Auto Insurance

Our auto insurance is out of this world. Granted, we haven't had to file a claim yet—knock the wood, as Mr. Yu says—but we have still gotten our money's worth. It's very cheap, $300 for a year. With this comes a full set of benefits. When we lock our keys out of the car, someone comes and lets us in at no extra charge. When we blow a tire, someone comes and replaces it, no charge. If we are bad enough planners to run out of gas, someone will come and give us some gas. It's time to renew our policy, and the insurance agent called me and offered to come visit my office so that I can pay and fill out the paperwork. It's going to be hard to go back to our old “pay a fortune and pray you never have to file a claim” stateside policy.

Melly Clistmas to All

This week has been hectic, but fun. On Monday, I had a Christmas ornament making party that drew in an unprecedented 35+ people. I crammed as many in as I could, then I started sending people away. Library events normally draw ten to fifteen people, so I was unprepared for the rush but glad to get the attention. Storytime has been well attended recently as well. I think the library is on the up and up.

On Wednesday, I had some kids from the youth center come in for a storytime. We read some of my old favorites, The Polar Express and The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. The Polar Express was once a family tradition, and I was glad to read it to the kids, though they did keep making references to the movie! They sang some songs from The Grinch for me, holding hands and swaying like the whos. I think Christmas is far more fun when there are kids involved.

On Christmas Eve I made a chicken pot pie, which is kind of a tradition, and we gave some to our neighbor, Jin. He gave us a bowl of kimchi. I admit, I'm kind of over kimchi, but the homemade stuff is okay. It works wonders for the digestive tract.

On Christmas Day we had reservations at the Novotel, and we went downtown early in order to catch the new Harry Potter movie. Well, despite leaving at 4pm,we couldn't get into a single showing that would let out in time for our 8pm reservation. We tried four theaters, then bought tickets for the next day. We then wandered around for three hours, stopping for coffee.

The Christmas buffet at the Novotel was something. I actually liked the dinner we had last year better, but this one came with a Korean santa (he had clown shoes and made balloon animals), a beautiful view, and rows and rows of dessert tables. The place was packed, and the food was pretty good. Bobby got a robster (I will now always think of them as robsters). Our place card said “Hyarey,” which I guess is our Korean name.

The cats and dog got Christmas meals, despite the cats' sincere effort to wreck our tree. While we were gone last weekend, they managed to destroy the green lights as well as pulling some of my favorite ornaments off and batting them around the living room. Green is my favorite color! Little devils. Bobby got a PSP and I got an external hard drive and a mink robe. Of course, we bought a Christmas cake. This year was Bobby's choice. He went with the chocolate cake.

Puck next to our ravaged tree

Wrapping paper is Loki's favorite thing about Christmas

Us at the Novotel.  On my right is half of Korean Santa.

This year's Christmas cake

The Dragon Hill Lodge in Seoul.  They really do it up for Christmas

Christmas in Seoul, Reprise

We went to Seoul this weekend. We saw the Korea National Ballet perform The Nutcracker, had Indian food at that fantastic restaurant in Itaewon where we ate last Christmas, and went ice skating at Seoul Plaza. As you may have guessed, this trip was my Christmas present.

I loved seeing the Nutcracker again, which was very similar to the one I've seen at home, but a little different. There were similar costumes and sets, for example, but the Christmas tree had a fish on it. Not a fish ornament, a giant goldfish. There was also no nutcracker. The orchestra made the nut-cracking noise during the song when Drosselmeyer introduces the doll, but the doll was a kid wearing a lot of makeup and more closely resembled a clown. I guess the choreographers thought Koreans wouldn't know what a nutcracker is, anyway. The little girl who played Clara was amazing. She was doing some complicated stuff en pointe and she couldn't have been older than 13. They added a Christmas song medley at the end, when the dancers took their final curtain call.

The cabdriver who took us to the Seoul Arts Center (a fantastic, three storied opera house) didn't know what ballet was, which didn't surprise me after trying to explain it to my staff. There's a credit card commercial over here starring a famous ballerina, so I had thought it was in the public consciousness but I guess not. And yes, it is called ballet in Korea.

Seoul Plaza was all done up with a lighted Christmas tree and a large snow globe, and there was a skating rink in the center. Bobby preferred to stand on the sidelines and laugh at me as I struggled to remember how to skate. I finally got the hang of it about five minutes before closing time.

We encountered a protest at the train station, which isn't unusual. I see protests about 75% of the time I come to Seoul Station. The man on stage was shouting something very angrily, and I wasn't surprised when our cabdriver told us they were protesting the government's inaction in response to the bombing on Yeonpyeong Island. Many Koreans are upset about this, understandably so. The US is still in a war we entered as retaliation for the September 11 attacks nine years ago. Americans who have been in Korea for awhile are very nonchalant about the incidents this year. They say it has always been like this. I wonder if this fervor is going to die down after awhile.

The Good 'Ol Days

As I was contemplating several rather dismal homemade ornaments, the most random person popped into my head.  I do a lot of craft programs for the library.  People seem to like them, though I hate crafting with a passion.  I was never very good at it, and these ugly ornaments are proof.  I like to do my crafts beforehand so I can work out any kinks, though when I'm demonstrating I always start out with, "now, I know yours will look nicer than mine."

But the name was the interesting part of this story.  For the first time in years, I thought of a somewhat unbalanced former patron with a very distinctive voice whom I'll call DD.  DD made calling telephone reference a regular part of his day.  He was one of many.  It wasn't until I began working in telephone reference that I began to realize how many severely mentally unstable people there were wandering the streets.  Anyways, one of DD's tricks was to call every day to ask if a particular person had been released from jail.  I believe he was in trouble when this man got out, which didn't happen while I was working there.  DD would also call for various phone numbers, and once he asked me to write him a business plan so he could submit it to the government and get his free money (thinking, I believe, of an SBA grant).

He was a handful, but he was easier to deal with than Washington DC lady, by far our most persistent caller.  Washington DC lady would call for the numbers to various businesses, some of which no longer existed and some of which had very different names from the ones she gave.  She would call for the same number several times.  When confronted with the fact that her mind was almost gone, like when we told her some business did not exist, she would become very angry.

She was easier to deal with than Morphine Man, who was trying to get his roommate arrested or fired.  When he was done complaining about his roommate and trying to get legal advice from us (we didn't give it), he would try to stump us and then complain about receiving inadequate service.  A typical question from Morphine Man was, "so
what's going on these days?"  He got his name because we suspected that he was at a methadone clinic.

There was the Reverend BJ, who would sometimes ask me to read her every quote from the Bible with a particular theme, and sometimes thought our answers were too quick or simple, at which point she would say, "don't get smart with me!"  Media Man only wanted the numbers to various media outlets, about 3 a day, while HQ man thought that we could find him the direct line to a company's CEO if he just asked the right person (he kept asking for the head librarian).  South Carolina man was fascinated with the Romans, and wanted lots of little facts about them.  He then wanted to know where we found the answer.  He would ask the same question several times, and didn't like it when the answers weren't consistent, so we started photocopying the source material and highlighting the fact.  When someone quit paying his phone bill, he tried to call us collect, but we never accepted.

It's easy for me to tell stories about telephone reference with the fond humor that comes with having left a dismal situation.  Any one of those names would send a current telephone reference employee's blood pressure skyrocketing.  I guess what I'm saying is, crafting isn't really so bad.

Riddle Me This

Supposedly, the greatest human fear is public speaking.

People illogically differentiate between speaking and typing.  It's far easier for me to send out a strongly worded  email than to give someone a dressing down, and I think this is true for many people.  Nonetheless, the words and the effect of them are the same, whether spoken or written.  If anything, it's worse to write something mean or stupid, because the words can sit there in someone's inbox for years, and can be pulled out and dusted off when a spoken argument would be long forgotten.

People remain afraid of public speaking, but not of public typing.  One facebook post can reach hundreds of people.  How many of us, however, would walk in front of 500 people and report that we had pizza for lunch?

As I read my 100th squabble on the USAG Daegu Facebook page, I have to wonder if there was an evolutionary purpose to our fear of public speaking.  Sure, deep down, we don't want to hurt or offend people.  Our adrenal glands tell us this.  Now, by removing ourselves from the podium, we have bypassed this ingrained impulse to be polite in front of strangers and I, for one, don't like it.

And yes, I originally tried to make this a Facebook post, but couldn't condense it to 160 characters.

Christmas shopping

We went to Daegu's biggest shopping enclave, Seoumum market, to do our Christmas shopping. There are almost no traditional shopping malls here. There are a lot of shopping streets, and a couple of underground shopping malls. There are also multistory department stores. None of these sounded particularly appealing to me, and the best deals are to be had at the market.

We had been there once before, just a few days after we arrived. I remembered a rather overwhelming experience. We landed in the fish market and got pretty lost. We had not been back.

Seomum market actually turned out to be like a massive flea market, but with nicer things. We found some good deals. We ran across a store with Christmas trees, where most of the business appeared to be people taking pictures of the trees. The shopkeeper was happy to have a westerner there, and she chatted to me a bit.

For dinner, we went to a place that let you design your own pizza. I am proud to announce that, one year after arriving, we have finally found a place that sells real pizza. Their secret? They let you pick all of the ingredients. So while we could have mayonnaise as a sauce or top our pizzas with sweet potatoes, corn, and squid, we were also able to design a normal pizza. Success!  

Much to be thankful for

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. Just like last year, we had planned to go to my boss's house for a potluck. Unlike last year, I was able to contribute. I cooked up two batches of Dubuisson sweet potatoes, and Bobby made a Mt. Dew cake. Also different this year: we brought a friend! I am grateful to have made friends over the past year, and it was wonderful to share Thanksgiving with them. Dinner was a nice mishmash of good food, good liquor, conversation, and karaoke, which I'm finding is a fixture at all parties in Korea, American or Korean. Here they call it norebang (karaoke is a Japanese word, which Koreans try to avoid).

My birthday is tomorrow, but I've already received my presents. I got some fabulous boots from my parents, along with some clothing and an autographed copy of Greg Mortenson's book. Greg is a personal hero of mine; he is fighting terrorism in the middle east by building schools. I firmly believe that education is the key to a free democratic society, and Greg is trying to prove that. My dream job is to one day help build libraries where Greg builds schools. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

This morning, Bobby retrieved an Amazon box from base. It was kind of slim, and I opened it to find a bread machine cookbook. Bobby told me he would get me the bread machine for Christmas. I was actually kind of fooled, but then he got the machine from the car.

I have wanted a bread machine for awhile now, and it was astute of Bobby to decide to get me one now. I used to live two doors down from a bakery, and now there is almost no source of good, fresh bread. Sure, Korea is littered with bakeries, but they concentrate on Korean pastries: sweet cakes with bean paste or cheese and sausage laden crusts. There are no baguettes or artisan breads. Now, I can make my own with little effort.

Clearly, I have much to be thankful for. Here's to another year in my fortune filled life.

My bread machine

These boots were not made for wearing in the house,  so don't tell my landlord

Pyeongtaek

Well, I need new work pants. There are a ton of places to buy clothing in Daegu, but many of them have no fitting rooms and I am often too tall and thick for Korean clothes. We decided to skip the hassle and go to Osan Air Base, which has the closest thing to an American shopping mall on the peninsula, or so we hear. There's a free bus that goes from Camp Walker to Osan every day.

It was a four hour bus ride, but once we got to Osan we encountered a store resembling a Target. I have to say, I have missed my big box stores (sorry, small businesses). They had everything, including a large Misses clothing section. I found my pants, and we decided to explore Pyeongtaek while we waited for our bus out.

There is a nice shopping area outside of Osan, though it's very similar to what we have in Daegu. I was able to buy some super cheap socks, mittens, and a pillow. Pyeongtaek has a much higher concentration of Americans, which is no surprise given their proximity to Osan Air Base and Camp Humphries, both of which are larger than USAG Daegu. The stores had American sizes, and everyone gave prices in dollars.

The highlight of our day was when we decided to try a Brazilian steakhouse. It was an experience. I'm not a big meat person, but Bobby is, and he found a lunch right up his alley. We paid a flat fee for “weekend lunch,” and received a couple of plates for the salad bar. When we finished our plates, the waiter brought us steaks. Then veal. Then some kind of flank steak on a stick, chicken and beef bits wrapped in bacon, more flank steak, chicken, sausage, garlic encrusted beef ribs, and more flank steak. I am inclined to believe that there was more meat in our dinner (and the chain's website says something about 15 meats), but I started refusing courses after four and Bobby had to stop after this. The waiter then brought us a pineapple on a stick encrusted with cinnamon, and cut a sliver for each of us. We spend the rest of the afternoon joking about our meat on meat lunch with meat on the side. I don't think I need to try that again, though I suspect that Bobby will want to.

Fortified with meat, we took another four hour bus ride back. A year ago, I would never have imagined myself traveling four hours to visit a more expensive version of Target. I would travel twice that for a good Mexican restaurant!

The Autumn Leaves

Since we live next to a mountain, I have eagerly anticipated the changing leaves. And then, I missed them. I'm not entirely sure how this happened. It seems like one minute, the leaves were green, and the next they were brown. I have a couple of theories:

1. The mountains are to the north and south of me, so the light never hit them right.
2. The leaves don't turn fiery spectacular colors like the ones on base.
3. I've been working too damn much.

I think it's some combination of the three. I did catch some of the leaves on our street, which were cherry blossoms in the spring. In the fall, they get lovely red leaves. If I ever have a yard, I'll be sure and plant some wild cherry trees in it.

I do work a lot. I have somehow adopted this evil schedule where I work Tuesday through the following Sunday, take Monday off, then work till Friday, and take a three day weekend. Of course, there are often meetings and other hoopla that come up on Mondays, so I'll pop in for them. On paper, it sounds nice to have a three day weekend every other week, but the preceding 10 day stretch is just too much for me. I know, I know, Koreans work 6 days a week. I'm just not cut out for it.

In other news, we've been here a year now! Woohoo! A nice celebratory dinner is somewhere in our less hectic future. The time flies, and I find us facing another Korean winter (inject whatever the opposite of woohoo is here.)

I'd be remiss if I ended this post without mentioning Bob. A good friend died last week. Bob Remsburg was like a grandfather to me, and I feel his loss like I would (did) my grandfather's. I'm sorry I can't go to the funeral, but I am saying goodbye in my own way. Bob Remsburg, thanks for everything.

Bob and Mary Remsburg and Bobby at our wedding

The last time we were all together.  That's Bob in the back.

The cherry trees changing color.

That's today.  The red comes from the setting sun, I think, 'cause it's pretty much all gray now.

I think she's too big to be a lap dog, but Bobby begs to differ

My Trip to YUMC

On Thursday, I was reminded that Korea is an easy place to be an English speaking foreigner. I developed this godawful pain in my abdomen very suddenly on Thursday morning. I have never felt anything like it. While I was making a scene, Bobby frantically called Mr. Pan and had him cover for me. I happened to know that Yeungnam University Medical Center is close to our house—well, there's no happen about it. It's, of course, very important to know your closest hospital, and I had this scenario worked out in my mind shortly after we moved in. Anyways, Bobby helped me hobble to the car and we took off. When we got there, I made it to the international reception desk, which has a bevy of translators. A nice lady took me to see a gastroenterologist, and by the time we got into the office the pain was very manageable. I felt silly being in a hospital for it. Nonetheless, they gave me a once over and got an extensive medical history. The doctor actually spoke English as well. I left with medicine for an ulcer and gastritis. I guess they were covering their bases.

The medicines are Korean, but they worked well. The pain has disappeared, and I'm glad it wasn't my appendix. That was my first thought. In the back of my mind, I keep remembering when the Chinese herbalists in Beijing asked me if I had poor circulation and pains in my stomach. I wonder if the two are related. I have been consulting my good friend internet, and poor circulation may also finally explain to me why my legs hurt so badly sometimes. They have done so my entire life, and I'm completely clueless as to what brings it on. I wish I could find an oriental clinic here with an English speaker. I will have to start questing.

Okay, full stop.  Going to the hospital was my wake up call about dealing with stress.  Since we got back from China, I have been working nonstop.  Literally.  I did not take a day off until I was forced to.  The thing is, I'm still learning this management thing.  I have always had the opinion that if you don't like something, you stop complaining and change it.  Now that I have some power, I feel obligated to fix all of the problems.  I am finding that this is a little beyond my limits as a human being, and I need to learn how to step back a bit and pick my battles.  I hope this isn't my first step towards "jaded-bureaucrat-collecting-bloated-salary-for-a-living." 

Shouting at the wall

Reason #550 why it is frustrating to run an English speaking library in Korea:  Having to delegate some of my more unpleasant duties

Here's what I mean: This morning, the internet didn't work at our Carroll branch.  Our commercial internet is run by an outside company, so I had to ask one of my staff to contact them.  After a short conversation, he came back and told me that the company suggested that we restart the router, and if it didn't work they would stop by tomorrow.  They do not do work at Camp Carroll on Fridays, they said.  As anyone who works in a library with public internet knows, this is not an answer my staff can give to our patrons.

Koreans by and large get exceptional customer service, but they do not demand it.  It made one of my employees very uncomfortable to ask for a return on an item I bought in error.  At this point in our internet saga, I would normally put on my manager pants and muscle the company into fulfilling their duty.  Instead, I had to ask my employee to call back and be pushy for me.  I hated putting him outside of his comfort zone to do my job, but he was gracious about it.  Lo and behold, a few phone calls later and we got a repairman.

Living in a country where I do not speak the native language makes me feel impotent.  Ironic, since I do wear the manager pants for the first time in my life.  Much has been written about the power of language; I am not in the mood to wax philosophical nor do I have anything brilliant to add to this conversation.  But yes, words are a weapon I wield competently in my own world, and without them, I am disarmed.  Rats.

Evil Mosquitoes

I have to devote a post to Daegu's mosquitoes. Daegu is not a tropical city. The houses are not made of thatch or bamboo. There are no malarial swamps, and the temperature never reaches 100 degrees. In spite of these odds, Daegu is home to the most pesky mosquito population I have ever encountered.

North Carolina is no stranger to humidity. Quite often, in summer, you can almost drink the air. Summers in Charlotte helped me understand why "muggy" is a word. With humidity comes mosquitoes, of course, and there are plenty. Our old house had a wonderful front porch that we couldn't use from Memorial Day to Labor Day because even 5 minutes outside would leave me heartily bitten. Those mosquitoes scoffed at citronella candles, and nothing but a rich smattering of “Off” would keep (most of) them away.

Daegu during the rainy season is somewhat similar, but I was prepared and had a generous supply of “Off.” I never walked the dog without it. Daegu does not have the clouds of mosquitoes that North Carolina had. I deluded myself that I could handle Daegu mosquitoes because damnit, I'm a southerner. I wondered why there are mosquito nets at the Home Plus.

Well, now I know. What Daegu mosquitoes lack in numbers, they make up for in guile. I was dismayed to discover that when temperatures dropped to the 50's at night, the mosquitoes hung around. They survived by moving inside. We have screens over our windows, so I'm still not sure how they get in, but they do. Then they hide, biding their time until we fell asleep. I don't detect mosquitoes during the day, but I wake up with bites all over.

Our temporary solution is to have Bobby conduct regular mosquito patrols, newspaper in hand. He usually kills about 10 a day. I think we're going to check out the mosquito nets the next time we go to Home Plus.

I've always associated mosquito nets with 3rd world countries.  I guess the stupid, lethargic mosquitoes of my old home deluded me.

China: The Good, the Bad, and Everything in Between

I have written a good deal about our trip, but I think it warrants an overview, particularly for those less interested in reading pages of my musings. China: I have been reading books and watching movies about it for years. Our whirlwind tour was surely not enough to give me a comprehensive view of such a large country, but I do leave with some distinct impressions.

First of all, if you have ever been to a big Chinatown, say in New York or Los Angeles, you are already familiar with China. The main tourist areas are full of the same food markets, endless stores full of trinkets, and that distinct fishy smell. China is also similar to Korea with its back alleys full of activity, laundry hanging from windows, bicycle commuters, people wearing face masks, exercise equipment everywhere, and old men playing games on the sidewalk. One new thing was the masses of people dancing in the parks. The first time I saw this, I was thrilled and had to stand and watch through a couple of songs. We saw it again and again throughout our stay. Sometimes there were different dance groups with competing music right next to each other.

The Chinese diaspora is brutally honest about China's past, particularly the crimes of Chairman Mao, so I was kind of surprised to see his picture on all of the money. There is a Mao museum and a large portrait in Tiananmen Square. Many slogans from the cultural revolution have been quietly painted over, but China has not admitted to its ugly past. The presence and absolute power of the Chinese government was intimidatingly evident everywhere. Many major sites had bag scanners. Bobby and I were wanded each time we went to the airport, and there were cameras everywhere. No wonder there hasn't been a terrorist attack in China.

The Chinese people do not have any of the consideration of Korean and Japanese people. They shove each other aside to get on the subway, cut in line, and are constantly trying to bilk tourists out of their money. Both Shanghai and Beijing have distinct big city attitudes, unlike Seoul. Bobby and I were surprised at how many street people spoke excellent English. They would often try to engage us in conversation to try and sell us something. At first, we were happy to talk to them, but after the second day we would just ignore shouts of “Hello! Where are you from?” The Chinese don't have the earnest friendliness of the Koreans. It's like comparing North Carolina with New York. This can be refreshing, as I don't ever know how to end a polite conversation with a Korean, and sometimes their solicitousness can be downright rude (a woman once grabbed money out of my hand to try and show me how to charge my subway card, something I know well how to do.)

China's cities are as diverse in nature as the country, which was a refreshing change. There are people from all over the world. The architecture itself varies from traditional imperial to communist utilitarian to colonial European. We saw mosques and kebab houses, which are not evident anywhere in Korea.

The traffic is a nightmare, and it's not easy to get around. Cars don't move on the roads, and the subways fit an unbelievable amount of people. We walked for miles and miles to see everything, which is really the best way to see a city anyway. We stumbled across some interesting things that were not in guidebooks. The air is very dirty, visibly so.

The food is out of this world. Meals are always shared, like in Korea, but there are far more flavors and textures. Every time we went out we ordered three or four dishes, and we never had a meal we were not happy with.

We had a wonderful time, and were both sorry we could not stay longer. China has much more to offer than can be experienced in a week. I have taken far more pictures than will fit in this blog. You can find the rest here.

China

The Bund

We spent a lot of time in transit to get here. First we took the KTX to Seoul, then the shuttle to Incheon airport, then a flight to Shanghai, a maglev from the airport to the city, and a cab to our hotel. The maglev is worth mentioning. It goes 440 km per hour and banks to turn, and I found it a slightly terrifying experience. Bobby thought it was cool.

When we finally got here, we headed for The Bund, which is a picturesque and crowded, area by the river. One side of the river is lined with old European buildings, and the other sports flashy, space age buildings. It was well worth the crowds. There is a lot of history on the Bund, which was where the British set up shop after the Opium Wars. The venerable buildings included a British consulate built in the mid 1800's, an old customs house, and a fusty old club where “Chinese and dogs” were not allowed. It's a wonder that the Chinese let these symbols of British imperialism stand, but they are beautiful now (and all fly Chinese flags). There is a steady flow of barges heading through the canal. It is almost like watching cars on the highway. On the other side of the river, after nightfall, there are twinkling buildings, buildings with candy colors, and two with video shows on their sides. We had a drink at an old signal house, where we sat on the roof and watched the city light up (well worth the overpriced drinks).

We then squeezed into the ferry with tons of Chinese and headed to the other side of the river. The light show intensified: all of the trees lining the boulevard had green or blue lights on them, and some had white “icicles” hanging from them. It sounds garish, but it was tastefully done, probably for the Expo. We went to the observation deck of the World Financial Center, which is the highest observation deck in the world (or was, they weren't very clear). It was 492meters up, and there was a section in the middle with a glass floor so you can see just how high up you are. Bobby loves these things, and we go to one at every city we visit.

On the third floor, we found a dumpling restaurant. This is exactly what I wanted. I have been reading The Last Chinese Chef, and I was very eager to eat some dumplings. They did not disappoint, though I popped a couple in my mouth before they were adequately cool.

Western influence is very obvious in Shanghai. Aside from the buildings, there are Mc Donalds's, Krispy Kremes, KFC's, and Starbucks, everywhere. We even saw a Hardee's and a Best Buy. We have not yet seen a temple or anything resembling one, but we are in the industrialized area of town. Shanghai has long been a commercial center, and there is not much evidence of old China here.

The Bund

It looks like a space needle

I think this is a customs house

You can kind of see the light display

Yuyuan Gardens and the French Concession

We were going to visit the Expo today, but Bobby pointed out that it's Sunday and there will be less people there tomorrow. We will never be able to avoid crowds; not in Shanghai at this moment. I don't know if it is always this crowded or if people have poured in for the Expo. The event is evident all over Shanghai. There are signs, statues, and topiaries that say Expo 2009, and there are police everywhere. There are bag scanners in the subway, and wherever we go, tons and tons of people.

Anyways, Expo tomorrow. We decided to go to Yuyuan Gardens, which is lovely in the pictures and right in the middle of Old Town. We got there to find a huge crunch of people. “Old Town” doesn't look particularly old, though the traditional architecture is beautiful. It's a cluster of stores that was jam packed with tourists. We found our way to the gardens and paid the entrance fee, which got us away from the overwhelming crunch. The gardens were lovely. There were clusters of pathways, lots of pagodas, pools with koi, and grottoes. The whole thing used to belong to the obviously well heeled Yu family back in the 16^th century. We laughed about what old Yu is thinking now, with his estate packed with gawking commoners and foreigners. Even with all the people, it was peaceful.

We wandered back through the crowds into a temple. It looked like a Korean buddhist temple, but there were no Buddhas. Instead, there were several different structures honoring different gods. China has many gods, most of whom were real people at some point. I was excited to find the temple to the god of literature. There were a lot of people praying, and each of the gods had offerings of dumplings and fruit. Bobby pointed out that at one shrine depicting three gods and a tiger, someone laid out a dumpling for the tiger. There was one temple with three different gods of wealth, and another shrine had a god of war and wealth. It was no surprise that Shanghai, with it's relentless commercialism, has four different gods of wealth in it's town temple. In retrospect, I realize that several of these gods are in Buddhist temples in Korea, though Buddha gets the main slot. Buddhists, I remember, are allowed to worship other gods.

We pushed our way into a three story dumpling shop (“dumplings again? Says Bobby”) but there was absolutely no space. We wandered a bit until a woman lured us into her restaurant, which had dim sum but “expensive” enough so that we didn't have to deal with crowds (our meal was less than $30). We had fabulous dim sum with Chinese businessmen and European tourists.

We noticed some cats outside of the gardens, and more around the city. One was sleeping in the rafters of a temple. Shanghai is a cat city. I bought this kitschy porcelain cat, the kind of tourist fare I normally avoid but I love cats! I have been living in an anti-cat country and was thrilled to see Shanghai's appreciation of their cats. The strays all look very clean and well fed.

We went out again for dinner, but this time to the French Concession. This was a true old town, full of colonial French buildings. One of these was the site of the first meeting of the Chinese Communist Party in 1921, a holy place for Chinese Communists. We found a bunch of restaurants, one of which was German. I told Bobby he could pick where we ate dinner since we had dumplings AGAIN, so this was serendipity for him. We ate on the sidewalk and watched all the tourists trundle by. We noticed a Haagen Dasz, which prompted me to wonder if there's a Haagen Dasz at every tourist spot in the world. I never see them in town, but you go to, say, the Old Church in Amsterdam and there's the Haagen Dasz. We walked among the buildings, which are stunning. I'm glad Shanghai kept them.

Old Town McDonalds

A sea of people

a teahouse

a design on the eaves

one of Yu's halls

grottoes

Shanghai god

Prayer ribbons ??

A magnificent stage

Kitty in the temple

Shanghai Expo ad.  That's the mascot

French concession

Shanghai Expo

Meh. I planned this entire trip around the Expo. I read Devil in the White city a few years ago, and it filled my head with dreams of a World's Fair with dizzying displays of tomorrow's technology. We probably should have visited a technology pavilion. Instead, what we encountered were long lines, pushy people, and bad food. There were some interesting pavilions. My favorite was probably The Netherlands, which was a multilevel display of Holland art, old and new. The bottom level was astroturf and model sheep. Canada had a display on sustainability where you could ride a bike and make a trippy cartoon run, complete with psychedelic music. They also managed to grow grass all over the side of their pavilion. Australia had a rotating set of screens that came out of the floor and retreated into the floor, revealing a new sculpture each time. Indonesia had an indoor waterfall. We waited in line the longest to see the USA pavilion, and it was so lousy we didn't even see the whole thing. It was almost entirely in Mandarin, and while every other pavilion displayed some of the country's contributions to art, history, and/or science, the US was a series of videos. The first showed a bunch of people in New York trying to say “welcome” in Mandarin and Kobe Bryant. I was annoyed. Were we trying to say we have no culture? Also, all the other pavilions had some English, but the US didn't? “Hi, we're America! Most of us look ludicrous trying to speak Mandarin, but we do have Kobe Bryant.” Guh.

It was also one of those places that brought out the worst in people. They shoved in line, like pushing me up against the person in front of me would get them in faster.

The entire event was massive, and there were 3 hour lines for some of the pavilions. The UK had a really long line and a neat looking pavilion. It resembled a giant pincushin.

So, World's Fair—I've seen one, I don't really need to see any more.

You see the sign!  No noising!

USA! USA!  What a bummer.

Some of the more creative buildings in Africa

This is inside the big Africa building

The UK pincoushin

The Netherlands

Part of the Czech Republic exhibit

Australia exhibit

Thailand

Beijing, Day 1

Well, we're here, but getting here was not easy. We took a soft sleeper from Shanghai. There were two other people in our car, but they kept to themselves. It wasn't until the man asked Bobby if he could turn off the light that we realized that he spoke excellent English. One thing I like about Chinese (and Japanese) people is their standoffishness. If he were Korean and spoke English, he would not be comfortable with silence.

We arrived at the station at about 8am. We walked around awhile looking for a taxi line, and when we finally found one there was a long line. Several men approached us and offered us a taxi, but I know by now that an unlicensed taxi is a bad idea. Our taxi driver made a genuine effort to get us to our hotel, but there was just too much traffic. He tried two different approaches to our street, but both were at a standstill. Finally, Bobby asked him to let us out and point us in the right direction.

We wandered around for awhile, suitcases in tow, until we found a Hilton. The bellhop there was very solicitous and got us a map. We then ran into our first “art student”. We would meet several more. He spoke excellent English and told us he was preparing to study in the U.S., as, we would discover, was a commons story. He did help us find our hotel, but (in all honesty) it was after we bought a painting from him. It's a beautiful calligraphy, but we probably paid too much—a cardinal sin to the Lonely Planet guide. This art student scam is a long con. They talk to you for awhile, asking questions and behaving like they are studying English. I'm used to Koreans doing this, but the “art students” do eventually ask for money. My dad once said he would offer bums money if they didn't give him the story. I feel the same way about the “students.” In Shanghai, there are tons of people walking around trying to sell watches, but they are straightforward about what they want, as are the unlicensed taxis. Something about the students con rubs me the wrong way (and I love my painting and we were planning to buy one anyways), and by the time I met my fourth student I was telling them to piss off. Anyways, we got to our hotel and the clerk told us the hotel had no power and that he would take us to another hotel. It was a bummer, because the hotel I chose overlooks the forbidden city. He will bring us back in two days, but in the meantime we have a five star Chinese hotel that's close to the shopping district.

When we finally got into our room, it was almost noon and Bobby had no suitcase. The staff had delivered his suitcase to the wrong room. The problem was eventually corrected, but we were not in the mood to deal with it.

We had lunch and set out for Tiananmen Square. It was incredibly imposing. For one thing, it's massive. There are lots of soldiers and metal detectors at each entrance. In the center of the square, there are two giant screens that show propaganda: waving flags, patriotic songs, etc. The buildings surrounding the square are ominous and imposing. To top it all off, every few feet there are light poles with three or four cameras on them pointing in all directions. I was creeped out, and we didn't stay long. Most countries will admit the bloody parts of their history, but China has glossed over the Tiananmen Square massacre and the Cultural Revolution. Officially, Mao is still a hero.

One of the things Bobby and I do best is wander around and find interesting things. Today we found a historic “rice road” that used to be the main thoroughfare for bringing goods into the palace off the left side of the square. It was lined by some old looking walls, and there were some doors in the walls with stores behind them that have probably been there for centuries. We saw a colonial European looking church and some old mansions, where (I imagine) nobles used to live. It was also refreshingly free of tourists and the people who prey on them. We returned down a huge shopping street and saw a 7 story book store.

For dinner, we visited Xiao Wang's Home Restaurant in Ritan Park, a very popular place that was listed in our guidebook. We had Peking duck and a couple other dishes, and we were not disappointed. The restaurant was worth the hype. I have been reading about Chinese haute cuisine, so when I order dishes I can't help but feel we are doing it wrong, but our duck, dumplings, and soup were delicious. We walked around the park afterwards and ran into several dance classes. I have seen dance classes in Central Park. They do it in Beijing, too! We also walked down Embassy Row, though there were no indicators on any Embassy so we couldn't tell which one was ours. We saw another shopping mall with a huge LED billboard for a roof. It lit up the entire street. Beijing has a lot of character. There are ostentatious futuristic buildings right around the corner from buildings which could be 500 years old. For all it's brutishness, I like it a lot.

A street corner

Recognize this?

Giant propaganda screen

Cameras, Cameras

Statues in the square

The Rice Road

Seven story bookstore

The Great Wall at Mutianyu

Today we went to the Great Wall at Mutianyu. This section of the wall is about 70km outside of Beijing, so we had to sign up for a tour at the tour desk in our hotel. We piled into a bus with 8 other English speakers, only one of whom was American. We have noticed that Americans are in the minority of Western tourists here. There are far more Europeans. The other people on the bus were German and Austrian.

We drove out of the city and into a sprawling countryside filled with courtyard houses, wide roads, and empty space. We headed for some mountains, while our tour guide told us some interesting things about Beijing. There are 1,900 new cars in Beijing every day. To deal with the pollution and traffic congestion, both of which are substantial, people with license plates with certain numbers are not allowed to drive on designated days. Every day, 1/5 of the cars in Beijing are not allowed to drive. She also told us about family planning, which we call the one child policy. It's a little more complex than that, apparently. People in an ethnic minority (not Han Chinese) get to have as many children as they want. Two people who are only children can have 2 children.

We got to the wall, and headed down a gauntlet of shops with increasingly familiar hawkers. We took a cable car up to the top of the mountain, and below us I could see some old walls, I guess meant to keep the path from flooding. We discovered that the wall is basically a giant staircase. Some of the stairs were perilously high and small, but we slogged until we got to the end of the reconditioned wall. There were gatehouses at regular intervals that were pretty big: each had about six or seven rooms. This must have been where people lived. Our guide told us that there were farms all around the wall so the soldiers could feed themselves. There were vendors at regular intervals selling overpriced water, which we bought. Going down the mountain was delightful: we each took a toboggan down a loopy track. It was like a carnival ride.

On the way back we were pushed into a state supported “healing center” where we were offered free foot massage (no one took it) and a palm reading. We were all analyzed by a Chinese doctor and advised to buy expensive traditional medicine. One thing I will say is the guy felt my pulse, looked at my tongue, and pinched my ear, and he was dead on about me. I do have poor circulation and pains in my stomach. I went through a lot of testing a couple of years ago to discover that there's nothing really wrong with me, and the Chinese doctor apparently could have told me what caused it in 10 seconds. I did not buy the medicine.

When we got back, we were hungry, so we hit the Donghuamen Night Market. This is a row of food stalls that sets up in the late afternoon. It was similar to the food stalls in Korea, but with a much wider variety. We had fried banana balls, eel sticks, corn cakes, and some jello like substance. We went out for dinner a few hours later. We headed for a restaurant recommended by Nicole Mones, who wrote The Last Chinese Chef. We actually did not find the place. There was no English on the sign and the address was not readily evident. We went inside a restaurant with a nice English hawker, who helped us select the best meal we have had in China. It was incredible and less than $20. When we got outside, we found the restaurant we were supposed to go to, but it was a happy mistake.

We walked to the bell and drum tower, which are massive structures built by the emperor to tell the time. They were impressive, even at night. We wandered the hutongs for awhile. Hutongs are old streets designed by the Mongols. They are really thin and accessible only by bicycle and small car. These were lined with old structures and very picturesque. I wish I could have gotten a picture, but my camera doesn't do night shots.

This was painted on a wall in a hutong behind our hotel

Cable cars to the wall

An ancient view.  Watch out for Mongolians!

Bobby shakes his fist at Mongolians

The wall

A particularly treacherous set of stairs

Here we are!

Night market

Detailing on one of the guardhouse roofs