Small World, Small Beijing

So another few discoveries for your enjoyment:

In China, almost all the "trendy" clothing people wear here has some sort of writing on the front or back. However, all of it is in English, furnishing us westerners with a very amusing past time. I finally got to be on the other side of the fence after all of those times my friends and I got henna tattoos, shirts, or jewelry with Chinese characters without having any clue what they meant. So far, my favorites have been: the "I'm too sexy for my cat" tee and the "Dark, scary barn...safe in here" shirt a woman wore at Wu Mart yesterday. Hopefully, these "Chinglish" tees can be a running theme throughout my blog as time goes one. I'll keep you posted.

In other news, a few of us ventured out for our first real Peking duck experience this week. Picture a four floor building, the sole purpose of which is to prepare hundreds of Peking duck (probably for unsuspecting tourists like ourselves) embellished with scenic Chinese paintings and traditionally clad waitresses. It is apparently one of the best known duck restaurants in Beijing, and for three whole ducks, pancakes, a beef dish, a chicken dish, two vegetable dishes, and tea, we all made it out with a $15 tab each. I'm not complaining.

Here is where the title of this post comes in. Friday night a group of us ventured out into the Sanlituanr bar district on the east side of Beijing to celebrate the end of what has been a pretty strenuous week of classes and exams (given the fact that it's summer anyways). There are two streets filled completely with bars and dance clubs, and after arbitrarily choosing which one to enter, not only do I run into one Yalie, but three! According to previous Light fellows, apparently this is a frequent Beijing occurrence, but I'm still having a hard time believing that I ran into more people I knew at one bar in Beijing than I did the entire four weeks back in Los Angeles.

I am proud to say that I have also made my best purchase here yet this week: a peeler! As some of you have read, for the past week or so the only food items that I had been consistently eating are Ritz crackers and yogurt. Actually, it may have been later that I discovered yogurt here, but we have finally tiptoed into what we've been told is the risky realm of fruit consumption. Missing what I'm sure is a wonderful summer fruit season in the States, ripe with fresh peaches, nectarines, apricots, grapes, strawberries, and cherries, it has been very sad not having the same access to fruit as I am accustomed to over the summers. Fortunately, Wu Mart came to the rescue yet again with beautiful ripe bananas, oranges, and watermelon. But what about the fruit with skins, you ask? Well, technically we're not allowed to eat the skin for fear of contracting some virulent stomach virus, which is where this wonderful tool comes into our lives. Normally, I find it a tedious task peeling cucumbers, carrots, potatoes, or what have you while home, but here it is a blessing, even a luxury. Now we are free to eat apples and pears, and I even risked eating an entire peach skin and all (only after a thorough wash, of course), and I'm still here to tell the tale. I am also proud to announce that the Duke program students have also discovered the jiaozi stand! Jiaozi are Chinese dumplings, nearly identical to Korean gyozi, or potstickers, and as my friend Jess said, I think they put some sort of addictive substance in them because we are constantly craving them. Although, if you ask my family, I think I've always been known to eat my fair share of dumplings. So, there is hope yet. Not to fear, though, I still have a bag of Ritz crackers in my desk drawer for emergencies.

Speaking of shopping, as you know, with the Olympics around the corner, China has launched a huge "Green China" campaign to reduce pollution and begin to remedy the notorious Beijing smog. In addition to TV commercials and banners, however, the Chinese government has implemented a law that requires you, as a consumer, to pay 1 kuai (what would be ~30 cents in the US) for every plastic shopping bag you use. If you forget to bring your own shopping bag, you're out of luck, unless you have a third or fourth arm hiding somewhere.

This new policy, so simple in its nature, is incredibly influential in practice. It affects nearly every individual (and that's 1 billion people we're talking about), no doubt achieving its ultimate goal. It makes me ask myself, if Communist China can begin to "think green", what is stopping the US?

All this aside, though, my habits haven't changed much since I've been here. A funny incident happened last night as two of my friends and I rushed back from Wu Mart. With a shopping bag in each hand, the three of us entered the lobby elevator, and knowing my luck in particular, what did we find when the doors closed? Only a huge, flying, Chinese bug! I told you it was just my luck. Now just picture three white American girls with six shopping bags running around in an elevator as it lifted us from the first to the tenth floor (ironically, it was probably the only time we have traveled that distance without stopping on another floor at least once), trying to escape the wrath of what I am pretty sure was a harmless insect. Some habits die hard.

One final closing note: I was browsing through the New York Times the other day on what is becoming an ever faster Internet connection, and I came across this article titled Prisoner of Normalcy. I sort of adopted it as my new anti-slogan. The fact that I have been able to travel halfway, if not all the way across the world to study in this culturally rich and fascinating place has allowed me to escape this idea of "normal" and begin to morph my life into something rich and interesting in and of itself. I think that too often we allow ourselves to assume the fetal position in our comfortable little nooks at home, afraid of getting thrown out of our homeostatic state. Crossing boundaries and exposing yourself to new ideas and experiences is what gives life meaning, and that is how I have begun to regard my time here. It's a time to challenge myself mentally, physically, and emotionally, and to keep evading the ever seductive state of "normalcy."

That's all for now. Until next time, 再见！

-Tess