The Flood

In late June, Huludao was hit by a major rain storm that brought some pretty serious flash flooding. I was sitting around all day waiting for the rain to stop, when around 3 o'clock I decided I needed to go out and get some stuff done. It turned into enough of complete mess by 4:30 that I regretted leaving my apartment.

After visiting the Electronics market I decided I ought to stop by the supermarket to buy an umbrella and some sandals for the ancle-deep water on the roads and sidewalk. I slipped the 25 cent flip-flops on, put my already wet shoes in the plastic shopping bag - to keep the other contents of my shoulder bag dry- and headed for my Erhu lesson. I figured that if I rolled my pants up to my knees and used my umbrella, I could stay pretty dry; but then the wind blew and the rain came down so much harder, that by the time I had walked the three blocks to the music store, my shoes were the driest things I had on me.

The walking Street and entrance to NewMart. Someone seems to think that laying marble tile down for sidewalk is a good idea. That stuff is like ice when wet! I slipped on the stuff and feel pretty hard dropping my camera in the water. I picked it up as quick as I could, but the damage had been done. I was able to take a couple of dark, grainy pictures before it quit working alltogether. I was really dissappointed to have missed some of the more exteme photo ops that I came across later in the day.

The entrance to NewMart, with its NewWaterfall. NewMart was built below street level so that you go down these steps to get to the entrance. Again, not a great idea. I heard that this area was a swimming pool by nightfall. The shops along the walking street were beginning to sandbag themelves in. They were at a good enough level that the water was just licking their front doors as I walked by. I don't think they were flooded very very badly.

This is the side street that passes the music store where I study erhu. When I got to the main street after I finished my lesson I found that everything was at a standstill and that I would have to walk home in the sometimes knee-deep water. A number of cars had decided to brave the flooding and were flooded out themselves, blocking traffic in every direction. It was a flooded traffic jam. I had never seen anything like it. People were just plain Stuck- forced to abandon their buses, taxis and if they were really unlucky, their own cars, and walk. I really wish that I had a picture of it. In another part of town the taxis were literally floating. I heard a story at on one street people were were trying to their push stalled and floating cars out of the street/river, huge trucks would drive by causing waves to wash over them and push them under the surface. It was that deep! Waist and chest-deep in some places! 7 people died in Huludao during this flood. I am sure that even more died in other parts of Liaoning province.

I consider myself really lucky in that I only came out of it with a bad cold- probably from walking around soaking wet for almost 3 hours.

On the way home I passed the oil refinery and saw a nice rainbow slick on the water's surface. It's no wonder, then, that the next day the beach was covered with dead fish and garbage. In some of the more recent Chinese floods, extra doses of pollutants were suddenly washed out of factories and into the rivers, killing everything. These can cause major environmental catastrophes. I could see that something bad was coming out of the oil refinery as I walked by. It had to have done something to the nearby streams.

This is one of the last pictures I took with my camera before it died. I let it dry out for a few days and it seems to be working fine now. I just wish I could get all my pictures came out like this- so dark and inky. I love it!

What the Heck?

So, there is a whole story here but I think it's more fun to let you fill in the blanks on your own. I'll just point out that the sign on the front of the truck says "The Tiger Tamers Are Coming!" and that the She-Lion in the cage has black stripes painted on her back.

Panda

I made this awesome panda stamp out of a Korean eraser. Works GREAT! The kids love it (at first, now they are getting a little bored) so I use it to stamp their lesson books when once they are able to read a new dialogue. I give them two stamps if they can recite it. It has lasted the whole year, though his left ear is falling off and the top of his head is almost gone. the whole stamp used to be as thick and sharp as his butt and legs are.

bike repair

I see a lot of my students when I am out and about. Here is one that I met while I was out taking pictures of the wrecked slums. She was buying corn with her mother. All of my students were assigned English names last year by my Australian predecessor. This one is called Kiara.

So, I thought I would post some random pictures I took while on my bike. These are all on the street that runs from the market to my house. I enjoy these views. its simple things like this that make me love being in China.

milk straight from the teet.


out of focus bike repairman


"shoe repair"





Not greatest pics in the world, but I'm still proud of them.

Order and Progress

It must have been about two weeks ago when I was riding to my Erhu lesson and came across a novel scene. Twice-a-week I ride my bike through the market behind my house and then cut through a slum to get to the "old district" for my lesson. On this particular day, I was turning down one of my usual side-streets and immediately noticed that all the people were gone, thier homes were empty and all their windows were either removed or smashed out. It was so weird because I wasn't expecting it. Only a few days earlier everything looked normal to me: people were milling about and doing the usual thing, kids were coming home from school. I suppose the streets weren't as crowded as they should have been, but I didn't notice that at the time. The whole thing just caught me off guard. Like everyone just picked up and left all of the sudden.

Within days the the whole area looked like this, block after block. They are tearing the whole neighborhood down.... probably to make way for some new condos.

Here are the few last remaining structures. These were nothing special and I'm sure they won't be missed. They were nothing like the old Ming Hutongs in Beijing that are being ripped out to make way for the Olympics, or any of those sites already destroyed in connection to the three gorges project. These appear to be part of the happier side of development. Order and Progress... so it seems.

Selling stuff in front of my school

Here are some pictures I took from the street in front of my school of one of those Mom and Pop shops I mentioned earlier. This shop is basically a first-floor apartment in the building across from the school, with goods being sold through the fence from the back yard. They have candy, cola, stickers, school supplies, small toys and comics. The place I go to for breakfast is two doors down.

Kids gather here during lunch, and before and after school to stock up on provisions.

Whad'l-it by kiddo!

All over town you also see these carts and flatbed trucks selling all kinds of food stuffs. The lady with the Pepsi cart sells a sort of bubble-tea juice stuff, (without tea) made from a powder mix. Watermelons are everywhere too this time of year. I ate a half a watermelon last night and don't think I can have any more for a while. The old man below sells popsicles and ice cream. Some of the flavors aren't bad.... though I'm not too fond of the red-bean-and-pea-sicles.

Meet Bob

Meet Bob. Bob is a first grader at my school who's Mom works out of the Art Office. Like all the kids with teacher parents (or more generally, Chinese parents) Bob is under a lot of pressure to succeed, but is still too young to do anything about it. He doesn't seem to be doing too well in his classes and can often be seen crying in the halls after a good scolding from his mother. Poor kid. Recently he was caught with a puzzle book in one of his classes and really got it. I worry about the little ones sometimes. They all have to work very hard to make it in their society, and may not have enough time to think about who they really are. It's especially bad with the middle school and high school students, who are always having to prep for exams. Many just burn out and fall into menial jobs, while others just rely on their important friends, family, and teachers to get help them "pass." If only you had heard the stories. If only you knew how much cheating goes on in these places! goodness! And they are punks too! I hear that teaching Chinese middle school is the WORST job ever, and that even the students at the nearby University act like 12 yr olds.

But not my kids. They are all little angels, like Bob. I love them all and wish that the rest in society were so pure. I often think about what they will be like when they are older, how they will handle being a part of the generation of single-children, and how they make use of the tremendous change their country is experiencing. Will they do something important, or will they end up like that student who went crazy and then appearently died from playing too many computer games? I wish I could see them all in ten years. These are the cream of Huludao, so I reckon they will do pretty well. In any case, Bob is the man. A little man, but still the man.

Beijing Walmart

Ah yes, the new Beijing Walmart! We're gonna civilize them Chinamen real good! After doing a little shopping I found that it was no better than any of the other Chinese Supermarkets I'd been in, just more expensive. The products are clearly picked for the Chinese market and are of a much lower quality than anything you'd at a typical "Wally-World" in the States. All the shoes are the normal fake-leather penny loafers I see in all the stores here. All the sweaters look like those I see the sleek Chinese guys wearing while taking walks around parks with girlfriends. All the paper is thin and tears too easily. It's the same everywhere I go. I was hoping that Walmart would have some Pilot G2's, decent notebooks and index cards, but they didn't.

Beijing Seven-Elevens don't have slurpees either. But then you should already know that from an earlier post.

I took this picture back in March or April. That's why it's snowing.

Everybody Loves Tingting

This is a student of mine that everyone in the office calls Tingting. Chinese kids often have cute little "primary school names" that they use until they reach until their teens, so even though Tingting is not her real name, it's basically what she goes by right now. I call her Jessie in English class. All of the staff agrees that she is one of the cutest children at our school, more like a Muppet or bunny rabbit than a person. Both her parents work during the day so she doesn't get to go home for lunch like most of the other kids her age. The teachers all take special care of her as a result. Everybody is Charmed by her neat little personality. We often speak gibberish to each other.

For about a week straight she came to the English office to help one of her classmates catch up on his lessons while the others went outside for their morning exercises. I assume my class assistant has some sort of relationship with the boy's parents and started assigning smarter kids to help him out. I doubt he would get the special attention otherwise. I just wish these pictures came out better.

Breakfast of Champions

Across the street from the school all the neighbors have set up little shops out of their homes that sell candy and school supplies. Once such family sells breakfast out of their living room. If you go at the right moment it is really quite crowded. I usually make it in there after 7:20, when its thinning out a bit, or even empty.

come back in a few days and I will have pictures of the shops outside in this post. I still need to snag a few of those.

Whenever I go there I have 6 "baozi," a bowl of millet porridge, and little dishes of tofu and pickled veggies. If you mix the spicy stuff in with the tofu and eat it along with the baozi it makes for a tasty meal. The porridge is pretty bland, but still edible. If I am in a hurry I just take 8 baozi in a bag to go.

1 meal = 2 yuan, or about 25 cents.

Dinners on the Run

Just before or after my erhu lesson I will often stop for a quick bite the local 杭州特色小吃 - which literally means "Hangzhou-style diner." I don't really know what's so "Hangzhou" about this place or if it's at all authentic, but my friend Jeffrey (马杰) laughed when I told him that I enjoy the flavor of his hometown a couple times a week. He supposes that a backwater like Huludao it couldn't have anything like the real thing. Its clean, the people are nice, and the food is edible. That's good enough for me.

Hangzhou (pop 1 mil+) is located 180 km southwest of Shanghai. It is the capital of Zhejiang province and is known for its picturesque scenery and fine silks. I hope to go there someday and eat more of their food.

I am a creature of habit. As soon as I walk through the door they know what I want and bring it out right away. Always a bowl of red-braised beef noodles, a round thingy of 10 小笼包 (small sticky "baozi" stuffed with ground pork), and a bottle of 花生露 (ah, peanut dew! the best drink ever!) I am starting to feel I have this meal too often. I ought to eat more vegetables.

1 meal = 7 yuan, or 86 cents

Great Wall Adventure

geNot long ago a fellow American English teacher who works not far from Huludao was visiting some remote spot on the Great Wall and got this crazy idea: let's get a bunch of people together during the May labor holiday and hike along The Wall from here until it reaches the sea! Well, as soon as word got to me I knew I was in, even though it was clear that nobody knew what was going on. We didn't know how hard it would be, how far it actually was or how long it would take, what kinds of things might happen to us, and barely knew what was between the rural and relatively unknown site Neil visited and the sea. But then I guess that was part of the whole idea- we would just get out there and see what happens. If we ran into trouble some of us could hoof it down to a village to get help, and we knew we could always just hop off and take a bus back. We all agreed that no matter what, it would be pretty freakin cool.
Initially,we planned on a 4-day hike from the village 小河口 (xiao he kou), passed the famous 九门口 (jiu men kou -9 gates), and on to 山海关 (shan hai guan), where the Wall reaches the sea - supposedly something like 80 km all together, but not really. Since we all had a week off for labor day, May 2nd would be the perfect time to set out, so that we would get back to civilization on or around Friday, May 5th. We had some tips from local hiking-gear dealers who said they had made the trip themselves and that it was a peice-of-cake, so we felt that we could do it without too much trouble. We had to learn the hard way that in China, any reliable information about the Great Wall (or just about anything) is pretty hard to come by. Here is a run down of what it was like:

A view from the wall of the village we started at, 小河口. I am pretty confused about what this place is and exactly where it is located. All the maps we could get ahold of were dorky tourist maps that don't pay attention to small details like distance and location, and are no good for use on a hiking trip like this. Neil's girlfriend took him here a while ago and he was able to find a taxi who had heard of it and could take us back. That's all I know. It's a charming little spot with lots of nice old men and cute little kids playing in the street. There is a lady there who showed us her 400 yr old farm house and a few of her husband's antiques. I heard he has an awesome old chariot, but he didn't get to see it. I would love to live in a place like this.

The wall where we started

Before too long we came to a place in the wall that was basically unpassable -or at least too dangerous for a bunch of sissies like us. So we bushwacked down the hill (harder than it sounds) and hiked along the road hoping to find something a little more reasonable. We ended up camping on a trail behind some guy's farm. The great big guard tower was within sight of our encampment, so we went to bed excited to be back up on the mountain and killing the wall the next morning.

It would have been nice if the whole wall was in such nice shape. This section was actually kind of easy.

Dave is smelling a flower. They smell like those markers we all had in elementary school.

some parts are piles of rubble

This lady was just chilling at one of the guard towers when we passed by. She is a local goat herder who likes to hang out at the wall while her goats tear it up on the hillside. He had a nice conversation about how I don't wear enough clothes and how my shoes are inappropriate. Ha! She let me take her picture, and then asked for a copy. Of course I couldn't give her one on the spot, so I told her that if she gave me her information I would send her a copy in the mail. It turns out she doesn't have much in the way of information, only a phone. I can call next week and find out the name of her village, maybe the the postal code for the nearest post office, etc. I had better not forget! She is cool. She used this phrase "您贵姓" (what is your honorable surname?). It's something I learned in my first day in Chinese class but never heard in China until she said it. We saw lots of goat herders hanging out on the wall.

Yes, I wore my cons on this hike. What's it to you?

I don't know what's going on here. I use hello to post all my pictures IN ORDER and then I go back and edit all the posts with witty and informative comments after I have a little time to think about them. But then blogger goes and moves them around when I repost them! what the heck? These are all out of order now! This picture is supposed to come just after the close-up, and the goat pictures keep moving around. How am I supposed to tell a story when everything gets all messed up. Stupid blogger. Who can help me out here? Am I just computer dumb?

I like this picture.

kate and hamish

This is sort of what the wall looks like on the inside. It would've been a better pic if that stupid plant wasn't in the way! We looked around for cool-looking skeletons of slaves buried in the wall, but no such luck.

A wide shot from a high tower. That shot that I took of myself was taken on that small white pile of bricks in the middle of this picture. The tower this was taken from is in the backround. Our starting point is way off beyond the horizon. I just about killed myself getting up this mountain.

I was pretty sick this whole trip. Can you tell? Right after I took this I ran up that hill behind me and died in the guard tower at the top.

pretty late on the second day we realized that there was no way that we would make it to jiu men kou before night, and many of us didn't have enough water to camp out on the wall. So all but three of us made for this village. It was a bit frustrating because from what the goat herders were telling us I thought we would be there shortly after lunch. not so. I guess those guys just move a lot faster then we do.

inside a tower

a guy with his goats. He helped us get a taxi to jiu men kou.

on the way to the village we passed through some apple and pear orchards.

alex and lucy

I stopped to enjoy a little ice cream and a chat with the kids. They seemed less interested in our conversation than I was.

more goats

We made it into the village just in time to see the annual running of the goats! Three people were gored to death this year.

This is at jiu men kou- the "halfway point." If you look through the dusty haze you can see that the wall goes up that hill and then just runs smack into that mountain... and stops! well, that ended our trip. It is so hard to get reliable information about anything here. Or maybe we just don't understand what is presented. Here people give us tips on taking the wall from point A to point B but don't mention that the wall doesn't actually GO from point A to point B. HA! Ooops! We knew that we could just hike around the mountain (no, not over! not this time!) but no one was feeling up to it. I was sick and hike was certainly the hardest thing that I have done since I was an explorer scout -12 years ago! Everyone else was worn out too. We started out the treck planning to cover10-15 miles/day for four days, but quickly realized that the terrain made that impossible- at least for mere mortals like us. I think in the end we probably covered about 10 miles in two days and we were beat. It was all either straight up, or straight down.

This is jiu men kou! The "NINE GATES!" Someone told me that this is the only place that the wall crosses a river in the form of a bridge. I guess that makes it special. It really isn't much of a river now is it? It's more like a pond these days. I assume they call it "nine gates" because of the nine arches that support it.

We stayed the night in this tower at jiu men kou. Many of the more historically significant sections of the wall have been rebuilt to match its original splendor! That is why Jiu men kou looks so much cooler then the rest of the wall. Construction of the original wall began over 2000 years ago, while all of what is standing today was finished during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). I would say, judging by the style of the building's roofline, the width of the windows and doorways, as well as from the brick firing and laying techniques used, that the section we are looking at here was built sometime in the late 1980's.

What's going on here? Am I to believe that The New York Times has now joined Wikipedia, BCC News.com, and all my favorite blogs (including my own) on my list of great websites that I am not allowed to visit from China? That's great. Juuuust great.

I was looking though my stash and found this picture I took in Shandong last December. I forgot to share it! All the time I see old ladies out in the parks doing these traditional dances for fun and exercise, and sometimes go to watch a group that practices near my apartment every evening. I will take pictures as soon as it is light enough that late to get a clear one. I know of at least 6 or 7 other groups in Huludao that also practice in public. I hear they get together and hold competitions once and a while.

I hate stupid laundry

This is my Chinese washing machine. It is about 98% plastic and works about as well as a Chinese washing machine ought to work. Loads have to be small- 1 pair of jeans with a couple of T-shirts and socks, any more and the poor thing starts gasping- after the wash cycle I take everything out and rinse it in the sink before putting it all in the little separate spin cycle thingy. Then I fill the main wash chamber with water again- with a hose- and repeat the wash cycle without soap, rinse again and spin again. Otherwise all my clothes stink. I also have to reach behind the machine and hold the valve open to drain the water after each wash cycle, adding time and effort to the whole process. Washing my sheets took all morning as I had to separate them out into separate loads and rinse them out one by one in the sink. The rinsing was especially time consuming. I have no drier of course, so I hang my clothes out to dry. Its pretty nice that each apartment out here has a special little sun room for hanging clothes in so they don't freeze or get stinky from being outside the pollution. I have my sheets hanging up in there right now. Its warming up now so they should be nice and dry before bedtime.