"Chinese" logic

He who drinks gets drunk,
He who gets drunk goes to sleep,
He who sleeps does not sin,
He who does not sin goes to paradise,
So let's all drink and go to paradise.
Found on the cover of the list of beverage at the "by pass bar" (Beijing)

Sounds pretty logical, doesn't it?
(Well, the third line may actually give rise to discussions..)
Cheers! ;)

Welcome to a Chinese market

While one can definitely find shops à l'européen in Beijing, they are relatively expensive and way less fun than going to one of the numerous markets. So let me share some impressions of Panjiayuan, the market just next door from where I life (South-East Beijing):

Panjiayuan is an outdoor market covered only by a roof on stilts. This implies that you better check out the weather forecast before you go there as otherwise you may run into the same problems as we faced when we went there 2 weeks ago: blue toes and frozen, well you don't want to know what.. ;) Oh boy, I was really impressed by Pierre (Indian wearing SANDALS) who supported the icy temperatures and the wind that could easily compete with the Genevan "Bise" for a considerable 30 minutes before starting to murmur something like "freaking cold...".

Walking through the entrance gate to a market feels like walking into a kaleidoscope: everything is in abundance and you'll find anything you can think of and some more. While Panjiayuan is said to be specialized in Antiques, I would like to add at least two thoughts to this statement: Some things you find on this market are as Antique as 2 days while others are, as I’ve heard, truly Antique. As even some salesmen cannot tell the difference anymore, a well informed tourist may well make a great snip. (well, in general you should never pay more than 20% of the “best price” the salesmen ask you for in the beginning) Given the crap I’ve bought there, I do not believe to be falling within the latter category.. “Crap”, well this leads me to the second remark: even though the market is said to be focused on Antiques one can nevertheless find just about everything. Browsing the market the following “trouvailles” caught my eyes:

While the original 2000-year old army of thousands of life-size terracotta warriors (picture on the left) guards the tomb of Qin Shi Huang (Somewhat tyrannical emperor who reigned from 246BC until 210BC) in Xi'an, lots of replicas can be found on the markets. Some of these noble soldiers apparently took to cross-dressing.. ;)

While one can find statues, pictures, plates of various emperors and modern leaders, the all time number one still is Chairman Mao ze Dong. From the Mao watch, the lighter, the ashtray, his quotations in at least five languages, his little red book, the banner, cards to a
wide arrange of statues: you find it all. Until now I only bought his quotations and red book so as to potentially find out more about a man that tears me into two.

What does a Swiss (who had the opportunity to vote even on whether to abolish the military service or not) think when his/her eye catches plates as the ones shown in the picture on the left? I must admit that I was pretty amused by the idea to be invited over for a dinner and then eat desert from a plate showing Samuel Schmid (Swiss Federal Counsellor, in charge of military (and sport..)) and blokes such as Keckeis.. I spontaneously decided not to dump my dear 2 kuai (20 Euro Cents) Shop and to continue buying my tableware exclusively over there..

My loyalty to the 2 kuai shop was soon tested again when I discovered what one might call the Chinese version of Kamasutra, neatly painted on some little vases and bowls. Given the somewhat strait-laced attitude of the average Chinese towards sex, I was pretty surprised by this discovery and kind of amused to see the saleswoman blush when I asked her for some more details and the origin of the paintings. By the way: when I opened the peanut shown in the upper left part of the picture, I blushed as well... ;)

Oh yes, Chinese markets have the potential to turn even Dom into a staunch "shopper" ;)

Christmas à la Chinoise

This picutre expresses pretty well what Christmas is like in China: Confucius is strong, Christianity weak and Christmas, consequently, merely a commercial happening...

I'm nevertheless looking forward to a yummie Christmas feast together with some friends and hope that you all enjoy a sparkling time being surrounded by the people you love!

:o)

Chinese, Kites and flying dogs

The lovely comment by Sheila (Read her “flash and sparkle” on http://sheila.nomadlife.org//) - certainly not exempt of a subliminal pinch of sarcasm - provides me with the opportunity to elaborate on the Chinese language in general and my experiences with it in specific:

(1) “The “oups, and what now”- feeling:

I expected to be lost at times (since I, once again, hit the road to live in a country while knowing about as much about its language as I know about Finnish..), and indeed was: One evening, it was my first night in Beijing, I hopped into a taxi and showed my precious scrap of paper showing my address spelled in Chinese characters to the driver (that's one way of communicating with taxi drivers that speak as little English as “W” speaks Arabic..) Well, the address was obviously misspelled or simply not precise enough.. I, consequently, found myself somewhere in the streets of Beijing not knowing were I was. I could neither make sense of any sign (as they are almost exclusively written in Chinese) nor would any of the people I bumped into (not that many since it was around 3am) understand any of the languages I would understand... (I might add that I was slightly "tipsy" (well, not that "slightly" actually.... ;). To cut the story short: I was totally lost. However, as I, since the very beginning of my China experience, expected myself to be confronted with such a situation one day, I could not help laughing at myself. I strolled around, whistling and singing, in the hope that I might get to a corner, house, etc looking familiar.. After a couple of minutes, however, when my nose and fingers started to turn blue, I decided to abandon my search and decided to ring up Sheila (which, was yet another extremely-logical manoeuvre of mine (as Sheila had never been to my place and, even though she really wanted (my assumption ;), could not possibly help (I won’t even try to defend myself by invoking my condition and the early hour…;) In the end I woke up Show, who, after laughing at me, told the Taxi driver number 2 where to dump me.... ;) Well, and that's where AIESEC comes in: It was beyond doubt partly thanks to the great people I know since the day of my arrival, that I actually felt like whistling and laughing in a situation like the one sketched out above.. How could, even an ignorant Swiss, ever feel lost surrounded by a network like this?? Cheers dear (even sarcastic) mates!

Well, in the meantime I boosted (what a presumptuous exaggeration...) my Chinese horizon so as to at least handle very basic situations (almost always) on my own. However, lots of hurdles still need to be taken:

(2) Small difference, big trouble

The most difficult thing about Chinese is the 5 tones, meaning the 5 different ways a syllable can be pronounced: high-pitch, mid-high-pitch, middle-pitch, mid-low-pitch, low-pitch.. First lesson to learn: Do care about these seemingly tiny, sometimes hardly distinguishable differences as other wise people will either not understand what you’re saying, feel insulted while you actually intended to compliment them on something or then you may run into somewhat more serious trouble. To give an example: ma (1^st tone: wipe; 2^nd tone: leash, 3^rd tone: horse, 4^th tone: affront, offend.. 5^th tone: ?? don’t know..). If you do not pay attention you may also “ma” (in its "4^th tone sense") people: While Mao spoken in the 4^th tone stands, among other, for Chairman Mao(4) ze(2) dong(1), Mao spoken in another tone means as much as brick / hick (now, while writing this post I start doubting about this anecdote my Chinese teacher told me. Let me check on this again; however, there’s plenty of such potentially embarrassing misunderstandings). So you better go on practicing your tones (Chinese lessons sometimes feel like singing lessons… ;)

(3) Regional differences

Chinese comes in probably about as many dialects as Swiss German. However, the only one that I can already make out is the Beijing dialect. Its specificity lies in the fact that it adds an “R” (pronounced somewhat like aaaaarrrrrrrrr (imagine a raucous bark)) to about every single word. But well, my attempts to pronounce the place where I live (Pan jia Yuan (becomes Pan Jia Yuaaaaarrrrrrr)) the “Beijing way” have yielded different results: Sometimes I seem to get it right, which consequently makes my counterpart think that I’m able to, and really good at speaking Chinese. He/ she would then start talking slang at an incredible pace while I would go “Hüüüüüüü?!?!?!”. Sometimes, however, I mess it up right from the beginning, meaning that both of us go “Hüüüüüüü?!?!?!”, he/she because he/she doesn’t understand and I because I do not understand what he/she is asking for… jolly times.. ;)

Even though my (too little) efforts to learn Chinese have not yielded a lot of results yet, I am nevertheless motivated enough to go on fighting the wind mill.. ;)

Oh boy, it's again 2am.. I guess I'll have to cover some other experiences at the help of pictures and short comments only:

We were kiting close to Tian'anmen square.

I love taking pictures of people taking pictures.. Look at the guard: yes, it is bloody cold in Beijing...

"Beijing bicycle": While cars are more and more frequent (worsening Beijing's somewhat scary environmental situation) bicycles are still very popular (especially among thieves.. (I decided to invest more money into a lock than the bicycle itself...)

Ice-skating the Chinese way. We are actually planning to participate in the "ice-bike challenge" on the frozen HuoHai lake (above) next Sunday..

A supplier (by bicycle) delivering (meaning actually throwing!) dog meat to a small butchery..

Receive a hug from Beijing, that still fascinates and challenges me.

Dom ;)

fun, chinese language, beijing, pictures

One of these days in Beijing

Oh, well it was one of these days in Beijing: Since I went to bed quite late, I had kind of a hard time convincing myself in the morning to get my butt out of the cosy, warm bed so as to rush through the chilly floor into the hot shower. I consequently left my (actually quite neat) apartment pretty late and, yes of course, was "punished" for it right away: I hit the infamous Beijing rush hour and got stuck in a bus moving at the pace of a snail with a broken leg (well, use your imagination..;) Fortunately I had my lonely planet with me so that I could at least entertain myself while being squashed like a sardine in a tin (well, I might exaggerate a bit, as my bus (976) is one of the least frequented ones..).. I read that the temperature in Beijing can drop as low as -20C during winter... jolly, isn't it..? Oh boy, I'll definitely reconsider buying some of these incredibly unsexy, itchy long johns..

Finally arrived at Exowebs gorgeous office I had just about enough time to prepare the interview with an Indian guy that I was to have in the afternoon and some other stuff, before heading to the welcome lunch of a new employee. Today’s “shockers” were cooked duck feet that came on a Masabi (not sure if I spell it correctly) dressing and some jelly fish, plain. While the jelly fish was strange in its consistency but definitely edible, I keep on having serious doubts about the value duck feet add to my culinary horizon.. Guess I’ll try to avoid chewing on them again when and wherever I can… ;) What ever: apart from these two somewhat exotic dishes, numerous others passed on the “lazy Susan” (merry go round kind of thingy to be found on every table in Chinese restaurants).. As every day, I happily joined the feast...

At 7 pm, once work (some quite interesting interviews, invitation for the Exoweb Christmas bash,..) done, Keeshav and I, as every Monday (oh, yes, we build up and cultivate some traditions here.. ;) went to the Xinjiang restaurant (well, it’s basically a room of about 20m2) down the road to eat. The waitress already knows us and always has a smile to share (this may be connected to the fact, that last time, when we tried to order some of the gorgeous bred you get at this place (Naan type of bread with lots of spices on the top) received some kind of lettuce in stead… guess we have to seriously work on our pronunciation..;)

At 7.30pm our (Keeshavs’, Sumits’, Troys’ and my) Chinese teacher then awaited us for our weekly Chinese class. Today we tested a new teacher and might want to stick to him. He set out his method, and I can tell you, my Swiss eyes blinked: what a structured guy he is.. ;) I enjoy classes with these three great nerds a lot as we learn some Chinese while having quite a bit of fun.

Subsequently we passed at, what is probably the dream of every extreme-shopper in China: the 2 kuai store. All the crap you can think off, for a lousy 20 Euro cents the piece. We couldn’t hold our horses and bought - as silly foreigners probably do. I’m actually pretty happy with what I go:

- 4 mugs (the latest Hello-Kitty line..)

- 4 wine glasses (guess they are actually going to be transparent once I washed them..)

- A bottle opener in the shape of a real bottle (100% plastic, indigo, semi transparent.. a real beauty.. ;)

- 3 shiny note books for my Chinese words

- And, last but certainly not least, two little figures: chubby Chinese grandparents, both wearing glasses and having a cute smile on their face. The fun stuff is: the head and the body are connected at the help of a spring only. So: if you shake them, they nod.. and they keep on doing it for a while…. Ahhh, looking at them I spontaneously think: Capitalism truly works; you can produce all the crap imaginable and people actually buy it… yeah ;)

Keeshav and Troy: Shopping with you guys is a blast!

Well then, I finally reached home by cab (as my bus runs only until 8pm..) and was pretty proud of myself since I managed to guide the driver in Chinese right to the street that I life in. I won’t tell you that all I required for this was even less than what Arnold “Terminator” Schwarzenegger needed to earn Millions of bucks, meaning about 5 words.. ;)

Big Hug! Dom ;)

beijing, daily life

Beijing - first impressions

It’s been more than three weeks since I arrived in the “Northern Capital” (Beijing), the “striking metropolitan core of the Middle Kingdom” or the nucleus of the “ailleurs absolu” how one of my beloved history teachers used to call China (quite right he was, actually, at least with regards to this very expression… ;)

Well then, let me share some of my first impressions about China and the little Swiss’s life in it. Let me do it the bullet point kind of way, as all other ways would go beyond the scope of a posting that is still digestible for the reader..

Beijing – the city:

At least all the Swiss among us may understand what I mean by: Beijing is HUGE. The size of the municipality is roughly the one of Belgium and the Swiss population would be just about enough to establish a neat little neighbourhood; let’s call it “Switzerland town”..

What truly intrigues me, however, is less the size of Beijing than its dynamics; the incredible pace at which this city grows, is being remodelled or even “reinvented”. It somewhat feels as if water was being poured on a cyst after a long drought (which would stand for the introspectiveness that characterized Beijing until very recently). With the 2008 Olympics – some refer to it as the “holy grail of Beijing city planners” – the transformation of the city has been envigored, letting the forest of cranes grow even further.

The Beijing Urban Planning Exhibition we (let me introduce some of my Beijing mates: From the right: Gürkan (Turkish intern), Mats (Czech intern), Keeshav (Indian intern), Pierre (Indian working for AIESEC), Mishie (Aussie working for AIESEC (see second pic)), Aude (Swiss intern) and I) went to gave a good, and truly stunning overview of the projects that are going to be realized until 2008.

Even though I knew that this Exhibition was part of the Chinese PR strategy until 2008 I must admit that I was thrilled and stunned by the amount, size and quality of the projects that ought to be realized. You might want to check out the Olympic stadium (build by Herzog & deMeuron Architects) which looks like a huge nest and will host up to 100’000 people: http://www.thebeijingguide.com/olympic_construction/
olympic_stadium_1.html or http://www.chinese-tools.com/beijing2008/national-stadium.html

As stunning, impressive and thrilling some these projects may be, they also
raise some questions. Numerous neighbourhoods, including hutongs and other parts of the “original Beijing” are being bulldozed so as to give way to fancy, shiny skyscrapers. Apart from cultural heritage that is destroyed, also the sustainability of these projects (some with telling names such as “the new aristocrat”, etc.) may raise some questions. Looking at the construction sides I cannot help but being reminded of what we have seen in Thailand before 1997. However, I continue being torn into two, the fascination about the quality and dimension of the ongoing work on the one side and the above mentioned downsides on the other.

Traffic

- Compared to Switzerland: a total mess. But, hey, compared to Switzerland where drivers are fined for not wearing a seatbelt, where pedestrians would stop in front of red lights even though it was 2am and no car to be seen at the horizon and where 85% of all cars are no older than 5 years, everything seems messy.. ;)

- Compared to Colombia Chinese drivers are lame, and eternally contained ducks. The most impressive special thing about Beijing is consequently not the traffic jams you get into during rush hours, the irrational lane-jumping of drivers causing traffic to break down, or the disrespectful way of how people drive, but the fact that drivers, cyclists and pedestrians always stay the calm. One day I was sitting in a taxi that pulled over without caring about bicycles. A cyclist bumped into the rear end of the car and fell. Even in such a situation: not a single four letter word. The cyclist, almost bashfully brushed off her jacket, checked if all joints were still in order and then drove on… How am I supposed to learn all the Chinese four-letter words in such an environment..!?! ;)

- Public transport is very cheap, even for Chinese standards. The ticket for the bus that takes me to work every morning costs 1yuan (which is about 10 Euro cents); the subway (there’s 3 lines in Beijing) 3yuan, a rickshaw (some are really tiny and I would probably have to take a deep breath in order to fit in; too cold in winter) about 4yuan and a taxi about 20 yuan (about 2 Euros) for a ten kilometre drive.

Oh well, I guess I'll have to leave it there for the first posting and write about the exotic food, the people, the language that has twisted already numerous tongues, work and people another time..

Receive a hug from a little swiss, all happy in big vibrating Beijing. ;)

East meets West.  

The famous Beijing Duck (-Parade)

Looks almost romantic, doesn't it? Chinese food is as diverse as delicious.. Sometimes, however, it tends to be slightly adventurous..

Getting started

Well, I guess I'll be a new member of the Blogger-community then.. Please, however, do neither expect frequent updates nor reeeealy spicy insights into my private life.. ;) If you're interested nevertheless: bookmark this site and share some of the exciting, challenging and funny moments I'm currently living here in vibrating (and in the meantime bloody cold) Beijing ;)