BILL PART DEUX
Le Francais saw Bill off at the airport.
"I was never so sure I was going to see a grown man cry," le Francais explained. "He begged to stay in China and I did everything I could but they insisted that he has to go to India now. However, I’m going to try to create a training so he has a reason to come back. I had no idea he loved China so much."
As the situation was explained to me upon my return, I thought about a brief moment Bill and I had together.
"It is my dream to live in China." Bill told me in the cab on the way to Tang Paradise.
"You could live with me," I reflexively thought but found myself only capable of a la Jaconda smile because I had the inkling that he might not object to such a notion. Normally, I reflexively say things like that in an "I dare you to realize it" gesture but I wasn't so sure he wouldn't shy away from my dare and I suddenly found myself wanting a relationship predicated on more than a dare "to catch me if you can." In the lessons I've learned in China, I wanted to take the time to get to know him instead of the cowardly, backdoor, "Give me your irrefutable 'yes' before I take any serious emotional risk."
Bill’s great passion for China is something he shared with me and the thought of him moved to welling up at the airport, while primarily about leaving China, seems to have the faint air of us around it. We compared notes about China (among a great many other things) and through his eyes my love of China further deepened. With me, he was incredibly comfortable confessing profound intimacies and I found myself in the same space. His openness inspired not only better French from me but a certain healing as well. In China, I’ve learned to let men take care of me and my time with Bill was the greatest gift from my new ability.
And, upon recounting stories of our shenanigans together (the thing about boys who like to explore is that you can talk about your time together under the pretext of explaining new locations), I found myself wondering what the hell I was thinking, imagining that he wasn’t interested in me. I would be talking about something I had been doing in the company of my Brazilian Angel, le Francais and Bill and found myself having to consistently interrupt the story with something to the effect of, "Oh, and at that point [Bill] came over to talk to me" or "Oh, and at this point [Bill] showed me this."
Upon the conscious realization that he was irrefutably interested in my company, Bill cemented himself in my psyche. In fact, when a handsome, New York-based screenwriter picked me up in a Starbucks while I was home, I knew instantly that Bill was the reason I wouldn’t actually ever hook up with a man I would have killed to be with mere weeks before. I was quite sure I would never see Bill again but I wasn’t ready to let go and the idea of another man (perfect though he may be) was simply not appealing in real time. My whole trip home, Bill was consistently in my thoughts and the day he left China, I took a moment to just sit and be depressed.
"Mom, [Bill]’s left China. He leaves today." I called out to the Jude, in spite of myself. It was the first time I allowed myself to speak of my kindred spirit beyond anecdotes. I had thought of him constantly but it felt foolishly childish to entertain notions and it was certainly nothing I want to confess in broad daylight. Nonetheless, the words were out of my mouth and I couldn’t take them back.
"Don’t be surprised if this isn’t the last you hear of him," she hollered back. "No one has a good time like that alone."
I tried to block out what she said because it just seemed like screaming into the wind to invest in a man who, in the real world, wouldn’t be in China when I returned. I didn’t want to have to deal with the inevitable disappointment when I returned to a Bill-free China.
At the airport, one of the last things I said to the Jude was, "[Bill] won’t be there when I get back. I don’t want a [Bill]-free China."
"No, he won’t but I think you’ll see him again," the Jude provided me with some real-world comfort as I headed off to my [Bill]-free China.
"It seemed a bit much but he comes from a small town in France and perhaps Xi’An is just such a lovely city. He really loved living here. Perhaps it’s just an easier world," my Brazilian Angel tried to analyze the world-traveler that is Bill. Bill has been all over the world and in all sorts of cities his whole life. He loves his country home in France and he loves the quiet Sunday exploration of the forest and abandoned homes. There’s something different about China, something special, and maybe we’re a small piece of that.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
BAS RELIEF
In retrospect, one of the things I like most about the work I’ve done in film is the effect it has had on dispelling my expectations of life. At least from where I grew up, media so fully saturates a child’s life that it’s difficult to tell what one should expect from day to day life. Most precisely, working in film showed me just how unrealistic and fabricated those orchestra-swelling, climactic moments are when all things align for the hero and the major truth is revealed.
However, that is not to say that life isn’t utterly without those moments. They’re just far less prevalent than one raised on a diet of American film and tv would expect. I was fortunate to have one of those moments while I was home. It came under the guise of a former friend’s misguided meltdown.
The details of his meltdown, suffice to say, are not particularly relevant to this monologue and, under the pretext of the hope that someday he will see his great error and the damage he has caused himself, I have no intention of flogging him further. The loss of the love of four decent women who loved him dearly is enough punishment for one lifetime.
Essentially, after a single misunderstanding, he exploded into a rage that had apparently been festering for some time. The sum total of that response was a single letter (with the singular purpose of wounding all of us) sent to the one of the four of us he knew would not fight back nor call him on his shit; he knew she was too close to the situation to do much more than ache from his rage.
Weeping, my beloved Frenchoise (no relation to le Francais other than they both come from France) came over to see my girls and I at the home of my good friend Cakes and my other good friend Panda (who are sisters) while we were renovating their bathroom. Cakes read the letter out loud and as I heard the absurd and unfounded "criticisms" hurtled at my friends I knew the purpose of the letter was nothing but to wound as only a close confidant can. I recognized the vitriolic and histrionic nature of the letter as a spoiled child desperate to wound others by dragging them down to his remarkably paranoid and delusional level.
As Cakes got to my name, I had the last moment panic of the person who knows they’re about to be tortured and they can do nothing but start begging for lenience from the giddy, aroused sadist. Being home had been destabilizing enough; the last thing I wanted was to violate the sacred space and the respite of my girls with this toxicity for toxicity’s sake. I’m getting old enough to understand that places of kinship are few and far between and consequently they should be protected at all costs.
"I don’t want to hear this. It’s going to be too emotionally violent," I thought. The former friend in the midst of his meltdown knew too much about who I have been to not draw blood. In the days before my return to the States, I had been unsettled by his decision that we were still very close friends after over a year of no communication and him living for several years with a woman who not only constructed a profoundly deep friendship between she and I out of a mere acquaintance and the proximity of mutual friends but also proceeded to construct numerous vile betrayals by this mythic "me." However, he seemed to be remarkably, desperately fragile in his new state and the recent upheavals in his life so I decided to place my concern aside and, for old time’s sake, ignore my gut reaction that openly embracing him was a bad idea. "He’s punishing all of us because I was stupid enough to try to embrace him. What was I thinking? There’s no way, after years of living with delusional lies, that he could possibly return to what we all once were. I have to stop this."
However, I spent too long thinking and Cakes was already through the brief section about me. The sum total of his criticism of me was that too much money had been spent on me, that I was all there was to show for said conspicuous consumption and despite my impressive pedigree, I was still nothing more than a loser who has to lie about everything in her life to make it sound more interesting than it is.
To which all I could think was, "And?" Frankly, the dollar amount spent on my life education is irrelevant to whether or not someone finds me interesting to say nothing of the fact that people loathe most in other what they loathe most about themselves. My life is what it is. It’s full of such random crap that, while I have a fantastic imagination, it could never compare to the random beauty the universe gifts me with. In many ways, I have been beyond fortunate. In many ways I have not. In that, I am just like everyone else. It took me the vast majority of my life to come to the understanding that I am who I am and the value other place on me isn’t really relevant to my life. Either you want in on this ride or not. Which ever you choose, I’ll be having a pretty good time.
The fact that his criticisms were simply a reiteration of the constructivist woman’s (who, in high school, felt it appropriate to lock me in a bathroom for over an hour until I "confessed" that the sexual molestation I was experiencing and I refused to stay silent about really didn’t effect me because my "dad is rich") broken record criticism didn’t surprise me in the least. What did surprise me was that, this time, I didn’t have to suppress a moment’s agony.
And I had my moment when the music swells. I am no longer that girl and haven’t been her for a long time. At last I have stopped feeling the desperate need to apologize for who I am and what I have been fortunate enough to be given. I have been able to profoundly alter my life for the better.
I found myself thinking, "Well, if we are all the things you claim in the letter, then you’re better off without us but why all the drama about it?"
As I checked back in to what Cakes was reading, she read an unspeakable piece about his criticism of how she, Panda and their family have been poorly handling their brother’s KIA in Iraq. In a nutshell, he felt that after two whole years, the family should be over his death. In that moment, I understood that the former friend was dead to me. The use of a soldier and a baby brother’s murder in a distant land further than China in my generation’s Vietnam to retaliate after a mere misunderstanding is, in my eyes, far beyond unforgivable. He is so lost within his own agony that death and global tragedy are merely tools to wield for his unwieldy ego. Frankly, there are no words.
The letter, primarily, had its desired effect. Three of the four of us were wounded. However, we recovered by thinking about the criticisms he threw at everyone but "me." Beyond the blinding shame and pain he tapped into by hitting nerves for the sake of hitting nerves, we could see that the criticisms he offered the rest of us weren’t rationally relevant. And, we were all saddened to understand that, at pushing 30, he still hasn’t left high school when things like the loss of a loved one is nothing but an egomaniacal chip.
In the abstract, I find it to be a tragic loss that someone so bright and promising as my former friend could be so trapped by his own fear, paranoia and self-imposed limitations. In real time, I find it terrifying that some one so bright and promising is so desperate to lash out violently that he fabricates reasons out of thin air.
In retrospect, one of the things I like most about the work I’ve done in film is the effect it has had on dispelling my expectations of life. At least from where I grew up, media so fully saturates a child’s life that it’s difficult to tell what one should expect from day to day life. Most precisely, working in film showed me just how unrealistic and fabricated those orchestra-swelling, climactic moments are when all things align for the hero and the major truth is revealed.
However, that is not to say that life isn’t utterly without those moments. They’re just far less prevalent than one raised on a diet of American film and tv would expect. I was fortunate to have one of those moments while I was home. It came under the guise of a former friend’s misguided meltdown.
The details of his meltdown, suffice to say, are not particularly relevant to this monologue and, under the pretext of the hope that someday he will see his great error and the damage he has caused himself, I have no intention of flogging him further. The loss of the love of four decent women who loved him dearly is enough punishment for one lifetime.
Essentially, after a single misunderstanding, he exploded into a rage that had apparently been festering for some time. The sum total of that response was a single letter (with the singular purpose of wounding all of us) sent to the one of the four of us he knew would not fight back nor call him on his shit; he knew she was too close to the situation to do much more than ache from his rage.
Weeping, my beloved Frenchoise (no relation to le Francais other than they both come from France) came over to see my girls and I at the home of my good friend Cakes and my other good friend Panda (who are sisters) while we were renovating their bathroom. Cakes read the letter out loud and as I heard the absurd and unfounded "criticisms" hurtled at my friends I knew the purpose of the letter was nothing but to wound as only a close confidant can. I recognized the vitriolic and histrionic nature of the letter as a spoiled child desperate to wound others by dragging them down to his remarkably paranoid and delusional level.
As Cakes got to my name, I had the last moment panic of the person who knows they’re about to be tortured and they can do nothing but start begging for lenience from the giddy, aroused sadist. Being home had been destabilizing enough; the last thing I wanted was to violate the sacred space and the respite of my girls with this toxicity for toxicity’s sake. I’m getting old enough to understand that places of kinship are few and far between and consequently they should be protected at all costs.
"I don’t want to hear this. It’s going to be too emotionally violent," I thought. The former friend in the midst of his meltdown knew too much about who I have been to not draw blood. In the days before my return to the States, I had been unsettled by his decision that we were still very close friends after over a year of no communication and him living for several years with a woman who not only constructed a profoundly deep friendship between she and I out of a mere acquaintance and the proximity of mutual friends but also proceeded to construct numerous vile betrayals by this mythic "me." However, he seemed to be remarkably, desperately fragile in his new state and the recent upheavals in his life so I decided to place my concern aside and, for old time’s sake, ignore my gut reaction that openly embracing him was a bad idea. "He’s punishing all of us because I was stupid enough to try to embrace him. What was I thinking? There’s no way, after years of living with delusional lies, that he could possibly return to what we all once were. I have to stop this."
However, I spent too long thinking and Cakes was already through the brief section about me. The sum total of his criticism of me was that too much money had been spent on me, that I was all there was to show for said conspicuous consumption and despite my impressive pedigree, I was still nothing more than a loser who has to lie about everything in her life to make it sound more interesting than it is.
To which all I could think was, "And?" Frankly, the dollar amount spent on my life education is irrelevant to whether or not someone finds me interesting to say nothing of the fact that people loathe most in other what they loathe most about themselves. My life is what it is. It’s full of such random crap that, while I have a fantastic imagination, it could never compare to the random beauty the universe gifts me with. In many ways, I have been beyond fortunate. In many ways I have not. In that, I am just like everyone else. It took me the vast majority of my life to come to the understanding that I am who I am and the value other place on me isn’t really relevant to my life. Either you want in on this ride or not. Which ever you choose, I’ll be having a pretty good time.
The fact that his criticisms were simply a reiteration of the constructivist woman’s (who, in high school, felt it appropriate to lock me in a bathroom for over an hour until I "confessed" that the sexual molestation I was experiencing and I refused to stay silent about really didn’t effect me because my "dad is rich") broken record criticism didn’t surprise me in the least. What did surprise me was that, this time, I didn’t have to suppress a moment’s agony.
And I had my moment when the music swells. I am no longer that girl and haven’t been her for a long time. At last I have stopped feeling the desperate need to apologize for who I am and what I have been fortunate enough to be given. I have been able to profoundly alter my life for the better.
I found myself thinking, "Well, if we are all the things you claim in the letter, then you’re better off without us but why all the drama about it?"
As I checked back in to what Cakes was reading, she read an unspeakable piece about his criticism of how she, Panda and their family have been poorly handling their brother’s KIA in Iraq. In a nutshell, he felt that after two whole years, the family should be over his death. In that moment, I understood that the former friend was dead to me. The use of a soldier and a baby brother’s murder in a distant land further than China in my generation’s Vietnam to retaliate after a mere misunderstanding is, in my eyes, far beyond unforgivable. He is so lost within his own agony that death and global tragedy are merely tools to wield for his unwieldy ego. Frankly, there are no words.
The letter, primarily, had its desired effect. Three of the four of us were wounded. However, we recovered by thinking about the criticisms he threw at everyone but "me." Beyond the blinding shame and pain he tapped into by hitting nerves for the sake of hitting nerves, we could see that the criticisms he offered the rest of us weren’t rationally relevant. And, we were all saddened to understand that, at pushing 30, he still hasn’t left high school when things like the loss of a loved one is nothing but an egomaniacal chip.
In the abstract, I find it to be a tragic loss that someone so bright and promising as my former friend could be so trapped by his own fear, paranoia and self-imposed limitations. In real time, I find it terrifying that some one so bright and promising is so desperate to lash out violently that he fabricates reasons out of thin air.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
THE PRODIGAL SON
I’m back in China and it’s the Spring Festival (the weekend of February 17th and 18th). Day and night, fireworks have been exploding outside by my home in an enthusiastic declaration that feels custom made for my return. Yes, it’s remarkably egocentric to turn the ancient tradition of the Chinese reverie of the New Year into a celebration of "me" but I like to think that China missed me as much as I missed China.
It’s not that being home wasn’t wonderful (with a few snags; a root canal for one, the truly confusing and utterly psychotic meltdown of a former friend for two, to say nothing of the fact that two weeks really just is too short a visit resulting in me not seeing my Michi as well as several other friends) but I really missed China. I’ve come to realize that, at this point in my life, I really am a marginal man. I simply don’t fit in if I’m supposed to. I never have. I don’t know if I ever will. Being home reminded me of all the things I’m supposed to have together and all the things I simply don’t. Being home reminded me of how social I’m supposed to be and how very much I’m just not. Being home reminded me of how small the "continental" life can be; most people I spoke to simply fear the great unknown of China with very little desire to dispel the vague haze of (currently) unfounded fear. This is to say nothing of the racism displayed by my fellow "enlightened" and "cultured" college educated types typified by the comment, "God, you SMELL like China. China smells musty, right?" not an hour after I disembarked a 16 hour flight and before I had a chance to shower.
Somehow, "Yeah, but they’re communists" is supposed to explain to me the unwieldy enigma that is the horrifically terrifying "Chinese." I still don’t get what’s so unforgivably wrong with communism. I definitely prefer democracy (but it’s not like the US can really lay claim to that right now) but there’s more than one way to get things done. Every argument I’ve heard about the terrors of communism all seem to go back to the violence of revolution as if revolution could possibly be peaceful and fun. France didn’t call it the "Reign of Terror" for nothing. And for that matter, what must the Iraqis think of "democracy"? Revolution hardly seems like a reason to forgo an entire political system. Frankly, I’ve yet to hear a single argument about the current state of things that justifies the perspective most people I know seem to have of China.
It’s clear to me that a large number of Americans have their Regan-era perspective of China and refuse to hear a post-internet revolution perspective. Most everyone was quite sure that I’d have a meeting with some sort of Gestapo-esque thought police or that one day I’d simply vanish from the face of the earth, not to be seen or heard from ever again. I spent so much time dispelling other people’s fear of the great, scary question mark that is China that I spent almost no time whatsoever discussing the cool stuff I’ve seen or the adventures I’ve had. I had a brief moment where I busted out the map of Xi’An and started explaining the where’s and what’s with my uncle, aunt and mom but that was cut short by the invasion of the ego that is my sister-in-law. Essentially, the closest anyone has come to understanding my experience here is a friend of the Jude’s who came to Xi’An on a guided tour (read: in a Western bubble) and found the locals to be scary, money-grubbing peasants because she made a huge spectacle of herself.
So, as much as I missed my friends, it was a relief to get back to China; the one place in my world where notions of "China" are what I recognize as "Chinese" and simply a part of everyday life. China and Xi’An in particular have progressed so much in the past 5 or 6 years that it’s difficult for even Chinese immigrants to understand what a fucking cool place Xi’An has become. I’ve made friends with a wonderful Australian in West Egg and he’s been splitting his time between Xi’An and Sydney for about three decades and he’s said that the perspective I’m building about Xi’An and China is a very recent thing and that he’s seen all these improvements spring up very recently. I hope I am at the beginning of a new era in China and not simply at a blip on the map because, really, it’s wonderful here.
Nonetheless, my trip back was a bit haggard as, in typically Chinese fashion, my stopover was scheduled WAY too short and WAY too dependent on everything working like machinery and not like life. It was fully believed that a less-than-two-hour stopover was enough for an international flight to transfer to a domestic flight. Less than two hours is generally not enough time to get off the (theoretically not-delayed) plane, get your bags, get through customs, re-check in, find your gate and board. I knew when we were delayed by two hours at JFK that there was simply no way I was going to make the transfer. I don’t care how much time the pilot makes up; I knew I wasn’t going to make the next flight. However, I also know the Chinese and so I knew that I would be very efficiently (read: I would be taken directly through the appropriate chain of command with none of that American bullshit of "sorry, you’ve spent 45 minutes in line 46B but your paperwork says you should be in line 46b" or my "can you please help me" met with "you should have filed the appropriate paperwork previously for an escort"; it may take them a moment but the Chinese will always get you to the right place provided you ask for help… if you don’t ask for help, they probably won’t offer it because it’s considered rude to openly acknowledge an adult having a hard time) and generously taken care of (there would be no question of me having to pay for anything involved with their fuck up), even if it did end up taking a little while (read: while I would always be with the right person to get to the next right person immediately, I would end up waiting a little while as the Chinese, by and large, are incredibly overworked and so I would not exactly be the only person this one person would be dealing with).
As I got in to the transfer re-check in location, it was noted that my plane already took off. My ticket and passport were then handed off to several people (by the way, most Chinese are casual about taking and passing around passports within the appropriate spheres; a most nerve wracking habit for Westerners because we’ve all seen one too many movies where the innocent White American loses sight of their passport while surrounded by the slanty-eyed officials speaking a funny language and promptly end up either forced into prostitution or in a third world prison on charges of drug trafficking but, in the real world, it’s a common gesture for the Chinese because the Chinese who own passports are proud of the fact that they have them; it takes an obscene amount of money, interviews and time to get a passport… the more people who see that you have a passport, the more people see that you’re important). Not much to my surprise, I caught a fair amount of the rapid fire Mandarin about how my plane had already taken off.
I could tell from the nervous way everyone kept glancing at me that my flight was the last one going out that evening and I was going to be spending the night in Beijing. I could also tell exactly why it is that Hollywood uses this setup a lot. The nervousness of the Chinese is often exhibited in quickly shifting glances but without the Western furrowing or twisting of the eyebrows indicating low-grade anxiety. In other words, Chinese nervousness often resembles Western conspiracy and the fact that everyone was getting a solid look at my passport in an attempt to buy time would absolutely freak out the big wigs in Hollywood.
Nonetheless, I had missed my flight. Frankly, there’s nothing to be done about that. Shit happens. However, it was amusing to watch as no one wanted to tell the American who just got off a 13-hour flight that her next flight has gone and she’s stranded. Most of us foreigners tend to freak the fuck out under that situation; especially if we’re American. However, most of the people working around me were men and I was a helpless, stoic, calm single woman. I knew there was no way I wasn’t going to be getting the best treatment possible.
Nervously, a kindly dude with a walkie-talkie looked me up and down.
"Ah, here’s the gentlemen whose job it is to inform me of the bad news," I thought.
"The flight is…" he paused to look for the right word, "gone." He finished quite softly and nervously in English.
"I know. At 5 o’clock I knew. We were…" I said in Mandarin and drifted off as I realized I didn’t know the word for "late."
His eyes grew wide and quickly slid into a smile. "You know?" He asked in English.
"Yes." I replied in Mandarin.
He laughed a little, clearly relieved I not only wasn’t going to throw a fit but that I could speak Mandarin. The Chinese have had the notion that their language is unacceptably opaque jammed down their throats. Consequently, any Westerner who speaks any modicum of Mandarin is unspeakably obsessed with accessing China and therefore the chance of a Mandarin speaker treating a Chinese person like shit is highly unlikely. This goes double for Western women who are not seen as Robber Barons or pilfering the "untouched" poontang and so we are seen as having even less reason to need to learn it.
Just as I had predicted, because the Chinese are nothing if not dependable in their support systems (for the gainfully employed), I was escorted to the appropriate place, met with the appropriate people, provided water and every possible comfort during my long-as-expected wait, rescheduled for the first flight out the next morning and shuttled off to a hotel. Of course, everything was paid for by the airline and I was shuttled back to the hotel the next morning.
On the flight from Beijing, I was seated next to two thirds of a family while the father was placed further up in the cabin. So, I swallowed the suckitude and offered my beloved aisle seat (at over 6 feet tall, the only chance for leg room is either the emergency exit aisle or an aisle seat) so the father could sit with his wife and son. I hate little more than the middle seat and that’s what the father had but it’s the New Year and the most important thing to the Chinese is to be with their family.
In my terrible Mandarin, I suggested that he and I switch and I found myself planted between a New Yorker and a young Chinese teenager. The New Yorker and I chatted for a bit and as the plane took off, I noticed the Chinese teen was starting to have a panic attack.
"You okay?" I asked in Mandarin knowing that even though she should be able to speak English, in the midst of a panic attack, a foreign language isn’t exactly the most forthcoming.
Without speaking, she shook her head as her knuckles turned white around the armrest.
"Breathe," I said in English because I don’t know the word in Chinese. I showed her a deep breath and said, "This" in Mandarin. Then I mimicked her hyperventilation and said "Not this" in Chinese. "Together" I said in Mandarin as I took a deep breath in. "One," I said in Mandarin as I took one breath in. She watched me nervously and breathed in with me. "Two" I said in Mandarin as I took a second breath. Her deep breath got a little deeper and as we continued to ten.
By the time we got to ten, we had leveled out. Her nerve had returned to her and she began to look out the window at the morning mist lingering between the mountains.
"Beautiful" I said in Mandarin.
She looked at me and nodded. As she nodded, the plane banked hard to the left and I could see her anxiety rise again.
"It’s nothing." I comforted her in Mandarin.
Wide eyed, she looked at me to sort out if I was just saying it to comfort her or if I really meant it.
I shook my head casually to emphasize the irrelevant nature of the plane banking on our safety and returned to my newspaper. She seemed to be comforted by my blasÈ behavior and was soon out like a light, lightly snoring next to me.
In fact, she didn’t wake up again until the seatbelt sign turned off and people were up getting their things to disembark.
Once I was off the plane, I hopped into a cab, negotiated a good price (actually, I just named my rock-bottom price and he simply agreed) and chatted a little with the cab driver. It was really cool to be able to figure out what he was saying and he really seemed to enjoy our conversation as much as I did.
As we got to my compound, he leapt out of the car to help me with my bags and teased me a little about my heavy bags. I do love when Chinese men feel comfortable enough to tease me a little. We wished each other well and he was off.
I collected my things and as I turned to enter, the main entrance on my side of the compound exploded in a cacophony of fireworks. Every color imaginable exploded before me and a mind-numbing series of explosions unleashed themselves all around me. The excitement in my head at being back manifested itself outside my head in a cinematically well-timed unleashing of more fireworks than I’ve ever seen at one time. I made it through the arch of blinding light and one of my guard-friends smiled broadly at seeing me.
"Ni hao!" He called out to me.
"Ni hao!" I called out, positively glowing.
And then, in my brilliance, I was wandering about my apartment, giddy with excitement, as I tripped over my phone cord, effectively pulling it out of the wall and severing the line. I now have to go to the store first thing in the morning to get another one.
The dumb ass is back.
I’m back in China and it’s the Spring Festival (the weekend of February 17th and 18th). Day and night, fireworks have been exploding outside by my home in an enthusiastic declaration that feels custom made for my return. Yes, it’s remarkably egocentric to turn the ancient tradition of the Chinese reverie of the New Year into a celebration of "me" but I like to think that China missed me as much as I missed China.
It’s not that being home wasn’t wonderful (with a few snags; a root canal for one, the truly confusing and utterly psychotic meltdown of a former friend for two, to say nothing of the fact that two weeks really just is too short a visit resulting in me not seeing my Michi as well as several other friends) but I really missed China. I’ve come to realize that, at this point in my life, I really am a marginal man. I simply don’t fit in if I’m supposed to. I never have. I don’t know if I ever will. Being home reminded me of all the things I’m supposed to have together and all the things I simply don’t. Being home reminded me of how social I’m supposed to be and how very much I’m just not. Being home reminded me of how small the "continental" life can be; most people I spoke to simply fear the great unknown of China with very little desire to dispel the vague haze of (currently) unfounded fear. This is to say nothing of the racism displayed by my fellow "enlightened" and "cultured" college educated types typified by the comment, "God, you SMELL like China. China smells musty, right?" not an hour after I disembarked a 16 hour flight and before I had a chance to shower.
Somehow, "Yeah, but they’re communists" is supposed to explain to me the unwieldy enigma that is the horrifically terrifying "Chinese." I still don’t get what’s so unforgivably wrong with communism. I definitely prefer democracy (but it’s not like the US can really lay claim to that right now) but there’s more than one way to get things done. Every argument I’ve heard about the terrors of communism all seem to go back to the violence of revolution as if revolution could possibly be peaceful and fun. France didn’t call it the "Reign of Terror" for nothing. And for that matter, what must the Iraqis think of "democracy"? Revolution hardly seems like a reason to forgo an entire political system. Frankly, I’ve yet to hear a single argument about the current state of things that justifies the perspective most people I know seem to have of China.
It’s clear to me that a large number of Americans have their Regan-era perspective of China and refuse to hear a post-internet revolution perspective. Most everyone was quite sure that I’d have a meeting with some sort of Gestapo-esque thought police or that one day I’d simply vanish from the face of the earth, not to be seen or heard from ever again. I spent so much time dispelling other people’s fear of the great, scary question mark that is China that I spent almost no time whatsoever discussing the cool stuff I’ve seen or the adventures I’ve had. I had a brief moment where I busted out the map of Xi’An and started explaining the where’s and what’s with my uncle, aunt and mom but that was cut short by the invasion of the ego that is my sister-in-law. Essentially, the closest anyone has come to understanding my experience here is a friend of the Jude’s who came to Xi’An on a guided tour (read: in a Western bubble) and found the locals to be scary, money-grubbing peasants because she made a huge spectacle of herself.
So, as much as I missed my friends, it was a relief to get back to China; the one place in my world where notions of "China" are what I recognize as "Chinese" and simply a part of everyday life. China and Xi’An in particular have progressed so much in the past 5 or 6 years that it’s difficult for even Chinese immigrants to understand what a fucking cool place Xi’An has become. I’ve made friends with a wonderful Australian in West Egg and he’s been splitting his time between Xi’An and Sydney for about three decades and he’s said that the perspective I’m building about Xi’An and China is a very recent thing and that he’s seen all these improvements spring up very recently. I hope I am at the beginning of a new era in China and not simply at a blip on the map because, really, it’s wonderful here.
Nonetheless, my trip back was a bit haggard as, in typically Chinese fashion, my stopover was scheduled WAY too short and WAY too dependent on everything working like machinery and not like life. It was fully believed that a less-than-two-hour stopover was enough for an international flight to transfer to a domestic flight. Less than two hours is generally not enough time to get off the (theoretically not-delayed) plane, get your bags, get through customs, re-check in, find your gate and board. I knew when we were delayed by two hours at JFK that there was simply no way I was going to make the transfer. I don’t care how much time the pilot makes up; I knew I wasn’t going to make the next flight. However, I also know the Chinese and so I knew that I would be very efficiently (read: I would be taken directly through the appropriate chain of command with none of that American bullshit of "sorry, you’ve spent 45 minutes in line 46B but your paperwork says you should be in line 46b" or my "can you please help me" met with "you should have filed the appropriate paperwork previously for an escort"; it may take them a moment but the Chinese will always get you to the right place provided you ask for help… if you don’t ask for help, they probably won’t offer it because it’s considered rude to openly acknowledge an adult having a hard time) and generously taken care of (there would be no question of me having to pay for anything involved with their fuck up), even if it did end up taking a little while (read: while I would always be with the right person to get to the next right person immediately, I would end up waiting a little while as the Chinese, by and large, are incredibly overworked and so I would not exactly be the only person this one person would be dealing with).
As I got in to the transfer re-check in location, it was noted that my plane already took off. My ticket and passport were then handed off to several people (by the way, most Chinese are casual about taking and passing around passports within the appropriate spheres; a most nerve wracking habit for Westerners because we’ve all seen one too many movies where the innocent White American loses sight of their passport while surrounded by the slanty-eyed officials speaking a funny language and promptly end up either forced into prostitution or in a third world prison on charges of drug trafficking but, in the real world, it’s a common gesture for the Chinese because the Chinese who own passports are proud of the fact that they have them; it takes an obscene amount of money, interviews and time to get a passport… the more people who see that you have a passport, the more people see that you’re important). Not much to my surprise, I caught a fair amount of the rapid fire Mandarin about how my plane had already taken off.
I could tell from the nervous way everyone kept glancing at me that my flight was the last one going out that evening and I was going to be spending the night in Beijing. I could also tell exactly why it is that Hollywood uses this setup a lot. The nervousness of the Chinese is often exhibited in quickly shifting glances but without the Western furrowing or twisting of the eyebrows indicating low-grade anxiety. In other words, Chinese nervousness often resembles Western conspiracy and the fact that everyone was getting a solid look at my passport in an attempt to buy time would absolutely freak out the big wigs in Hollywood.
Nonetheless, I had missed my flight. Frankly, there’s nothing to be done about that. Shit happens. However, it was amusing to watch as no one wanted to tell the American who just got off a 13-hour flight that her next flight has gone and she’s stranded. Most of us foreigners tend to freak the fuck out under that situation; especially if we’re American. However, most of the people working around me were men and I was a helpless, stoic, calm single woman. I knew there was no way I wasn’t going to be getting the best treatment possible.
Nervously, a kindly dude with a walkie-talkie looked me up and down.
"Ah, here’s the gentlemen whose job it is to inform me of the bad news," I thought.
"The flight is…" he paused to look for the right word, "gone." He finished quite softly and nervously in English.
"I know. At 5 o’clock I knew. We were…" I said in Mandarin and drifted off as I realized I didn’t know the word for "late."
His eyes grew wide and quickly slid into a smile. "You know?" He asked in English.
"Yes." I replied in Mandarin.
He laughed a little, clearly relieved I not only wasn’t going to throw a fit but that I could speak Mandarin. The Chinese have had the notion that their language is unacceptably opaque jammed down their throats. Consequently, any Westerner who speaks any modicum of Mandarin is unspeakably obsessed with accessing China and therefore the chance of a Mandarin speaker treating a Chinese person like shit is highly unlikely. This goes double for Western women who are not seen as Robber Barons or pilfering the "untouched" poontang and so we are seen as having even less reason to need to learn it.
Just as I had predicted, because the Chinese are nothing if not dependable in their support systems (for the gainfully employed), I was escorted to the appropriate place, met with the appropriate people, provided water and every possible comfort during my long-as-expected wait, rescheduled for the first flight out the next morning and shuttled off to a hotel. Of course, everything was paid for by the airline and I was shuttled back to the hotel the next morning.
On the flight from Beijing, I was seated next to two thirds of a family while the father was placed further up in the cabin. So, I swallowed the suckitude and offered my beloved aisle seat (at over 6 feet tall, the only chance for leg room is either the emergency exit aisle or an aisle seat) so the father could sit with his wife and son. I hate little more than the middle seat and that’s what the father had but it’s the New Year and the most important thing to the Chinese is to be with their family.
In my terrible Mandarin, I suggested that he and I switch and I found myself planted between a New Yorker and a young Chinese teenager. The New Yorker and I chatted for a bit and as the plane took off, I noticed the Chinese teen was starting to have a panic attack.
"You okay?" I asked in Mandarin knowing that even though she should be able to speak English, in the midst of a panic attack, a foreign language isn’t exactly the most forthcoming.
Without speaking, she shook her head as her knuckles turned white around the armrest.
"Breathe," I said in English because I don’t know the word in Chinese. I showed her a deep breath and said, "This" in Mandarin. Then I mimicked her hyperventilation and said "Not this" in Chinese. "Together" I said in Mandarin as I took a deep breath in. "One," I said in Mandarin as I took one breath in. She watched me nervously and breathed in with me. "Two" I said in Mandarin as I took a second breath. Her deep breath got a little deeper and as we continued to ten.
By the time we got to ten, we had leveled out. Her nerve had returned to her and she began to look out the window at the morning mist lingering between the mountains.
"Beautiful" I said in Mandarin.
She looked at me and nodded. As she nodded, the plane banked hard to the left and I could see her anxiety rise again.
"It’s nothing." I comforted her in Mandarin.
Wide eyed, she looked at me to sort out if I was just saying it to comfort her or if I really meant it.
I shook my head casually to emphasize the irrelevant nature of the plane banking on our safety and returned to my newspaper. She seemed to be comforted by my blasÈ behavior and was soon out like a light, lightly snoring next to me.
In fact, she didn’t wake up again until the seatbelt sign turned off and people were up getting their things to disembark.
Once I was off the plane, I hopped into a cab, negotiated a good price (actually, I just named my rock-bottom price and he simply agreed) and chatted a little with the cab driver. It was really cool to be able to figure out what he was saying and he really seemed to enjoy our conversation as much as I did.
As we got to my compound, he leapt out of the car to help me with my bags and teased me a little about my heavy bags. I do love when Chinese men feel comfortable enough to tease me a little. We wished each other well and he was off.
I collected my things and as I turned to enter, the main entrance on my side of the compound exploded in a cacophony of fireworks. Every color imaginable exploded before me and a mind-numbing series of explosions unleashed themselves all around me. The excitement in my head at being back manifested itself outside my head in a cinematically well-timed unleashing of more fireworks than I’ve ever seen at one time. I made it through the arch of blinding light and one of my guard-friends smiled broadly at seeing me.
"Ni hao!" He called out to me.
"Ni hao!" I called out, positively glowing.
And then, in my brilliance, I was wandering about my apartment, giddy with excitement, as I tripped over my phone cord, effectively pulling it out of the wall and severing the line. I now have to go to the store first thing in the morning to get another one.
The dumb ass is back.
Friday, February 02, 2007
NOT YOUR MOTHER’S CHINA
Here I sit. I leave for the US in about 30 hours (it’s Friday night 2/2) and I was just contemplating how odd my life is. While I sit listening to Opie and Anthony online and watching the Daily Show on YouTube during commercial breaks, I’m eating Nutella out of a jar shipped in from Europe with a chopstick bought at the local market and clementines bought from a local vendor who peddled them in today on his bike. I know, dinner of champions but I’m leaving on Sunday (hence the empty fridge) and I don’t want to go out because I don’t want to have to deal with the great concern of my Chinese friends about either my great trip (the likes of which they have never experienced; nothing settles nerves like "Aren't you afraid of crashing or dying in a firey wreck?" when you're already waking up at 2 am every morning with images of crashing and dying in a firey wreck) or the great concern of my Chinese friends that they have stumbled upon me all alone. I’m never aware of the great trauma that being alone seems to be until I’m quietly enjoying my own company and friends find me only to show their great pity that I’m "all by [my]self!"
And it’s been six months. Six fucking months. Holy shit, how did I make it six months? How did I make the friends, fall for the boy, find the redemption, communicate with little kids and learn to herd them even though we have no common language? How did I go from New York to midland China and manage to blend? How did I survive six months without, not just sex, but no man contact whatsoever? Who am I?
Crazy times. Hope you’re having fun wherever you are. I know I'm entertained.
Here I sit. I leave for the US in about 30 hours (it’s Friday night 2/2) and I was just contemplating how odd my life is. While I sit listening to Opie and Anthony online and watching the Daily Show on YouTube during commercial breaks, I’m eating Nutella out of a jar shipped in from Europe with a chopstick bought at the local market and clementines bought from a local vendor who peddled them in today on his bike. I know, dinner of champions but I’m leaving on Sunday (hence the empty fridge) and I don’t want to go out because I don’t want to have to deal with the great concern of my Chinese friends about either my great trip (the likes of which they have never experienced; nothing settles nerves like "Aren't you afraid of crashing or dying in a firey wreck?" when you're already waking up at 2 am every morning with images of crashing and dying in a firey wreck) or the great concern of my Chinese friends that they have stumbled upon me all alone. I’m never aware of the great trauma that being alone seems to be until I’m quietly enjoying my own company and friends find me only to show their great pity that I’m "all by [my]self!"
And it’s been six months. Six fucking months. Holy shit, how did I make it six months? How did I make the friends, fall for the boy, find the redemption, communicate with little kids and learn to herd them even though we have no common language? How did I go from New York to midland China and manage to blend? How did I survive six months without, not just sex, but no man contact whatsoever? Who am I?
Crazy times. Hope you’re having fun wherever you are. I know I'm entertained.
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