Abbie Toney.

C and I have been teaching English to local taxi drivers. An average lesson goes like this:

• Taxi Driver: (Pulls Up)
• Abbie:  Nǐ Hăo.
• Taxi Driver: (Pulls Away)
• Abbie: (screaming at the cab) **** *** *******!

Yes, rather than seeing past my crystal clear pale skin, poor Chinese and well written directions – you spot the lǎowài (foreigner) and pull away as fast as possible. These interactions are common, annoying and are a reason I’ll no longer have blood pressure problems upon my return to the United States.

Fortunately most of the time, it’s easy to get a cab. And most of the drivers are kind, and don’t try to screw the foreigners by taking excessive routes or charging off meter. Some of them are quite friendly, and repeat the English they know – usually a combination of “Hello” “Goodbye” and “USA”. In return I spit a few words of Chinese (it’s hard since most of my Chinese revolves around food.)

The most concerning part of the average Chinese taxi rides is getting dragged off major thoroughfares (see also: a great place to rape/kill/dump someone) for “CNG”  (compressed natural gas). This has happened at least 5 times I can remember, and I’m making it my new mission to snap photos each time it.

Can you imagine in the United States, your cab driver, still on the meter, dropping you off at the curb while he refills?  You can’t really argue with it – not when you don’t have enough Chinese. Further, there’s no reason to argue – at most you are gipped $1 – and even on principal I can’t argue over $1 in China.

I have not met the Chinese trash man yet. I am not sure if he really exists, or if he has an awesome garbage truck, or a day that he is supposed to come. All I know is – trash magically disappears in this country. Piles start in random places, for no apparent reason. Even on the street, at all times of the day, you see piles of trash that magically appear and disappear.

To test our hypothesis that the trash businesses in China is some sort of magic, C and I added to a random pile of garbage in the hallway of our apartment at 6:30 pm.

Now you see it.

And upon return to the Rainbow Palace at 9 pm ….

Now you don't.

I don’t know a trash guy in the US who works on evenings, much less weekends – but in China – it’s like he’s always on call. The real question is after this magic disappearance act – where does all the garbage go? I shudder at what a land fill in China would look like.

One thing the landfill would be free of is diapers.  Most of the kids walk around bare bottome, with carefully crafted outfits that have holes between the legs so children can do their #1/#2 anywhere they please. I’ve seen many a granny holding onto a baby assisting them in squatting in trees and bushes. Perhaps the liberal no diaper policy explains why most the sidewalks in China are tiled.

At night, when the weather cools and it’s just dark enough out that you can’t see the cockroaches crawling around – the grills are fired up and the fridges are stocked with skewers of vegetables, meat, and indistiguishable food products. A man or woman, or a couple of them, stand over a hot grill – pouring spice and oil on food and slinging it back onto tables of anxious diners. By far my favorite meal – a welcome relief from rice and noodle heavy dishes served around campus.

After a few too many cocktails – Catherine had our first street food dining experience (note, called street food because “alfresco” is really all too classy a word for what it is). The chicken liver or kidney or whatever organ we had chowed on was spicy and tasty. Still, in the back of my head I kept the faith that perhaps it was all the beers and the fact it was 3 am and I was hungry that made this street food so delectable.

After a sober visit or 12 I can attest that it’s fabulous. C and I have indulged in way too much of it – and I can already tell – when I return to the US – I’ll miss it. It’s one of the few times ordering is a breeze. You pick up a basket (unwashed and still with goo from the last person who used it), walk to the fridge and take out the skewers that you want. You set it by the grill and in less than five minutes theres spicy deliciousness delivered to your table.

Catherine and I managed to wander across a cheap street food vendor, with an anxious server who uses his three words of English with vigour: “hello” “goodbye” “okay”. For 4 skewers of meat and endless skewers of mushrooms, lotus, eggplant, and onions – it sets us back $4.

Children out on walks with their parents stop by our table to smile and try their hand at interacting with the Americans (one boy told us we were beautiful the other night – obviously dining on the street comes with low light – so he couldn’t get a good look at us).

Everyone says to stay away from the street food – but it’s bologna. At least I can see the the “kitchen” and count the cockroaches – which is much more than I can do at any restaurant in America.

The international program coordinators at SWUPL organized a lunch for all the international students and teachers. We were ushered onto a bus and then off across the city. We had no idea what we would be eating, or where – but it would be free. (Students world wide will always agree that you have to love free food!)

After a 20 minute bus ride we had made it to the restaurant where there was a fat statute and a red painted wall with glittery letter spelling out “Four Seas”.  The fat statute (which I failed to get a picture of) was an omen of how everyone would leave feeling.

It was mecca for Americans – a Chinese Buffet, in China. (Something I never thought I’d partake in!) Football fields of food, with corners of food I left unexplored. I stayed away from the Western food, a side full of golden: french fries, chicken nuggets, pizza, and pork roast.  I ate Eastern everything I could, focusing on putting duck in my mouth as many ways as possible – smoked/bbq/stir fried/curried. For fillers I tried spring rolls, curry turnovers, watermelon, and sushi.

The sushi came with REAL wasabi – not the weak horseradish stuff they have in the US. This stuff knocked me on my butt. So strong my eyes teared up – BEFORE it got to mouth.

When I was far too full to be human, I wanted to tap out and nap in the corner. At which point, I felt so much comfort – as if the Four Seas was in Des Moines and I was sitting next to my mother. Doreen, a blond/german/24 year old version of Sheila insisted I go with her to sample desserts. If Doreen and Sheila were to go head to head in some sort of sweet eating contest – I imagine there would be a boxing match over the last piece of chocolate cake, (luckily Sheila has some kickboxing training so she might fare well in the match.)

Doreen managed to sample ALMOST every dessert available (we had to leave or she would have tackled them all), loading them onto trays and schelpping them back to the table – insisting people take bites of them all. I tried to stay on pace but my sweet tooth just wasn’t up to snuff – and because the Chinese haven’t exactly figured out the whole “OVEN” thing yet – nothing really suited my taste buds. (WHERE ARE TEH CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES IN THIS COUNTRY?)

The buffet costs 130 RMB ($20) and came with a scoop of Hagen Daz and endless beer/liquor – so I’m sure we will be going back sometime. Hopefully then there will be more pictures, when my appetite isn’t crying out over my camera and when Doreen doesn’t come with – so there are pictures of things other than dessert.

I have been on a pretty standard sleep schedule, waking between 6:30 and 7:30 AM. This morning I woke up like usual, in a pool of my own sweat, cursing the 105 degree weather and swimming through the Chongqing humidity.  I threw on some clothes, the least amount possible (but just enough to prevent scaring C should she leave her room) and headed to the sofa to try to keep my skin from melting while I surfed the web and watched some CCTV5.

Showers are the highlight of my day right now, because the water is a comfortable cold and it’s the only 10 minutes of the day I don’t spend sweating out the toxins.  At about 10 am, I was ready to give in to a shower to begin my Thursday layer of sweat. As I headed for my room there was a knock at the door.

Who’s there? I’ll give you a hint: It was not the cops, a crazy crack head* or Publisher’s Clearing House. Yes, standing at five feet tall and weighing in at 100 pounds it was GRANNY. Replay her last visit, minus the washing machine. Granny came in and began toiling away over our marble floors. The little girl was with her and immediately got to watering the plants. I knocked on Catherine’s door – warning her they were back. Again we toiled, mystified as to what they needed. Why is our landlord’s mother in our apartment? Why is she cleaning? What does she need? Does she think we’ve picked up Mandarin in the last 3 days and will be able to chat with her?

C picked up the phone and we called the foreign relations office to ask for some translation and inquiry to why Granny was back. Let this be our first lesson in how different American and Chinese culture is. Granny was just there to be helpful and friendly. Seriously. Our translator attempted to explain to granny the American way of being left alone after renting – asking Granny to give a bit of warning before dropping by next time. If you are thinking what I’m thinking, it’s that there will be many more stories in the Granny series to come.

Our apartment is now an even better deal. A 2BR/1BA apartment with a built in cleaning lady – not bad for $238/month. Has there ever been a time in the US when your landlord has showed up to clean for you? If so please let me know where and how much your rent was – I’d happily live there.

*This is mostly a jest on my brother, who opened his door to a stranger – who ended up being a crack head. However, I will admit my own stupidity because I opened the door only after asking “Who is there?” twice and getting no reply. In my own defense – I’ve not seen any crack heads since arriving in Chongqing so I was willing to bet on my own life and Catherine’s that opening the door would reveal some sort of pleasant and non dangerous surprise. 

I generally don’t like watching TV (I don’t even own one), but when it’s 105 degrees out, you are in the middle of China and you have nothing to do – you find yourself laying on the sofa sweating it out in reach of a remote and thirsting for easy entertainment. So far, the TV in the Pink Penthouse has been stuck exclusively on CCTV5, China’s version of ESPN.  Normally you wouldn’t catch me watching sports on tv, but Chinese Soap Operas and television programs are painful to watch (with period specific wardrobes, fake facial hair, bad makeup, questionable “acting”- add in the fact they aren’t in English and my comprehension falls to about two words in every 2000).

Since sports generally transcend language, C and I have watched a healthy amount the last few days. Things were desperate after a few days with nothing to do, when C and I were sweating on the sofa, screaming at the TV as we watched an Olympic Qualifying track meet. We were cheering on different runners in the 10,000M men’s run and bickering over who was going to win. (I was right, FYI – there was no way Ethiopia would let Great Britain win… it’d just be un-African).

Back to the point of this blog – I found CCTV 5 after spotting a volleyball match on television. It get’s better – there was A WOMENS SOCCER MATCH DURING PRIME TIME – ON what is essentially PUBLIC TELEVISION. I thought it was a fluke to see women’s soccer match at all, but it has happened a few times. There have been numerous women’s sporting events breaking up the monotony of professional table tennis. Write CBS/NBC/ABC – hell included ESPN, because really – if China, culture that prefers male babies since they only get one, can put women’s sports on TV, so can we!