LI KAI DE SHIHOU: WHILST LEAVING

17:32BST 7/29/08
SHANGHAI PUDONG TO CHICAGO O'HARE

i hate this feeling. i hate it so much. i was totally late to the airport (im not sure i know how else to arrive), so i was too busy running through the airport and skipping people in lines upon lines to get nostalgic. as the plane was taking off, i realized this would be the last time on sino-soil in quite some time and immediately became very sad. im so so grateful for all of the help and support that i got to come here and for all of the tremendous hospitality i was shown here that its almost too overwhelming to describe. on the plane, i asked the first flight attendant that i saw (asian) in chinese if i could switch my seat to one that had a power outlet. she answered back in perfect english that the flight was full. without realizing why, this made me very sad. most of the flight attendants on this flight are american. they look american. they are fat and have over-dyed blonde hair and they speak english. for this past leg of my trip, ive listened to and used more chinese than ever... and its wonderful. i got this awesome feeling everytime i figured out a new way to ask for something or when someone would explain something to me and i would actually catch it. and now its gone. like the last one, on this international flight, the americans are somehow sequestered in their own section and the chinese grouped in theirs. all around me, i hear happy people talking about how nice its going to be to use regular toilets and be among people who speak english. ... . maybe its just a readjustment funk, but i hate it. i actually came to like the squatters... you never have to worry about whether the seat is clean or not. aside from the countryside and one kunming toilet covered in poo (out of three whole weeks), i didnt really encounter any problems and like them better i think. and maybe im just being silly, but when i saw the chinese attendent asking a man a couple rows up ta yao he shenma (what did he want to drink) i was filled with this longing for him to ask me the same. i caught him and said 'qing wen, wo de duzi bu xufu de, nimen you meiyou yao?" (excuse me, my stomach hurts, do you have medicine?). he answered back in perfect english, we only have aleve, maybe i could ask for something else? stubbornly, i tried again. "wo xiangyao ne ge huang ling pian haishi ne ge fen hong se de yao" (i want the little yellow pill or pepto bismal). in english, "your chinese is very good! i will ask someone if they have either." actually, i know im being silly bc the flight attendents on the chinese planes would do the same, regardless of how hard you were trying to yong putonhua. i think im just going to miss the giddy satisfaction of communicating. i guess.

last night, after feeling beaten and bruised by that awful woman, mike and i cozied up and watched some episodes of a show he likes, "greek." this morning, after waking up too late again, we forewent mcdonalds delivery for a crazy delish thai restaurant (the experience that kunming (or robbo lol) could never give me). it ended up taking a little too long so we had to make a mad dash back to the house, to a cab, to the subway, to the MAGLEV! to get to the airport. i thought that i wouldnt like the maglev bc youre pretty muched forced to use it to get to pudong (shanghai's eastern airport) and it costs 50 kuai, but honestly it was pretty cool. like, they post the speed of the train (which is actually hovering above the track via high powered magnetic levitation (ergo 'maglev')) and it goes as fast as 431 kph (which, if my quick conversion is correct, is about 267 mph). and you can see the whole time, its pretty nutty. im glad i took it. when i got to the airport, idk how i managed it with ALL of my luggage, but i straight up ran from the maglev station to the AA desk, easily over half a mile. i had to argue with the lady to let me on... maybe it was my awesome broken chinese that won her over. they sent a guy with me up until customs that helped me cut everyone in line. this was really helpful bc when i tried to jump the AA line by myself, my "wo de feiji kuai qu, qing, wo ke bu keyi xianzai qu?" didnt really seem to register. it was either incorrect or the people at the front of the line didnt take kindly to me telling them (i think) that my plane was soon leaving, could i please go right now? like i said, it was pretty quick moving. and so were back here, on the plane.

to dwell on more positive thoughts, things that im def happy to get back to include my bed, my theodore, my roommates, autonomy, and calling my parents whenever i want. i felt like there were so many things in china that i would love to call and tell them about, but wasnt really able to. im a little sad bc as well as i tried to document my travels, i find it hard to remember some of the more trivial but amusing things. im also a little anxious to get back to work to finish up some loose ends and get on with my last year in grad school. im excited to get it on and over with! i also really want to find some sort of sneaky way to find everyone's address in china and send them goodies :).

i feel like, since this will be my last china post (that i can think of anyways), i am obligated to say something profound that i learned. im kind of grasping for straws here though... instead, i think i might comment on general things that i picked up on that may be amusing. if anything, i feel that i learned that the culture is not so much different but slightly shifted. just like americans, chinese people are modest about somethings and open about others. only here, most chinese people with whom i spoke were very conservative about sexuality and more open about nudity. for instance, a lot of public restrooms dont have doors. on the four hour trip from mi le back to kunming, we stopped at a gas station where there was a long rectangular trench carved out of the concrete with two short dividers to suggest the existence of three stalls. ni yong ce sua de shihou, qita de ren hui kandao ni (yingwei, tamen bu xihuan deng). ... . . :( im still upset about saying goodbye lol. but when youre going to the bathroom, people can watch you, and will sometimes glare bc youre taking too long and they dont like to wait! its these little shifts in culture that stuck out more than anything. other things learned?
-chinese hospitality is better than anything ive ever experienced before.
-also... chinese people dont like to wait. at all. they push... like crazy... even when its not important or honestly possible to go anywhere.
-OMG! chinese drivers are freaking nuts! i know theres the stereotype in america that chinese people are bad drivers. its not true! what it is is that they drive COMPLETELY differently here! lanes? yeah theyre good sometimes, but not when its inconvenient. motorbikes on roads, sides of roads, sidewalks, and general pedestrian pathways? YES PLEASE! changing lanes and a cars there? so? hahaha, oh god its so fun to watch! so yeah, chinese people arent bad drivers, american traffic is just more passive than what theyre used to.
-mmm, chinese parents are really dedicated to their kids, and at the same time, dont really care what kind of career path they choose as long as it will bring in some money.
-oh! chinese people are homophobes!
-this ones easy, chinese babies are the cutest things in the world. on the subway to the airport today, i had a little extra bribe candy leftover from camp in my luggage pocket and politely offered it to a xiaohai. in three seconds, the look on his face went from confusion to excitement to concern over whether his parents would let him have it (they would) back to extreme jubilation. i could have snatched that kid and put him in my pocket!
-mmm, a more interesting paradox that i encountered was that it seemed like both the chinese government and chinese people are more concerned with appearance than reality DESPITE the extreme directness of the culture. at the macro level, this manifests itself in the extent to which shanghai makes a show of being an environmentally friendly city when it is SO obviously not. on a smaller scale, a chinese girl (probably the most interesting one i met there), chelsea, embodies this trend in her actions. she is 28, a professional club dancer and a dj, and just recently married sam, an expat rapper. she has a tattoo (among others) across her back that says "dontfuckwithme" and her attitude shows it politely but firmly. and yet, she makes a really big effort to tone down her sexy badass ways in public. honestly, its kind of impossible for a city thats growing as much as shanghai to stop polluting as much as it does (though i think they could try harder), and theres no reason why chelsea should be concerned about what people think about her (when most people that i know would think shes cool as hell!). and still, both are concerned about their outward apprearance and the way they are perceived. i wouldnt call it hypocritical, so much as humorous.

all in all, this had been a trip of a lifetime, and i think as the plane pushes forward, im happy to be getting back. theres so much to come back to... and i guess ill just have to keep xiaolin close to me or teach amanda another song in chinese (i heard something about two tigers...). anyways, thats my trip. thanks to everyone for reading and for their comments. it made it easier to be away from everyone without contact for so long. hopefully the future will require more similar diaries. im hoping for taiwan, france, spain, thailand, turkey, and canada (i want to go to montreal!!!). all in good time! zai jian, au revoir, adios, aloha, and goodbye :).