Accidental Hiatus

Hi guys, I'm back from my accidental hiatus. I've been a little dry on things to write about, which is why I haven't in a while. I know most of my readership comes from college students (and my mom), so I don't feel that bad - I know crunch time is upon you. Anyway, I will (for once) update a little about interesting things that I have seen or done lately.

1. I saw John Legend live. I took some pictures, but of course they aren't that great, so if you are curious as to what he looks like, you can Google image search John Legend. In fact, here is the link: hot right? He also sings really well. If you want to hear his music, go onto YouTube and search John Legend. I can't provide that link though, since unfortunately the wonder that is YouTube is blocked by the censors of China. The concert was pretty great, but the best part was probably when a bunch of girls behind me yelled, "WE LOVE YOU JOHN!", and I, not wanted to be bested, yelled louder, "I LOVE YOU MORE JOHN!" and proceeded to pretend to jump off the balcony to run to the stage. I didn't actually do it of course, but you know, all good fun.

2. I went to 杭州 (HangZhou), which is apparently one of China's most beautiful cities. I would have to agree - it really is beautiful, cleaner than any place in China I've been, and has a pretty legit (man-made) lake, 西湖. While I was there, I biked all the way around, and also saw the Zhang Yimo production 印象西湖. I didn't think it was very good, but you guys can give it a shot if you go.

3. I saw Waiting for Godot, a play by Samuel Beckett. I've read it like six times and I think I've seen it once or twice (or maybe not, my memories play tricks on me). I didn't like the production too much, but it might be because a. it got a little warm in there, b. the actor's didn't mesh that well, c. I think the themes are kind of depressing, d. some of the parts are kind of pretentious, or e. the set is so sparce it makes me think I wasted hella money on the ticket. Maybe I'm a Philistine, but I just don't seem to jive with this play.

Anyway, those are three semi-interesting things I have done recently. Not that interesting, but I'll try to update with more interesting thoughts soon. Please comment and let me know how you are doing!

黑人牙膏

So first, I wanted to say how honored I am that Jen Chiu reads my blog. So very honored.

Anyway, it's been eleven days since I've updated my blog, but I had several things I wanted to mention. First, church here is so interesting! Without being particularly negative, I was very astonished at something I saw on Palm Sunday here. I was sitting with a couple friends maybe in the fifth or so pew. Two pews ahead, and almost directly in front of me, there was what seemed to be an Asian married couple who were seriously just making out during worship. Just like all over each others' faces. Honestly? It's just so weird to see two people straight up mouth on mouth action in a pew at church with a possible 600 people glancing at you. Oh, and the guy had a man-purse. I feel like that makes the scene just that much more ridiculous. I can see holding hands, or even hugging, but making out? Too much. I couldn't stop myself from bursting out into uproarious laughter. I think my friends were more ashamed by my laughing than by the couple. The cherry on top is that right after worship ended, the couple grabbed all their stuff and either left or got seats in the back. I like to pretend the first because it makes the story that much better. As a sidenote, I think it's interesting that the worship director plays the keyboards/drum machine every week. That's right. He plays the drum machine.

Tangentially, I think one of my favorite introduce yourself+random question random questions is what toothpaste you prefer to use. Prefer, because sometimes you just can't get it. For some reason, I've always been a Colgate Total person. The idea of 12 hours of protection, even if it's just a marketing gimmick, is somehow really reassuring for me. Also, I think it tastes pretty good. Anyway, I've been to a couple more people's places around here, and in using their bathrooms, have noticed a semi-disturbing trend. Apparently, Darlie Toothpaste is very popular here. In Chinese, Darlie Toothpaste is called 黑人牙膏, which for my non-Chinese reading audience means Black People Toothpaste. I guess I'm more racially sensitive than the average Chinese guy, but that just seems ridiculous. But also ridiculously amusing. The Wikipedia link above is quite enlightening though. Here is a picture of what it looks like:

I just think that's really funny and also very ridiculous.

Warriors Interlude

Okay, I've been good at not writing about the Warriors, but last night I had a revelation. If we traded Monta (bear with me), Wright, and Bellinelli for Chris Bosh this off-season, think about the possibilities. Assuming Crawford doesn't bail (which surprisingly, if this goes through, I hope he doesn't), imagine your starting line. Some point guard (to be addressed later), Crawford, Stack, Bosh, Beans. I mean, that's pretty beastly considering that Crawford and Stack are legit wings who can semi-play point. Okay, next assume you draft a decent point this summer. And, from what I understand, there are a fair amount of possible NBA rotation quality points in the draft. With those other four in the starting lineup, you wouldn't even need a superstar point, just someone who had decent handles and could pass.

Then consider the bench. With Bellinelli and Monta gone, you lose a lot of congestion at the wings, so you have, on the bench, Morrow (shooting fantastically), Buike at the wings, Randolph being Randolph, Ronny running the frontcourt, and Maggette scoring and jacking up fouls. Oh, and CJ Watson running the backup point. I mean it's not the best depth, but you would definitely say it's deep. Okay, now imagine we trade some combination of draft pick/Ronny (God forbid)/Buike (since no one would take Maggette, or would they?) for a second tier starting pg - Raymond Felton/Ramon Sessions for our starting lineup. Final team is something around the lines of 2nd tier pg, Craw, Stack, Bosh, Biens for starting 5, then cj watson/draft pick, morrow, maggette, randolph, ronny, and some random combo of rob kurz/jermareo davidson. That's a good team. I mean, we could definitely make that work. Seriously!

Okay, and on a non-basketball sidenote, this morning I ate some button mushrooms in an omlette in this western-style cafe/deli. Woo mushrooms!

Elevator Efficiency

So in an attempt to write more interestingly on my blog, I've made a little note on the side of my desktop about things to write about.

So mushrooms. If you guys know me or have eaten with me a couple times, you know I really like eating mushrooms. For some reason, though, the normal mushrooms I eat in the US I've never actually had in China. Apparently they are called button mushrooms Here is a picture:

In China, and I'm definitely not complaining about this, all the mushrooms I eat are 香菇. I wonder what that is in English. According to Google Translator (which is the third result if you google translator, oddly enough), its translated as Dried Mushroom. I'm sure they are fresh sometimes though. Anyway, I eat a lot of them and they look like this:

Also, I eat a ton of eggs. I think the only thing for sure I'm coming back from China with (besides my person and a suitcase or two) is high cholesterol. Honestly I love eggs so much. I eat a Chinese egg crepe (the eggs aren't particularly Chinese, but I think the style of crepe is) like every night. Eggs are (wonderfully) an all day food here. I really like using parentheses.

Okay, the cover/title story: elevator efficiency. My dormitory has five elevators. Two on each side of the main corridor and one in the back which I think technically is a service elevator, but is actually no different than the other four except perhaps in smell. Each of the pairs of elevators is controlled independently from the other, ie. if you push the up button on one side, it doesn't register for the other, or for the service elevator in the back. The back service elevator and one of the pairs shuts down at midnight. Oh, and for some odd reason, sometimes if you press down at any given floor, both of the elevators on that side might open their doors for you, and not simultaneously.

Okay, that is all just to say that the program that these elevators are run on seem totally and unecessarily inefficient, and it drives me nuts. I have a hobby of betting on a side to see which side will come first, but most people in their haste push down or up on both sides, step in the first elevator to arrive, and let the other side stop there unnecessarily. I know it isn't a big deal, but it bugs me. I feel like someone should come here, link all the elevators up to one program, make it effecient, and then...well finish. Ahh! Okay that was it, I just wanted to share that with the world.

Point

I have had very little inspire me to write recently, and I feel bad about it, so I will try to make my life interesting as to write more here. So look forward to more soon!

As a quick aside (so there's at least something interesting), apparently I/something burned a hole in my lamp. Like part of the base melted. The lamp was always crazy and flickery and really hot, and for some reason smelled like seaweed, so I wasn't really surprised it started melting today. As my roommate Greg put it, "20块 Chinese construction". I really hope that's the right word.

Oh that's interesting! I finally, after 20 years of being Chinese, learned how to type Chinese on my computer. How exciting!

Matchmaking

Happy Spring Break for you guys who are lucky enough to have it now. Enjoy it! If you are at home, watch a Warriors game for me. Serious - Anthony Randolph playing time (or is he injured now?)!

Quick aside - I had my first apple-tini (what's the correct way to spell that?) the other night. And, amazingly enough, someone else said, "I have to get one, I just love Scrubs too much" before I had a chance too. Naturally, I responded, "Does that come in hetero?" It was quite a moment.

Anyway, today I went to the Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art (I think). It was pretty cool! The place was a little small, at least compared to art museums I have previously been to, but it was very interesting. There was a lot of multimedia stuff going on. I think I have that kind of grouped with contemporary dance in my head - I just don't get a lot of it. There was one really cool exhibit that was like a room with white walls, but they had projected like walls of an actual building on to the walls using projectors, so there were like projected windows and doors and stuff, and some guy I guess just filmed a day from those viewpoints so it was like being indoors, but not. Does that make sense? There were also like some exhibits involving lots of newspaper made into mannequins and a crazy post-apocalyptic view of PuDong and some other crazy stuff. Definitely interesting, but it was hard for me to see the artistic value in a lot of the stuff. I guess I'm just not that artsy of a person. While there, though, I decided to rank the most to least confusing forms of artwork in my mind (in general of course, some stuff doesn't make any sense to me at all even in a great meduim):
1. Dance. Hella don't get contemporary dance.
2. Multimedia. An excuse not to work hard enough on any one medium (kind of joking, but I don't see how something gets significantly meaning-ier by adding bland music in the back and using a projector).
3. Theater. A lot of it makes sense, but some new stuff is just over my head.
4. Visual Art. Even if I don't get it, the colors are usually pretty.
5. Literature. It's mostly cool, but some of that stream of consciousness stuff is kind of weird.
6. Music. Sometimes whiny, but there's just so much good music. Like Soul.
I hope I didn't miss any huge artform. While at the museum, though, I was reminded that I really like observing things. While my friends were fairly contented with a cursory glance at most the "pieces" (can you really call a room with curtains and a smoky fountain a piece of art?), I felt rushed even spending ten minutes looking at some splashes of paint. Which I think is nuts. I also like what I call the "looking at art" pose. It might look something like ... Well I just spent twenty minutes Googling/Yahoo Image Searching "looking at art", "appreciating art", and "viewing art" and either no one looks at art like I do, or no one who does takes pictures of themselves doing it, or at least they don't including the words looking, appreciating, viewing, and art in the title. Anyway, I look at art standing up wiht one arm cross and a hand on my chin. I'm pretty sure I only stand like that when looking at art. It's a fun pose. In conclusion, the art museum was pretty cool and kind of weird. Oh, but it was interesting that almost all the artists were Chinese, but most the visual/multimedia stuff that included text only had English, not Chinese.

The real cool part of today, though, was walking through People's Square on the way to the museum. Our teacher had told us about this thing that happens there on Saturday afternoons, but I totally forgot about it. Apparently tons of people go there on the weekends to try to matchmake for their kids. Seroiusly hundreds of older people carrying around hand-written classified ads for their kids, including information on height, age, weight, birthdate, and a ton of other crazy stuff. Some of them were pinned up on clotheslines, some were clipped to little bags, I assume used to get information from interested people, and some were just held up by sitting people. It was fascinating. If I'm unmarried by 28 or so, and my Chinese improves enough, I hope my parents would come to Shanghai to market me in People's Square. I was even thinking about asking my dad to do it when he gets here in May. I figure, 1.72 m, born in 1988, successful parents, good education, I might be a little young but that seems attractive enough on paper right? I should have taken pictures. Yeah...it was nuts.

There was something else interesting on the internet I wanted to share, but I can't remember what it is anymore. I guess it will give me fodder for next time.

Babies

I have been trying really hard to think about things I want to write about on my blog. One idea was toilet paper, since it's come up before. It's a lot cheaper apparently if you get toilet paper without the cardboard tube in the middle, and we don't have like a rack/dispenser for it anyway in our bathroom, so I think I'm going to pick up some sweet tubeless toilet paper soon. Maybe I'll take a picture and put it here. That would be kind of interesting and also desperate.

Aceyalone's Magnificent City CD is really good. I haven't listened to this in hella days. I remember LiveJournal used to have the currently listening to and currently feeling little blurbs for each entry. That was hella days ago.

Anyway, I had a really cute experience today. I got to class a little late, but during my lunch break I was outside laying on a little patch of grass outside the classroom because the weather has just been super gorgeous in the last couple days. After maybe fifteen minutes just lying down enjoying the sun and the light cool breeze, I heard the yells of little kids. There were three of them running toward me with a jumprope. I sat up to observe, and it was just so adorable - they were maybe between 2 and 4 years old, and the older boy and younger girl were taking turns holding and jumping of the rope. It was just so cute! The boy had to go, though, so I helped out the little girl by holding the other end of the rope so she could jump over. After a while of this, she ran around to her grandmother (I think) and gave her the biggest hug over her shoulders. It was seriously a moment where I was convinced of the work of God. The little girl just clearly loved her grandmother (I think) with such an innocent, pure love. And she was really cute. I ended up having a short conversation with the grandmother (I think) about job opportunities in China versus those in America and all that business with the world financial crisis. In Chinese!

The grandmother (I think) told the girl to thank the xiao shushu (sorry I still haven't figured out how to type Chinese) in reference to me. I can't believe I'm a shushu instead of a gege now. Oh, shu shu means younger uncle and gege means older brother. I feel like that's a right of passage into adulthood, and it freaks me out. Weird!