Coming Home

I opened the door to my house at 2:00am after 18 hours of air time, 4 different cities, and a little over a full day of travel. I was pretty tired and smelled even worse. It was an interesting trip: in San Francisco I found out that the airline of the flight which I booked my ticket to Jacksonville no longer served Jacksonville…so that was interesting. To make a long story short, because they had me on all kinds of different flights, my bags didn’t make it to Jacksonville until I once again arrived at the Jax airport the same day to board a flight to Nashville (had to get to school). But all is well, and I’m home…or rather at school.

Just before we left I got a picture with Yinglian (Helen), Daniel, and Xiao Yan. Xiao Yan, who was the stay-in-home-maid, would always get up to let me in at night, even when I came home past midnight, and then she’d be awake again at 6am or earlier, chopping away at something in the kitchen. She would get me all taken care of with food, and even did some ironing and laundry one time when I was busy. She was so nice, and I did make sure to thank her often, but it probably wasn’t enough. Daniel, Yinglian’s son, had just gotten home the day before from a summer session at Exeter in Boston, so it was cool to get to hang out with him a bit.

During these last few days, for example during the lunch they treated me to with all of the family, including the super-busy Mr. Wang, I’ve realized how lucky I am to know this many people in China already, and pretty nice ones at that. From Kunming, to Mile, Nanjing, Shanghai and Beijing, I have friends in every city which would be willing to hang out with me or take me into their homes.

When I got back home, my mom asked me what the best part of the trip was. If I had to pinpoint one event, it would have to be the cultural camp in Mile. While some of the planning and communication wasn’t perfect, in the end it didn’t really matter. I got to meet a lot of really cool kids and experience teaching on steroids: I don’t think many teachers arrive at the school with no teaching experience and are told that they have to teach to a group of students the next day with no teaching materials and no guidelines on how to teach. Oh, and by the way, they don’t speak your language and the class includes a wide range of English speaking abilities. That was the challenging part—I made it interesting, and I think the kids had fun…even Oscar with his busted eye. But probably even better than the teaching was getting to know all the volunteers and hanging with them. In China, as a foreigner, you can be pretty stupid (see that night in Mile). Most Americans won’t hear about it and most Chinese will just write it off as “well, they’re foreigners”. I think I made some good friends at the camp, and I sincerely intend on annoying Jes by dropping by on her in Orlando unsuspectingly.

This time in Beijing, on top of my previous two, raises some real questions as I head to Vandy. I gotta figure out what I’m going to do my life. Will I start out in China or in the US? Will it be in consulting, banking, or non-profit? I hope that by doing some more research and applying for jobs, I’ll figure this out, but if anyone knows the answer, please tell me.

Until my next China exodus, Rob.

The Chinglish Post

At the end of each trip I have made it a habit to post the best Chinglish I've found during my adventures. I don't feel like this year's is as good as last, but there's still some good finds. I kicked myself on several occasions because I didn't have a camera, but that's how it goes. Anyway, here they are:

These silver signs were found in an elevator, and yes, that says "The mulberry takes the workout center".

This sign was found in an outdoor sporting goods store. We could never figure out what it was trying to say.

This is by far the best one. Spicy crap soup with rice. Man. This menu was full of other ones too. I contemplating asking the server if we could buy the menu.

This landslide warning was found over the toilet in the hotel I was staying at in the countryside. Nice.

Apply jealous drink.

I think this was a knock off of Breyers, but the ice cream looked pretty good.

Day 2, From the Bird's Nest

After finishing my last day at McD and getting off early, I hit up a swim and then skipped dinner at the house to make sure I got to the National Stadium with plenty of time. Arriving at the stadium and knowing I was about to enter gave me this really crazy feeling—I guess I just felt extremely lucky to not only be going to the Olympics, but simply to just be an American college student over in China.

This time security moved much quicker and seemed better organized...or maybe it was just because I got there earlier—5:30 for a 7:00 event. Once getting inside the view of the stadium with the sun going down behind it was awesome. Since I hadn't eaten, I looked for an outpost. For pumping so much money into the stadium and the Olympics, you'd think they'd have some good food, but no. All they had was some crappy rice and what was supposed to be pork and veggies (it was hard to tell). After waiting in line for a while, I got to talking with a guy from England. He must have been smart—he'll be a freshman at Oxford next semester. After getting our crappy food, I got to meet his dad, and then started inquiring about preparations for the London Olympics four years from now. He said it's going fine, but don't expect anything on this scale. Apparently the Chinese have just poured in so much money (I think he said $20 billion) and of course they have so much more manpower.

Anyway, I got to my seat, which of course wasn't the best, but who cares, I was in the Bird's Nest. The view was still fine. The stadium was amazing. The huge TV displays were so clear and crisp, even from my seat. Things were really mechanized. Instead of rakes for the jumping pits, they used these mechanical things that smoothed it out (see pic). And for the discus, instead of having people run out and gather the discs, which would certainly slow things down and could also be dangerous, they had remote control cars that went out and collected the discs, bringing them back to the throwing area.

One of the first events was the first round of the 1500m, an event I was really looking forward to. It was pretty awesome. All US runners advanced, including Bernard Legat, the world champion, and I believe the American record holder. I also got to see Tyson Gay, our 100m hope to take on the two Jamaican favorites: Usain Bolt and Asafa Powell. Gay also advanced. I'll be watching these final races for sure. I was happy I got to see a medal ceremony. In the men's shot put, a US guy took second place to a Polish guy, so unfortunately instead of hearing our National Anthem, we had to hear Poland's. But the race of the night was definitely the last one: the women's 10,000 meter final. The people to my left who I'd befriended over our time together that night decided to leave—guess they weren't into distance races. Anyway, a US runner Flannagan was in 8^th place for the first half of the race behind a huge group of Africans. Slowly she move her way up, picking off one runner at a time. In the last few laps I was getting kind of nervous, but she ended pulling through and getting a bronze in a one of the fastest 10K's ever run.

That would have been a great way to end the night, except it wasn't over. I had to find a cab. Buses weren't running anymore and the subway was not convenient. I ended up waiting close to an hour to get a cab. I walked so far toward my house that the cab ride was actually almost not worth it. Well, it was still a good night. I give Beijing an A+ for facilities, volunteers, and organization, but a D- for transportation and concessions (there were more problems that weren't mentioned).

By the way, I freaking overslept this morning...my alarm went off at 6am (my ticket was for 9am), but I didn't wake up before it was too late.

Going Olympic

Last night was the first Olympic action of a three-day stint for me. Last night I got to see Japan take on Chinese Taipei. Japan is one of the favored teams in this thing, so I was pretty pumped. Not only was I excited about watching the game, but also being at an Olympic event. Because my leg’s been hurting lately, I hit up a swim after McD, and then really cut it close getting there. I would have made it in on time had the security check not been 200 people long (just for my queue…see the picture).

Once I was finished being fondled by the wanders and got through security, I got to see the whole complex. This was Wukesong, not the Bird’s Nest, so it was in a whole different part of town. But the facilities were still top notch. The place was crawling with volunteers, staff, and security. I finally found my seat, which was really good—right off the third base line—and only ended up missing the first half inning, in which nothing had happened anyway.

The game was good—slow as usual…it’s baseball—and it didn’t really pick up until about halfway through, when they knocked in a couple runs. But the fans kept it interesting. The Japanese were pretty nuts. They had their contingent all throughout the stands, but most concentrated on the 1^st base line (see pic). They had their flags going and were using these whistles relentlessly along with cheers. Nine innings and they never let up. Of course, the Chinese were saying the only cheer they know, “Jiayou Zhongguo!”…which means, “Let’s go China!” or more literally, “Add oil China!”. At every match I’ve ever seen (on TV), this is the only chant they’ve known. It has to stem from the stunting of creativity/individual thinking…that’s my only guess.

And on the topic of fans, it was pretty crazy the types of people sitting around me. I struck up a conversation with two guys to my right, who were from Dallas—one had actually graduated from UF. He was trying to get me to sell him my Track & Field ticket for Saturday—definitely no go on that one. To my left was a couple—the lady was Japanese and the guy was Canadian. And then directly in front of me was a group of four from Holland and the Netherlands, who was actually living in Beijing for work. They were an interesting bunch. One of the guys kept trying to get The Wave going, but I don’t know if that phenomenon has made it to the Orient yet. And then there were a few people I didn’t get a chance to talk to, like the Japanese group sitting at 9 o’clock, the Chinese guy sitting behind me, or the two Australians sitting in front of the Holland/Netherlands group. The Aussies were really decked out, with one guy wearing his flag as a cape. They made a couple trips for beer.

I got back really late, so because the door gets locked at 10pm, and since I didn’t want to wake anyone up, I tried sneaking through the side door, which I’d done before. Well, because it was locked I didn’t have much success getting in, but I was able to wake up the entire neighborhood when the enormous dog next door determined that I didn’t look or smell like a Chinese person and proceeded to have a bark-fest. He told all his friends too—soon the entire neighborhood was howling. In the end, I didn’t even have to call the stay-in-home nanny, because she woke up from all the commotion. How embarrassing. Tonight, however, is a new night, filled with track & field and without big dogs barking.

A Steady Diet of Mickey D's

Lately I've been volunteering/interning at the McDonald's office in downtown Beijing, and you'll be happy to know that they've been filling me with Spicy McChickens every chance they get. We actually probably eat at Mike D's every other day...pretty intense. I've been rotating between different departments, from HR to Operations to Marketing. So when I'm not eating their Corn Cup (you can swap the Corn Cup for French Fries...Chinese people really like corn), I've been learning quite a bit and getting to do some pretty cool stuff. When I got to help cheer at the torch relay, that was with McDonald's. It was amazing: over 200 employees who were selected as the city's best showed up on their days off to meet at McDonald's at 8am in the morning. And they were all nuts about McDonald's.

At one restaurant I got to meet the Chinese Ronald McDonald, who was making his rounds. He did some pretty cheesy magic tricks, but his English was really good. He looked nothing like the real, more authentic American Ronald McDonald...a lot shorter and a lot more Chinese. I should be getting these pictures soon.

I've also been taken to too many McD's to remember and talked to a countless number of managers. At a couple restaurants they gave me the grand tour and even let me make burgers. I failed miserably. Here I am, 21 years old about to graduate from a top 20 university, and I can't even flip a freaking burger. You can just see them laughing at me. The lengths the restaurant goes through for standardization is amazing. For example, when putting the burgers down on the grill, there is a certain way to place them so that when you take the burger flipper, the first patty down is the first patty up, ensuring the same cooking time. I felt I kind of bad for the customers who were getting my sandwiches, but the workers just laughed about it--they were pretty cool.

Everyone has been so nice--not just the employees at the office, but also the managers and workers at the restaurants. I've had gifts thrown at me like Christmas is coming early--from Olympic pens to restaurant group photos. There's something different about these McDonald's. Whenever you walk in, you feel good. It's kind of exciting. There's pumping Chinese pop music, the facilities are mostly new and always clean, and all the service counter workers are young, happy, thin Chinese girls. When I was talking to one of the managers we got on the topic of age, and I found out her age...it came about through asking how long she'd worked at McDonald's, so lay off. I thought she was about 22-25, but turns out she was 35. She explained that working at McD's "Makes you grow up to look young", because everyone is so happy to work there.

You can see in the pictures, all the girls have the stickers on their cheeks that say "I'm loving it when China wins!"...a promotional for the Olympics. But it's not just girls wearing these things--guys too. Trying pulling that in the States. You'd have employees walking out. I was taken up to the break room for employees, and found them relaxing over some chicken nuggets. Then I saw a framed song on the wall. After asking about it and reading it, I found out that one of the employees, who in fact was right there, had written the song about how working at McDonald's is awesome and how it brings people together. I was pretty blown away. Not only did he write it, but he recorded it with his friends, and the rock video was playing in the break room as we talked.

A lot of employees have asked why I'm here and want to know if I work at McD's in the States. I embarassingly reply that no, because I'm paying for a large part of college I went for a job that pays a little more. You don't want to say that working at McD's is a bad job, because it's not, but it is certainly not what you want to do between college semesters to vault yourself to a good post-graduate job. In China, though, working at McDonald's during college breaks is pretty normal, and being employed there is pretty respectable. A lot of people just keep on working there and move their way up, and now I know why--it's a really good culture.

Well, better go and rest up for Japan vs. Chinese Tapei in baseball tomorrow. I'm pumped.

Crazy Chinese Names and Things I Find Odd About 中国

Not saying that in the States we don't do our own stupid things that might go against common sense, or just weird little things that everyone does, but I figured I'd enlighten you about what I've seen in China (some of which give proof that China is still certainly a developing country):

Chinese ladies love to tell you what's good for your health, and why not, aren't Americans always trying to learn the secrets of the long-living Chinese? Well, I'm not buying in. For example, after a run I was digging into some lychees (a type of fruit, if you didn't know). Mrs. Yang basically threw up her arms in alarm, saying that I shouldn't eat on an empty stomach because it'll give me migraines. She also went bizerk on Jes too. We both have decided that this is not true. Or then there's just the whole thing with them telling me which foods to eat, and then they bust out a dish of straight "fei rou"...which is just the fat off of a pig. Chinese love to eat this stuff.

My favorite has to be when you drop food on the table and then reach to pick it up to eat it (who wants to wast food?). Well, that's not going to go over with a Chinese person too well. It's much too unsanitary. Then the next minute you'll see them offering you fruit that has just been washed (and grown in) in polluted water--you can just see the beads of water glistening on the peach. (I personally don't care about either one, I'm not too picky...then again, I've gotten sick twice this trip)

The bathrooms. The Chinese have not yet conquered the bathrooms. First off, they're still loving the squatters, which most be the most uncomfortable method of relieving yourself. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, they are rarely clean, especially the ones you find in internet bars and other areas that aren't frequented by foreigners. You know you're in China when you can smell that eerie bathroom smell from 50 feet away...it's the same in every bathroom...they all have this smell. I don't know if it has to do with not flushing the toilet paper down or what, but man. It seems to me that there's a misallocation of labor. Out on the streets there are so many people mindlessly sweeping streets that are already clean...sweeping up a few leaves here and there that have fallen in the last 20 minutes. Sometimes I just feel like no one wants to clean the bathrooms (you wouldn't either if you saw these things).

And on the topic of bathrooms, can we stop having the kids do their business in the streets? I've seen it 3 times this summer. To save money by not buying diapers, parents are cutting slits in the pants of their little ones, so all they have to do is take a squat when the need strikes them. This is not helping the problem.

Little chairs and tables. Many outdoor restaurants and a lot of homes love the doll-sized dinner tables. It still takes up about the same area, but it just lowers everything by about three feet. We're talking about chairs that are 6-8 inches high, and tables that are about a foot high. It's cool if you're 3 feet tall, but for a pretty tall guy like me it's a bit uncomfortable. I'll be going for a dumpling but I can't see over my knees--not good.

And then there are the interesting English names they give themselves...

--Innerson...a kid saw a poster of basketball star Allen Iverson, but it had a misspelling (like many fake Chinese goods), hence his name
--Saturday...she was a student in my class...must be her favorite day
--Purple Law...is this some form of government enforcement?
--Sunny...met two of these in one week. Wow.
--Cookiya...this is actually a friend of mine...never really figured it out
--Firey Princess...no comment
--Kitty...I'm surprised this is the closest name to that of a stripper...I feel like I've heard better
--Cinderella...at least it's pretty?
--Carmen...a guy in my class wanted this name, and he wanted it bad, but I just couldn't give it to him
--AND THE BEST FOR LAST: Tampon...I didn't actually meet this girl, Sam from camp did. All I have to say is that's ballsy

Like Cramming for a Final

With the Olympics just days away (I know it has started, I'm just trying to catch up), the preparations I've seen have been incredible. You've probably heard that nearby factories have been shut down. It's helped: in my first day here I saw a clear blue sky. Crazy. They've also instituted a policy where only cars with an even-numbered license plate can drive on even-numbered days of the month (and odd-numbered plates on odd days). This had helped some, but since taxis are exempt, it probably hasn't had the effect anticipated. The entire city is covered in Olympic banners—even places that don't seem to be frequented by foreigners, or even local Chinese for that matter. Every light pole proudly displays flags proclaiming "Beijing 2008: One World, One Dream". Shrubbery in parks has been molded into Olympic athletes and, as if that wasn't enough, people have started carving it into their hair. I saw this kid on the subway the other day, so I asked his parents if I could snap a picture of his hair. Pretty intense.

Running down the street I'll see people erecting even more Olympic propaganda in places I didn't think they could fit anymore. Taxis have rough translations in English, and sometimes the drivers can communicate too, even though I never really find out since I just speak Chinese, but that's word on the street. People have even started queuing up for the subway (most of the time)—I've never seen this before in my life. Usually it's survival of the fittest—this must be some sort of attempt to seem more civil or something. Sidewalks are incessantly swept, flowerbeds pruned, and what little grass there is in this city, cut. Volunteers are crawling the city in their white and blue shirts, ready to help anyone find anything.

In hindsight, I'm actually kind of happy I didn't get accepted to the volunteer position. I applied back in September, but in usual Chinese fashion, they never even responded to me telling me either way. Oh well. Recently, with my volunteer work with McDonald's, I've gotten to see some pretty cool stuff. I was able to see the torch relay the other day, which was pretty cool. They sure don't let them run very far—couldn't be more than 100 meters or so. My McDonald's crew and I got to cheer them on while sweating our behinds off in the ridiculous late-morning heat. Then there was the press conference with McDonald's China CEO Jeff Schwartz (who I met in Shanghai...see pic), Jim Skinner (CEO of all of McDonald's) and a couple other pretty important guys. I was allowed VIP access, and got to hear every question twice, since everything was in Chinese and English. The Chinese people love to ask multi-part questions—seemed like every one was "20 Questions" or something. Anyways, the energy's been pretty awesome, this place is ready to explode, and I think Beijing is preparerd. (Oh, and jeez are there a lot of foreigners here—sometimes I feel like I'm back in the States)

Vanderbilt in China

For brevity's sake I left out one person that I met over those few days. Ariel, who was a freshman last year at Vandy, was back in China for the summer and just happened to be in Beijing for a couple of days. She's one of two authentic Chinese students at our school—she's lived her whole life in China (mostly in Nanjing, which is her hometown), and she hadn't even attended an international school. And since 2 Vandy students are rarely in the same town on the other side of the world, we had to meet up.

Friday night after dinner we met at Houhai Lake, which is the same lake that I would run around almost every day two years ago when I lived in Beijing. This was basically party central. We walked around, had some coconut milk, checked out some stores, and talked for a long time. In all honesty, I didn't know her very well before that night. The most interesting thing was to hear the perspective of a local Chinese who was in the process of being "Americanized" while still having pretty traditional Asian parents. She explained how it would have been really easy to do exactly what her parents did and follow the same blueprint, and they were actually pushing her to stay in China. But Ariel, as I understood from our conversations, is pretty open-minded and willing to explore new things (maybe even more than me--someone who's been on the other side of the world the past three summers). This is something I haven't seen often in Chinese people. Sure they like Kobe Bryant and they watch Prison Break, but at Vandy Ariel actively tries to associate with non-Chinese people. When I first saw her that night I found out her hair had been completely redone from the traditional straight banged cut to a curly, more Westernized one. She's also taken up salsa dancing and mentioned all kinds of foreign places she still wants to go to meet the people.

This contrasting mindset and these changes aren't coming about unchecked. Her parents, while understanding her ideals, still keep a pretty close watch on her. Like a lot of Asian parents I've found, they still have a very big influence on what she does. She talked constantly about wanting "freedom", something that a lot of Americans might complain about when we're rouge teens in our high school years (not me, I was a good boy), but probably not so much as a college student—especially one that lives halfway around the world. This influence was quite evident when it was getting late that night at Houhai, and her dad was calling pretty often, concerned about her safety. After 10 minutes of conversation, a quick check of her phone showed that her dad had just called 7 times (maybe that's slightly over exaggerating, but it was close...can't remember too clearly).

Anyway, we rode together after waiting for a cab for close to an hour (it was stupid), and dropped her off first. I fell asleep after dropping her off, and I think my cabbie took advantage of the situation and had a joy ride to Shanghai and back. My cab fare was 80 kuai, when it should have been less than 40. Oh well. The next day brought us back to the Houhai area, but we first explored that aforementioned hutong, Nanlou Guxiang. Since two years ago I had both had my eyes on those boats in the water, so having the time today I convinced her it was a good idea. It was called something like "River Romance". Kind of funny considering we were in a lake. All in all it was a good time: I got a picture taken with a fist pump (check out that power pump), we got in a traffic jam under the bridge with 200 other boats (approximately), and we got to see Chinese people swimming in Speedos. I asked our driver whether that water was safe to swim in, and he said, "Oh certainly not." Gotta love Chinese people.

Getting My Greet On

(Once again, I can't move the pics, but at least they're in order.) Literally an hour and a half before my train left for Beijing, I finished up having drinks with a Chinese friend I met through recruiting for the Mile summer camp. She wasn't able to come to the camp, but she still wanted to meet up with me since I was in Shanghai anyway. After that short rendezvous, I started to make the cross-town journey to my (Thomas's) place, where my bags were—not a quick transit if you're on the other side of the HuangPu River like I was. The HuangPu River divides the city into PuDong (which means east of the HuangPu) and PuXi (I'll spare you the explanation and instead fill it with these words that actually take up more space anyway). With the help of some Chinese guys at the airport I made it onto the train with 15 minutes to spare, although pouring sweat.

Of course I hadn't eaten, so the first thing I did was hit up the dining car. Oh crap, I realized I just had 30 kuai left. The cheapest thing available thing that would fill me up was 23 kuai...that wouldn't leave enough money to get to Helen's house once in Beijing...oh well, I decided I'd figure that out when the time came, I was freakin' hungry. A couple was seated across from me (the car was packed) and turns out they were Russians from St. Petersburg in China doing business. They spoke no Chinese and only the women spoke English. I learned all about them and helped them order their food. They were only spending a day in Beijing, so they wanted to get in the most sights possible. Since I'd seen pretty much all of them I, along with some random Chinese guy that had lived in California for a while (his English was really good), helped them plan out their day, along with Chinese characters to show the taxi drivers. (See pic, the Russian guy left after getting tired of having everything translated). Three people from completely different places all over the world on the same train car. Pretty nuts. I know I sat there over 2 hours just talking about different stuff. Interesting perspectives.

Once I arrived in Beijing I was broke and hungry. I had to trek close to a mile with suitcases so big it looked like I was ready to change addresses, and then wait outside the Bank of China for over an hour for it to open up so I could exchange travelers checks...definitely not willing to pay the stupid ATM fees. Anyway, I'm still alive to tell the story, and once settled down at Helen's house (I finally tallied up the size of the house: 9 bedrooms, 6 baths, 2 living rooms, and of course a kitchen and dining room...found a room yesterday I'd never seen) I had the weekend to explore Beijing before starting my volunteer work at McD on Monday. I found this really cool hutong (means "alleyway") that was right near where I lived two years ago...I just never found it before. It had some of the coolest shops and was a foreigner magnet. I could tell why—they had some pretty sweet bars, which I definitely intend on hitting up once the Games begin. Anyway, got a full body massage, heavy on the legs, for one hour—only $10. Nice. At the parlor I met an American named Andy from New Jersey. He was here only for a couple months to serve as a body guard for celebrities—he told me some pretty nuts stories, like the time he served as the body guard for Chinese track great (gold in Athens' 04) Liu Xiang without even realizing it. He said he'd call me to get a beer...we'll see if that happens or not.

Then almost as soon as I jumped out of there and into another shop, me and this lady named Revital started talking. She's Islamic and now lives in NYC, but from the sounds of it has lived pretty much everywhere on the globe. We talked a lot (this was her first time in China) and then invited me out for drinks, which eventually turned into dinner (American fare, thankfully...need a break every now and then). She's lived a pretty interesting life, which I won't try to regurgitate here. Anyway, that dinner/conversation went 2+ hours, and then really pushed hard for me to join her division at her company (Ericsson, the parent of Sony Ericsson), explaining that they had opportunities in China. We'll keep in contact and I'll probably shoot her my email. This was all just in a two day span and just a small sample of all the people I've met—meeting new people has become a favorite pastime of mine—I guess some say it's the spice of life? Or is that trying new things? Whatever.

Rolling Out to the Shang

With the camp over, everyone went their separate ways. It was kind of sad, because in just one week we'd gotten to know each other pretty well—maybe I felt this way because I had been in contact with everyone weeks before for the preparation. I had to say goodbye to Mrs. Wang (see pic), who became a very good friend and someone I have a lot of respect for. On the bus I got to sit next to Chris (see pic), one of my students. He's quiet and shy, but really interesting and very hard working—at the Olympic Quiz Bowl I saw him in the crowd taking notes. He's one of those kids who's so cute you contemplate squeezing him in your suitcase taking him home with you.

After arriving in Shanghai, the utopia of Western goods, the first three things I bought other than a hotel room (no, I didn't stay at the Ritz...I just had to get a pic in front of it) were Gatorade, Tylenol, and Blink by Malcolm Gladwell (my Chinese-English dictionary had sufficed for pleasure reading for long enough). After that first late night in the hotel, I moved to Thomas's place. I met him last summer at study abroad—he was keeping the dream...he'd been in China ever since. He and his roommates were cool enough to let me crash on their couch.

His summer job (he's now a grad student) is pretty cool: he represents Western companies like Proctor & Gamble and makes sure that fake goods aren't getting on the market. So what he'd do is find out where the fake goods are being produced, go there, pretend to be an interested buyer (he usually plays a greedy Westerner), take pictures, then bribe the cops to bust them. It's pretty sad that you have to bribe the cops to do their job, but that's sometimes how things get done with the Chinese government—they turn a blind eye in order to benefit. The day I got to Shanghai Thomas had just gotten back from a raid where he played a Russian trader...he said seeing thousands of fake Umbro, Wilson, Nike, etc. socks all being produced in a nice warehouse was pretty surreal.

Anyway, he would go to work while I played in Shanghai, and then we'd meet up afterward for dinner and/or drinks. I did some bargaining at YuYuan (bought some art for 80 kuai, and the artist started at 480 kuai...felt kind of bad about that one), but the main reason I was there was to set up my volunteer work with McDonald's and the Olympics.

I met pretty much every high-level employee in McDonald's China, including the CFO and CEO. All the business cards made me feel like I was back collecting baseball cards—except these were probably a little more valuable. The meeting with the CEO was really special. I was half an hour late due to my driver getting lost and then dropping me off a mile from the office. Oh, and I got hit by a car, so all my clothes were pretty dirty. Add all this to the sweat that pouring down my face from the mile-long walk, and I looked like any old smuck that got drug off the street. But he didn't seem to care. We had a great conversation for over an hour about everything from VSS to what it was like to carry the Olympic torch. I made it clear that I'd like to work for McD China—he didn't say anything substantial, but he mentioned hitting me up with Olympic tickets if he has any extra...I'm pumped.

Also, the employees plan to set me up for the volunteering in Beijing. Everything I experienced at the office was great—everyone was really nice (but not overwhelming), spoke very clear Mandarin, and had everything planned out before I ever came. I was just really impressed by everything, and I'm looking forward to working with the Beijing crew.

(Btw, I don't know why I can't move the pictures...I guess they are in reverse order all at the top.)

Dancing with the Homeless Guy (jeez this is long)

After that crazy talent show, the next day was all to ourselves. Because of an aching leg, I decided to wuss out on the vineyard trip, which ended up being a more of a good meal than a tour/activity, so I chose well. Since we didn't have anything to do, we decided that going into town (Mile) offered the best chance at getting in some trouble. Big Mike, Little Mike, Joe, Erica, Jes, Cynthia, and I all hopped the bus and started looking for western food, after eating loads of Chinese food for the past week. To no result, we finally decided on some stupidly cheap Chinese food that ended up being pretty good, and pretty firey hot (I went through 5 drinks and Jes said it pretty much ruined her meal).

After that we walked around looking for something to do. That's when we saw people carrying torches all around the city. Turns out it was the Torch Festival. Carrying lit torches around crowded Chinese streets...I have to hand it to the guy who invented this holiday. You can see me getting lit up (Jes actually purchased the torch after we both decided that it was a necessity that we carry around a burning stick), and yes, those are 10 year-old kids getting their torch on.

After having my turn with the torch riding it around town like a horse (got a few looks, especially when I said "What's up?" in Chinese to people walking by), things really got interesting. A nearby store was cranking some techno music. This homeless guy was getting into the groove, and I thought it looked like a good time...I joined him by mimicing his moves. It's hard to believe that he didn't notice me, or Cynthia and Michael who joined me shortly afterward, especially because there was a lot of people watching. Quite a few. You can see the wall of people that formed on our left side, and there was a similar one on our other side and even people lining the other side of the street. Cars were rubbernecking, partly causing traffic to come to a standstill. We danced for like 3 or 4 minutes. It was pretty nuts. Then some shop owner came over and interupt the music, causing the homeless guy to stop dancing and us to give up our fame. (Thanks to Jes? I have the video...that thing is good).

Well, we finished dancing and then Jes gave the torch to some lucky Chinese lady as we went for what else but kareoke. You really had to dig to get some good songs, but we sang pretty passionately and made out well (not in that way). I know for a fact that we went through all the Britney Spears songs, Jes and I were the only ones who knew Tom Petty, and Big Michael went for the usual Carpenters.

We had had a few drinks, and then I went to go to the bathroom and order another round when I ran into some random Chinese guy who was taking a break from the adjacent room. We got to talking and he invited me into his room, which was so smokey it made my eyes water. He introduced me to everyone in the room, which led to a toast from each of them...I drank everytime when they each drank once...I really needed my team. Anyway, we had a shouting conversation as the music was blasting, and of course, as pretty much every Chinese person asks me, he wanted to know if I had a girlfriend. Indicating that I didn't led to him offering to "take my pick" of the girls in the room. I don't think the girls were hookers...he said they were friends...so I was pretty confused. I stayed for about 20 minutes, finally returning to my room where people might have been wondering where I was? I think they were just so pumped to get rid of me. Anyway, we had used up pretty much all the American songs, so I invited them over the smokey room to sing with my new friends/hookers. We stayed for a short time, all my friends got toasted (of course) and I sang "Girl From Across, Look Over Here"...what else? (the guy wanted to take me out to dinner the next day, which for some odd reason I agreed, even though I knew we were leaving town at noon...he called around 2pm the next day...that was an awkward conversation).

We got back to camp pretty late, but not late enough. I think Cynthia or Jes wanted to play cards. Girls weren't allowed in the guys dorms, so we told the guard lady that "It would be our little secret." Guess it worked. We busted into Little Michael's room--he had already returned home early to sleep...serious mistake. He got a wake up massage by me. You can see how much he enjoyed it. Then Joe and I got beat by two girls at euchre...weak sauce. That entire night was pretty stupid...maybe due to the fact that we'd been working pretty freaking hard the past week. You know how we do.