Happy Trey Day Eve

It's that time of year again. Know what you can do to make me super happy? Use this damn Florida phone number I bought and CALL ME! Even if just for a few minutes... you have know idea how good familiar voices sound 8500 miles away.

I'm 12 hours ahead of EST (11pm Saturday in Jax = 11am Sunday for me). I'm off work tomorrow. And the next day. Friday night my time is good for super-short drunken hello's and that's about it. Hot Pot, karaoke, and wine will surely flow at a Double Going Away + Trey Day Party.

(904) 302-7336

Step 1) Save it in your phone.
Step 2) Right now.
Step 3) Call it at a good time for both of us.
Step 4) Identify yourself.
Step 5) Chat!

Q&A time with Joe Flowers

why did she have to go to the hospital?

There are no general doctors here, so we have to go to the hospital for nearly everything that would require a prescription back home. There are little hospitals in almost every neighborhood. A visit can cost less than $10. The other option, which I prefer, is to self-diagnose using the internet and find the appropriate medication and go to the pharmacy to pick it up. I don't play around with antibiotics though.

why were you sent out of the interrogation room--for snapping what photo? why was anyone interrogating you/her about HER purse being stolen (shouldn't they interrogate the culprit)?

There's a photo on that post that Cody wanted me to take - of the guy asking her all the questions. I was kicked out because I was clearly taking photos official police business. No one really knows why they spend so much time filing police reports with inane questions, but the general consensus is that they just don't want you to file police reports. It makes the stats look bad, maybe. Who knows. It's happened with everyone, even a coworker who saw someone fiddling with his bike locks. One hour minimum in the police station. They tell you it will be quick, maybe 10 minutes, beforehand... which goes against the "they don't want you to file" idea. Who knows... really.

any definitive conclusion on the fetus eating issue?

Hera and my Chinese-American coworker maintain that it's real. My friends admitted they were playing a joke on Hera and I but said they have had placenta before. I don't think that last bit is a joke. That said, these guys eat everything. When queried about eating dogs, saying they're pets not food, the response I heard was, "Not these dogs. They're not my pet." People literally buy snake oil in the street. Someone's gotta think that fetus makes you healthier in some way, and there's gotta be some hospital in need of cash meeting the supply needs of the demand of someone with cash.

if everyone wants to be friends with whitey, how can you be sure that the girls (any girl) isn't also kinda/sorta influenced by the white-ness?

I don't completely follow this question, but I think you're asking how can I be sure Chinese girls aren't also victim to the Blanchaphilia? Many are and there's also a deep shallowness to it. I haven't had a Chinese girlfriend so I really can't speak too knowledgeably on this issue, but I think they're the same wavelength as many of the guys: they see us as curious two-dimensional objects with deep wallets.

Where many of the men might see a future business deal (even my good Chinese friends can't resist trying to get me to sell CCTV camera's [their business] to my filthy rich American friends, that's just one of the expectations in friendship here), some girls might see a potentially bright future for herself and her family. Contrary to the prevailing stereotype of Asian women, I think most Chinese girls aren't too interested in American guys outside of chatting, flirting, and maybe a little dancing at a club.

The one sorta-kinda girlfriend I had before Hera in Shenzhen was only interested in white guys. She saw us as much more than Curious 2D Wallets. She saw us as some sort of liberation from prevailing mindsets. For me it just felt like a fetish and spending time with her felt like wearing a crotchless polyester bunny suit. It was a sick and sinister role.

if you're NOT going to answer their phone calls, why give them your number? ;o)

One word: Face. You never, ever do something that might make someone look like an idiot. If I've used my phone around them and they ask for my number, I need to give them my number. If I said that I didn't have a phone when they clearly saw it they'd look like bad. The problem is exacerbated by the Dork Cord© connecting my phone to my belt loop. I leave my phone everywhere and it's good protection against pickpockets. So they see it. So I have to give my number or make them lose face.

Crowd Control

By Shuggiefisher

I don't envy any major policy maker in China. Every national policy decision affects 1/5 of the worlds population. Any egalitarian ideals forces a yuan to split 1.3 billion ways. It's precisely the same conditions that make China the world's factory that keep men and women in poverty even through endless hours, days, weeks, and months of labor. There's just too many damn people. A college degree in boomtowns like Shenzhen will earn about $250 a month. They move thousands of miles for this kind of wage. Anything less can easily place in a factory making 50 cents an hour, fourteen hours a day, six or seven days a week. They also move thousands of miles for this wage.

China's population is set to hit 1.5b by the end of this decade, which has China adding something like 1/3 America's population every year. So what's a policy maker to do? Welcome to one of two One-Child Policy nations on the planet (correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Vietnam is the only other one). Because the Communist Party of China isn't the strong top-down structure most people think it is, government policy is enacted differently in different parts of the country.

In Shenzhen, the policy seems only to act as a tax to the super rich. 1/3 to half the kids at my (boarding) school have brothers and sisters, if that's any indicator. I've read that most farmers get away the practice because they need the financial help that multiple children bring once they're old enough to work. In Tianjin, I have a friend who's father lost his job as a teacher because he had three girls to finally have a son.

Officials in Guanxi (the province of Guilin/Yangshou) took things a bit too far though. The NY Times writes that, "officials in several parts of Guangxi mobilized their largest effort in years to roll back population growth by instituting mandatory health checks for women and forcing pregnant women who did not have approval to give birth to abort fetuses." In addition to this, "[they] slapped fines starting at 500 yuan and ranging as high as 70,000 yuan, or $65 to $9,000, on families that had violated birth control measures anytime since 1980."

"The family-planning officials were just like the Japanese invaders during the war. They took everything away, and destroyed or tore down the houses if people could not pay the fines," said one villager surnamed Wu.

"In some families, even the gate and bowls were taken away, leaving them with an empty house." [Washington Post]

______

"....gangsters used hammers and iron rods to destroy people’s homes, while threatening that the next time it would be with bulldozers,” [NY Times]

The villagers responded by, "clash[ing] with officials and police armed with guns and electric cattle prods, pulling down a wall surrounding the government office, turning over cars and burning part of its main building."

"The government office was a big mess," a villager, who witnessed the scene, said by telephone. "The big gate and two cars near it were all burnt and black, and broken glass, bricks and rubbish were everywhere." [Washington Post]

Teaching

Photo by Lida Rose

As my juniors last year graduate from Greenwood this week, I've been pondering my own growth as a teacher. It's a strange and wonderful career I've chosen and in my two short years I feel like I've done it all. I've worked with little kids, adults, teenagers, college kids... everyone. I've given hour-long lectures, taught 40-minute classes, have one-lesson weeks now, did twenty lesson weeks last year. I've created my own courses from scratch, worked out of a book, and given one-to-one's in principals offices to explain how an American school board works. What have I learned?

Forgive. The most important thing is to never get angry with a class. It's pointless and you'll lose every time. Chances are if they're misbehaving, you've gone over their heads or your simply boring them. Never hold a grudge. Never expect the bad student (or class) from last week to be a problem this week. Allow them to redeem and redefine themselves. Reward instead of punish. Do this not only for your own sanity, but for the example you - as teacher - are supposed to set as a model behavior. Forgiveness isn't about accepting apologies. It's about moving on.

Entertain. That is, after all, why most students and parents think you're there. Let your personality fill the room and be the sole object of attention. You're competing against a lot of things. Flying paper balls, notes, books, and cute crushes have an advantage. Steal and co-opt them.

Think on their level. I once heard someone say, of teaching kids, that if you ever stop thinking like one, even for a moment, you've lost them. It's absolutely true. If your teaching businessmen, be prompt and efficient in your teaching. If you're teaching little kids, sing songs and be a ninja from time to time. Match the pre-existing vibe of the class and everyone wins.

Review. You'll be floored by how much they forgot. Make it as fun as possible though.

Meaning. Make sure they understand and believe that what they're doing means something and in some way will help them in a tangible way. Make them feel privy to some sort of inside information that others aren't getting. It works as well with history as it does with English.

Yangshou

As expected, I come back from vacation and I'm swamped with work. I'm just now getting around to uploading my photos to Flickr [about 1/3 are up as of now]. The basic jist of what we did was take a night bus [fine] to Yangshou for May Holiday, stayed in the town for three nights but prices kept rising because of the massive influx of Chinese tourist, then moved into a village for the last three days. Most of our time was spent relaxing, hiking, and biking around the countryside of the YuLong River valley. I got my groove back with photography :-)


Before I went, I asked a friend who had been whether or not it's "China beautiful or World-class beautiful." My own answer is that nobody who makes a trip out there will be disappointed. It's a stunning and charming land with friendly locals and laid-back visitors.Some memorable points, in no order, as jotted down sitting down in a tea shop before the [worst] night bus [ever] left for Shenzhen:

• Finding our own valley (behind the mountains in the first picture)
  
  
• A strange bird who's ghostly noise was a long, steady single note that rose gradually before breaking into in short birst of chirps. Found higher up in the mountains, I first discovered it...
  
  
• Finding a Taiping Rebellion-era fort built into the side of karst. No maps mentioned it and I only happened to find it while climbing a bit and having...
  
  
• A little girl offering Hera and I unripe pears as she and her friends played on a trail we were hiking up
  
  
• Trying, unsuccessfully, to befriend a peasant's cow.
  
  
• Riding in a (tethered) hot air balloon for ten minutes.
  
  
• "Bamb - oooooo" The other English word, after "hello," that every villager within 100 miles knew. It was lucrative business of sending tourist down the river on bamboo rafts.
  
  
• "Hello, beer?" The business-pitch of a small restaurant owner every time I walked past.
  
  
• Having a local de-mud our bikes the last day. The mud was everywhere and created a significant problem of getting the wheels to, ya know, spin. He cleaned it in a rice patty water-hole with patches of weed and grass he grabbed.
  
  
• Five possible dishes to choose in the village. Five.
  
  
• Noting the almost total absence of people between the ages of 20 to 50 in the villages, mainly skewed towards men. They've all gone to the cities to work in the factories leaving grandparents to do the farming.
  
  
• A foreign kleptomaniac snatching Hera's phone and camera out of her bag
  
  
• Wondering whether caribou have the right-of-way.
  
  
• A cool peasant-dude who wanted to chill and chat by the river with us after I fell into his rice patty
  
  
• Not thinking about work for a week.
  
  
• Meeting a Danish fellow who was towards the end of his
  Denmark-Russia-Kazakhstan-China bicycle journey.