Chinese New Year's Eve

I’ve heard about the Chinese New Year before, but have never really understood the importance of it until this year. The most important day for the start of the New Year celebration is New Year’s Eve. This year it happened to be Februrary 13th. So February 13th is the equivalent to our December 31st. New Year’s Day was the 14th. They do not celebrate Valentine’s Day here so that was not an issue. Chinese New Year is celebrated by eating, playing mahjong and visiting family and friends. It is not just a one night event either. It is one week to two weeks long event. Think Thanksgiving and Christmas combined. From what we understand the Chinese do not get public holidays plus two weeks of vacation they can take anytime, they just get the public holidays and there are 2 of them, Chinese New Year and one in October. The vacation at Chinese New Year can be anywhere from 1-2 weeks long, so EVERYTHING shuts down. Also, EVERYONE travels. Tickets for airlines and trains are booked solid. Hotel prices skyrocket because you either go home to your family or your family goes sightseeing - the Great Wall, the Terra Cotta warriors, etc. So with this information in mind and 1.3 billion people traveling, we stayed put.

On “New Year’s Eve” we went to one of the Chinese teacher’s apartment to celebrate with her. She’s from the Dong Bei province which is in the very north eastern part of China and it takes her 2-3 days by train to get home (think Maine), so she was unable to go home for Chinese New Year. We asked her what time we should arrive and she said anytime after 12pm. Hmm, does that mean 12:15pm or 6pm??? I tried asking for clarification, but she sort of looked at me like I had 2 heads, because this is clearly a very strange question! In the end we asked one of the other Chinese teachers who was also going to Kelly’s house what time she would arrive and she said 2pm. So that’s what we did.

It was the first time we’ve been invited into a Chinese person’s home. As we walked up the unpainted gray concrete stairs to her 6th floor apartment I was wondering what we would find when we opened the door because there was trash, broken furniture, stains and marks all over the stairs and on the walls. Fortunately we were pleasantly surprised when she opened the door. There was a "wood" floor, more furniture than I expected and it was cozy. Chinese apartments are nice, because they are built so that the apartments have windows opening on both sides. If you live in the middle of an apartment building your apartment will face north and south or east and west. Being on the top floor, Kelly’s apartment also had the equivalent of a roof garden without the garden. She uses it to hang clothing to dry.

We played mahjong for several hours, like 3 or 4. One of the most valuable things that I have done since moving to China has been to learn how to play mahjong. Each area of China has its own rules. I have learned to play both Shanghai and Suzhou rules. It was quite amusing, because Aaron and I were teaching Kelly and Lulu, the Chinese teachers, how to play mahjong with the Suzhou rules and we’re the foreigners! We bought a mahjong set and are going to have Kelly teach us the Dong Bei rules and have Lulu teach us the Beijing rules.

After mahjong Kelly cooked us dinner. The food was very good. Simply cooked, oil, water, salt or sugar but with a nice flavor. There were a couple of dishes with meat, pork and chicken, and then there were quite a few dishes that were just vegetables. Eating in China is a bit like eating tapas. You order many plates, but of a good size, and then eat a bit of everything. You order a chicken and it will come with a few vegetables. The broccoli will just be broccoli, etc. No, we didn’t eat anything “scary,” that would come on Friday, which I will write about soon!

We had a really fun day with Kelly and Lulu. We ended up leaving around 9pm and then went home in anticipation of watching and hearing a lot of fireworks. We've spent quite a bit more time with Kelly and Lulu since then and it's been really nice to make some good Chinese friends. Once we move to Shanghai we will continue to visit them in Suzhou to spend time with them.

A real, warm house!

A few weeks ago we were invited by a Slovenian family, whose children go to the school, for after dinner drinks and desert. They live in a house!!!! A house is a rarity in China. Everyone lives in an apartment or duplex. She made mulled wine. It was amazing. Then she wouldn’t stop feeding us. She brought out chips, nuts, a chocolate cake, fresh made whipped cream (yum) and a variety of other deserts. I think the thing we enjoyed the most was that their house is warm. A very close second was the mulled wine and whipped cream. Their house has insulation, carpeting and siding. Aaron and I are so tired of always being cold. We turn on the heat and it takes the chill out of the room, but it is still cold.

There is some imaginary line in China between the North and the South. The northern part has central heating and the southern part does not. So while the Beijing temperatures reach -20 degrees Centigrade, they have central heating and it doesn’t feel as cold (this is what I’ve been told.) The southern part of China does not have central heating. We have space heaters, blankets and you wear your down jacket, hat and scarf in doors. Aaron and I are not the kind of people who think you should wear shorts and a t-shirt inside during the winter, we like our sweaters, but we do not like to be constantly cold. Just to give you an idea, I am currently wearing thick fleece pants, short and long sleeved shirts, a fleece, down slippers and am wrapped in a fleece blanket. I am about to put on socks and long underwear pants because although I have the heat on, it is still cold inside because it is a very cold day outside, -4C.

The winter temperatures in Suzhou are around freezing. November here was windy and cold. December and January were just plain cold. February has been wet and cold. A week or two ago it was rainy and overcast for 10 days straight. When it doesn’t rain you can’t see the sun or blue skies. It’s not overcast, but there’s cloud cover or pollution cover.

Now some of you might be thinking any or all of the following: “we’ve been dealing with snow all winter long, rain no big deal” or “I live/d in London, I live/d in Seattle” or “I live in South Africa and we don’t have central heating.” We don’t get to just walk the 30 seconds to our cars, but rather have to walk home carrying the bags of groceries along with the umbrella. Let me tell you, I had never appreciated before how heavy groceries are! In South Africa, you walk outside and it’s warmer because of the sun (We haven’t seen it since October.) It’s taken us some getting used to and we’ve survived. Would I rather have a car on those rainy days? Absolutely, but we clearly don’t hate it enough to leave, because we’ve signed on for another 2 years of this weather. Not in Suzhou, but Shanghai.

CRASH!

So, the bicycle used to be the thing that tied China together. If you ever saw a National Geographic special in the 80's and 90's about China, you probably saw the streets choked with bicycles. The bicycle is still used a lot, but even more so recently is the electric scooter. You take the battery with you to your house/apartment and plug it in overnight. TONS of people drive these things here and in Shanghai.

You do not need a license to drive these things, and there are apparently no laws governing their driving. If you feel like wearing a helmet, wear one. If you don't, don't. No one is going to stop you. It's very laissez-faire here. I have OFTEN remarked to Kristy how I hate that people stare at me as I am walking to work. I don't hate it because I am a waiguoren (foreigner) but because they are DRIVING A MOVING VEHICLE!!!

This brings me to tonight. Kristy and I are standing at the bus stop, chatting with a co-worker who also happens to be our Chinese teacher when we hear a tremendous CRASH! We turn around to see that one of these scooter drivers has smashed his scooter into a parked car, effectively demolishing his little scooter. He is talking on his cell phone. The entire time. He was very clearly ALREADY talking on it when he crashed. He picks up his wrecked scooter, and a few of his belongings that are strewn about on the ground, and upturns his scooter. Apparently, the thing still goes, and he drives off. We are all speechless. Honestly, I am surprised that this is the first scooter wreck that I've witnessed. Only took seven months.

Hairy, hairy man!

So, as you probably know, I have a full beard. This is probably more of an oddity to my Chinese neighbors than the fact that I'm pasty-white and speak English. I know Kristy used to get a little nervous when she would go shopping without me, because she'd get stared at, but I really do think it happens far less for her when I am there too. The beard is curious to adults and TERRIFYING to little children, which of course makes me laugh.

This brings me to my next observation. Since we have been in China I have noticed on several occasions men and women with moles. Ok, so that's not so weird or different. I have a big mole on my forehead. So what? Well, fortunately for me, I do NOT have weird hairs growing out of said mole. If I DID, I would shave, pluck, wax, or whatever it took to get them out of there. Apparently, the Chinese do not share my sentiment. I noticed these men and women with moles, not because they had moles per se. No, it was because of the TREMENDOUS amount of HAIR sprouting from these moles. The woman I saw had what looked like octopus tentacles growing from the mole. I was waiting for them to come alive, Medusa-style, and attack me.
The second was today as Kristy and I were waiting on the platform for our train to Shanghai. The man next to me had hairs SHOOTING out of his chin-mole that were no less than 1.5 inches long. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?So, I'm interested in this now. The information I've found after my brief research has been that hairs growing from a mole are lucky. A sign of good fortune. Personally, I find it repulsive, but I'm a stupid waiguoren, so what do I know?

Philippines (part 2)

We planned our trip so that the first half was action packed and the second half relaxing and calm. So after we finished swimming with the whale sharks, we traveled to Naga to go hiking at the base of Mt. Isarog in order to see some hot springs and water falls. Unfortunately we were horribly misguided by lonely planet and ended up in the wrong place. So our water falls ended up being a creek about 2 meters wide and then someone built these concrete swimming pools on the side of the creek. They then filled the pools with water from the creek. The hot springs were better, but we didn't know there was a dress code that required you to wear shorts and shirts, so we couldn't go swimming.

After our day of wandering pointlessly around the mountain (although there were some pretty views and it was nice to get out and walk) we caught the night bus from hell to go to our final destination, Puerto Galera. We wanted to take a night bus so we didn't waste a day traveling. Traveling by bus in the Philippines was an interesting experience. They try to cram as many people into the bus as possible before you leave. You think a van is supposed to seat 12 (because that's how many seats there are), that's a joke, you can easily fit 16 in that van. Squash them in! We anticipated that we would have our own seats like a coach bus and be able to get some sleep. Nope, it was a vinyl covered bench seat. Not too uncomfortable, you could definitely sleep on it sitting up, the problem was the driver and the fact that there aren't any highways in the Philippines, so everything is a winding two lane country road. I think we were late for something, because the guy was driving down this road at what felt like 500km an hour. Aaron and I were literally sliding back and forth on our bench seat. I would grab onto the bench to try to stay in one spot and he would hold onto the headrest. That's how we slept, if you can call it sleep! I couldn't decide if I was more scared that we would crash into an oncomming car or flipping as we barreled around one of the turns. It was insane. But we survived!

We finally arrived in the town of Puerto Galera after that awful bus ride (and I'm not exaggerating at all) and a boat ride. The town of Puerto Galera isn't anything to write home about. There are beaches, but the restaurants and hotels have been built right up to the water and there are so many hawkers. Our favourites were the guys selling pool ques. Hmm, that's exactly what I want to buy when on a dive/beach vacation - my own personalized pool que. The people selling necklaces, sun glasses, fruit, shells - that made sense, but a pool que?? That is what we call a bad investment.

We chose Puerto Galera for the scuba diving. The diving was nice. We saw a white tip reef shark, turtles, flounder, angel fish, nudibrachs, a wide variety of soft coral. The water was chilly for diving 27C/80F, but we enjoyed it. When we weren't diving we read either on the balcony of our room or on the beach.

So that was our trip. Not incredibly exciting, but we enjoyed it. It was nice to get away from cold Suzhou and be able to see the sun for two weeks. I don't know if we'll go back to the Philippines, but we enjoyed ourselves.

(I wanted to add more pictures, but couldn't get them to upload.)

Milburn in the Philippines (part 1)

So, Kristy and I are spending our Christmas holiday in the Philippines. Originally, we had planned to go to Beijing for the vacation, but I forgot that Beijing is around -10 Celsius right now.... So that plan got scrapped. Instead, an article in one of the expat magazines inspired us to come to the Philippines. After a bit of research, a travel guide supplied by Kristy's mother when she came to visit, and some debate we settled on going to two different areas. The first one: Lagaspi. Lagaspi is not home to much, except the Philippines most active volcano.
MOUNT DOOM!!!

Woo hoo!! Ooops... that's the wrong picture...





So, the real volcano is Mount Mayon. As I am typing this, however, it IS getting ready to erupt for real. It was currently erupting a little bit when we landed. Here's what it looked like from the airport where we landed.


We didn't stay in Legaspi for long, though. We were there long enough to grab some food and some pictures before heading to Donsol for some Whale Shark watching. I wish we had some pictures of the actual whale sharks, but this will have to do.

The visibility was not good when we went, so we were very close to the sharks. These guys get up to 2 busses in length (we saw three, ranging from 5 to 9 meters in length). They eat krill, just like humpback whales, so they are very safe to be near. However, you are not supposed to scuba dive with them, because it can spook them. So, we went snorkeling. That really is good enough. We were very close, and the things were ENORMOUS. They were very cool.

Public Toilets

So it's about time that we discuss relieving oneself in China. There are two styles of toilets. The one the Chinese are most familiar with is the squat toilet. This can exist in many forms. There is the literal hole in the ground, the trough (women have trough toilets too) and the porcelain one. (Here is a link to Wikipedia in case you want to see the different styles: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squat_toilet) The second style of toilet is the regular sitting toilet that most Western countries are familiar with. Now you cannot throw your toilet paper in the toilet, you must throw it into the little trash can next to the toilet - that is if you're lucky enough to have toilet paper in your stall. Most of the time you need to bring it with you. Also, very rarely will there be soap or towels at the sink for after you have finished. The miracles of hand sanitizer.

Now it is perfectly acceptable to relieve oneself wherever you happen to be. For instance, we have seen cars and tuk tuks driving down the street and then pull over. The driver or passenger gets out of the car, walks into the bushes and about a minute or so later comes back out and gets back into the car. We have also seen a little girl come running out of her house, pull down her pants and just pee all over the sidewalk. While sitting in a cafe along one of the canals, a 5 year old little boy came, pulled down his pants and then urinated into the canal. Unfortunately about 10 minutes later a woman came and washed her clothes in the canal! This past weekend our friends went to Taihu lake to eat the Hairy Crab. After they had finished lunch and were taking a tour of the island, they saw the wait staff cleaning the dishes and fresh produce for the next meal in the lake. The very same lake that the hole in the ground toilet empties directly into! Mmmm, yummy!

I now need to pause and take a moment to describe the split-bottom pant to you. These are for babies through potty-training age. Babies don't wear diapers here. I don't know why. I like this only in that there aren't a bunch of diapers going to sit in a landfill forever, plus the kids get potty-trained much faster. I don't like this because babies are constantly exposed and quite frankly I don't need to see that (Aaron agrees). Split bottom pants are just that, split. Instead of a seam it is just wide open so if the kid needs to relieve itself you just pull its legs into a squat position and voila. So with this bit of knowledge, I must tell you about our favourite public excrement experience. We're at the brand new mall. It's rather upscale with a variety of Western stores like H&M, Zara, Quicksilver, Wal-Mart, Best Buy and a variety of others I don't remember. We see this woman holding her 18 month old over the trash can on the second floor at the bottom of the escalator. We start discussing - What is she doing? She's been standing there for like 5 minutes. And then it dawns on us - her child is taking a dump in the trash can in the middle of the mall!!!!!!

Ah China.

So at this point, when we step into our elevator and there's a puddle on the floor we avoid it. If it isn't raining and the concrete is wet, we walk around it. If it smells like someone's just taken a dump, they probably have. At least it's rather liberating - need to go to the bathroom and can't find one? No problem, just stand behind this tree, everyone else does!

P.S. When you come to our house you are required to take your shoes off and leave them by the front door!