My MBA group is in Financial Management class right now. Good professor, interesting material. The class is approximately half Chinese, half expats from around the world.
I love listening to the different discussions. It's now breaktime and I just told the classmates sitting and chatting behind me how much I enjoy hearing long streams of Chinese broken up by financial terms in English.
Zhege..(Chinese, Chinese, Chinese) discount rate....(Chinese, Chinese, Chinese) financial crisis....
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Cold and Colder
Winter is here, and Beijing has been cold enough to keep all but the hardiest and most well insulated Beijingers indoors recently. My apartment is well-heated (thank you to the Soviet building engineers and builders who put up the five story complex in the 1960s), and I can sit indoors in a tank top and shorts while watching people shiver in their jackets outside.
Tomorrow morning I'll leave my warm cocoon to head further north, up near the border to Siberia, to Harbin - a city known for its brutal winters. My friends and I plan to see classical Russian architecture, visit a Siberian tiger preserve, drink vodka and take part in the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival, an annual event featuring full-sized buildings designed out of blocks of ice lit from within.
Hand and footwarmers are already packed. Several are located in my carry-on bag so that I can access them easily before we leave the plane on our arrival.
Tomorrow morning I'll leave my warm cocoon to head further north, up near the border to Siberia, to Harbin - a city known for its brutal winters. My friends and I plan to see classical Russian architecture, visit a Siberian tiger preserve, drink vodka and take part in the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival, an annual event featuring full-sized buildings designed out of blocks of ice lit from within.
Hand and footwarmers are already packed. Several are located in my carry-on bag so that I can access them easily before we leave the plane on our arrival.
Girl Kill Girls and Sainkho Namtchylak
Girl Kill Girls are an all-girl Chinese rock group, and Sainkho Namchylak is a 50-something singer with a seven-octave range who is a world renowned throat singer from Tuva. Last night Girl Kill Girls opened for Sainkho at Yugong Yishan, a popular Beijing nightspot where I've gone in the past for film screenings and parties with DJs I know, to a crowd made up mostly of Chinese fans.
Girl Kill Girls have a strong stage presence and play well with and off of one another. The
three young women are all professionals, their music has a lot of energy and it was easy to imagine 
them filling larger houses. Lyrics were in both Chinese and a heavily accented and at times difficult to understand English. Their music has influences of Boston area girl-groups the Breeders and Belly, and at times they were reminiscent of the Bangles or Shonen Knife.
With a career spa
nning decades that has taken her around the world, Sainkho is a down-to-earth matriarch in whose glow the entire audience basked. She started her performance with some traditional throat singing, reminiscent of what you've heard on NPR in the past, then moved into a blend of throat singing and vocalization using her entire vocal range, with instrumentalization provided by a young male accompaniest/DJ working from a MacBook and a turntable. At times her music felt like it came straight from a rave hall, at other times it was out of a dream. The crowd loved it and demostrated their appreciation through enthusiastic applause, which is rare here.
Girl Kill Girls have a strong stage presence and play well with and off of one another. The
three young women are all professionals, their music has a lot of energy and it was easy to imagine 
them filling larger houses. Lyrics were in both Chinese and a heavily accented and at times difficult to understand English. Their music has influences of Boston area girl-groups the Breeders and Belly, and at times they were reminiscent of the Bangles or Shonen Knife.With a career spa
nning decades that has taken her around the world, Sainkho is a down-to-earth matriarch in whose glow the entire audience basked. She started her performance with some traditional throat singing, reminiscent of what you've heard on NPR in the past, then moved into a blend of throat singing and vocalization using her entire vocal range, with instrumentalization provided by a young male accompaniest/DJ working from a MacBook and a turntable. At times her music felt like it came straight from a rave hall, at other times it was out of a dream. The crowd loved it and demostrated their appreciation through enthusiastic applause, which is rare here.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Paying the Rent
Today I paid my rent all by myself. It feels silly to be proud of something so mundane, but I am.
My landlord wants to be paid via bank wire transfer, and the information is laid out in the lease. He uses the same bank that I do, just a different branch.
This afternoon I went to my branch, with a copy of my lease and five figures worth of RMB, in cash. Everything is cash around here, and few places take credit cards that I haven't had to sign my name in public in months, so that isn't a big deal. I showed my bank card, and my lease, and told the bank manager (the only person who didn't giggle uncomfortable or just stare at me when I walked in) that I needed to make a wire transfer. He used my lease to copy the account information onto the transaction slip while I stood by and watched, grateful for his assistance. I'm willing to fill out the slip but I can't read it, and if I tried to write in Chinese characters the bank teller probably wouldn't be able to understand it. After the manager filled out the slip I was given a paper slip with my queue number and went to the waiting area.
When my number was called I handed the paper slip and the large pile of 100 yuan notes to the teller, along with my bank card. He placed the cash in a counting machine to confirm the amount, typed the information into the computer, had me sign a slip confirming the transaction and then gave me the receipt. Fairly simple, really, but still daunting without language skills to facilitate.
My landlord wants to be paid via bank wire transfer, and the information is laid out in the lease. He uses the same bank that I do, just a different branch.
This afternoon I went to my branch, with a copy of my lease and five figures worth of RMB, in cash. Everything is cash around here, and few places take credit cards that I haven't had to sign my name in public in months, so that isn't a big deal. I showed my bank card, and my lease, and told the bank manager (the only person who didn't giggle uncomfortable or just stare at me when I walked in) that I needed to make a wire transfer. He used my lease to copy the account information onto the transaction slip while I stood by and watched, grateful for his assistance. I'm willing to fill out the slip but I can't read it, and if I tried to write in Chinese characters the bank teller probably wouldn't be able to understand it. After the manager filled out the slip I was given a paper slip with my queue number and went to the waiting area.
When my number was called I handed the paper slip and the large pile of 100 yuan notes to the teller, along with my bank card. He placed the cash in a counting machine to confirm the amount, typed the information into the computer, had me sign a slip confirming the transaction and then gave me the receipt. Fairly simple, really, but still daunting without language skills to facilitate.
Cold
The mercury is dipping lower and lower on the thermometer recently. Apartments are warm, often overheated, but so dry that your skin itches unless you slather on moisturizing lotion almost constantly. Someone I know has five humidifiers set up in his room but his skin still hurts.
Yesterday I ventured out into the cold to look at winter coats and the streets were almost empty. Friends are canceling social engagements so as not to have to venture out into the wind.
The blasting cold will only last a few more days before we get some respite. I hope. In the meantime I'm wearing lots of layers and have developed a new appreciation for some of my warmest clothing.
Yesterday I ventured out into the cold to look at winter coats and the streets were almost empty. Friends are canceling social engagements so as not to have to venture out into the wind.
The blasting cold will only last a few more days before we get some respite. I hope. In the meantime I'm wearing lots of layers and have developed a new appreciation for some of my warmest clothing.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Expat Life
This weekend I was at a dance party filled with expats from around the world. One of the DJs is the boyfriend of a friend and the music promised to be good. The dance floor was crowded with people from all over Asia, Africa, Australia, Europe, North America and South America. The dance floor was still crowded when my friends and I left, shortly after 4am.
At one point in the evening a friend pointed out that one of the usual expats was missing. He had gone down to Thailand last week for a beach holiday. Usually that's entirely unnoteworthy. However, Thailand has been experiencing a lot of political unrest and the airports were shut down. In an attempt to return to Beijing the man we know took a 14 hour bus ride from Bangkok to Phnom Penh, where he and others who had been stranded in Thailand tried to book tickets on overcrowded flights into China.
He was never in any physical danger, just inconvenienced. Still, his experience is a good reminder to all that we need to be mindful of political realities as we plan our weekend trips and short jaunts to fun places.
At one point in the evening a friend pointed out that one of the usual expats was missing. He had gone down to Thailand last week for a beach holiday. Usually that's entirely unnoteworthy. However, Thailand has been experiencing a lot of political unrest and the airports were shut down. In an attempt to return to Beijing the man we know took a 14 hour bus ride from Bangkok to Phnom Penh, where he and others who had been stranded in Thailand tried to book tickets on overcrowded flights into China.
He was never in any physical danger, just inconvenienced. Still, his experience is a good reminder to all that we need to be mindful of political realities as we plan our weekend trips and short jaunts to fun places.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Happy Thanksgiving!
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
I hope everyone who celebrated had a good holiday, surrounded by family and friends. Thursday day I bicycled between several different markets to buy ingredients for fruit salad, a green salad, and brownies. My oven doesn't heat up properly, so even at the highest temperature it took over an hour to bake brownies that should have taken twenty minutes, but it was still fun to bake.
That evening some friends came over for a girls' night of frivolity, planned without that that there was a U.S. holiday: we ate pizza, salad and brownies, and watched Sex and the City on DVD. It took us a few minutes to figure out how to change the language track to English, but it was amusing to hear the characters speaking Chinese while we matched wits with the remote control. It was a fun evening overall.
This afternoon I went to a holiday charity bazaar at the German embassy, a ten minute walk from my apartment in brisk air under a clear sky. There was a row of BMWs parked outside and a bevy of foreigners, mostly German, packed inside - most eating sausages and drinking mulled wine. I grabbed a perfect pretzel and covered it with mustard to enjoy while I strolled around, looking at the wares. I picked up a holiday present for a German-speaking friend (who will be very curious about it after she next checks in here) and some yummy potato bread to eat with dinner while watched downloaded American television.
Tonight I join some other friends for a belated turkey dinner. I'm taking the green salad. Afterwards I'm going to a party celebrating African culture at Club China Doll, where I'll see several different groups of friends - Italian, German, British. It will be a fun night.
I hope everyone who celebrated had a good holiday, surrounded by family and friends. Thursday day I bicycled between several different markets to buy ingredients for fruit salad, a green salad, and brownies. My oven doesn't heat up properly, so even at the highest temperature it took over an hour to bake brownies that should have taken twenty minutes, but it was still fun to bake.
That evening some friends came over for a girls' night of frivolity, planned without that that there was a U.S. holiday: we ate pizza, salad and brownies, and watched Sex and the City on DVD. It took us a few minutes to figure out how to change the language track to English, but it was amusing to hear the characters speaking Chinese while we matched wits with the remote control. It was a fun evening overall.
This afternoon I went to a holiday charity bazaar at the German embassy, a ten minute walk from my apartment in brisk air under a clear sky. There was a row of BMWs parked outside and a bevy of foreigners, mostly German, packed inside - most eating sausages and drinking mulled wine. I grabbed a perfect pretzel and covered it with mustard to enjoy while I strolled around, looking at the wares. I picked up a holiday present for a German-speaking friend (who will be very curious about it after she next checks in here) and some yummy potato bread to eat with dinner while watched downloaded American television.
Tonight I join some other friends for a belated turkey dinner. I'm taking the green salad. Afterwards I'm going to a party celebrating African culture at Club China Doll, where I'll see several different groups of friends - Italian, German, British. It will be a fun night.
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