Night Markets and Foreign Banquets

Well, this week has been really good - I'm learning how to get into the rhythm of teaching and figuring out what I need to do to keep up my stamina, and having some fun with my classes. It's been fun and challenging!

Well, Fall is here, and Winter is just around the corner, and every morning I wake up and think, "GOD, it's freaking cold this morning..." But hey, Lanzhou gets cold. The central heating doesn't get turned on until November 1st, so I've got about a month before the heat comes on.

One thing that signals the onset of winter is the sweet potato vendors. As you can see, there's an empty oil barrel filled with wood/coals, and the sweet potatoes are baked whole right on top of the barrel.

From what I've heard, this was originally a Beijing/Northeastern tradition, but it seems that over the years, it's made its way out to Lanzhou and other places in China.

I don't eat sweet potatoes, but it's just one of those things that I see and think, "Well, I guess it's officially Fall now."

So, I've been up to a lot this past week - one of the things that I enjoyed the most was my trip to the Zhengning Night Market. It's one of Lanzhou's more famous and popular night markets, and deservedly so. There are a lot of great snacks to be had there.

One of the best things you can have there are the kebabs - lamb kebabs, chicken kebabs, octopus kebabs.....all kinds of great stuff.

They'll have the raw meat on sticks there, and they season it and cook it whenever you order it. It's pretty awesome, and really fresh! You can see the guy here seasoning it with a water bottle poked full of holes filled with the seasoning.

One of my favorite things is the octopus kebabs, and it's great, but the ones I had weren't cooked quiiite long enough, and I was thinking....."And yet again, I'm rolling the dice with my food here." Haha that's part of the deal in China. But I was fine.

It's a chaotic place - crowded, a little hot, dirty, and such delicious food. Oh, man.....it's so awesome, and so uniquely China.

I went there with a Chinese friend who hadn't been to Lanzhou in a while, so I got to sort of play the guide and she got to be the tourist.

We had a lot of fun sitting and chatting about China, America, life, culture, and a lot of great stuff. I was thinking,

"You know, this is life. This is a good time. Just watching the people go by, talking about culture, eating some delicious food, and not really doing anything."

I dunno, I enjoy those little moments of being idle and relaxing in this crazy, chaotic city. It's refreshing.

One thing that I enjoyed a couple of days ago was the Gansu Provincial National Day Reception for Foreign Experts. It was a little gathering for about 100-ish foreign teachers, delegates, and workers in Gansu Province.

I didn't know that it was a really special dinner, but apparently it was. Not a lot of people were invited to this dinner, so I was pretty lucky to go. Lanzhou Jiaotong University is a pretty well-regarded university in the province, so all the teachers were invited to go.

Only about 8 of us went, but it was pretty fun. As you can see, it was a pretty nice spread - a lot of great food, some wine (I don't like win), and some great conversation.

(Also, check out the menu. My favorite one is "Fried Bun stuffed with Vegetarian Stuff"....awesome, huh?)

We got to meet a lot of other foreigners, a few of them who had read my blog. I met a girl from Europe who had emailed me about coming to Lanzhou, and another American teacher who read my blog before coming to Lanzhou.

It was pretty cool to meet them, and it really made me feel like this whole blog thing is finally worth doing. I've gotten emails, met people who've read it, and I keep getting hits. It's nice to know that it's not just numbers - real people are actually reading it.

I always love meeting other foreigners in China, because we're all here for the same reasons - we love China, and we all are here to do something we can't really do back home.

It's also fun to share those funny stories about talking to kids, embarrassing moments, our crazy-normal lives. There's no such thing as a foreigner with a 'boring' life in China, and once you get a bunch of foreigners together, it's readily apparent. Once the China bug bites someone, it's not a bug that people that can easily get rid of.

Until next time,

Austin

P.S. - If you guys want to see more pictures of Lanzhou, I've got them up in a couple of albums on Facebook: Here and here and here. I've got way more, but it would be a lot of trouble to put up everything on here. Anyway, yeah......see you guys later!

Good Times and Being Content

So, it's been a while since I posted something, and a lot has happened in the past few days. I'll do a post tomorrow or the day after about the other stuff.

One thing that has been the highlight of my recent life was my trip to Bai Ta Shan, or White Pagoda (Tower) Mountain Park in Lanzhou.

It's located just north of Zhongshan Bridge near downtown Lanzhou.

Along with the bridge itself, it is a central landmark of the city. If you say, "Oh, it's by Bai Ta Shan," people will know exactly where you mean. 

Yeah, you can see from the pictures here, it's a pretty cool place - there's a lot of trees and shade, and it's pretty "new." 

Last year, it was being remodeled, so I didn't get to go to the park itself. I just got to go to another peak of the mountain range. 

I went with a bunch of Chinese friends and another foreign teacher. It was a great afternoon - a lot of laughs and a lot of new sights.  

The part is facing directly south. If you look at the picture here, you can see the gate to the park is directly across the street from the north-south running Zhongshan Bridge. Pretty much every important building, historical site, park, etc. has a gate somewhere, if not the main gate, facing north or south. 

That makes living in a city like Lanzhou easy. The river runs east-west, so you always can figure out where you are.

I had seen this exact picture so many times on the internet, but the pictures just aren't the same as actually being there. You just think to yourself, "Wow, I can't believe that I live here. This is such a crazy, amazing, polluted, wonderful, dirty, loud, and unique city. How did I end up here?" I did another post about "Seeing The Elephant," which talked about how it's impossible to understand these kind of feelings without actually being there. I hope someday you can come here and experience these things for yourself. It's great here.

You know, I came from a very small city of about 100,000 people, and to be in a city like this is a very interesting and wonderful experience.

It's so different from my hometown - Lanzhou has a long history and has a lot of special food and culture. I'm not saying that my hometown doesn't have these things, it's just a different kind of special.

Just look at this place - do you live in a place like this?? If you do, that's great! If you don't, try it! If you live in a big city, try going out to the countryside for a little while - find something different. It's been great for me, and I can't wait to try even more new things. It gives you this little rush - a little endorphin buzz every time you do something. It's something that can't be replicated.

Going to Bai Ta Shan may have just been a fun afternoon for my friends, but for me, it was a time to just be in the moment and reflect about where I'm at in my life right now.

I remember, just before I left for China, I was at church, and the preacher did a sermon about being content and not being restless in your life. For some people, they can find it in their job, some people can find it in religion, some people can find it with their friends, or any number of places.

For me, I am truly content in being here and continually learning new stuff and learning new things. I really wish I was my sister sometimes so I could pull out some crazy word from the Oxford English Dictionary to express myself, but I'm not, so I can't. I definitely miss home sometimes - my family, my friends, and the food, but I'm having a good time right now being a teacher and doing my China thing.

__________

Well, that's all I have for tonight - I'll put up another post about some other stuff  this weekend!

The Teaching Begins

Well, I guess I'm a teacher now!

As I write this, I've just finished teaching my classes for this week at Lanzhou Jiaotong University. It's been interesting, encouraging, discouraging, awesome, extraordinarily dull, and amazingly crazy all at the same time.

There are a lot of emotions for me because I'm a first-time teacher. Dull from teaching the same lesson 8 times a week, awesome because of the students, discouraging from the limitations of the book/curriculum, interesting because of the questions I've been asked, and a lot more.

I've got big classes - all around 60-70 students each, so it's going to be hard to get all of them interested and engaged. I can already tell which classes are going to be the most outgoing, which students will be the most interested, and which students don't understand anything I say. I hope to work more with them soon.

I'm teaching non-English major freshmen students. A pretty shy group, all in all. I've taught the first week - I teach 4 hours a day, 4 days a week. One hour of required "office hours" a week, and that's about all. Since I don't teach English majors, I don't have to deal with English Corner! (at least at the moment)

It's been really fun to be at the front of the class and talking about where I am from. It's so easy in one respect - this is my language and I'm talking about my home and my culture, but on the other hand, these are freshmen, non-English major students. I have to talk slower and make sure most of them understand what I'm talking about.


It's also really fun to share funny stories about being a foreigner in China - it feels good to have the whole class laugh and whisper and stuff at my comments. That way, I know they're paying attention. If I say something funny, and there's crickets.....then there's a problem and I need to explain myself haha

I have had no discipline problems whatsoever - it's always quiet, maybe too quiet. The students are smart, but they're shy. That's going to be the biggest challenge: getting them to come out of their shells. That's the big thing about Gansu students...they're just too shy.

Chinese students in general are too shy. They have low self-esteem, and they think they are not smart enough to contribute to the class. But if I ask them questions, they can answer them almost every time. If I can just convince them that they're worth something and that they're smart, maybe we can really open up and have some fun. I've really tried to emphasize this, and I've seen a couple of encouraging smiles and a twinkle in some students' eyes, and that's great. Maybe it won't always be there, but I'm happy right now.

We've talked about movies, music, sports, the Diaoyu Islands, Apple, traveling, and a lot more. It looks like this will be a good year.

I'm sorry that I haven't been posting much in the past week or two - I've been adjusting, preparing for my classes, losing my USB Drive (which gets videos from my laptop to the desktop computer with faster internet. Long story for not using the laptop), and my new addictions to "Inside the Actor's Studio" and "Drew Carey's Improv-A-Ganza."

The Unfamiliarity of it All

Finally, a new video is here! Yeah, I've been pretty much keeping to a once-a-week update unconsciously, so I guess I'll be sticking to that schedule!

I just got my teaching schedule and textbook/curriculum and everything, so I'll be putting up a post about that soon.

First, the videos! Watch, and then I'll get into more detail below. As always, YouTube and Youku:

 



As I said in my previous post and in this video, everything you do here is different. Everything. And to a certain extent, it is really wonderful, but sometimes it can be really tough.

I'm not really sure how to explain it, but there's a great amount of satisfaction to be had in daily life in China, especially in a place like Lanzhou, where there are few foreigners.

You find yourself in these seemingly normal circumstances here - buying food, going to a restaurant, talking to people in Chinese, seeing the neon lights at night, and all of these other things......to you they are normal life, and to be able to function in these ways without really thinking about it is really satisfying.

You have to use your Chinese to do all of these things, you have to always be aware of the fact that people may be staring at you literally all the time, you have to use your patience to deal with crowds or lines or noise or whatever, and at the end of the day, when (or if) you think about what happened that day or what you did that day, you kind of say,

"Oh, yeah, I totally just did ______ in China/Chinese, who knew I would/could ever do that?"

Just doing simple things requires a little work in another language or requires a little more thought, and it's these little daily/hourly challenges that make life here so interesting. Some people relish how awesome new and unfamiliar things are, and some people just don't.

You think and live with a different part of your mind here than you do back home. Because you're utilizing this other language, it changes how you think and how you deal with the circumstances around you, and that's something you just can't fully explain to people. It's one of the biggest reasons that people who come here stay here. 

That's about all I've got for you now - I guess I'll talk to you later!

Austin

"Don't Lose Your Sense of Wonder..." and Upcoming Projects

Well, I have run out of things to do today, so I guess I will put up a blog post! It's funny, blogging was so important a few days ago, and I have totally neglected documenting this "just arrived and still adjusting" time.

I spent yesterday and today at Lanzhou University of Technology, my old school, to see old friends and help one of them do a crazy difficult and heavily technical translation for a recruiting presentation. It was so difficult and seemed impossible at times, but together, we did it! I feel pretty accomplished because I was able to translate pretty well in my own right except for some really, really technical things (like different kinds of engineering projects and statistics kind of technical).

Basically, that made me realize that I DON'T want to be written translator. Ever. That's just too tedious, and because of the nature of written vs. spoken language (not just Chinese, any language), it's much harder and it takes the human element out of the equation. No fun.

Besides that, I hung out, had a few meals with, and joked around with my friends who are still left at L.U.T. - they kind of became my family during that time there, and it brings back memories of great times to see them.

Anyway, you didn't come here to read about me waxing nostalgic - you came here to read about me and Lanzhou (or just Lanzhou.). 

I met a couple of American teachers who live next door to me at Lanzhou Jiaotong University, and they are really cool - they're in their early 40s and the wife has spent some time in Kunming and Hohhot, Inner Mongolia. They can't speak much Chinese, so I gave them some advice and said I would help them out anytime they needed. I like them a lot, and I hope we can hang out more.

Campus is still kind of crazy with all the new students - I see people giving tours to groups of 30-50 people at a time and people are clogging the shops to stock their rooms with snacks, water containers, etc.

Living in China is a constant exercise of your patience, your sense of adventure, and your capacity to deal with unfamiliarity. Pretty much how you do everything in China is different from how it's done in America. The public transportation system is the best way to get around, which is new to most Americans, water must be boiled before drinking, walking is just part of life, not an exercise regime, people drink tea instead of coffee and soda, eat rice, noodles and dumplings instead of pot roast, steak, hot dogs, and burgers, and live in apartments instead of suburban houses. It's a whole different way of life.

My dad told me,

"Hey, while you're over there, don't lose your sense of wonder and appreciation at where you are. You have a really unique opportunity, and you need to not lose sight of where you are and where you come from."

That's been rolling around in my head a lot these past few days, and while the wonder is still fresh in my head being sort of "fresh off the plane" for this time, it's my third time to come to China and to Lanzhou. It's more or less daily life, and it's hard to shake your head out of the daily routine and remember where you are. Most days last year, I totally forgot I was living in China - it was just life. Anyway, I'll try to stay conscious of that.

Anyway, I will make a video about all of that soon - I've been a bit busy and distracted to film much stuff. I've got about 2 minutes of raw footage I could spin into a video, but I want to wait until I've got enough for a good video. I want to make good stuff, you know?

I met an American couple online who are in Lanzhou now who said they saw my videos and read my blog about Lanzhou, and they said it gave them a lot of really good information, so I'm very happy about that, and the American couple who live next door to me said they read my blog and watched my videos as well, so it appears that what I'm doing is at least reaching a few people.

I know  that Lanzhou seems like a relatively unimportant place in a world with cities like New York City, Shanghai, Beijing, Mumbai, London, Sydney, and Chicago, but that doesn't mean that it's not a place worth visiting. It's a whole different kind of city, with great people, great food, unique culture, and a long history.

I will be putting together a series of pages/posts about a "Guide to Lanzhou" project, and I'm hoping to get some feedback from my readers and the people I know here as to what they want to see in it. In the future, I'm kind of hoping that my blog will become a significant stopping place for people who want to visit northwest China, and hopefully Lanzhou in particular. It's got it's faults, sure, but I like it just the way it is.

Until next time,

Austin Guidry

I Got This!......Wait, No I Don't

So, yeah, I was walking around campus after going to 西站 or the "West Station" in Lanzhou.

I just bought a Chinese version of Tom Sawyer, a few snacks, explored the final corners of campus, and was just thinking,

"Wow, great, I could really get used to this. I've finally got the hang of the area and campus."


And then I proceeded to get lost.
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That's what you get, I guess. I finally got my head on straight and found my apartment, and THIS time, I really think I got the hang of the campus layout. It's a big place, so it's a little easy to get turned around the first day or two. But I got it now! (I think)

I was kind of annoyed at the lack of restaurants and shops on campus at first. Actually, really annoyed. Pissed, really. But I had neglected a corner of campus that apparently had ALL of them haha

It's cool now. I'm not mad anymore.

It seems that most universities are like that - they can pretty much be self-sufficient. There are shops, restaurants, offices, and all kinds of stuff on campus. But if you want raw vegetables to cook or some special items, then you gotta get off campus.

I'm settling into my new place. It's not a two-bedroom apartment, so it's a lot smaller, but hey, it's pretty cool. It's more decorative and....I dunno, unique than apartment at Lanzhou University of Technology.

This is the living room. Just to the right of the photo is my desk and computer/printer.

I like it a lot, and I've unpacked everything. After going to the market, it's starting to look a little bit like a home.

There's not a lot going on besides the move itself. I've got a few things that need to be taken care of like my residence permit and foreign expert certificate, but other than that, I'm pretty much free for the next week!

I spent part of the morning and early afternoon off campus wandering around Lanzhou's West Station and bought the aforementioned Tom Sawyer.

I got lunch at KFC, which was not bad, although the KFCs in China are a little more bland than their western counterparts. I got the "Double Stacked Sichuan Sandwich" with some fries and a mango-peach juice or something like that because they were out of soda.

I'm happy to be back in Lanzhou - it's a great city, although it's really big. I was sitting on the bus earlier today and thinking, "Dang, this city is big.....I kind of forgot about that."

The area around Jiaotong University is a giant shopping center and doesn't have a lot of the family-operated shops that I liked so much about Lanzhou University of Technology.

It IS a lot newer than the stuff around L.U.T., and maybe that's why I don't like it as much. It doesn't have the character that

However, I've only been here a couple of days, so I can't say that I've found everything, but that's just my impression so far. I can't make all the decisions and judgments about the place in two days - this is a nice campus and it's just a different area.

As open as I am to living in other countries and traveling and stuff, it's weird how much I don't like change......I keep thinking:

"Man, this isn't L.U.T.. I want to go to You Jia for my favorite potato dish and that Sichuan place for the spicy fish and beef dishes! I don't WANT to go to these restaurants around here!!!!"

What the heck is wrong with me?! hahaha

I'll be back later with some more updates and pictures! I don't know if they'll be interesting or not, but hopefully they are. I've seen a couple of cool alleyways with lots of shops and restaurants that look promising. You'll like those pictures!

 I'm off to read Tom Sawyer!

About Huan, China (Videos and More)

Today, these videos come from Huan County, Gansu Province. This is the hometown of my best friend, Benjamin Xi.

It is a really great little town nestled in the mountains of southeastern Gansu.

As you can see on this map, it's in that weird little fin that borders Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in the southeast of Gansu.

Huan is one of my favorite places because it's one of the places that is pretty much untouched by Western influence, or at least as untouched as it can be. There are no McDonald's, no KFCs, no Pizza Huts, Starbucks, foreign investors, foreign teachers, foreign firms or anything like that. It's a completely Chinese city, and that's cool. Lanzhou is pretty much a Chinese-only city, but the number of foreigners in the city has definitely increased in the past few years. I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing - I'm just saying it's a trend. I'm not one to really make that kind of call.

I visited Huan last year as well, and it's still pretty much exactly as I remembered it.  It's still a great place that's way out of the way of most foreigners.

Huan is a very old city, with parts of it dating to the Song Dynasty (960-1279 A.D.) and before, including this wall.

Amazing, yeah?

 It's crazy, nothing this old stands in America and as someone who studied and has a degree in History, it's beyond amazing to be able to see and touch something that's been around for so long. 

I'm not knocking America for being too young or anything - it just hasn't had the chance to stick around for that long yet.

Seriously though, how cool is that?!

One of the things Huan is famous for is its embroidery, particularly its handmade insoles. It may not be famous abroad, but in China, Gansu is the home of artful embroidery. This photo on the left is an example of it, although not a great one. Unfortunately I am away from the pair I was given by Ben's mom -- it's much more beautiful than this one. This one's only so-so.

The amazing thing about these is that they're totally made by hand. The firm inside is basically extremely hardened dough (that will never cook again), and the outside white cover is handsewn.

Then the fun begins.

It's all done by needle and thread. One needlestick and colored thread at a time. Ben told me that the pair I was given took about 300 hours of solid work. Wow. 300 hours - imagine putting that kind of time and energy into something that you'll walk on and ruin.

I didn't wear mine. They're too beautiful.

I can't wait to go back again - the people of Huan are hard-working, friendly, very hospitable people. The only complaint I have is that their dialect is hard to understand, but maybe that's because I'm just a white boy who can't speak enough Chinese to understand......

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That's about all I have to say about Huan County at the moment - maybe when my friend Benjamin comes to the States, he can write something about his hometown for you guys! Until next time! My comment section is always open for you!

Chillin' at Lanzhou University of Technology (Video)

I've still got some videos to put on here, but here's one that I made during the first week of my trip.


During me and Rob's trip to Lanzhou, we did a lot of the stuff that we wanted to do. We ate some great food, saw our old friends, played ping pong and badminton, and soaked in the atmosphere of relief and relaxation.

The school year was coming to an end, so most people were finishing up their tests, and the ones who were done were doing absolutely nothing - my favorite activity haha. 

It was great to settle back into the routine of seeing everybody, going to places like the Yellow River, the new soccer field at L.U.T., and not doing much, but just enough to make us really tired at the end of the day.

We both got to learn a little something about the process of graduation for the seniors. The seniors take their applications for graduation to get approved and signed for, and once they're approved, they have to rent their graduation caps and gowns, then they're off to take pictures with all their friends! The pictures are a big deal for them, because it's the last chance for them to all be together for a long time. Each department hold their own special farewell party, and people cry. The emotions are the same as any graduation anywhere, but the process itself is very different. Hooray for learning!

Me, Rob, and all our friends shared meals, activities, laughs, mutual confusion over Chinglish, and now, some great memories.

See you guys next time!

Back in the States

Wow, what a ride!  Hey everyone, I'm back in the States! I'm still suffering from jetlag and I still have yet to catch up on my YouTube subscription and put all the pictures on Facebook, but I'm pretty happy.

Life in L.U.T goes on - a lot of my friends graduated and are moving onto the next step of their lives.

The campus was pretty busy when me and Robert  arrived - since the seniors were graduating, they were trying to sell all their books/clothes/whatever  to the younger students who might need them later.

The campus was in a mild state of chaos with all the noise from the student-turned-vendors, but it was interesting. We don't do that kind of thing in the States.

We went around all the places that I wanted to go - including Zhongshan Bridge.



This bridge is one of the key landmarks of Lanzhou - it was the first bridge built across the Yellow River in a provincial-level city. Built by the Germans as well.



It bridges the gap between the northern and southern part of the city and lies just beneath Bai Ta Mountain, which stands atop the mountain on the north side of the Yellow River.

The Yellow River itself is something worth noting. 

It's the mother of Chinese civilization, which is why it is still called the "Mother River," even today.

The Yellow River provides a measure of tranquility in this crazy little city - people take their pets down to the water, sit in little cafes, drink tea, do Tai Chi, and more. You'll find lots of couples, families, and elderly people along the river.

It was great to be walking along the river again - drinking in the cool breeze in the lovely afternoon. 80 degrees with no humidity and a slight breeze - wonderful!

Of course, what you look forward to the most is your friends. I couldn't wait to see all of my friends again. 

All of us together, sharing meals, taking walks, talking about anything from girls to guns to Chicago to the TV show "The Big Bang Theory" (which seems to be waaaay more popular in China than America). 

"Rock-Paper-Scissor-Lizard-Spock!"

Life goes on in Lanzhou and at L.U.T.. Some time has passed, and while there are new faces, not a lot has changed around campus and in the Qilihe District of Lanzhou. The same hole-in-the-wall restaurants with the same waitresses still serve the same great food, the teachers still bring their children to the playground and soccer field to play at night, the students still do (or don't do) their homework, and time marches on without regard for anyone else.

It was a wonderful trip - I got to do everything I wanted to do and more. Keep an eye out for more posts, there's some cool stuff coming up!

Feel free to comment or to subscribe to my blog - it's totally free and no sign-up and I would love to hear from you!

Didn't I Just Get Here?

Holy crap, I'm leaving tomorrow....that's weird, I feel like I just got here.

As a tourist of sorts, 3 weeks was a pretty appropriate length trip. It was short, but not so short that I had to rush everything. I got to do basically everything I wanted to do:

Go to Zhongshan Bridge and downtown Lanzhou

See the Yellow River

Eat at my favorite Bao Zi restaurant

Eat some of Lanzhou's famous Beef Noodles

Eat various other things haha

Visit Ben's family in Huan Xian

Visit the "Tiger Cave" town/village

Visit and stay in a cave home in very remote Gansu

Be surrounded by a terraced landscape of mountains at the peak of the harvest

See all my old friends

See you guys back in the States! Much love!

Feel free to comment or to subscribe to my blog - it's totally free and no sign-up and I would love to hear from you!

6-23: The Big Bang Theory

"Hey Austin, let's go to the cafeteria and get some beef noodles."

hahaha I finally saw my buddy Ryan the other day - this is his most famous line. He was in a movie that me and my friends made together, and that line interrupts someone else trying to speak to me in broken English. 

We had a lot of laughs about that, and many other things.

One thing that surprised me was that, out of all the things Chinese college students could attach themselves to from the American media, "The Big Bang Theory" seems to be the most prevalent of them.  Me and my buddies literally talked about the Big Bang Theory on and off for hours, because they love it so much and because I love it so much - it has become an international show, apparently.

"Remember when Amy got that painting for Penny?"

"Remember when Leonard proposed to Penny in bed?"

"[Knock knock knock] Penny. [Knock knock knock] Pennny. [Knock knock knock] Penny."

"Did you see the latest one when Howard was about to go into space?"

"Was that REALLY Stephen Hawking in that episode?"

Hahaha it was really funny, and an unexpected pleasure!

"The Big Bang Theory" aside, we all had a lot of laughs. Me and my buddies went to Lanzhou University of Technology's West Campus to meet up with people, play some pool, get some bubble tea, check out the new 3D movie theater on campus. Yes. 3D movies. On Campus. Dude.

Awesome.

The only downside of the day was the sandstorm and the rain, but hey - it didn't ruin our friendship or anything, it just kind of cramped our style.

It really was a perfect day - one of those where you just spend time with people you love to hang out with, have a few laughs, and just waste the day away. You won't remember the details, but the feelings you all shared will be there, and the ease of conversation and laughter will not soon be forgotten. 

It was a homecoming, of sorts, and I can only hope that the feeling will be present in my upcoming job at Lanzhou Jiaotong University.

I'll talk about that soon, I promise!

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Feel free to comment or to subscribe to my blog - it's totally free and no sign-up and I would love to hear from you!

HyperSmash.com

Top 8 Facts About China (and Thoughts on Vlogging)

Hey, guys! (and ladies.....hello, ladies)

Today I'm coming at you with my Top 8 Facts About China in vlog form. I've been sort of addicted to vlogging because I just love being able to tell stories. I love being in front of the camera and talking about stuff that I love, which is China.

Vlogging is such a great way to do that - it's still relatively new and is exploding all over the internet - from China to Giraffes to Tea to Music, vloggers talk about all kinds of things, and are able to share their gift of storytelling through the medium of video.

Here's my latest one from my YouTube Channel - http://www.youtube.com/user/austinguidry2





I'm still learning and improving on my vlogging techniques - if you watch the first video that I ever did all the way up until what I've done now, you can see how I've improved.

I've really begun to realize just how much of an art form that vlogging can be - there are so many different facets to the way things are shot, the way you say things, whether or not you have a script or lighting or a microphone, how you use your jump cuts or your silence.....it's really hard, but can sometimes just be organic and in-the-moment.

I really love doing it, and I can't wait to get back over to Lanzhou to do more and share my adventures with you!

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My Daily Life in a Chinese City

I've been really surprised at the number of views on my posts concerning what Chinese cities are like, so I thought I'd post a little something about the subject, since it seems to be a topic of interest.

[by the way, the blog hit 10,000 total hits a few days ago! Great milestone for me!]

Although I'm not in China now, I can remember very well the daily routine of the life of a foreign student in mid-sized Lanzhou (3.3 million people) when school was not in session. Some of the stuff is not exactly pretty, but it's part of what's really in China. I love China just as much (or more) than America, but there's no such thing as a perfect country.

Breakfast

Breakfast usually consisted of 饼子 of some kind (sort of like if a pancake and a crepe had a baby. A wonderful, tasty, baby), and then a short walk to the bus stop to either the West Campus of 兰州理工大学 (Lanzhou University of Technology) or to 西关, a downtown region of Lanzhou. It could be any other place, but for this post it'll be 西关 (pronounced "She-Gwan") and Zhongshan Bridge.

The Bus

In Chinese cities, the bus is what most people take to get places. Depending on where you're at, they can be air conditioned and clean with a few people in them or hot, dirty, musty, smoky, and crowded with all of the migrant workers of the entire city.

It's different from place to place, and you never really know what it's gonna be like when you step on - you just hope to God that it's not so bad.

On an average day in Lanzhou, you'll be standing up in the bus. Only one bus line in the city has air conditioning, and I think it's bus line 1. How appropriate, right? The #1 bus is the only one with air conditioning.

Most buses have windows you can slide open if it gets too hot, but it's generally not too unbearable unless it's the weekend and everybody's going downtown to shop. God forbid. I really didn't enjoy the weekend crowds.

The Streets

Just like every section in this post - it depends on where you are. If you're in Guangzhou or Beijing or any other city that sees a lot of tourist and/or foreign business activity, it's pretty clean and organized with a decent amount of English speakers.

However, if you're in Lanzhou, Huan Xian, parts of northern Beijing, or any other place where not many tourists go and no foreigners "dare to venture", it's a little different. Many streets are dirty or under construction, there's a lot of trash in places, and you can see a lot more of China's poverty. It's in these moments that you are forced to confront the fact that you're in another country. Not many streets in America will have kids wearing only dirty t-shirts run through the street and playing in trash piles and peeing on the street. Seen it.

The People

When walking the streets of Lanzhou, I was usually left alone except for the occasional "Hello," but it was whenever I was idling about by myself or just standing alone looking at the Yellow River that people usually came up and talked to me.

(Okay, this photo is cheating...it's actually on a train, but he DID just start talking to me)

It's true - it's not just some funny story we tell people for fun. People really do come up to foreigners and try to practice their English! If they don't speak English, you'll get to practice your Chinese. This is especially true in certain situations:

1.) The person who comes up to you is alone.
2.) You are alone or are only with other foreigners.
3.) You are just idling about and not really doing anything.
4.) You say you can speak a little bit of Chinese and are friendly.

If you're with another Chinese person, it's rare that a strange Chinese person will approach you if they speak sub-standard English. They'll assume your Chinese buddy will be fluent and that they'll be inferior. Best advice - go alone to a place where you know you can just hang out and chill.

For me, that was the area around Zhongshan Bridge.

The area on the far side of this picture is green, shaded, and dotted with small beaches and areas where you can sit and buy a drink and just chill.

Along that street, you can see a lot of older people in the morning doing Tai Chi, and in the afternoon you can see some doing different types of martial arts or playing the Erhu or any number of activities.

It's a great little area that reminds you of why you wanted to come to China in the first place.

After hanging out and talking to a few people, it's always cool to go to 西关 (pronounced "she-gwan"), which is the most cosmopolitan area of the city. It's mostly pedestrian roads and has a lot of shopping centers and restaurants and tea houses. It's the perfect place to go for a snack. I don't really have any pictures of 西关 itself, which is something I'll have to rectify, but I've got some video of it here and here if you want to check it out.

Other

Usually, after that, I'd go back home to the apartment and just chill until dinner, which was at one of the local restaurants, but I'd also do laundry every couple of weeks or so. Very involved process you can see here at my YouTube page. If YouTube's blocked in your country, sorry....I'll put them up on Youku eventually

You'll get a few (or a lot) of strange calls. I've gotten calls from:

1.) The International Office of L.U.T. asking if I would hang out with a high school kid who wanted to practice his English

2.) From a local TV producer asking me do participate in a segment about my culture shock in Lanzhou

3.) From a primary school asking me to come down to participate in "English Adventure Day"

4.) From a VERY wealthy businessman who wanted me to help him in some very lucrative (and possibly illegal) business ventures

5.) From many random people that I never met or talked to before.....just to chat! "You're a foreigner in Lanzhou? Oh, what's your name?......etc."

6.) Calls from anyone and everyone inviting me to dinners, parties, just to hang out, help with schoolwork

7.) To travel to Tibet......wait, what? Yeah, I got a series of texts/calls from some random guy who wanted to take me to Tibet. My friend Elizabeth would've jumped on it in a heartbeat haha. Yeah, I don't think I told you about that one, did I? Maybe I should've called you, yeah? haha

I'm a pretty friendly guy, and once I got over there, I made it a policy of mine to never refuse an offer for a new experience unless it was: physically dangerous, illegal, or if I was really ill. I never once did, and I don't regret any of it - I had a lot of interesting experiences, and you've got to be open.

When people find out how open you are to try new stuff, you'll get more and more friends, more and more calls, and you'll be a popular dude! (or chick).

So, if I had to sum up my Lanzhou life in a nutshell, that'd be about it!

See you guys next time,

Austin.

WC Bob (I'm Sorry, Man)

I'm sorry to have to tell this story, but it's way too funny to keep secret anymore. I do feel bad about this, though.

Okay, so when I was in Lanzhou, I met a whole lot of people. Of course I did, China's got a ton of people, and since I was Lanzhou University of Technology's first-ever exchange student, I got a lot of attention, right? Yeah.

So, anyway, I met a bunch of dudes who were going to study abroad the next year - among them Janson and Freddy, who became my bandmates and my best friends while I was over there.

I also met Bob.

Bob was also going to study at NEIU - I didn't know him that well, and I still don't, but I liked him and still like him. Occasionally, I will still talk to him.

When I first met him, it was on L.U.T.'s West Campus, because that's where he lived. We talked, exchanged numbers, and I put him in my phone as "WC Bob" - short for "West Campus Bob", because I already had a "Bob" in my phone.

Now, here's where things get a little complicated. China has a couple of hundred years' worth of history in dealing extensively with Europeans, mainly the British and Germans. Even now, there are traces of this influence all over the country, but none more odd than the WC sign.

The WC sign is known as representative of one thing: the bathroom - public bathrooms, more often than not. It took me a long time and a lot of asking before I found out WC stood for "Water Closet," a mostly British term.

No doubt, you can see where this is going.

I had never connected the name in my phone and the sign on the streets as being the same. They were always locked away in my brain as two different things, of course. WC Bob is a cool dude, and the WC is where I go to the bathroom. I never even thought about the fact that it could be a point of embarrassment for Bob.

A few months had gone by, and I was in Guangzhou (Canton, for you historians and old-timers haha) with Bob and some of the other L.U.T. students, when we were trying to find out what Bob was up to.

Somebody's phone was dead, and I said, "Use mine, he's under WC Bob."




................................"What?"

"WC Bob. West Campus Bob - that's where he lives, right?"

................................."Dude, WC is the toilet."

And wouldn't you know it, Bob walked in right then. Perfect timing.

"HEY, WC Bob!!! We were trying to find you!" said the other guys.

He was really confused, and once the whole story emerged, both of us were quite embarrassed - me because of my ignorance, and Bob because of his newly-found nickname. I believe it's been forgotten, but just in case it hasn't, I want to take this moment and tell Bob that I'm sorry. That was my bad, dude, and I know they gave you crap about it for a little while.

Sorry, dude.

And that's the story of Bob "WC" ****, a true tale of cultural ignorance, loss of face, and forgetfulness.

Seeing the Elephant

If you've ever spent significant time abroad, there's just something about it that is uncommunicable about your experience - that's what I'm talking about today. If you've been abroad, tell me where, when, and if you agree - I'd love to hear about it!

There is a phrase that combat veterans sometimes use when referring to the experiences of war and why they are so often reluctant to talk about it. It's called "seeing the elephant." It's an odd phrase that has some interesting origins, but I don't really want to get into that, but here's Wikipedia if you really want to know:

"Seeing the Elephant" Wiki

What I really want to talk about is the meaning the phrase. 

Currently, the phrase seems to pop up a lot among military combat veterans, particularly the enlisted. When someone has "seen the elephant," it means they have seen combat. 

It sounds simple, but there are a lot of dimensions to seeing combat - I was reading "Shooter" by Jack Coughlin and he talks about seeing the elephant. He says that if you've never felt the sting of smoke in your eyes, never heard a bullet zing by you, never killed a man, never smelled the stench of death, then you can never really talk about war with veterans. 

He says that in order for you to truly understand what war is, you have to be there and experience it yourself. Otherwise, war is just something sterilized you've seen on TV or read about in books.

This may seem like a clumsy parallel, but I believe that living abroad is the same way - you just have to be there to understand what kind of experience living in China is. When you've walked through the Hutongs of Beijing,

                         When you've hung out with people that don't speak your language,

When you smell the garbage dump you pass by every day to get to class (or go to a restaurant),

When you go across the world and meet wonderful friends who become your adopted family,

When you meet a girl you like and she likes you, but her dialect is so heavy you can't communicate well,

When you've been disturbed in the middle of the night by 'women of the night' coming into your hotel room.

When you've tried and failed to understand so much dialect from random cities that you feel like your language study has been worthless,

When you go down to a place as old, majestic, and historic as the Yellow River with your buddies just to skip rocks and kill time,

there's just something that is beyond communication to others. You tell them and they say, "that's cool," but that's all. There's just an added dimension there which is impossible to really convey. You had to be there.

You had to see the elephant.