Elif Shafak: The Politics Of Fiction

How is it that Canada and The U.S. – both immigrant countries founded and populated from people all over the world seem to be insular places famous for people who seem to know so little (and care equally little) about world?

In Canada we have a policy of multiculturalism but for some reason, I'm uncomfortable with it, though I have trouble articulating why. It seems to me, as well intentioned as it is, it's effect is to make second class citizens out of hyphenated Canadians.

I confess that I don't know anything about Elif Shafak beyond what she presents in this short talk, but I am intrigued.

The last month or so of my China trip was spent traveling around rather than staying in on place and studying Chinese so I didn't get a chance to post much. I'm back in Canada now and I've come home to dozens of small problems to deal with.

I hope in a while to write some catch up posts.

Update: Not Dead Yet

Yes, I'm still alive. Believe it or not, just because I'm not posting doesn't mean I'm dead.

It's just that I'm doing some real traveling (instead of just staying in one city and studying) and I just can't be bothered to post all the time.

But here's an update for you: I went back to Beijing, got tired of the crowds and cars, went back to Shanghai, got tired of the obnoxious Shanghaiese, went to Suzhou and I'm now tired of heat and humidity.

Suzhou is one of the prettiest cities I've ever been too. The downtown core is full of tiny canals cobblestone streets, stone bridges and NO CARS (the streets are to narrow for cars and the canals, well, they've got water in them).

Take a look, here is the Wikipedia article on Suzhou.

So I'm going back to Beijing. I'm just too tired to go somewhere I've not been before and figure things out from scratch. Besides, I know this cute computer programmer in Beijing who promised to have coffee with me if I go back.

And Beijing is not quite all the way across this not exactly small country.

And since I made this decision (just like all my travel decisions) on the spur of the moment, I don't have a seat or bunk. I have to stand the whole way.

What the hell, it's only 14 hours of unbearable heat and misery, all for one coffee.

Good plans go wrong. The beauty of bad plans is nothing really can go wrong.

On other news: I have finished one Chinese textbook, and have done 15 chapters from another. This is in addition to the courses I was taking. Whatever else, nobody get's to call me lazy.

Finally, I decided to buy a bike and get back into cycling. Anybody who knows me knows I hate regular bicycles. I think normal bikes are pretty badly designed with too much tradition, to much fussing over pointless details, too much marketing and too little real engineering.

I'm through with long distance riding though (I used to do 200K rides pretty regularly, 100K was my regular Sunday ride and 50K was my regular after work ride). This time I want a city bike so I don't have to walk everywhere.

I got my choices narrowed down to two: The 2008 Dahon Curve SL and the The 2010 Rans Fusion ST.

The Dahon is tiny, foldable, carry up to my cubicle-able, and of course cute, but probably a pain to ride for more than 10K. The Rans is probably a dream to ride, but big and unwieldy.

To hell with it, I'm tired of being cheap. I might get both!

Also, I'm going to get a the 27" iMac and throw my TV in the garbage.

Finally, I'm going to get some goldfish. I don't want an aquarium, I want to put a tiny goldfish pond in my apartment. I know, it sounds stupid and tacky. Trust me, it won't be.

The whole thought of going back to work is just plain revolting, but since it's unavoidable, I just want to get it over with.

Seriously, anyone with comments about the bikes, let me know...

Harbin Blues Bar

Translation:

Attention!!!

From now on all Russian girls who party at the Blues Bar until 5 AM will receive a free 300 ml. bottle of Jim Bean.

To assure their a safe return home we will also pay 20 Yuan taxi fair for their ride home.

I didn't manage to get pictures because I got shooed away by a bouncer but there is another room without live music (but with Russian TV) and if you choose to drink there beer, vodka, chips, peanuts, fruit are all FREE.

You don't even have to ask for the free stuff. It's all laid out for you. You just pour your own drinks. Even the vodka is on draft. You just pick up a glass and pour as much as you want.

Cool, huh?

The Great Wall

Here's what you need to know about the Great wall.

First, it doesn't look anything like the small section that's been rebuilt for postcards and tourists. The real walls were built over the span of more than a thousand years using all kinds of different technologies like earth, mud, stone and only later brick. It's been falling apart ever since it was built. None of it looks like the section you see in the photographs. That's been built a few years ago (OK, not built, restored, but still).

I had only one day before I had to leave the Beijing area, so I chose to go to an unrestored section. Other parts are completely underground buried by sand and so on. It's a mixed bag.

Next, Its not one wall, it's a lattice of walls. The Chinese built a wall every time they won or lost a war, to try to keep the next war from happening. The Chinese were (really still are) basically farmers. All they wanted to do was farm. The people they were fighting for the most were nomads. Farmers put stuff away for leaner years. Nomads can't because they have to move with their flocks, so when they don't have enough to eat, they raid.

Hence the Chines paranoia and the walls. There are tons of walls. They find new ones all the time.

By the way, The Wall isn't really about just keeping people out. It's really a fortified road. The point of the wall was you could travel along it really fast to get to any sections that had been breached. Breaching the wall was probably no big deal to the Chinese since the nomads couldn't possibly hold anything they took. So what if Nomads got a section? the Chinese could come and take it back. The point was The Wall let the Chinese know when the enemy was coming, and let the Chinese move along the border quickly.

It's kind of obvious when you think about it, but you don't build a wall in a valley, you build it on top of the highest ridge you can find. The problem then is that you have to go up there to work there to build it.

We had to hike of a couple of hours and some people almost died from exhaustion up climbing there. Nobody could imagine lugging rocks up there or wanting to fight anyone once we got up. But that's exactly what people did all the time when they were building and fighting for control of the wall. It's freaking cold up there too. In the last two pictures those little white flecks you see flying around are snowflakes.

Speaking of which, the guys who almost died were twenty something super healthy Scandinavians all decked out in their ultra modern hiking gear. Our guide was 73 years old, which is the same age as my mother. She was wearing cloth sneakers. She just zipped up those mountains with nothing but a twig of a walking stick, just looking back once in a while to see if everyone was with her or not.

Anyway, I can't go on and on about this. Read the Wikipedia article on The Great Wall Of China, but here are two parting fun facts. First, The initial section of the wall was longer that the distance from New York to Los Angeles. It took just 12 years to build. Second, if you string up all the walls end to end, they could go around the world.

Enjoy the pictures!

Kite Flying In Laixi

Kite flying is really big in China. If you go to any open area you're sure to find tons of people flying kites (and a few people selling them too).

It turns out that the self proclaimed kite flying capital of the world is Weifang, which just happens to be right next Laixi.

Panda Sighting In Laixi

Dalian - Harbin Overnight Train

So much to say, so little time to write it all down.

I took my first overnight train in China, an experience I'll never forget.

Everything was clean and well kept, but this was not one of the super modern bullet trains. Overnight trains often go deliberately slow to make sure you don't have to leave to late or alive too early (not just in China, in other countries too) so there is really no point in using a fast train for these trips. Basically, except for the the cleanliness and the service, this could have been a Russian train. Same vintage.

Except for one thing: the bunks are absolutely tiny and worse, they are stacked up three levels. The top ones, like the one I got, are really really high up. But not just high up: because the bunks are narrow, the stairs are off to one side, so basically you have to swing yourself up into the bunk with the ceiling inches from your head. It's really hard to describe, but believe me it's terrifying.

And once you get there, all you can think about is how in God's name your going to get down without breaking a leg, or worse embarrassing yourself in front of 500 Chinese people, all who have been watching your every move since you got on the train. I could barely manage to get up there, soon I'd have to do it again but groggy, needing a piss, and backwards.

Well, in the middle of the night, I wake up, and yes, I needed to piss. I'm barely awake, but I somehow manage to get down while the train is rocking back and forth... Actually I fall, but it's OK, nobody noticed... And no broken bones so it's a howling success.

Groping my way through the dark I find the toilet and piss. I'm still terrified because it's not over yet. I climb up to the top rung but the last part is the final fling where you have to swing your body while your holding onto the last step which is far to one side of your final destination. After a few minutes of deep breathing I launch myself... onto... it turns out... right on top of some poor sleeping Chinese guy... Wrong bunk!

Probably the most embarrassing moment of my life.

To make matters worse, the next morning I climb down again and I can't find my shoes.... After a while the Chinese guy I landed on top of comes over and points to under his bunk... Just where I put them.

So embarrassing!

Anyway, I've got lots of catch up posts. I'm going to staying Harbin for a while (I love it here!) so there will pictures soon!

Waiguoren!

People who've been to China (especially people who've not traveled much and been to China for a short time I find) always comment on how people are interested in them.

A lot of people seem to dislike the extra attention they get here.

Being in Laixi now, where they definitely are very few foreigners, you really do get a lot of attention. When I'm walking down the streets here, people just stop what their doing and just stare or they wave and cry out hello. When listening to other peoples conversations, I hear the Chinese word for foreigner, waiguoren, an awful lot.

I went to the one club in Laixi, and basically my presence was completely disruptive. Everyone wanted to buy me a drink or say hello, or really, I don't think they knew what they wanted, but that wasn't going to stop them from waving.

Even in Qingdao, a lot of people would endlessly stroke my hair arms wondering what the deal with all that hair is

Still, I have to say, it's definitely motivated by curiosity without the slightest hint of anything unpleasant. I don't mind it one bit.

I remember on the train ride from Beijing to Qindao, I was walking through one of the cars and a small child was staring and staring wondering who the space alien was babbling on and on to his mother. A second after I passed him, I heard her mother say "Ta shi pengyou!", Chinese for "He's a friend!". I turned around and waved at the kid, which caused squeals of laughter.

China hasn't been open for very long, as I said, people are just curious.

Finally, on a linguistic note, a lot of people told me that though the real word for foreigner is waiguoren (literally means outside country person) I'd here the more colloquial "laowai" (a combination of waiguoren and old). Well, maybe where they've been, but I've heard laowai exactly once. Then rest of the time, it's always waiguoren.

Laixi

Before I came to Laixi, my friends were talking about it like it was some little town they came from.

Well, I'm here now and though they still talk about it like it's a small town, it turns out that it's a city of about 780,000 people.

That put's it about the size of Ottawa, where I'm from and, at least in the downtown core, it feels more like Toronto than it does Ottawa.

The price of shish kabap has dropped here to just one CNY. That puts it about fifteen cents US.

Tastes better than anything I tasted back home too.

And to wash it down if you want a beer, they have a pretty neat system for purchasing: They just bring over a twelve back of one liter bottles (that's about a "tall boy" for you Canadians) and then they just count the empty bottles when you go to settle up.

A bit more efficient than all the forms that had to be filled out to get a beer in bigger city clubs.

Add Oil On A Horse!

Chinese is a surprisingly colorfull language. Here's two examples:

In Chinese "right away" (as in you won't have to wait long) is 马上 (ma shang). Directly translated it means "on a horse".

If it's not fast enough for your taste you can say 加油 (jia you). Directly translated this means "add oil".

Cool, no?