Tag odd

Beijing is a funny place. If you don’t have a sense of humor living here, you simply can’t survive. Some of the funniest things I’ve seen lately in the city involve food.

For example, did you know that the Oreos sold in Beijing have a different recipe than the ones sold in the USA? They are less sweet, and the dark brown cookie aspect doesn’t taste of chocolate but of wheat. This was done intentionally because the Chinese don’t like overly sweet baked goods. To me, however, they taste like burnt air.

The funniest thing to do with odd food is to sample and then laugh about it. One of the things we constantly get a kick out of are the new varieties of Lays and Pringles chips on the market. The most disgusting was blueberry flavored, the least disgusting was kebab flavored. The oddest was potato flavored, leaving me wondering if the Pringles are made with rice here in China. Either way, they are gross.

Cheese isn’t really consumed in China. You’ll find most Chinese have never even tried it. The cow to human ratio here is so skewed towards humans that there simply arn’t enough utters to go around. Meanwhile, the only cheese at the market remains a Chinese brand of white singles slices.

Its very hard to find some of the most simple items imaginable. For example, a can opener. Since most Chinese get their vegetables at the little street markets, canned foods are simply not that popular. As a foreigner, canned foods were a primary source of nutrition back home and I had found a place to buy canned items in town (a place that mysteriously had no suggestions on how to open them). I imagine wealthy Chinese shopping in the expat food store, buying canned items and then going home and bashing the can against the counter or trying to twist off the top.

Chinese kitchens don’t have ovens. This means you can’t bake anything. In fact, most stove tops are gas, and the gas doesn’t go down very low since most Chinese cook in a wok, which means that trying to cook something with a Western recipe in an Eastern kitchen is like trying to ice skate while standing on your head. Its hard to do. I can testify as someone who has tried to bake a cake in the microwave at the importance of ovens for Westerners.

But cooking at home and shopping are not the only food related oddities you’ll encounter in China. Remember that post a while back about the frog in the soup in Shanghai? We come across things like this all the time. For example, a few days ago we took a friend to a popular burger joint in town called the Blue Frog. When he looked at the menu he wasn’t shocked to see a ‘blue frog burger.’ We all took this as proof that he had been in Asia too long, it was a branded burger, not an actual blue colored frog as substitute for beef.

Niyazov Gold

Laid out in 1993, two years after the Turkmen claimed independence from the Russians after the fall of the Soviet Union, Independence Park is a testament to the strangeness of the country. The park is 2km long and 1km wide, the center is entirely planted in non-native pine trees, a passion of the former President’s. The pines require constant watering, difficult in the harsh desert climate that is native to the area. Locals say the plan is that the trees will alter the climate, thus bringing coolness to Ashgabat. This is unlikely to occur as the trees continue to die. The entire circumference of the park you will pass a small fountain the size of a bus every twenty feet. Each waterfall has a leaping plaster dolphin in the center jumping through the fountain’s spurts of water. It is fair to say there are over 100 fountains in the park, a park which rests, I will remind you, in the middle of the desert. If you ever wondered where the Aral Sea went, this is your answer. Canals built to fuel the dolphin fountains in Ashgabat have contributed largely to the Aral Sea’s demise.

While the interior is dying a pine-tree-in-the-desert-death, the outskirts of Independence Park, are here to stay. Along the western side runs Ruhnama Park, a small homage to the former President Niyazov’s book of sayings and revision of Turkmen history. The Ruhnama, it is said, will guarantee your way into heaven should you read it three times through. The people we have met so far, have not completed that arduous task. In the center of the park sits a giant sculpture of the Ruhnama in all its pink-green glory. The book sits atop a giant fountain on a metal track. In favorable weather (of which there is none) the book can open along the track, displaying a TV screen inside. Around the giant Ruhnama sit a plethora of flag poles bearing the Turkmen flag, and an array of small pavilions and water fountains.

At the southern end of the park rests Independence monument, which locals fondly call ‘The Plunger.’ This giant monument doubles as a flag holder and a base for 8 smaller waterfalls. The monument reaches 118m, significant because Turkmenistan gained independence on 27 Oct, 1991. 27 +91 =118. Along all eight sides neon strobe lights have been installed pointing upward so that in the evening from nearly everywhere in the area, one can see a giant, neon, wet plunger sitting in the middle of a dying pine forest. We were bold enough to venture for a closer look, and discovered that the entire area around the plunger is guarded by large, bronze statues of famous Turkmen with weapons or books.

Across the park, on the northern side, sits a monumental achievement locals call 5 legs, for it is a five-sided structure. Naturally all five sides double as raging waterfalls. Inside the monument is a mall called Altyn Asyr, or Golden Age. You can take an elevator to the 6th floor for an amazing panoramic view of the neon park, where a beer will help put your aching mind to rest- there need not be logic in Independence park.

The highlight of the park, however, is along the western side past the giant Ruhnama statue and before the neon, 118m plunger. Here a pure gold statue of Niyazov himself stands with his arms outstretched, a cape billowing in the wind behind him. Two unfortunate guards stand post, without moving or blinking, 24 hours a day. This golden monument sits atop a waterfall, the waterfall is surrounded by five-headed eagles also made of gold.