Updates

- A couple weeks ago, Megan had her going away party at OK Pizza, the pizza buffet in Shijiazhuang that is just "OK". The plan was to eat a minimal amount of pizza and drink a shit ton of beer while playing drinking games such as quarters and flippy cup. Not only is OK Pizza an all you can eat buffet, it's also all you can drink. As I came in, Bence immediately offered me a shot and I took it immediately. He told me it was "Hungarian baijiu." It was definitely similar to Chinese baijiu and had the same burning sensation. After a while of eating and drinking casually, Bence became very intoxicated. Bence face became red and blotchy, then his neck, and finally his shoulders. It was hilarious to compare his level of drunkeness with how red and blotchy he was (we would later find out that he is allergic to beer). Bence has a really weird sense of humor but he was incredibly entertaining to Andy and me. Bence told us of the problems that gypsies pose in his country. He said, "The worst thing ever is a gypsy flying on pegasus, because he will come down and stab you in the back with a knife!" He also mimicked the shaking of a bee hive while yelling, "Are you bees?! Will you follow me?!" After everyone had had their fill of pizza and baijiu jello shots were consumed, we cleared the table to play some rousing games of flippy cup. The Chinese in the restaurant either looked at us like we were crazy or they were trying to figure out what the hell we were playing. The restaurant was supposed to close by 9 and we ended up being there until after 11. I posed the question to our Drake friend, Jason, whose Chinese is quite advanced for how long we have been here. He said, "They have asked me to leave a few times, but I just pretend I don't understand them." Jason's girlfriend is Chinese so he added, "We just say that she is Chinese American." The entire time that we are at OK Pizza, these Russian girls that are attractive, but take total advantage of Bence call him non stop. They basically wanted him to come to the club to get them free drinks. He kept on telling them that he would be there later but they would not stop bothering him. Bence is too nice, so finally Megan, myself, and a few others got on the phone with the Russians and told them very bluntly, to "STOP CALLING!" as well as some other requests. Finally, we left OK Pizza and went to 7 Club where, of course, all the Russian girls were waiting outside...fucking bitches.

- On a similar note, the night I met many of these Russian girls, Bence had been hanging out with them beforehand. Bence came up to me and said, "These girls are crazy! They drink me under the table!" His animated face was bright red and his English was noticeably poorer. He said, "I chase baijiu with coca-cola, and they chase it with beer!" I looked over at these tiny Russian girls, and they are acting completely normal, and look back at Bence, who is a pretty big guy and has trouble standing up at this point and just laughed. Fucking Russians...I still firmly believe that there are no water pipes in Russia, only vodka pipes. Not only do they drink it but they also bathe and wash their clothes in that shit, I swear.

- There is a new bar that opened up recently called the 80s Cowboy Bar. Despite having the most unoriginal name possible and sounding like a stereotypical gay night club, the place is actually really cool and reminds me of dive bars in the states (something China seriously lacks). We've dubbed it the "music bar" (not much more original, I know, but it's the only bar in my city that has live rock music). I'd have to see it a little less crowded, but the place has all sorts of decorations covering the wall...a weird mix of Pacific Island and cowboy kitsch.

Last weekend I went to a Chinese deathcore show there. Our Chinese friend, Nigel, is one of only a few Chinese people I've met that actually has a decent taste in music and he was the one that informed us of the show. Every few weeks they have a concert and last week it was a Beijing deathcore band, Suffocated.

Recently I've been hanging out with a group of foreign teachers from No. 43 Foreign Language School which is considered the best middle school/high school in the city. There is Ben (English), Francis (Australian), Kevin "K-Fed" (Australian), Mark (Canadian), Mike (Scottish), and Dave (English). Ben and I have some similar tastes in music. We both grew up on metal and are both still into it to a certain extent. Anyway, Ben was totally down with going to a metal show. Right before the show Ben tells about four other teachers from his school (Mark, K-Fed, Dave, and Ben's wife Christine) to come to this concert...without telling them what kind of band was playing. As we are walking up I get the feeling he purposefully didn't tell him and ask the four others, "Do you know what kind of concert this is?" They said, "No...". I told them, but they seemed just as enthusiastic as before.

The opening band played a total of three songs. A little different from warm-up bands elsewhere. They were OK. A lot of standard metal riffs, but they had some lengthy Iron Maiden solo harmonies that sounded great.

The headliner, Suffocated, was very tight musically and you could tell they had been at it for a while. Both guitarists had hair down to their shoulders and the vocalist/bassist looked like any other tough guy you would see in the metalcore scene...except of course, he was Chinese. The band had some nice solo work and a really heavy sound. There were mosh pits galore as young, skinny-as-a-twig Chinese boys collided into one another. There was also Bence...out weighing and out muscling everyone else there, shirtless and head banging. Bence brought two Russian girls that have recently moved to Shijiazhuang as students as Bence's school and went CRAZY head banging with Bence. Ben and mild-mannered Dave ended up moshing which was hilarious. The crowd did this one thing that I have never seen at a metal show before. At the beginning of a song, two lines of people lined up on opposite ends of the mosh pit. As soon as the song kicked in they broke rank and ran directly into each other. It was a great time and the PBR flowed aplenty. At the end of the concert, the owner insisted that Dave make an announcement IN ENGLISH for the next concert. We were the only ones that probably even understood one word of it.

According to Dave's announcement, the bar will have a Norwegian punk band soon, which should also rule.

After the music bar and grabbing a bit to eat, we went to McDonald's Bar to meet up with the others. After being there for half an hour or so there was a near consensus of people wanting to go to Mazzo (a night club). Not particularly being in the mood, I practically had to be dragged. Levi (American teacher/student who we also hang out with) insisted he could get us free drinks there. At Mazzo it was taking us a while to get drinks. Francis, the other one of our group who was adamant about not going, became very pissed off. Finally, we got vodka and coke (?) delivered to our table which is around the time that the shit show began. After slamming back several glasses, Levi, Ben, and especially Mike became extremely intoxicated.

After a while we decide it's time to go so we're getting all our coats back from the coat check. All of a sudden there is a big commotion behind me. I look back and Francis is literally holding Mike with all of his strength. I search for the other focal point of the soon-to-be confrontation and it is quite an attractive Chinese girl, probably in her early 20s. She is surrounded by men who seem to be trying to lead her out of the club. Not knowing what is going on, but knowing how volatile Mike can get in these situations, I tell the one or two Chinese people that I somewhat know in their group to get that girl the fuck out of the club.

Afterwards, I learn that Mike had been hitting on this girl for a while. Francis explains to me that this girl has a reputation for luring in men and then having her security beat the shit out of him. Don't ask me why, but it sounds like some sort of power fetish...kinda hot if you ask me.

After this ruckus, we evacuated the premises back to McDonald's Bar. Kevin, the bartender, was not happy to say the least when he saw our stumbling, drunk asses mosey back in because he had just finished cleaning the bar (it was about 2:30 a.m. by this point). Francis insisted that we would just stay for one beer because we were trying to calm our friend down.

As soon as we sat down, Mike passed the fuck out on the table. Two minutes later, he lifted his head up, grabbed one of the ashtrays and through it against the wall causing it to shatter everywhere. Francis was ordering beers at the time turned around and said, "Who the fuck was that?!" I replied, "Who the fuck do you think it was?!" Francis came back and put a beer in Mike's limp hand. Jokingly, I pretended to remove it a couple of times and each time Francis and James (along with me, the two most sober of the group at this point) said "No no no no!!!" As we all know now, during times like these, a beer in Mike's hand is almost as important as his having a still functioning dick (sidenote: when they were traveling during the Spring Festival Holiday, Mike was in a similar condition and passed out on the bar with a beer in hand. They literally could not remove Mike's hand from his beer. They coined it "The Scottish Death Grip"). The beer never even touched Mike's lips and after the rest of us enjoyed our beers, Francis, Sandy (Francis' girlfriend), and James took Mike home, and I waited for Ben to get some McDonald's. By this point, Levi had disappeared like he tends to do when he is drunk at the end of the night.

Ben comes stumbling out of McDonald's with a huge bag of food, a cup of coffee IN A BAG, and a full beer. I said, "Ben, do you want me to carry any of that for you?" Now Ben has a quick, mumbly English accent that at times is difficult to understand anyway, but it is compounded when he is drunk. All I heard in reply to my question was, "No, shiva douba lan to ra dabba." After we got into a taxi I insisted that I hold something for him but he replied more or less the same. Ben also insisted that I have some french fries. "Here, take some fries shiva douba douba shuda." I replied, "No thanks." He got more insistent, "Here, c'mon! Shuda buda nava." Ok, I took a few, but he soon insisted I have more which I denied.

When we got back to their school, we saw Francis leading Mike upstairs to his room. Ben immediately went to his room while mumbling something incoherently. I went to Francis' room where James was lounging and drinking. Francis came back and asked where Ben was. I said, "He went to his room but I think he'll be over in a few minutes." Francis said, "He's not coming back." James, Francis, and I ended up staying up until 5:00 or so drinking and shooting the shit. What a fucking shit show of a night.

- There is a student of mine that I regularly see at the gym. She is a short, innocent girl whose English name is Madeline. A few weeks ago I saw her at the gym and she approached me a couple of times to ask how things were going. She approached me a third time and said shyly and hesitantly, "Josh...I have a question...about relationships." "Oh, God," I thought. She explained to me there was an Egyptian man who came to the gym a while back but left the city at the end of SEPTEMBER...now keep in mind it is February by this point. She said she only talked to this man once, but got his phone number before he went back to Egypt. She said she texts him semi-regularly. She then asked me...now get this..."If it's true love, do you think he will come back to Shijiazhuang?" I was so shocked that I could barely answer. I answered as calmly and collectively as I should, "Well, you know relationships are...blah blah blah" and "When two people love each other...blah blah blah." After I broke it to her as nicely as possible she said one of her friends thought she was silly for thinking such things. I said, "Well, I wouldn't be so blunt, but yea, I don't think you should bet on him coming back." She took it well, but then mentioned sometime later in class that she had an Egyptian boyfriend. I just don't know how a 20 YEAR OLD (I suppose she does look like she is 14) can be this naive. Incredible.

- One thing that I've gradually noticed is that Chinese men will look over at my dick when I'm taking a piss. I'm assuming they want to know what I'm packing. They are not too inconspicuous about it. After talking to other foreigners, this a completely regular occurrence. When I notice this, I usually say in English, "You like what you see? You can't have it" or "I know it's bigger than your's, are you jealous?" I can't wait for the day when Chinese man actually understands that.

- On a similar note, I was at McDonald's Bar about a month ago and I was waiting for the bathroom to open it up, as soon as it did and I was about to head in, the Chinese man behind me looked at me and said, "Together? Together?" meaning that he wanted us to take a piss together. Not knowing exactly what to think of this proposition, I quickly replied, "Um...no", went inside the bathroom and made sure to lock that fucking door.

- On another similar note, Francis (who I mentioned earlier) is pretty fucking crazy. Although he has calmed down quite a bit since he has a pretty serious girlfriend now, some of the stories he's recounted surpass even some of my college stories (hard to believe, I know). He said that one time, he was walking around a mall with his girlfriend and these Chinese men were following him and talking shit (Chinese men sometimes don't particularly like the fact that foreigners date Chinese women). Ignoring it to the best of his abilities for a while, he finally turned around and said, in Chinese, something like, "Do you know why she's with me and not with you?" He then proceeded to pull out his junk in the middle of this mall and then said, "Now show me your's." The Chinese banters apparently became silent and walked away.

- As I've mentioned before, restaurant experiences for Chinese men can turn into insane shit shows. They get really fucked up on baijiu and just yell a lot. As a result, the bathrooms in the "classy" restaurants turn into vomitoriums, especially on the weekends. My favorite experience concerning this is from one of the first weekends we were here. I don't think I've told this story but if I have, it bears repeating. I stepped into the men's room of a really nice restaurant only to see all of the urine stalls filled with puke...except for one. The only one void of vomit was occupied by an older gentleman who was literally seeing how far he could back up from the stall and still get his piss in the stall. I decided I would leave him to his fun and return in a few minutes but as I was leaving, he ripped one of the loudest, wettest farts I have ever heard. It was awesome.

Chinese New Year Travels (Lijiang, Dali)

Like I wrote before, we did not end up staying in Kunming for very long. After a day and half in Kunming, we decided to take an overnight bus to Lijiang. Basically, Lijiang is what everyone imagines China to look like before actually coming to China. Lijiang has an extremely well preserved Old Town that has the classic winding streets and Chinese architecture (refer to the pictures).

Our bus ride from Kunming to Lijiang was absolutely awful. As soon as we got on the bus and got situated some Chinese guy came around claiming he was the manager and charged us for our luggage based on the estimated weight. The more you thought your luggage weighed, the more he would charge you. Having no idea what the deal with this guy was before he approached me, I ended up paying 100 yuan to him and was not happy afterwards. In retrospect, I should have just refused and seen what happened. Since we got an overnight bus we had beds, but the road was so bumpy I barely slept at all...even after taking some Benadryll to make me drowsy. We got in at about 5:00 a.m., got into our hostel, and promptly passed out for about 3 hours. After breakfast, we decided to explore the city a bit. The city was beautiful and a welcome departure from the hustle and bustle of the larger Chinese cities we had been traveling to. The old city (where we were most of the time) had old Chinese houses with the traditionally made roofs along winding paths barely large enough to fit one car through. There were a couple of streams going through the city with the classic arching bridges over them. Refer to the pictures for more detail, it's a little hard to describe. One great thing was that there were a lot of merchants on the streets, but none of them were nagging us at all. I could tell that in a few years Lijiang could have the potential to be an overly touristy spot, but now it's not bad at all.

There is a famous lake just outside of the Old City in Lijiang. The name escapes me at the moment but the scenery was gorgeous. It's a little hard to tell, but you can see a very large mountain in the background of one or two of the pictures. The area is well renowned as one of the most pricelessly beautiful areas in China. A stone path lead us all around the lake.

As beautiful as Lijiang was during the day, it was spectacular at night when the only light in the city came from hundreds upon hundreds of Chinese lanterns.

While the rest of our group was headed for Tiger Leaping Gorge the next day (also considered one of the greatest destinations in China), Billie and I realized we couldn't logically go there, come back to Kunming, and get back to Shijiazhuang to teach by Sunday, so we elected to go to another nearby city called Dali. I really wish we had spent more time in Lijiang, but I definitely wish we would have been able to spend more time in Dali. Dali was completely untainted as far as western or corporate businesses are concerned (i.e. McDonald's). We stayed at an amazing hostel which was run by an older Australian man. The day we got there, we decided to go on this mountain hike. It was more than a few miles but definitely worth the peace of mind garnered from it.

That night we ate dinner with an extremely nice couple from Australia and as we returned to the hostel we saw that the party had already started! We were greeted with shots of a locally made blueberry flavored liquor which was nothing like I had tasted before, but not bad at all. As we started conversing with more people we realized that most people were indeed from Australia. As the night progressed, old AC/DC music videos were projected onto the wall. I stayed up until 3:00 sitting and talking with a fairly interesting guy who had married a German woman. The Australian guy and his wife were on vacation and he was teaching English in Germany. The next day we went back to Kunming and then the day after that we went back to Beijing and then back to Shijiazhuang! What an amazing month and a half...

It's been a while (almost two months), so if I have forgotten anything on this part of the trip, I'll add it later!

Sidenote: the one time we did not book a hostel or hotel in advance throughout the entire trip was our return to Kunming before our flight to Beijing. We got there and they told us that they were booked. However, they also told us that we could stay in the employees' room. While a little strange, it was just as comfortable as the dorms (if not more comfortable considering there were two less people able to stay in the employees' room than the big dorm rooms).