First of all, let me start with a disclaimer. I remain extremely grateful for the amazing opportunity of this trip and all it entails. With that said, I am not the happiest camper at the moment, and I realized a rant might make a fairly interesting way to make the blog current. Here goes...
1. Our current A/C: There is nothing quite like waking up due to the heat. Granted, most of the world population has either learned to deal with this or is antagonized by it on a daily basis. However, context may be important to this rant, so I'll keep going. Our A/C remote is covered in buttons inscribed with beautiful Chinese characters. We have figured out OFF/ON (the unit beeps and a light turns on and off). The rest is a game of pointing, clicking, and praying. Somehow no combination of the 4 buttons that are not included in the "timer section" (little clock symbol gives that section away) will not make our unit produce cold air. Johnna is sleeping blissfully in what she will likely remember as "that hotel room with the perfect temperature." After tossing and turning for some time, I decided to take a break. How does the sand man feel about whiners?
2. "Hello": We spent the two nights previous to this in a city called Wuzhen. It is about 2 hours outside of Shanghai but felt like a slightly different planet. We spotted exactly one caucasian other than ourselves during our two-day stay. I will add the specific disclaimer that this was pretty darn cool, and I am completely understanding and comfortable with the effect of this situation. The main effect of being an extreme minority was people walking up to us and saying "hello" fairly obnoxiously. The first 5 were fun. The next 50 started to get annoying.
3. "Hello. Come eat here.": In many of the cities we have visited, the sellers of everything (including food) are pretty driven. You buying their products is important. If you are selling something worth buying, sign us up, although we do typically end up buying from the most understated salesperson. The dumpling street vendor gave us an extra free dumpling tonight. He wasn't pushy at all. He knew he was offering the best product. On the other hand, the seared-squid-on-a-stick guy started yelling at us a block away. He ripped me off a little (everyone knows $1.50 is a little high for a stick of squid), but he was cooking some tasty tentacles. Let me backtrack. How do you eat in a city where the English stops at hello? The pointing method. In most Chinese cities, there is a picture menu adoring the wall. If you are lucky, there is an English menu. Here's the problem. The type of noodle we are looking for involves a dedication that does not include wasting time or money on English lessons or a translator for the menu. Introducing the point method! You can steal this when traveling. Find a hole-in-the-wall with a limited number of options. If you are good at a dish in Asia, then you don't go creating an extensive menu. You are smart enough to rock a few dishes well. Make sure that someone at said restaurant is eating something you want. When the waiter (who will also be the owner and chef) comes over, walk them over to the dish you want, point at it, then hold up the number of fingers to indicate how many you want. Johnna and I prefer to split everything. That means we get to try more things. If a place is really good, then we'll hunker down. If there seem to be a slew of awesome places, we'll use the point method a couple times in a row. Let's call that "the multiple restaurant tasting menu" method. Nowhere did this work more wonders than in Thailand. Drinks? Just go grab those from the fridge. Every mom-and-pop noodle shop has a big fridge holding everything (including drinks) at the back. They will not mind that you overcome the cultural divide by grabbing your own soda. If you're smart, grab the one that looks the most interesting. With that said, Wuzhen was pretty slow. So, there were no fellow eaters...no dishes to point at. Also, no pictures on the walls. So, we ended up inside a restaurant where apparently the only English spoken was "Hello. Come in please." We got even by having a few beers, some rice, and a plate of veggies (the staff were rocking this simple combo). That made for a pretty small check. We didn't feel like resorting to the "point to something random on menu" method when the street vendors outside looked pretty tasty.
4. Our debit cards. Neither of us can access money with our debit cards currently. This makes very little sense since we have different accounts (for now? : ).
5. Credit cards. The Chinese are not huge credit card folks. They are accepted almost nowhere (that you'd want to be), and this makes number 4 above an issue. Mom is sending us some cash via Western Union to tide us over for the next two days.
6. E-bikes. Take your pre-conceived notion (and National Geographic video montages) of thousands of folks riding bicycles en masse through the streets of China. Toss that out. Replace it with thousands of folks riding electric scooters. These silent (aside from the horns) little demons tear through the streets in place of bicycles. You'll still see bicycles, but their electric counterpart is making the cash now-a-days.
7. Beer. Seriously Asia. Move past the mass-produced lager. I can only choke down so many warm Tsing Taos before I decide to board a plane and head back to the land of amazing beer (the US and its wonderful microbreweries)! The lax view of drinking (buy a beer at 7-11 in the mall and drink it while shopping and the complete acceptability of discreetly peeing on the street if you'd like as examples) help, though.
8. Ice. Blame this on the fact that the only potable water in every city we've visited comes from a bottle (although it is usually very cheap...say 40 cents per bottle or so). I miss ice! I miss iced tea! Over 4,000 7-11s in Hong Kong. You're not going to walk into a single one of them that will offer a 32-oz. Big Gulp brimming with ice. Village Pantry better stock up for my return.
9. Soft mattresses. Wooden box plus two-inch mattress equals some serious tossing and turning.
10. A good pizza. We have stuck to local cuisine in almost every instance, but we are eagerly anticipating a quality pie upon our return. The Italians may have invented it, but we thickened it, put more greasy things on it, and churned it out for cheap.
11. Facebook and Blogger. China, in its attempt to shield some info, does not play well with these "others." So, we'll have to catch ya'll up on pictures upon our return.
12. Sleeping beauty (Johnna) would probably put doughnuts on this list, and it seems appropriate for that to round out a clean dozen.
We are meeting up with one of my former students tomorrow for a sightseeing tour of Shanghai (birthplace of the Communist party and the Shanghai museum). That will round out Sunday. Monday gives us a day to wander around with some serious anticipation building for our return. On Tuesday, we fly all day (although the time difference makes it seem like we teleport). We'll be back in the States on Tuesday doing our best to fight the urge to let jet lag turn us into zombies.
Much love,
Josh
