Beijing Nighlife, Wilderness and Massages

Last weekend we decided we needed a break from tourist activities, so we experienced Beijing nightlife Thursday and Friday night from around 11 p.m. to 5:30 a.m.  Need I say more?  It was such a blast, and there are a number of different bar/club hubs, but we went to the east side of the city which is dubbed Sanlitun.  Sanlitun has streets of bars where a lot of foreigners go to find each other. I think that is my favorite part of traveling; you just never know who you are going to meet. One second I was talking to someone from the U.S. and the next Ireland and the next Nigeria. It is so fun and exciting to hear everyone’s story. Anyway, we did that and ended up at KFC both mornings since we were starving. Outside of the bars there are a lot of vendors/street food, but nothing  like the stereotypical ‘late night’ in the U.S. Unless you crave bugs, vegetables and fish in the early hours of the morning, KFC and McDonalds are you best bet. 

On Sunday, Liz and I decided that getting out of the city and the pollution would be a good change, so we signed for a hike 3 hours outside of the city in Cypress Falls. The first hour of the hike was fine, but I started feeling ill about half way up the mountain, and by the time we got to the top I was very sick. On top of vomiting 4 times before getting to the bottom of the mountain 3 hours later, it poured, so our entire group was soaked for the 3 hour bus ride back to Beijing. I think that this might have been one of most difficult days of my life. I thought that I was going to either pass out from dehydration or slip and fall down the mountain.  I am positive that I had food poisoning because it was so abrupt, and the next day I felt much better, but if you ever come to China I recommend bringing antibiotics and probiotics for digestion issues and WATCH what you eat very carefully. 

Work has been the same old routine – I do have two more articles that were published.

http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/2012-06/24/content_25710314.htm

http://www.china.org.cn/china/2012-06/21/content_25709004_2.htm

Last night, we went needed a change from Chinese food so we went to a Mexican place called La Bamba, which was excellent. We decided to walk around after dinner, and we passed a massage place in the process.  On a whim, the three of us decided a foot massage would be good and it was fairly inexpensive so we went for it. If I only knew what I had signed up for….. This was definitely the most painful foot massage I have ever had, and the guy who rubbed my feet kept talking to me in Chinese (I am pretty sure inappropriately). So, in addition to my foot massage, which consisted of a lot of hitting, suction cups (increased circulation???), and hammers, I was hit on for 60 minutes.  I posted a few pictures below in an attempt to help you understand this ridiculous experience. On the bright side, the three of us were laughing the entire time because there wasn’t much else to do. 

Other than that, not too much is new. It took me a few days to recover from the food poisoning, so this blog is a little late, but keep your fingers crossed that I don’t get sick again. Love Kristen.

Hospitals, Temples and the Olympics

Hello All,

I am still having a wonderful time, apart from the fact that I got really sick last week. I don’t know what is with me getting sick in foreign countries, but I must say that I am not a fan.  I just had a bad stomach virus, but it was so bad that I decided to go to the hospital on Sunday.  I texted a friend who lives here and she suggested a hospital and texted me the address. So I got in a cab, and found the hospital fine. Once I was inside, however, I walked through half of the hospital before finding the registration desk.  Nothing is in English so navigating here is quite the task, especially when you feel like you are going to fall over. By the grace of God (literally) a woman in line spoke English and she asked them if any of the doctors or nurses did. The answer was a definite “no”, so they wrote down the address of another hospital that had an international clinic.  

So I got in another cab, and made my way to hospital number 2.  After searching there for 15 minutes, a teenage girl could tell I was getting flustered and walked me to the international clinic. Once I finally got there after an hour and a half of driving/walking around, a doctor was there that spoke English. She did a blood test, and gave me some medicine after discovering I had the virus. Overall, the second hospital was great, but a checkup that would have taken me an hour or so took me the entire evening because finding people that speak English are so hard to come by. I realize that I am the one who should be speaking Mandarin, since I am the one in the foreign country, but man, when you don’t feel good and no one understands you, it is all you can do not to just cry or get angry.

In addition to my adventures in Beijing hospitals, we went to the Olympic Park and the Temple of Heaven last week. The Olympic Park was very impressive, and although there is not a lot to see, it was definitely worth the trip. It was so odd seeing the Olympic stadium (nicknamed the ‘birds nest’) after seeing it on TV in 2008 and thinking it was so far away. Our friend and colleague, Jozy, bought us the characters/mascots from the 2008 Beijing Olympics which was really sweet of her.

 The Temple of Heaven was beautiful as well. It is a circular temple, which is different from other architecture I have seen here, since everything seems to be square. Like the Forbidden City, it consists of multiple buildings that extend over acres of land. It was beautiful, but we went on an incredibly hot day. The weather is getting consistently hotter (comparable to NC), and in addition, the pollution is also getting worse. I don’t know if the smog gets worse with the heat, but that seems to be the trend. There is a radio tower that I can usually see from my apartment window, and for the past week there has been so much smog that I can’t see it. Every time I go outside, I feel like I am smoking, which is apparently pretty accurate since the rate of lung cancer here is 5 times the world average due to the pollution. 

Tomorrow (Friday) is a holiday, so we will have a 3 day weekend. I should I have more stories/adventures on Monday. Until then :)

Operas and Articles

Hello All!
I am still having a wonderful time in China. I went to the Opera last weekend, which was a wonderful experience. It has always been on my bucket list to go to the Opera "Pretty Woman" style, and know I can finally say that I did.  It was at the National Theater of the Performing Arts near Tiananmen Square, which is nicknamed 'the egg'.  It is a huge dome that was very controversial when it was built because it is so modern, but I loved it. I thought it was absolutely beautiful.  It is surrounded by water so you have to go underground to get inside and once you are underground the ceiling is glass so that you can see the water above.  

Other than that, we have been going to work from 8:30 to 5 every day, and a lot of touristy things close around 6, so we can't see much during the week. We did go to a tea house last night for dinner, which was a really neat experience.  They had the traditional Chinese puppetry show during dinner, which is where they have flat figures or puppets that they move behind a screen.

 I had two more articles published today:

http://china.org.cn/opinion/2012-06/13/content_25640362.htm

http://www.china.org.cn/arts/2012-06/10/content_25611264.htm

One is an opinion article and one is a feature story. I want to write more instead of just editing, but it is hard for me to report on anything because press conferences, events etc. are all in Mandarin. Even interviewing people is a challenge.  I have to see if I can’t find a story idea where people speak English.  Let me know if you all have any ideas.  I am going to the Olympic Park this weekend, the Buddha Bar, and a going-away party for a friend, so I will give you all an update on Monday. 

Love Kristen ;)

Beaches, beers and buses

This past weekend we had the opportunity to go on an office trip to the coastal community of Beidaihe.  It is a beach community about 3 hours from Beijing (5 with traffic) where a lot of people go to get away from the city. About 40 co-workers climbed onto the bus at 7:30 a.m. Saturday morning and we were off.  The bus ride was pretty eventful between the constant breaking and honking as our bus driver weaved through traffic, and the fact that one of my colleagues, Pan Li, was almost left on the highway. Pang Li, a short man with classes and a huge smile, is quite a character. Since the office paid for everything over the weekend, everyone indulged in as much food and alcohol as they wanted. Pan Li started early on the bus and after three beers, got off on the highway to relieve himself (we were stuck in traffic anyway).  But before Pan Li was back on the bus, traffic started moving, and I looked out of my window to find him running next to the bus screaming for it to stop.  This was probably the funniest experience I have had since I have been here. I couldn’t stop laughing.  He finally was able to get back on the bus, sweating and smiling like nothing had happened.  About four hours later we finally got to the beach where we walked around and hung out for a few hours. Then we went to our hotel and ate a huge meal.  One huge difference between a Chinese meal and an American meal is that everyone shares. You can’t go to a restaurant and buy your own meal. You order a selection of plates and the center of the table rotates and everyone gets there fill.  This is a prime example of how the U.S. is more individualistic and China is more collective.   

The following day we got up and went on a ferry ride, which was pretty dull (it was raining and there wasn’t much to look at except for cargo ships) until Oscar and I got attacked by locals. In Beijing, two women have asked if they could take a picture with me, but the ferry was a different story. Approximately, 20 to 30 people were in a line to take pictures with us. I felt like I was a celebrity. All of our co-workers were laughing at us since we were such a spectacle. I guess that the beach was far enough away from Beijing that the locals rarely see foreigners.  It was a fun experience and my face hurt from smiling when we finally got off of the ferry, but at the same time I felt bad for getting so much attention for nothing. The same was true in Uganda where white skin is rare, but no one owns a camera, so no pictures were taken there. It is a funny experience since no one would ever do that in the United States where there are so many ethnicities/nationalities. No ethnicity is a novelty. All I know is that if you ever want to be famous, traveling to Africa or Asia is a good test run to see if you like it. My family better get ready for some picture taking since the average male height in China is 5’ 6.7’’ and the average female height is 5’ 2.5’’.  My mother is the shortest member of our family at 5’7’’.  If Oscar and I stand out like we do, my very tall, 5-member family is going to stand out everywhere we go.  

We ended the trip at the beginning of the great wall (where the great wall goes into the Pacific Ocean), which is near Shanghai Pass.  Shanghai Pass is a pass through the mountains that enemies had to get through in order to get to mainland China. Thus, there is a military town at the base of the mountain to protect China from invasion. Now, however, it is a tourist site and there are dozens of vendors in the streets of the revitalized town. It was a great weekend, and it was also a great opportunity to go somewhere other than a stereotypical tourist site. I feel like I really experienced China, and now I can call a lot of my co-workers friends.

China.org.cn

It is hard to believe that I have been in Beijing for a week already.  It has flown by! Yesterday was my first day at work and it has been great so far.  I am in the English Department for China.org.cn, which is a branch of the Chinese Internet Information Center.  Basically there are three branches that provide online news, and we are one of them.  CIIC is owned and operated by the Chinese government since no news or broadcast organizations in China are private. There are 50 people in my department from all over the world including China, Mexico, the United States, the Netherlands, and Germany. The news is split into four groups, hard news (politics, war etc.), soft news (education, sports etc.), useful information (travel, leisure etc.) and mobile news. I asked to be a part of the hard news group and Oscar joined the mobile news group.  Oscar is getting his Ph.D. at UNC and his thesis is going to be about education and technology.  Basically, he wants to see how handheld devices such as smart phones and tablets affect different cultures and how they use them to learn, so this is a great place for him to start his research.  I chose hard news because it involves politics, which I am interested in pursuing.  We also have to do a project at the end of our internship.  Last year, the interns made a sort of virtual map that summed up everything they saw in Beijing (tourist sites).  Oscar is an expert in audio visual communication since he worked in online news/video production before coming to North Carolina to do his PhD.  In fact, he teaches audio visual communication at UNC, so I think we are going to do a video for our final project. We have not chosen a topic yet, but I am really excited to learn from Oscar because I know nothing about video production.  I will basically have the opportunity to take his class for free, so I am looking forward to it. Although the office is a pretty stereotypical news organization in some ways like the layout (rows of cubicles), I have to say that the atmosphere threw me off a little bit.  When I reported for the Daily Tar Heel the news room was absolutely crazy.  People were running around yelling, music was playing, phones were ringing, people were talking, typing, editing etc. The office here is the polar opposite; quiet.  Everyone talks to each other through instant messenger which is very efficient, but the office is incredibly silent.  If I talk to someone I feel like everyone can hear me and the office is an entire floor.  It further enforces the stereotype that Americans are loud and obnoxious and Chinese are quiet and respectful.  This atmosphere is initially very intimidating, but everyone has been so nice to me (specifically through instant messengerJ).  It is just very different from the U.S. I have learned that the stereotype that Chinese people are very cold is 100% false.  They come off that way because they often have a blank expression on their face, which Americans misconstrue as being cold. But if you talk to anyone here they immediately engage in the conversation and offer their help.  It just isn’t customary here to be blunt or forward. Anyway, overall my experience at the office thus far has been pretty good except for the cafeteria.  The food yesterday was pretty bad, so I sincerely hope it is better today.  I have Skype if anyone wants to chat, so shoot me an email and we will have a Skype date. 

Kristen J