“Once there was a way to get back homeward…”

In a surprsising turn of events, our flight out of Japan to Shanghai had been canceled due to maintenance, an advantageous position in the airline perks world that had Amit salivating at the mouth.  We quickly browsed through all the other places that we could’ve gotten a free flight for then and there and settled on Beijing because we didn’t drop $130 dollars on Chinese Visas just to decorate the passport.  So off we went to Beijing with an airport provided hotel and breakfast that they didnt technically have to provide awaiting us on the other end.  We knew we were really someplace quite different when amit decided to steal a small hand towel from the hotel room to wrap up a donut he borrowed from the all-you-can-eat-here buffet, and seconds later the desk agent at check out inquired, “where small towel?” and amit had to go run and “locate” the small towel that had somehow made its way “under the bed.”  No more stealing in China.

In Beijing I was visited by three very dear old friends:  food poisoning,  culture shock, and seasonal depression.  Since everybody loves diarrhea/vomit stories I’ll start there first.  A liter bottle of Tsingtao in China costs approximately 40 to 60 cents even with restaurant markup, so after pouring two of those on top of a steamed sweet potato I got off a bucket on rolling street cart and a pizza from a questionable travellers cafe, and getting blatantly and bluntly hit on by the only Mexican dude in China, I had an all night vomit fest that left a ring of splatter around around every possible recepticle within puking distance from my hostel bed.  Amit’s sleep was more or less undisturbed and I was mostly better the next day.

Then came culture shock. Hadn’t seen this one in a while.  We’re talking irrational contempt for your surroundings, feelings of wanting to escape, putting familiar things on pedastals and asserting their superiority…all that jazz.  I think most of it was rooted in the fact that people in China just do NOT speak english with any consistency so never have I felt so totally and completely inept.  The best english speakers we found in China were very well-educated chinese university students running what foreigners call “tea scams” in Tiananmen Square, where they approach you and talk to you, invite you to a few pots of tea which you find cost around $70 each and next thing you know your smacked with a 250 dollar bill they get a comission off of and an urgent need to pee.  We avoided this like pros but did get caught up in buying a 13 dollar painting of a pig somehow from some “art students” who brought us to their art exhibition.  Aside from the frustration, we found ourselves excited by China, the hustle and bustle, the street culture, how cheap everything is.  It was quite a contrast to block after block of trendy people, vending machines, and places that look like time square.  Though in anticipation of the 2008 Olympics, China has issued 7 changes that the people of Beijing should make to become more agreeable to Westerners like me.  They have to stop spitting in the streets, tucking their shirts up into their armpits on hot days, littering, cursing loudly and profanely in the streets and they have to start lining up more for subways and buses like in Japan.  Based on my short experience in Beijing, the Chinese government will never be successful in accomplishing these tasks, and most certainly not by September.  It amazes me that the Olympic committee was impressed enough with Beijing to select it for the summer games as it was offered up by the people of  China but now has to undergo a good thorough cultural cleansing.