I've never been this cold... ever

So apparently China doesn't have indoor heating. Well, at least I know that any city south of the Yangtze River doesn't have heating. Which unfortunately includes Nanjing. My Chinese family believes that indoor heating is bad for your health and that you should open all the windows in the house to improve the air circulation. It snowed yesterday. And yes, our windows were still wide open. My classmate, who is also in a homestay, said you could see his breath in the house. However, this is also the same classmate who doesn't have a mattress, he sleeps on a plank of wood. Luckily our apartment wasn't that cold, but I was still shivering pretty much the whole night. I dread taking showers. And I used to complain that my family kept the thermostat at 67 degrees...

So it snowed yesterday, one of the earliest times of the year that it's ever snowed in Nanjing. I found out that this apparently was caused by China's "Weather Modification Team" that fires rocket shells full of silver iodide into the sky in order to create rain. This is a common practice in Beijing and other parts of China that frequently suffer from droughts. This year, a cold front came into Beijing right after they shot the silver iodide, and it caused a huge snowstorm on November 2nd. Apparently, Nanjing is just now feeling the after effects of this as the precipitation is moving south. I'm not really sure how all of this works, so google it if you have time! China's "Weather Modification Team" also diverts clouds on days of importance, including October 1st, for the National Day Parade.

So Obama's in town. Well, not my town, but in Shanghai and Beijing this week. Pretty exciting stuff. I didn't even know about it until my family was talking about it at dinner last night so I watched the video of his speech on CNN.com. Although I thought that Obama was most definitely stepping on China's toes, it was certainly interesting and I think everybody would agree that the US-China relationship is the most important in the world. Check it out: http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/11/16/china.us.relations/index.html

It was also funny because in Chinese class today we just happened to study that same proverb that Obama "quoted." For those that are curious, it's "温鼓而知新 wen gu er zhi xin" which is usually translated as "Understand the present by reviewing the past." We all agreed that it wouldn't have been that hard for Obama to have learned how to say that in Chinese.

Exploring China Part 4: Chengdu

On Friday, October 30 we got on a plane and flew to Chengdu in Sichuan province. Chengdu is a big city of 8 million people. Many of you probably know Chengdu for one thing: two summers ago, in the summer of 2008, Chengdu suffered a devastating earthquake of a 7.5 magnitude. You may also know Sichuan for one thing: their food. They are famous throughout China and the rest of the world for their food—it's mostly spicy food and they are also famous for Hot Pot. They also are famous for their Panda research center.

Anyway, we arrived at the hotel on Friday and went to go get food. I had a delicious noodle dish that was extremely spicy. Afterward, I took a 3-hour nap because at this point of the trip I was exhausted—I probably got about 5 hours or less of sleep every night. Afterward, we went and got more delicious food. Unfortunately, except for the food, Chengdu was a little disappointing. After the clean air of Lijiang, we were disgusted by all the pollution. Chengdu is definitely dirtier—both in air quality and in the street—than Nanjing is. We were kind of grossed out. Plus, because Chengdu was so humid, all the pollution was just trapped inside. Nanjing has a similar effect but Chengdu was pretty gross. That night we hung out at a restaurant by the river.

The next day was October 31, Halloween! In the morning we went to the 三星队museum, a museum dedicated to an ancient civilization and culture that they discovered in artifacts buried underneath Chengdu. This culture seemingly disappeared for no reason at all and they are still researching to figure out more information about this mysterious civilization that has virtually no roots to any other ancient culture in China. After that we went to lunch at a delicious Hot Pot restaurant. Immediately we headed to the Panda Research Center, which was definitely one of the highlights of my trip. One of our first stops was to look at the red pandas, which are pandas from the raccoon family and look very similar to a cross between raccoon and a fox. And guess what? It was only 100 Yuan to hold a red panda! I decided that I didn't want to hold one, but all of my friends did and I've included a picture of Kira holding one.

After that exciting adventure, we went to the nursery, where the baby pandas were. There was a set of twins playing in a crib-like contraption in one of the nurseries. This was definitely the cutest thing I've ever seen. It almost made me want to cry, thinking about how these wonderfully cute and adorable creatures are almost extinct! We also looked at the adult pandas, which were also incredibly cute in their laziness. And of course I bought some panda paraphernalia as when we left. After that, we went to an extremely fancy dinner at a hotel and I had this delicious beef that kind of resembled steak! I was so excited! It was amazing!

After that we went to see Sichuan opera, which was very different from Beijing Opera, which is what you may be familiar with. This was more of a talent show of sorts, which a skit, music, and opera. One of the acts was shadow puppets and it was literally one of the coolest things I've ever seen. This man made birds, dogs, and cats with his hands using the shadows! He even made a scene with a snake that eats a rabbit! It looked so real. For the finale, he had a horse galloping across a beach. It was so realistic.

After that we were all exhausted, as we had been out of the hotel for more than 14 hours, touring around Chengdu. But of course we had to celebrate Halloween. So we all convened in my friends' hotel room. Unfortunately, we were being too loud and we got some noise complaints from the front desk. A hotel clerk came and knocked on our door to tell us we were being too loud. When we left, we all collapsed in laughter because he probably thought we were out of our minds—after all, we had three people dressed up as pandas, and two people dressed up in 喜羊羊- XiYangYang (a popular cartoon in China) clothes. So the hotel clerk invited us to hang out in the lobby. After a little while, we eventually went to sleep, but it was certainly interesting celebrating Halloween in China! The next day, was Sunday, November 1, and we woke up early and got on a plane back to Nanjing.

So it's easier for me to just post all the pictures at the end of the post instead of throughout the whole thing:

Me on Friday with some guy who was cooking us skewers. I have no idea why I took this picture but it looks kind cool.

PANDA!

Kira holding a Red Panda!

Halloween! Emilia and Jonathan are of course dressed up like pandas. I don't really know what Vince was (on the left) but we was just walking around in a bathrobe type deal.

Halloween

Exploring China Part 3: Lijiang

On Wednesday, October 28 we arrived in Lijiang around 8:00 pm. Lijiang is home to several minorities, including Tibetan. It is mostly made up of the Naxi minority, which is one of the only societies in the world to still widely use pictographs as their written language. Their language is called Dongba and most of the signs, especially on the shops, still had the pictographs on them. In an effort to conserve the language, Dongba, as well as Mandarin, is still taught in school. By the way, I forgot to mention earlier the minority statistics in China. China is made up of 92% Ethnically Han Chinese. The rest of the 8% of the population, which is over 1 million people, are officially made up of 56 different minority groups. As many of you may know, the Communist Party created these official groups and gave them names, and the government is not perfect. Many people argue that they actually grouped many different groups that were culturally different into one group. Anyway, the Naxi people are one of these groups. The Naxi people practice a religion that worships a Tree god and their religion forbids cutting down trees.

Anyway, we arrived in Lijiang around 8:00 and were exhausted when we checked into the hotel. We quickly showered and headed off to dinner. We found that area we were staying in this night (as opposed to the night before last) was swarming with tourists and much more commercialized. However, it was still a charming and beautiful town that reminded me of Venice. Even though I've never been there, I imagine that it might be similar. There were canals that ran along the streets with small bridges everywhere to cross them. Red lanterns glowed in the entrances to all the shops and restaurants and you could see the mountains in the background. After an awkward encounter when a restaurant gave us an English menu that was more expensive than the Chinese one, we finally found a restaurant and ate more Yak meat! As you might have already noticed, Yak meat is a staple in Yunnan Province.

After that, we walked around the endless winding streets for a couple hours, exploring the new town and chatting. After that a few of us sat in a circle in the central town square playing a game that is kind of hard to describe, but let's just say it's kind of one of the elementary school games that involves clapping. That certainly attracted a lot of attention and a few Chinese men joined us but they quickly gave up because it was somewhat complicated. The next morning was Thursday and we woke up at 9:00 am for a lecture given by a university and/or government official (we weren't sure) about the Naxi minority and Lijiang itself. He told us about the ways that the local Naxi government is preserving Lijiang and other interesting facts about the minority. He also said that this area attracts a lot of Japanese tourists who believe that the Naxi people are ancestors of the Japanese, but he said he did not agree that those facts were true. Afterward, we walked around shopping for more Christmas presents and 3 of my friends and I bought matching friendship necklaces.

They decided to check out "Ma's Mansion" which is the old mansion complex from the previous Naxi clan ruler from long ago. I decided to head back to the hostel, where I met up with some friends who were going to the Black Dragon Park. The park was absolutely beautiful, but a bit crowded with Chinese tourists. 3 of my friends and I decided to sit and play Chinese chess on a bridge over a stream in the middle of the park. I played 2 games against Jeff and we tied, and Tom ended up playing a random Chinese guy, as we like to say sometimes.

Jeff and I headed back to the hostel and met up with some of our friends for dinner. We went to the "Prague Café" which had Western food, namely pizza, hamburgers and milkshakes, which are extremely rare commodities in China. Luckily the prices were relatively equivalent to the nearby restaurants, and so we indulged in some of our cravings. I myself got some Westernized Chinese food, which tasted exactly like what a Sweet and Sour pork dish in the US would taste like. I get cravings in China sometimes for American Chinese food. The other foods that I usually crave are cheese and salad. Anyway, we had a very fun dinner in which we played a couple mind games, first the "umbrella" game, which was a word-pattern game, and then the "triangle" game, which involved pointing. They were two mind-boggling games and we laughed so much trying to figure out the answers. We played more games back at the hotel and packed to get ready for our next city, Chengdu.

This is me and Linnea playing the triangle/pointing game, trying to figure out what the trick was to the answer by keeping our legs folded and our hands crossed.

This is Jonathan with some random Chinese guy that gave him flowers. I included this so you could see all the red lanterns hanging.

Exploring China Part 2: Lugu Lake

On Monday, October 26th we arrived in Lijiang for 1 evening. It was a small town with a beautiful park and lots of shopping. After Lugu Lake, we returned to Lijiang for 2 days so I will write more about Lijiang in my next post.

On Tuesday, October 27th we had a quick breakfast of egg sandwiches at the hostel and then got on a bus at 8:00 am to head over to Lugu Lake (泸沽湖）. Lugu Lake is one of the last truly matriarchal societies in the world. The reason it has been so well preserved was because the society was unknown to the Chinese government up until 10 years ago when it was discovered. One of the women left the village and walked for 7 days until she reached Lijiang. She later moved to Beijing and reported to the world about her town.

Today Lugu Lake has a relatively developed tourist industry and is known as 女儿国 or "Daughter's Kingdom." They have 走昏, which means "Walking Marriages." This means that the women don't get married to one man for life. If they fall in love with a man, then he comes to her bedroom at night and leaves in the morning. This usually lasts for 5-10 years or so, after which they usually break up, and the woman starts seeing another man. All the men live with their mother's or sister's family, so the children's mothers and uncles raise the children. They don't live with their fathers.

So on Tuesday morning we got on a very small bus with our tour guide. It wasn't a problem at first, but then we started driving very fast down dirt roads on the side of the mountain. You can see in the picture on the windy roads through the mountains. Every time we would drift off to sleep, we would be jolted awake by a huge bump in the road, upon which all of us would go flying out of our seats. Our bus had to go up and down 5 mountains for 9 hours before we arrived in Lugu Lake. Also our tour guide had a tendency to yell and sing into her microphone more loudly than anyone could bear. But the scenery was beautiful!

As soon as we arrived after our long bus ride, we got on cable cars (which was basically just a ski lift up the face of the mountain). At the top we had a beautiful view of the lake and mountains. As we arrived, we saw wild monkeys in the trees jumping around. There was a Buddhist temple at the top and also a cave with special spring water that supposedly will make you have twins.

Afterward, we went to our tour guides home. I guess this was part of our travel package, but it certainly was wonderful hospitality. Her family had 39 people! We all sat and ate the delicious and over-abundant food. Also, this society has a very strict cultural tradition that the men and women drink different alcohol. So the men's alcohol was basically rubbing alcohol. We're talking Everclear/Moonshine alcohol here. The woman's alcohol was basically tea with a little wine in it. And of course the family was toasting us the entire time…

After we ate dinner, we went to the town square where they have traditional dancing. After watching the dancing, we all got to dress up in traditional clothing and they taught us their traditional dance, which was basically dancing in a circle. Then we had a singing contest with the local people where they would sing 2 lines from a song, and then we would sing 2 lines from a song. I think we lost.

Afterward, we sang songs on the bus until we got back to our hotel. We were excited because we could actually see the stars and the moon, as opposed to in Nanjing where that will always be impossible. So we walked to the lake and lay by the lakeside stargazing. We saw about 6 shooting stars! It was amazing. It was also freezing outside and our hotel rooms didn't have any heat. We also didn't have any hot water so it was a cold experience!

The next morning was Wednesday and we got up at 7:00 am to walk along the lake. Then we got in rowboats and rowed across the lake to an island. The picture above is us on the rowboat going across the lake. Since this society was isolated, I really don't know how Tibetan Buddhism got there, but it must have been the religion from thousands of years ago. Anyway, on the island there were a couple beautiful Tibetan Buddhist temples. After looking at the art and other artifacts in the temples, we took the boat back to shore. Before we headed back to Lijiang, we stopped at an elementary school. We found a classroom that didn't have a teacher in it (I'm not sure why... teacher shortage maybe?) and talked with the students there about their lives and their family.

We were all dreading the 9-hour bus ride back to Lijiang, so we decided to play Mafia, which is a game with a Killer, a Policeman, and townspeople. We probably played that game for at least 6 hours. It was pretty fun because you get to use your imagination. We had a zombie apocalypse, we were dolphins in the sea, we were pirates, and we had a Mean Girls theme… pretty much everything you can imagine. It was pretty hilarious—it's a psychological game. We also played a Japanese clapping game. In the middle of the trip we stopped at a restaurant and while we were eating lunch they slaughtered a pig right outside and we could hear it squealing for like 10 minutes. We all agreed that it was strange and it even made some people sick! Finally we arrived back at Lijiang on Wednesday evening.

Exploring China Part 1: Shangri-la

Last week I went on a CIEE sponsored trip around Southern China to the Yunnan and Sichuan Provinces. The purpose of the trip was to study minority cultures and interact with minority peoples in southern China. We visited 4 cities: Shangri-la, Lugu Lake, Lijiang and Chengdu. Here is a link to a map of all the places that I went to. Note where Nanjing is, all the way to the East, and where Burma is! We were less than a 100 miles from Burma at some points. For the next 3 days I will write a post about each destination. Today's post is about my adventures in Shangri-la.

On the morning of Friday, October 23 we departed Nanjing on a plane and arrived in Yunnan Province at 3:00 pm. At the airport, we promptly boarded a bus and traveled for another 4 hours to Shangri-la (香格里拉), which is the capital of the Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (read: we were in a Tibetan county but technically not in Tibet itself). Shangri-la is about 3,000 meters (2 miles) above sea level and we had all been warned the day before that we might experience altitude sickness, which is usually dizziness, racing heart and shortness of breath. When we arrived, we all immediately noticed how incredibly cold it was. Unfortunately, due to linguistic and cultural barriers (they had told us how cold it was going to be in degrees Celsius…), most of us had not brought enough warm clothing.

We noticed right away that it was harder to communicate with the Tibetans. Not only were they not as accustomed to hearing Mandarin with a thick American accent (since they mostly deal with Chinese tourists), but also many did not speak Mandarin as their first language. All the signs were also in Tibetan. That first night, after bundling up with as many clothes as possible, we headed out to find food and stumbled across a Hot Pot (火锅-literally "fire bowl") restaurant. Hot Pot is a style of food in which a pot of boiling water is placed on a fire in the middle of the table and you add ingredients, such as noodles, meat and vegetables, as you wish. A bunch of my friends and I walked in and sat down. We were pleased to find that although the restaurant was cold, the tables were small and the fire in the middle of the table created a warm and cozy atmosphere. After we warmed our hands in the fire in the middle, our Hot Pot came and we quickly added the mushrooms, potatoes, and of course, Yak rib meat. Yak meat is the most commonly eaten meat in Yunnan Province and that night we discovered that it was absolutely delicious! We mixed the delicious sauce and feasted that night.

The next day was Saturday and we woke up early and headed off to Putatso National Park, the only national park in China. Although it was cold, we walked around and took pictures of 2 beautiful lakes. It was there that we reached the highest elevation of the entire trip- almost 3,500 meters above sea level, which is over 2 miles. Afterward, we feasted on more Yak meat and headed off to one of the highlights of the entire trip, the Tibetan Buddhist temples in Shangri-la. We were first instructed that we couldn't take pictures, wear hats or sunglasses, or walk/explore the area counter-clockwise. Then we climbed several flights on stairs to the top of a smallish mountain. The first temple took my breath away. A huge golden Buddha sat in the middle with prayer flags and other adornments hanging on his person. The walls were painted with the most beautiful and intricate murals I've ever seen. Different Buddha idols sat positioned around the room at various points. The first temple was 3 stories high, all surrounding the huge Buddha in the middle. I wish I could describe the beauty here, but it is impossible to find the right words. The next temple was just as beautiful and breath taking. As I walked around, I felt myself holding back tears. This beautiful culture, this beautifully peaceful religion has been practically eliminated and almost made extinct by the Chinese government. It is so sad to think about how in Tibet many of these temples were ransacked and destroyed. The pictures of the Dalai Lama that adorned the temple reminded me that their leader will forever be in exile from their country. The third temple, the last temple, was empty when I walked in, except for a monk chanting prayers and burning incense . I walked around the temple as I listened to him chant, and lit a candle at the end as a wish for the happiness of all those who have touched my life.

The next day was Sunday and we had a free day. Some friends and I decided to go to the hot springs at a ecological park nearby. After arriving at the hot springs, we got 1.5 hour massages and then got in the hot spring, which was a large pool of very, very hot water. It was so relaxing and fun to sit in the hot water when it was so cold outside. We swam, relaxed and chatted for a few hours in the water, got a delicious dinner with more Yak meat, and then ventured into Old Town Shangri-la which is a very quaint district with cobblestone, windy streets, a city square and small shops. We went shopping, buying Christmas presents, and watched some traditional dancing in the city square.

Afterward, 3 friends and I decided to hang out at one of the restaurants:

My friends and I at one of the restaurants, from left to right Elaine, Sean, Me and Jonathan.

After hanging out and chatting for a while in the restaurant, we discovered that we had actually walked in on a birthday party. Luckily, they gave all of us cake, which tasted exactly like a birthday cake you would buy at Giant Eagle. A cake fight ensued, of course:

This is a picture of us in the midst of a cake fight. Note the cake on Jonathan's face.

This is the part where we interacted with the local people! We made Tibetan friends, of course!

The next morning was Monday, October 26^th and we left for our next city, Lijiang. On the way to Lijiang, our bus stopped for an hour at Tiger Leaping Gorge, one of the most famous and beautiful gorges in China. Pictures below!

This is a picture of 4 CIEE students at Tiger Leaping Gorge. Their shirts say "We stay Fresh to Death." It's funny because 1. It's purple 2. It's Chinglish. I mean, who says that really? 3. Chinese people say everything is "adjective to death" such as "hungry to death" but when they translate it it doesn't always work!

This is a picture of me and Kira at Tiger Leaping Gorge.

This is a sign from Tiger Leaping Gorge with Mandarin at the top, English in the middle, and Tibetan at the bottom. I included this so you could see what Tibetan looks like if you've never seen it. Also, this sign is an excellent example of the awesome Chinglish that is seen on all the signs in China. The security guard gave me a weird look when I took this picture.

Nationalism

For my midterm project in Chinese Contemporary Studies, we had to do "field research" (read: go out and interview people) in our topic of interest. The question of my project was "Does Chinese Nationalism cause Xenophobia?" I interviewed three people: my host mother, my little brother, and my friends roommate. I asked them a host of questions such as:

Are you proud to be a Chinese citizen?
Since China has over 5,000 years of history and the US only has 230 years of history, do you believe that China is a better country than the US?
Do you think that Americans are too arrogant?
Do you believe that Chinese people are sometimes afraid of foreigners and foreign influence?

It was extremely interesting to hear their responses. For one, of course, they were all very proud to be Chinese citizens. I think if the question had been asked of Americans, it would not have been such a positive response. Also, they pretty much agreed that the American government is too arrogant (ie it frequently tells other countries what to do), but that American people are not. One of the most interesting things was what my host mom said. She said that the one most prominent example of Westernization is the way in which western influence is fundamentally changing the structure of the family in China-- which as we all know, is thus changing the structure of society. She said not only are people living together before marriage, but also that people are no longer as willing as they were before to take care of their parents in their old age. She said that this is definitely a result of Westernization and that such ideas have never been an issue until about 10 years ago.

For my presentation, I looked into the implications behind the word Nationalism in the US, versus Nationalism in China. In the US, Nationalism generally has a negative connotation associated with it. Additionally, there are some stereotypes surrounding China, such as that its Nationalistic tendencies cause some mistrust of foreign nations and people. Also, that Chinese people regard themselves as being from the "Middle Kingdom" or the center of the universe.

In contrast, Nationalism in China is regarded as one of the most important cultural values, right up there with Harmony, Relationships and Family. Nationalism was also one of the Three Principles of Dr. Sun-Yatsen. The Chinese people that I interviewed thought that my questions were very curious and did not understand why I was asking them. I explained the stereotypes about China that surround the concept of Nationalism, and then they seemed to understand somewhat, but it was hard to break the language and cultural barrier for this one. Still, interviewing people and hearing what they have to say about China--for example, they hate the French because Sarkozy once said in an official statement that Tibet should be its own country--was one of the most interesting experiences I've had yet.

I'm leaving tomorrow (October 23) for our "Chengdu Module" which is an awesome opportunity to go on a week-long trip with my program to Southern China. We'll be going to Lijiang and Shangrila in Yunnan Province and Chengdu in Sichuan Province. I'll be sure to write about it when I get back next week, on Sunday, November 1st. Until then, I'll be out of touch but feel free to email me, as always, if you need anything!

More pictures from my trip

As per my Mom's request, here are some pictures with me in them. This is a picture of me on a camel at MingSha Mountain, which is where the largest sand dunes in the world are located.


That is me there at the top with the blue shirt. This is the part of Hua Mountain where you had to climb on the face of the mountain using chains. It was only scary because there were so many people there.
This is the whole group of us that went on the trip at the top of Hua Mountain. The first row are all the guys, from left to right, Trevor, Matt, John and Sean. The second row from left to right is Me, Sharon, Linnea and Kira. 8 people trying to travel together proved to be difficult, but we had a blast.
This is a picture of us waiting in the ridiculously long line for 3 hours.

This is a picture of Sean, Me, John and Sharon in DunHuang walking around and chatting one night. We were surprised by how cold it got when the sun went down. As I mentioned, Dunhuang had an awesome night market that we frequented when we went there. As you can see, our friend Sharon is Chinese American. She got asked about twenty times a day if she was our tour guide or interpreter, and everyone was surprised when she told them she was our classmate. Chinese people always ask her why she doesn't speak Chinese fluently but she has a good excuse-- she's fluent in Cantonese.