Musings

It has been such a long time since I have written I am not quite sure where to begin. So maybe I’ll try a little James Joyce and see how it goes.

On my many trips around Beijing I couldn’t help but notice the number of couples who wear the exact same clothing or colors when they go out together. At first, I just thought it was a coincidence; but when one of our house guests (

a college friend of Matt’s) noticed this too, I realized it probably was a trend. My suspicions were confirmed the

other day when I walked past a shop and found this set of T-shirts in the window. If you can’t read it, the shirts say Happy Family, with the same shirts in men’s, women’s and children’s sizes.

I thought this was particularly surprising in that it seems customary that most Chinese men and women do not to wear wedding bands. I asked a group of my colleagues at work about this because none of them wear wedding bands. I thought they were all single until one day, in the course of a conversation, one of them talked about her husband. Over a period of a couple of weeks, I learned that almost all of the wedding bandless women were married with children. I asked one day at lunch if the Chinese wedding ceremony included an exchange of rings because none of them wore rings. It turns out that there is an exchange of rings as part of the ceremony; but no one really wears their rings. One colleague said it showed i

ndependence. I guess I could have argued that independence and commitment aren’t mutually exclusive. I decided that that was a conversation left for another day. Maybe people wear T-shirts instead?

We’ve done a bit of site seeing recently. We took a rail trip to a city called Shi Du, which in Chinese means 10 crossings. It is an area of gorges with a river running through it and at one time, when the water levels were much higher, there

were 10 places to cross the river. Now, with water levels much lower and modern transport, there is no need for 10 crossings. We did cross the river on a rope bridge suspended about 30 feet over the water. A bit nerve racking as it was a windy day, the bridge swaying because of both wind and people traffic. The area is a day outing from Beijing to hike in the gorges, do some river rafting or bungy jumping. We did some hiking (no bungy jumping for us!)and found a quaint little restaurant where we had fish freshly caught in the river and grilled on an outdoor set-up right before out eyes. Some of the best food we’ve had in

China.

We took an overnight trip to the Great Wall when Matt was visiting and slept on the Wall

under the stars. We hiked a portion of the wall know as Simatai. It has refurbished areas as well as areas that are original. It was a demanding hike and if it had lasted any longer than it did (4 hours), I think we would have needed assistance to complete the trek. My upper thighs were sore for about 5 days following our trip! The steps on the wall are not necessarily uniform in height, with some rises 1 1/2 or 2 times higher than the normal step rise. Also, many steep slopes and incline ramp areas. Very few level areas. But we made it to the end and saw some incredible views and met some very nice people. The trip was organized by a group called China Culture Center. They have a reputation for providing good tours and they didn’t disappoint.

Pets have a position of prominence in Beijing. I suspect is has a lot to do with the one child policy; the elderly, in particular, are looking for an object for their affection. In our neighborhood, dogs seem

to be the visible pet of preference. Owners proudly walk their dogs (with and without leashes) that have been primped and coiffed, often in outfits resembling clothes in which you would dress a small child. The most interesting “outfit” I have seen is the ow

ner that had his dog’s coat died shades of green and yellow and sheered in a shape to resemble the shell of a turtle. (see photo). When I saw this ( I have become bolder in my photo taking) I asked the owner if I could take a photo. He beamed and posed for the following photo. When I showed the photo to some locals, they said they had never seen anything like it! Haven’t seen too many cats. I think they are kept inside which makes incredible sense given the traffic patterns (or lack there of) on city streets. This fall and winter, I intend to take pet fashion photos. I’ll keep you posted.

An Extra Curricular Activity

Being involved with a private school, I am finding, comes with benefits and obligations. In public education, at least in the US, for the most part, you decide what school your children will attend with your choice of apartment rental or home purchase. The realty market drives the advertising or promotion of a town and therefore its school district. In the expat realm in Beijing, or in any expat situation throughout the world, the decision of housing and schools can be made independently. Therefore, marketing becomes a core component of a private or an international school’s daily life. In a growing, competitive market like Beijing, there is a lot of pressure on the marketing departments and admission staffs of private schools to attract new applicants; very different than the mindset of relying on state and municipal tax funding for education. As a result, I find myself in the role of sales person for a good part of the day. I never realized how tiring sales can be!

Now for the benefits. Because of my connection to BCIS, Steve and I had the unexpected pleasure to attend a most unusual and special piano concert one Saturday afternoon. It was called “Love and Music Charity Concert” and it was sponsored by an organization called Little Angel Action Fund. The purpose of the charity concert was to raise money for music education programs for children living in the poverty-stricken western region of China called Qinghai. In fact, it was in this province that China suffered its most recent earthquake. The organization had been providing music instruction in this area prior to the earthquake; but the recent devastation makes any funds going into this area all the more important.

The international school I work for has been a supporter of the LIttle Angel Action Fund and, over the years, we have held fundraisers at our school to support their efforts. All the proceeds of “Spring in the City,” our annual spring fair which took place on May 8th, will go to Little Angel Action Fund.

Anyway, our Marketing Manager, Sabrina, asked if Steve and I would like to attend the concert because she had some extra seats... so off we went. It was a real treat. The event was held at a grand facility in Beijing call the National Center for the Performing Arts. It is a spectacular building, fondly known as the “egg” because of its shape, that is the premier concert venue in the city. It has a concert hall, opera house and theater. Steve and I had been there once before, to attend a Chinese opera, but in the evening. It turns out that many of the unusual features of the building are lost without the day light.

The concert began with an introduction of the organization in exhibition hall format with posters and displays throughout a room adjacent to the concert hall. Then a group of young performers (about 5-8 years old) came out in traditional Tibetan ethnic dress to sing for the audience. They were very talented little children who did movements with white scarfs, which are a symbol of health and longevity. After they finished their little performance, it was their job to move the audience to the concert hall. They did this by selecting members of the audience to whom they presented their scarves and held hands with them with the rest of the group following. Guess who was chosen by the main singer? It was Steve! The main little performer ran right up to him, presented him with her scarf, and took him by the hand as we all followed. We were all then seated in the concert hall. It was very sweet and special. It happened so quickly I couldn’t get a photo of it in process; but I did get this photo of them afterwards.

Now to the obligations. I find myself responsible for attending school events or functions on the weekends; like proctoring our diploma program scholarship test, working at our school fair, working at the expat show. While the events have not been onerous and have even been lots of fun, they have cut down on our weekend flexibility and mobility this spring. It’s funny. I was asked by someone the other day what places I had been to throughout China so far. In reality, not too many because of the number of weekend Steve or I have had to work. But, I am hoping, at least with regards to my schedule, that these commitments will be limited to the spring...hopefully not too many this fall and winter.

Life in the Bike Lane

Well, maybe you can be a kid again. Get your bike and get in the bike lane on a nice spring day - an entire city to explore, with your own lane, your own little traffic lights and blue direction signs - and go for a ride. The bike lane on many roads is protected from traffic by a little white picket fence 18 to 24 inches tall; sort of like the white wire fences you might use to edge a flower garden, only made of a much heavier gauge of steel. Mounted in concrete blocks or water-filled blocks, it creates a very private lane for bike traffic. On some roads, of course, the bike lane is defined merely by a painted line on the road, but around our apartment the major roads all have a fenced off lane; which is very good for keeping the buses away.

Of course the excitement is not purely from the joy of a safe and serene ride through a major city like Beijing in your own bike lane, it is also from the on-coming traffic. Because many of the roads in Beijing are big – six lane highway in the middle, three lanes of traffic in each direction on the “street”, a right turn lane and one or more left turn lanes at major intersections, plus of course a bike lane on each side – crossing the street is a pain, not too mention a five minute exercise if you have to cross in two directions. So what people do is ride the wrong way.

So there you are feeling sunny and warm, having a leisurely ride down your bike lane, when the cry of “Oncoming! Oncoming!” disrupts the peace. This cry of warning can range from a mild reminder to look up and avoid an elderly man or woman riding one of Beijing’s many look-a-like beat up old bicycles, which from their dusty and corroded appearance you’d think Mao himself had taken them on the Long March, to a warning with the urgency of the battlefield cry of “incoming” as some deranged delivery van driver careens up the bike lane on a short-cut to his next stop. Your bike lane which a moment ago seemed peacefully separated from traffic now seems like a death trap as it generally has the sidewalk curb on one side, possibly lined with parked cars, and that nice little fence separating the bike lane from vehicular traffic on the other, so you can’t escape whatever is coming in the opposite direction. The likely choices are another bike, an electric scooter, a motor cycle, at pedal powered junk cart, and electric junk cart or a three-wheeled enclosed contraption that is a one passenger taxi, a car, an SUV or delivery van. Now other bikes and motor scooters aren’t too bad, but the carts depending on how they are loaded take up quite a bit of space. Everyone slows down and somehow squeezes by.

When the bike lane isn’t hemmed in with a little fence the convention seems to be that the wrong way riders hug the curb. Not sure why. Maybe the theory is the slight swell of the bike traffic out into the vehicular lanes will just nudge everyone over a little. Maybe there is an aversion to head on collisions? Maybe it is just faith in the unseen driver behind you not to run you down. After a few rides you learn to cut-off the buses to avoid the “oncoming” just like a native.

The other sign that your bike lane life is achieving native status is that you too will ride the wrong way, at night, without a light, and hug the curb. If my children did this I would definitely be taking their bikes away! I did wear my helmet, which makes me a complete oddity in the bike lane. Helmets just aren’t done - must mess up the hair or something. Diane and I did this the other night coming home from the tailor shop and were just commenting to each other how odd the situation was when we were passed in the bike lane, going in the wrong direction, by a Land Rover doing the same thing!

There are other traffic hazards in the bike lane as well. One stems from the fact that battery powered motor scooters are very popular. With a top speed of about 2 to 3 times of a bike at its fastest, they are the speed demons of the bike lane. And, they are completely silent. You can’t hear them coming up behind you, although most of the drivers will beep their horn in your ear several times, there are plenty of times when you don’t know you are about to be passed by a “swerving-dervish” until he appears six inches off your left elbow. It’s a bit unnerving. Same for those headed in the wrong direction. If you are looking at the road for pot holes etc, you don’t hear the traffic approaching head on. 360 degree awareness is needed at all times. Another hazard is the old and slow riders entering the lane without looking. Diane was viciously cut off by an old guy pedaling a yam-roaster. Basically a three wheeled bike with a 55-gallon drum of the back for building a charcoal fire and using it to roast yams for sale. They seem to move up and down the main roads catering to people waiting for the bus.

The worst traffic hazard is cars turning right – or what I have come to think of as the “right turn terrorists.” For some reason, everyone who makes a right turn in China seems to believe they have the right of way. As a car driver, you do not yield to bikes in the bike lane which you have to cross to turn right. You do not yield to pedestrians in the cross-walk, even when they have the walk sign. Stop at a red light before proceeding to turn right? Never! And of course you don’t yield to traffic traveling on the road you are turning onto, you just plow right in. This is all very different from New York where you can pretty much cross with the light and expect the cars to stop for you, or CA where most drivers will at least slow down if not stop as soon as you step off the curb. I think this is the single biggest hazard of Beijing traffic.

There isn’t anyone wearing Hugo Boss in the bike lane. The average bike lane rider has jeans or khaki’s, about three jackets, gloves, and all varieties of wool caps to keep their ears from freezing off. Once in a while you see some office workers heading in to work in a shirt and tie on their electric scooters. My secretary rides her bike to work, both for exercise and to save the subway fare of 4 RMB a day (about 60 cents). She changes out of her jeans at the office. In the main, however, the bike lane seems to be a blue-collar experience. It is how our newly hired Ayi (maid) gets from home to work and from client to client. As a result the bike lane is pretty crowded at shift change times, 7 to 8 in the morning, and 3 to 5 in the evening. But it’s not like the “old days” of even 10 years ago when bikes far out numbered cars. Now it seems that the 4 million cars on Beijing’s streets are in the majority – which makes the bike lane a good choice for whizzing past grid-locked traffic.

Of course the Chinese tendency to adopt the expedient approach to any given problem means that when traffic gets jammed it naturally seeks the path of least resistance and that means cars, trucks and possibly buses start using the bike lane. Sometimes to the extent that even the bike lane grinds to a halt. This has only happened to us once so far, but a traffic delay caused by a large theatre event on the East Third Ring Road blocked the bike lane. Usually the cars leave enough space for a single bike to squeeze by along the curb. But since the bike lane is also used by pedal powered pick up trucks, which are three-wheeled carts the width of about two and half bike riders they can’t get through. Thus the bike lane is grid-locked just like the rest of the lanes. Of course single cyclists like us can solve the problem by putting on our “Chinese” thinking caps and either (a) ride on the sidewalk with the pedestrians or (b) ride in the wrong direction in the bike lane on the other side of the road. We’ve done both!

The bike lane has its own set of service stations. No need to compete with cars at the gas station. The bike lane has frequent repair shops to cater to the cyclists every need. Well, most mechanical needs; there are no convenience stores for snacks or toilets. These bike shops are generally mobile affairs using a pedal powered three wheeled cart with a large metal box on it containing supplies. The owner will park on a street corner, more or less out of the way, and get out an assortment of tires, inner tubes, wrenches (spanners for UK readers), a pump, a pan of water and a small stool and pretty much be open for business. We have a regular guy on the corner about a block from our apartment who is generally open for business from about 7 am to dark, which right now works out to a 12 hour day. I haven’t patronized his “shop” yet, but I’m intending to buy a bell and a basket for my bike. Diane got a good bell for her bike from a similar guy in another part of the city, installed, for less than a dollar.

The bike lane has its own parking facilities as well. Most office buildings, malls, and shops have designated bike parking areas – sometimes with a wrack, sometimes covered, sometimes just a space on the sidewalk. And like parking lots for cars, some of them have attendants and fees. Diane and I stopped at one of the large grocery stores, Jinkalong, and parked our bikes in the row out front. As we were headed in the attendant came over and said something in Chinese, which we didn’t understand, so I offered him money (a common solution to almost every problem of any size or shape here). This seemed to produce an explanation that you pay on the way out based on time. I think I understood one word and guessed the rest. We came out a short time later and sure enough the attendant strolled over to collect. It cost us 30 Mao to park two bikes for 15 or 20 minutes. That works out to 9 or 10 cents per hour for attendant supervised parking right at the front door. Parking cars is also inexpensive. I believe the charge for 12 hours in the parking garage beneath our office building is 50 yuan, or about $8 a day.

I’m planning to enjoy life in the bike lane as often as possible. That and not hiring a car and driver will be my contribution to China’s increasing (slow but increasing) social responsibility efforts. It may not make much of a difference, but at least the joy of riding in the bike lane will make me feel like the sky is blue!

School Daze

I began this Saturday with my language lesson. We worked primarily on pronunciation, beginning consonants and tones. It requires placing the tongue behind the teeth and forward or back in unaccustomed ways when pronouncing English vocabulary. Steve likens the whole Chinese language speaking process to doing a puzzle. Selecting the right words, the proper tone, the proper pronunciation, the right word order and somehow assembling them altogether to ask or answer the question or make the point in a split second. It’s often after the situation is over that you figure out what you should have said! At times like this, learning Chinese seems overwhelming.

After my lesson I headed to Chinese Public Middle School No. 8, one of the top schools in the city. A misnomer really because it is a high school too and that is the reason why I was there. At the end of middle school, which is the end of ninth grade, Chinese students take an examination to determine which high school they are eligible to attend. Much emphasis is place on this exam and its results determine if you can attend a tier 1 or a tier 2 high school. This, in turn, will determine which tier college you will be able to attend. As you can imagine, both parents and students are very stressed about this and take the whole process very seriously.

The high schools throughout the city have open houses in the spring to showcase their programs to attract the best students, and in turn, the students and parents attend the open houses to learn what scores their students need to achieve in order to be successful applicants. Parents interview the teachers to understand their teaching style and success rate. Each student will apply to high school, listing their top choices. But there is a strategy involved. Within the tiers, the schools are further ranked so that there are different exam scores needed to attend the highest top 1 tier or the middle top 1 tier, for example. As I understand it, if you don’t make the score for your top choice, you automatically get placed in a lower tier. So, in essence, you really need to understand how you will score on this test and what scores are needed as you are making your high school selections to get into the highest tier school possible.

Anyway, our school, BCIS, has a relationship with Public School No. 8 and we were invited to attend their open house to offer our western IB education as an alternative for Chinese students who ultimately would like to attend colleges or universities in the West. This is a dicey decision for parents and students because once you attend a school like ours, you have pretty much have decided to preclude your options to attend a Chinese university. Chinese high school curriculum is geared to passing the Chinese college entrance exam and the western curriculums don’t include a lot of what is tested on that exam. Also, Chinese language proficiency would be an issue too since international school classes are taught in English, with only one class in Chinese per day. My understanding is that it could be done, but not very likely. On the other hand, if student wants to go to US, UK or Australia for college, the English skills they would acquire in a program like ours would enable them to apply to college without having to do intensive English studies between high school and college. It could be a win-win. BCIS gets top students and the Chinese students put themselves in a position to attend universities in the West.

My supervisor suggested I attend this event to learn about the Chinese system and she also thought some parents might want to speak English. Well, I did learn quite a bit but no parent really wanted to talk to me. In fact, they even asked my colleagues what I was doing there! (an interloper)

The format for these open houses is a reception room (large multi-purpose room in which tables are set up in a big square in the middle of the room, teachers seated by department in the middle of the square and parents huddled around the perimeter going from department to inquire about the curriculum and entry scores needed. We had a table on the perimeter of the room, apart from the school departments. We had a number of parents take our brochures and ask lots of questions, but I couldn’t get a sense of their interest because all of the conversation was in Chinese. My colleagues thought we might have one or two applicants to our school; that would be about it.

As we were leaving, a group of high school boys, whose assignment it was to give tours to potential students and parents, asked me if I wanted a tour. It was the end of the open house and they were probably both bored and curious about me and why I was there. I agreed to take the tour. My colleagues all left. I was glad I decided to stay. The boys were all very nice and clearly enjoyed showing off their school. I know that this school was not representative of the ordinary Chinese school; but, I would be curious to see how it compares to a place like Bronx Science or Peter Stuyvesant High School in New York. As you can see from the labs, they far exceed the facilities of most schools. I saw a physics demonstration and some experimental equipment that had been designed by their teacher for which he/she had won an award. Their pool and two gyms were used as training facilities for the Beijing Olympics and Olympic banners were hung proudly in these venues. The athletics facilities are open to the public on the weekends.

Public education is free but if the students board at the school, which many of them do, they do pay a fee. Some of my tour guides were commuters and some were boarders. They seemed to say the decision was based on how far they lived from school. Teachers live in the dorms with the students. I didn’t ask what percentage of the teachers were residents. In the end, I think they enjoyed the tour as much as I did!

On my way home, I encountered a lesson of another kind. I had seen this before but this time in the subway station. A manager or supervisor will line up the employees on the street, in front of their place of employment, in several rows and stand before them giving instructions, like a drill sergeant standing before his/her platoon. This time it was the supervisor of the subway clerks who handle security and ticket booth sales. They were in two rows, in their uniforms, standing at attention. Everyone looks very serious as they received their instructions for the shift for the week.

A day of learning for many.

Spring Time in Beijing

Happy Passover and Easter to all. We hope everyone had a nice holiday. We did, though not in our normal way of celebrating. I spent the weekend before Passover making matzah kugel and Passover cake with supplies sent to us by Leslie. We found a synagogue in Beijing and attended a formal, very informal seder (if that makes any sense) second seder on Tuesday evening. Their web site is called sinogogue (not kidding). The seder was lead by three congregants. The Haggadah was reformed in nature. Everyone got a xeroxed copy without a title page so it was unclear the origin of the text. Pretty much everyone there was western; some members of the local congregation and the remainder were people like us who are in Beijing because of employment or on vacation. A very traditional meal of brisket, tsimmes, gefilte fish, matzah ball soup and chopped liver (real and vegetarian) was served. It was fun to sing the traditional songs and prayers. Makes the world feel a bit smaller.

We spent Easter Sunday riding our bikes around Beijing, Steve’s first road trip around the city and our first time together. It was a relatively peaceful day; fewer cars, trucks and buses. We made our way to the Central Business District which is about 3 miles from our apartment. Steve will fill you in on the details with his blog entry. But, it was a warm, sunny, spring-like day. What could be better!

Work continues to go well for both of us and keeps us busy with lots of activity and long days. We still keep up with the pub quiz every Monday and the Embassy lectures twice per month. We go out to dinner occasionally by ourselves and with friends we have made through the expat groups and with some of Steve’s colleagues. We had our first guests, although they didn’t stay with us. A colleague of Steve’s, Wendy, and her friend Catherine, were passing through and we had dinner with them at a restaurant called Da Dong, known for its roast duck. It was a nice meal and fun to catch up on PwC people and stories.

I continue to be intrigued by Beijing city street activity. I guess it’s just the contrast of seeing the ultra modern side by side with the pre-industrial. On our bike trip over the weekend, I wound up pedaling behind a older man who sells street food. His food stuff is roasted sweet potatoes which are prepared on the street in large metal trashcan like bins. He moves his bin, brimming with potatoes, from location to location strapped to the side of his bike, almost as if it were a side car attacked to a motorcycle. I was so disappointed that we didn’t come to any red lights so I was able to take a photo of him as he pedaled down the road.

On the same bike trip we stopped at the Chinese grocery store called Jinkalong. We were just locking our bikes when a man come up to us who we realized was a bike lot parking attendant. We attempted to pay him but he motioned that we paid when we returned, the fee based on time spent in the store. It was clear that he would be keeping an eye on our bikes to make sure they were safe. We were back in about 15 minutes. The man reappeared and Steve gave him a yuan, uncertain about how much we owed. He gave us 70 mao in return (100 mao to the yuan). The thirty mao he kept were worth about 4 cents. Parked just next to our bikes were a BMW and a Mercedes. I think they paid a bit more for their parking!

Very often you see men on street corners playing board games. It reminds me of the chess matches in Washington Square Park in NYC. Two men will actually be playing and there will be another five or six men huddle around them, engrossed in the action. I’ve learned that they are playing Chinese Chess, which sounds similar in nature to chess but pieces move differently and have different names. (like emperor instead of king). Still a game of strategy and the people standing around are offering strategy suggestions. Only men at these gathering, never women.

More soon!

A Working Woman

I’ve finished my second week as a member of the Chinese workforce. My official title (business card and all) is Admission Manager, Beijing City International School (BCIS).

It was kind of serendipitous how I came upon the job. I noticed the ad for it in a English language magazine that someone just happened to pass onto me when we visited Beijing to look for housing in November. I had been skimming for apartment rental ads when I happened upon the job listings and saw the one for the BCIS Admissions Manager. When we returned to New York, I submitted my resume, mostly as a lark, but also with the worry of how I would be occupying my time once we came to reside in Beijing. I thought it would provide a more authentic China experience for me. A few days later I was asked to submit an application and to come in for an interview when I arrived in Beijing. I went through several rounds of interviews, some contract negotiations and finally began work on March 15th.

The Admissions Office is part of the Communications and Development Department (CDD) so, in addition to taking people on tours and processing their paperwork, I will be responsible for doing outreach and marketing to make our school better known to the expat crowd to attract more students. We have about 600 students with a building capacity of about 1200. I am supposed to supervise two women whose primary responsibility it is to lead the tours, field phone calls and accept the admissions applications and process them. I say supposed to because at the moment they are the ones who are teaching me the ropes! It’s an IB curriculum school, primary through Diploma, that was founded 5 years ago; relatively new among the other international schools here. If you want more info you can check out the web site www.bcis.cn.

I am the only western person in my all female, eight person department (CDD) and the only native English speaker. Before I arrived, all of the inter-office communication was conducted in Chinese. Most of it is still conducted in Chinese unless people are speaking to me or we are having team meetings. As a result, it is hard to pick up on the nuances one gathers from a conversation among co-workers. Everyone speaks English, though, some better than others. Surprisingly, I don’t feel uncomfortable amid the Chinese language. I can pick out words I know here and there, but I don’t know enough to get even the context of a conversation. An incentive for me to study my Chinese and learn more quickly! Yet, being in a western style school, where teachers and administrators are primarily western (British, Australian, American), seems very familiar and comfortable. The IB curriculum is inquiry based and there are a lot of hands-on manipulatives and demonstrations of mastery. All the talk from my school board years. I have been impressed with the quality of education and dedication of the personnel who I have met thus far.

My hours are from 8 to 5 with one hour for lunch. That being said, it usually is a much longer day. The commute is about 45 minutes each way. I leave the house around 7 or 7:05, walk 10 minutes to the subway and take if for 4 stops and then walk about 20 minutes to the school. By the time we finish with work and team meetings, it is generally about 5:15 to 5:45, sometimes later.

There was an Expat Fair in Beijing at the end of my second week working and I was scheduled to work at our booth. The purpose of the fair was to provide information about all the goods and services expats may need or want in Beijing. So, I was manning our booth with a fellow admissions person and a Chinese language teacher. In my case, talk about the blind leading the blind! No, actually I have learned a great deal about our program and school and feel very comfortable talking about it and answering questions.

This weekend was the first warm, spring-like weekend we have had so far. Too bad we couldn’t take the time to explore the city ourselves. Steve was committed to attend a going away party for a staff member in his department (a trip to a local amusement park and dinner, really) on Saturday and I had to work at the Expat Fair for my second shift on Sunday afternoon. Maybe we’ll be better coordinated next weekend!

The Police Come to Call

Everyday life is generally pretty normal in Beijing and one tends to forget that we are living in a totalitarian society. Well, that realization came to the fore when I got a knock on the door about 10:30 on Wednesday morning. Standing at the threshold were two, uniformed policemen asking for my passport and police registration receipt (when you move into an apartment building, expats must register with the police and you must keep the receipt available for inspection). Of course, I had neither my passport nor my registration receipt at home because my new employer needed both of them to apply for my work permit. I politely said I did not have them and explained why. They asked if I had a copy of my passport front page, which I did. I quickly got it and presented it to them for inspection. They examined it, took my passport number and said they could call headquarters and check if I was appropriately registered. He must have had some voice wire directly connected to the station because he began to verbally check my information without dialing or even using a phone. While this was all going on, I wondered what they could possibly do to me or where they might take me and what options I would have depending on how things transpired. All those speculations came to a halt when it appeared they were going to leave. I guess I must have checked out because, after asking how many people lived in the apartment and where my husband and his passport were, they left looking somewhat disappointed. I think they thought for a moment that they had gotten one!

There has been heightened security throughout Beijing this week, probably due to the big governmental conference taking place at the People’s Hall, near Tian‘amen Square. There have been lots of soldiers and police, seemingly unarmed, walking around the streets and in front of places of business. Later that same day, at my language lesson at the Berlitz Center in the Ritan Park area of the city, two police officers, one man and one woman, knocked on the classroom door, peeked in to see what was going on, and then left. That was the first time in the six weeks I have been going for lessons that an official of that sort was in the building. My instructor was concerned because she, a native Beijinger, had forgotten to bring her ID card with her. Apparently, all residents have to have their documents with them at all times. I suspect once the conference is over things will go back to normal. I’ll keep you posted.

I participated in my second Beijing city bike ride tour. I went with basically the same group of women as last week. This time we were more ambitious and rode round trip approximately 18 miles. We headed to the Muxiyuan Fabric Market which is very far to the south. I didn’t feel as nervous as I did the week before, but I probably should have. We traveled through some very congested areas and had to weave in and out between buses, motor scooters, cars and pedal cars. We had a difficult time finding the market and enlisted the help of a kind young woman who led us by foot through some narrow alleyways to the market. On the whole, a pretty intense ride. The market, however, was amazing. We saw some beautiful fabrics and trimmings. I purchased a few things and got some ideas for other projects. On the way home, we passed by a street vendor who repaired bikes and sold bike parts. His repair kit, parts and accessories were strewn along the sidewalk. He was an older gentleman who seemed to have a nice sense of humor. I purchased a bell for my bike, a real need here, which he installed for me while I waited. He then tried to sell us other parts, like padded cushion covers for our seats and baskets. We declined, but thanked him for his efforts, and pedaled off.

My days of bike trips are over for a while since I begin work on Monday, March 15th. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Houhai Bike Ride

Well, believe it or not, I went on a bike trip around Beijing with three other women today. A little nerve-wracking at first but it was good fun. Biked on the main road to a small hutong and then around the lake at Houhai and stopped for lunch in a dim sum style place that you walk around to various stations and choose what you want to eat. It was a very interesting place but I didn't have my tester (Steve) with me so I was pretty cautious about what I ordered. (photo below)

I also managed to open us a bank account today at Bank of China (a little cheating because Steve's secretary Carol helped me fill out the forms in advance).

As The New Year Begins

March came in like a lion in Beijing. Snow began falling Lantern Festival night (February 28) and continued until morning. Total accumulation 1/2 inch. Just enough to make cars and sidewalks white and streets wet and slushy. It was difficult, but the end of Spring Festival revelers managed to get off their fireworks, but to a lesser extent, I think, than they would have had the weather been more cooperative. When I think about our February here, it was jam packed with settling in, experiencing new things, and welcoming new opportunities.

Each day continues to be an adventure. Some are fun and interesting; others bring the realization that we are strangers and at the mercy of others. The biggest impact is the helpless feeling that accompanies the inability to communicate with people around you or the frustration that comes with being illiterate in the country in which you are living. It limits a full appreciation of what is going on around us and I continually wonder what I am missing. Ignorance should be bliss you say? Was the Chinese message on my cell phone an advertisement or is my service being canceled? I guess I’ll find out soon enough.

We are both enjoying our language classes. That being said, we can communicate very little with non-English speaking Chinese at this point. My big accomplishment today was ordering a cafe mocha in Starbucks in Mandarin. However, I didn’t listen to what the order taker was saying to the person who makes the coffee. It took an American behind me, who was paying attention to my order, to direct the clerk to make the coffee I had ordered and payed for. The American told me I had ordered correctly but the clerk had miscommunicated the order. It’s not just the speaking, it’s the paying attention to and understanding what is being said around us. Oh well. I’ll try again.

My big news is that I was hired by an international school, Beijing City International School, to be the Admissions Manager. I begin work on March 15th. I learned about the job in an English language magazine. Applying for and securing the job was learning experience in and of itself. I'm sure the next couple of months will be a real adjustment in many ways. But I am looking forward to the challenge and I am glad to have more of a purpose to my day to day activity. The school website is www.bcis.cn if you want to check it out. It is relatively new (about 5 years) and the people I’ve met so far are motivated and friendly. In a nutshell, I will be responsible for interfacing with prospective parents and students and building relationship with embassies and expat community groups.

Steve’s work keeps him busy. He hasn’t been required to travel much although he has an engagement or two that are outside of Beijing. He comes home with handfuls of business cards, the primary way people introduce themselves here.

We are beginning to find some weekly routines. Our Monday evening activity is the Pub Quiz at the English language book store/cafe called The Bookworm. The first week we went we sat by ourselves and were decidedly the old folks in the crowd. The next week was pretty crowded so a young couple joined us at our table and then a few others and we had a team. Now, after four weeks, a group of six of us (Americans and Brits) convene, have dinner, chit chat, and then partake in the quiz. We do pretty well until we get to the music portion. Mostly modern songs that we have never heard before. We’ll keep trying for that bottle of wine prize!

We did a little sight-seeing this past weekend. We went to the Forbidden City, the Summer Palace, a porcelain museum and a eastern medicine center. We also attended a Chinese opera Hua Mulan, the basis of the Disney movie Mulan. The most interesting aspect of the opera was how is appears that the vocalists, both men and women, imitate the sounds of the instruments in the orchestra. We wondered if that is the origin of the Chinese singing style. Anyone have any insights to share? The National Center for Performing Arts, which includes the opera house, is a spectacular building, a must see for anyone coming to Beijing. It is shaped like an egg from the outside with very high wood vaulted ceilings. The floors are marble, a variety of colors and patterns. One enters the building under a pool of water which you can look up through when you travel down the main corridor to the performance spaces.

Our sea shipment finally arrived this week. We were most grateful to receive our bed. Seven weeks of sleeping on the low, hard Chinese style mattress that our landlord was kind enough to loan us was six weeks too many! We are mostly unpacked now and ready to receive any of you who want to have a taste of the East.

Celebrations

Chinese New Year (aka Spring Festival). February 14, 2010. The Year of the Tiger. Also Valentine’s Day and 30 years since Steve and I were engaged. A Big Day!

Let the fireworks begin! Well, actually they began almost a week before Chinese New Year with firecrackers and little displays going off randomly around our neighborhood at dusk. The US fire marshals would have fit if they saw how fireworks were stored and used here. Everyone is entitled to purchase fireworks. (In our apartment foyer a notice states that you can store up to 60 lbs. of fireworks in your unit.) About one week before New Years, little government-sponsored huts appeared on street corners that sold a variety of firecrackers from sparklers to quite extensive displays. The largest variety we saw came in box about the size of a records storage box filled with canisters connected to one fuse. You light it and run. They cost about 2000 RMB which is about $250 USD. People bring their explosives to any street corner, alley, or open area they choose and set them off.



After having New Year’s Eve dinner in our apartment (I made sweet and sour chicken), we had a great view from our apartment window of some of the displays. We then went outside around 10 pm to check out what was going on. We found some of our apartment residents (primarily French citizens) with their young children setting off all kinds of fireworks right next to our building! New Years revelers began setting off fireworks late in the afternoon on February 13 and continued without stopping until well past midnight. We fell asleep to the sound of fireworks and woke up to some in the morning about 8 am. They will continue for the next week or so until the Lantern Festival which marks the end of the New Year holiday.

The Spring Festival is a family holiday and, as such, it is a big travel holiday in China. People travel to their hometowns to reconnect with family and friends. There are noticeably less people in Beijing the past couple of days. On New Years Day we went to a older neighborhood in Beijing called Liulichang at the recommendation of my Chinese tutor Lucy. We saw the old hutong type houses and wandered through the narrow alleys and streets. It was quite cold so we made our way back to our apartment to warm up. At the recommendation of Steve’s work colleague, we went to dinner at a restaurant called China Grill on the 66 floor of a Central Business District office building. It was fun to see the lights of the city and the fireworks displays dotting the panorama. The food was great too!

Happy Year of the Tiger!

A Visit to Hong Kong

We’ve been in our apartment now just shy of one month. The newness of being in the city has passed, although I still don’t feel like a resident yet. We had a quick trip to Hong Kong for work and visa related missions and as we re-entered Beijing and came though immigration, Steve asked me if it felt like I was coming home. It did not.

Hong Kong is a fascinating city; a collision of Western modern, traditional Chinese and colonial British. Hoards of people, skyscrapers and markets everywhere. We stayed at a hotel on Hong Kong Island and spent most of our time there. The streets are narrow and hilly. Thank goodness for the escalators and stairs which are available inside and outside of office buildings to assist with the steep terrain. In addition, covered walkways connect the sidewalks two and three stories in the air to take pedestrian traffic off the sidewalks and out of the cross walks. It is maze-like in that not all the covered walkways connect to a building or a sidewalk. Many times I found myself backtracking to get to my desired destination.

We visited the “Peak” which is a high point on the island where you get a view of the downtown business area and further onto Kowloon, which is the part of Hong Kong on the Chinese mainland. Because we went there at night, we saw the lights of the city and missed out on seeing views of the China Sea and other natural terrain. The weather was not particularly cooperative during the daylight hours, sun but lots of haze. Maybe another time.

On our trip to Kowloon, we had a chance to visit with fellow Crotonite Ally Goldberg, who is in Hong Kong teaching English at a local university. She took us to markets in Kowloon which were even more crowded that the ones on Hong Kong Island! Bird market, goldfish market, ladies’ market, flower market. Lots of shopping going on for the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) which begins on February 14th. We had dinner at a restaurant near the ferry terminal with beautiful views of Hong Kong Harbor and then watched a laser light show that is presented daily at 8 pm. (It reminded me of the light show at Epcot.) We then ferried back to Hong Kong Island.

We went to a Tea Museum in Hong Kong Park that has a wonderful collection of tea pots and other tea related items. We learned about the various types of tea, how they are prepared, the different types of pots, the health benefits of the various types of teas, etc. The Park also has an aviary with many spectacular bird species. They attract the birds for public viewing by hanging fresh fruit near the elevated walkways in the aviary. The birds would swoop by, fill up, and fly off. It made for good viewing.


I can get around Beijing pretty easily now. I have learned to use the subways and found a street map that has the subway stops marked on it. Steve and I have both begun our Chinese lessons. Our tutors have very different approaches. I have learned how to introduce myself (wo jiao Diane), to identify my family members, and how to count. He has learned counting, food and restaurant vocabulary. Between the two of us, maybe we’ll have enough to get by soon. So far, in a pinch, I haven’t had words at my fingertips what would have been useful. But, we’ll get there.

City Living

It is hard to believe that just over two weeks ago I was in was living in sleepy, suburban town outside New York City and now we are trying to settle into a bustling metropolis of over 10 million people. I haven’t lived in a city in over 30 years!

Our apartment is very comfortable; a living room/dining room combination, 3 bedrooms, 3 baths and a modern kitchen. Located near Chaoyang Park, it is pretty central to most things we have attempted to do so far. It is about a 15-20 minute commute to work for Steve, which makes his work day quite a bit shorter than in New York.

Our area is more western than most and nearby are a number of foreign embassies. In addition, it supports a variety of ethnic restaurants, some western style grocery stores and several several malls. The Apple Store, where I have attended One-to-One tutorials, is just a 15 minute walk away in Sanlitun. Settling in, therefore, has not been too difficult especially when we can travel to places on our own, guided by English language maps. The difficult part is communicating with non-English speaking taxi drivers who seem so convincing when they assure you that they know where they are going, but you wind up on the wrong part of town! We begin language lessons this week, but I am sure it will be quite a while before we can converse and understand what people are telling us.

A fun place we have discovered is called The Bookworm. It is a combination pub, coffee shop, English language book store and library reading room. They have nice food, great coffee and all kinds of books to read. I think I might become a regular there. You hear a variety of western languages spoken as you move throughout the shop.

I have met a number of Steve’s colleagues here and they have been very helpful. Also, I have connected with former Croton resident Carter Mailk and she has introduced me to a couple of groups for expats. Everyone has been terrific.

The weather here has been pretty cold and windy although we have had a few days above freezing with no wind. Dust storms appear from time to time (from the Gobi Desert) and create a haze about the city. Lots of the manufacturing plants have move out of the city we have been told so that the pollution problem has been minimized.

Crossing the street here can be an experience. Like in many parts of the US, vehicles here can make a right hand turn on red. The difference is that in Beijing vehicles, both cars, bike, peddle carts, etc., approach the intersection to make a right turn as if they have the right of way. While I’m sure this helps with congestion by keeping the traffic flowing, it also causes almost a war between cars and pedestrians (who has the right of way?) when crossing the street with a green light. We try to stay with the packs of people when crossing--safety in numbers! But you must always be looking over your shoulder. The funniest thing we have seen here so far is McDonald’s delivery cyclists. A new meaning for fast food.

To my rug hooking friends: I have begun the friends rug: Amy’s Indian Head square and Ching’s lantern square next to it. Seems a fitting parallel right now. Decorations are starting to go up for the Chinese New Year (Spring Festival). I will try to post some photos of that soon.

Keep in touch. I would love to hear from you. My email is drskalak@optonline.net.