Acting II

The audition script was in Chinese, which I do not read so well. The assistant casting director sat to one side of me, AnAn on the other. I first reviewed the script for words I didn’t know.
"What's this?"
"It means this (pointing to forehead)"
"Brain?"
"No, this..."
"Oh. [english] Forehead [/english]. And this?"
"Carve a sign".
"OK. And this?"
"SuanMing"
"I can actually read these characters. What does SuanMing mean?"
"You have this in Western countries too. Usually an older woman or Tibetan person who looks at your hand, or sometimes looks at eggs or tea, and then tell you something about yourself. They can tell you what happens in the future too."
"[english] Fortuneteller. OK [/english]

I spend about 1/2 hour memorizing the lines. Then I was taken downstairs to meet the casting director. The movie director (I think) was standing on the side. He told me to put my leather jacket back on...he liked the look. I stood in front of a camera, said my name, and told the camera a little about myself. The casting director looked like a younger Chow Yun Fat (Killer, Replacement Killers, King and I) Very cool. They were very warm and supportive. Then I said my lines.

Lacky cop1: Chief, look at this.
Chief Detective Anthony (me): These two have some kind of mark carved into their foreheads. I think we are missing something.
Lacky cop2: Maybe we need to consult a fortuneteller.
Anthony: Fortuneteller! Are you kidding? Then what are we here for?
[pause. Anthony examines the body] Look. Here is a dead man. I don't need no god damn Mr. Fortuneteller to tell me that. [contemplate a second] Do you think there is a relationship with the time of death?
Lackey cop 2: I dunno Chief.
Anthony: Maybe if we add up the marks on their heads, it will spell out the killer's name. Could it be that simple?

Cut!

They thanked me profusely and said my Chinese was great. I think they were looking for someone who actually acted before. I kept getting the feeling that they were expecting me to do certain things that only actors know about. For instance, after the audition, I was supposed to hold my last facial expression for a couple of seconds. No one told me that before.

It was a really incredible experience though. I have not memorized lines like this in a long time, and I don't believe I ever memorized a Chinese script (except when I had to recite a stupid poem with my class when I was attending BeiDa). I think I'll go for more auditions here. Not for the lead role though - I will need to take some acting classes before I get a main part.

Networking and Acting I

Pictures from our day trip to ZhuJiaJiao...a small suburb city of Shanghai with a pretty cannal.

So I've been going to bars alot. And parties. And Toastmasters. I've been trying to become Mr. Social. Some of you, like Jeremy and Brad will say "Jesse...you have always been Mr. Social." Some of you,...well...most of you will say "Jesse...becomes social...really?" This is how I do my job search here. I go to events and bars. I talk to people. I hand out business cards and collect there cards.

So far I have gone to interview for a Product Manager position with Intel (I didn't get the job...they are giving it to an internal hire...but I never got an interview with them before). I am interviewing with a consulting company for a business development position (basically I would be paid a little money plus commission to do what I'm doing now...go to networking meetings and pass out cards). I interviewed for a Business Systems Analysis position for a credit card software company. I got the Intel interview through a T-bird Alumni. The other interviews were from referrals from people I met in bars.

In the later two interviews, they called in Chinese workers to test my Chinese; they all said I spoke with charm and intelligence. OK. Please don't make the obvious jokes/lame comments on the tag board about this.

So I met this guy named Jack in a bar who told me he was looking for foreigners to be actors, models, etc in commercials and movies. I told him I didn't like the idea because foreigners are always portrayed as the "bad guy", or without normal human relationship sense. Or they are stupid red-headed Canadian clowns. But I would not mind being cast as a zombie or other monster. Big, hairy chested monster.

I got a call the next day to appear at an audition. Jack didn't tell me anything about the role, except that it is a horror movie and the director is American. I thought, "Great! I can be the zombie and eat the brains of the sexy (but too short and stupid) Chinese girl!" I took a taxi to the audition location. It was raining heavily and pitch black. The address took me down a dark alleyway in a sort-of slum area (meaning, big molding Stalinist concrete apartments). I walked down the alley way and couldn't find the address. I said (in Chinese) "This must be a fudging joke. I will fudging kill Jack the next time I fudging see him". Just then a girl called out from a doorway telling me to come. The girl, AnAn, was Jack's coworker.

The audition studio was a two story apartment with bright red painted walls covered with movie props. (the fact that it was a two story apartment meant that some thick walls were knocked out of this 1950s set-piece apartment block) Beautiful people all around. Not model-beautiful. They were TV-beautiful. The type of archetype good looks you never ever see walking down the street to the $.45 dumpling restaurant.

AnAn asked me about my past acting experience. I said none. She was pissed. "Why did you come here then?!"
"One. Do not use that tone with me. Two. I'm here because Jack told me to come here. What is YOUR problem?"
"The problem is Jack sent you to audition for the lead role and you have no experience!"
Lead role?! "No problem. Any moron can act."
AnAn took me into another room filled with actors waiting to audition. She was very nervous. She put the audition script in front of me - it was all in Chinese...which I cannot read.

The assistant casting director sat down next to me. She was nice. She started to explain the movie. "Its a horror movie. But it has some things to do with religeon. Do you understand?"
"Yes. Horror and religion in one movie. Like peanut butter and chocolate. "
"Right. Now...you are a police investigator. The head investigator. You are a tough guy. And there are these people that are dying. After they die, they get a mark carved into their foreheads."
"Sort of like a Roman Polanski film?"
"I don't know."
"OK. Go on."
"So in this scene, you are in the office with your two subordinates. And you are questioning them about these murders.".
"I think I've seen this movie before. So… cool. I’m gonna be the tough cop.”

The Mission, Part 2

Cab it over to Everbright Convention Center for a morning pick-up. David, the handler, is waiting in his car - a non-descript Toyata with a dashboard mounted LCD monitor which he uses to watch porno movies while driving in traffic. Chinese traditional musak is playing. Traditional instruments with bad synth background melodies.

We head out towards the South West. The drive is comfortable for about 1/2 hour. Then we are stuck in the road. Can't tell what's causing the traffic, but I keep my senses open; this would be a perfect location for a daring daylight ambush. The civilians and peasants in surrounding cars and trucks are getting out to stretch. Some grab socket wrenches to tighten their vehicle's wheel-bolts; I wonder how they know that the wheel-bolts need tightening now that the cars have stopped.

David asks, "So what do you think about US attacking Iraq?" Uh oh. Here comes the ideology test.
"That's a pretty big question David" I say slowly. "Can you be more specific?"
"Lets say that a year ago you could vote yes or no on attacking Iraq. What would you vote?"
"David, what have you voted on in your life?" I ask.
Silence. Silence is sometimes good. But this fails the test. "OK David," I say. "I'm being a bastard. That was not a fair question."
"You are not a bastard. I appreciate your directness."
"If I had to vote on attacking Iraq or not, I would probably vote no."
"So you think the war was wrong..."
"Again. I big question. I would vote no because its very expensive in terms of prestige, money, and lives to engage in war when we have not properly finished our mission in Afghanistan. But for the record, I'm happy the US armed forces have sent Saddam's sons to hell."
"You believe in hell?"
"No David. That's just my way of speaking."
"I see."
"David, you are not happy with what happened. Most Chinese people are not happy with it"
"Right. I understand invading Afghanistan. But Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11 (which, by the way, I and every Chinese person thinks is a horrendous event). American president Bush lies and America rides roughshod over the wishes of others. It is an arrogant country."
"Yup. We are an arrogant people."
"I didn't say you American people are arrogant. I mean..."
"I know what you mean. But I say we are an arrogant people. We believe we know what is right and wrong. At least, when we bother to pay attention to something, we have an opinion about it. Chinese people and Arabs, on the other hand, often seem very unreasonable to me."
"We are the unreasonable people?! How so?"
"Example. You know about that tour group of 200 or so Japanese idiots who went to Zhuhai to have an orgie?"
"Yes. That made me so mad."
"Well. If 200 Chinese people came to San Jose every week to buy prostitutes, I would be very happy. Supports the local economy."
"This is different."
"OK. But in China, every day several thousand...perhaps several tens of thousands...of prostitutes go to work. And every day they get lots of customers. I bet about 95% of those customers are Chinese men. Would you agree?"
"That is probably correct. Tens of thousands. And most of the customers definitely are Chinese."
"But when a group of Japanese come to China to do the same thing (albeit, in a big, unseemly group...and you know those Japanese have to do everything in groups), Chinese people everywhere get mad. I know the real reason you get mad."
"Why?"
"Because you don't want to think about the failures of Chinese people and Chinese culture. Because you are really angry about not being able to fix problems here. Or, more likely, you are way way past being angry about what China is...you accept it and have little hope for positive change. And therefore feel little responsibility."
David doesn't answer. I knew he would not answer.
"And Arabs...they're the same. Their culture and governments are messed up. So they blame America and the Jews. I know America and Israel does some very bad things. But I have little sympathy for the Arabs. At least, they didn't have to go through a Great Leap Forward and a Cultural Revolution. They didn't have a MaoZedong...and I say that as a good thing."
Are conversation quickly shifts topics. That was enough politics for one day.
...
Traffic lasts 3 hours. We go straight to the restaurant. Girl in standard red greeter QiPao (with slit up the sides to maximize leg viewing) leads us to a private room. I'm introduced to Mr. Wang, the factory Director of Engineering. Big man in his 40s with big hands. Big glasses. Handsome, face. He has the face of a cop..I really hope the front team did they're homework. The front team - the local manufacturers reps - are not impressive. There is Smoking Weasel Face, Peasant Girl Face, and Say-Nothing Driver-cum-lackey. They all know who I am, so at least we are somewhat on the same page. "Hello Mr. Wang! Gosh you are tall and smart looking" ,I say in English. David translates. Wang says he is so happy that I came out from Germany to meet him. David translates. I say he is an important customer and HQ wants to show our support. David translates.

Wang orders beer to go around. A cold Shanghai crab is waiting for each of us on the table. SH Crab is probably the most overrated food in China. Its the only famous dish with the Shanghai brand name on it (although there are lots of famous dishes from suburb cities, like "Ningbo Roast Ham" for instance.) Lots of toasting. Wang chats with the locals about girls, food, and foreigners. He toasts me more. I toast him.
"Jesse, you are German. You can drink a lot of beer, right?"
David translates - we are maintaining pretenses. I say that, although many of my ancestors on my father’s side are Russian - who can drink even more than Germans - I am the only German in the entire world that gets drunk after drinking just two beers. So lets drink slower.

Waitress comes, grabs the soup bowl out of my hand to refill it, and spills hot soup on my hand. I say in Chinese "What are you doing?". Weasel Face skips a beat. Waitress says "What?" I say "Gansheta frankenstein vicken doing?" David translates; "You spilled soup on him. And please don't bother refilling his bowl…he can do it himself".

Brunch concludes. We drive to the "Water Factory". David notes that it was a close one with the waitress, but Mr Wang doesn't suspect a thing. I have my doubts.

The Water Factory is on the edge of a farm. It supposedly supplies water for 100K people. I am keeping my eyes open for the tell-tale yellow and red barrels that contain nerve agents. We get the tour. I ask the right questions; how old is the generator? Have their been problems with the existing electric actuator valves? Does that penstock ever jam up? Is that where the new plant will go? I can fool anyone into thinking I am an expert. Being an expert is mostly an act anyway. Unless you are a doctor or something like that.

After the tour, we go back to the office. Cold concrete room with no decorations. No heater. Cold, damp river air permeates everything. 10 year old computer sits on a desk at the side - no dust.. its still being used. Fluorescent lights. Hot water canister for constant green-tea refills. Dirty windows. Wang pulls out the schematics of the new project and lays it on top of the pile of papers on his desk. I point to objects and say "that’s the generator." "Valves will go along this line, right?" “Here is where a penstock will go.” David translates. I'm 100% correct.

Mr. Wang then asks questions. David answers most directly. What is the local service policy? Who are other customers in the South of Yangze/Shanghai/SuZhou/Hangzhou region. Who will be the correct contact person? What type of air compressor will be needed? David answers most directly. Then he translates. Then I answer the same, as I heard David say it. Then David translates, giving the impression that David and I are on the same page...I'm just a little behind because of the language barrier. All the while, Wang looks at David like a cop who's looking to spot inconsistencies during an interrogation. I know this look well. I believe it is my look.

Meanwhile, Weasel Face is smoking and Peasant Face is making little high-pitched comments that Mr. Wang does not understand (because her accent).

Then its my turn. "As you may have been told, Krautworks has been making valves since 1871..." I go on about the corporate profile. Then I give the sales pitch I developed. "There are four factors where pneumatic actuators are superior to electric actuators...Overall Quality, maintenance costs, operations costs, and purchase costss..." David translates. Wang writes it down. He's heard the spiel before. But now he is getting it from a HQ man.

Wang then has David go over a diagram of how a pneumatic actuator actually works. Finally... "Because of the esteamed guest from Germany, I'm convinced we need to use pneumatic actuators. Now I need to show these results to the company president. And we need to look at some of your competitors as well."

My closing comment; "I'm so happy that you have come to see the advantages of pneumatic actuators. Please feel free to investigate the competition. Although our competitor is a German company, I know that in recent years they have become more like a trading house, sourcing their valves from Poland and the Chek republic - which, of course, will not have as good quality as German valves."

He thanks us profusely. I welcome Mr. Wang to visit me in Germany, where we can drink some good beer together. Everyone is happy. My ass is freezing cold and I feel sick, but its mission accomplished. I sleep on the ride back home.

The Mission, Part I

"Gooden Afternoon. My name is Herr Jesse Covner. I'm am a valve and actuator expert from Krautworks, the leading German manufacturer of stainless steel valves, pneumatic actuators, and penstocks for municipal water processing market.". Thus began my insertion into the secret Iraqi biological weapons factory (ingeniously disguised as the JiaAn Water Factory).

It all started, like many great stories, in a bar. The M-Factory. Not really a bar as much as a poorly decorated post-modern disco which lacks a proper disco dance floor. It was jammed with locals. Girls were dancing on the tables - like they saw in some bad 90’s teenager movie - to Jon Bon Jovi "Shot Through the Heart" as sung by a short Chinese girl in a pink sweater. I tried to be inconspicuous in my army boots, blue dry-fit t-shirt, and matching blue pants. I sat at a table with two citizens. Guy; completely average looking, but with confidence and money. Girl; average looking by Chinese standards, pretty round face and big eyes. Start up small talk with guy. Give business card. I move on.

Monday. Receive call from Annie. Annie got my number from Kevin. Kevin? "He told me you met in a bar." "Lady, I meet lots of people in bars. Most of them have more feminine sounding names." "Look, its a job. We are a *German* company . We manufacture valves. We need your help."

German company. Everyone in the field knows this is a code word for unofficial undercover CIA op. Black ops stuff. Wetworks. I'm finally going after the dirt. The WMD.

I previously did my research, never knowing it would come in handy so soon. I attended the International Expo on Valves and Pumps, located in the convention center across from my apartment. I learned what a valve is - in Chinese.

Its a cold, wet night in South Shanghai. I'm wearing work cloths; black wrinkle free micro-fiber pants, dress shirt, polished combat boots, and black imitation Hugo Boss long coat. Paisley tie. Secret pocket on the side to keep my tools of the trade.

The first appointment is in a small office over a bank. I take the bare walled elevator to the 10th floor. Annie greets me. She is wearing farmers overalls - she's probably going to the countryside on a support mission. We get right down to business.

"Mr. Ke (my Chinese code name), we have an important meeting on Wednesday. Its very important for 'the company'. But there was a snafu; the 'engineer' from HQ cannot attend. We need someone to represent the company from HQ. Can you do this?"

"But I'm not from HQ. I'm not an engineer."

"But you can still *represent* the company as our valve expert."

I see where this is leading, but I want Annie to spell it out. Lets not pussyfoot around the details. This is going to get messy. "And how do I become a valve expert?"

The company handler was eavesdropping. He decides its time put the cards on the table. He walks in. Calm. A little nerdy, but confident. "Hello Jesse" he says in English. "My name is David. I do *sales*. (back to Chinese) Let me try to explain the situation."

"David, let me explain the situation to you first. You want me to infiltrate the meeting. My cover story...I'm to pretend I'm a valve expert from Krautworks HQ. You think you need this to get the *sale*".
"Mr. Ke, you are to represent the company HQ as our valve expert in this important meeting."
Annie is looking down and her face is red. Is she nervous? Did this mission come about because she failed to communicate/ coordinate a schedule? "David, you say represent. I say I'm putting on a disguise. The issue is,.. why is it so necessary? You're sales. You have come across many situations in which you could not satisfy customer demands. Why go to these measures?"

"That is what I need to explain to you. You see, the customer is using electric actuators in their plant. We need them to use our pneumatic actuators. The plant design plans need to change."

"So the customer needs me at the meeting to change their designs."
"No. We need you at the meeting to confirm the change in designs. The designs have been changed. But the president of the *Water Administration* won't OK the design changes unless he sees a representative from the German company. He needs to see high level support from our HQ. And that is part our problem. The HQ engineer cannot come."

I press for the main point. "So why are pneumatic actuators so important?"
"Electric actuators break often. Maintenance costs are high. And the electric actuators in the original plan do not fit with the valve product which we wish to sell." This was a lie. I'm 100% positive the pneumatic actuators are rigged to explode, and thereby uncover Saddam's secret WMD factories in China. But that's neither here nor there; a job is a job. What's important is the background work; I don't want to be caught in the field with my pants down because someone didn't do their homework.

"So how can I fool them that I'm the German expert?"
"Simple. Memorize this product lit. Talk fast. Talk with an accent. Say whatever you want. They don't speak English. And you will have Krautworks business cards to give them. That will fool them."
"You're 100% sure they don't speak English?"
"100% copasetic."
"I don't know. Sounds dangerous. Why not just call in an air-strike?"
"Believe me...if there was any way we could have avoided doing this, we would have". He looks at Annie, who's face is a little red. Something going on there.
"So the plan...you pick me up at 8. We ride for 1 1/2 hours. Have the meeting. In and Out. Have lunch - very important! Then we are back here around 3PM. Clockwork."
"Sounds about right. One last question," David says.
"Yes. My compensation."
"Yes."
"I want 1200 RMB for this half-days work. And I consider that cheap."
David stays silent for 10 seconds. "Fine."
"What? You don't want to haggle?"
"We'll talk about this price when we call you for future missions."
"Well. That's good. But understand, I didn't come to China to pretend I'm from Germany... if you know what I mean. This is a one-shot mission. I'm doing it because I'm bored. If we are going to work together in the future, no more undercover. I want legit work."
"Sounds good to me. See you on Wednesday."

Disaster / Class Lecture

House in the colonial French concession in Shanghai. More pics from our Beijing trip - including new pics from the Temple of Heaven park - are in the gallery.

This was going to be a journal entry, but I have decided to expand it into a post relevant for this communications class. Part of it may bore you. I'm writing this here so that you can A) understand a personal disaster story that happened to me, and B) understand what I write about in the COMM 470 Communications in the Virtual Workplace class that I teach online through the University of Phoenix.

Disaster has struck me last night. I rode a taxi to the Shanghai Hilton to attend a "Mixer" put on by the American Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM). I was sort of in a daze, trying to summon the right attitude and energy needed to be Mr. Smooth Networking Guy. I got out of the taxi. The Taxi took off. I discovered that my brand new Sony Erricson T610 cell phone - which took me months to buy - was not in my pocket. It was in the Taxi. So I called my phone. Someone answered, but didn't speak. He was trying to figure out how to turn it off. I started screaming in Chinese "Gosh fudging darn you bumbblehead… you can't use my phone - its an English system phone! If you’re smart, you will bring it back and I'll give you money!" Whoever took my phone didn't care for my reasoning.

I went into a murderous rage. Albeit, a quite rage because there was none around that I could rage against.

Luckily, China Mobile - the cell phone operator - was able to switch my telephone number to a new card...but they couldn’t do that today because (I'm told) all the customer service input terminals are down throughout Shanghai due to system upgrades and will not be available until tomorrow.

!!!! (breath in.) !!! (breath out. Feel the Chi in your chest) !! (breath in. Visualize a peaceful forest) ! (breath out...much better)

I have decided to use my misfortune (or stupidity...depending how you look at it) to open up a conversation about cell phone usages and virtual communications.

First of all, the obvious. Cell phones are first of all phones. So they have the same communication characteristics as wired phones, except they probably have more opportunity for noise,

Cell phones are also text messaging devices. Text messages(also known as SMS messages) are similar to internet chat Instant Message (IM) programs from Yahoo!, AOL, and MSN. You can even send messages from the phone to computer IM and E-mail programs (and vice-versa). Although most people send SMS to other cell phones.

I'm not sure if its right to classify this form of communication as synchronous or asynchronous. The SMS message can be received immediately after it is sent. On the other hand, because it takes so long to input a message on the phone keypad, reply communications (and feedback) definitely cannot take place in real time. Unless the reply is really short.

I bought a new phone today. Took me about 3 hours to pick it out - I'm improving! My new phone is manufactured by Siemens. I can input and read Chinese characters on the phone almost as fast as a can write English. I don't actually know how to write or read Chinese, so I'm never really sure if my messages are clear. I know how to write the characters for Love, Make, With, I, You, and Bed. My wife, being Japanese, can write and read Chinese fluently. She sent me a Chinese SMS message with something about Smelly, Brush Teeth, and Leonardo Di'Caprio (his name was written in English).

In Asia, SMS messaging is a very common form of virtual communications. It has a very low level of formality - grammar and spelling are not important. I often wonder why SMS is popular, given that voice communication on the cell phone can convey information much quicker because it takes so long to compose messages. In Japan, everyone types SMS messages while riding the train (and it seems most people ride the train). This is sort of understandable because phone signal is blocked on the train. Even if phone signal was available, its not socially acceptable to talk loudly on the train (where everyone is concentrating on trying not to think about the 12 hours of work misery that awaits them day after day).

The administrative assistant / marketing coordinator of a prospective employer in Shanghai seems to prefer to send me SMS instead of calling me, even though we each understand each other's English and Chinese. When I call her, I remind her about proposed meeting times. I then give her compliments; I tell her how enjoyable it was to meet her. I have also given her a little complaint because she did not sent me an email with meeting location details. She also didn't call me back within the time frame previously agreed upon (no one in China ever does - I complain because I want them to realize that communication with foreigners requires on-time communication). She sometimes calls me, but more often she sends a message saying "meeting at 6", or "good 2 talk 2 u" or "I confused. Meeting at 4". Although these are short messages, it still would be quicker to call. I think calling requires more mental preparation . When you call, you communicate information with your voice tone. SMS messages frees someone from being concerned about the non-verbal part of the communication.

Also, its difficult to find a quite place in Shanghai. Streets, restaurants, and office buildings are always bustling with people. SMS tends to have less opportunity for noise (COMM usage ) than voice calls in Shanghai.

That's the end of my COMM470 Communications in the Virtual Workplace discussion post.

I have been going to networking meetings almost every day. I will describe this in a later post here.

BTW, if I was going to buy more pirated DVDs in order to help me forget about losing my cell-phone, I would probably buy:

Malibu's Most Wanted (recommend only for M.L.P.)
Yet Another Teenage Movie (not even recommend to M.L.P.)
28 Days Later (recommend to everyone except Mom, Rachel, and M.L.P)
Down with love
Casablanca
Days of Being Wild
Music CD: Nellyville (to bad no hip-hop clubs in Shanghai)

I an effort to keep you all up to date on what is going on, I will write about our experiences of the last couple of days for the next half hour. This way, I cannot go too much into details about lots of minutia. I will not go into how Haga yelled and cursed at a tour-guide scum bucket while I kept my cool. I will not tell you about the ghetto place he tricked us to going to, and will not tell you about how we ditched the tour-guide (whom we hired because we thought we were just hiring a driver for the day). I will not brag about how I used my charm in negotiating to get a pretty wool coat for $20 (one of my comments: "Don't tell me she looks pretty in the coat. She does not need this coat to look pretty. She is pretty no matter what she wears. She is even prettier if she wears nothing!") I will not spend my time trying to approximate what Beijing accent sounds like in English (although I am going to imitate Beijing accent every day now, just for the hell of it). I will not talk about the Beijing Roast Duck - you saw pictures of that. I will not talk to you about the Beijing noodle house we went to - I already talk about noodles too much. And I will not talk to you about Haga's obsession with steamed bread buns. So what is left to talk about?

First of all, Beijing is a ghetto compared to Shanghai. Period. People are poorer. They don't dress as well. They have not developed more sophisticated manners. There are no 7-11s on every corner. But the worst thing of all...

The bathrooms in the foreign student dormitory at Beijing University have not changed. They smell and there is no toilet paper.

Haga does not think this is a big deal because she thinks she is tough. She isn't bothered by little things like the condition of the toilets. This is a very important thing for me. Toilet condition is a representation of a countries march towards civilization and progress.

OK. Enough about the toilets at BeiDa. The rest of Beijing University is prettier. The lawns are better cared for. The surrounding lakes have been drained, which is a major bummer. The No-Name Lake is still there and very pretty. And the only 5 reasonably attractive girls at BeiDa were seen walking around the lake with their geeky boyfriends. We ate at a Beijing food restaurant in the University. The food was soo salty it made me sick.

In Fall of 1991, I attended Beijing University. It was my first time out of the US and I was clueless and a little scarred. BeiDa was not a friendly place and I think I didn’t have the social skills needed to find good Chinese friends. At the No-Name Lake is a stone boat. On that boat, during the Moon festival in October of 91, I sat with a bunch of Chinese students, who sang beautiful Chinese acoustic rock songs for hours. The moon was beautiful; I could see the pagotta reflected on the lake. It was the first (and one of a few) time that I felt strong connection with Chinese people. The next day, the school administration made a regulation forbidding singing on the boat by the lake.

We ate ShuangYangRou, which is "swished lamb meat". Picture is below. Basically, we dipped thinly sliced pieces of lamb in a boiling broth. Then we ate the pieces of lamb. And we drank a lot of Beijing city beer while we ate the lamb. With some raw garlic on the side.



We saw the Great Wall. I don't know why we wanted to see it again. Its just one of those things you do when you travel to Beijing I guess. We got a lot of exercises out of this. The first time we went to Great Wall - in October of 91 - , Haga didn't know me - but she wanted to know me. She didn't like the fact that I was flirting with other girls- I have a picture of me with this Peruvian chick, with Haga in the background giving her the evil eye. The second time we went - in April of 92 - I was mad at Haga because I thought she was flirting with me, but didn't want to have a real relationship with me. So I ignored her and she decided to hit me and poke fun at me because I ignored her. Later that night was the first time we really kissed (besides the kiss I gave her on the cheek next to Ronald McDonald outside of McD's on its opening day in Beijing). This time we were together. It was fun. And a lot of exercise. We took the roller-coaster train back from the top of the wall to the parking lot. That was fun too.

We went to the Temple of Heaven park. That was fun. Very pretty. OK. So Beijing is not as developed as Shanghai. But Beijing has some good parks. And Beijing people are cooler...but that's probably because they have less money. Temple of Heaven part was filled with old people who were reading plays, dancing, practicing TaiJiChuan, playing badmiton. Playing traditional instruments. And sitting around being Altakakas (that's Yiddish for old people that sit around on benches talking all day).

We went to a bunch of markets. Everyone calls for me; "Hel-lo". "Comeheretakealook". "goodpricelooklook". The fact that they call me does not bother me. But they have really freaky voices when they call out in English.

Beijing

Haga and I went to Beijing this weekend. I'm to tire to tell you more about it now. Here are the highlights:

1. Beijing is ghetto compared to Shanghai
2. We are having a great time
3. We went to a huge antigue flea market



3. We ate Beijing roast duck and deep fried duck liver with ginger-spiced hot red rice wine.
4. We visited the forbiden city.