Mark P. Casey, April 20, 1942 – Feb 23, 2010 My Dad died
yesterday at Crawford Long hospital in Atlanta. It was rather sudden,
at least the actual cause of illness, but in general not really, as he
didn’t take very good care of himself and had minor mental health
issues for most of my life. He had advanced pulminary fibrosis, which
was only recently found, with complication of pneumonia. Even if he
had last six more months for a lung transplant, that would have only
bought him a few years.

The situation is especially strange as I am overseas and wont come
back for a funeral. Our plan at the moment is to have him cremated
and take him to the (family) plot in Minnesota in mid-October, hopefully
beating the first freeze. I am glad I spent a lot of time with him
before I left on this trip. The last time I actually spoke/talked
with him was via Skype in December. There were no indications then
that this would be coming so soon. I really feel for my sister who is
having to deal with the details first hand and wish her strength and
support. She got to say good by, but also had to see the horror at
the end. I called this morning and spoke into his ear over the phone
but he was already unconscious an in intensive care.

For whatever faults he may have had, he always encouraged my curiosity
and interest in history…or one of his favorite cliches, taken from
what I assume is a long defunct teen literary magazine called Cricket
- a sense of history, mystery and adventure. I wished he’d gotten to
travel more, specifically, I wish I could have gone on a trip with him
to parts of the UK before he passed. He really would have dug that.

I’ve had a chance to do a bit more traveling. Just here in
Shandong province, but I’ll take it. There are big changes coming for
our school – new name, new books, new problems etc and there was a
banquet in the capital, a meeting of the three schools our owner owns.
They put us up in an adequate hotel, which strangely had nude woman
tiles in each of the shower rooms. We had a few hours until the
dinner, so we went out into the city to explore a bit and get things
we can’t in Liaocheng. Sadly, I must admit I’ve appreciated Walmat
and McDonald, as we don’t have them here. I hate both companies in
theory, but the Chinese seldom use deoderant and I’m running low. I
found one place with Nivea, very expensive roll, on in Liaocheng, but
I wanted more variety and sure enough they did, though not much. As
we headed out, not exactly sure how to tell a cab where to take us, I
was really pleased to recognize one high rise among the many, and was
able to direct us to the store on foot in about 10 minutes. We came
to Jinan once before to see Avatar in English (though not 3D) and
Walmat is in the same multi-story building, as well as a decent toy
sore (as in collectable toys, Qees, robots and other figures). Also,
Chinese Walmat has decent log sleeve shirts with chinesey looking
stuff on them, obviously cheap.
So we made it back to the hotel in time to see part of an utterly
depressing documentary about the Chengdu earthquake (English TV is
also a treat as we don’t pay for channels. I see historical dramas in
the massage parlor, occasional news shows or sports in restaurants).
We were given nifty Qing dynasty jackets to wear, though a bit more
red than I’d like, and we were off to the drinkfest/banquet. As the
evening wore on we met some of other foreign teachers, got the schpeal
on good tattoo shops and other Jinan goodies (*ahem*…did have a
taste later in the evening, but it was bullocks and hardly worth the
general risk). We went out drinking with them at this pub (another
treat. There is a bar or two here in Liaocheng, but they are very
expensive and don’t really have what you want. Also very difficult to
talk to the hot chicks, who are mostly college students and can’t
afford to drink in expensive bars. Not to mention the garbage pop
music. I’ve got dibbs on the assasination of Kenny G btw…) and then
a dance club. Not my scene of course, but it was this one Jinan
western teacher’s last night in town, so we tagged along. Actually
the room itself was pretty cool, steam punk decor they refused to let
me take proper pictures of, and all the female employees in these
matching 60’s airline stewardess outfits. Inside all sorts of lights
and coyote ugly nonsense, plus our hosts bought copious amounts of
watered down drinks. If I’m gonna be in a silly ass disco, it might
as well be a Chinese silly ass disco. The four Liaocheng foreign
teachers, Dean, Darren, Kissi and myself eventually wandered on to a
cab and were almost home when we made the driver drop us at the 24
hour McD’s. We were all blasted and it is munchie food, though they
use cucumbers instead of pickles and some spicy dust. There Kissi got
into a fight with some guy and we wandered on, easily could have
walked the rest of the way, but Dean got us into another cab that took
us way in the wrong direction, wasting much time and money.

We awoke the next morning to the kind of
gasoline-destroying-the-peeled-skull style hangover only baiju can
produce and caught the bus back to Liaocheng. I napped, drank much
water and went for a massage. I’d call it about a 6 hour recovery,
which is impressive if you could understand the previous level of
pain. Note to self: do not mix countless beers, whiskey, vodka and
baiju. Unless ready to PAY.

The winter course has begun which means lots of work for a few weeks,
six days per. But it actually wasn’t as bad as I thought it might
have been. We’ll see about the summer when we must do two months of
this regiment. To be fair I must say, other wise the load has been
rather light. I’m not on the shift that has to go to the rural school
for a few months, and my adult class all got so busy in their personal
lives it’s on hiatus for a while. So January I only worked three days
a week, can’t bitch. But now with the new books and routine, plus
having to judge a few rounds of the national English competition – I’m
nervous.
But now it was holiday time, and Dean and I headed for the coast at
Tsingtao (“Ching Dow”). It’s stressful because even though everyone
knows the date of the lunar new year (Year of the Tiger of course) the
govt. doesn’t announce the actual dates of the long holiday until a
week before. EVERYONE goes back to their hometown for New Year (also
called Spring Festival), ensuring the bus, train and air routes will
all be clusterfucked. The only thing smaller than Chinese foreskin is
Chinese forethought (*double snare-kick-cymbal crash*). But we got
seats on an overnight sleeper, caught it at a frozen 3:30 AM and awoke
more or less rested in Tsingtao.
There were a bunch of German settlers there about a century ago,
starters of the famous brewery, and they left some architectural
influence. It’s also very dense and hilly, so it felt sort of like
San Franciso to me (though not THAT hilly) or a bit of Europe in
China, but the red tile roofs had me feeling Italy more than
Deutschland. There was a snow a few days before, and they got more
than Liaocheng, so there was still plenty of snow in the corners and
ice on the hills. The hostel where we stayed was in a converted
observatory and really cool, though the tiny restaurant in the
telescope part was freezing cold. We split a private room with it’s
own bath, very reasonable, but there were also dorm style rooms in the
three story building.
Almost immediately we met Lou, who was up on the hill taking pictures
but not staying at the hostel. She was born in Tsingtao but has lived
most of her life in LA and NYC. I know I’m into Chinese girls, but
seeing her general Western style, nose ring and saying fuck every
sixth word, had me realizing it’s more about Chinese-American girls.
She didn’t have long before having to go to a huge family lunch, but
we went on this goosechase trying to find a market area by bus, none
of us really knowing the right way. Eventually, we got into a cab and
headed back to the right area, but Dean and I hopped out to check some
stores we saw on the way and paid the cabbie to take her on. She gave
me her number, but it turned out to be a digit short when I tried to
call later…

There was a big free dinner party that night at the hostel, and the
baiju flowed liberally. Other guests who had seemed standoffish
before now got lubed and loquacious. There were several Irish
teachers from Korea who’d come over the the holiday. And at dusk the
fireworks started…well I guess I mean the colorful ones, as noisey
bangs had become a constant in the previous days. From our vantage we
could see half the city, what wasn’t blocked on the other side of the
hill and explosions were everywhere. The beer ran out and more
arrived and the colorful explosions continued. When I’d left Dean
inside, he was pounding drinks hard with some Korean guys. It was
eventually reported to me that after falling over, they’d taken him
off somewhere. Which I presumed meant to some room to sleep, as I had
the only key and knew he wasn’t in ours. ‘Fucking rookie’, I thought
‘passed out by 9 and missing all of this’. Hands down the greatest
firework evening of my life. We had some of our own of course an lit
them in the snow, but not the heavy artillery colorful stuff. It went
on until midnight, then an hour of “finale”. Madness! We made
dumplings and ate for late night munchies and everyone pretty much
wandered off. I was still up with the owner and a woman from Texas
when a phone call came. Someone from the hostel had been arrested
breaking a glass door across town, and police were bringing them over
now. We laughed about the pathetitudue of it all, and pondered the
condition he’d be in after police Chinese cutody. The owner described
“the panda” which amounts to two black eyes.
“I’ll bet it’s one of those Canadians who left before dinner. That
big one looked mean”, I said.
“Yes, your right”, AJ agreed.
“No”, the counter girl said.”Room 306″
My blood went cold, as that was our room.
“No it can’t be. I’m in 306 and Dean is…passed out….somewhere…(I hope)”
“I think it is him, the boy from England…”
Oh sweet mother of fuck!
I went up to get his passport to give the cops, which I essentially
had to, and asked AJ to try and get me a minute alone to talk with
Dean to explain selling him out at this point, even though it was a
situation of his own making. But still, even though there were no
options, giving someone elses passport to Communist Cops doesn’t feel
good. I sweated and waited. This had to be some bad joke.
Car rolled up about 20 minutes later and I was expecting a bloody
panda to emerge from the backseat. But Dean actually seemed rather
jovial, with remarkable Chinese for his condition, an actually joking
around with the cops. They let me take him aside and I gave him the
passport to give them.
“What the fuck, Dean…”
” I know mate, I fucked up. Big time.”
“What happened?”
“Don’t really know. I’ve been blacked out most of the evening. But
apparently I’ve broken something…”
“A glass door the owner wants 10,000 RMB for (over $1,500), and you
fucked with a bank’s door. The cops picked you up sleeping in front
of an ATM…”
“Shit*”
“Why DEAN?”
“Can’t say. I remember nothing.”

He was released as they had his passport and he’d be an idiot to leave
town without it. The plan was to go to the station the next day with
AJ and try to negotiate the price down. Up in the room, I plugged him
for more information, but he had nothing I described the last time
I’d seem him hours before and he didn’t remember any of it, the Korean
guys, nothing. I’ve seen Dean drink plenty, and Jinan just the week
before had been a “blowout” but I had no inclining a beast such as
this dwelt within him.
“How are you gonna pay? Ask your folks for the money?”
“My parents don’t have any money. I’m gonna have to ask the school in
Liaocheng.”
He’d only remembered at some point thinking there was a zombie
apocalypse and begging the cops not to “go out there”.
I laughed bitterly and was soon asleep. I awoke to the sound of Dean
puking his guts out, the phone rang and it was time for him to go to
the Police station. Certainly that day’s hangover beat the Jinan one
for him. After a few hours the school called and I talked to Carol,
who was in a full panic. The cops had found her number in his wallet
and called the night before.
“What has happened? Why did you leave him? (because I am older, there
is a cultural assumption I should have been watching out for “younger
brother”) What was the phone number of the restaurant owner?”
And of course I had no info for her, but resented her presumptions, as
indeed HE’D left, I never went anywhere, and after months of cleaning
up after his 23 year old ass. Not to mention he fucked the chick I
was after for three months, and I’d wanted to come on this vacation on
my own anyway, and he’d tagged along like a fucking puppy. I’d didn’t
want to hear any shit about “responsible for Dean”. He’d made his bed
and he’d lie in it. I told Carol he planned to ask the school for the
money, and she laughed bitterly.

So I went on with my day, what else could be done? I went and toured
the Tsingtao brewery with the Irish which was mediocre. They only
give two small beers and the giftshop, the main reason I went, didn’t
have much. It was more of a museum tour, we saw no live brewing. I
wandered home, exploring the city. Got a cool robot, mech-warrior
model in a shop that seemed mostly a flower store but had a few toys.
I ran into some gay guys from Chicago who were staying at the hostel
and wandered with them a while trying to find this historic German
house, but was soon hungry and tried, in need of a shower, and headed
back to the hostel on my own after they pointed the way.
Eventually, Dean showed back up after spending most of the day with
the cops. Carol called again while he was in the shower and seemed
more calm but still claimed it was the “worst New Year” ever, and
asked me again not to drink any more.
“Fuck that! I didn’t break anything. I had a lovely evening, not
even a hangover as I just stuck to beer.” But I tried to calm her as
well. AJ had talked the price down to 5,000 and the school had indeed
wired him the money, about a months salary, which he now owed them,
but he had his passport back and supposedly there were no charges
being pressed. Apparently the guy who owned the restaurant was a
mobster, but as I never even saw him, this is the vaguest speculation.
AJ’s previous hostel had been “closed by gangsters” and I think he
sort of had gangster paranoia. But who knows… Bottom line, Dean
the black out drunk got lucky as fuck after getting really stupid. At
one point, the cops showed him the video from the bank of his butting
up against the doors, out of his mind wasted.
“If only it had just been the restaurant, the cops wouldn’t have had
any evidence”, he said.
“Zip it Dean”, I told him. “You have to own this! Now lets try to
get on with the vacation.”

We’d gotten tons of great DVD’s at a shop the day before, that night
found Book City which had lots of English titles (which means two
shelves worth, in China) finally got my own copy of the four volume
Outlaws of the Marsh so I don’t have to worry with borrowing volumes
elsewhere to get through the 1200 pages. We had dinner with a
Canadian living in Shanghi named Matt at a Korean Bar-b-que place.
Tsingtao has the Old City which is the hilly part, and the New City
which is more modern, full of jazz bars and conveniences, but much
less charming.
The next day was more wandering, exploring, had some sushi, back to
the new city for a two huge department stores, one French owned an one
Japanese. Dean was psyched to find Stella Artois. He had three
despite his new swearing off alcohol (but to be fair, he hasn’t had a
drop since) and I some Tsingtao dark, which is tasty and stronger than
the regular. And they even had Cheese, not processed bullshit but
real slice-able cheese. But it was stupid expensive, in small
packages that never would have made the trip home after a few drinks,
so we just stood there a while and looked at cheese – which was free.
I also saw one of my favorite wines Negro Gato, which is $7 for a
magnum in the States, but here slightly less than a bottle of Jameson.
I was so befuddled I almost grabbed a salesgirl to freakout on, but
what would have been the point?
That night met some more travelers, including a swell Hungarian chick
who lived in NYC for a while. Next morning we went to the train
station at dawn, glad we’d already gotten tickets home as soon as we
got to town, but not yet realizing it was for the local train that
would stop in most every station. So it was a freezing cold day, took
about 10 hours to get home, but at least we had seats the entire way,
which some didn’t.

So you’ve heard about Google pulling out of China for hacker attacks
against pro-democracy dissidents, possibly linked to the Chinese govt.
itself. While this makes me fear for loss of my gmail accounts and
gmaps either through the pullout itself or over reaction from The
Great Firewall, this week I began to experience other less expected
results.

Flickr is so huge, it is fed by “farms”, which I believe refer to
server farms. At first I thought it just might be me, but looking
around in the forums there I have confirmed that farms 3 and 5 are
blocked in Northern China at the moment; and this when I was just
given two more years membership as an Xmas gift. As a result, I can
not see most of my images, the more current ones, nor my contacts. I
can read image titles about others recent vacations etc, but only get
to see a red dot in the rectangular silhouette. Also IMBD is off
limits (really? you fuckers…) and Wikipedia comes and goes. And
obviously pornhub which was miraculously activated a few weeks back
doesn’t crank out the money shots any longer. Thus has begun my
search through various forums, which will remain nameless, for ways
around this bullshit.

Maybe I’ll spend my Spring Festival vacation in a Falun Gong training
camp in Taiwan or Tibet…

Went to Qufu (choo fu), Confucius’ hometown, which was nice to get out of Liaocheng for a day, but unlike the Forbidden city and various sites in Beijing, they allow vendors on site.  As there aren’t many tourists in winter, they are hungry, and ALL OVER YOU…  sort of a drag. And we had a big snow a few weeks back.  Did I mention our apt. has no heat?  The rooms do have electric units, but the main room has no gas heat, as they are repairing it for the entire building.  But what’s the point of bitching about this here?  Or the new roommate from the UK whose only 23 and used to his mommy cleaning up after him all the time?

Here are some articles I’ve compiled on Chinese weather manipulation (some sci fi shit…here’s another from Wired), censorship (I’ve heard from a woman who works with my Dad at the Fulton library, “party” members even harass anti-party press in the Chinese community in ATL),a robot Olympics,gang trials, and stupid laws no one is about to obey.  Happy clicking.

Living in China, I’ve had some encounters with other American’s over here to “teach English” who are in fact protestant Christians who feel they must convert, “save”, these lowly Chinese savages and inject bible-speak into every conversation they can. This despite the fact that Confucious, who is 500 years older than the “Christ child”, has had a more lasting effect upon the morality of China than the impact Holy J seems to have had upon the west. The wars, rape and murder keep on and on, but some just won’t shut about him. Unfortunately, many of these boring-ass myths are new to the Chinese students and they indulge the coersation, not to mention they’ll do most “anything to practice English”. I was hoping to vent some of this angst enjoying a film with this name, but the story has almost nothing to do with the title. A better title would have been Gynocide, which is seen written on a notebook at one point during the film. Note the feminist symbol for the T in the poster…

The prologue of this film is straight beautiful, even if a bit heavy handed. There are glimpses of the blunt carnality to come. But the film is more of a psychological thriller/ghost story than apocryphal. Charolette Gainsbourg steels the show from Defoe, but they both have rather solid performances. I wouldn’t have minded seeing her go off even more when it gets to that bit. I didn’t think the violence was as hardcore as some, or as realistic. A man would not carry on so after receiving such wounds. It’s got the fucking and genital mutilation you may have heard about, but not to such great effect. I’m not sure about Von Trier’s overall message in this film – is sort of wreaks of misogynistic paranoia. And you know it’s bad if I’m saying such a thing…. But it’s creepy like you want a scary movie to be creepy. I also give props for making a “small”, non-blockbuster film, and tasteful use of CG for a pleasant change.

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So right now this is just Bob Pollard style fake band and fake album/fake song titles, but the new roommate Dean is on the way from the UK and is a bass player. So maybe I’ll get a classical acoustic as are so cheap in a nearby shop, a better mike for the software and we’ll actually record some of these songs…

Band: Qilin(chi lien)

Album: Liaocheng Shien Tsi

side A- Buddha was a hippie, Lao Tzu was punk rock
I beat a little Emperor, then another one
Somehow the un-lubed Happy Ending works
Sha-fucking-ma?
Wua shiang my negga (I would like to buy this)
Down to 400 RMB for the week
cheap but cheap

Side B- What the hell are you saying?
Ditch oil
Juicy Mao
pay me if you want to stare
Golden Pig Blues
Tai Chi on a frozen morning
Ain’t goin’ back to Bo Ai
Hey Shiao Jia, dig this…

So things are going on: Halloween parties, frustrations with uber-chaste Chinese cuties, roommates moving out and new ones on the way from England, but none of that is the focus here. Today I had my first Tai Chi lesson in the park. I needed an “introduction” which took time to arrange, but now apparently I am welcome to come by any morning whenever I can between 8-11. Tai Chi is one of the main things I’ve wanted to check out while over here, and would have liked to start before now, with cold on the way, but it is what it is. The main instructor of course has no English, but we’ve established sort of non-verbally that I am not a Westerner completely clueless about the ways of the Inner Life, and he isn’t go to kick the shit out of me with some of the moves/exercises that look more like Kung Fu. Tai Chi is of course one of the soft martial arts, and can help in fighting/defense. I was a bit dismayed when he put me in front of one of the female students and urged me to “attack her”. It was more of a balance exercise. But then he made boxer fists and urged me to go harder at her, which I wasn’t gonna do. I was ready for the various movements – of which there are either 108 or 85. But first there was a lot of breathing and centering to get used to. At first I felt he was giving too much attention to the foreigner, but other students would come and go at various points and he would pass me off to others for instruction as he went elsewhere. I thought it strange too how most of the men stopped for a cigarette every 5 minutes, but after all this is China. They can shut down smoking in English Pubs and NYC, even France, but it’ll never happen here.

Anyway, there was no doubting this teacher – he read me like a book. He could tell when I was doing something with my arm or with my Chi. He had a little “time out” T motion he would use to stop me whenever my motion was originating from the wrong place, and I’d start again. He would also stop me at just the right point, which I’m slowly learning to recognize. Then he would make me close my eyes, and take like a psychic snapshot to try and recognize the position. I don’t mean to be overly flaky in describing this, but that’s what it felt like. He’d say things in Chinese, which of course I couldn’t get, but I can say “I understand” and “I don’t understand”, and he can say “OK”, and make the thumbs up sign along with smiles, frowns and occasional blatant hand slapping or shaking out my arms when I was getting too tense. I felt like we had communication going and I was at least getting some things right, based on the look that eventually came over his face. It’s like meditation: you can tell when you’re hitting alpha wave state, but can’t really describe it or explain exactly how you get there. You just zone in on this other place, over time it’s a muscle to be exercised like any other.

Then I followed his head student through what were supposedly the first six moves, but felt more like 20. It’s hard to understand where one begins and the next ends, and of course they couldn’t completely tell me. But then I’d be surprised by another student being able to say just a few words in English to clarify. If I keep going often enough, things will become clearer and clearer – through muscle memory if nothing else. Plus there is all sorts of action in the park: people of all ages stretching, doing this rhythmic pingpong ball toss and catch, various weapons training, and other exercises; not to mention all of the tables of gaming – majong, Chinese chess, card games; and people playing classical music. Commies really know how to utilize a public space…

In other news, one month without TV (I’ll get a DVD player later, we don’t pay for channels and what would be the point?) but plenty of beer drinking with the music and net. Also digging more into Old Time radio (a strange nostalgia for my culture, or as it was 50-70 years ago), I recently found a PK Dick story on X-1 from May 22,1956 (#50 The Defenders). Not the greatest or anything, but still the first time I’ve heard Dick done for radio. Thankfully Phil didn’t have to live to see some of the less prestigious adaptations, not to mention blatant rip offs, of his work.

So there where some holidays right after I arrived, followed by a busy week of all the students making up the English School classes they had missed (how exactly is this a holiday?), when they weren’t in their normal school, which also had to make up it’s missed days. So I am just now experiencing my first standard work week. Students here have it rough: I see high school age kids riding bikes home at 10PM, to get in and do hours of homework, then up early as can be and start it all over again the next day. There is a lot of pressure to get into a good University, among which there is a three tiered system, in order to get a good job. Thousands of applicants for each job in China. Sure, many will end up labors or relative factory grunts, but while you’re young and have a shot at an “easier” life, there is much pressure to get a leg up, for the sake of your entire future. Anyone who has $ to go to our school comes from a rich family (more on this later…), and English School is on top of everything else. I heard on a recent NPR report, the average annual Chinese income is $3,000 per year…which by American standards is unbelievable. Even the poorest American will make 3K in 3-4 months, and that’s minimum wage and struggling. But I doubt this Chinese NPR data. Here’s another report along with a move to create an “Asian standard”. 687Yuan is about $101, per month, and you get paid once a month. (The NPR report was saying “average”, so weigh some Shanghi high-roller business man types making a western income, against many rural poor making fuckall…)

Anyway, my load is about 21 hours per week, for starting pay of 5K RMB (same as Yuan) per month. It’s about $734, not impressive for the west. But when I consider I can save 1000yuan per month and still live on 1000 per week, I’m essentially living like a king by Chinese standards, and my first raise is in 3 months. And also, this IS the “light” season. I will have one hell month in Winter (Jan or Feb), and one hell month in Summer (June or July) which means working closer to 40 hours per week. When I say 21 hours, that’s classroom teaching time, also have to make lesson plans, some teacher meetings, other school functions and dinners I must attend. Also there is a rotation that goes out to another rural school two days a week to what we call Bo Ai. I’m not on Bo Ai shift this month and am already trying to figure out how to get out of next month. It’s only an hour, flash cards with little kids, but an hour each way, so that’s another 6 hours per week not your own, every other month. I guess Bo Ai just stops during our “hell months”. So in a typical week, I am off Mon and Wed; one class in the evening Tues and Thurs (not counting Bo Ai), Fri; a full day of 4 two hour classes on Sat, and 3 two hour classes Sun. Ages range from 5-14, and actually my Tuesday nite class is adults level 1, beginners (more to come here…). Classes have at least 8 students, my biggest has 18 which is considered “too large”. A new teacher from the UK is on the way, and will make some of our large classes smaller. The worst are the 8-11 year olds, esp. the boys. Like maniacs are they! It’s shocking how they will run amok before class and during the 15 minute break that separates the two hours. Parents often just idly stand by and watch art being torn from the walls, screaming and chasing etc. It’s a combination of “one child – little emperor” (which is not as strict a “law” as westerners are lead to believe) spoiling and the fact these kids are pent up in class most of their week. Yeah they get recess, but they have almost no unstructured time. “Little boys are naughty” – is just understood, and little is done to curtail their behavior. The Chinese assistants get the worst of it, as occassionaly one will bo up and say all sorts of abusive things. It’s in Chinese, but you can tell it’s ugly. The discipline style is to verbally shame the kids into submission, which usually works, but not always. We can assign homework as punishment (picture Bart Simpson at the chalkboard) but this also only goes so far. Of course, it’s even more hilarious for them to see a foreign teacher lose his shit (remember when you had a “sub” at that age? Now imagine how much funnier it would have been to abuse them had they a heavy Chinese accent…) so this must not happen. The shear noise and commotion… It isn’t helped when you’re trying to prep your materials for the young ones and some jackass parent comes into the room and starts SCREAMING into a cell phone – that’s just the style here. The school’s main concern is that the money keeps coming in, so they don’t want to push things beyond a certain point. But anyone who knows me, knows this isn’t MY style, and I will only be pushed so far. I’ve already instituted business cards with our names for each of us to hand out (after all, we are walking advertisements all around town…) and if we can prove enrolling a certain number of kids/new clients, I will vote we be allowed to kick out some of the worse ones, who after all only slow up everything for those who can learn. And it’s only a matter of time ’til one of these naughty boys will discover “the emperor really does wear no clothes” i.e. we don’t have much ultimate power, and we have some sort of Lord of the Flies situation on our hands. I already saw one nasty fight between two boys, and the first thing the parents wanted to know was what the teacher had done to cause this. The teacher of course was already on his way out the door (not me), finished with the end of his final class on a long day, and could care less if two little demon emperors wanted to tear each others throat’s out. At least they don’t have guns… Another factor is: keep in mind how medicated American kids are – ridalin, prosac, who knows what the fuck, and there is none of that here, at least as far as I can tell.

So my adults are also all rich. One owns a coffeeshop/hotel/spa, which is just a hobby and not his real income. I was having a Chinese lesson with a friend in his shop and he invited us to dinner, which ended up being in a posh dining room. I was a bit dumbfounded and nervous, until our first class when I quickly realized he was the worst student. So it seemed he was trying to bribe me… But I’m more than willing to hang out in his expensive coffeeshop (which is more like a bar) and he can ply me with 15 year old scotch (even more exotic here) and such while we practice his elementary conversation starters and ABC’s. There was also a BDay party for one of our teachers (and my roommate) and most of the school in SPR coffee, which he owns (franchise). At one point, well buzzed and after singing all the verses I could remember of “Hotel California” to a conga and hollow body guitar, I wandered over to Rick’s “men’s table” so he could show me off to his buddies and they could drunkenly bellow their limited English into my ear. I am learning to drink warm beer, because the style is to slam small cups of it…”now this toast do 2, now this time 3!”…and you just can’t get cold beer down as easily. So I sip my one cold large one, and slam small warm ones, it all ads up quickly. Anyway, I didn’t want to be rude to my school friends…mostly female…and wandered back to the main table. All of the Chinese drunken men acted like 10 year olds trying to win the cool kid back “Here Teacher, have more whiskey…here Teacher we’ll give you this!…you want cigarette?…you want this? Come back to the men!”. Woke up the next morning, not hungover, but with a cold from overdoin’ it and biking home in the fog, but a friend took me to the pharmacy. They gave me a shitload of pills for like $2 and I was 99% again within a day.

Anyway, there’s an impression of the job. Meeting other foreigners, some other little dramas and joys, and still generally getting along fine. For now…