THINGS I'VE HEARD RECENTLY

At the beauty parlor:

Speaker: well-dressed, educated, well-spoken British woman drinking champagne: I've learned so much living in Asia! For example, the nails on one hand don't have to be the same exact length as the nails on your other hand! Because no one ever sees your two hands together at the same time. So if you break a nail you don't have to file them all down!

At a restaurant:

Speaker: American woman with enormous breasts, tucking into a plate of beautifully carved fruit: Eating well gives me the strength to diet.

At a job interview:

Speaker; me, sniffing: I don't want to live anywhere hot enough to grow bananas!

Over lunch:

Speaker; male colleague, saying this to me during a meal in which I have just tearfully confessed to breaking up with my boyfriend and feeling very very miserable about it: I hate everyone gassing about their family! It really makes me feel bad to hear people go on and on about what I don't have. Such bad manners.  It's so insensitive when people rub your face in what they have and you don't have.  I'm divorced and I don't have my kids or wife around. Thank God I can go home and have my sexy Chinese girlfriend waiting for me in the bedroom.

At an English competition:

Speaker: very well known person in the linguistics field, addressing room full of contestants: We encourage all of you to enter the future by speaking Chinglish!

Please poke out your eyes after reading this

I've just come back from a few days spent judging but yet another English contest here in the P R of C and I must say it was hideous. The Rose and I were together, which is an invitation to fun and/or danger, and we had our usual plans for that lovely city (not Beijing): We check into a suite at a five-star hotel and divvy up the sweet sweet privacy. I usually get the bedroom, while he flops on a very luxurious roll-out bed in the living area. I take multiple baths in the bathtub big enough for four, while The Rose records in the other room. I go to the gym while he naps: he goes to the gym while I nap. It's our sanity after a year of being in the city. Best of all, since we're on the executive floor, we can eat and drink  for free in the executive lounge, so it ends up costing us very little for our sanity.

So, after making reservations, and showing up at the gig that had sent us to that city in the first place, we were horrified to find that we were going to be sequestered in a rural three-star hotel, forbidden Internet access, and worse of all, told we'd be fired if we didn't hand over our cell phones. There's a lot I will do for cash in hand, but giving up my last link with my embassy ain't one of them. The Rose countered with some witty argument and in the end we were allowed our phones but told we HAD to stay in the hotel. We couldn't take pictures with our candidates, we were escorted to the toilets (I believe I told my handler rather acidly that I could wipe my own ass, a line I hadn't expected to use until I was eighty). Jurors on the OJ trial had more freedom.  I might add that my room was grotty, the TV was all Chinese (hardly stellar) and that my room had neither air conditioning nor a mini fridge. The Rose was next door, which was nice. My part in the show was done after the second day, so I elected to come back to Beijing so I could catch up on some work for graduate school.

Little did I know what consternation this would cause. Let's see, I've lived here twenty years, speak a moderate amount of Chinese, can read well enough to get around, and oh yes, I'm pushing fifty. The show was sent into a flurry: oh dear, they'd have to find a driver, they'd have to find an escort, they'd have to pay me (rather less than the amount I had bargained for) and in the end I was sent to the train station with two students, neither of whom spoke English as well as I can speak Chinese, one of whom got car sick and spent much of the time hanging out the window vomiting copious amounts of white fluid, the other a useless male who sat up front and listened to rap music. At the train station, the idiot escort got into the wrong line then pulled me out of the right line to queue up at an automatic ticket dispenser which of course I couldn't use as it was for Chinese citizens only... Escort thought I could breeze in, grab a ticket, and then swan several thousand meters away in less than two minutes and make the two o'clock train.. we had to line up back at the queue he had pulled me out of, where there was a twenty minute wait in line, then get my ticket, then I had to sprint the distance, only to have Escort try to make me go to the wrong terminal as he misread my seat number for the platform...when I finally ditched my escort and got on the train back to Beijing, my phone binging with the collection of messages and IMs and emails of two days without contact with the outside world, I breathed a sigh of relief.

I wish I had stayed, I wish I had spent more time with The Rose, but work calls, and I am always afraid that I'm boring The Rose. I don't know how anyone can be so witty and generous and kind: I keep waiting for him to be an ass, and when we work together, it just doesn't happen. The contest was the usual mix of misplaced egos and overconfidence, with a sprinkling of big words inappropriately used. There were also some sweet moments, kids from the sticks who were overwhelmed with what they had accomplished. As I stepped into an elevator at one point I realized I was probably the last generation to have the odd pleasure of witnessing someone's first elevator ride. While I kvetch a lot about the lack of air conditioning, the fact I couldn't stay where I wanted, or the lack of ice cubes, I do believe my heart is in the right place, and I am deeply grateful for those moments of clarity when I get to experience someone's pleased astonishment and surprise.

As for the contest, I can tell you nothing: I signed a confidentiality agreement, I can't tell you who was there, how anybody did, I couldn't take pictures, and while I could tell you more, we should leave it at this: Please poke your eyes out after reading this, and I'll let you live. 

The Three Dirtiest Words In My World

Just in case you don't know me, let me state this loud and clear: the three dirtiest words in my world are these: Girl. Scout. Cookies.

Thanks to the miracle that is airmail, the local Girl Scouts did indeed get a large, large shipment of Girl Scout Cookies flown into Beijing for sale throughout the local community. The hell with the presales: if I want some, I just have to go to the Troop Leader's classroom and hand over a large wad of cash (50 RMB) and then heaven is mine. I'm not in weight loss mode right now--maintenance is about all I have the time and patience for--and having a drawer full of heaven is not a good idea as I am powerless over Thin Mints and Nassaus. So, I bribed students to perform small errands (read: pranks) for me with a handful of cookies as a reward. One particularly fun prank earned its perpetrator an entire sleeve.

I've just spent 200 RMB to support the Girl Scouts and I am glad that I got to taste some of my childhood in return.

But one small note: Arnott's Mint Slice are way, way better than Girl Scout Thin Mints. Call me crazy, but  after you taste them you will once again concede that I am queen of the biscuits. All bow. Hmm, wonder if I can come up with a good homemade version of Mint Slice? With mint fondant, and a nice bittersweet coating? I think I have just decided what I'm doing this weekend...

Yes, it's in 3 D, but it still went down

God help me, I spent a weekend judging English talent, everything from three year olds dancing charming little dances and lip-syncing to recordings to young adults reenacting the worst bits from the most horrible plays ever. Every act was to be cut off after 10 minutes and the producer naively decided everyone was going to follow the 10 minute rule, that the next performance would immediately begin without delay, and...well, I leave it to you to judge for yourself what kind of drugs this woman was on because most people, actors in particular, don't give up the stage that easily. Some of the acts dragged on for 20 minutes or more and there were waits of up to 15 minutes between acts. Six acts an hour? Count on three. As a consequence I was there for over 12 hours viewing forty plus acts (I hesitate to call them "talent") and of these only a handful were interesting or even, well, good. (This would include the group I directed.)

One act featured an original play based on Cinderella which included changing the names of the leads to Jack and Rose (a la Titanic, no doubt so the lead actress could say she had played Rose on the stage) and it also featured a hip hop dance to "Nobody But You" which was very disturbing at it featured a group of five year olds, a Harry Potter backdrop, use of the Harry Potter theme music, and several characters dressed up as the monk and pig from Journey to the West. This was one of the more tasteful shows. I went to the competition in the next building to say hi to the judges, both old friends, and ended up getting home horribly late. I haven't had time to process quite how yucky it all was--how we weren't even given supper--how my group was given McDonald's hamburgers but the other judges the next building over were given only the French Fries--one hamburger and one bottle of water per judge for a 12-plus hour day... Gone are the days when just asking us to stop by for a photo shoot entailed a four hour banquet.

The Words Change, But the Melody Stays the Same

A conversation going on all over Beijing at this very minute:

He: (white guy on cell phone to Chinese girlfriend) No, go ahead and eat dinner, I told you I was eating out.

He: Eating out! With people from the office! I told you! So go ahead and eat.

Pause.

He: No, I'm not leaving now to bring you a bowl of noodles. You know how to order them, you speak Chinese. 

Pause.

He: So, then have something from the fridge.

Pause.

He: Yes, she's here. Of course she's here, she's my boss! She's like, 14 years older than I am. Chill out!

Pause.

He: I'm sorry you're in pain. So take a pain pill. No, I don't know what cramps feel like.

Much high pitched squealing emerging from the cell phone. He listens, grimacing, then starts taking notes.

Two minutes later: he gets off the phone, orders some noodles and leaves, take out container in hand. His colleagues sigh and return to discussing tomorrow's big presentation. You know, the one HE is supposed to lead.

However, I heard a variation tonight. I should mention that I have recently become pals--and nothing more, btw--with a much older Australian self-made millionaire. I was initially attracted to what's beneath the belt (and I don't mean wallet) but a few dinners out convinced me he's a lot more fun over a dinner table than under it. (Enough said.) He IS fun, and I've learned a lot, and that's what counts.

Since he's wealthy as all get out, he has a string of young admirers, and a handful of mature ones too. We met for a quick pint so he could get my take on a business venture (he loves my brains, a feature I find highly desirable in any man) and as we gulped down a cold one his phone rang.

"Bloody Xiao Xiao again," he grumbled. "Oi'm teyeking this outsoide." (Which is where we were.) So lucky me, I got to hear the following:

"Oy, yeah, hell yeah it's me. You rang me. Who the hell did you think you were calling?"

Pause.

"No one at home? No food? And you have cramps? Well, ain't that a right pisser?" Click!

He turned back to me with a beatific smile. "I'm the only white  guy in China who idn't pussy whipped yet. Jesus, I feel sorry for the poor Yank bastard who married that bird."

Note: Sadly, I know the poor Yank bastard who IS married to that bird, and guess what? He thinks she's pregnant!

I promise to start writing about sunshine rainbow pony club again, and all that goes with it, but pardon me a tad while I smirk.

Just the Part About the Puppet Sex, Please

Note: This is a partial reposting for a friend with with limited time for shuffling through posts. If  you're wondering how fat white guys get laid in China, this is a partial answer, and every damn word is true.

I have the pleasure of knowing not one but TWO Elvis impersonators here in Beijing and only one is gay. The other makes a living in a variety of performance pieces including some brilliant work with puppets. So, The Rose is over there one day, just hanging around and watching TV with Elvis Impersonator Number One (Elvis in his later years, with a stooped back, advanced myopia, and very thin hair) , when a Chinese girl comes over. They sit and chat for a moment, then Elvis One disappears into the bedroom. The Rose knows there's a bathroom back there and he figured oh, hell, he just nipped back there for a quick toke. But no: within a minute or two, Elvis One slips back into the living room, clad in clown pants, clown shoes, and a cowboy hat. One of his puppets, a Muppet-like creature that is mounted on Elvis One's fist with arms controlled by two thin rods manipulated by Elvis's free hand, beckons to the girl suggestively. The Rose is startled: reckless hedonist he may be,  even he is appalled by the presence of a clown-clad puppeteer soundlessly beckoning a stranger for sex through the seductive come-hither gesture of a knock-off Muppet. The girl jumps up, strides to the bedroom, and within seconds the sound of hot monkey lovin' fill the air. The Rose wonders if he should leave--and is very very relieved they didn't ask him to join them--but fortunately, after ten or so minutes, the girl wanders back into the room, a fist full of 100-kuai notes in her hand. She nods goodbye and leaves, as silent as the  Muppet which sprawls open-mouthed in post-coital abandon across the door sill. Elvis One reappears, freshly toked. "Ah, she's a nice girl," he remarks. "She's not a whore or anything, we just hook up when I have an extra thousand."

Talk Talk

I've had the oddest weekend; I have a jillion work projects, all with screaming deadlines screaming at me, a sinus infection due to hay fever, and a general sense of laziness. I haven't had a day off in about two months, and I have the usual messes to sort out, trips to tailor, out to buy guinea pig feed, and all that jazz. I won't even mention what five minutes of practice on my ukelele did to my manicure.  So rather than sitting down and doing MY work, I ended up taking two trips out of the way which ate up a lot of my precious precious time, and I don't regret either.

Trip one, to introduce a colleague to a producer over at a television station to drum up some work or some contacts. Afterwards,  long talk over beer and pizza. While I usually confide in my friend Teri, who is the coolest missionary on the planet, I tend not to listen much. And yet, I listened to what this person had to say, made some sharp comments, and hoped in the end that I was insightful, rather than shrewish. As for tonight--I should have worked on a project due Thursday (two are due Thursday, actually) but I ended up babysitting someone's mother from out of town while he went off on a hot date. As this is a friend (he of the "You're too big!" bitch girlfriend) it seemed only fitting to take care of his Mum while he went out on town. Little did I know it would turn into eight solid hours of listening to this woman discourse on everything from forgiveness to her sister's five pound tumor that popped right down into her vagina. Interestingly enough, while she was hip enough to say "vagina" she referred repeatedly to "cancer of the back door." I am not suggesting that either was boring or dull or that I took delight in their pain. Friday Night Colleague was a study in how different two lives can be and I was glad to listen. Saturday, a lesson on letting go and not being bitter.

Perhaps we don't all really need counseling, as I stated to Colleague One on Friday. Maybe we just need a healthy dose of forgiveness, and the strength to move on. Does it take more strength to cling to the edge of the pool, or to cast yourself into the water and move straight and confident through the deep end? I've been in this relationship where I'm clinging to the edge and now I'm thinking, why put this  much energy into maintaining the status quo? I was drowning in his eyes: why not just let go and swim past the pain and into whatever and wherever the current leads me? Or better yet, strike a path towards something strong and straight and true, instead of clinging to the crumbling edge of the crap I already know. So there you are: I'm getting deep again, but knowing me, will be back to writing about crisps and ice cream and blow jobs again tomorrow. As colleague number one said, "First you write about sex and evil Chinese women and then there's a recipe for fudge." Well, Friend, that is my life, and you don't have to read unless you want to.