Fish Stomachs

You should all come to China.

Chinese people operate on an entirely different plane. I want so badly to share with you the differences, words do such a poor job, and I’m eager to avoid boring story telling.

To begin, Chinese people move into open spaces much like they are collective wad of silly putty. An open space for our purposes is an elevator, a bus, a street, a room, a hallway, or a line – its only defining characteristic is that it is the place everyone wants to go.

For the most part, everyone wants to go wherever it is that you think you want to go – you are usually wrong, but they beat you to it anyway, so after your 4th try you succeed in getting on the elevator, only to find out you were on the right floor before hand and you get to start the game all over with burning cheeks and a sense of hopelessness renewed.

The best way to put it is that China eats you. It has no room for your fears or cares or quibbles. It is a moving, breathing, mass of great force and tremendous will and you bend to it – no questions asked, no answers given.

I really like it here.

I boarded the plane and helped the 40-something Chinese woman in my row put her bag up in the uselessly-sized compartment. We got to talking in Chinese, and everything was going pretty well – we covered the basics: (dialogue below translated out of Chinese)

Evan: “Hi, how are you”

Woman: “Fine, thank you, thanks for putting my bag up”

Evan: “Are you from Beijing”

Woman: “Yes, I live an hour outside in a city called Tianjin…. You speak Chinese well…”

Evan: “No I don’t, but thank you – this is how long I’ve been studying – do you like Beijing…”

And though I’m missing a few lines, that was about where it stopped being OK. She started talking faster and it became a game of Whack-a-mole or maybe more like trying to catch flying fish with nothing but a baseball mitt. All these words kept popping up and I had to grab on to the ones that made sense and hope that when all the syllables slurred together I was still listening to something that was close to the intended meaning.

To help the conversation along I bobbed my head happily the whole time.

Bad choice.

Apparently she informed me that her reason for coming to America was that her mother was sick. I found this out because as I was picking out intelligible words from the fast-paced super-garble, she stopped suddenly, and in a slow, pronounced, caregul Chinese said “You shouldn’t nod your head if you don’t understand what someone is saying”.

I heard this, and though it didn’t make much sense why she was saying it, I dutifully nodded my head.

Bad choice.

Apparently her message was important, and I was being a dunce. She switched to a pretty good English and said “You shouldn’t nod your head if you don’t understand what someone is saying”. Resisting the urge to nod my head, I listened in English to the error I had committed by smiling and nodding when when she confided in me about her mother.

Hey … you learn from your mistakes?

Save for the fact that I didn’t sleep for any of the 13 hours, and some absolutely beautiful sunsets, dawn-breaks, and sun rises over Greenland, Antarctica, and Ulaanbaatar respectively (I like the flight map feature – its calming) the flight was only semi-eventful.

Apparently my mistake endeared this woman to me. The first moment that she stopped talking was 90 minutes into the flight. I hadn’t glanced at my watch or dared to divert my eyes for fear of committing a 2nd cultural taboo, as she switched between Chinese and English denouncing the Communist Party and her friends that support it, I heard of a whole new China, a China viewed through the lens of resentment.

The stream of high-powered emotionally-charged China critiquing had about as much order and sensibility to it as a sentence that has all its words scrambled. Without any transitions she plugged through every topic she had opinions on, assured I was enthralled and in concurrence on each. To me, it sounded like this:

Fish stomachs, Poverty in the rurals, Building those factories, and GOVERNMENT OFFICALS! Tibet – did I mention in America – oh, my friends don’t under stand and in your food, think of Tibet, so many people, the American dream! communist party and your stomach the beautiful mountains of China fish stomachs poverty Tibet mountains stomach friend AmericapovertycommunistFISH!!!!!!!!! – what is your name?

The last part I answered, TWO HOURS LATER when she finally asked. That was nearly the end, and eventually an 11 hour silence ensued.

My trip out of the airport required all 5 semesters of Chinese and all 6 weeks of China experience not to incur disaster. I enjoyed feeling like I could talk to people, but it’s a crazy world and its just plain tough to speak Chinese. I bought a phone card, figured out how to use the phone, called the program and learned that I was supposed to meet my host at “The Nine Dragons by the White Hole”. I misheard this – it was actually the Nine Dragons on the white wall – such a subtle difference, but it makes people look at you funny when your asking for white holes that don’t exist.

I went to various information desks asking for the nine dragons by the white hole – one finally figured out that it didn’t matter if there was no such thing as a white hole, 9 dragons are 9 dragons and so I learned I had to get on a bus to get to the place with 9 dragons.

I took a bus. An intra-airport bus. For 30 minutes (China does BIG quite well). Then I took an elevator 6 floors within the 3rd terminal and found some dragons – No contact person. I found another phone called another contact and got the whole 9 dragons story all over again. Right before I hung up – I realized it they were saying something about a wall and caught site of something light colored and marble-looking in the distance. An hour and a half after landing – all was well.

My host family is awesome. The dad is traveling far away for work. The 12 year old boy is totally awesome, super cute, and really friendly – I think I have a new Chinese best bud. The internet doesn’t work. My family knows no English. I haven’t eaten. I’m sort of exhausted, but sort of high on the trip, and high on the country. I love China – you should really come visit … its an experience like no other.