Inconsistencies

In LA in limbo (is that redundant?)...

Sat, 06 Oct 2007 21:01:20 GMT

One of the pleasures/annoyances of travel is that often the ability to go or do is taken from you by the infrastructures that be and you end up with time to kill. (Very odd phrase that) Killing time puts me in a strange limbo frame of mind in which it is difficult to focus on work. Of course it's always difficult to focus on work for some reason or another and I am a master procrastinator, but there does seem to be something different about the distraction through enforced passive limbo waiting that occurs while en route.

In that mode I am stuck in the part of LA near the airport until it's time to board my rebooked 11:50pm West Coast time flight to Guangzhou. Continental forced me to miss yesterdays by circling 3 times above LA before landing an hour late. Naturally Hilton, the hotel that Continental booked me into, (a process which took about 3 hours if you include being sent from desk to desk and terminal to terminal, incompetent help, infrequent shuttle and long check-in line) has a 12:00pm check out time. (Naturally I retaliated by taking two long showers. So effective. To my credit I thought about getting rid of the travel and aggravation kinks, upping the endorphins, and lightening my mood by exercising, but naturally Hilton's gym is under reconstruction and my swimsuit is in the suitcase currently ambiguously "en route" to some unspecified location.)

What to do with the next almost 12 hours? Stay at the hotel floating through the lobby, the restrooms and the overpriced cafe? Head to the airport and do essentially the same there? In this case I chose the stay-longer-at-the hotel option, in part because I paid $10 for 24 hours of wireless connection here and don't want to end up in airport without such and in part because I'm guessing that the chairs here are more comfortable than the chairs there. Although I might qualify for the Continental first-class lounge because of my frequent flyer miles. Hmmm...

Stretching

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 15:11:19 GMT

This is the first morning in a very long time (I tried to calculate months, etc, and couldn't) that I've woken up alone (except for three demanding cats)in a house. It's rather odd, peaceful, and pleasant; I'm not really sure what to do with myself. Sure, I have a lot of work to do; I have even already started; I have even already been "connected" to other humans through technology. Nevertheless, in an "empty" house with the clock ticking and the church bells sounding, the day and the space just feels so expansive. Hope Teo and Lauren are enjoying their vacation in Belgium. I am certainly enjoying their house.

swimming in Shantou

Wed, 05 Sep 2007 23:05:58 GMT

My aunt wrote back to express how very impressed and proud she was of me for my international swimming prowess. Indeed she was going to copy the post to my cousins to inform them of my amazing natatory triumph. Somewhat consternated and worried that some extensive revision was in order, I was vividly reminded that all texts do indeed have multiple readings and author's intent no longer applies. Despite the possible futility of the effort, I thought that some further framing of my heroics might help discourage any similar reactions. Also I get to pontificate/speculate on comparative regimes of body discipline in Shantou and Ithaca.

Point 1) I am a very slow swimmer in comparison with most of similar height/weight/age in the USA. When swimming on campus or at the Y, I often have to use the ignominious slow lane at the edge of the pool, usually reserved for beginners or people at least twice my age.

Point 2) I am very lazy swimmer. I rely on my body's natural tendency to float to do most of the work. My stroke is nearly perfectly in tune with its mission - to get me across some distance in the water with as little physical effort as possible.

Point 3) Most swimmers in Shantou are even slower than I am.

Point 4) Most swimmers in Shantou expend far more effort than I do - perhaps because their body fat quotient does not allow them to float as easily as I do, perhaps because they splash more, or perhaps simply because they like it that way.

There are, however, other possible reasons for why Shantou swimmers tend to be both slower and more effortful than I and those answers concern the difference in the meanings and functions of swimming within Shantou, but I will get to them later. Let me know if I should just keep such ponderings to myself.

International Fame

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 00:12:36 GMT

hello friend and relations,

Just wanted to let you know that you are less than 6 degrees separated from the newest in international celebrity.

I am once again newly famous in Shantou for swimming across the channel in the annual "International Shantou Swim Across the Channel". This took place the morning of the 25th before leaving 3 hours later for HK so as to not overstay my visa. The universe was telling me to make the swim. I had participated a couple of years ago and missed the event last year. I had turned down 3 offers from friends of mine, because I thought I was leaving that day in the morning, but then my ticket got changed to noon. Lam and I went swimming at Shantou university the evening before and I was 'HELLO!'d by this incredible cute old guy in the pool with an impressive paunch and wearing round bug-eye glasses and a neon yellow swim cap. He asked me if I wanted to participate the next day as well. Convinced that this was indeed a sign from somewhere (I'm thinking Shantou local place gods, rather than from 'above'), I acquiesced. There was a young man with him who kept swimming too close to me and I felt crowded so I lapped him to give myself room, only to discover afterwards that he was their best swimmer and the older guy had asked him to pace me during the event to make sure I would be safe. Oops! Luckily his ego didn't seem all that bruised. After finishing laps and heading out of the pool, I found out that, unlike before when I was one of the massive swimming hordes, this year I was to be swimming with the primary corporate sponsor of the event, Jingang Glass (a company that Lam's architecture firm had worked with to build a hot springs resort), with the very first group of people to hit the water.

As I was apparently the only thing/person that made the Shantou International Swim Across the Channel, 'international,' I was excellent advertising (guy in the neon cap was apparently no slouch in marketing) and was frequently pulled out of the crowd of sponsor group swimmers I was trying desperately to hide behind for photo ops before the event started. Once my presence was noticed by a sports bureau official, yet another swimmer (this time a young lady from the city swim team) was delegated to pace me as well. I don't think any other swimmer could have possibly been safer! While apparently an excellent marketing scoop, guess I was also perceived as a potential USA-China relations disaster should I have the temerity to cramp half way through. At least this second swimming companion looked like the channel barely counted as a warm up. If anything happened to our other companion, I'd have help rescuing him.

Well, at least as far as the three of us were concerned, nothing untoward occurred throughout the watery experience. I scraped my foot heading into the water, but barely noticed in the confusion. Luckily for me, Jingang Glass had rigged a floating sign that was towed across by six swimmers making it easy to follow the largely unmarked route (there were first aid ships, but weren't always visible in the waves). I was somewhat confused when a large ship (I believe navy?) swam right across the route in the middle, but other than that, it was just lots of dirty water, occasional bumps from other swimmers' feet and elbows, and constant checking to stay on route (due to current, one had to head directly across thus allowing the tide to sweep you diagonally to the end point). Not really remembering how long a swim it was I paced us really slowly and ended up on the other side about 35? 45? minutes later barely warmed-up enough to feel my muscles, to be pulled onto the red astroturf carpet placed over the dock and then greeted by an enterprising, if somewhat damp official in dress clothes for yet more photos. His companion, a young lady, smiled fetchingly for the cameras, shouted "congratulations' in English and then thrust a bunch of flowers into my arms where they could be refreshed by the polluted water that still clung to me. I was only then allowed to head up the rest of the ramp and to the side. Along the way someone else shoved Gatorade into one of my hands and someone else (never really saw who) threw a towel over my shoulders. It was while trying to juggle flowers and Gatorade that I finally saw Lam waiting, but was unable to do more than smile before being mugged by TV journalists. Lucky me!

Lam is now collecting newspapers with my gorgeous swimsuit/bathing cap/goggles photo plastered on them and according to friends and Lam's family, I was the focus of much of the Shantou TV news for a couple of days as well. Apparently the 70 year old man who made it across didn't get nearly the same amount of coverage. Round-eye trumps age in Chinese media. What is filial piety coming to? That's what comes of being friends with one of the primary sports journalists of Shantou (when surrounded by TV/radio journalists and no longer wanting to answer questions, I just pointed to her and told them that as a good friend of mine she had all the answers about me) and having the head of the Sports Bureau as one my informants. Just what I always wanted to be famous for, looking like an overly curvy drowned rat in a red bathing cap after swimming across a dirty channel very very slowly. Sigh.

International celebrity at last! Think it will help me get a job?

Car Salons

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 06:27:12 GMT

So riffing of a comment from pkdan, yes, people in China (or at least in Shantou) are VERY proud of their "investment" into passenger cars. And this indeed might be one of the reasons they are kept so shiny, but that's definitely not the whole story.

Here's the rub, passenger cars are not really investments in China because of the high cost to benefit ratio. They are luxuries and the premier example of conspicuous consumption (which explains the obsessive washing even better than the investment paradigm) aside from banquet dining, brand-name clothing, and monster houses. Until recently, foreign cars were priced at 3 times their pre-import price due to tax as luxuries. As the domestic industry has developed and as more and more people are clawing their way into middle-class consumption, however, prices have started to come down and the 200% tax was adjusted much lower. As a result the purchase of a car has come to mean that one (or one's family) "has arrived" into the brave new world of surplus income.

For this reason, cars are washed, petted and cossetted. In China cars have it good; they even have their own beauty salons where they can be washed, waxed, decorated (the same word as used for interior design in houses), and outfitted with stereos, dodads and knicknacks. The word for these car salons is exactly the same as that for hair salons, and with the exception that the customers are much larger and require more water, the idea is very similar. The client arrives and is immediately surrounded by attendants who see to the client's every perceived need. They get rinsed, soaped, lathered, scrubbed, rinsed and rubbed down. The services available include entirely replacing one's old clothes, like rugs and tires. The clients even get to put their "feet" up as they are often raised off the floor so that the attendants can get to their lower extremities. Meanwhile the relatives of the customer are invited into the adjoining room which is a sparkling clean, bright, showroom of accessories (fuzzy dice are soooo last year). There the companions to the client drink tea, read beauty magazines, and browse through the fashion accessories for that week while waiting for the beautifying process to be over. The Boy was flipping through Chinese Cosmo last time.

And, just like the human-oriented salons, you can also get a color treatment. Like many in the US, many happy Chinese car owners are wont to paint "wicked" designs all over their cars such as flames, running horses, hot women, dragons, etc. Unlike the US, many cars, particularly the small ones that come in neon, also have large children's cartoon characters pasted over them in bright happy colors. These neon, pastel or primary colored, preschool-like designs are often also paired with phrases in Chinese or cliched Chinglish. The result is something oddly resembling a mobile, badly translated Hallmark card. And all of it can be done at your local car salon which sparkles and shines. When will the American public wake up to this amazing entrepreneurial idea?

Negotiation

Wed, 28 Feb 2007 04:06:57 GMT

"Three kuai!" "Three kuai!"

The line of tricycle drivers at the mall entrance shout out low prices in an attempt to outbid each other in volume and price. The Boy and I walk over to one, loaded down with bags of groceries.

"To Lotus Market."

"Ok. Ok. Get in!"

Uh. Uh. Nothing doing. We weren't born yesterday.

"How much?" The Boy asks.

"Six!"

"Five." The Boy points to me. "Just one. No bags."

The pedicab driver grunts in assent, waves his hand, and nods while motioning to the seat of the tricyle. I get in and wave good-bye to The Boy. A few minutes of weaving, dangerous traffic later we arrive at my destination. I get off and try to hand the driver a five.

"No. No." The tricycle driver waves his hand in denial. "Seven. Seven."

"No." I wave my hand in imitation. "We already agreed. Five. Take it or leave it."

"Two more. Two more. You owe two more."

"No. I don't. If you don't want the five, I can give it to that guy over there." I point to the tricycle driver enjoying the show and resting in his own vehicle two feet away.

"Seven. Seven."

"If you don't want it, you can throw it away. The price was five." I stick the bill in his tricycle basket and walk away.

"Hey! Hey!" I don't turn around.

"It really was seven." I hear quietly behind my back. I turn to see my driver talking with resting dude.

"Maybe she's from Xinjiang (the Uiguer region)." (In other words, not a foreigner?)

Market socialism with Chinese characteristics. Negotiations are never over.

Pick Pocket Nostalgia

Mon, 26 Feb 2007 10:35:22 GMT

This weekend I've been almost completely offline because my Chinese little sister and her husband were visiting from Tibet where they own a bar and teach English. At one point during the weekend, we went out to Shantou University so that Helena (my little sister's English name) could show Zheng Biao (her husband) where she went to college. Plus he apparently really likes to visit campuses wherever he goes for traveling. The Helena and Zheng Biao just returned to the mainland from a 20 day visit to Thailand and Nepal. It was apparently Zheng Biao's first trip outside China and he enjoyed it a lot - not to mention stating that it gave him a chance to compare the situation in China with something else for the first time in his life. In this case, the act of camparison included how safe one felt on the street. Both Helena and Zheng Biao both felt safer abroad than they did in Guangzhou and many other Chinese places.

Yesterday afternoon, while at Shantou University, we also met up with a couple of designers who had originally worked for (or in cooperation with) The Boy's design company when they had first graduated. Now the two designers who got married last year live in Guangzhou and run a design studio out of their house. They've just reached the point of actually renting an office and hiring one or two associate designers on a permanent basis. So they've essentially made it. So when asked whether they enjoyed living in Guangzhou, they immediately started to compare it unfavorably to Shantou along the lines of pollution, population, water quality and safety - although they admitted that Shantou was no longer as safe as it used to be. Nevertheless, they discussed how absolutely blatant and violent the thieves of Guangzhou had become: grabbing people on the street from inside "loaf of bread" minivans and taking their stuff, getting a whole pack to beat people up, pulling people off the back of motorcycles while aiming for their bags, carrying knives where they used to rely on fists and sticks (bear in mind guns are NOT legal in China except for the army and a few elite units of police) etc.

One of the designers, Feeler, told a story about how his car was intentionally hit by a motorcycle and the guy wanted Feeler to hand over a chunk of cash - perhaps RMB4000 ($500). Feeler told the guy that he had bought insurance for just that purpose and would send in the paperwork. The guy immediately backed down on the amount of money he wanted and suggested a lower amount so that there would be no need to go to all that trouble, RMB1000. Feeler lied and said he'd already called the insurance company. The guy lowered his price to RMB100. Feeler forked it over and the guy left. As Feeler said (and everyone else agreed), the insurance companies are mafia just like that guy, but they have much more mojo. Why not use the big mafia to control the little guys. Then Feeler ended the story by saying that at least this guy was only going to hurt Feeler's car and was easily scared off. Must have been a beginner - or had a certain amount of compunction against beating people up. Not like most of the bad dudes out there.

In response to all the discussion of the burgeoning violence of the new Chinese society (markets, speculation, gambling, corruption), they started to wax nostalgic about the thieves of yore who would steal stuff out of your bags or pockets without you ever knowing, "How civilized!" "How gentle." "We didn't appreciate them at the time. Wish they were here now." "At least then the thieves had to have a little technique. It was a real career. Not like these guys nowadays."

Ah the "harmonious society" as designated by Hu Jintao. Glad to be part of it.

The South is a Whole 'Nother Country (and So's the North)

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 14:39:43 GMT

The Boy and I, after spending all day hermiting in our apartment, decided to walk to dinner to a new place we had "discovered" on a previous meander home. This "wheat restaurant" specializes in northern and northeastern cuisine which is differentiated from that of the south by its staple, wheat.

Noodles, pancakes, dumplings and steamed buns are the most typical way to down your calories, rather than rice or rice porridge (of "cool" fame). "Wheat" cuisine is what I first learned to think of as Chinese when I was in Harbin to learn Mandarin. Don't be worried, people in the north and northeast still eat rice, they just don't eat as much of it as those in the south which cultivates three or four harvests of rice in one year. As The Boy explained to me this evening, northern rice has more flavor or tastes better (the phrase is ambiguous in Mandarin) because it takes so much longer to grow. (Please keep in mind the source. The Boy lived in the north until graduating college and may be a bit biased in his pronouncements.)

The northerners like their wheat and they are very inventive about the possible ways to prepare it. Most people in the US are familiar with the previously mentioned types but there are some less well-known ones. In addition to "pulled noodles," one of our favorites is something called "knife-cut noodles": the cook has a smooth knot of uncooked wheat shaped a little like a loaf of bread in potentia; s/he stands next to a boiling pot of water and makes quick slices off the top and sides of the wheat into the pot of water where they cook. The noodles are then garnished with some onions, cilantro, and meat and served in the soup or lifted out of said soup and fried with essentially the same ingredients. I usually substitute eggs for the meat, but it's all good. You can also sip "wheat soup," the broth the noodles boiled in, for free. Another style comes from the significantly large ethnic Korean population of the north, a dish called "cold noodles." The noodles are first cooked and then chilled and served in a lightly vinegry broth with julienned apples, radishes and cucumbers as well as an egg, kimchi and a few slices of pork. We usually ask for the pork on the side. Not that we get to eat it very often as there are very few Korean restaurants in Shantou and its usually a choice between the expensive one or the one with really bad service. Now, thanks to our discovery of this evening, we have a new cold noodle candidate.

Since it was our first visit, we played it safe and ordered dumplings and green onion pancakes in addition to a couple of other non-wheat dishes. As soon as we walked into the restaurant it was like being right back in Harbin. The "lack" of interior design, the accents of the servers and the customers, the lighting, the menu and the presentation (or the lack thereof) was a reminder of our respective "original" Chinese homes. The Boy grew up in Shenyang. Harbin, where I stayed, is even farther north. Customers and restaurant personnel were, on average, all taller and wider than most of the locals. And they move differently too. I only noticed this because there were two mother-nearly adult son pairs amongst the customers. In one pair the mother reached out to her son who was complaining of not feeling well. In the other pair, the son reached out and took his mother's hand as they walked out of the restaurant. These northern mothers and sons were noticeably touchy-feely to my more recently southern-accustomed eyes. I'm used to being the only one who does stuff like that - to The Boy's combined embarrassment and enjoyment.

Our first restaurant contact was a guy who had to be at least 70 years old with a northern accent so strong that if I hadn't actually lived up there, I would never have been able to decipher what he was saying. There was a woman who couldn't have been much younger who seemed to be doing a lot of the serving upstairs but was wearing an apron and so possibly could be one of the cooks as well. The "boss" who looked to be around 50 or so was the one who wrote down our order and took our money. Other than that we didn't seem him much.

The older guy was great, particularly because he didn't really have that professionalized service attitude that is so very popular in the south. He was happy to wait on you and very very polite, but would just do things differently. For example, asked how large the portions are, instead of describing the size, he opened the refrigerator and had The Boy walk over and take a look. Asked for tea, he brought the glasses over and poured it for us all the while smoking and giving us a detailed and pauseless description of the "toasted wheat tea" and how it was made. The Boy only got the chance to tell him we were both quite familiar with and appreciative of the tea and the food after his tea spiel was done. Due to bad eyes, he got as much tea on the table as he did in the first glass, so we helped him pour the second. His eyes were keen enough to figure out I wasn't from China, despite my ability to speak Mandarin, so perhaps that was why we had received the tea lecture. Another example: the elderly guy and The Boy had a long interaction where they were deciding on the order. The Boy always has to consider all the options and asks a lot of questions before ordering. (Food is a very serious business for him and ordering a matter of great weight. This is apparently not unusual in China as I've rarely seen waiters display any impatience with the process.) Anyway, after The Boy and the waiter had finally reached a few tentative agreements, the waiter then called the boss over and the whole process was repeated, minus the refrigerator expedition, as the boss wrote everything down.

While The Boy and I were enjoying the interaction, I, at least, was a little confused about how the previous interaction saved the restauranteer any time. Not that repetition is to be unexpected in a northern establishment where redundancy tends to be the rule rather than the exception. Communism had a much greater cultural hold up there than it did in the south. Unemployment was solved by creating underemployment and overall the effects of the "iron rice bowl" for customer service and enterprise rationalization bleed out with much greater intensity there than in the entrepreneurial south (especially Shantou - a la The Boy). Of course, unemployment was also "solved" by early retirement and the replacement of retirees with their children. The older waiter doesn't entirely fit that paradigm - unless we speculate that he retired from one job to go to work in a restaurant (pretty unlikely).

Our waiter was apparently newly arrived and had only been in Shantou for 6 months - hence the thickness of the accent and his lack of familiarity with the radius for delivery. The restaurant we ate in is apparently a new, larger edition of one had that has been in Shantou for a while. The waiter was brought in for the expansion. The Boy and I speculated that he was some sort of relative of the boss (which means that it's much harder to organize against the boss but then it's also harder for the boss to fire you).

The food was terrific, but that was only part of our enjoyment of the dinner; we were enjoying the small spot of northerliness in the midst of sub-tropical, southern China. The place almost felt like an embassy compound; it was that "disconnected" from the Shantou we were used to. The food hadn't been "shantouified" the way a lot of Northern restaurants will do in order to bring in local customers, which explains why the only eaters we heard were northern ones. The ability of the restaurant to grow and expand with what appears to be a solely northern customer base does mean, however, that northern migrants are growing in numbers and money. Even though prices were very modest in comparison to local style food (the two of us ate huge amounts for 25 Rmb total - about $3.00), previously migrant workers could not have supported such a place. The population of customers, already a mix of laborers and more middle-class segments, was also at least half families (remember the touchy-feely moms). And families mean that the migrants might just be sticking around and creating even more of their own compounds. Which is good for The Boy and I - the next time we want a blast of northern comfort, we can walk to our new favorite "wheat place" and avoid both the cost of a plane ticket and the need to wear snow boots and gloves.

Neruda again

Wed, 21 Feb 2007 09:29:02 GMT

Nature, culture, market...

"In the morning, the miracle of this newly washed nature was overwhelming. I joined the fisherman very early. Equipped with long floats, the boats looked like sea spiders. The men pulled out fish of vivid colors, fish like birds from the teeming forset, some with the deep blue phosphorescence of intense living velvet, others shaped like prickly balloons that shriveled up into sorry little sacs of thorns.
With horror I watched the massacre of those jewels of the sea. The fish were sold in segments to the poor. The machetes hacked to piece the God-sent sustenance from the deep, turning it into blood-drenched merchandise." p.89

A communist writer's critique of capitalism?

The role of the poet...

"The poet who is not a realist is dead. And the poet who is only a realist is also dead. The poet who is only irrational will only be understood by himself and his beloved, and this is very sad. The poet who is all reason will even be understood by jackasses, and this is also terribly sad. THere are no hard and fast rules, there are no ingredients prescribed by God or the Devil, but these two very important gentlemen wage a steady battle in the realm of peotry, and in this battle first one wins and then the other, but poetry iteslf cannot be defeated.
It's obvious that the poet's occupation is abused to some extent. So many new men and women poets keep cropping up that soon we'll all look like poets, and readers will disappear. We'll have to go looking for readers on expeditions that will cross the desert sands on camels or circle the sky on spaceships." p.266

Do you think he might have appreciated "If On A Winter's Night a Traveler"?

Neruda: Memoirs

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 02:36:27 GMT

I have always maintained that the writer's task has nothing to do with mystery or magic, and that the poet's, at least, must be a personal effort for the benefit of all. The closest thing to poetry is a loaf of bread or a ceramic dish or a piece of wood lovingly carved, even if by clumsy hands. p. 49

(Not) Celebrating Chinese New Year

Sun, 18 Feb 2007 16:00:23 GMT

Just as we were unsuccessful in not celebrating Xmas, we were also unable to avoid "celebrating" Spring Festival - which in case you didn't already know is today, February 18th. It is now the year of the Golden Pig (or Boar if you prefer something a little more intimidating sounding).

Wear some red, eat some Chinese food, and send lots of funny, punny text messages. Text messages are apparently a far more important part of the holiday than even last year - most of which I've been told I won't "understand" because they are very "Mandarin" or "Chinese Language".

Because of the impending doom of my dissertation, The Boy and I had axed our original plans to head out to the Phillippines for a period of 3 weeks or so which would have bracketed the holiday nicely. Instead, we agreed that we would try to hibernate from the world, as if we were out of town, and attempt to engage in a week or so of intense creative work and couple interaction. Accordingly I canceled my Open House (which because of others' vacations plans wouldn't have pulled in many anyway) and have been trying to be diligent about writing. Lam has been spending lots of time on the computer attempting to assess and organize the vast amounts of video, music, and written material he's downloaded from the internet. Officially he's "thinking" about drawing, but so far no results that I can see - but then who knows what goes on in an artist's head as they watch TV?

The hibernation has been successful in shutting out most of my friends and acquaintainces and much less so with Lam's. This situation occurs because Lam's family, friend, and work worlds overlap and coincide to a remarkable degree (not unusual in China). His family's architecture firm, he and his best friends' software company and the teaching position at Shantou University (that he got as a combined result of friendship, family ties and qualifications), all guarantee that, as long as he's in town, a certain amount of end of the year contact is unavoidable if one wants to avoid future social conflicts. He had end of the year wrap-up, planning and reorganization meetings for the two smaller companies all this last week. Since these are also the meetings where shareowners and employess receive end of the year bonuses and profit sharing, it behooves one to show up for the whole process.

These annual meetings are also either proceeded or followed by an annual company dinner of some sort. The University, as a very large organization which had to feed many, rented out a buffet restaurant for the dinner. Lam and his closest colleagues all decided the food was below par and went off to eat at one of their favorite places instead. This was only possible, of course, because there was very little personal face involved. Although their skipping out on dinner could possibly have been read as a complaint about the miserliness of the food. In the case of the architecture firm and the software company, where the shareowners and decision-makers are friends and family, one must show up for face reasons. In the case of the software firm where things are mostly copacetic, this usually means that the head dudes (which includes The Boy as a shareholder, despite the fact that his only real job is to be the CEO's best friend and occasionally design powerpoint presentations and namecards) talk through most of a morning and afternoon and in the evening there is a party for all and sundry. This year it was a BBQ. I was invited but didn't go because of the dissertation and the fact that I had had a less than fun experience at the annual dinner for the architecture firm. Apparently the BBQ, which was also attended by many of the architects and designers, was a blast so I missed out. Ah well.

The dinner for the architecture firm was a study in the power of face and form to overlay and attempt to reconstruct content. The firm, which mostly runs according to the inclinations of Lam's middle brother, the head architect, is in the process of splintering due to differences of opinion over administration and future direction, not to mention personal conflicts between the head shareholders: husbands, wives, friends and brothers. The head architect, for reasons known only to himself (apparently), won't allocate firm resources to search out projects. In this vacumn, the husband of one of the head designers has been funneling projects to the firm on the basis of his guanxi ties - which means that guanxi guy will probably end up with an undetermined amount of money for the favor of mentioning the firm while smoking and drinking with his mates. This results in the firm being in debt to someone not formally connected to it and whose kickbacks are neither formally negotiated, nor formally accounted for. This tends to piss The Boy off (and perhaps others as well but I have no access to them). Using guanxi as "marketing" also tends to result in a somewhat arbitrary and diffuse collection of projects based more on guanxi guy's connections rather than pitching projects according to their size, prestige and fitness for the firm. According to another of the shareholders (who is on her way out and plans to move to Shanghai to join a different firm) this "marketing" has resulted in the firm wasting its time on a lot of small, time-consuming projects that bring in little money. Despite these consequences, however, guanxi marketing means that guanxi guy gets invited to all formal functions, like the annual dinner, not only in the role of designer's husband, but also in his unofficial role as liasion.

As mentioned before, the adminstration of the firm is also one of the causes of contention. In The Boy's and the female architect's accounts, apportioning work on projects, like the coice of projects, is similarly not prioritized according to cost-benefit criteria, nor is compensation proportioned along strictly "market-style" lines. Instead, in following family-style "accounting" methods and old-fashioned, Communist-style, "iron rice bowl" practices, the head architect has created a situation in which the more expert, hard-working, and effective members of the firm carry other members (related through affinal and kinship ties). These issues and the resulting current lack of money in the firm, have caused divisions amongst the shareholders and, not coincidentally, greatly attenuated and negatively affected their non-work relationships. Despite these personal and work conflicts, however, everyone showed up to the dinner with a smile which had been organized by the very shareholder who will be leaving within the year.

The architecture and design firm has often had an uneasy cooperation with a local construction and engineering firm. The pairing of their expertise is very necessary, as are the excellent guanxi connections that the construction and engineering form has (especially since one of the head engineers is actual a low-level cadre). Still, there have been a few projects in which the cooperative work of the two firms had been awarded recognition but only the construction and engineering firm got named. Hence the presence of the main engineers of that firm at the dinner ensured that friendly relations are maintained and was simultaneouly, an attempt to bring the two companies' priorities closer in alignment.

I was perhaps the only person who didn't have a real claim to belong there - that is, the only one who wasn't included in the social construction of work unity. Nevertheless, as "girlfriend" (not my phrase, but at least they've stopped using the word "wife" as is common in Shantou) of one of the designer/shareholders, my inclusion probably helped to give the occasion an air of sociality beyond work. Even if my role as foreign anthropologist muddies that sociality claim up a bit since I had run an Engish class for them; and leaned on them for fieldwork connections. Nevertheless, according to The Boy and the female shareholder, I had also given them a cosmopolitan air when they went to give reports to clients like the city of Chaozhou so the final score (even if guanxi is about refusing to recognize one) was about even.

So there we all were, the firms' designers, guanxi guy (also designer's husband), construction firm engineers and moi. Actually it took quite a long time for all of us to get there since the engineers, The Boy and I were there on time and most of the design firm and guanxi guy showed up in stages thereafter. The long wait for everyone to arrive was really not adaptive for unity construction. The reason that eating together creates sociality isn't because people are actually talking with each other, it's because they can shut up and stuff their faces and then, in those moments when they need to rest from that, talk about how great the food is and make toasts. Accidentally or not, the lateness of arrival was nearly exactly proportional to the centrality of the people. The last carload to come in, of course, was that of the head architect so everyone was hungry edgy by the time he did. During the time before they all got there, The Boy and I attempted to make small talk with the engineers - made more difficult by my dislike of one of them. Luckily (or not), guanxi guy showed up soon after and took it upon himself to maintain the "party" atmosphere. This he accomplished by making jokes with the guys and lighting up a cigarette to show how relaxed he was. He was the only one who didn't appear awkward, but then that's basically his "job" so it's not surprise he pulls it off well. Next carload included his wife and a few of the younger designers then the Shanghai-bound designer and her carload. She had just decided to order the food anyway when the head architect and his load of the last of the younger members showed up.

Thank all the deities for food. Small talk was accomplished by those who needed to engage in it. The rest of us could shut up and chew.

Despite the meal being at one of the better restaurants in town, it was not one I could say that I enjoyed. The atmosphere, to me, was just too awkward and the contrast with what I knew was happening to the company outside of the dining room just made it a little too alienating. As a result, I went into theorization mode. If you can't talk, might as well think. This is not always a good thing, but when living in one's fieldsite tends to happen more than might otherwise be the case.

So that's one way of celebrating Chinese New Year - at least for the "work" circle. As for the family circle, that dinner was eerily similar in awkwardness and form, as well as in the need to give face through one's presence. There was also a significant overlap in the population at the table, although the addition of some members of the parental generation and some kids who helped to make it a little more chaotic. Since the family dinner was held at the same restaurant, the similarity was perhaps even more apparent. The symbolism of the dinner, that of family unity, was, once again, in direct contrast the nature of the interactions at the table. A large amount of time was spent in private interaction with cell phones focusing on sending and receiving text messages for the new year. Equally large amounts of time were spent watching the TV that was conveniently located at my and The Boy's back. And the food wasn't even as good as the first time. The Boy and I left the restaurant after the dinner was over swearing to be out of the country next year. Apparently my desire to escape the ruckus of Christmas is equalled by his to escape the ruckus of Spring Festival.

Hence, our "celebration" of the first day of the Chinese year by seeing no one else but ourselves - in contrast to the more common custom of hanging out with relatives all day. We got up late, had wine, cheese, and fruit for brunch, apricated naked, had sex in the garden and the fell asleep for much of the afternoon. Actually, the sunbathing naked and sex part echoes our Christmas celebration as does the dinner we had at the Thai restaurant - which was delicious. On the walk home, we got to see people setting off fireworks.

So there you have it, that's how The Boy and I failed to not celebrate Chinese New Year. Maybe next year we'll do a better job.

Cool Tea

Thu, 15 Feb 2007 16:00:46 GMT

Lam and I have a habit of visiting our favorite "cool tea" stand on the way back from the market to buy fruit and veggies. "Cool tea" is not to be confused with iced tea or even lukewarm room temperature tea. "Cool tea" is actually served very very hot - in conventional temperature terms nearly boiling.

I always have to wait until it's merely steaming before attempting to down it. "Cool tea" is herbal Chinese medicine served as a hot soft drink with varying amounts of sugar added (without the sugar it's quite bitter usually - although there are varieties which are less so). A local phenomenon (or so I'm told), the many "cool tea" stands in Shantou will give you a bowl (at the stand) or a plastic cup with a straw for takeaway. For 5 mao or 1 kwai, you can have a cure for what ails you, support a localized idea of medicine and quench your thirst.

"Cool tea" lowers the heat in your body in Chinese medicine terms. Chinese medicine is very concerned with balancing out different forces in the body, amongst which having the proper hot and cold levels is very important. These ideas are not commensurate with any western medicine concepts that I've been able to determine - except perhaps Medieval concepts of the humors of the body. I can guarantee you, however, that the concepts are very effective as descriptions of how locals experience their bodies and any discomfort. Any time a local Chinese gets pimples, or a sore throat, or an allergic reaction, or an eye twitch, they will pinpoint some food that they've eaten recently as being the type to raise one's body heat. Chinese medicine doctors will do the same and almost any time one gets sick, one is advised to maintain oneself on a diet of hot rice porridge - the "coolest" food out there. Works for them! While I believe utterly in the practice of Chinese medicine and have gone to Chinese medicine doctors myself for a variety of ailments, a rice porridge diet is not going to happen. I'd much rather drink bitter tea. Most of my favorite foods fall into the heat raising category: coffee, tea, wine, milk, cheese, chilies, mangoes, dragon fruit, kiwis, ginger, bread, and chocolate.

For those who are interested, the following foods lower the heat in your body: watermelon, bitter melon, and rice porridge (congee). There are a whole lot more heat lowering foods out there, but I don't remember which ones they are because I mostly prefer heat raising foods. Bitter melon isn't my favorite thing to chow down on, but I've eventually cultivated an appreciation for it, partly because Lam likes it so much, and because he is so certain that his body reacts quite sensitively to heat raising foods. Thus in order to continue to eat together without deleterious effects on the poor boy, we need to include something to balance out the rest of what we (I) eat and drink. We've come to the "chinese medicine" conclusion that my body must be permanently "cold" which would explain my voracious appetite for heat raising foods and the complete lack of negative reactions to the subsequent "temperature" raise. The fact that my body is often both Chinese medicine cold and temperature cold at the same time is apparently a complete coincidence, but it's fun to fix both problems simultaneously by drinking "cool tea" (which I've come to have both a taste for and a growing appreciation for its effectiveness).

Anyway, so back to the "cool tea" stand that Lam and I like. It first caught our eye on the way back from a particularly successful fruit buying trip because his neck was stiff. Apparently his stiff neck (a frequent complaint) means the heat in his body had been raised and the fact that he has terrible posture while at the computer and sleeps with his neck propped against the bedroom wall merely inclines him to a neck pain. According to Lam, it's actually the heat raising that causes the neck pain made likely by the other two factors to manifest itself. (Still doesn't mean that fixing those other two factors wouldn't help - IMHO). Whatever! Since I was fighting off a slight cold (probably didn't eat enough rice porridge, but really I'd prefer suffering the cold to being forced to eat large amounts of that stuff) and I like the stuff anyway, we decided to stop by one of the stands the lined the road behind our apartment complex.

Our soon-to-be favorite stand was visibly notable for one thing - it's typical 2 meter wide counter lined with tall thermoses was accessorized by flaps that folded-out. The top flap became a short roof giving shade and relief from the rain to customers and the bottom folded down to rest on a stand to become a counter. The owner laid a couple of pallets on the ground and placed some plastic stools in front of the counter. One can drink and sit (somewhat protected from the elements) at the same time - and have somewhere to place one's packages. So we did.

The first couple of times were simply contractural, but as we continued to come back (we eat a lot of fruit, most of which are heat raising due to my preferences), the male owner and then his family started to talk with us a little. The owner is a former peasant who works for the local importer of a brand of coffee during the day. He is also an acupressure or therapuetic massage freelancer. In addition to running the cool tea stand, he has a variety of clients who either call him to their homes or come to his stand for help. This means of course, that during the day he spends his time working for a business that imports a heat raising product which he also sells at his cool tea stand for 2 kwai a cup (really cheap when most coffee shops charge about 25 kwai for the same stuff). We mentioned and he agreed that his stand is probably the only one in Shantou that does so. The apparent contradiction appears to please him. But then, it's not that much of a contradiction. One could say that his day-time salaried job basically builds a market for his two owner-operated businesses. His wife is actually the one who holds down the fort for the bulk of the time at the "cool tea" stand - during the day and whenever the male owner has massage clients. She tends to talk a lot more when he isn't around and even more when Lam isn't around.

The owner has apparently passed down his interest and expertise in Chinese medicine to his kids. He and his wife have three kids - all girls (not a coincidence according to Lam who believes they kept trying for a boy). The eldest is much older than the younger two and is currently in college studying Chinese medicine. We've only met her since the Spring Festival holiday started. We've named the two younger girls after our cats because we think that their characters correspond. "Camo", the middle daughter, is quiet, shy (almost timid), independent, and is constantly being pestered into desperation by the younger one, "Kuching". "Kuching," on the other hand, is loud, brave, energetic, friendly and needs constant stimulation and attention - and will do anything to make sure she gets it.

One evening the two younger girls and their parents were all at the stand. I think they had all just had dinner and the girls were finishing their homework. Lam and I came by and we all starting talking. They were curious about me and Lam and the fact that both of us were teachers came up. The usual questions about place of origin and length of stay in China came up. The parents, as is often the case, were quick to have the kids "practice their English" with me. "Camo" did this by very reluctantly after much encouragement saying hello and responding to questions asking her name and age - all in a barely audible voice with her head down and her hair hiding her eyes. "Kuching" did this by getting out her first-grade English textbook, standing right by my stool, and reciting the entire thing for us very very loudly and very very quickly - to much exclamation and applause.

From that evening on, Lam and I were in the "person" category - a category I have been enjoying very much. We are not real friends but we are "people" and the weather, the holidays and the state of the world are available as subject matter. Ms. Cool Tea will give us advice about how to buy vegetables and ask about how to help her kids learn English. We discovered we live in adjacent buildings and have never run into each other going up and down the patio steps. Mr. Cool Tea will expound on the influence that the weather has over the heat levels in people's bodies. "Camo" will quietly say hello and "Kuching" will drop whatever she is doing to come over and stare at us until we ask her what's up - or will show us whatever game she has come up with recently - or expound on how big Lam's ears are or how strange my Chinese is.

Tonight we went by and, because of the holiday perhaps, the two younger kids were wearing new red clothes and had their hair up in matching red ponytale clasps. The oldest daughter was home and more or less in charge of the stand and her sisters. Dad was busy with a massage client who had stopped by. He still had to be called over to look for ingredients though. He excused himself from hanging out due to the other client - something none of us would have expected a few weeks ago. As we were drinking our cool tea, relatives showed up to "baifang" the family for Spring Festival so Ms. Cool Tea was busy as well. So tonight we mostly got to interact with the kids. Kuching found us more interesting than her relatives and proceeded to pester Camo into helping Kuching show off her newest "kung-fu" move which involved destroying pages of newspaper with her finger. We were very impressed. Newspaper shredding activities were quickly stilled through lack of material - much to the relief of the oldest daughter who was attempting to ride herd on the other two. As we left, the cool tea stand was still there - despite Kuching unintentional efforts otherwise. Looking forward to the next visit.

Bruno Latour "We Have Never Been Modern"

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 07:40:49 GMT

One is not born traditional; one chooses to become traditional by constant innovation. The idea of an identical repetition of the past and that of a radical rupture with any past are two symmetrical results of a single conception of time. We cannot return to the past, to tradition, to repetition, because these great immobile domains are the inverted image of the earth that is no longer promised to us today: progress, permanent revolution, modernization, forward flight.

... the moderns' time has finally been suspended. But time has nothing to do with it. The connections among beings alone make time. It was the systematic connection of entitites in a coherent whole that constituted the flow of modern time. 76-77

Being Polite

Tue, 13 Feb 2007 07:43:48 GMT

"So are you heading back home for Spring Festival?"
"No." (This is my home. I'm just not Chinese.)
"Are you going out of town?"
"Don't really know." (Actually we're turning off our cell phones and hibernating from the world, yourself included.)
"Then this is your first Spring Festival in Shantou?"
"Yes." (Previously Lam and I had always fled as soon as we could.)
"Are you enjoying your vacation?"
"Sure. Although I still have to work every day on the dissertation." (The only real change is that Lam is around more and in a much better mood. Plus all the prices of everything especially food, has gone up and there are street vendors everywhere selling flowers, orange trees and calligraphy couplets. Apparently right around midnight of Spring Festival Eve all the prices drop - kind of like after Xmas sales, but not.)
"Ah. Don't be like that. When in Rome, do as the Romans do (Ruxiang suishu)."
"Might be fun!" (I totally would if only Cornell and the rest of the USA would rearrange vacations accordingly and give me all of February off, as it is...), "What about you? You guys going on vacation?"
"Nah. Too much to do."

Fencing

Thu, 08 Feb 2007 16:04:18 GMT

The massive ribbon of reinforced-steel concrete stretched for kilometers gradually fading away into the dusty grey foothills.

"Run for the border! Ha! We've been digging for weeks," groaned Ernesto.

Suddenly the pit exploded! A huge geyser of water spewed Ernesto aloft.

Soaking wet, Ernesto grinned widely.

"The grass will finally be greener over here."

Graeber - again

Thu, 08 Feb 2007 03:21:59 GMT

"Creative action, one might say, is at any level encompassed within a larger system of action in which it ecomes socially meaningful - that is, in which it takes on social value. All creative actions is to some degree revolutionary; but to be revolutionary to any significant degree, it must change that larger structure in which it is embedded. At which point one can no longer imagine one is simply working on objects, but must recognize that one is also working on people. And that system of acion and meaning is, of course, always encompassed by another. We are dealing with a continuum. This does not mean that revolutionary social change with something of the same creative, intentional quality as the architect's is not possible; it does mean that it is a lot harder to get a handle on, because it proceeds through a far more subtle, collective media." p. 249

"What I want to focus on here is the peculiar role of objects in situations of historical agency - in particular those which, like money, serve as the medium for bringing into being the very thing they represent. ... The larger social reality does not yet exist. All that is real, in effect, is the actor's capacity to create it. In situations like this objects really do, in a sense, bring into being what they represent. They become pivots, as it were, between imagination and reality." p. 251

"Universal ideas are not ideas that everyone on in the world has, that's just false positivism; universal ideas are ones that everyone in the world would be capable of understanding; universal moral standards are not ones on which everyone in the world agrees-but ones that, through a capacity for moral reasoning and experience of forms of moral practice that we already do share, we would be able to work out together and agree to (and probably will have to on some level if we are all to survive in the world), and so on.
p. 255

Graeber has a very calming, seductive, fire-side chat, professorial, competent, male, and old-fashioned sort of voice - almost like that of the academic don of an earlier age. It kept reminding me of neatly constructed, old fashioned academic arguing, with rhetorical moves that echoed very much like Sahlins' "The Use and Abuse of Biology" did. Took me a while to figure out that the Sahlins' echo was hardly coincidence, given Graeber's admiration of him. Also took me a while to notice the effect that Graeber's authorial voice was having on me, that is, I found myself in a listening mode rather than a querying one. And while that's fine for a first read-through, and as inclined as I am to agree with many of his points anyway, it was a little annoying to realize how close I came to succumbing to the twinkle-eyed, politically radical, male professor without much of a fight. hrrmm...

Wed, 07 Feb 2007 02:10:43 GMT

As my poor friends can probably attest, I've been having a lot of fun with the nanofiction form. I apologize if they are bugging people. I have a free account and can't seem to figure out how to make smaller friend filters yet. If they are too annoying let me know and I'll start privitizing them.

In the process of writing these stories (which are great mind rests from the dissertation and take up far less time than I expected), I've come across a few difficulties. First, I can't seem to stop being meta. I wonder if the need to endlessly comment on the writing or the reading of them evidences a lack of committment to the form or to writing in general? Second, I can't seem to produce anything but satire, which has a lot to do with problem no. 1. I think, however, that producing something like "drama" or "tragedy" in 55 words is really really difficult. Far too easy to slide wholeheartedly into melodrama. Any suggestions from all you writers out there?

Graeber "Toward an Anthropological Theory of Value: The False Coin of Our Own Dreams."

Tue, 06 Feb 2007 14:00:56 GMT

"One is tempted to say that "society" is created as a side effect of such pursuits of value. But even this would not be quite right, because that would reify society. Really, society is not a thing at all: it is the total process through which all this activity is coordinated, and value, in turn, the way that actors see their own activity as meaningful as part of it. Doing so always, necessarily, involves some sort of public recognition and comparison. This is why economic models which see those actions as aimed primarily at individual gratification, fall so obviously short: they fail to see that in any society-even within a market system-solitary pleasures are relatively few. The most important ends are ones that can only be realized in the eyes of some collective audience."

p. 76

Manufacturing Myths

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 04:44:58 GMT

Sister Three coughed and sniffled all throughout the incantation and the brewing process. The resulting chemical imbalance caused shockwaves in the destinies of heros, gods and civilizations.

Sisters One and Two jealously admired the ensuing chaos and resolved to wash hands no more.

Unfortunately for them, the germ was corrupted during replication. Hollywood was born.

banana and strawberry omelettes

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 06:57:18 GMT

One of the nice things about having an early riser for a lover is that they will occasionally have breakfast waiting for you when you wake up. In this area, Lam has come a long way. From being able to only make coffee and tea, he has progressed as far as cutting up fruit, making toast and now has accomplished the ultimate - creating his own omelette. In the past months he has been diligently studying my omelette technique, mostly by accosting me as I try to make them. Finally conquering such tricky questions as how much butter to use, when to fold it over, and how hot the pan should be, he has started to branch out.

Yesterday I was served with his first actual creation - banana, strawberry and cherry-tomato omelettes. That's what living with an artist will get you. They always have to come up with something new.

It was really really good. At first comtemplation the masterpiece crossed a few food categories that I didn't know were hidden in my brain: omelettes are savory, strawberries and eggs don't mix. But, really, as with corn on pizza (another Chinese surprise I discovered here) there's no reason NOT to have a banana and strawberry omelette - especially when you don't make them yourself and your pleased-as-punch lover hands you freshly brewed coffee as you stagger out of bed with your hair sticking to your face. As if the shit-eating grin wasn't enough to keep you from bitching to him (it's morning after all; being cranky should be a right!), the bouncy up-and-down eagerness with which he pulls out your chair and says good morning makes it almost possible to smile. By the time I made it through half the omelette and, not coincidently, two cups of tea and one of coffee, I had actually progressed to talking and was awake and happy enough to compliment the chef.

The student has indeed become the master.

What will he make of lasagna?

after the sunset

Sat, 27 Jan 2007 02:41:27 GMT

You know how there are all of those romantic movies where the romantic couple is made up of two people from different backgrounds - usually cultures, but also occasionally classes, etc. And in order to fulfill the requirements of a perfect Hollywood ending, they either manage to overcome the prejudices of those around them to create a better society through their love or they escape into a "brave new world" in which their love (the audience assumes) will be able to flourish without prejudice or consequences. Regarding the latter version, I would dearly love to see a movie that takes into account the hyperconnectivity I live with daily and essentially obliterates the horizon of the edenic "brave new worlds." There's no escape dudes. Wherever you go, you still encounter class, gender, ethnic, and national boundaries - and most of them maintain the judgemental imprints of USA hegemony. On the other hand, you can get the most recent seasons of US televisions shows really cheap.

ethics question

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 15:02:57 GMT

One assumes that children can not be inethical about things they have never been taught - don't hit, don't lie, etc.
At what point is ignorance no longer an out, that is, at what point do people have the responsibility to know that certain things are wrong? And what sort of actions would be covered by this?

Thoughts caused by useless anger as a result of the kitten peeing on the bed.

Not eating wild snakes

Mon, 22 Jan 2007 03:45:05 GMT

I try to limit the dinners I attend with Lam that involve people I don’t know for a variety of reasons. My odd eating habits and political opinions often throw a wrench into Chinese sociality which depends upon eating together as a way to gloss over differences and create guanxi (relationships). The dinner I had last Thursday is one such example where I made an exception to this rule because I was going with Lam and two of his friends who I like and know well.

One of the two is Lam’s best friend and the CEO of the software company that Lam is associated with in a peripheral and entirely satisfactory way for all concerned. The other friend is a fellow alumnus of Lam’s art institute from the sculpture department, like Lam, who also teaches at Shantou University in the design school. The sculptor, poor guy, was put in charge of seeing that the design school has a new sculpting workshop with all sorts of machines for welding, firing, wood-working, painting, etc. This involved a large expenditure of time and head-aches on his part because finding machines and companies to do the work for the university was difficult. It’s not a large assignment (read high profit project), and being a university, the administration wanted lots and lots of paper trail (invoices, and estimates and such) which make it difficult for companies to make their typical profit margins based on an accustomed proportion of non-tax income. It was so hard to find construction companies to work on such a small and paperwork-demanding project, that the workshop has taken a year longer than expected to reach its current stage of semi-completion. With the time delay, the Design School began to get ancy (funding could disappear) and the paperwork demands were eventually relaxed somewhat. Hence, Lam’s sculptor colleague, through Lam’s architecture and landscape design connections to the construction industry in Shantou, was able to find a local company to install the high-capacity ventilation required for the workshop.

Since this is business and this is China (but networking over food is hardly particular to the Middle Kingdom), an expensive dinner is the expected way to celebrate the semi-completion of the project, thank those involved in providing one a way to make money and to cement social ties with an eye to future endeavors and cordial relations.

As such, this sort of dinner is not the sort of gravy train that I tend to hop onto since they are usually long, boring, and involve lots of expensive food (read meat), drinking of expensive hard liquor, and are essentially about male bonding. I’ve learned that if I go, I basically get to eat around the meat and occasionally grunt agreement with people. It’s not that I’m shy of speaking up in front of “the menfolks,” it’s just that normally there isn’t much I can add to the conversation since I’m usually not an integral part of the client-entrepreneur relationship.

This time, however, Lam said that the business person involved was someone he knew pretty well and basically liked, plus his software friend was coming along for the ride anyway because software friend was also friends with another friend of client guy who was coming along as well. And since I know, like and find it easy to talk to both software guy and the sculptor, it should be a less alienating dining experience than usual. And to top it all off, we were heading out to a riverside restaurant in Chenhai where Lam thought there would be lots of fish (instead of meat).

Ah for assumptions, you, and me – or in this case Lam and I…

The evening of eating with Lam’s friends and close acquaintances started out well enough despite the rain that’s been spattering Shantou for the last couple of days. Since there was no need to impress, I headed down to the back gate armored against cold and rain in hoody, jacket, gloves and sneakers to meet up with Lam and his two buds waiting in the Jeep (all of which ended up being very useful). We all had a pretty good time in the car, gossiping about the lives of and critiquing the work of Chinese intellectual icons as well as Lam and the sculptor’s colleagues at the design school. While listening to a Kumbia King’s CD Lam had picked up the day before, we also discussed cool new computer technologies (I was in the car with a bunch of techno-geeks) and what direction the market was going (apparently on-line gaming). So far so good. Interaction copacetic.

The trip out to Chenhai, a suburb of the city that fades quickly into paddy fields, and the river took about 45 minutes before we met up with the car of client and client-friend (skinny guy with glasses) to follow them to the restaurant. Restaurant did not turn out to be the one with fish as the main menu. Instead the client drove to a new place, also on the river (more or less) even farther out than Lam had been before. The client asked sculptor if there was anything he didn’t eat, sculptor said no and then the client ordered a bunch of things in Shantounese. After sitting down at the table, we were equipped with a hot plate and a large pot full of broth with some spices and veggies floating in it. We were going to eat hotpot.

Hotpot, while it can indeed be delicious, is a bit of a social problem for me because everything that gets served ends up going into the soup. So there’s no way for me to eat anything that hasn’t been cooked in meat broth once some form of meat has been dumped into the soup. Second, all forms of prestige food that go into hotpot are meat. Since this was a thank you for the money making project dinner that meant that there was going to be a lot of prestige food involved. Finally, any reluctance to eat can be interpreted badly with social consequences of loss of face either for the host or for the guest. Not good.

Also not good…The area in front of the kitchen was covered with tubs of live creatures in water, most of whom were not fish and cages of live animals, most of whom were not chickens or pigs. All of whom are either squeaking, squawking, splashing or snorting in discontent in their various tubs and cages.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, sculptor happened to ask me about my eating habits. I don’t know if he did it deliberately so that I wouldn’t have to bring up the subject on my own, but I believe so. He’s had dinner with me many times before after all. I’ve found that my Chinese friends are far more worried about my eating huge amounts of food than I am. After all given how much I tend to devour while I’m over here, I’m hardly likely to keel over just from “missing” one meal. Upon hearing the words, “I don’t eat meat,” client guy immediately said, “Oops! Everything we ordered is meat. What shall we order in addition?” Conversational chaos and intense negotiation immediately ensued.

Communal eating Chinese style makes it impossible for the idiosyncrasies of the one NOT to affect and be commented upon ad nauseum by the many. Add to that the fact that the default topic of conversation in China is not the weather, but rather food and the Chinese attitudes towards it and you get what happened last night -endless discussions of Chinese eating habits and questions about whether or not I shared them, was disgusted by them, or had heard of them. So in addition to being the person who made everything less socially smooth (client guy looks slightly bad for not finding out about my habits sooner and perhaps this makes restaurant choice less than optimal), I was also the person who stood out as the slightly batty, gustatorily unsophisticated, and trouble-making non-conformer.

Not that I usually worry about being non-mainstream, particularly in China, (there’s really no way to be an ex-pat otherwise), but I prefer to do so in such as way that mostly affects myself, rather than those who choose to associate with me. I often prepare my own friends a while ahead of time about the whole, “no meat” issue. In this manner, by the time I’m actually eating, it’s not a surprise and most of the questions and negotiations are already out of the way. Either that, or I try to finesse the situation by quietly not eating things I don’t want which is not always effective since one way of being a good Chinese host is dumping the choicest bits of food (meat, again!) into your guests’ bowls. Nevertheless, a food tempest in social situations that are not supposed to be about me always makes me want to shrink. Hence, once “No meat,” flys out of my mouth, I often feel like I somehow have to compensate (bad cultural relativism conscience), so my anti-meat requirement is usually followed almost immediately by a lame and somewhat timid, “but I eat fish,” offering.

As it was on Thursday night. Only it didn’t end there, since client friend (skinny dude with glasses) happened to ask about whether this had to do with me being an environmentalist. Which it bloody well does, but most likely not in the fluffy warm-fuzzy way that skinny guy thinks. My environmentalism is part of a whole anarchist, neo-marxist, social justice, feminist, anti-hegemonic mindset that client guy and skinny were never going listen to because networking in the form of dinner is about creating social lubricant not about acknowledging differences. While I have talked in depth to Lam about these sorts of things and would be perfectly happy discussing such with software dude and sculptor at other times, this dinner was not the place to indulge in political pontification, I mean, discussion.

So not only was I a logistical eating issue, I was also a judgmental environmentalism issue. The non-universal nature of the environmental movement - “developed” nations telling “developing” nations that they cannot make the same mistakes the developed nations did (and do) make, developed nations (USA is paradigmatic) using the bulk of the world’s natural resources, motivating the manufacturing, and propagandizing resource-heavy lifestyles through images of the good life – makes being a foreign environmentalist a touchy thing in China. Especially if you are also an anthropologist and have to make nice with one’s cultural-relativism impregnated conscience.

At this point I’ve come to a détente with my cultural relativism. I will not engage in practices I do not agree with but will not proactively oppose them either - unless I am asked to help in doing so by a local. Nor will I actively seek to discuss most of these topics, but when they do come up, even if the situation is not ideal for actual discussion, I will not lie about them either. It’s an uneasy balance that does not always work out as well in practice as it does in theory. Like most compromises, this particular détente often results in no one involved actually being satisfied, conscience included.

Let me also state that I do not believe that I am a proselytizing vegetarian or a proselytizing environmentalist. Telling people what I think they should eat is stupid. Not only because my eating habits relate to my entire world view, one I am aware that most people do not share, but also because telling people what to eat is essentially a waste of time. Especially in the past few years, it’s been hammered into me that it’s nearly impossible to get someone to change their mind about something if they already have a set opinion. The most you can possibly do is offer information if people ask for it, and make counter-arguments if they choose to discuss it with you - which they rarely do. A la Perez-Reverte, pushing opinions on people doesn’t work – you end up with American politics where people from opposing camps stand up and nearly simultaneously shout what they think from podiums for media sound bites. No one actually discusses or even listens critically to anything. For this reason, in the gospel of Felix, there are forums where you are going to be just slightly effective and forums where you are not. This restaurant and the social situation I was in was the latter.

Worse still, this restaurant was famous for wild-caught food (remember the non-chickens and the non-pigs in the cages making lots of noise and ready to be eaten) which client guy was happy to note since this means that the snake meat the others were digging into was even more prestigious. While I have made a certain amount of cultural relativistic peace with Chinese habits of eating animals like dogs and cats (which involved the adoption of two felines), the continual prestige of eating wild caught animals and the even greater prestige attached to rarity just grates. And passing “protective” legislation is a waste of time while that prestige exists; illegal restaurants serving “protected” species often cater to rich government cadres and their entrepreneur hosts. It’s not like there’s a whole lot of wild diversity left in China. “Development,” population increases, and the resulting expansion into previously less intensively used ecosystems, have effectively put a time limit on what few viable wild populations still exist through “indirect” extermination due to habitat destruction. But directly prioritizing one’s taste buds and prestige over the existence of the few wild animals left in the area seems even more egregious, particularly when there’s so much fabulous Chinese food that does not depend on China’s last surviving wild fauna as ingredients.

(For those who read about Shantou’s penchant for “fake” food: I’m not proclaiming that these snakes were definitely wild caught. Who knows? The snakes involved might have been domestically raised and therefore were “wild-caught” fakes. Nevertheless, the actual status of the snakes being devoured notwithstanding, their wild-caughtness, real or imagined, was part of their desirability and corresponding incredibly high price. Hence, somewhere out there poor Chinese are going to continue to comb the hills, fields and rivers for the few animals that are left because there is always a demand for “real” wildness. And who is going to convince them not to when they can earn the income of months in one sale to those who cater to gourmet Chinese tastes?)

Result: a social compromise in which no one was entirely satisfied. Despite the presence of people I like and could normally converse with, I can’t say anything I feel good about without essentially making a useless critique of choice of restaurant, menu, and client’s eating preferences. On the other hand, I’m not going to lie either - even to appease my own cultural relativism - so I basically try to shut up. Then I get frustrated listening to narrow and strongly tweaked conceptions of the environmental movement while skinny guy mentions that the environmental movement is strong overseas in Europe and hearing client guy say that it couldn’t be. Nor can I join in the related conversation about how the Chinese eat everything and the following discussion of the various tablemates’ experiences eating non-quotidian meats, like dog, cat and others. And, I nearly bite my own tongue not to start pontificating when they discuss their varied opinions about whether wild caught tastes better. Finally, because of the few statements I do allow myself to make and Lam's proportionately small intake of wild snake, the others make jokes about Lam having to follow along with me which is insulting on a variety of levels to him, me, and our relationship. And the evening ends with client guy and skinny guy taking one of the snakes home (it was already paid for and killed) because people had filled up on the non-meat stuff that was ordered, in effect, for me and were, hence, not able to finish the prestige items on client guy's carefully concocted menu.

Great evening, huh? I just love being an expert in intercultural communication.

Luckily, Lam thinks I’m wonderful, doesn’t care what client guy thinks, and believes I should start an NGO which, based on this dinner, I’m sure will be a roaring success

Post Script (added Jan 23rd) Poor Lam woke up this morning after a nightmare where he, many members of his family and a bunch of his colleagues from the university went out to the countryside to eat dinner. Since many of those involved were Lam's family, he offered to pay. The bill came to about 2000 RMB, a ridiculous amount in the "poor" countryside, apparently in the dream he hadn't bothered to check prices first before ordering. He then asked the restauranteer to give him an itemized bill and discovered they had all been eating wild-caught snake which explained the price. At this point, more or less, he woke up. Interpretations???

painting a city?

Fri, 19 Jan 2007 06:36:59 GMT

“I wanted to paint. I wanted to live like the French painters I’d read about in books, but I lacked the strength to create such a world in Istanbul, nor did Istanbul lend itself to the project. Even the worst paintings of the Turkish Impressionists – their view of the mosques, the Bosphorus, wooden houses, snowy streets – pleased me, not as paintings, but as likenesses of Istanbul. If a painting looked like Istanbul, then it wasn’t a good painting; if it was a good painting, it didn’t look enough like Istanbul to suit me. Perhaps this meant that I had to stop seeing the city as a painting, or as a landscape.”

"Istanbul: Memories of a City." Orhan Pamuk, trans. Maureen Freely p. 291

that's how I feel about my dissertation. Sigh.

Fri, 19 Jan 2007 06:07:23 GMT

"Later, with time, I learned that although all men are capable of good and evil, the worst among them are those who, when they commit evei, do so by shielding themselves in the authority of others, in their subordination, or in the excuse of following orders. And even worse are those who believe they are justified by their God. Because in the secret dungeons of Toledo, nearly at the cost of my life, I learned that there is nothing more despicable or more dangerous than the malevolent individual who goes to sleep every night with a clear conscience. That is true evil. Especially when paired with ignorance, superstition, stupidity, or power, all of which often travel together.

And worst of all is the person who acts as exegete of The Word - whether it be from the Talmud, the Bible, the Koran, or any other book already written or yet to come. I am not fond of giving advice - no one can pound opinions into another's head - but here is a piece that costs you nothing: Never trust a man who reads only one book."

Purity of Blood: The Adventures of Captain Alatriste. Arturo Perez-Reverte, trans. Margaret Sayers Peden.