1) China is creepy, except when it's not.
2) Don't give money to beggars, except maybe thrown out of a moving car ... so they get killed scrambling for it in traffic. (Hey, they attacked me first.)
3) Three hours is the maximum you can endure even a wonderful massage before it becomes annoying.
4) Starbucks is God, except they don't let you smoke.
5) What to take with you as provisions - including gifts for monks and offerings for Buddha - when you pilgrimage to a mountain monastry.
6) Comfort eating is no salve for desperate loneliness, except when you richly deserve it.
7) Being an International Observer for anything except bribery is tedious beyond belief!
OK, backstory: the university where I used to teach (name omitted) asked me to go up to Guangzhou University as an international observer for their two-days worth of Joint Program exams and so my friend Alba from Puerto Rico suggested we go up a day early and spend the entire day at a ridiculously cheap spa she knows up on the Mainland and so that was the plan ...
... except, on Thursday, I'm in Kowloon on my way to the China Ferry Terminal when Alba rings to say her husband had just announced he'd invited six people to dinner that night so she can't come ... but that I was to go on ahead and her friends would pick me up in Nansha, show me around and put me up for the night. I thought, without her, since she's fluent in Cantonese, the whole thing would be fraught with problems (which it wasn't) but I already had my visa and yuan so went anyway.
Geographic Information: the whole coastline from Hong Kong to Nansha - a three hour high-speed ferry ride - is tropical, beautiful and dense with luxury gated estates - built as retirement homes for the HK rich I discovered.
Anyway, Alba's friends B., Dr and Mrs W. (I've omitted their names in case they wouldn't like me talking about them), all chemists, picked me up at the ferry terminal and they were so nice - beyond nice considering I was a total stranger to them. Mrs W. couldn't speak any English but the other two were fluent, B. especially so since she was born and raised in Australia. They collected me in a chauffeur-driven luxury car - which was at my disposal the entire next day after we dropped them off at the airport. Naturally, I was expecting to be taken up to the spa only Alba hadn't told them that part of the plan and here's what we did instead:
DAY ONE:
1) Was taken on a tour of their factory - which makes food additives from natural products - they are gambling on the world soon realising how dangerous chemical food additives are, and then they'll be way ahead in the market. I so approved!
2) Went with them to ... no way I'm making this public.
3) Went to the town of Pan-Yu to watch them shopping for their three-day pilgrimage - they were leaving the next day - to a monastry in the mountains - which turned out to be the same one that's at the end of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" (if you haven't seen the film, this monastry is amazing and I was so envious ... especially since they say there's now a cable car and you no longer have to climb all those ghastly steps.) So, if you want to know what to take with you when you go on a sino-pilgrimage, I'm the one to talk to.
4) Went out to early dinner in Nansha, which was so much fun and we talked non-stop (poor Mrs W. was so bored) about Buddhism, reincarnation, Mao, the Cultural Revolution, the greatest mystery of western culture: blue vein cheese, and why B.'s entire family has returned from Australia to China in the last decade.
Actually, that last one's a great story so I'll tell you in another post.
5) Walked home under the most amazing full moon, which was, strangely, blood red in colour. They'd never seen a Blood Moon before and I'd only seen one, which was during that last eclipse. I told them that, in western culture, it was seen as a bad omen and meant something awful was to happen. They said the Chinese didn't have that superstition, and then they decided, since China had only that day announced it was going to mine the moon, that the moon knew and had already started bleeding. Decided I liked that explanation very much. I mean, mining the moon!!! To my very core I find that obscene.
6) I returned to B.'s spectacular townhouse - more about them later - for the rest of the night and was given the choice of either watching Chinese TV for several hours or taking advantage of Ping, the very nice beauty therapist B. had hired and who was now standing by ready to serve me in whatever capacity I wished.
Well, what else could I do? It was only polite.
7) Ping - who looked like a sino-girl Ziggy Stardust - they pick up trends late in China - couldn't speak a word of English and thus the next five hours were spent constantly mobile phoning from the upstairs Japanese-style apartment to the downstairs Italian-style apartment to find out what I wanted done - which naturally was everything Ping was trained to do - so I had five hours of Beyond-Wonderful and discovered that, after three hours, Beyond-Wonderful becomes Beyond-Boring, but - when it seems like a waste to not continue - one can endure anything. And then I fell asleep and B. left me there, on the Japanese sleeping platform, for the rest of the night. And what a delicious sleep too! Nice, nice, nice!
Hey, can you think of a more wonderful way to entertain a houseguest? You don't even have to talk to them. I recommend everyone take it up.
Well, what else could I do? It was only polite.
7) Ping - who looked like a sino-girl Ziggy Stardust - they pick up trends late in China - couldn't speak a word of English and thus the next five hours were spent constantly mobile phoning from the upstairs Japanese-style apartment to the downstairs Italian-style apartment to find out what I wanted done - which naturally was everything Ping was trained to do - so I had five hours of Beyond-Wonderful and discovered that, after three hours, Beyond-Wonderful becomes Beyond-Boring, but - when it seems like a waste to not continue - one can endure anything. And then I fell asleep and B. left me there, on the Japanese sleeping platform, for the rest of the night. And what a delicious sleep too! Nice, nice, nice!
Hey, can you think of a more wonderful way to entertain a houseguest? You don't even have to talk to them. I recommend everyone take it up.
Now for B.'s story:
THE MODERN CHINESE SUCCESSFUL IMMIGRATION STORY
Twelve years ago, great grandma, approaching 100 and after 70+ years in Australia, decided she wanted to die "at home" and so, for companionship, talked all four of Barbara's grandparents (all born in China too) into coming with her so they could die there as well. Since they were all over 80 and frail, the family insisted 40 year-old B. - as great grandma's only unmarried great grandchild - take them back and stay to take care of them until they all died. She was promised it would only take a few years, however the moment the Oldies returned to their ancestoral village up in the mountains of Guangdong and met up with childhood friends they all got a new lease of life and to this date, twelve years later, only great grandma had died ... and B. by then had decided she liked China so much, she bought the most spectacular set of properties (more about them later).
And when she told her family she was staying on, her Oz-born parents, four Oz-born brothers, their Oz-born wives, and their sixteen combined Oz-born children, all came to see what was so great, and there discovered that, with their fluent English and internationally-recognised university degrees, they were considered way-beyond-demi-gods and thus they all stayed on too, with the parents living on in their ancestoral village and doing a nice line in organic farming, and the brothers and their wives getting spectacularly important jobs and money beyond their wildest dreams ... and thus all becoming The Real Chinese Immigration Success Story - which is not about going abroad and becoming assimilated into a new country and culture, but going out into the world and then bringing your skills, knowledge and money back home again!
Twelve years ago, great grandma, approaching 100 and after 70+ years in Australia, decided she wanted to die "at home" and so, for companionship, talked all four of Barbara's grandparents (all born in China too) into coming with her so they could die there as well. Since they were all over 80 and frail, the family insisted 40 year-old B. - as great grandma's only unmarried great grandchild - take them back and stay to take care of them until they all died. She was promised it would only take a few years, however the moment the Oldies returned to their ancestoral village up in the mountains of Guangdong and met up with childhood friends they all got a new lease of life and to this date, twelve years later, only great grandma had died ... and B. by then had decided she liked China so much, she bought the most spectacular set of properties (more about them later).
And when she told her family she was staying on, her Oz-born parents, four Oz-born brothers, their Oz-born wives, and their sixteen combined Oz-born children, all came to see what was so great, and there discovered that, with their fluent English and internationally-recognised university degrees, they were considered way-beyond-demi-gods and thus they all stayed on too, with the parents living on in their ancestoral village and doing a nice line in organic farming, and the brothers and their wives getting spectacularly important jobs and money beyond their wildest dreams ... and thus all becoming The Real Chinese Immigration Success Story - which is not about going abroad and becoming assimilated into a new country and culture, but going out into the world and then bringing your skills, knowledge and money back home again!
PRECISELY WHY YOU BECOME A RE-IMMIGRANT:
But I have yet to tell you about B.'s property: See, when she decided to stay on in China she realised there was no one in her league to marry so decided to organise properly to live out the rest of her life as a single woman, and to this end went about buying an apartment and during the search discovered this newly built five-storey townhouse in the most exquistitely landscaped gated community:
The townhouse consisted of five luxury three bedroom/three bathroom apartments one atop the other: the first floor apartment was done up Italian-style and had a gorgeous walled courtyard garden; the second floor was an English-style apartment with a wonderful country-style kitchen and balcony herb garden, the third floor was Japanese with the most exquisitely crafted wooden everything, all sleeping platforms, compact built-ins and a family shrine, the fourth floor was New York-kickarse-modern, and the fifth floor was a glass studio apartment in the middle of the most gorgeous roof garden and with spectacular 360 degree views of the coast and mountains. Mmmm, which to buy? They only cost 60,000 yuan each - divide by six - so, mmmm? Which one?
B., being totally my sort of woman, decided, mmmmm, to buy the lot and she then knocked internal staircases between each floor, and now lives in the most spendid luxury, being Italian to watch TV and bathe, cooking and sleeping English, getting her thrice-weekly beauty therapies and praying in Japan, playing mah-jong and entertaining guests in New York, and the top floor is where great-grandma spent her final year and thus is set up as a luxury nursing home room and is kept that way for when any of the grandparents get too frail to live in the mountains.
Hey, no attitude about living like this. Of course it isn't excessive, considering she has twenty six immediate family members who drop in to stay constantly - all at the same time during China's four annual Golden Weeks. And as for looking after the property and gardens? Hell, when local wages are 500 yuan a month that's what the Chinese hired-help is for. And the best part of all is that the property market boomed immediately after she bought and now each floor is worth 2 million yuan, so if she ever needs money she can always hew away a staircase and sell a level.
In my next life, I want to be B.
DAY TWO:
I'm becoming a little fed-up with going into detail with stuff, so I'll just skim.
1) Dropped B. and the W.s off at the airport for an 8 am flight. Everything was so rushed and hurried I really didn't get a chance to thank them properly for their wonderful and so-generous hospitality. They really did go above and beyond. Gorgeous people.
2) And then I had the chauffeur and car for the rest of the day to do with what I willed, with the driver under strict instructions to pay for everything. (He wouldn't even accept a tip) I didn't have to be at Guangzhou - over an hours drive away - till 3pm, but beyond doing what my nice driver was under orders to do with me - like, take me to breakfast - I am ashamed to tell you how I wasted this outstanding opportunity. Totally my fault! I hadn't done any research so didn't know what was good in Nansha, and my chauffeur didn't have any English so I couldn't ask him, and so, I'm sorry to say, that, since the previous day I'd noticed a Starbucks in Pan-Yu, I simply asked to be taken there. Are you ashamed of me? I know I am! And I'll probably discover there's a famous something in Nansha and kick myself bigtime for not going to see it!
3) First, however, breakfast, which was such a hoot! Since he was under orders, I allowed myself to be swept into a western-style buffet breakfast at a luxury hotel where my chauffeur stood behind me, arms folded and looking fierce - thereby demonstrating my absolute importance to the world - as I ate, drank tea and smoked to my heart's content, meanwhile being closely watched by hordes of Chinese guests who seemed to want to know how I did everything, being particularly interested in what I did with my napkin. I kinda thought I could have fun with it but in the end the good angels of my nature prevailed and thus I gave several hundred people a crash course in western dining etiquette with the bonus of letting them think it was absolutely OK to smoke whereever they wished. Won't the rest of the world thank me for it!!!
4) Absolutely didn't mean to spend the next four hours sitting at Starbucks - where they wouldn't even let me smoke - but what can you do? What happened was that, apart from a small handful of funky-modern Chinese folk, there was this white girl sitting there alone, eating an entire cheesecake, looking so desperately and palpably lonely. When she saw me she practically started panting in her desperation to simply chat, so my heart went out to her and thus I surrendered myself to her needs until my nice chauffeur started pointing at his watch. But let me go into detail with this one, since it's cute:
3) First, however, breakfast, which was such a hoot! Since he was under orders, I allowed myself to be swept into a western-style buffet breakfast at a luxury hotel where my chauffeur stood behind me, arms folded and looking fierce - thereby demonstrating my absolute importance to the world - as I ate, drank tea and smoked to my heart's content, meanwhile being closely watched by hordes of Chinese guests who seemed to want to know how I did everything, being particularly interested in what I did with my napkin. I kinda thought I could have fun with it but in the end the good angels of my nature prevailed and thus I gave several hundred people a crash course in western dining etiquette with the bonus of letting them think it was absolutely OK to smoke whereever they wished. Won't the rest of the world thank me for it!!!
4) Absolutely didn't mean to spend the next four hours sitting at Starbucks - where they wouldn't even let me smoke - but what can you do? What happened was that, apart from a small handful of funky-modern Chinese folk, there was this white girl sitting there alone, eating an entire cheesecake, looking so desperately and palpably lonely. When she saw me she practically started panting in her desperation to simply chat, so my heart went out to her and thus I surrendered myself to her needs until my nice chauffeur started pointing at his watch. But let me go into detail with this one, since it's cute:
SADSACK'S STORY:
I grab a HK newspaper - which is what I'd come for - and am looking around for somewhere to sit and she nervously says "I hope you don't mind me asking but I love what you're wearing. Will you tell me who made it?" and I say "This is from Madonna's new Classics range." and she immediately squeals with ecstacy and says "Me too, me too." (She's wearing a black wool wrap-around dress that's just sublime.) and we immediately dive into a big conversation about what a wonderful designer Madonna is - as if I believe for a moment she did it herself!!! - but whatever!
After that there's no stopping her and I get 20 to the dozen all about her life: she's from Israel, married at 17 to escape military service, now 24 with four children, no skills, no life, a husband who doesn't seem to like her anymore, feeling desperately old, fat and life-passed-by; moved to China three months ago so her husband can run his homewares factory and she doesn't know anyone and hasn't spoken to a soul outside her family ever since she arrived and her entire day, once her children are at the International School, is spent in Starbucks eating cheesecake, and she's put on so much weight the only clothes that still fit her are from Madonna's Classics range, and she can't buy any more because they don't sell them in China and she just wants to DIE!!!!
Naturally, being me, I tell her she's a real sadsack and, inspired by B.'s wonderful life, I told her to immediately go out and hire an elderly Chinese amah she could off-load her kids onto - with the bonus that they'd learn Chinese easily - and a nicely ugly middle-aged Thai maid - for obvious reasons - to take care of everything else, and then get herself into some course to learn Chinese with the aim of getting into Guangzhou University to become whatever it was she wished to become - which turned out to be a fashion designer.
And that's when she started playing "but, but, but" games and I realised she really was a desperate sadsack and would probably spend the rest of her life in Starbucks comfort-eating cheesecake and growing fatter by the hour, and I decided I didn't care and I was so grateful to my driver for all his "umph"ing and watch pointing, and I got to go take the hour's drive - along the usual Chinese six-lane highway, along a gorgeously tropical coastline - to go play International Observer in Guangzhou!
I grab a HK newspaper - which is what I'd come for - and am looking around for somewhere to sit and she nervously says "I hope you don't mind me asking but I love what you're wearing. Will you tell me who made it?" and I say "This is from Madonna's new Classics range." and she immediately squeals with ecstacy and says "Me too, me too." (She's wearing a black wool wrap-around dress that's just sublime.) and we immediately dive into a big conversation about what a wonderful designer Madonna is - as if I believe for a moment she did it herself!!! - but whatever!
After that there's no stopping her and I get 20 to the dozen all about her life: she's from Israel, married at 17 to escape military service, now 24 with four children, no skills, no life, a husband who doesn't seem to like her anymore, feeling desperately old, fat and life-passed-by; moved to China three months ago so her husband can run his homewares factory and she doesn't know anyone and hasn't spoken to a soul outside her family ever since she arrived and her entire day, once her children are at the International School, is spent in Starbucks eating cheesecake, and she's put on so much weight the only clothes that still fit her are from Madonna's Classics range, and she can't buy any more because they don't sell them in China and she just wants to DIE!!!!
Naturally, being me, I tell her she's a real sadsack and, inspired by B.'s wonderful life, I told her to immediately go out and hire an elderly Chinese amah she could off-load her kids onto - with the bonus that they'd learn Chinese easily - and a nicely ugly middle-aged Thai maid - for obvious reasons - to take care of everything else, and then get herself into some course to learn Chinese with the aim of getting into Guangzhou University to become whatever it was she wished to become - which turned out to be a fashion designer.
And that's when she started playing "but, but, but" games and I realised she really was a desperate sadsack and would probably spend the rest of her life in Starbucks comfort-eating cheesecake and growing fatter by the hour, and I decided I didn't care and I was so grateful to my driver for all his "umph"ing and watch pointing, and I got to go take the hour's drive - along the usual Chinese six-lane highway, along a gorgeously tropical coastline - to go play International Observer in Guangzhou!
There's so much more to tell you - like how I got attacked by a beggar gang in Guangzhou and was hit over the head with some big metal object and thrown against a wall and held at the throat and suffered lots of other strong-arm brutality and other creepy things until I was rescued by a couple of waiters from the local Starbucks - but I'm tired of writing so will leave all that for another day.
See you later,
Denise
2008 - Discovered much later that there is a mysterious temple high up in the mountains above Nansha. Nobody knows when it was built nor how it got there but it is truly ancient and was full of truly ancient, legendary and thought-lost relics, which have since been moved into a brand new temple built especially to house them further down the mountain. I could have visited either of those, but since there are no roads up to either of them and I don't do trudge, nor did I have trudge-worthy shoes with me, I guess I would have chosen to sit in Starbucks even if I'd known sooner that they were there.
You know, I'm always surprised that the South Chinese are endlessly surprised when these mysterious and unexplainable sorts of things turn up "from nowhere". It happens constantly and each time it does the Cantonese can't understand why no one knows about whatever it is.
Me? I always think "Duh!" because it's so obvious why they don't know.
It's the Ancient History teacher in me coming out, but here's the explanation:
Back during the Ming Dynasty - about 500 years ago - the Emperor decided to rid the South China Sea of pirates, so ordered all the citizens of Quangdong to move to other provinces for as long as it took to smash the pirate rings. Since he also ordered that anyone who stayed behind be killed for piracy, naturally all the fisherfolk (Tanka) and farmers (Hakka) moved away. And then it took almost 70 years before the deed was done and they were allowed to return.
By that time, more than two generations later, everyone had new lives elsewhere so no one wanted to uproot, go back and start all over again. That's when the Emperor ordered that the Punti (rich Han from the North) take over the empty land.
Since the Punti were too delicate to do any farming themselves (these days they're the filthy rich of Hong Kong), they decided to sublet everything to the Hokkai (Northern Farmers) and when word of this got out, and the Hokkai were actually on their way, the Tanka and Hakka realised they were about to lose everything so hurried back fast to grab their old farms/villages ... only hardly any one knew precisely where they'd lived before so, with Punti and Hokkai breathing down their necks, most of them just grabbed anyplace, staked a claim and set up all over again.
And the poor Hokkai - those Northern farmers who'd uprooted from their own previous lives on a promise of rich pickings - were left to rent "the scraps" ... and to be treated horribly by their Predatory Punti landlords, who almost immediately became filthy rich at their expense ... and have remained filthy rich until this day.
So that's the explanation. The on-going contact with what was there in the past was broken and so none of the "locals" really knows anything about this part of the country.
And now they've even forgotten why they don't know.
And on this note - and I probably shouldn't be telling you this - there's a cave on a little island around here - and no, I won't tell you where - that has an entrance that has been obscured by a rock-fall. And what makes it so intriguing is that between each of these big rocks there are holes through which you should be able to see into the cave, except somebody has carved "rock clinkers" they've pushed in to fill all these chinks.
Why? Why go to all that trouble so people can't see into a cave?
There's a Tanka fishing village well within walking distance - loot-carrying distance? - and it all makes me go "mmmm!" because ... well, if you're a pirate who doesn't want to be killed for piracy and you're moving away for an unspecified amount of time, and you can't be seen with certain stuff, what would you do?
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