Biggest dog I've seen in China

"sand bug"

I ate this for lunch yesterday.

Ax drew this after lunch yesterday.

Murse

This is one of the finest examples of the man purse, aka "murse," I've seen to date. In rural areas in years past, I've seen plenty of men with black man purses that look like large Caselogic CD cases with a strap. These are usually carried under the arm like a clutch. Before anyone tries to conclude that Asian men are somehow less masculine for carrying murses, allow me to introduce you to the utility skirt, available for all you manly men in Seattle, WA.

This is soup?

Lunch at my cafeteria. It's reasonably priced for lukewarm tomato with fried egg and bitter melon stir-fired with bits of pork, but the soup, lukewarm salty water with rare slices of white radish, leaves something to be desired. Perhaps it was a taste acquired in more difficult times.

Purple Mountain

I set off this morning to grab some breakfast and then take a little hike.  I bought a 糯米烧卖 (steamed glutinous rice dumpling, or should it be a "gluttonous" rice dumpling?  They're so tasty!) and a 馒头 (steamed bread).  In my mind I was planning a little 3 mile jaunt, but because it's never any fun to turn back, I found myself on a 7 mile trek.  I was not alone, mind you; this is China.  On the way up through the mix of bamboo and deciduous forest, I passed a harmonica group performing patriotic favorites to a riveted crowd.  W, what you are missing out on now for not taking the harmonica seriously!  I never noticed this in the past hiking in China, but people like to play their music players out loud for their friends and family (and anyone else) to hear.  The older folks sing along to old ballads. The younger folks blast Beyonce and Asian pop.  It looks like some of them are using their cell phones for this function.  I can't decide if it's any better in the U.S..  Walking amongst zombies with headphones on OR being forced to listen to Linkin Park while trying to enjoy your bamboo forest?  Rather than trying to commune with nature, one just has to accept people-watching as part of the deal.  On the way, I passed the first astronomical observatory constructed in East Asia (so they say).  It was built in 1934 and has in turn been used by the Nationalists (I assume) and the Communists for research and is now a cultural site.  Despite the advertised view of Nanjing from the observatory being "too beautiful for eyes," I decided to move on. 

There's a photo of a pillbox bunker that was constructed to prevent the Japanese from advancing up the mountain.  Ah, nature. 

From the top of the mountain (448 m above sea level), you can see Xuanwu Lake, Nanjing, and just a wisp of the Yangtze River, through the smog/clouds.  If you squint, you might be able to see the first major bridge that the Communist Chinese constructed without Soviet technical engineering assistance.  This is also where I found the man reading the newspaper upside down.  I did a little reading myself, but my reading was performed right-side-up.  (I started The Diving Bell and the Butterfly while I was up there. I haven't finished it, but I recommend it wholeheartedly anyway.)

I was impressed by how little trash was left by the wayside.  There were signs everywhere reminding people to love nature and take responsibility for protecting the forest.  I saw 4-5 mountain bikers decked out in full spandex and sport sunglasses.  At least 50% of people wore activity appropriate clothes and shoes (When will women stop hiking in heels?).  I didn't see any smoking.  There were no hawkers along the path, except for three people selling cucumbers.  Can it be that times have changed? Granted, most people taking these paths sounded local based on their accents.  This would make sense since the Sun Yatsen Mausoleum and the Ming tombs would draw out-of-town tourists to a different part of the park where tickets are required.  Some things don't change, however.  I spent ten minutes trying to figure out what a "ropeway" was.  Evidently, ropeway = "risky looking cable car."  Of course!  It's not a Chinese mountain without a cable car, which, to me, sounds exactly the same as "lazy car" in Chinese. 缆 vs 懒.

More by the lake.

Lotus flowers in the breeze on the edge of Xuanwu Lake.  I should mention that dragonflies filled the air from time to time today.  But they were camera shy.
The second photo: Wha?  Is this Endor?  No, it's the Sun Palace (太阳宫), not that knowing the name explains anything.

It's hammock time.

As I walked by all these people in hammocks, I thought to myself, wow, the Chinese sure know how to relax on a lazy Sunday afternoon.  Even though I later ran into three hammock hawkers, I still give them credit.  The lake on the left is Xuanwu Lake (玄武湖), the beginnings of which date back over 2000 years.

刀削面！

Literally this translates into "knife scraped noodles.".  He uses a knife to "peel" the dough and the noodle peels fly straight into his boiling cauldron.  These noodles are yummy.  The are a Northern specialty and if you are to believe the guy from Xian who was eating next to me, these can't compare to the noodles up north.  Perhaps, but having spent some time in the north myself, I thought they made the cut.  Har har.  I know, that was terrible.  :)

Man reading the newspaper upside down.

He was still hanging there when I left.  Maybe I should have studied for boards like this.

Matching family t-shirts

Matching sets of family or couple t-shirts are all the rave here.  There's another set where the woman's shirt says, "I eat dinner but I don't do the dishes!" (我吃饭不洗碗！) and the man's shirt says, "I do the dishes but I don't eat dinner." (我洗碗不吃饭！) It's somewhat funnier in Chinese, but not by much.

Fuzimiao - Confucious would faint.

The first photo is of the new mall in Nanjing.  Stocked with Levi's, Sephora, Zara, H&M, and mas mas more!  There's hardly anything you can't buy in China these days, but it comes with a steep price tag.  A quick, non-representative survey found a 30%-100% mark up for American goods. 
The next two photos are of Fuzimiao by night.  The lights are pretty.  But Epcot Center looks more authentic by comparison.  And there's a ride!  For 120 RMB, you can ride a boat in a circle.
Dinner was a mish mash of random dishes: more Duck blood soup, spicy braised cow intestine, bland sesame bread, seaweed, braised tofu, and overpriced 小龙包 ("Shanghai soup dumplings" = xiaolongbao).
We did a little shopping on the side.
The highlight had to be the flying maxi pad with wings advertisements in the subway.  At first I couldn't figure out how this was targeting their intended audience, but someone kindly pointed out that this was a shopping district.  Lo and behold most of the people waiting for the train were women.

Joke overheard:
Two men are debating which of China's subway systems is the most crowded.
Man 1: Beijing's subways are definitely the most crowded.  My wife rode the train when she was pregnant and ended up with a miscarriage.
Man 2: That's nothing.  The Guangzhou subways are so crowded that my nonpregnant wife became pregnant!

Inappropriate jokes rife with sexual innuendo appear to popular here.  It's almost cute.

Pip, this is for you!

I think it's a photocopy shop, but I didn't even bother going inside.

New Digs

Let's play the Price is Right.  Check out my new apartment for the next three weeks in the photos below.  It takes three separate levers to get hot water in the "shower," two of them are in the kitchen.  I don't think this place has been renovated since the late 70s or early 80s.  So it's not the Hyatt, and it's not even the Motel 6, but it's a place to rest my head.  And it seems reasonably safe.  I did take the rusty butcher knife out of the kitchen and hide it in a drawer in my room, just in case.  After that and replacing the sheets, my room is downright homey.  The neighborhood is fantastic because it's totally Chinese.  There are ping pong tables down the way, crotchety men playing Chinese chess, and white-haired old ladies fanning themselves under the trees.  Outside the gate of my little community of Soviet style concrete block apartment buildings, there are random shops, a small grocery store, hole in the wall breakfast joints, and a middle school.  I'm a three bus stops away from the Center, a hop and a skip from the big lake in Nanjing, and still within close proximity to the Purple Mountain.  Perfect for getting back on the running/workout schedule I was hoping for!

I pushed my own culinary limits last night with a dish called "duck blood mung bean noodle soup" (鸭血粉丝汤).  It's a Nanjing specialty and it wasn't nearly as gruesome as it sounds.  The duck's blood was cubed and there were bits of duck liver and stomach.  All of this was surprisingly palatable.  See photo above.

As for the price for my apartment: 50 RMB/night.  Nicer places can go for less, but since I'm only renting for 3 weeks, this was about as good of a deal I could get.  For those who don't live and breathe google, that's $7.32/night.

Duck blood soup

The whole place looks this grimy

The 3 levers for hot water and my "shower"

And yes its totally the kind of shower makes the whole bathroom the shower stall.  Gotta find a good place to put the toilet paper.

Tea-flavored fake beer

X rescued me from my overpriced hotel and took me out to lunch.  I'm going to try to post photos of our crazy Nanjing feast.  She found a great deal for me over at the East Star Holiday Hotel just down the road from the Center.  I have an airy room.  Too airy, in fact, given that my bathroom is enclosed in glass, perfectly clear glass.  There are some things in life that are simply not meant to be shared.  :)

I visited the Center.  We have a fabulous view of the Purple Mountain from our shared office on the 6th floor.  And as previously reported to me, there is a bust of Dr. George Hatem (first non-Chinese party member) in the front courtyard, along with a green fig tree.  There was a sign asking patients to please respect the tree and not hang their clothes to dry there. 

With J's help, I've liberated my phone so we'll see if it works when I get a new card today! 

For dinner last night, X took me to a little street lined with tiny little shops and one table restaurants.  It was like a mini-night-market.  She treated me to half a duck and a bowl of noodles!  Will attempt to post photo of ducks.


Watch out, if you eat too much, you might turn into David, as in 大胃 (da wei = "big stomach"). 

Arrived in Nanjing

My last post fell through a crack in the interweb!  Long story short: after a twelve hour flight from SFO to Beijing, two hour delay in Beijing, a two hour flight to Nanjing, 40 minute bus ride, 10 min cab ride, one hotel rejection, 25 min of wandering in the warm night, 3 kind souls, I am settling into my slightly expensive, but comfortable, hotel room. 

Packing

Packing--AGAIN. Well, obviously, I can't be in /that/ much of a rush given I'm sitting in front of my new laptop writing this entry. I must take breaks because my mind drifts easily in the wee hours of the morning. The large suitcase will likely be overweight, as usual, and the smaller one will be my bookshelf until I find a more permanent residence. In June, I overestimated the amount of stuff I would bring by at least two or three suitcases. The editing process has gone smoothly thusfar, but the night is young. Thank goodness for Joyce bringing an extra bag of my winter clothes to Taipei. This is not even mentioning the great help she was in organizing my errands today. If her brilliance couldn't be better applied to helping people through nursing, she would have no lack of work as a personal assistant I am certain.

Max beat the traffic home from LA and made it with more than in time for our yummy dinner of Thai take-out. He says that Comic Con was enlightening insofar as he now understands "my" generation better. Ha! He alleges that "my" generation is somehow responsible for media being the way that it is today. I can't be held responsible for my inactions so credit must go to visionaries who happen to be my age.