A DAY LATE BUT NOT A DOLLAR SHORT

Today (10/2), it came to my attention that romance, in America, is dead. I spent the day at town about an hour outside of Xi’An with a colleague, her son, his friends and her husband. My colleague’s son is 16 years old, his male friend 17 and his two female friends are both 16. (In China, 16 years old is a high school senior and 17 years old is a college freshman)

Yesterday, I received a call from the top of a mountain carved into a sleeping woman from an 18 year old (who remembers my birthday and calls me in advance to make plans) because he thought of a beautiful conversation we had in a park once about said mountain. Today, I was escorted by two lovely, nervous, eager, bright teens who were so gentle I couldn’t help but feel the cynicism washing away.

The son of my colleague came with his father to pick me up and we immediately hit it off. About an hour into our conversation, he asked me if the people in China think I’m fat.

I instantly sank and thought, “Oh Christ, I spend everyday getting lecture, at some point, about how fat I am. Can I please, please, please have just one fucking day off? It’s my damned vacation!”

“Yes. I get told that a lot.” I told him.

He rolled his eyes. “You see, people in China are crazy. The women, they are always trying to be so skinny. It’s not healthy. You are healthy. You are not fat. You are very tall. You should not look like a skeleton. I think the women in China are so skinny they make themselves sick.” I remind you this boy is 16. He then proceeded to profess my “great beauty” in great detail. It was interesting to hear what, precisely, is esthetically pleasing to the Chinese. My nose is “tall and the perfect shape.” I have a narrow, English nose that is vaguely reminiscent of the Barrymore profile. We then briefly spoke of how some people have rhinoplasty to make their nose more “flat.” My lovely new friend couldn’t understand why anyone would want a “flat” nose. He then told me he loved the shape and the energy of my blue, Irish eyes. He explained the Chinese prefer a smaller lip, low cheekbones, a soft jaw line and pale skin. I explained how beautiful the West finds Eastern people. From their perfect, honey colored skin to their work-of-art face, they are all nothing short of beautiful.

We then talked about skin color (a great source of discussion around me as I seem to posses the perfect shade of pasty) and I talked about how in the US, we’ve got self-tanners in a vain attempt to turn our skin his delicious shade of honey. He explained that he hated his dark skin, that was too yellow (I was unaware of any indications of Jaundice) and that skin bleaches are all the rage here in China. He summed it up with “I think foreigners are most beautiful.” I said, “To me, you are foreign, so I agree.”

We continued to talk about movies and music and my new friend was amazed and excited to know that Chinese movies are seen at all in the US much less as much as they actually are.

We made it to my colleague’s flat and then went out for lunch; again, so much was ordered and I was teased about being a slow eater who is bad with chopsticks.
After lunch, we returned to my colleague’s flat to meet up with a childhood friend of her son. A tall, gangly young man of 17 with a hint of a lisp and a major in electrical engineering, I was immediately smitten with the lad. At about six foot four, the childhood friend was shyness and self-consciousness personified. He was nervous and too shy to make lots of eye contact at first. Within thirty seconds of meeting him, he professed how much he hated his height at least twice.

Knowing exactly what that feels like, I told him to stand up and we stood near each other. I said I had a brother that was taller than him and that girls “like me” like to date men as tall as him because we can wear tall shoes without having to worry. I told him he looked like he belonged in my family. He seemed to like what I had to say and he started making more eye contact.

We chatted some more, took tons of photographs and then were off to meet up with the two female classmates. As we were strolling to the car, the tall young man hopped off the curb to walk in the ditch to balance out our heights. (I recognized the behavior immediately as I often participate in it.) I said, “See, you are not so tall. I am now taller than you.”

“Yes. I do this often to balance out height.” He confessed.

“But we are no longer balanced, I am much taller. I think you are short.”

He smiled at that. If I feel like the occasional sideshow freak here, at least I’m not in adolescence and the awkward teen years. This poor boy needed to hear that the “exotic beauty” (shut the hell up; that’s what they were calling me) in fact finds his “weak points” assets. It must have worked because he used his English a lot, spent much time around me and translated everything for me.

However, the girls were a different matter. I intimidate the hell out of young women I intimidate (some young women are inspired by my presence and won’t stop talking but the rest simply cannot bring themselves to even look me in the eye) and, as I cannot really flirt with them, I was at somewhat of a loss. I asked them the occasional question and we had some good back and forth from time to time but for the most part, they shied away from me.

Once the girls were picked up and the obligatory comment about my beauty was made, we were off to the park for a lovely stroll. Parks in China are a lot like amusement parks back home; tons of rides, lots of candy stands and fun water activities. We strolled around a bit and debated going on one several of the rides but always decided against it. We strolled around a massive lake called “Youth Lake” that was built in three days (they apparently shipped in every single university student from Xi’An and in three days, the kids managed to build a sprawling lake).

After about an hour of walking around the lake (and making only about 3/4ths of the way) we decided to sit for a spell and just chat. For the 75th time today the camera was busted out and we took another 400 photos. The boys sat with me and reviewed every photo of me and told me how beautiful I am. I thanked them and then my colleague’s son repeated it, in earnest.

“I really mean it. You are the most beautiful. Look, beautiful” as he scrolled through more pictures of me, pausing on one and zooming in. “You are even more beautiful than your pictures.” I nodded, cynical to the intentions of any male insisting on being heard that I am beautiful. “I am not saying that to be nice,” he said in that earnest way that men really wanting to be heard always manage to muster. His childhood friend nodded.

“We say that because we mean it,” the young, tall man concurred.

I was really touched and I didn’t know what to say, so I just said, “Thank you.”
Once our rest was over, we strolled some more. The girls and I spoke from time to time and the boys explained how they want to have Western girlfriends but that Western girls would find them ugly because Chinese people are ugly. I said I didn’t think that was true at all.

We finished up in the park and as my colleague and her husband returned to the flat to prepare dinner, the kids and I went window-shopping. I must admit, it is strange to see Maybelline and L’Oreal hair dye, to say nothing of Cover Girl singled out in the fancy shops as high end products. As we window-shopped, they asked if I knew anything of Korean movies and I tried to explain (without sounding like the obsessive freak that I am) that I do, in fact, enjoy the occasional Yu Ji-Tae flick. (Dear god, there is no man more beautiful that that man and there is nothing I wouldn’t give up for a moment alone with him. First born? Done. He is like some medieval statue God breathed life into and turned cold stone to warm flesh without altering any of the lyricism of line or distant melancholy of the mortal condition with the insertion of movement.) They had no idea who I was talking about and we eventually moved on.

As we returned to flat after window-shopping, we passed our thirtieth bride of the day (apparently today and yesterday are the two big days of weddings in China as they are considered incredibly fortuitous days to get hitched) and someone made the comment to me that, “Next year, that’s you.”

“Yeah, that would be nice and if you’ve got any takers, let me know.” I thought. Externally, I just nodded and smiled.

The girls parted ways with us and I was left with the two lovely young men. We chatted amiably for the rest of the walk and as we made our way to the apartment block they live on. The tall young man left us with warm goodbyes and my new friend and I made our way up to the apartment.

My colleague made us a dinner of crab and a ton of other things. I mainly ate crab because that’s what kept getting piled on to my plate. Stuffed full and my mouth on fire (the crab was cooked with equal parts hot peppers and cracked pepper), my colleague and her husband left the table for a moment.

My new friend looked down at his plate and spoke softly. “I am sad. I wish you had a younger sister. One my age.”

It was the best compliment I have been paid in a long time. I am surrounded by a world of young men on the cusp of adulthood and instead of being bitter, cynical, jaded and entirely too hip for thou, they are beautiful, open, earnest and romantic. Poetry has been lost in America. Cynicism, while occasionally entertaining, has turned us afraid of sentiment and fearful of true risk. A broken heart here is of monumental, societal proportions. A broken heart at home is either one more reason you should learn to be cautious and “not put yourself out there” or something the pop machine cannibalizes to make a buck.

This is so what I craved when I was young. I wish I had had access to it when I was young; it would have saved me a lot of time and wasted rage.