Wendy Meets Distant Family in Southern China--Thoughts, Part 1: Gender Roles

I just got back from one of the strangest familial interactions of this entire trip (possibly the strangest, but it's tough competition since there have been some pretty strange family interactions in the past few weeks).

Chinese culture is very patriarchal, as you may have been able to guess. Men sit around a table, sipping their tea, munching on snacks, while the women are in the kitchen preparing the food, pouring the tea, and cleaning up. And I am in a particularly odd situation. Would this happen at home, I'd probably be the one in the kitchen, offering to help, and definitely expected to help. But here, it's a little bit different, since I'm the guest. Not only that, but I'm the only guest, so there's no one to diffuse the good mannered-ness and politeness among (there is probably a better word for that, but I can't think of it right now. and it really seems like a chinese word would be more appropriate in this situation).

This is probably the first time in my life where I've had to act like an adult in a family situation, since I'm the only one here to represent my immediate family. Usually, as the fourth child, I get to run away from these familial obligations to the kids' room and just watch the 5 year olds play video games. And it's an especially awkward situation as I am young (22 years old as compared to the middle aged people around me) but not so young that I need someone else to speak for me (and seeing as how I'm completely alone in this situation, I literally have no one else to speak for me), and as I am an unmarried woman (I don't know how many times I've been asked if I have a boyfriend, especially when I bring up me meeting a "friend"). (And it seems so much that the defining act which makes one become an adult is, marriage.)

It's just been weird for me, in these interactions, because I feel very much the outsider. And I'm sure it has something to do with me being an American, and me being young, but the more I think about it, I realize it has very much to do with me being a woman. The table isn't set for me. It's set for the middle-aged Chinese men, who sit, have their food cooked for them, smoke their cigarettes around their babies who have their asses wiped for them by these men's wives, mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, daughters even, I mean, any woman really, just not themselves.

I sit and observe and feel awkward and think, "Wow, this is exactly what happens in Chinese American families in the States too." I've often thought that the awkwardness of those sit-in-the-living-room-with-the-tv-on-in-the-background-sipping-tea-while-the-kids-are-making-a-fuss conversations was somehow a result of the interaction happening in the United States instead of in Asia, somehow a result of the immigration process. But it's not. It's just as awkward here in China.

Tonight I had a chance to sit at the big boys' table, to be a member of the boys' club of middle-aged Chinese men. I was given one of only 6 available wine glasses, and served wine by women my own mother's age and ganbei'd (cheers'd) glass after glass after glass of wine. I was a guest in the house, so I was served. 5 of the men in the house were guests, so they were served. But I sat silently as I watched 3 of the women in the house who were also guests, in the kitchen slicing apples, preparing tea, serving tea, wiping off tables, as I and the men sat and slowly got drunk and smoked cigarettes around their babies.

And now I feel sick to my stomach. I'm sure it had to do with the fact that the first bottle of wine we drank had gone sour (and had practically become vinegar), but no one in the place dared to admit that the wine that had been sitting for years (the cork broke upon opening = bad sign) had gone bad. Ironically, thanks to patriarchal norms, I get to pull the woman card and say that I couldn't drink that much (when quite honestly, I could probably outdrink most of these men). It's just unreal.

And moments like this make me think of my own future, and whether or not I'll have a family someday, and if I do, how I envision that family to be. I very much want to raise a "Chinese family," whatever that means. Chinese culture has become very important to me, but I do not want to be a part of the continuation of patriarchal practices (ie. I refuse to be the mother in the kitchen cooking food for my full grown son as he literally sits at the dinner table criticizing me for the food not being hot enough and requesting soy sauce for his bland chicken when he can very well cook his damn dinner and get his own damned soy sauce while slowly giving me cancer from his second-hand smoke. I bring up this example because I saw it happen).

And at the end of the day all I think is, These women are strong as hell. I hope someday to be half as strong as these women are. To be put through so much, and to have the patience for the men in their lives, and to still love and give their children all their hearts, it's awe-inspiring and a bit heart-breaking. The best that I can do is tell these women the food they've given me has filled me up but I can't ever express how much more it's provided me.

I am lucky and privileged, and sometimes I need to remind myself that.

Good-bye cold weather! Hello less cold weather!

Okay, so I'm not exactly going into the warm weather I had originally (naively?) expected, but at least I'll be leaving Beijing's below-freezing temperatures for Hong Kong and southern China's chilly, but above-freezing temperatures.

It's winter vacation time for me in China! Oh, I am in major major need of this. We spent the last week of school hanging out with the students all day, not teaching classes. I decided to teach my students how to do the electric slide, the macarena, and some random cha-cha line dance. I also got a chance to go to lots of good-bye dinners with my students. Even though I'll see most of them in a few weeks for the spring semester, I am already missing them all. I really really love some of these students. And it makes me sad to think about leaving them for good.

Tomorrow morning I leave for my Chinese New Year adventure! My itinerary: Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Macau, ZhuHai, ShunDe, Guangzhou, Guilin, and Yangshuo. Whew. I'm getting exhausted just thinking about it. Hopefully I'll make it to all these places, cuz I'm kinda flying by the seat of my pants with the planning of this trip. And I'm backpacking, alone, to these different cities and meeting up with friends and family.

Go Team Wendy!

Currently 25 degrees Fahrenheit in Beijing

But this past weekend, I was in NEGATIVE 15 degrees Fahrenheit weather. That's right people, wayyy below freezing temperature.

I spent the past two days visiting Harbin, which is a city in the way northeast part of China (in Heilongjiang Province). Every winter, they have the famous snow and ice sculpture festival (and China is one in only 4 countries in the world that has the biggest snow and ice sculpture festivals).

I wore ski pants over jeans and long underwear and I wore 5 layers of jackets under a down coat the entire weekend! And I felt fine (not too hot, and not freezing). The city was wonderful. We visited a park with giant sculptures made entirely out of snow. And at night we visited this area with buildings made entirely out of ice. We could climb up the structures and slide down. It was so slippery (duh, it's ice) and the pieces of ice are each made with a hole in them so that fluorescent lights inside can shine out brightly colored lights. And uh, the ice doesn't melt cuz it's so freaking cold all the time.

AND I went to a bar made out of ice! ICE BAR! And we went to a Siberian Tiger park, and I saw a real live LIGER!

Below is a video I took at the snow sculpture festival where some people are working on building some snow sculptures. They're literally breaking the snow away in blocks, leaving behind gorgeous shapes in snow. It's amazing.



This is another video I took while at the Snow Sculpture Festival. You can't tell in the youtube video (since the quality is so poor), but my cheeks are bright red from cold windburn (since it was the only part of my body not covered in 5 layers of clothing).




This last video was taken at the Siberian Tiger Park. Here they breed Siberian tigers since they're an endangered species. They have about 300 in the park, and they claim that they're preparing them to be released in the wild, but I don't believe them. It's pretty much a tourist spot, and you get taken around the park in vans, and people can pay money to buy birds or cows to feed the tigers. Here is a video of the tigers preying on some birds.





Pictures on facebook!

Whose sister is so thoughtful it hurts?

That, would be my sister. Check out the spread below of the awesome goodies my sister sent me in a care package, only the best thing I've received in the mail, ever.


FOOD! She sent me food! I know this is going to sound ridiculous, but I was actually really really craving that microwave cake thing. If you didn't know, I have a majorly soft spot for super disgusting processed junked food; I'm kinda obsessed. So tonight for dinner, I had mac and cheese, canned tuna salad, and hot chocolate. Mmmmmm. I'm going to save the cake for a special occasion.

My sister is way thoughtful. I mean who would read an email from me saying, "It's so cold here and my skin is so dry that my hands are actually starting to crack and bleed," and think, "Send that woman some hand cream!" And who would webcam with me, see a disgusting cold sore on my upper lip, ask, "Ew, what's that on your lip?" and then send me some ScarZone! to reduce scarring on my lip. And who would send a portrait of themselves, in fact the same portrait that covers our entire refrigerator back at home? Yep. Only my sister. :)

Oh yeah,. I forgot to include this in the photo, but I also got different kinds of Chinese medicine with post-its on each one. Each of the post-its had things like, "Mom says buy this for colds," "Mom says buy this for sore throats." That's right, my mother sent me Chinese medicine from the States, to me in China so that I can show the packaging to someone in a store to buy it for me.

Are we noticing a pattern here? Yes, my family thinks I get sick a lot. And it's true.

They also love me a lot, which makes me happy. And makes me miss them a lot.

beijing is a little bizarre at times.

Today was xmas eve in Beijing. Another teacher, Brandy, and I went to an Italian restaurant named Annie's Italian Experience. I had awesome penne with creamy white sauce, a Caesar salad, bread dipped in oil, vinegar and pesto, a glass of white wine, and one of the best tiramisu's I've had in my entire life. All for about 10 US dollars. It was really really awesome. And the plate of pasta was so huge that I have leftovers that I am going to eat for breakfast tomorrow, woohoo!

After dinner, Brandy and I went to this bar called the People's Bus Bar, which was pretty much a trailer in a parking lot converted to a bar. They had 10 kuai (= $1.35 USD) giant mugs of draft beer and the dj was spinning an awesome mix of reggaeton and hip-hop, my fave.

So in case you didn't know, there is no legal drinking age in China. That means, little kids as young as five (or 1 even) can buy beer (and presumably drink it), though most shopkeepers simply assume that a five year old is buying beer for parents, and not guzzling the stuff themselves. Anyhow, I mention that because at the bar that we were in, there was a 3 year old tottering around. YES! At 11pm, someone brought a 3 year old in a BAR! I'm pretty sure her parents were wasted, and the little 3 year old was running around the dance floor hugging people. The kid was sooo cute, I wanted to dance with her.

So, I checked the weather for Beijing today on weather.com and the weather condition for today in Beijing is... SMOKE. No joke. I mean, I've seen Partly Cloudy, Sunny, Windy, Showers, etc. but never ever in my entire life have I seen SMOKE as a weather condition. Seriously? That's ridiculous. I had to copy and paste it just to prove to everyone it's true. And yep, it's cold in Beijing (though that's the temperature for the middle of the night and the wee early morning; usually we're in the 30s or 40s during the day.).






Also, on the way to dinner tonight I saw a car on the highway that was smoking and on fire! It was absolutely crazy.

Other random events of the day/night: I found a Coldstone ice cream place in Beijing! I wandered around a fancy schmance hotel (China World Hotel). And I went to a swing dance club earlier tonight!

i'm feeling good.

I'm feeling great. No more homesickness. No more annoyance (okay, well, less annoyance). No more depression. Still confused, but that's expected. I've been keeping in touch with my family a lot recently, which is making me happy. I'm excited about being able to go home for my sister's wedding (I'll be in L.A. and in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico during Memorial Day weekend). I'm not sick anymore! (well technically I still have a dry cough, but it's not as bad as being sick and having a cold sore). I just cleaned my room, so now I have a nice serene environment to be in. And I've found a friend here that I really like hanging out with. So things in the life of Wendy are going well.

I was also put in charge of (against my will of course) planning a holiday concert at my school, where all the students performed Christmas songs. I didn't volunteer to do the planning, but since the Director of Teaching Affairs was leaving early (and he was supposed to plan it), he cornered me and asked me to take over since he knows I'm ridiculously organized. Even though it was more work (that I didn't get any extra pay for), part of me really missed planning events. I didn't get stressed out from it, and everything went smoothly. And I got sooo much affirmation from the other teachers, during the process and afterwards, it was great. I was shocked actually at how good these people were at affirming, but it is nice to be appreciated so much.

And earlier this week, we had a staff holiday dinner at an all-you-can-eat (and drink!) Japanese restaurant. I stuffed my face with so much raw fish, it was awesome. And I got ridiculously drunk from drinking mugs and mugs of beer, plus I had to chug with one of my bosses. Kinda awkward, but oh so fun.

Gymnastics at the new Olympic stadium

For those of you who miss the sound of my voice, you can watch this little video clip and listen to me narrate. :)