Big News!

I interrupt this catch-up blog post to bring you two pieces of real-time news: my blog now has ads and I scored highest on my teacher evaluations!

In reference to the first piece of news, I finally figured that I might as well get paid for my writing. As per the Google Adsense agreement, I cannot encourage you to click my ads so I won't.

My boss told me this evening that I had received the best feedback on my teacher evaluations. The parents and students like my teaching style and gave me pretty high marks. They say that I break Physics down into a way that is detailed and easy to understand. I knew none of my students were falling through the cracks, partly because I hunt them down on social media and make them explain to me what they don't understand in class/why they weren't in class to misunderstand me. But I became excited when I heard the news that I am not only considered an interesting foreign entertainer but an bona fide educator as well. I eagerly asked to see the evals and was handed several pages of Chinese characters. So I can't really tell yet exactly what was said, but I can get back to you after several years of Chinese lessons.

Good Luck Restaurant

“Can you recommend a local favorite?” my dad asked the hotel staff that night.

Let me preface this post by saying that I have gotten used to local digs. After a semester here I have only slight trepidation eating at the neighborhood “greasy chopstick” and asking for a side of bowling water to clean my utensils/ bowls. After several stomachaches and six months of eating, breathing and consuming the bacteria of the middle kingdom, I would like to think that I have developed immunity on par with that of a frat boy.

For someone visiting for two weeks, eating street food or dining in at a local hole-in-the-wall comes at your own risk. Even if the food is clean, the quality is not (always) the best. So though I hold the hotel to no fault as we got exactly what we asked for.

‘Good luck restaurant’ was the name of the establishment, although a more apt description might have been good luck finding where it is located. Thanks to my limited Chinese, we were finally able to find the place after wandering around for a while.

A store employee attempts weird marketing tactic

during our search for Good Luck Restaurant.

In short, the restaurant was a place that needs to be seen to be believed. It included:

- non-English speaking waiter (we were in China to be fair)

- meat-filled vegetarian dish

- questionably ‘clean’ plates/tables/entrees

- interesting choice of decorations (see below)

Barack "the riveter" Obama

Being wine enthusiasts, my father and stepmom decided to order a bottle of wine. Similar to the shopkeeper on the night of my Christmas Eve party, our waiter struggled to open the bottle of wine. For several minutes, we uncomfortably watched him dig into the bottle and destroy the cork, not saying anything for fear of causing him to lose face.

Poor cork, we hardly knew ye.

A manager, seeing his struggle yelled at him and sent him back to the kitchen (to get a new bottle presumably) and apologized to us in Chinese. When the wine was finally poured, it turned out to be pretty terrible. We all felt bad for the waiter so we sat and drank our wine. Surprisingly, none of us got food poisoning but GLR is not a place I will be recommending to friends.

Guilin, Day 2

So the blog’s been silent for a while now. No, I am not dead. Rather the opposite. My month-long trip was just the boost I needed to put me in the positive frame of mind to finish my last semester in China strong. It was nice to have so much time off to get a fresh perspective and lay plans for my next venture in life. During my time off I visited Guilin (China), Hong Kong and Australia. My last post left off at my first day in Guilin. Looks like I have some catching up to do…

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The next day, the entire fam woke bright and early for a cruise down the famous Li River and a trip to Yangshao Village. The tour started out with a bus ride to the dock during which my father (whom I love dearly) played “that guy” of the group and asked as many questions as possibly about things he would probably never concern himself with again. I supposed he was making sure he got his money’s worth.

As those who have signed up for group tours know, there is a lot of waiting in between activities/ sights. Since the cruise was filled with mostly Chinese people I looked at the lull in time as an opportunity to practice my Chinese and bug those around me to help translate characters that I had drawn on my airplane barfbag into English.

Barfbag

For me the Li River was a real life representation of the mass-produced Chinese river/mountain landscape artwork found on vases or wall tapestries at one-size-fits all home stores that are common in America. The actual Li River was better. Lonely planet hits the nail on the head when they describe the river’s beauty as “hard to exaggerate” and “one of the classic, legendary images travelers tend to have of China.” Although it was a cold and damp day (winter in southern China, what can you do), I braved the top deck to snap pictures of the scenery, including some family shots. Despite the gorgeous mountain scenery eerily beautiful river, the best time to see Guilin, Guangxi is undoubtedly not in winter so I would suggest that those of you wanting to go wait until April or May.

Vase depicting Li River scenery

Li River

After 83 kilometres of river boating, we arrived at Yangshao village. Yangshao village is where the majority of tours on the Li River end and has thus become a huge hub for tourism. Despite the definite tourist feel, Yangshao has managed to keep a village feel and resist conversion into a complete tourist trap.

The Guangxi ‘state’ in which Yangshao and Guilin lay is actually the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, a moniker created to allow for special governing allowances for the Zhuang minority group that resides in the area. I really enjoyed exploring the shops and learning about the minority customs and apparel that I don’t see in my predominately Han city.

Top to bottom: Photograph of Zhuang minority women, traditional Zhuang garb.

After everyone stuffed their bags with souvenirs, the entire group piled into a passenger van and headed back towards the hotel in Guilin. We had been sightseeing for 9 hours and wanted nothing more than to get out of the damp cold. This was not to be the case.

Since the tour guide was a rational man, he assumed that anyone who had asked so many questions as my dad had about the local pearl factory must really want to visit and make a large purchase. So as we neared Guilin, the tour guide took it upon himself to transfer us to a separate bus to visit the factories that no one wanted to visit. My father was confused when the rest of the group failed to join us. His eyes grew wide as we explained to him in hushed tones that the tour guide was taking us on a separate trip since he thought that is what we wanted. I was aware that it was to be an expensive side trip, as I knew from 5 months of living in China that reciprocity is the usual expectation for any thoughtful act. No action is performed without an agenda.

We pulled up to the pearl factory and listened to a painful, pre-rehearsed speech, complete with awkward questions and unnatural vocal pauses. I met eyes with my stepmother and had to excuse myself from the group so as not to burst into laughter and cause the worker to lose face. After describing how a pearl is formed and how China has the most beautiful pearls, we were ushered into a jewelry showroom where we could buy government guaranteed pearls. We tried on 15,000 and 10,000 dollar strands for giggles and browsed the nacreous jewel filled cases. I felt like I had stepped into Breakfast at Tiffany’s but with crappy carpet and an Asian cast.

Top to bottom: Being shown how pearl is formed, showroom.

I grew bored of looking at jewelry I couldn’t afford and chatted with the tour guide while we waited on the rest of the group to make their purchases. He informed me that the Clinton family had also visited Guilin and pointed to a picture of the first family on the wall.

Former first family

My sister and stepmother eventually decided on something a little bit more reasonable and my dad left the pearl factory with a lighter wallet, paying the consequence for his curiosity. His load was lightened again as he pulled out a tip for the above-and-beyond service.

I can’t say that I regret our little side trip because it was definitely an experience and that is what traveling is all about. Don’t know about my dad.再见