New adventures

I've been keeping a pretty tight lid on it, since it seems like the
universe always conspires to ruin things I talk incessantly about. But
I got the official word today... I'm moving!

I had planned on staying another year in China, but after I inquired
about a teaching position in a more tropical destination, I got an
email this morning that said yes, I got the job! So, I'm heading to
Madagascar in the fall! It's gonna be amazing!

Wish me luck as I count down my days to a life full of lemurs and
parrots and cannibalistic living!! As always, much love, all. More
details as I learn more about my new, upcoming adventure...

T

I hate you, bucket showers

It's about twenty past 2pm and I'm sitting in my apartment, attempting to have a conversation with my landlord (who's English skills are marginal and, you must remember, that my Chinese is pretty much rubbish). He arrived more than an hour ago. I was planning to exit the house to sort out some flights for the May holiday and to get a bit of work done, but it was not to be. He decided to come over and hang out while I/we waited for a repair job. Why did he come? I'm not sure.

I have a type of gas-fired automatic hot water heater in my place. Every time I turn on the hot tap, I hear a small clicking and a "whoosh" when the gas catches the spark, and about 3 seconds later, delightfully hot water reaches my fingertips. On Wednesday night of this past week, I no longer heard the click. Likewise, I no longer experienced the sound of the "whoosh". And finally, my fingertips felt no warmth (and, consequently, the same went for my entire body the next morning, since I was standing in the tub ready for a 5:25am shower before work. The means I had to heat up water on my stove and have an impromptu "bucket shower" utilizing a face cloth and a pot. This did not help me begin a day well. And Thursday turned out to be a bad day). I thought the problem might be that I just needed to pay some cash on my gas bill, so I left 200 kuai (about $30) for Ayi on Thursday (I'll explain my love for this amazing woman in a coming post) and thought it would be taken care of. Well, this was not to be. I arrived home Thursday night and saw that Ayi had paid the bill and left me a receipt. I flipped on my tap and... no click, no whoosh, no heat. 

So, I sent a text to the landlord the next day after bucket shower #2 on Friday morning. He didn't get back to me until Saturday morning, asking me if Sunday was okay. I said no, since I sent the message on Friday and I needed hot water. So, I got a call back saying that they could meet me at my apartment at 2pm. No problem. I had just finished my 15km run, was having a delightful omelette, and was enjoying life (even if I was caked in salt from 90 minutes of exercise).

10 minutes later (at 12:25pm), my landlord called to ask if I was home. I said no, since I was mid-omelette. He said that he was at my apartment waiting. I guess that 2pm thing went out the window. Off I went.

The landlord checked out the situation, called a repair guy, and he said the repair guy would be there that afternoon. No such luck. What did this mean? Yes. Another bucket shower. I got a text later that night (at 8:40pm!) asking me if the repair guy had come... uhhh, no. He hadn't. I hate using my rice pot to help me bathe.

It now turned into Sunday morning, and the landlord sent me yet another message saying that I needed to be home between 2pm and 3pm so I could wait for the repairman. No problem. But just as I'm getting motivated to leave the house about 12:30pm, my phone rings. "Hello. Are you home now?" (Of course, it was my landlord). "Uh, yes, I am," I respond. "Okay, I am here. I come." Looking at my building cctv feed of the front door, I see him peering in the window. So, I buzz him up and he arrives. And sits. And proceeds to just sit and hang out for more than an hour and a half while we waited for the repairman.

The repairman showed up, putzed around with the heater, told me it had actually started on fire and he needed a new heater box, and left, saying that he couldn't fix it until WEDNESDAY! GAAA! That meant 3 more days of bucket showers. I might go postal. Some poor student is gonna say he was late because he was enjoying his hot shower too much, and I might murder him. I cannot be held responsible for my actions come Wednesday. Or even tomorrow for that matter. WeiShenMa?!?!?!?

In other news, spring is springing, running is going well (minus the semi-constant achilles pain I'm dealing with) and in almost exactly a month I'm running off on another great holiday, hopefully to Yangshuo in southern China. Should be amazing. For now, no more complaining. Much love, all.

T

Nine weeks and counting

It's March 19th, which means that in exactly 63 days, I'll be lining up with about 2000 other masochistically inclined runner folk on the Great Wall of China at Huangyaguan, east of Beijing. I'll be pushing off for 21.1kms along the Wall and around the nearby villages as I participate in the Great Wall 1/2 Marathon. It's been in the works for about a month now, and I've corralled about 13 others to hop on a plane on the 20th of May so we can trash our knees, legs and, most likely, our resolve in an attempt to run in what's been dubbed one of the best destination marathons in the world.

I'd heard about the race shortly after coming to China last year. I had high hopes of participating last year, but between my residence out in the boondocks of the greater Dalian area, the brutal winter, a lack of fellow participants and no way of organizing things from Daheishi, I just didn't do anything to get ready. And, I guess the whole 6.5 weeks of holidays last year prevented me from winning the award of Mr. Svelte 2010. But it's a new year, I'm training regularly (even when under the weather from various malaises), and I've convinced a crew to join me. Sometimes our Saturday runs are limited in numbers, but I know that the massive omelette which awaits me after every long run on Saturday makes the outings worth it. Today, it was 14kms plus a couple of add-on hills to get the quads ready. And I added borscht to my already awesome post-run brunch. So, it's official... Great Wall 1/2 Marathon 2011 is a go.

The training is even more worth it when you're treated that night to an amazing sushi dinner and a fantastic massage and it's all paid for by a delightful person. La dolce vita.

T

I'm not sure where I am... is this the Cold War?

I woke up yesterday morning, looking up through my skylight window, thinking to myself that it was going to be another blue-sky-filled day, all the while acknowledging the grim reality that the normal north wind blowing down from Siberia would put me in a mediocre mind state as I walked down to my taxi. I grabbed my green golf shirt from it's hanger (it was St. Patty's Day, after all), and got ready for work. Luckily, the wind wasn't so bad and the day turned out to be okay. 

After school, I joined 7 or 8 other teachers for a basketball game against our high school boys' team. I generally like to consider myself somewhat adept at a lot of games/sports, but basketball's not my strong suit. But, since I'd been to the gym the past two nights, I needed something a little different. And in my earlier PE class that day, I DID hit 2/3 shots from half-court (yes, half-court) and beat 4 of my students in a free-throw competition. Unfortunately, this pregame shooting didn't translate into our post-school competition and I got shut out for points. I did, however, leave the game with a few souvenirs in the way of raspberries and bruises all over my body. Those boys can play some pretty physical ball when they get going.

All of this was normal. This takes me to the best part of the day. 

I'd hopped in a cab back home to KFQ with a few of the guys and got dropped off at "The Shop" below my place. I told my friends (the owners) that I'd pop in for a visit when I got back to town so I could wish Sunshine a happy birthday.

As I walked in, the mood was extremely jovial. I said hi and happy birthday and I could tell something was up. There were still 3 or 4 people in the shop at 6:15pm, which is not normal... normally it's empty at this time of night. And it seemed like people were leaving empty handed as well. No Dongbei hotdog-like sausages, no chicken feet in a bag, no super-pasteurized milk in a sack, and no cigarettes.. just saddened faces. The next statement that came from AA pretty much made my night...

"Been a big day, T! Made a big run on salt today!"

"Salt? Huh?" I reply.

"Ya dude. Salt!"

I had to laugh, because I was confused and thought it was a joke. In China, you can get a small bag of salt for about 1rmb. Which is 15cents Canadian. So the fact that AA and Sunshine were excited, well, made me wonder... how much money can you possibly make off salt?? Honestly, I don't think it's much but they did mark up the salt by 500% (they were selling bags for 5rmb... which is about 80 cents). Highway robbery? Maybe. Or simply a case of supply and demand. Sunshine had to argue and fight with 3 old ladies over 3 cases she'd claimed from the distributor up the road and she came out victorious... I'm wondering, though, if she was concealing some scratches under the sleeves of her sweater. People get crazy around markets here. "The soya sauce is the next thing to go!" AA says to me, pointing to 4 cases of the stuff in the corner of the shop.

Salt. And soya sauce. And apparently seaweed. Huh. Whodathunk it?

It turns out there's a reason why (a crazy reason, but a reason nonetheless)... KFQ, the suburb I live in, is officially OUT OF SALT. Yes. Sold out. Everywhere. Supermarkets, small shops, restaurants, everywhere. And "WHY?" You may ask? Because as of yesterday morning, the people of Dalian started hoarding it (and, I'm suspicious, in the whole of China  is the same way since it was on the news).

It's all about Japan. On Tuesday night, I received the following text message:

"BBC FLASHNEWS: Japan govt confirms radiation leak at Fukushima nuclear plants. Asian countries should take necessary precautions. If rain comes, remain indoors first 24hrs. Swab neck skin with betadine where thyroid area is. Radiation hits thyroid first.Take extra precautions. Radiation may hit Philippines starting at 4pm today. Pls send to your friends."

First off, where can you buy betadine? And what IS IT? Secondly, "Asian countries"? Like, India, too?

Since this hoax message came around (yes, it has been confirmed as a total hoax and has nothing to do with a BBC report), people have been really paranoid here. A similar email has circulated since Monday. And after hearing about the news reports coming from Japan, people in China started worrying about radiation polluting the Yellow Sea, South China Sea and other related Pacific seas and the fact that they might not be able to produce salt anymore (all of China's salt is produced on the east coast of the country, staring toward Japan). There was also talk about a big push for seaweed, since the Japanese seaweed industry might crash so market demands are skyrocketing. Another news story said the salt hoarding crisis was related to a report that iodine in salt could prevent the absorption of radiation by the body, so people were out in droves to get iodized salt from the stores. Check out this news article. Apparently that's not really true, but I've just heard that iodine tablets even IN CANADA are being stockpiled as a way to prevent radiation poisoning. People! Come ON!

I spoke to a couple of my grade 12 students about the importance of education (they thought it was ridiculous, too) and one of the boys told me that a news report came out about a year ago which quoted quack doctors as saying green beans could cure cancer and many other diseases. So, people all over China bought up tens and hundreds of kilos of green beans because it was the new wonderdrug. And then the price gouging and hoarding began. Is it time to build a bunker underneath the park near my apartment?? I might have to talk to the local land development agency about this...

T

The days move on

I'm continually amazed at how a community can come together to support each other and help each other grieve. A member of our staff lost his 23 year old son in a hiking accident here in China last week, and the people came out in droves to celebrate JF's life tonight. I can't imagine what C&M (JF's parents) are going through, but my thoughts have turned to them continually throughout the day. I didn't know JF well at all, but he passed on as he lived out his dreams, hiking mountains and chasing sunrises. I can only hope to be so lucky as to leave this world doing something I love. And as was obvious tonight, you never know how far your influence can reach. 

I posted this a long while back, I think, but I can't help but recall it now...

"When a man comes to die, not matter what his talents and influence on genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and dying [must be] a cold horror... if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try to live so that our death brings no pleasure to the world."
- John Steinbeck, East of Eden

Rest in peace, JF.