A long China update

The past week or so.

Friday-Sunday, June 21-23, 2013

I left work early today to head out to Siyang, to meet Curtis and Ken and have the advantage of a translator when we go to the mountain tomorrow morning.  Just getting to Siyang was much more difficult than I expected.  In taking the taxi to the South bus station my driver kept forgetting that I didn’t speak Chinese (apparently telling them you don’t speak Chinese, in Chinese, is kind of counterproductive).  One guy pulled up next to us and started pointing and freaking out, rolling down his window and exclaiming and accented “HOW DO YOU DO?!” Even after the light turned green, it took several honks from the cars behind him, before he would move on.  I am still the only blonde person I have seen in China.  Once we finally arrived at the South bus station and struggled with the ticket lady, I found that there were no more buses to Siyang going out from that station and that I would have to go to the East station.  After getting into another crowd, I got to hassle with another taxi driver, who kept getting confused on where to take me and it took several calls to Junda and Ken to translate for me before he would take me to the station.

            Once I finally got to the other station I still had to wait another two hours before I finally got on a bus.  Curtis was waiting with Mac & Cheese and wine J He also showed me a beautiful park near their apartment, with lots of lit up bridges and trees.

            The next morning we left early to catch a bus to the high speed train station.  The trains are nice, clean and comfortable.  When we finally reached the mountain we found, to our disappointment, that visibility was terrible and we couldn’t see far up the mountain.  The climb was tough.  Ken ended up taking the gondola up to the top but the rest of us managed the 15000 steps to the top (though it felt more like a million).  It was more crowded and cold than I expected.  The top is supposed to have a marvelous view, however with the mist, we could barely see the stairs in front of us.  Curtis and I did not bring enough money so we lived off of peanut butter sandwiches and granola bars.  The motel we booked was predictably awful.  There was one bathroom for all the rooms, which had no hot water and barely running water.  The eight beds in our room were exceedingly hard plywood and between three snoring roommates I was able to manage a solid 2 hours of sleep.

            We went out at 4:30AM to hopefully watch the sunrise from the summit, which is the main attraction of the mountain.  Unfortunately the fog was so thick, it was hard to tell if there even was a sun.  So we decided to grab a few more hours of sleep before beginning the trek down.  The hike down, thankfully, was not nearly as difficult as the hike up, although Ken decided to take the bus down (not really one for physical exercise).  The mist and the woods reminded me of being back in the Northwest and made me a bit homesick for working at summer camp up in the mountains.

            The second half of the journey down was spent walking between a road and a river, but there were actually several scenic spots along the way.  Curtis even chose to ignore a no swimming sign long enough to jump in one of the ponds.  By the time we reached the bottom, hot, tired, and very sore; we had been walking 5-6 hours and just had to catch a taxi, a train, a bus and another taxi to get home.  My bus took a grueling 3 hours to get to Shuyang, and we found out later that Curtis actually left his Chinese cell phone on the train.

            All-in-all it was a tough couple of days.  Though I am grateful for the experience, I do hope that future journeys will be easier and less stressful.

Thursday June 20, 2013

Today I woke up to Matt in our apartment.  He is traveling around with the CEO and the COO to the different branches.  I had a great breakfast from one of the street vendors and got to attend the morning meeting.  It was very nice having Matt there to translate the dialogue, since Junda usually just provides the general idea of what is going on.  I also went on a run today for the first time in a VERY long time  It feels good to be active again, especially when so much of my day is spent on a computer in an office.

Wednesday June 19, 2013

I got to ride to work on my beautiful, amazing, awesome bike today! She tops out around 20 MPH but hey, much better than my walking speed.  I am starting to get material together for the website and have been working on the Internship page today, though I still need to find someone who is technologically savvy to help put things together.  I am also hoping to come up with some good, creative lesson plans for the English classes, which start in a few weeks.  After work I tried to ride home on my bike, unfortunately some wires got loose or something so the honk button would not turn off and the gas would not turn on.  I ended up having to walk the bike home and wait for Will (one of my coworkers) to take me to a repair shop.  Thankfully it was a pretty easy fix and cost me less than a dollar.  Later I drove to the grocery store, which was fun and took a fraction of the time walking would have.  I loaded up on water, juice and of course ice cream J. When I got back the guys were all drinking beer in our apartment.  One was happy to cheers me over and over again saying “Cheers!” “you are very beautiful,” and “I am happy!”

Tuesday June 18, 2013

I tried the street food today for breakfast-an egg wrap with a hot dog inside, and it was pretty delicious.  Unlike the past few work days, we are actually doing things today.  Curtis and I have started to brainstorm for the website and still need to find out lots of information on building one, seeing as how neither of us has ever actually created a website.  We are also going out to the countryside to visit various clients.  The first we visited is a chicken farmer who has just received a loan from OIC.  The next client was a wood manufacturer.  We traveled to many stations of is factory and learned more about his business but it was difficult to catch the details. 

After a very long, hot day of driving round the countryside, we got back to the office.  Will, one of the workers volunteered to go bike shopping with me and help me find a decent, second-hand one.  We drove around and eventually found a place that had two.  I ended up buying the little pink one for 650 RMB ($100), not bad! Will also offered to buy it off me at the end of summer.  Looks like I will be traveling in style! As I test drove, it seemed like the whole block gathered to watch, as if I didn’t turn enough heads before, I think an American on a bike is even a stranger sight than an American walking.  I cannot wait to explore the city! The ride back to the office was a crash course, but I passed with flying colors J. I am hoping to start my exploring small and steadily work outwards since cities in China can be very confusing.  Maybe because they are trying to building so quickly, or maybe because it is a communist country, but all the buildings look exactly the same.

Monday June 17, 2013

Today we took the bus into Hu’an.  We met up with the other interns and finally got to meet the CEO Aaron.  I became much more knowledgeable about Opportunity International and IOC.  Aaron seems great and loved our idea of redoing the website and creating links etc. After lunch we discussed our ideas more with Matt and proceeded to take our buses back to our branches. 

Brain Ku is planning a weekend trip to a famous Chinese mountain, which is know for its many temples and especially the temple of Confucius. The ride home was long but I did get some reading done.  Junda is a rather interesting character and I am not sure he understands the idea of thinking strategically.  Instead of getting off in the city, he insisted that we continue to the end of the route, taking another 40 minutes before we could get off; at which point his aunt and uncle picked us up and drove us back into the city the way we had just come.  His aunt and uncle are extremely nice and live up to the Chinese reputation of great generosity and hospitality, sometimes to the point that it is overwhelming.  They took us to KFC knowing that American food is something I have been craving and then escorted us through the supermarket, insisting that we stock up on groceries.  I now have 4 containers of milk, lots of Oreos, cheese, jam, Peanut butter, bread, Pepsi…

I am excited to see what the work tomorrow will be like, now that orientation is over and I have a project to begin.  Most of all I am excited to hopefully get a bike.

Sunday June 16, 2013

I finally got to sleep in today and Curtis and I decided to walk to KFC in the downtown block at night.  The hot fudge Sunday was incredible.  Most of the shops are pretty much the same, but the lights on the buildings and the fireworks in the background make for a esthetic atmosphere.  The radio tower in the middle of the city was particularly decked out in lights.   Along the way home we came across a small park and even saw a woman practicing her Kung Fu.

June 15, 2013

I took the bus this morning to Siyang, where Cutis’s branch is located.  It took about two hours but thankfully was not too stressful.  I think my dream of owning an electric bike/scooter may in fact soon become a reality!! I am so excited! I will be going shopping later today.  Curtis and Brian and I went out to walk around and look at bikes. In passing a tea shop we were asked to come in and try tea.  Tea in China is a luxury and can cost thousands of dollars a pound, so we said yes J.  The women in the tea store showed us more about the proper ways to drink tea, and how to hold the tiny cups.  It was fun, but after about 5 cups of tea we did our best to excuse ourselves.  We got to test ride some bikes at one of the stores, which was fun, but the best part of the day was making mac & cheese, and homemade garlic fries!

            We also went to KTV (karaoke) which was an experience.  You get put in your own private room, which could probably fit 20 people, and they have a giant screen and two microphones.  It was fun, especially seeing Junda get into it with the Chinese songs .