Sleep is sacred

Sleep is highly valued thing here in China. It seems that most Chinese people always ensure they get enough sleep each night, and make sure they have a nap every afternoon after lunch. Actually I hadn't realized siesta was part of Chinese culture before I came here, and certaintly it doesn't have a universally known term like 'siesta' is to the Spanish. When i first arrived i was always puzzled why all the students and staff in the cafeterias would shovel down their lunch then quickly disappear. Now I know. At the current university i'm based at, they switch all the lights off in the cafeteria after an hour to politely knudge you out of there. That's when the sleeping bag and dunas come out onto the tables and the kitchen staff have their snooze.

I'm not sure if all white collar workers take naps in their offices at work, but certainly all the Chinese teachers at university do it. and forget about getting any service from the departments or admin offices between 12-2pm, because nobody will be there.

You'd think that with so much sleep Chinese people would always appear spritely, but it's completely the opposite way around. It's not unusal to see workers looking like they're half-dead and completely drained, eyes glazed over. I'm sure it's not like this for all professions, but opennly showing and expressing fatigue is quite acceptable here. It's quite a contrast to western society, where opennly displaying tiredness can get you the wrong sort of attention from the boss. And it doesn't exactly strike confidence into the customers either! I wouldn't feel comfortable if my bus driver or doctor looked half awake.

In particular, university students seem to be deprived of sleep 24/7. Most of my class always look like they're about to drop dead, and take every opportunity to bury their heads into their arms. I know not all my classes are exciting, but they ain't THAT boring either. and you might think that all Chinese students are overloaded with classes causing them to be constantly tired, but i think this is onlytrue up until university. Once they enter university, most of the pressure is off. I always wonder if they just need to introduce coffee into their regular diet! Or perhaps some of them are just malnourished?

More than anything else though, I think that just because it's more socially acceptable to look tired in public, people let themselves go. I myself often feel tired throughout the day, so i can see myself going flacid and floppy if I wasn't so stuck in my western ways.

Yep chinese people are not afraid of sleeping anywhere at anytime. A while ago i came accross an album dedicated to asian students sleeping in Universities in the west.

http://asianssleepinginthelibrary.tumblr.com/

Just goes to show that westerners find it peculiar to see such an openness to sleep in public! Living here in China though I can't complain. Since I do look like a local I can do as the romans do and now blissfully sleep anywhere I like without so much as a sideward glance from passersby. after securing my wallet of course!

Those damn Chinese dating shows - Part 2

The format of the dating show Fei Cheng Wu Rao has evolved over the years. The current format of the show is pretty cheesy, but the original version was even more unpalatable. So much so that it brought upon itself the ire of the Communist party, mandating that the format of the show be changed.

In the original version there was a much greater emphasis on the material wealth of the male contestants who came on the show. Why during the introduction video of every contestant the details of their monthly income would flash up on the screen. Accordingly, many of the male contestants would fill their intro videos of shots of them posing in front of their expensive cars or other flashy assets. After government intervention, gone is the emphasis on material wealth, though it's a sure bet that it still plays in the back of the minds of the female contestants. At the very least, the occupation of each guy is still detailed.

One particulary infamous incident attracted a lot of public criticism. Ma Nuo, one of the more  prominent girls on the show, used to proudly proclaim herself as a money worshiper. During one episode she flatly rejected a guy who wasn't rich enough with the now infamous line: ''I would rather cry in the back of a BMW than sit happily on the back of your bicycle.''




Apparently she copped a lot of criticism on chinese social media websites and talkshows after that, and she scrambled to make up all sorts of excuses to explain her words had been taken out of context. Not that anyone believed her though, since she had a reputation of being cruel, mocking and condescending of any guy who didn't tick her many, many boxes. Since leaving the show she's gone on to do some modelling (most of her work comprising of shoots for FHM-like men's magazines), singing and acting.

In fact, the tone of many of the other girls was also quite mocking and disrespectful of many of the male contestants who weren't made of  prince-charming material. One episode comes to mind when a 31 year old guy who dressed a bit too formally was laughed at and called 'uncle' by most of the girls. All this, coupled with a healthy serving of sexual inuendo quickly attracted the attention of the Communist party, who told the producers to shape-up, or ship-out the show. The party were none too happy with the messages it was sending out to all the viewers.

So in the revamped version gone is any details of income, focus on materialism, or disrespect for the male contestants. And just for good measure, the Communist Party also installed their own psychologist, Huang Han, to join the other relationship expert, Le Jia already on the show. I guess she's there to prevent discussions from heading in the wrong direction and keep everyone in check.

So there are three regular figures on the dating show. The host Meng Fei, and the two relationship experts Le Jia and Huang Han. I don't know why but Meng Fei and Le Jia, who are both guys, always keep their heads shaved. My theory is the bold heads are supposed to symbolize the eunuchs, since they don't take part in the show or court the women.

Once in a while they will have these special episodes where they bring a whole bunch of Chinese ex-nationals, who now work or study abroad, on to the show. Needless to say, the strike rate for these guys seems to be a bit higher than their counterparts who remain in China. I wonder why....

Once in a while they'll also have westerners on the show, and again the strike rate for them seems to be higher than the local guys. Whenever I see a foreign guy on the show they always seem to be a designer of some sort. Perhaps the producers have a template for foreign guys they want on the show? Anyway, most of the guys seem to fit a certain type of character profile. I can't quite describe it, you'd have to watch a few episodes with foreign contestants to get an idea. Most of them seem genuine though, but mind you there are some pretty shady characters on there too.

Finally, I'm loathe to say that the idea for this show was actually taken from the original Australian tv show "Take me out''. I believe it only lasted a season or two a few years back, and even then i don't know how such shite lasted that long. As the title suggests, the show was more about finding a date, rather than finding a partner for the long term. It seemed that all the female contestants were recruited from nightclubs, and every male contestant who came on the show seemed to be a part-time model. The funny thing was, a lot of the contestants seemed to know each other, or had a friend who used to date someone else, so the producers must've recruited all of them from the one night spot.  They also had special episodes where the roles were reversed and all the guys were behind the podiums, though on these episodes it seemed every guy couldn't get a date if their lives depended on it.

Those damn Chinese dating shows - Part 1

Chinese people have a fascination with other people's dating and love lives. It's a topic that often comes up in conversation, even with practical strangers you've only just met. Two weeks ago I had my first classes this semester with my new english classes, and all eight classes asked me if I had a girlfriend when i allowed them to ask questions of me. (they also all asked for my opinion about the diaoyu / senkaku island dispute, but we'll leave that for another blog!) Perhaps if i was a woman they wouldn't be so bold to ask. Not that it bothers me though since I've become used to getting this question.

Match-making your friends seems to be a regular past time here in China, moreso than the West. When you think about it, going out to bars and clubs is not as common here (not that I think theres a very good strike rate there), and it seems that people who work together don't have as many opportunities to socialize vs their western counterparts. This might sound offensive when said, but I get the impression that Chinese people are a lot more guarded and weary of each other, especially towards people they don't know well. God only knows theres a lot of dishonest people out there. Add to that the fact that chinese people can be very opaque, and you can understand why a friend's word can be vital in finding a potential love interest.

So that brings us to the topic of this blog - TV dating shows. They are a HUGE hit in China, and it seems every province has their own spin on it. One of the most famous ones in all of China is produced locally here in Nanjing, Fei Cheng Wu Rao 非诚勿扰, which translates as ''not sincere, don't disturb'', or ''if you're not sincere, don't bother.''


 
   
Each episode  5 male contestants come onto the show, one at a time, and each is presented to the twenty-four recurring girls who stand up behind their podiums. All the players seem to range in age from mid twenties to as old as late 30's, but the majority seem to be in their late twenties to early thirties.
At any time the girls can press their buzzers to opt out if they feel the guy is not ideal for them, but once that buzzer is pressed they can't opt back in. So as soon as the guys come out and just gives his name and age, the girls can start opting out already! (Usually when this happens it will be because the girl has a set age or height in mind for their ideal man). After the male contestant has given his name and age he selects and indicates the girl he finds most attractive on a little hand held machine. The selection is known to the viewing audience but not to the girls themselves.

A series of  self-prepared videos are then airred  to get to know the male contestants, such as brief introduction, friend's impressions, past love life history, and ideal partner qualities. In between videos the girls are asking the contestant questions or making comments, while the host is also asking girls why they opted out. Most of the questioning is civil, but let me tell you some of the girls absolutely rip into the guy or denigrate him if they think theres something wrong with him. Even the host and resident ''relationship experts'' will have a dig at him if he's clearly not in-step with what a good man is expected of in Chinese society. Personally this is one of the things that turns me off the show, seeing some of these so called ''beauties'' with cakes of makeup on their faces holding themselves up on a pedestal. I really feel sorry for some of these guys who it seems receive more of a lecture on national television rather than take part in the show. It's like the producers purposely let these guys come on just to make an example of them and turn the show into some public education announcement.

If the guy has some sort of special talent, they're always given a chance to showcase their skills e.g massage one of the girls, do a dance, sing, whatever. This can take a sizeable amount of time, and sometimes you wonder if you're watching a variety concert or a game show.  







By the end of all the video segments and questioning if there are any girls who are still interested the guy can only choose two girls he likes, as well as the girl he originally selected at the beginning of the show (purely based on appearances). Even if his chosen girl opted out she is called out in the ''final 3 lineup''. You'd think that with 24 girls it's easy to get to this stage, but most of the guys fail to have a single girls still interested, and if there are girls still interested its usually only a handful. The girls come back on the show each week, so I guess they can be choosey!

 So up to this point the girls have had the decision, but after this the guy has the power to reject or not. From a list of questions that all the girls have already answered, he chooses one and their respones are shown on a screen. Finally he gets to ask an additional question of his choosing, and each girl has to answer on the spot. Taking the responses into consideration he chooses his girl. If he chooses one of the girls who never opted out, they walk away together, but if he chooses his original choice he makes one last plea to her to reconsider (usually this ends in failure). It's pretty rare for the original choice not to have opted out, but if this happens it's an instant match-make.





 
Like a lot of Chinese TV shows, this one is really overcooked. The dramatized responses and over-pleasant pleasantries by contestants, cheesy video's, down to the soppy music played in the background can really make your eyes roll unless you're a 15 year old teenage girl. It's supposed to be a ''reality'' show, but just like most western ''reality'' shows they're set in another universe unfamiliar to our daily lives. When asked, all of my Chinese uni students don't believe it's real either, and only watch it for a laugh.









One particular episode comes to mind where a perfect match was achieved (i.e. the guy's original choice of girl ended up being one of the many who still hadn't opted out). When watching the whole segment play out it seemed like you were watching something out of a hollywood script. The girl was beautiful, sweet, kind-hearted,, while the guy also seemed to be absolutely flawless, good looking, and was, wait for it........ a white whale trainer at a Seaworld-like theme park (his introuction video had him frolicking with his white whale awwwww). The question and answer sessions went like clockwork, with the guy having a good answer for every question. By the end of it there was a hoard of girls still opting in, including his original choice. Now unless almighty God is the producer and director of this show, I have to say this seemed a little staged.

 Theres a lot more to talk about this show, including the original format of the show which caused so much controversy and brought upon itself the ire of the Communist Party, special episodes for foreign chinese nationals, foreign contestants, the hosts, and it's special Australian connection, all of which i'll talk about in the next blog. 

Sleeper trains - the best way to meet the locals

I've previously blogged about train journeys, but I must say the latest trip that I made back in June was probably the most fascinating. I'll add a bit more info here about long haul journeys that I didn't mention before. More info is in the previous entry:-

http://alinchina08.blogspot.com/2009/01/second-china-train-experience.html

This trip was another sleeper, overnight train, well more than overnight, 27 hours to be exact! The journey was from Nanjing to Guangzhou, leaving about 3pm and arriving the following day at about 6pm. Like the journey before this one, I booked a hard berth, but unfortunately only the top berths were available (the ones with minimal head space!)

If you really want to meet some local chinese people, then book a hard berth on a long haul train. Being confined in such a small space with other people for that long a journey really allows (and forces) you to interact with the locals. I will say it's not for everyone though. It ain't exactly the ritz carlton on tracks, but if you're willing to tough it out a little it's worth the cultural experience. I'd do it again, but not a journey as long as 27 hours!

The head space for the top bunk is not even sufficient for you to sit up in your bunk, so unless you lie there the whole time you have to come down and sit on the bottom bunk or across the aisle where the seats are. Outside of sleeping hours the people who book the bottom bunks expect that other passengers in the cabin will come down and sit on the bunks, so don't feel like you're intruding. If you elect to sit on one of the aisle seats you do have to keep your legs alligned with the direction of the walkway, as it's not wide enough for people to pass around your legs.

Fortunately the people in my partitioned cabin were nice, and passengers do tend to strike up conversations with each other to stave off boredom. I had a chat with a middle aged women who told me all about her hometown, while I told her about mine. Also found out the girl opposite my bunk was a  TCFL 'Teaching Chinese as a foreign language' student, students whom I taught in my previous semester. Also had a wander and chatted with the restaurant carriage manager after my meal there. Nice guy, though i was forced to have a cigarette with him haha. Just like anywhere in China, people are keen to chat with you if you're a foreigner, and you'll be able to get into a wider range of topics if you can speak some mandarin. He ended up telling me about his wife and son, his son's recent trip to Australia, and his work schedule on this train route. In fact, I think he came close to asking me to be his son's private english tutor!

Theres a lot of adoreable kids and babies running around too, but luckily the mothers had them under control. In fact there was a young mother in our cabin with a baby a couple of months old, but it was the most docile and well behaved baby i'd ever encountered.She did change the kids nappy in front of me on the small aisle table though, which sorta grossed me out!

At first i was a little worried about my valuables, but as long as you take the portable and most valuable stuff with you and don't flaunt your big electronic goods you should be fine. I found most people there were trustworhty. And it's not like a thief could run very far.

In preparation for the trip though I do suggest you bring your own food. The instant noodles in the styrafoam balls are the most convneient meals since they provide boiling water dispensers throughout the train. You can buy them at the station or on the platforms at stops, but be prepared to pay upto twice the price vs a supermarket! There's also a food trolley that comes through every few hours or so, packed with drinks, snacks, fruits and meals. Again, inflated prices.
The other food option is the restaurant carraige which i mentioned above. Once you go in there you take a seat at a table (often you'll have to share with strangers), and then the service attendent will give you the meal options, which is usually a choice between two. I ended up going with the 'egg' meal, which is porridge with a hard boiled egg, veggies and man tou (steamed dumpling without filling). Again it's a bit of a rip-off at 15 rmb.

Finally, don't bring any massive pieces of luggage if you plan to take a hard sleeper. The luggage rack is not that wide, and it can be a struggle trying to squeeze it up there. 

Pharmacy is a little different in hong kong.....

So knowing that winter is approaching in china at the end of the year, i thought i'd stock up on some pseudoephidrine (aka sudafed to most people) to help me alleviate any colds or flus. i suppose i could've dispensed a crapload to myself back home when i worked a few locum shifts at the pharmacy over the school break, but of course that would look extremely dodgy since we keep strict records of supply on the register. not to mention in australia straight pseudo is now prescription only. and i also didn't want to purchase them in china because with drugs there you don't know if you're gulping down the real thing or MSG balls.

so i walk into the pharmacy in hong kong and ask the shop assistant (or pharmacist?) for a box of pseudoephidrine, to which he replies "oh, we only have them in boxes''. 
didn't quite know how to respond to that, becuase i wasn't expecting them to come in any other way. did i look like some sort of junkie hanging out for a quick hit of pseudo diced with something else? so i told him, ''yeah sure that's fine. Can i get two boxes?'' (i know how small the packs usually are and hey i won't be leaving china for at least 6 months)

Two minutes later after ducking into the storeroom he's back with 4 boxes of 12 packs. i thought to myself  ''i could've swore i only asked him for 2 boxes. at the sight of my confusion he quickly chirps ''special offer 4 boxes for 400 dollar''
LOL. i know asians love to bargain and haggle, but i never thought i'd see it done over medications in a proper pharmacy.  that, or he thought i was some sort of drug dealer looking to stock up. ironic, seeing that i'm still a registered pharamcist back home.
the thought then crossed my mind that either i had stumbled upon THE most dodge pharmacy in all of hong kong, or that the whole of hong kong was one big candy store for drug dealers. 

anyway, coming back to the situation at hand, the price per box was 128, so it was a pretty good deal. however being quite self conscious of carrying around that much pseudo across borders i had to decline. not to be disappointed though, he then offered  3 boxes for 300 hk dollars. (this pharmacy must've had a truckload of pseudo in the storeroom and probably made most of their profit from it's sales! ) seeing that i had to get rid of my hk dollars anyway i relented and took the 3 boxes. though with a bit of hard-balling i'm sure i could've gotten him to throw in a box of morphine for the same price....

p.s. 
while he was putting through the sale i thought about asking him to label the boxes with my name  to make it seem less dodge, but then realized i was going into china where customs officials probably wouldn't bat an eyelash

Asian photo poses

Asian people have somewhat of a love affair with the camera. Back when I was young and to this day,  if you think of a Japanese tourist you would envision someone with a big ass SLR camera, snapping at a hundred shots an hour. If you're ever sightseeing alone and need someone to take a picture of you, it is also wise to ask an asian looking person (preferably with a big ass camera). Almost every time I've asked an asian person to take the picture for me they've had the mind not to cut out that seventh wonder of the world behind me and not just snap my kneecaps. Now that's somehwat of a generalization (and hence probably racist!), but hey if you want to increase your chance of getting a decent picture of you without asking the person to re-take it 10 times, ask an asian person.  (Though of late i have had a gripe with seeing a lot of fellow asians with THE most expensive model SLR camera bodies and THE most expensive lenses (we're talking couple of thousand dollars here) composing and snapping photos like they have a point-and-shoot camera in their hands)

But this love affair extends to all asians, not just to the Japanese, and the people of China are no different. They do some strange things in their photos though.  What I'm about to describe applies to most other asian countries. Heck i'm pretty sure that most of these camera habits originated in Japan and Korea! But the following are definitely things that have filtered into China at least.

Notable Poses

There are many very asian poses out there, in fact, while searching for pics to add to this blog i've come across whole websites and blogs dedicated to asian camera poses. The following are the ones worthy of discussion.
NOTE: most of these pics are not taken by myself, and are in fact mosty of asian celebrities in other asian countries! just using them here for demonstrative purposes :)

This first pose more applies to the girls rather than boys. Most people know about asian's love for the 'peace sign' in many shots. Hell, I even pull it out when I'm in shots by myself and don't know what to do with my hands (I have long lanky arms and finger you see so it looks hideous just to let them hang down) But they also do a variation of the peace sign up bordering the checks, or pointed towards the face most commonly at 9 and 3 o'clock. I'm not sure if it still means 'peace' in this position. Perhaps it's there to somehow augment the face?

But I do know this next one is definitely meant to augment the face. I like to call it ''The blowfish''. This one is only done in close-up self portrait shots. Girls will blow up their cheeks with a good mouthful of air to make themselves look more ''cute''. I guess here in asia a lot of guys find girls cute if they have chubby cheeks. The problem is, of all the pictures I've seen, most girls don't do it subtlely. They take in a huge gobful of air, which makes them look more like they're about to vomit. It's akin to putting on too much makeup, or airbrushing way too much. Or fake boobs the size of watermelons. i.e. disproportionate. And it's not like when you're out and about you're going to keep that mouthful of air in your mouth everywhere you go. It looks extremely uncomfortable, and talking MIGHT be a problem. Finally, it's hard to smile and inflate your cheeks at the same time. I tried it just then, and it just looks creepy.

Another common one is the index finger pressed to one cheek, ''The cheek lifter''. I think, and i might be wrong, that pushing your cheek up from the bottom will push more cheek fat to the top and hence give you the chubby cheek effect again. Problem is i've only ever seen the single cheek pushup, not the double. I can imagine the double cheek push would look a bit strange though.

The final 'face augmenting' pose is the ''face-cup'' . This is where the hands cup around the cheeks from the bottom with or without making contact with the cheeks. I'm guessing this one is to block out any fat necks or prevents the double chin effect.This purple background one is a blowfish - face-cup combo.



 


 
Then there's ''The heart'' . and the boys are guilty of this one too. Theres a couple of variations of this one, as illustrated in the pics. The closest thing to it in the west is the ''I feel like a Whopper pose'', though I'm sure the Chinese are not trying to tell us they're craving a Whopper. I have never ever seen a western person pull this pose, EVER. It's just so strange, and a little cheesy (excuse the pun). What exactly is the person trying to convey? I love you (the cameraman). I love life, I love so I am, I'm full of heart, I'm single and looking for love, world peace? Perhaps someone out there can enlighten me and tell me exactly what the meaning is, becuase it seems to be thrown around a lot in any sort of picture situation.
Ok, i can understand the meaning if two love birds are in a photo and doing it together or forming each half of the heart (which still makes me retch though), but a lone person in a photo doing it? no idea. I can safely guess though that as part of commercial advertising it means, ''we care about our customers''. Though i'm yet to see anything appoaching TLC in any form of customer service in China to date. I'm sure it would be different though if you flash a VIP card or walk in with a high ranking Communist party official.

Indeed, Chinese girls in particular love being snapped. It's common for many young girls to have done at least one professional photo shoot, whether it be studio or outdoor, complete with a varying array of outfits and airbrushing. I know this because many of my friends and students on their social networking pages have posted the entire albums on there! For us westerners you would only go to get professional studio pictures done if you were trying to break into modelling, getting married, having a baby, or got dragged to the family photo shoot when you were 8 years old (those shots with the ghastly blue or green backgrounds). It's such an interesting phenomenon that isn't widely practiced in the west. I mean, if you went and did one of these shoots 'just for the hell of it' no doubt some of your friends would think you're a bit full of yourself. Of course, not all girls go vogue in front of the camera, but you can pick the ones that do. Approaching the end of semester I recall one girl dragging her boyfriend along with an SLR camera, ordering the poor guy around like he was some personal photographer, while she pulled out some of the most vogue like poses and positions in all manner of strange places (like the delapidated sports field).

Finally, don't be surprised if you're posing in a photo with Chinese and asked to say qie zi. In english it sounds like ''chair tzz''. It's their equivalent of Cheese, but it doesn't mean Cheese. It means Eggplant, but don't say eggplant in english. It's just that saying Chair tzz stretches out the lips into a smile in the same way Cheese does.  I actually didn't know the reason we say cheese until i found this out. haha.how ignorant of me.