Impressions from China - 366

The Bird's Nest Olympic Stadium

It's been a year & a day since we landed in Beijing. The first few months seemed to drag on, due to occasional bouts of homesickness & frequent attacks of frustration as we slowly got used to the different ways of how things work here & the very different mentality of how Chinese think(I use the word "Chinese" here in reference to mainland Chinese as opposed to ethnically Chinese) .

Then as we made friends & discovered where to go to buy safe meat, & got used to having to wash vegetables & fruits so that we don't get poisoned, & figured out the best & cheapest massage places to go to & found things to do in school & with friends, the time has flown by.

These are things that I have realised in our time here (in no particular order)...

• I have yet to learn how to cross a busy Beijing street without going through a panic attack...

• I have learnt to watch where I step to avoid dubious-looking splotchy patches on the ground which, more often than not, turn out to be emissions of the oral, hacking kind...


• I have learnt to be patient with Chinese excuses & reasons they come up with when something goes wrong in the house that they can't readily fix...


• I have learnt that an electrician here may not neccesarily know much about electricity, & a plumber here may not know much about the priniciples of piping...


• I have learnt that if I add a "rrrrr" to the end of every noun/phrase/sentence, & pretend that I have marbles in my cheeks, I can do a halfway decent Beijing accent...


• I have become more confident in my use of Mandarin as my ears slowly attune to the local accent, although I am still far from proficient...


• I have learnt that Northern Chinese food, dialects & even facial features differ greatly from the Southern ones that I am used to in South East Asia...


• I have learnt that being Chinese is not a homogeneous condition, but something far more complicated than what has been argued about in Singapore (i.e. learning how to speak Mandarin does not neccesarily automatically make one more Chinese)...


• I have learnt that the mainland Chinese & the Overseas Chinese may as well be two distinct cultural entities altogether, for all their differences & despite their similarities (as I said...complicated)...


• I have learnt to apply lip balm at least twice a day to prevent chapped lips in the very dry & very cold Beijing winter...


• I have learnt that when one is deprived of good TV programs & good movies, one's attitude towards pirated DVD's drastically changes. (I think Hollywood movie studios/producers have to approach this "problem" from a different direction)...


• I hate the fact that most restaurants still do not have "no smoking zones"...

I'm not sure how much longer we will be here. At the moment, I am still ambivalent about staying here long term. The air quality & health issues certainly play a part in how I feel. (Last Thursday/Friday, the air quality index apparently reached a horrendous 421!!!) On the other hand, I know that if we do stay on, it will be an enriching & eye-opening experience.

Happy New Year to all!