Archive for January, 2009

Moo

Sunday, January 25th, 2009

This evening is Chuxi, Lunar New Year’s Eve, and families and friends will gather for a feast to usher in the Year of the Ox.  Shanghai has been getting decked out for weeks and days. In our lane, our resident artist has sketched his own greeting:

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And here’s what you see if you stroll down Nanjing Lu, a very modern boulevard with expensive designer stores:

"paper cut" oxen

"paper cut" oxen

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a super-sized drum (noise chases away evil spirits) inscribed with a fu for good fortune,

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and a golden calf, oops! ox. (I half expected Moses to come marching around the corner bearing two stone tablets.)

Note how easily Christmas morphs into Lunar New Year by adding a few lanterns:

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Elsewhere, in the older part of the city, people are crowding the streets to buy traditional decorations — firecrackers (real and decorative), knots, lanterns, and stuffed cows.

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Not to mention toilet seat covers! (Maybe not traditional new year’s items, but it’s cold here!)moo8

And then there is the not-so-traditional Pepsi cow, whose background silhouette is composed entirely of cans:

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Jewelry and gold stores are pushing miniature oxen,

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Shouldn’t pigs be on sale?

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And at the Temple of the City God,

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people are sending up prayers:

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I am not in Shanghai right now, but I can tell you what it would be like for me if I were, based upon my experience there two years ago. In the evening, there will be very few people about, as they are all at home feasting with relatives and friends. But the quiet will be broken by bursts of firecrackers in the lane, although they are illegal and you can never see who set them off. The noise will build to a crescendo at midnight, with bursts  fireworks lighting the whole city randomly from every vantage point. Contrary to what you might think, the best view is not high up in a skyscraper; when we went to our 36th floor office to watch, we found that the smoke from all the fireworks quickly blotted out our view and the smells even penetrated through the sealed windows. The fireworks will continue for days, off and on, making it tough to sleep. This will all culminate in a couple of weeks with the Lantern Festival when, happily, I will be back in Shanghai.

Until then, my best wishes to you for a year of health, peace, and prosperity. Gong Xi Fa Cai!

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Gone Fishing

Friday, January 23rd, 2009

Coming home the other day I strolled into the lane and caught a distinct whiff. Not the smell of the garbage bins — I’m used to that. I looked up and found my prey:

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Fish, bathed in I don’t know what, and hung out to dry for a few days before becoming a delectable treat on the New Year’s Eve table. These guys are abundant in Shanghai at the moment. It’s high season for fishing.

Don’t ask me why, but I enjoy the hunt. I will whip my bike through traffic and over to the curb to catch a fish. Aren’t these beauties?

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Strictly speaking, the fish aren’t always fish. They can be fowl,

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or even sausage!

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You’ve got to have a sharp eye, looking for fish hiding in reeds

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and lurking in shadows,

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and, here in my lane, skulking behind shirts.

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Of course, some people just aren’t the do-it-yourself type. They prefer to swoop into the market, last minute, and scoop up their treats.

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But here on the balcony at our house, I’m proud to report that, thanks to Wang ayi, we have our own piece of pork that’s been brined and awaits our table.

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The Man on the Street (or, The Woman Knitting)

Friday, January 23rd, 2009

Wang ayi, our housekeeper, came in Wednesday morning and told me that at 1:00 am she woke up and checked the TV and watched Obama for a few minutes. (That’s what time it was in Shanghai when he was sworn in.) She was curious, I figured, because I have been talking about the campaign and the election to her for months. But what do ordinary Chinese people think about our new President?

Yesterday I asked a small group of the Chinese women who regularly come to my Thursday afternoon knitting group. Obama is good, one said, giving a thumbs-up and smiling. When I asked why, she said Because he brings change and will unify Americans. I pondered this for a minute with another American friend who speaks Chinese better than I do. Wouldn’t Chinese people fear a unified and strong America? We think that’s what some Americans  feel about a unified and strong China. So my friend asked. The Chinese looked puzzled and another replied, No, we want peace. Apparently she’s not worried.

And we are unhappy with Bush, another said. Why? You know, Bush made a number of phone calls to say goobye to leaders of other countries in the world. But he didn’t call the Chinese. He didn’t phone Hu Jin Tao. Ah, the face thing — not respectful of the relationship. I apologized on behalf of our country and pointed out that Bush didn’t speak for me on much of anything.

Then I played a US news podcast showing excerpts of the Inaugural and they dropped their needles and gathered to watch. Like women everywhere (or maybe because they couldn’t understand the speech), they were most interested in seeing Sasha, Malia, and their grandmother. In China, you don’t see the kids, Wang ayi commented. We have never seen Hu Jin Tao’s family.

And, of course, they commented on what Michelle was wearing. (They didn’t like the yellow shade of her suit, but loved her long dress.) When I said that it was designed by a young Taiwan-born designer, they reacted with big smiles.

And Obama is an Ox, they added. We are just about to enter the Year of the Ox. Maybe someone should send him some red underwear.

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Change

Tuesday, January 20th, 2009

We are tucked in watching the CNN feed broadcast from the Philippines and picked by our (illegal) satellite dish. (They are ubiquitous here.) As the last light faded here, I heeded my cousin’s suggestion and lit a candle to welcome in almost-President Obama and the new era of hope and change. There are some firecrackers in the distance — eager beavers gearing up for Chinese New Year — but I like to think that they are welcoming the Obamas, too. We are watching thousands gather in the dark in our hometown of Washington, DC — and feeling a bit wistful to be missing the most exciting event to happen there in our lifetime. Democrats Abroad is sponsoring a huge party in Shanghai but, in part because we are exhausted from John’s painful back and the lack of sleep, we are home watching alone.

Still, here at lane 123 on Yanqing Lu, change has come, too! After months of “comprehensive improvement,” the work is finally finished.

Right after Christmas, the workers started into the final stretch. They poured concrete over the new sewer lines and then set about tiling the whole lane.

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Taking the Cure

Tuesday, January 20th, 2009

My poor husband John has been suffering from the most excruciating back pain for about two weeks now. We’ve been on a western medicine odyssey, chasing doctors, physiotherapy, and those all important drugs. Sunday I decided to take him to a Chinese bath house for some relaxation, figuring it couldn’t hurt.

The place is a palace of sensory pleasure — scrub tables, saunas, hot tubs, and a relax room where you can get a foot massage while nibbling dim sum. After John soaked in various steaming pools of water and relaxed in the sauna, I persuaded him to try a massage. He was worried that a hard rub might be painful, but I had in mind the hot ginger poultice which I know, from previous experience, penetrates deeply with a fragrant heat that keeps on warming and relaxing long after it is removed.

But once we got into the massage room, the sharp young masseur took one look at John moving so painfully and said “Ah, your back has a problem, so your leg hurts here” and proceeded to massage the sore places gently for a solid hour, much to John’s contentment. Afterward, the young man nixed the ginger, saying that huoguan would be more effective. It took me a little while, with laughter on  both parts, to realize that he was talking about the Chinese remedy known as “cupping,”which is supposed to get the blood and qi flowing to the affected area to promote healing.

Huoguan literally means fire jar and a couple of minutes later he wheeled in a clattering table of glass globes and what looked like a Bunsen burner. He flamed a jar and quickly placed it on John’s lower back, where the vacuum immediately sucked up a wad of flesh. Soon John was studded with a dozen cups all clustered along the back and leg. I was really glad that John couldn’t see how much of his back was now bright pink and sticking up into the glasses.

In a couple of minutes, the masseur took them off and sent John on his way. He didn’t feel immediate relief, but here it is Tuesday and he is feeling slightly better — whether it’s the huoguan, the traction, or the drugs, who knows — but we are grateful. And the huge purply red polka dots on John’s back are hilarious — just what I imagine it would look like in the aftermath of a giant squid attack!  Wonderful husband that he is, he actually offered to let me post a photo here, but I suspect you’d prefer that I leave the image to your imagination!

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iPhonitis

Tuesday, January 6th, 2009

Christmas morning mega-surprise: an iPhone for me from my dear husband. Lost in Shanghai? Look at the map — even translated into English. In the back of a cab and can’t remember the address of that little cafe tucked down an alley on Fuxing Lu? Google it. Sick of printing out my address book to carry around when I return to the States? It’s all there in its sweet little memory. Finally I could leave home without the heavy bag stuffed with files and namecards and maps that has given me backaches for four years. (But I can still get the curative massages — right?) And my sweetie had already set up service with China Mobile.

For months he had been watching me pop into Apple and AT&T stores in the US, Canada, Japan, and Australia. I wanted to purchase a phone to use here in China where you buy a little slip of a SIM card from the mobile service provider and pop it into your own phone. (You can pay in advance for time, or set up an account.) Free market, open competition, no tie-ins. But no, I couldn’t buy an iPhone (ironically, I wanted it for my husband) at any price unless I subscribed to a plan in one of those countries we don’t live in.

But the sleuth I am married to (with guidance from our sons) had discovered that Apple is required to sell unlocked iPhones in Hong Kong, albeit at top dollar since there is no lucrative contract. He had asked a colleague on a business trip to pick one up.

With trepidation I popped in the SIM card from my trusty Sony Ericsson and …. the screen complained “No SIM Card.” Although it was fun to play with all the buttons, it was impossible to make a call. Problems with the phone, the screen suggested, might be solved by restoring its original settings. Following the prompt, I agreed to “reset and upgrade software.” BAM! No home screen, just a blaring notice that I could use the phone “for emergency use only.” I had bitten the tempting but poisonous Apple and the phone was locked up tight.

Annoying, but not an insurmountable problem, I thought. After all, I live in China. And I headed over to the nearby electronics market, located in the basement of a large globe-shaped building.

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