Archives June 2006

I wandered around the platform looking for Mike. Finally I saw a bathroom area in the far corner of the park where the dancing was going on. I walked over and waited a few minutes. After some time a strange and yellow Mike appeared from the bathroom clutching his stomach. I had a flashback to the Canadian on the bus and his coughing attack over the book Mike had been carrying.

Bell tower

We had also eaten lunch earlier at a local place where Mike had devoured spicy meatballs in oil at an alarming rate. Meanwhile, I had eaten noodles and beer. We figured it must have been the meat, as I was feeling healthy and energetic. He held his stomach, sat under a tree, and generally began to look Canadian himself. We jumped on the next bus back to the city and grabbed a hostel bunk room. I watched a film in the hostel lounge and emailed my parents to let them know we had made it safely to China and were enjoying Xi’an. Meanwhile, Mike hung out in the bathroom with a sour look on his face.

The next morning he was feeling himself again, and we decided to take the day slowly. We wandered down to the bell tower and then walked up into the Muslim quarter where I bought a compass in the shape of a turtle for my dad’s upcoming birthday. Mike bought a copy of the Little Red Book, which was a collection of quotes from former chairman Mao Zedong. The book was in Chinese and we soon discovered we could not read enough of it to be interesting. We walked around the Muslim quarter in a giddy mood, making up sayings we thought should belong in a quote book about communism’s many virtues. All of ours were cynical.

Dance for the Emperor

We decided, after the long relaxing day of joking around, walking and playing cards, to hop on another train and head for Chengdu. Chengdu is the capital of Sichuan, which is the most populated province in China. They say that one in five people in the world is Chinese, and one in four of those from Sichuan. We had plans to see the massive Tibetan national park and also the Giant Panda Research Breeding Center. We had a hostel recommended to us from some folks in Xi’an, and we had heard great things about the capital city. We were eager to get back on the road, and at dusk we boarded the urine-infested train with smiles from ear to ear.

-posted by Lauren.

From Banpo to the warriors we decided to grab a cab. It was nearly 90 degrees outside and our bags were becoming a burden. Meanwhile, we were finding it a bit hard to locate food near the tourist attractions that was not encased in plastic wrap, and we wanted a solid Xi’an meal. We finally flagged a cab and scooted into the back seat. We could almost see the money symbols click into his eyes like a cartoon when he saw our foreign faces and heavy bags. We were going to be taken for a pointless and expensive ride.

The driver ignored Mike’s Chinese and took us into the desert. We were surrounded by sand, heat and the occasional pile of discarded appliances and trash. Finally we saw buildings in the distance, a miserable, Russian-looking oasis. The driver promised to take us straight to the warriors after we went into the building, which was owned by a friend of his—a jade merchant. We walked inside, confused and bitter; our cab was the only means of transportation so we had to do what he wanted. We looked at the overpriced jade and walked back outside and got in the cab, having purchased nothing. The driver was talking to someone outside his window, pocketed something and turned the car around and headed back towards civilization. It took nearly an hour before we arrived.

A dusty army

The warriors were a bit of a disappointment to me. They were amazing in that their craftsmanship was stellar, their alignment precise, and their purpose mystical. However, when we visited much of the ruins were under repair and we watched (remember, we are history majors) as young Chinese workers crawled all about the shafts, picking up pieces and moving them about. If a shard did not fit anywhere it was tossed in a bag and carried out of the pit to be assembled later, if possible. Looking down on the soldiers I wondered how much of each one was ancient, and how much was modern super glue. One additional aspect of visiting the warriors was that one was constantly approached by salesmen of various silly replica objects. In all, it was an interesting visit to an ancient site, but one covered in a shroud of modernity and disregard.

We boarded a bus to visit the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, the mighty emperor to whom the warriors were a testament and a constant vigilant guard. The bus took less than fifteen minutes, but it was an interesting ride nonetheless. A strange Canadian man with dysentery sat next to me and asked to look at my guidebook. I handed it to him, he coughed and wheezed on the cover, crackled the pages, and nearly collapsed into my lap. He had been traveling in China for six months, and looked the worse for wear. In fact, we heavily recommended a detour to the hospital, but he took out a cloth, wiped some yellow pus from his eyes, and handed back the guide book. Mike took the book and wiped it off with hand sanitizer and put it back in his bag. The Canadian got off at the tomb and sauntered into the shade and slept. He was gone when we came back.

The tomb itself is a giant mountain with steps on one side. You climb and climb, bake in the sun, refill on water, and climb some more. Finally you reach the top to discover a platform the size of a Midwestern living room, and an old man with a wicker basket filled with ice and water. I’m convinced to this day that the old man is the best businessman on the planet. He was charging a ridiculous amount for the ice water. Looking at his aged frame I was embarrassed to realize he had not only made it up the steps, but had done so carrying water and ice, and probably did so several times a day. I paid nearly ten times the amount water should cost, and was happy to do so. I bet that man lives in a mansion today, and no one deserves it more.

Halfway down the tomb we encountered a modern ode to an ancient ceremony. Men and women in bright, replica costumes and army uniforms danced around on a large stage, waving flags and chanting to the sounds of an eclectic piano over the loudspeaker system. We watched for a bit, sitting in the shade. When I turned around to make a comment to Mike I discovered I was alone.

-Posted by Lauren.

The train from Beijing to Xi’an would be a long, overnight sleeper train. I had glorious images in my head of a large stateroom with bunks and a water closet. I skipped along with my large backpack barely weighing me down. The tickets were cheaper than we thought they would be—about twenty US dollars a piece. Mike did not tell me that they were cheaper because they were sold out of soft sleepers, and we could only find space in the hard sleeper, general population cars. We climbed aboard and stopped. Something dark flashed past our feet and into the next car. A dog? A rat, possibly? The smell of the nearby toilet stall was nearly unbearable, it burnt the interior of the nostrils so much that we were constantly inching our noses. The smell was almost a physical presence in the compartment. We moved down the narrow isle until we found our bunks. We were on the top bunk (three high) in a room with six bunks total. The room itself was the size of a Volkswagen beetle. We took off our shoes and scaled the interior of the train until we reached the top bunks. The space was so small that one could barely brace oneself on the elbows, let alone sit up. Below me was a man who must have been nearly ninety. He was hunched over, his shirt rolled up in the back and an equally ancient woman was pounding her fists against his spine. He coughed into a jar and sealed the lid. She cleaned his mouth off with a yellowed towel and resumed pounding on his back until he spit into the jar again. When they had exhausted this activity, they put the jar on the table between them and a terrified looking young Hong Kong man in the opposing bunk.

Neolithic village!

After a while I tuned out the coughing, spitting, and slurping noises and even managed to ignore the smell of urine and boiled eggs. I read a book, wrote in my journal, looked out the window and generally was as relaxed as I had remembered being in a really long time. I loved traveling by train! Every few hours a lady would come down the isle with a cart of instant noodles and milk cartoons and, to our surprise, warm Tsingtao beer. We pulled out our cards, opened a few beers, and set to playing each other in poker. We kept a tally, promising to pay out the winner at the end of the trip. By the time we got to Xi’an, a whole page of the notebook was marked in hash marks and stained with beer.

Xi’an is a beautiful city, and one that I will forever recommend. Parts of the original city wall still remain, and though we did not have time to scale the wall, it was a stately and majestic bit of ancient architecture that made one feel like they had stepped into a time warp. Xi’an is the capital of Shaanxi province, and a former capital to multiple Chinese dynasties. The city was famous for its powerful position throughout history, most notably revealed in the massive army of terracotta warriors which were created to carry the emperor Qin Shi Huang into the afterlife.
Despite all of the amazing historical sites in Xi’an, our first stop (at my incessant pleading) was to Banpo, Neolithic village! This little museum was built atop ancient ruins believed by some to be the first true village with remaining artifacts, some of which are said to date back further than 4500 BC. The reason I wanted so desperately to visit this site is somewhat embarrassing. I had played a computer game called Chinese Empire, wherein you had to build up your civilization from Banpo (the first village of huts) to Beijing (the mighty capital). It was my first computer game, and I loved building Banpo. I was not very good at the game, so spent a lot of time building and rebuilding the city, catching fish in the nearby creek and trading furs for wood. Banpo, the actual Neolithic site was not a disappointment– at all! I enjoyed every marvelous second of the tour through the ruins, starring in awe at pottery shards and looking at the evidence of an early matriarchy. Mike was nowhere as amused as I was, and was eager to get out of the village and see the warriors. Finally, after several photo ops with Neolithic fragments, we left for the main event—the 2000 year old Terracotta Warriors.

-posted by Lauren.

Chengdu’s Giant Panda Research and Breeding Center, China 2006

How We Became Cube Abandoners:

There is a certain dread that washes over a student when she realizes she will graduate within a few months. The dread starts subtly so that it can easily be ignored. It creeps up like a chilly breeze until all of the sudden you are shivering with worry and anticipation. The dread was extreme in my case because I was studying history—and therefore knew I would be unemployed when I graduated. After more than twenty interviews (brought about after sending out hundreds of resumes) I found myself lying on my air mattress in Illinois, listening to the cicadas and wonder if adulthood was supposed to be this full of rejection.

I contemplated my alternatives to the sounds of mating insects. There was always the military, and, having been a military brat I knew the advantages as well as the drawbacks.I had applied for various teaching positions with my MS in history, as well as researching and writing positions—but to no avail. With only two weeks until graduation I had no leads whatsoever.

The First Destination: A Chance of Glance

I went over to Mike’s after an evening of brainstorming possible occupations. We split a bottle of Jack, a tray of ice cubes, and watched Arrested Development as we talked about how hard it was to find jobs. Mike had a big map of China on his wall, having travelled there the previous year. I gazed at it while I chewed an ice cube. “I guess I’ll go to China,” I said. “Want to come?”

We found a teaching service in Beijing online and arranged to meet with a representative of their office when we landed in Beijing the following month. Once we’d said goodbye to our families, packed two suitcases full of snacks, water purifiers and flip-flops, we boarded a long flight from Chicago, and were on our way.

We unfurled wrinkled attire from our backpacks and rolled out of the hostel bunks, jet lagged and stunned by the brightness of the sun. We met the rep over lunch; he told us we were hired. We ate a massive lunch of chilled cucumber in garlic and fish heads in oil, drank black tea and listened to our stomachs protest as we talked contract terms. We finally agreed to work 20 hours a week for 8,000RMB a month. That was somewhere in the ballpark of 1,000 US dollars a month.

Our First Epic Adventure: Whirlwind China

Mike and I had decided to take a whirlwind month-long tour of China by train and bus before settling into teaching. Hoping to go from Beijing to Xian to Chengdu and then up through the desert to Xinjiang and then shoot across to Beijing again—no problem. We informed the school that we would be back in July, and we checked out of our hostel and headed for the long- distance train station. We left our bags with the headmaster of the school as collateral, “of course we’ll be back!”

Mike had studied Chinese in college for three semesters. I had taken one semester and earned a B (my only non A). For the first two weeks of travel Mike did all the talking in Mandarin. However, by the time we would reach Sichuan those skills would become useless, and my amazing charades skills would come into play as our primary means of communication with the Tibetans.

-posted by Lauren.