As shlaowais, we’ve all had our “China days”. The days when a 12 kuai taxi ride becomes a 21 kuai taxi ride. The days when you get mildly shaken down by the police because you registered one day late. The days when your landlord inexplicably evicts you. The days when every single thing in China seems to be poised to make your life difficult, annoying, miserable.
China days can seriously make you hate living here. They can make you glare at every local person you pass on the sidewalk, cursing them under your breath because you know you just paid 30% more than them for produce from a street vendor. China days can ruin your faith in humanity. And make you a sad panda.
No no no, that's not what I'm saying. At all.
But then there are things that happen in China that repair your outlook on life, and make you realize that the laws, people and culture of the Middle Kingdom do NOT exist for the sole purpose of getting you down. Two recent events led to this commentary – allow me to share.
Back in December, I was getting ready to go on a short trip to Vietnam. I packed my suitcase and brought it to work, planning to go straight to from the office to the airport. Except – cue sick feeling in stomach – the luggage didn’t even make it to the office. Because I left it in the trunk of the taxi that took me to work. I also didn’t get a receipt for that taxi, because I never do. But you know who did? George, the guy who opens the door when taxis pull up to our building. George heroically saved my receipt that day and was able to get my suitcase back to me in just a few hours. Without George, my luggage would have been lost forever; my trip ruined, my mental health destroyed. George really came through for me that day, and he was duly rewarded with cold hard cash* and a complimentary letter to his supervisor.
Even more recently, a friend left his laptop case and RMB 6,000 at the ATM of a China Construction Bank. Again, the sick feeling when he realized what he had done. Had it been stolen? Would the cash be gone? Would the computer and several months’ work also be lost? But when he got back to the scene of the crime (‘crime’ sounds better than ‘huge moment of retardation’), the case – and all of its contents – had been collected by the building guard, and promptly submitted to the nearest police station. Everything was returned to its owner after minimal questioning. Again, cold hard cash* flowed into the proper hands, and huge sighs of relief were breathed by all. Then huge glasses of whiskey were consumed by all.
I guess it’s some kind of inverse xenophobia, but I had come to expect the worst from my many China days and what I perceived to be poor treatment by the locals. But when I thought about it more, the only time I’d ever gotten any lost or stolen goods back in the western world was in Amsterdam, and that place is like some kind of fake dreamscape (because of how everyone is always on mushrooms and stuff).
For all the annoying, horrible shit that can happen to us in China as foreigners, when people as good as George and the unnamed CCB security guard get you out of some rotten fuck-ups, the bad can quickly melt away into the good.
And make you a happy panda.
*Cash money was not solicited by any of the heroes in this story.
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So, can you give some more examples of sad china days??? I mean, you mentioned registering your residence with the police and being evicted (which im not sure happens with all that much frequency), but those arent everyday common occurences. it would help add context to whatever your point is. Teach us something about china please. Its what the people want, ya know?
Thank you for your comment. Sad China days are essentially those in which you feel completely alienated because you feel utterly outside of and incapable of comprehending the politics, bureaucracy, culture and language of the locals in whose country you are a guest. It can be a lot of little things packed on top of each other – maybe someone flagrantly cut you in a long line, maybe you got handed a fake 50RMB note as change, maybe your electricity got shut off and you don’t know who to talk to about it. Or it can be something more grave, like trying to understand the visa limitations and provisions in a highly opaque and fluctuating system, especially when you are at risk of losing a job or being kicked out of the country. Landlord issues are no joke either.
Of course there are ways of solving these matters, and the longer you live here the easier it is to get by (especially if you know the language), but there are a lot of things we as foreigners have to deal with where it seems like China (in the metonymic sense) is very consciously against you. I’d be happy to write a post detailing those specifics.
Do you live in China? Sometimes I forget that we have readers who don’t live here, for which I apologize; I’ll try to keep that more in the forefront of my conscious as I write. Might have to scrap that next post on surviving zombie attacks in SH…
Hah, thanks for the reply. I just wanted to see more detail and elaboration. I do live in SH and think there is alot of potential in blogs such as this one. I tend to be defensive about how foreigners perceive chinese solely from their experience with the locals in shanghai. Its a special city with its own feel and rules of (un)civility, and unrepresentative of much of the rest of the country. Everyone knows this if they think two seconds about it, but its easy to forget. I def have my own gripes with life here, yet I wonder how different it would be if we lived in a western city of the same size/population, which i dont think exists. In the everyday battle for resources that seems to consume much of locals’ time, feet get stepped on, lines are cut, kids thieve and grift, and feelings and patience are widdled down, but why is it so foreign and frustrating to us? Look to history, culture, etc and the answers are probably all there. Who has time for that kinda research? Professors, researchers, and TLC interns, thats all. It is, however, interesting to hear how we try to make sense of it on our own, outside of academia, by using raw experience and reflection to connect the dots between foreign and familiar and find commonalities in it all. Dig deep. Just do it. Impossible is nothing, and so on.
Next time yOu have a bad china day you should pack your bags, leave china and never come back. STOP Bitching.
“you can’t help but feel that the Chinese are a subspecies”
WTF!!! That is fucking racist and sad. You are a guest here, be thankful, behave, and appreciate this golden opportunity.
You (Juancho) either:
1. Skimmed the post and saw a couple of words derogatory to Chinese thus forming an incorrect and unintelligent judgement on this piece
2. Read the entire post and you are too stupid to realize the point that she is trying to make and decided to write your idiotic response to your idiotic opinions
3. Decided to vent your hatred against someone because you were incapable of performing in bed last night
My guess is a combination of the three.
Juancho, as you can see from the quotation marks and the image itself, that line is from the singer Morrissey. The caption was written by me. You can Google his remark to see what kinds of replies he received after saying that.
Come on Juancho, we expect better from our readers. Public forum man, public forum. If you’re going to trash us be intelligent about it at least.