Everybody do the locomotion
Jul 9th, 2007 by Peter
4th July 2007 Beijing
Got up and went for some breakfast. We decided on a baker. I love bread and never tasted bread from a real Chinese baker before. “Bread” may be taking my mouth too full. All the 4 different breads we had, was like eating very sweet and odd textured cake. It’s ok, but not what I expected. I have to admit, that I won’t be eating that for breakfast again if I can avoid it. I may pick up one for my sweet toot another day, but it’s not what I would define as a meal.
Walked into a nearby hutong where it was quieter than on the bigger street. As we passed an open gate we spotted some old women practicing Tai Chi. When they spotted us they started clapping and waved for us to come inside. So we did. I always loved stuff like Tai Chi, so I was curious as hell.
After 10 seconds I had a real Tai Chi practicing sword in my hand and was placed with C on two empty chairs. The male instructor lined the women up, all with fans, and they started making an exhibition for us. How cool was that! I shoot some pictures and a few videos.
Unfortunately my first hunch hadn’t failed me and soon I was thrown into the back behind the women to do a monkey-see-monkey-do. Embarrassing. I didn’t do well on any levels. Well – I made them all laugh, but that was not intentional.
C held the camera meanwhile and I can only guess what it will reveal when I get a better look at them. After this embarrassment both C and I was pressured to pose in Tai Chi stances while the instructor shot some pictures and the women laughed or said “Hao bang!” when we finally had it figured out. Cool experience nevertheless.
We then walked on and found some shops, where C bought some lychees, some “man tou” (steamed bread) and some water. Later we found a vegetable marked where I walked alone, as C did some shopping. That’s how we’ve getting used to do our shopping now. If there something we need, I have to keep distance or not enter the shop. Crazy but necessary.
It was time to head back home to the hotel to get a bath and pack our stuff. It was time to prepare checking out of the hotel.
We paid our bill and made a deal that we could leave our bags at the hotel until our train was due at 9pm. Meanwhile we had to kill some time. As we delivered the bags to the boy at the hotel, I asked C to particularly be careful with the laptop, as I was worried it would get bumped. When the hotel staffer heard it, he politely declined to watch it, as he would not be held responsible for its security. That’s a weird reply from a hotel that at our arrival told us it would be no problem leaving our stuff, including my laptop, in the room. But apparently when it’s being locked inside a storage room under supervision of a hotel employee, it wasn’t. Anyway, I decided to carry it around all day. Not funny, as the bag already was over packed with things that wouldn’t fit in out suitcase (only brought one suitcase, one backpack and my laptop bag from Denmark).
As we were waiting for our turn at the counter, a bloke who was obviously foreign got more and more agitated about his bill. No need to go into details, but he was angry because he weren’t told in detail about the specific calculations before being demanded to come up with 600rmb. Actually the bill was correct, and he weren’t unwilling to think so, but no one could/would explain it to him. English speakers were scarce, which probably is the same nowhere you go. C and I ended up double translating for him. First to Danish, then to English. After a while he settled and smiled a bit. “I just wanted to know why I had to pay, and no one here can speak English. How will Beijing ever manage to overcome the guests during the Olympics? They are nowhere near ready for the amount of foreigners. All hotels should have at least one English speaker”: he said. I had to agree with him on that one. Afterwards he shook my hand and said thanks and we parted. Feels good to help people out.
From 12.00 to 18.30, we walked the nearby hutongs and shopping streets just to kill time. C was on the prowl for a dress for her sister. The last sister whom we still hadn’t bought a gift for here in Beijing.
I am not exaggerating when I say that we visited at least 30 small at bigger shops before we finally got lucky. The dress had to fit, be pretty, be good quality and C’s all time favourite: cheap. All of those at the same time.
After the first 25 shops we changed tactics and I think that was the turning point. So easy to figure out when our main problem always was the pricing. It was going up every time I showed my big happy foreigner face in the shops. The downside was that C somehow trusted my judgement on the looks of a potential dress, meaning that I had to find and accept it before she started negotiating the price. That meant that we had to go together, killing all chances for a reasonable price. It was 4-500rmb every time.
Our success started when I began probing the shops alone ahead of C and memorizing the pretty dresses. Afterwards C would go there without me and check it out and try to close the deal. When she finally found a dress fitting all our demands, she dragged me and my wallet in. Unfortunately the dress she picked weren’t one that I had agreed on, and I had to tell her all her work was useless. I pointed out one that was better to C, but now we were back to the beginning. The laowai was outed and we had to change tactics yet again. I started to play the grumpy, difficult, tired and cheap foreigner who would not give his girlfriend/wife more than 200rmb. Also I made faces telling the shopkeeper that I found the dress pretty ugly too, all awhile I told C that I was just making a charade and was ready to spend more doe if necessary. After a while the shopkeeper caved and giggling let C know that this man was a real cheapskate in Chinese. I didn’t mind, since I had let C know that this dress was great and I was more than ready to pay the 300rmb or more no matter what.
I was beat, C was beat My feet must have been both swelling and smelling. My stomach still acted up a bit. Not enough to kill the joy of observation, but still enough to agree on some rest. So we went for dinner. Only problem was that I was not hungry at all. I ate a tiny Chinese burger thingy for the sake of experience. I weren’t hungry, but I still needed the energy. Afterwards we taxied back to the hotel, to wait the last 1½ hour out in the lobby before we had to go to the train station and head for Harbin.
At the hotel I played the lottery and used the toilet. The toilet worked, but my butt is. Let’s call it hmm “Worn”. Back at the hotel lobby I pulled out my “lappy” and wrote some of this entry down. C relaxed meanwhile and after 30 minutes, she asked to get our luggage back. As usual she couldn’t find the receipt, so she started searching her bag from end to end. No luck. That meant bordering her lovely husband, who of course didn’t have it either. At last C finally remembered putting it in a different pocket of her back than normally, so we both drew a sigh of relief. Not cool loosing your bags 1 hour before we had to leave.
As we sat there waiting C decided to get some fresh cold water for us. Right now, as I write this, she came back and told me that a woman sitting outside in the hutong (the alley where the hotel is located is called Xiguan Hutong and the hotel Home Inn) didn’t know how to make Jaozi. So of course C told her that she could teach her. Now I’m back to alone with my Xiao Lao Po (as C calls my computer, which means mistress/2nd wife). Bet I won’t see her again before I have to drag her away from her new best friend and catch a taxi. At that time she will also be reeking of Jaozi and say the usual “Peter – I ate too much”. Turns out she didn’t eat anything, but she definitely got a new best friend. As we passed on our way to find a taxi she and her family waved at us with big smiles.
We got a taxi pretty fast and arrived at the train station 25 minutes later. The traffic was horrendous and we were set off pretty far from the entrance which meant a lot of walking. The chauffeur waved us down some stairs, which apparently should be the easiest way to get into the train station. It wasn’t and there were there no escalators. Turns out this particular underpass only lead to the other side of the road, but nowhere nearer the main entrance. I carried the packed suitcase that weighed about 19kg when we left Denmark. I was way more packed now, so I had the world’s longest arms when I finally came up on the other side of the tunnel.
Back on track steering towards the entrance where we met yet another underpass to go through. No escalators for me and my arm length were only matched by my sweating. Finally close to the entrance, where we first dodged the maze of people to get in line for entering. C showed our tickets, and we pushed our backs through some sort of x-ray-control-superman-eyesight-machine and went upstairs to confirm. Then down again to find the right waiting room, which we, accordingly to C, didn’t have time to use. My clock showed 40 minutes until departure, but who’s to argue with Chinese logic and Chinese train rides when you aren’t one and haven’t tried it before.
Rushed to train wagon number 14 and found our cabin. It was a 4 person one of that and two young girls had already settled there. It looked comfy, and the two girls allowed me to shoot a picture. I’m pretty sure it was only because they were afraid that I would eat them if I weren’t. Who cares – I got the picture. On all the train ride they seemed pretty scared of me and my attempt to loosen them up with the classic self-ironic “Waiguren” jokes fell to the ground. I’m a freaking stranger to them and will probably be mentioned in their diary as some sort of serial rapist type.
The bunk bed seemed nice, though the pillow to me was hard as a rock. It looked good but when you put your head on it, I noticed that it’s more like a bag filled with some kind of corn/pellets. In the foot end of the bed, there was a TV. A set of headphones was provided and everything looked like it would be a comfortable ride. We settled and I started zapping the channels. Lots of b-movies and all Chinese. Well actually there was one western movie and that was of course synchronized. But who wants to see Police Academy 4 anyway?
The train began moving and I was beat. This was about the same time as a strange smell entered the room: The unmistakable stench of the nearby toilet. I’m convinced that our air-condition was linked with the one in the toilet and that we got the fresh smell every time someone flushed. And someone did a lot of times.
Almost worse was when one of the young girls in our cabin started getting ready for bed and one of them did a massive spraying with some sort of perfume. I felt almost gassed and could feel it in my eyes. As usually I didn’t complain loudly, but throw it in the category: “This is China”. Who knows, maybe she thought that I reeked and could need something to overshadow the smelly white hairy beast.
2 hours later and I still couldn’t sleep. I was death tired but can’t catch a break. The thoughts were racing through my mind. I wasn’t worried about meeting my parents-in-law at all, which shouldn’t be so, but there have been so many new “known” impressions happening the last days, that my brain is full and fighting to sort and memorize. My feet was pounding from the many days of marathon sightseeing and the train is more noisy than expected. Every 10 seconds it made a noise like someone was poking a giant black bear on the stomach, but it was probably just the rails crying from many years of use. Either way, it was hard for me to sleep as we rumble towards Harbin.
3am and I’m awoken by massive sweat and thirst. The air-condition in the cabin has stopped and I unwillingly have to wake up C as well. She’s sweating too, so I know that this time I’m not just a cry-baby. Her Chinese dna and lacking body mass lets her sweat very rarely. She hands me half a bottle of water from her back, which I empty in one go. Then she heads out to find some personnel that can fix the problem. 20 minutes later it’s taken care of, but it’s too late. I can’t sleep. Short time before we arrive I finally dose off into half-asleep half-awake state and then it’s time to get up. Sucks, but that just the situation I have to deal with.
We get off the train and head outside. Yet again time to check our tickets. Maybe they want to be sure we don’t reuse our tickets, but one would imagine that you’d have to be a pretty cool cat to try your luck through that security maze we encountered while entering the train station in Beijing.