the opinion of Lin Yang (fabricated name). Lin is 25 (just entering the pressure zone), half Han and Half Yi (minority). Came to Kunming from a small town not too far off. She's been in Kunming working in a Jewelery shop for the last 5 years, and she has a boyfriend she's been living together with for the last 2 years. She originally thought she wants to marry the guy, but seems like she's recently going through some second thoughts. Her boyfriend recently told her that she's a bit too much on the chubby side, and he might not marry her. Her parents don't really like him, and would rather she doesn't marry him.
I asked Lin whether she would go for a combo as described above - marrying a guy and joining his family in some remote location (where she would probably be a slave of the mother-in-law), while he will continue to work in the city. She said that she doesn't like the idea, but that probably she will agree indeed.
.
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Kunming 昆明 - Part II
Continued from Kunming 昆明 - part I ...
I did promise to talk a bit about the club thing here. Clubs and bars are not really what you'd call traditional China, but they seem to be abundant in all big cities.
It's definitely an interesting mix of old and new.
The clubs usually have a mix of music, but all and all focused on trashy club-trance, technosized dance and Chinese hits, and most important - make it loud (nothing new so far).
Although these are - generally speaking - clubs, and the atmosphere is dancing, most of the clubs don't really have a proper dance floor (a few do), but rather the full place is filled with small round tables all over what was supposed to be the dance floor (and why not, if people are ready to stand there and buy an extra bottle).
These clubs usually add on some color in the way of some life acts - triplets of skinny dancers with minimal clothing, drag queens, Chinese pop wannabe singers. These moments are usually when the music might get semi-descent for a little while.
"Disco" in Kundu is as trashy a place as you can get, but it has an operational dance-floor, with a nice ratio of about 100 men/ 1 woman, and a wannabe radio-MC's that interrupt the music every roughly 20 seconds, so if you have some patience you can enjoy it. Around 1:15, just after the daily drag-queen finishes her thing, there's a moment of descent trance when they put on "Infected Mushroom".
Drinks of the day are warm Beers - bought at multiples (usually, about a dozen a time), or Whiskey mixed generously with room-temperature green tea. Either is drunk from very small glasses.
The beers are around 3-3.5%, and so is the mix of Whiskey with tea (thank god for that).
The whiskey, is the local breweries finest, usually bottled in your choice of Chivas Regal or Johnie Walker Black. If you really want to splash out - you are entertaining people or female company and you feel for some reason that you want to show off with spending extra money - you can usually opt in to pay twice and have the same Whiskey presented in a more classic way (say, in a 18 year-old Chivas bottle).
The tendency in the clubs is to try and get you a table, were you would normally be presented with a menu suggesting that you buy a whole bottle of Whiskey or a couple of dozen beer-bottles. They seem to fail to understand that one person does not require a whole bottle (or a table). And it's not necessarily a language barrier.
Not to despair. The trick is to arrive when the place is full - so they do not really have any tables to try and sit you at. Arriving to the main club areas after 11:30 or so, will usually allow one to just be ignored entering the place, and then go around as you will and enjoy.
This version of clubbing is so not standard, that it might actually be difficult in this case to get yourself a drink, or even find out where the bar is hidden.
Also, most of the clubs only (!) stock Whiskey and beers (bad beers), so you'd need to do some club-hopping to find out one where you can get your Cuba Libre flowing. But if you're ready to experiment a bit, and walk out whenever someone insists on escorting you to a table of your own - you'll be in for a good evening before too long.
While standing around the tables and drinking, it is highly important to have some drinking-facilitation. This comes in the form of games. There are a few favorites around, and it most of the clubs you'll see most of the people deeply occupied with padded glasses (usually red) from which they are rolling dice, or otherwise you'd see them playing cards or waving their hands frantically as they play group-stone-paper-scissors. I'm starting to slowly get the idea behind some of these, so might at some point do a post with the rules for some of these.
Getting the point, however, doesn't really help matters - as you might end up being too good and hence not drinking enough - bad company in other words.
There is one game, however, which stands out as a clear all-around favorite.
Called "get the foreigner drunk". EVERYBODY just loves this game, and I actually enjoyed it on my first night.
Really, if you don't mind drinking only the tea'd-Whiskey and warm beers, there is not particular need to spend money at all. You just get to a club, and stand or stroll slowly between the tables. They all stare at the foreigner anyway (Kunming is actually full with foreigners, but it seems they like to hang out together in foreigner-oriented bars, so I very rarely saw any foreigners inside the clubs so far), so before too long - someone will add to the smile a "cheers" movement. You can reply with an empty hand (which will speed up the next step), or cling glasses and have a sip (which will bring the next step just as fast), and then they'll signal you to get close to the table, where a glass is already being filled for you with beer/ whiskey. They might let you off the hook the first time (that's in the case that first toast will include all residents of the table), but by the second glass if they're patient, they'll make you understand they expect you to drink-up properly. This is because they person you just drank with did the same.
Only that the table is with 10 people around it, and once you've cleared the glass, it's being filled again so that you can drink with the next person down the line. When the table is more or less done with the round, there can be a few options (and don't forget, there is not much communication involved other than the toasts).
Possibly, if they found you really intriguing (and you have not found the experience too boring yet), they might continue with toasts, this time more sporadically, not in clear round-the-table order, and will point for you some nice girls (I cannot say about pointing boys for girls, as I hadn't had the pleasure). This is true event if they are themselves girls (assuming a mixed table). Also, usually, you'd find out quickly enough that a table nearby wants a piece of the action, so you'd be pulled a bit to have some drinks with them as well.
Sometimes, they'd actually release you after the first round by smiling politely while waving you goodbye.
On my first night here, I was actually pulled away from the table I was drinking with by some nice Chinese girl. The people at the table with me motioned me positively to go and follow her (she was not from the next table). I had a feeling that this was something of a more official nature, as I was following her towards the exit of the club, but just as we reached the exit, she turned right, and after a few more meters we reached a table with her friends. She just wanted to treat her friends for a round of their favorite game, after which I got the sign that I can go back to my original "friends".
At nights like this, you really get to appreciate the super-weak beers, the extra tea in the Whiskey, and especially the extra-small glasses. It all suddenly makes sense.
I was surprised to find out that not a lot of people in the school (living here for a while) have noticed that, but Kunming has what seems to be a surprisingly big Gay community. At least on the male part. This might not be as straightforward to see, I guess (if you're blind), since a lot of men here can be seen as having somewhat of a gayish behavior - specially around foreigners in clubs - and even the gays tend to not kiss here outdoors, but still - this can get quite obvious. The men-women ratio, as mentioned, is not favoring men, so you might not be sure at a first glance, but on some nights in some clubs, and on the streets as well, this is becoming more and more obvious for anyone who cares to look.
I wouldn't know to say much about a gay "scene" here as such, and I didn't run into any gay clubs per-se, but they are definitely here in numbers, and not hiding.
Another option in Kunming, is to go for a bit of inspiration on Green-lake park. Specially in the evenings (or early mornings, as I hear well from my window), you can find people practice their Chinese-opera singing (usually, they have been practicing for many many years with no apparent success, but are not deterred by this technicality), Tai-chi, or what seems to be quite popular, dancing in groups to the sound of Techno. The Techno groups are mixed with a tendency for older crowd, and there's usually some sort of a leader-figure that in between tracks gives instructions about the steps for the next track. Really cool staff.
.
I did promise to talk a bit about the club thing here. Clubs and bars are not really what you'd call traditional China, but they seem to be abundant in all big cities.
It's definitely an interesting mix of old and new.
The clubs usually have a mix of music, but all and all focused on trashy club-trance, technosized dance and Chinese hits, and most important - make it loud (nothing new so far).
Although these are - generally speaking - clubs, and the atmosphere is dancing, most of the clubs don't really have a proper dance floor (a few do), but rather the full place is filled with small round tables all over what was supposed to be the dance floor (and why not, if people are ready to stand there and buy an extra bottle).
 |
| Kundu club |
These clubs usually add on some color in the way of some life acts - triplets of skinny dancers with minimal clothing, drag queens, Chinese pop wannabe singers. These moments are usually when the music might get semi-descent for a little while.
"Disco" in Kundu is as trashy a place as you can get, but it has an operational dance-floor, with a nice ratio of about 100 men/ 1 woman, and a wannabe radio-MC's that interrupt the music every roughly 20 seconds, so if you have some patience you can enjoy it. Around 1:15, just after the daily drag-queen finishes her thing, there's a moment of descent trance when they put on "Infected Mushroom".
Drinks of the day are warm Beers - bought at multiples (usually, about a dozen a time), or Whiskey mixed generously with room-temperature green tea. Either is drunk from very small glasses.
The beers are around 3-3.5%, and so is the mix of Whiskey with tea (thank god for that).
The whiskey, is the local breweries finest, usually bottled in your choice of Chivas Regal or Johnie Walker Black. If you really want to splash out - you are entertaining people or female company and you feel for some reason that you want to show off with spending extra money - you can usually opt in to pay twice and have the same Whiskey presented in a more classic way (say, in a 18 year-old Chivas bottle).
The tendency in the clubs is to try and get you a table, were you would normally be presented with a menu suggesting that you buy a whole bottle of Whiskey or a couple of dozen beer-bottles. They seem to fail to understand that one person does not require a whole bottle (or a table). And it's not necessarily a language barrier.
Not to despair. The trick is to arrive when the place is full - so they do not really have any tables to try and sit you at. Arriving to the main club areas after 11:30 or so, will usually allow one to just be ignored entering the place, and then go around as you will and enjoy.
This version of clubbing is so not standard, that it might actually be difficult in this case to get yourself a drink, or even find out where the bar is hidden.
Also, most of the clubs only (!) stock Whiskey and beers (bad beers), so you'd need to do some club-hopping to find out one where you can get your Cuba Libre flowing. But if you're ready to experiment a bit, and walk out whenever someone insists on escorting you to a table of your own - you'll be in for a good evening before too long.
While standing around the tables and drinking, it is highly important to have some drinking-facilitation. This comes in the form of games. There are a few favorites around, and it most of the clubs you'll see most of the people deeply occupied with padded glasses (usually red) from which they are rolling dice, or otherwise you'd see them playing cards or waving their hands frantically as they play group-stone-paper-scissors. I'm starting to slowly get the idea behind some of these, so might at some point do a post with the rules for some of these.
Getting the point, however, doesn't really help matters - as you might end up being too good and hence not drinking enough - bad company in other words.
 |
| Assorted Yunnan mushrooms on a Kunming street |
There is one game, however, which stands out as a clear all-around favorite.
Called "get the foreigner drunk". EVERYBODY just loves this game, and I actually enjoyed it on my first night.
Really, if you don't mind drinking only the tea'd-Whiskey and warm beers, there is not particular need to spend money at all. You just get to a club, and stand or stroll slowly between the tables. They all stare at the foreigner anyway (Kunming is actually full with foreigners, but it seems they like to hang out together in foreigner-oriented bars, so I very rarely saw any foreigners inside the clubs so far), so before too long - someone will add to the smile a "cheers" movement. You can reply with an empty hand (which will speed up the next step), or cling glasses and have a sip (which will bring the next step just as fast), and then they'll signal you to get close to the table, where a glass is already being filled for you with beer/ whiskey. They might let you off the hook the first time (that's in the case that first toast will include all residents of the table), but by the second glass if they're patient, they'll make you understand they expect you to drink-up properly. This is because they person you just drank with did the same.
Only that the table is with 10 people around it, and once you've cleared the glass, it's being filled again so that you can drink with the next person down the line. When the table is more or less done with the round, there can be a few options (and don't forget, there is not much communication involved other than the toasts).
Possibly, if they found you really intriguing (and you have not found the experience too boring yet), they might continue with toasts, this time more sporadically, not in clear round-the-table order, and will point for you some nice girls (I cannot say about pointing boys for girls, as I hadn't had the pleasure). This is true event if they are themselves girls (assuming a mixed table). Also, usually, you'd find out quickly enough that a table nearby wants a piece of the action, so you'd be pulled a bit to have some drinks with them as well.
Sometimes, they'd actually release you after the first round by smiling politely while waving you goodbye.
 |
| Midday Siesta in Kunming, by the East Pagoda |
On my first night here, I was actually pulled away from the table I was drinking with by some nice Chinese girl. The people at the table with me motioned me positively to go and follow her (she was not from the next table). I had a feeling that this was something of a more official nature, as I was following her towards the exit of the club, but just as we reached the exit, she turned right, and after a few more meters we reached a table with her friends. She just wanted to treat her friends for a round of their favorite game, after which I got the sign that I can go back to my original "friends".
At nights like this, you really get to appreciate the super-weak beers, the extra tea in the Whiskey, and especially the extra-small glasses. It all suddenly makes sense.
 |
| Taking a stroll - Kunming streets |
I wouldn't know to say much about a gay "scene" here as such, and I didn't run into any gay clubs per-se, but they are definitely here in numbers, and not hiding.
Another option in Kunming, is to go for a bit of inspiration on Green-lake park. Specially in the evenings (or early mornings, as I hear well from my window), you can find people practice their Chinese-opera singing (usually, they have been practicing for many many years with no apparent success, but are not deterred by this technicality), Tai-chi, or what seems to be quite popular, dancing in groups to the sound of Techno. The Techno groups are mixed with a tendency for older crowd, and there's usually some sort of a leader-figure that in between tracks gives instructions about the steps for the next track. Really cool staff.
 |
| Street beggars - definitely exist here, but very easygoing for China - no groping, no heavy insitence - nothing like what one will experience in Shanghai or Shenzhen |
.
Friday, August 20, 2010
Kunming 昆明 - part I
If you're interested in some general information and stats about Kunming, you can go ahead and look here.
To cover the basics for context, Kunming is the capital of Yunnan Province, has a population of 3-8 million (depends on definition and who you're asking), and is quite elevated at 1,900m - the last fact has helped get it its nickname "spring city".
Yunnan - the province - is the south-western-most province in China, bordering with Vietnam Laos and Burma, and further surrounded by Tibet, Sichuan, Chongqing, Guizhou and Guangxi.
As the capital city of Yunnan, you can find here people and food influenced by the surroundings and various ethnicities,mainly Hui (Muslims), Dai (Thai related) and Yi, but unfortunately, the Hui are not as connected to the Muslim Asians as those in Xinjiang (the north-western-most Province), and there is a clear lack of Lamb meat dishes around.
Kunming's elevation/ moderate weather/ "Spring city" status can remind one of Dublin in a few ways. For one, there is a relative lack of mosquitoes. This was quite a surprising finding, as some pre-reading suggested that mosquitoes are around as much as in any other place (minus Ireland), as did the nets on all the windows in my apartment.
OK, the nets on the windows, and the 24th floor dwelling may be of some influence, but I still found it surprising to have waited a whole week before getting beaten for the first time, including a couple of days in Jiang-Shui to the south - a city with a lot of water and rice paddies around it.
And there's the weather. Yes, it's August, and it can get at time pretty hot, but in this area, getting as hot as 30 degrees, is as good as it gets. The weather really does resemble Dublin - on an average day, you can go through the 4 seasons, from a strong rain to clear sunny skies, from chilly to hot. It's only about 5-10 degrees above the average temperatures in Dublin.
The Game of the day in Kunming is playing Chicken with the cars/ buses/ taxis and the thousands of small electrical scooters on the streets. In most of the road you want to cross, you will not find proper traffic-lights, although the traffic is quite heavy, and the way to go is just go and hope for the best. None of the vehicles is taking much note of any of the traffic rules or signs anyway.
The way to go is jump in front of the cars, with the assumption that the cars will just decide to stop.
The traffic in Kunming brings us to an important observation (just before we can to some fun staff about clubs and drinking, so hang in there).
The traffic is just a small example of what I see more and more to be the most fertile ground for Game-Theorists. Behavior of the Chinese seems to be as basically rationale (in a pure economic sense) as it gets, every behavior being cost-benefit based (on the personal level), driven strongly by considerations of gains and losses.
This means that China can be a great place to experiment and implement economic behavioral theories, a great place for government intervention mechanisms, Mechanism Design implementations, etc.
This also (probably) implies that old-school management techniques applying good-old stick-and-carrot probably work best here.
"Cheap talk" is at revealing itself here in full, and any verbal agreements between people here, are only held to the extent that those agreements work well for all parties later on.
I spent most of last week here with no light in the bathroom. On Friday, when my roommate (Zhang Laoshi, you remember him) finished partially repairing the pipe issue (don't ask), it turns out that on the way the light somehow stopped working. As I notified the American here (Jonathan), he said no problem, Zhang is heading anyway for some shopping today (Friday), so he'll buy a new light on the way.
On Saturday, I notified Jonathan again that I am still taking showers in the dump, and got the usual: "oh? But Zhang said he fixed it. I'll see to it, it will be fixed today. Sounds good."
On Sunday morning, I ran into Zhang in the apartment. He casually asked me about drinking together that evening. In return, I opted for losing face, and raised my voice a bit when asking him about the light in the bathroom. He said "I'm not sure there's a problem". ...
I ended up raising the tone a notch when asking him how can it take a whole week to change a bulb. This of course would not have had a particular influence other than where the conversation has started.
That evening we were sharing a couple of glasses of BaiJiu and MiJiu (52% and 25% local alcohols), enjoying the light coming out of the bathroom.
.
To cover the basics for context, Kunming is the capital of Yunnan Province, has a population of 3-8 million (depends on definition and who you're asking), and is quite elevated at 1,900m - the last fact has helped get it its nickname "spring city".
Yunnan - the province - is the south-western-most province in China, bordering with Vietnam Laos and Burma, and further surrounded by Tibet, Sichuan, Chongqing, Guizhou and Guangxi.
As the capital city of Yunnan, you can find here people and food influenced by the surroundings and various ethnicities,mainly Hui (Muslims), Dai (Thai related) and Yi, but unfortunately, the Hui are not as connected to the Muslim Asians as those in Xinjiang (the north-western-most Province), and there is a clear lack of Lamb meat dishes around.
 |
| Kunming at night |
Kunming's elevation/ moderate weather/ "Spring city" status can remind one of Dublin in a few ways. For one, there is a relative lack of mosquitoes. This was quite a surprising finding, as some pre-reading suggested that mosquitoes are around as much as in any other place (minus Ireland), as did the nets on all the windows in my apartment.
OK, the nets on the windows, and the 24th floor dwelling may be of some influence, but I still found it surprising to have waited a whole week before getting beaten for the first time, including a couple of days in Jiang-Shui to the south - a city with a lot of water and rice paddies around it.
And there's the weather. Yes, it's August, and it can get at time pretty hot, but in this area, getting as hot as 30 degrees, is as good as it gets. The weather really does resemble Dublin - on an average day, you can go through the 4 seasons, from a strong rain to clear sunny skies, from chilly to hot. It's only about 5-10 degrees above the average temperatures in Dublin.
 |
| Taking the kids for some recreation in the city center |
 |
| Kunming's main commercial street |
The way to go is jump in front of the cars, with the assumption that the cars will just decide to stop.
The traffic in Kunming brings us to an important observation (just before we can to some fun staff about clubs and drinking, so hang in there).
 |
| reminiscing on better days |
The traffic is just a small example of what I see more and more to be the most fertile ground for Game-Theorists. Behavior of the Chinese seems to be as basically rationale (in a pure economic sense) as it gets, every behavior being cost-benefit based (on the personal level), driven strongly by considerations of gains and losses.
This means that China can be a great place to experiment and implement economic behavioral theories, a great place for government intervention mechanisms, Mechanism Design implementations, etc.
This also (probably) implies that old-school management techniques applying good-old stick-and-carrot probably work best here.
"Cheap talk" is at revealing itself here in full, and any verbal agreements between people here, are only held to the extent that those agreements work well for all parties later on.
I spent most of last week here with no light in the bathroom. On Friday, when my roommate (Zhang Laoshi, you remember him) finished partially repairing the pipe issue (don't ask), it turns out that on the way the light somehow stopped working. As I notified the American here (Jonathan), he said no problem, Zhang is heading anyway for some shopping today (Friday), so he'll buy a new light on the way.
On Saturday, I notified Jonathan again that I am still taking showers in the dump, and got the usual: "oh? But Zhang said he fixed it. I'll see to it, it will be fixed today. Sounds good."
On Sunday morning, I ran into Zhang in the apartment. He casually asked me about drinking together that evening. In return, I opted for losing face, and raised my voice a bit when asking him about the light in the bathroom. He said "I'm not sure there's a problem". ...
I ended up raising the tone a notch when asking him how can it take a whole week to change a bulb. This of course would not have had a particular influence other than where the conversation has started.
That evening we were sharing a couple of glasses of BaiJiu and MiJiu (52% and 25% local alcohols), enjoying the light coming out of the bathroom.
 |
| One of the few cities within the city - the East Pagoda |
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
A soft landing (kind of)
Have to start with a small disclaimer - worry not (reading the title) that everything is 100% smooth and there's not really much to report in terms of mischief or trouble making.
Knowing that my 3 readers are into some China-bound action stories, be sure I'd find something to tell you, sitting next to a quiet pond on a lovely warm spring day in Canada.
To keep things short and sweet (per post, relatively speaking), I will just have to split into a few posts at one go, as it took me a while to sit myself down and start updating.
As far as what is ultimately supposed to be a backpack trip in rural China, this was as soft a landing as possible, I guess.
For one, I made it easily enough (along with my checked-in bag) all the way through to Kunming, despite of the tight transfers. This includes a 3-hour scheduled transfer in Shanghai - requiring an on-time landing, getting my luggage, clearing customs and immigration, commuting/ locating another terminal, and checking in for the local flight.
This was all done with 2 hours to spare somehow, only to find out last minute that I forgot my iPod on my Shanghai-bound flight. Not an enormous loss on its own, other than I will now be deprived of my music and Chinese listening-courses for the next 3 months - can be quite painful.
And so, I will have to rely on whatever means I will find along the way to help me pick up some Chinese. We'll get to that in notime.
As of the landing's softness, I had someone pick me up at Kunming's airport, and take me directly to my pre-designated apartment. Well, there you go ... not really the pre-designated apartment.
Although I was promised a fully-furnished apartment in a specific location, to be shared with other students of this so called "language school", they forgot to mention they had some logistical change-of-plans, and so relocated me to their "new apartment", which I am to share with one of the Chinese employees of the company - as it happens, the only one who does not speak any English other than "Long live Chairman Mao".
"New" in this case, refers mainly to the fact that they had no time to equip the apartment with a lot of the essentials, which they apparently plan to slowly add up, with me serving as a free consultant on what's missing - not a bad deal, only that my consultancy fee here is not too exciting. There's a whole kitchen that they proudly showed me when I entered, but I soon found out that the Gas-cooker is without gas, the fridge is within-plans, no kettle, no utensils, .... you get the picture.
Plasma TV with extra stereo-speakers, but not connected to the cables (the box is there). etc etc.
As I said though - soft landing - as much as it will get to here. I'm on the 24th floor, overlooking the city-center's famous "green lake" park, the shower does work, and does have hot water, I have a bed, there's a leaving room with couches.
Oh yea, and I have a fully Chinese-capable roommate. Yea. Chinese non-privacy and all. He's called Zhang. Excellent, extremely friendly and touchy guy. Old-school, and yet very open to experience the weird foreigner mind. One of my proudest moments thus far is when I managed to get him to say "Drink Tea" (rather than "drink'a-tea") - not as easy as it sounds.
Zhang is ex-military, and not a newbie to Kunming or Yunnan - he was down in the south of Yunnan bombarding Vietnamese cities back in the days. He's actually from Shanxi province.
Zhang is very caring, as I said, so after I found myself locked out of the apartment one night at 2AM, as he decided to use an extra bolt on the door ... when we were asking him about the extra-locking, he really wanted to know when and where I went out to.
Working with this school's staff on getting things to the apartment, is really a quick-course into some work and general ethics here. Of course, this is about to be a very generalized quick-and-dirty generalization, but that's how observations work. Reliability, Accountability, Delivery ... not really. And I'm actually talking directly to the office's American program manager. This has been a daily routine, in which I'm being promised that a whole bunch of things would be at the apartment "today". I mean, how difficult can it be to buy a few plates, glasses and a kettle?!
All and all, things are good and comfy - as far as it can get here, I guess. By now I have a fridge, a hot/cold water dispenser (bottled), bought a few DVD's for the TV, got a local phone, laying low in a big city (next little post on that I guess), listening to Chinese-opera enthusiasts at the park from the 24th floor.
Knowing that my 3 readers are into some China-bound action stories, be sure I'd find something to tell you, sitting next to a quiet pond on a lovely warm spring day in Canada.
To keep things short and sweet (per post, relatively speaking), I will just have to split into a few posts at one go, as it took me a while to sit myself down and start updating.
As far as what is ultimately supposed to be a backpack trip in rural China, this was as soft a landing as possible, I guess.
For one, I made it easily enough (along with my checked-in bag) all the way through to Kunming, despite of the tight transfers. This includes a 3-hour scheduled transfer in Shanghai - requiring an on-time landing, getting my luggage, clearing customs and immigration, commuting/ locating another terminal, and checking in for the local flight.
This was all done with 2 hours to spare somehow, only to find out last minute that I forgot my iPod on my Shanghai-bound flight. Not an enormous loss on its own, other than I will now be deprived of my music and Chinese listening-courses for the next 3 months - can be quite painful.
And so, I will have to rely on whatever means I will find along the way to help me pick up some Chinese. We'll get to that in notime.
As of the landing's softness, I had someone pick me up at Kunming's airport, and take me directly to my pre-designated apartment. Well, there you go ... not really the pre-designated apartment.
 |
| Airport pickup - the only non-Chinese |
Although I was promised a fully-furnished apartment in a specific location, to be shared with other students of this so called "language school", they forgot to mention they had some logistical change-of-plans, and so relocated me to their "new apartment", which I am to share with one of the Chinese employees of the company - as it happens, the only one who does not speak any English other than "Long live Chairman Mao".
"New" in this case, refers mainly to the fact that they had no time to equip the apartment with a lot of the essentials, which they apparently plan to slowly add up, with me serving as a free consultant on what's missing - not a bad deal, only that my consultancy fee here is not too exciting. There's a whole kitchen that they proudly showed me when I entered, but I soon found out that the Gas-cooker is without gas, the fridge is within-plans, no kettle, no utensils, .... you get the picture.
Plasma TV with extra stereo-speakers, but not connected to the cables (the box is there). etc etc.
As I said though - soft landing - as much as it will get to here. I'm on the 24th floor, overlooking the city-center's famous "green lake" park, the shower does work, and does have hot water, I have a bed, there's a leaving room with couches.
 |
| View from my bedroom, over Green Lake and a 100 year-old but active military training facility |
Oh yea, and I have a fully Chinese-capable roommate. Yea. Chinese non-privacy and all. He's called Zhang. Excellent, extremely friendly and touchy guy. Old-school, and yet very open to experience the weird foreigner mind. One of my proudest moments thus far is when I managed to get him to say "Drink Tea" (rather than "drink'a-tea") - not as easy as it sounds.
Zhang is ex-military, and not a newbie to Kunming or Yunnan - he was down in the south of Yunnan bombarding Vietnamese cities back in the days. He's actually from Shanxi province.
Zhang is very caring, as I said, so after I found myself locked out of the apartment one night at 2AM, as he decided to use an extra bolt on the door ... when we were asking him about the extra-locking, he really wanted to know when and where I went out to.
Working with this school's staff on getting things to the apartment, is really a quick-course into some work and general ethics here. Of course, this is about to be a very generalized quick-and-dirty generalization, but that's how observations work. Reliability, Accountability, Delivery ... not really. And I'm actually talking directly to the office's American program manager. This has been a daily routine, in which I'm being promised that a whole bunch of things would be at the apartment "today". I mean, how difficult can it be to buy a few plates, glasses and a kettle?!
All and all, things are good and comfy - as far as it can get here, I guess. By now I have a fridge, a hot/cold water dispenser (bottled), bought a few DVD's for the TV, got a local phone, laying low in a big city (next little post on that I guess), listening to Chinese-opera enthusiasts at the park from the 24th floor.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
THE MAP - Initial travel plans
So here you go.
A map, full with details of the initially planned route for my travels. At least as much details as I could afford to spend the time to put in.
I didn't end up doing the full counting - but it seems like 20~50 minority groups, ~5 religions (not including the classic 3), ~10 mountains, a few rivers, a few gorges, and quite a few villages. Should be interesting to do the hour-count for bus rides.
This is just the initial plan - so no real idea how things will actualy evolve - but should give some good context for some of the stories to come.
Here are the map - some more info and tips/ how-to-read for viewing below.
First part: Landing and starting in Kunming, ending in Chengdu.
Yunnan and Sichuan.
View Ari's China Tour - the Plan in a larger map
Second part: - Continuing from Chengdu and ending in Chengdu, going clockwise.
Chongqing, Hubei, Hunan, Guangxi, Guizhou, Sichuan.
View Ari's China Tour - the Plan in a larger map
The route is split into 2 maps (technical lmitations), which can roughly represent a first and a second part of the overall route, nicely split at Chengdu.
Also, I will have to leave China and come back at some point in September, due to my Visa restrictions - options for where and when are left open for now.
Once you opt into any of the map-manipulation suggestions below, you might want to use Chrome browser - for some improved performance and speed ...
You can click above any of the markers for some additional information.
Change to Satellite view ('Sat' Button) to get a quick feeler of the landscape, or go full blast and try viewing with Earth ('Earth' button).
Points marked in Trquoise are options around the main route (loosely followed rule).
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Ari's list for a trip to China
Following my mom's excellent list of to-do's and packing instructions, I'm left with supplying a short focused list:
Camera: Cannon EOS 550D
Lens: Cannon EFS 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM
Cannon EF 50mm f/1.8
UV Filter: Hama 72mm
Lens Hood: EW-78E
Batteries: LP-E8 x2 + Charger
Memory, Cards: SanDisk SDHC Ultra 16GB Class 4
SanDisk SDHC Extreme 16GB Class 10
Kingston SD 2GB
Memory, HD: mini/ portable HardDisk, 500GB,
preloaded with Cannon SW and manuals
preloaded with Cannon SW and manuals
USB stick: SanDisck Cruzer, 32GB
Remote:Cannon RC-6
Cables
Bag: Compact Crumpler - Jimmy Bo 300
Monday, June 14, 2010
Mom's recommeded planning list for a trip to China
Here's a list of recommendations from my mother, for a 3-months trip to south-west China (Translated from Hebrew with Google Translate):
1. Elongated current passport
2. Visa to China - check if required
3. Vaccines - check if need for the area
4. Vaccination
5. Phone Book
6. Small log book
7. Stationery
8. Pens
9. Rope five meters for strengthening
10. Water resistant plastic bags
11. Raincoat
12. Brass coat
13. Spare shoes
14. Good water sandals
15. Disposable utensils
16. Spare credit card
17. Small vent for the face
18. Money belt
19. Unbreakable mirror
20. Travel Book
21. Maps
22. Magnifying glass
23. Marker
24. Camera
25. Batteries
26. Coffee, tea, sugar
27. Mineral water
28. Cell Phone
29. Luggage
30. Reserve Sunglasses
31. Suntan lotion
32. Water Purification
33. Toilet paper
34. Tissues
35. Wipes
36. Money belt
37. Pouch
38. Waterproof backpack
39. Flashlights
40. Sewing Tools
41. Wide-brimmed hat
42. Knife
43. Snacks: crackers, candy, chewing gum
44. Drugs - a special case: paracetamol, antibiotics, Stoapid for diarrhea, Edxmul colds, Faarmin nausea, Ahiston Allergy, plasters, bandages, iodine, a paste Aniviotit, pressure bandage
Lip dryness, mosquito remedy, Aloe Vera, drops, eye drops. Penisstil
45. Chinese Money
46. Chinese dictionary
47. mp3
Bag Organization
Money belt: money, extra credit, photocopy of passport, air tickets and the hotel
Pouch: lipstick, gum, candy, passport, cell phone, vaccination, mosquito balls, phone book identification., Individual wipes to wipe hands
Backpack "water, tissues, toilet paper, spare glasses, a hat, Stoapid Lshilshul (Diahrreah stopper), iodine, bandages, bandage pressure, charger for mobile,
Camera, batteries, disposable utensils, matches, flashlight, mosquito medicine, sunscreen, Paramin against nausea (In short - First Aid Bag)
Maps, travel-book or take a photocopy of a few pages to keep light, magnifying glass, Marker, a small fan, batteries, hair brush, folding umbrella, waterproof windbreaker.
Briefcase:
Toiletries: shampoo, soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, mirror, shaving, Aftershave, Deodorant.
Small scissors. Short T-shirts, long shirts, sweater, two pair of jeans, a pair of light sweatpants, fleece coat, Underwear, hat for the mountains, spare shoes, flipflops, scarf
Warm socks - a pair of
Socks and sneakers
Short pants
Coffee, tea, sugar bags, milk powder, more spare umbrella.
Can opener
Pretzels.
2. Visa to China - check if required
3. Vaccines - check if need for the area
4. Vaccination
5. Phone Book
6. Small log book
7. Stationery
8. Pens
9. Rope five meters for strengthening
10. Water resistant plastic bags
11. Raincoat
12. Brass coat
13. Spare shoes
14. Good water sandals
15. Disposable utensils
16. Spare credit card
17. Small vent for the face
18. Money belt
19. Unbreakable mirror
20. Travel Book
21. Maps
22. Magnifying glass
23. Marker
24. Camera
25. Batteries
26. Coffee, tea, sugar
27. Mineral water
28. Cell Phone
29. Luggage
30. Reserve Sunglasses
31. Suntan lotion
32. Water Purification
33. Toilet paper
34. Tissues
35. Wipes
36. Money belt
37. Pouch
38. Waterproof backpack
39. Flashlights
40. Sewing Tools
41. Wide-brimmed hat
42. Knife
43. Snacks: crackers, candy, chewing gum
44. Drugs - a special case: paracetamol, antibiotics, Stoapid for diarrhea, Edxmul colds, Faarmin nausea, Ahiston Allergy, plasters, bandages, iodine, a paste Aniviotit, pressure bandage
Lip dryness, mosquito remedy, Aloe Vera, drops, eye drops. Penisstil
45. Chinese Money
46. Chinese dictionary
47. mp3
Bag Organization
Money belt: money, extra credit, photocopy of passport, air tickets and the hotel
Pouch: lipstick, gum, candy, passport, cell phone, vaccination, mosquito balls, phone book identification., Individual wipes to wipe hands
Backpack "water, tissues, toilet paper, spare glasses, a hat, Stoapid Lshilshul (Diahrreah stopper), iodine, bandages, bandage pressure, charger for mobile,
Camera, batteries, disposable utensils, matches, flashlight, mosquito medicine, sunscreen, Paramin against nausea (In short - First Aid Bag)
Maps, travel-book or take a photocopy of a few pages to keep light, magnifying glass, Marker, a small fan, batteries, hair brush, folding umbrella, waterproof windbreaker.
Briefcase:
Toiletries: shampoo, soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, mirror, shaving, Aftershave, Deodorant.
Small scissors. Short T-shirts, long shirts, sweater, two pair of jeans, a pair of light sweatpants, fleece coat, Underwear, hat for the mountains, spare shoes, flipflops, scarf
Warm socks - a pair of
Socks and sneakers
Short pants
Coffee, tea, sugar bags, milk powder, more spare umbrella.
Can opener
Pretzels.
Swimsuit
GPS
Talcum powder
Hand Cream dryness
Friday, June 4, 2010
Heading to China
Yes!
It's been long time coming, and it is finally happening. I'll be taking a full three months' worth of time to experience some of south-west China.
I have to start with saying - you've gotta love Google!
Google is quite famous for perks and food, but really - letting me take a 3-months off to do my thing and come back - that's the real deal. So thank you!
And yes, Google is hiring massively. Check it out.
And now that we've got that out of the way - there is quite a lot to prepare. Over the next two months or so, I'll be sharing some of that enjoyable part of preparation, Travel planning, etc. Just to get everybody into the right spirit and to prepare you for the proper stories ahead.
The blog seems more or less set, some basic monetization is in place (we call it dogfooding), so we're more or less ready to get going.
It's gonna rock!
Visa For China - what is the maximum stay possible
This seemed all along quite straightforward to me. 90 days is kind of a standard tourist visa length, which seemed to be fully in line with my plans anyway. Alas, as I was booking my flight, and had about 24 hours to confirm-pay, I realized that my plans were to be in China for what might be closely calculated as 91 days.
So, as I was trying to run around figuring out how to calculate properly the maximum length of stay on a tourist Visa, I quickly learned on the internet, that there are no really clear rules about the length of Visa you can actually get (never mind how you count). It seems that in the US, for example, one can get a maximum stay of 30, 60 or 90 days - depending on the state in which you apply.
Very commendable! Since it was already late in the afternoon, I sent an email to the chinese embassy at around 18:00, hoping to get some sort of hint the next day about the length of time I can expect to be allowed on the Visa. You see, it's a chicken-and-egg thing, as you're officially supposed to have your ticket booked when you apply for the Visa.
I received an answer at 21:00 the same evening! Wow!
Unfortunately, the answer was not highly revealing, mainly quoting their general online docs/ hints, and consular section opening hours. However, they did add to that: "usually tourist visa is only grnated for short terms", and "please note it is not recommended to book your flights before applying for Visa".
Hah ...
To make the long story short - in Dublin, you are allowed to apply for a Tourist visa for up to 60 days.
However, while getting a 61-day visa is virtually impossible, it is very straight forward to to just get a double-entry visa with the same length.
This actually means an overall stay of up to 120 days. So they won't let you stay for 90 days, but if you cross the border once, you can actually stay easily for 120.
.
It's been long time coming, and it is finally happening. I'll be taking a full three months' worth of time to experience some of south-west China.
I have to start with saying - you've gotta love Google!
Google is quite famous for perks and food, but really - letting me take a 3-months off to do my thing and come back - that's the real deal. So thank you!
And yes, Google is hiring massively. Check it out.
And now that we've got that out of the way - there is quite a lot to prepare. Over the next two months or so, I'll be sharing some of that enjoyable part of preparation, Travel planning, etc. Just to get everybody into the right spirit and to prepare you for the proper stories ahead.
The blog seems more or less set, some basic monetization is in place (we call it dogfooding), so we're more or less ready to get going.
It's gonna rock!
Visa For China - what is the maximum stay possible
This seemed all along quite straightforward to me. 90 days is kind of a standard tourist visa length, which seemed to be fully in line with my plans anyway. Alas, as I was booking my flight, and had about 24 hours to confirm-pay, I realized that my plans were to be in China for what might be closely calculated as 91 days.
So, as I was trying to run around figuring out how to calculate properly the maximum length of stay on a tourist Visa, I quickly learned on the internet, that there are no really clear rules about the length of Visa you can actually get (never mind how you count). It seems that in the US, for example, one can get a maximum stay of 30, 60 or 90 days - depending on the state in which you apply.
Very commendable! Since it was already late in the afternoon, I sent an email to the chinese embassy at around 18:00, hoping to get some sort of hint the next day about the length of time I can expect to be allowed on the Visa. You see, it's a chicken-and-egg thing, as you're officially supposed to have your ticket booked when you apply for the Visa.
I received an answer at 21:00 the same evening! Wow!
Unfortunately, the answer was not highly revealing, mainly quoting their general online docs/ hints, and consular section opening hours. However, they did add to that: "usually tourist visa is only grnated for short terms", and "please note it is not recommended to book your flights before applying for Visa".
Hah ...
To make the long story short - in Dublin, you are allowed to apply for a Tourist visa for up to 60 days.
However, while getting a 61-day visa is virtually impossible, it is very straight forward to to just get a double-entry visa with the same length.
This actually means an overall stay of up to 120 days. So they won't let you stay for 90 days, but if you cross the border once, you can actually stay easily for 120.
.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
