blog.marcwiesner.com

I’ve been in SH for the last few days working on getting a Russian visa and gorging myself on foreign foods. I woke up this afternoon to a fantastic downpour that made an orchestra out of the plexiglass roof of the hostel patio two floors below my room. In the patio now, the heavy rain drowns out nearly every sound around me. The kinda rain I like. With the lines at the Russian embassy here I’ll be waiting in line starting at 5 am tomorrow to file for my tourist visa. I don’t know why they think they’ll have to worry about Americans illegally immigrating but it’s part of the game so I’ve gotta play.

Last night after dinner at a Thai place and dessert at a branch of the world famous Taiwanese Din Tai Fung it was off to a live jazz bar down the street. The cold Jim Beam and hot jazz made a nice cap to a night that actually ended much later. Next stop, pending Russian visa, is Beijing.

That’s next week though….there’s a lot to eat before then =P

I had the idea of approaching Xiaozhou (our younger chef who’s so cool about practicing english with me) about making a sweet and sour tofu the other day. He was surprisingly keen on the idea of trying. More so than the master chef he asked about it the next day. Both chefs are fantastic, but the master chef is a bit territorial with what happens in the kitchen. Once I suggested that putting some salt on top of the french fries after they’re cooked with add a nice (and authentic) taste. His reply was a firm “if they want salt they can ask me for salt.” He was similarly skeptical about my idea of blaspheming tofu with a sweet and sour sauce.

Xiaozhou had it handled though. He found me a minute later outside of the kitchen and said “the chef’s taking the day off tomorrow.” And today it happened. And oh it was so good. As I said, both chefs are fantastic, but it’s nice to get a new flavor mixed into the routine. I’ve already gotten an approving nod for a KungPao Tofu from the fellow ^_^.

Brilliant brilliant young chef

I’m really starting to miss non-Chinese foods. Don’t get me wrong…the Chinese food here is fantastic, but I could really go for some good Thai or Mexican..or Indian..or Viet. I swear I’m going to gorge myself to such a disgusting level when I’m back in Cali.

Work’s been good but tiring. Long hours, and I’ve been sick the last couple days. The Chinese is coming along well enough though it only takes a few minutes of trying to watch TV to know how far I am from fluent. Something I accept since I spend most of my time practicing travel and hotel Chinese.

I took a few days to visit a Lu Mountain (庐山) in Jiangxi (江西) province. The weather was nice, the beer good, and I found a fantastic potato, tofu, and black preserved bean dish. All the same it was so nice to get back into Wuhan. As soon as I set foot at the Art Academy next to Pathfinder I felt back at home.

The boss is gone for a couple days to Chengdu (成都) so I’m at the desk all day today watching the new kids to make sure they don’t break anything. Tomorrow once a real receptionist comes in I can rest. I found a Thai place a little bit away and I’m intent on seeing if it lives up to reputation (and still actually exists). It’ll be good to try something different =P.

One of the last conversations I had with XiaoJun before he left was the musing, simply expressed in my poor chinese, that people come and people go. His reply: "yes, because this is hostel."

That was more than a month ago. He left. Many have left. Because it is hostel. Had a dream while napping in the afternoon a few days ago. Wuhan, some time still to come. Sunshine needed someone to go with her to take someone’s passport picture and she took me. We drove for a while to a restaurant that Echo had opened. A nice restaurant. Big. It was Alex’s picture that we were taking. Grishka was there too. Fresh sadness at having them gone.

It’s starting to warm up in Wuhan. It’s close to reaching that point where leaving the hostel is an evening activity exclusivly. Two nights ago a Wuhanese coworker took myself and some guests to a hot pot place next to a night market that, despite being fairly close, I hadn’t even heard of before. Delicious hot pot and many great looking things that I didn’t get to.

The night before yesterday was busy in that unexpected sense that has ceased to surprise me; at least 10 foreigners flooded into the reception tired from the bus ride from Yichang into Wuhan.

Met Satan last week. Drank with him. Cool guy. An English student / artist who made some of the wall-space of the hostel more colorful. Most of the photos on his blog on and after May 2nd are in Wuhan Pathfinder.

The busy season from the May holiday has come and gone. We were busier when the cherry blossoms were blooming next to East Lake. I didn’t have an excuse (reason, need?) to sleep on chairs in the back this time around =P

Sunshine told me to take a morning off. I was planning on walking across Wuhan’s First Bridge but an hour relaxing next to the Yangtze and some time wandering around the streets around the hostel were enough to bring the romance of this place back and wipe away some of the frustraion that stacks up little thing by little.

I think I’ve figured out what bothers me about most Europeans I meet traveling; they tend to put a fair amount of effort in trying to find or recreate the Europe they left behind. Despite being in a very foreign country they expect the same standards of clean, language, privacy, public behavior and what not that’s found in Europe. The shock of not finding this familiarity seems to be more than most Europeans can handle. Thus, the communities of people who have nothing more in common other than their place of birth arise out of a smoke of disappointment and dissatisfaction.

In the west we usually criticize such insular communities. Indian, Korean, Chinese communities, it’s thought, create a buffer which impedes integration. We think it bad when people live in these communities and become so insulated they can’t speak a national language but what contributions to Europeans bring to their communities? Are western restaurants as popular in Asia as Asian restaurants are in the west? Do we have many scientists and scholars who decide to move into China to help with academic research or philosophical inquiry?

People from English speaking countries traveling here in China seem to be particularly off. Not as a rule, just as a general observation, people from Australia, England, Canada, and the USA react remarkably poorly to such a foreign place where English ability are by no means an expected norm. I suspect the problem can be considered as stemming from a Continentinal Island mentality due to the fact that we aren’t really pushed to learn a foreign language since we don’t really have any neighbors who make it necessary. While the USA’s southern neighbor Mexico would seem to give us a good reason to learn Spanish it’s clear that this motivation is lost on most US citizens; a point which itself should speak to Mexico’s general status within America.

I’ve thrown photos from my trip through Guizhou province and Wuhan up on my Facebook. I’m going to be adding them into my photoblog an a daily or as available basis.

 teasers:

March 5th I took a late bus to Wuhan. It’s nice to have a home away from home. I’ve been working 免费 at the Wuhan Pathfinder International Youth Hostel I stayed at before; helping out whenever possible in whatever way I can. It’s nice to be able to help. A visa is in the works so I can stay longer and not have to worry about visa runs to Hongkong. I’ve been able to get a lot of practice with my hotel mandarin and learn more about the city as I give tours and advice to foreign travelers. One of the most useful things I’ve learned is that the taxi drivers know where to find everything.

Reactions from the Chinese guests to seing me behind the front desk are strange. Usually, they fall within the amused, endeared, and skeptical. I’ve actually had someone tell me it was imposable for me to be working here and ask in English what happens if a guest who doesn’t speak English comes in. She was fairly shocked when I replied in Mandarin, “not a problem, talk to them in Chinese.”

I’m hoping to stay here until the summer and spend the next few months improving my Mandarin while I help as much as I can. It’s nice to be able to hunker down in a place with so many good people and good food. I’m hoping to have photos up soon, but these days are very busy. People are flocking up from the south of China to see the Japanese Cherry blossoms (樱花) next to Wuhan’s famous East Lake (武汉东湖). Haven’t had time to see them myself yet, but the small garden next to the hostel is already impressive.

Well…I didn’t get a revised contract tomorrow. Didn’t sign anything. Got me worried. Then the teacher who’s managing my schedule told me that I’d be teaching four classes instead of three and working 24 hours, something the headmaster said was unreasonable and never practiced. Even more worried. The headmaster, who’s going to Canada in two days, is in the city and largely unavailable. Very worried. So I’m doing what I know I should do, taking my stuff to Nanchang city to meet him and if we don’t come to an agreement I’ll hit the road. I doubt he’ll have a contract or even a draft when we meet and I largly expect to piss off after about ten minutes. The situation isn’t helped by not having a kitchen to cook my own food and not being able to use the internet as I wish to manage my other business concerns. It gets frustrating when the computer they put in for me is the only one that cannot access foreign sites and google.com redirects to the Chinese baidu.com search engine.

The staff and students here are great, but if I can’t work with the boss I can’t work at the school. The boss apologized saying that he forgot foreigners put such an emphasis on time and punctuality. I wonder if he knows that packing up and leaving a place quickly when things don’t seem right is a backpacker’s habit?

On another note, I’m planning on putting pictures from my Guizhou adventure online in the next week or so, internet connection permitting.

Tomorrow I’m going to the campus I’ll be teaching at for the second time. A few days ago I got the grand tour and made some comments about the contract they offered me. Tomorrow I’m going to review and hopefully sign the revised contract I expect to be presented with. The apartment they’ve got me and another foreigner sharing is plenty big (astonishing would be a more accurate word to describe my first impression of it’s size compared to the size of most rooms and restaurants I’ve been in thus far) and the hours, pay, and class size seem very reasonable. Probably the biggest plus is that the staff I talked to were all very friendly. The largest draw back is that the campus manages to be quite removed from a major city center while not rural enough to be enjoyable for quaintness. I like to think of it as "save and secluded" though =P .

The timing of this post is really inspired by two things. First, I was searching through Google for other blogs from foreigners teaching in China. Networking and comparing situations and what not. Second and more impacting though is an article I came across tonight by Carola Von Hoffmannstahl-Solomonoff titled An American Teacher in China: The Unquiet Death of Darren Russell. Now I know this is going to drive my mother nuts to read, but I is something that I want to put out there. There are many horror storied about foreign teachers getting treated like dirt but this is the the most seedy I’ve come across. My heart truly goes out to Mrs. Russel (who runs http://whiterabbitsmom.org/). Any one who’s considering coming to China to teach should read this story as it so vividly underscores the importance of coming repaired and keeping escape plans ready in case the dream of teaching in a mysterious foreign land turns into such a nightmare. Know the city you’ll be in. Make friends outside the school who can help if you need it. When we can’t count on governments to keep us safe, we have to count on ourselves and each other.

Travel safe.

Written Jan 29:

I checked out of the place I was staying since arriving in Nanchang and checked myself into a nice, warmer place closer to downtown. Good to be able to shower without worrying about when the hot water will run out but I’ll miss the good food that I found so closely available.

Lunch was fun though. There are a few restaurants on the same block as this hotel. I picked one at random and two seconds after I was done ordering a couple children who saw me walk in were asking me if America had this or that animal, car, fruit, sport and so on while marveling at my sinister use of chopsticks.

Feb 1st I’ll leave for Guiyang and spend the Lunar New Year exploring waterfalls with friends. Looking forward to getting into a totally new place and trying some of the local specialties ^_^.