Paparazzi and Turkey (or Duck)

Hello everyone,

So sorry I haven't updated in awhile. As soon as I got back from the US, classes got super hard so I've had no time to do anything! Last week, we started new classes for our 2nd module (mini-semester). I was supposed to just move up a level into a new comprehensive class, and a new listening/speaking class, but since I'm only here one semester, I really wanted to do a “材料课”, which is what IUP calls their independent self-designed courses. So instead of the regular classes, I condescended two sessions of one class into one, and added my independent class. In my independent class, I read articles (in Chinese of course) about my Fulbright research topic- women and NGOs and politics in China. It's been really interesting so far, although the content itself of the articles is nothing exciting. It's hard to briefly scan articles written in Chinese to see if they're worth reading so you just have to dive in. I've definitely learned a lot of great vocab already though. So I am now in 3 classes and have the coursework of a regular semester, PLUS my independent class= BUSY BUSY BUSY BUSY BUSY. Other than classes, some other highlights form my last two weeks:

-The first Sunday night I was home, my friend Thomas invited me to  Spark, the coolest club in Beijing at the moment, for an Olay "Winter Sunscreen" product launch party. (One of his friends works for Olay so that was our "in"). It was pretty awesome. It also happened to be "Singles Day" in China because it was 11/11 (all "1"s, which is like a single person, just "1"). It's mostly a shopping day (a bit like our black Friday, which is currently happening as I write!). It's also a day for various singles parties and mixers, and this was one of them...When we arrived, we showed them a random 6 digit number Thoma's friend had given us, and apparently that was enough for the entrance. Then we got the first set of party favors: a sparkly pink mask, a pink feather hair clip, or a blue sequin mini top-hat hair clip. I chose the pink mask. The whole night, drinks were free as long as you ordered from their pre-set list, which consisted of "fun", "fearless", and "female" cocktails (those were the drink names). As the party was sponsored by Cosmopolitan Magazine and Olay, they had cakes with their names on them:

 

People kept accidentally bumping them and breaking the icing, oops! I don't think they ever actually ate the cakes, at least not while I was there. Once everyone had a few drinks, the singles games started. There was a dance instructor who kept taking people up onto the stage (the stage was surrounded with small plastic strings that guided water down from the top of the stage to the bottom of the stage, creating a wall of water around the stage. Kinda cool...) to dance. Most of the poor chosen ones were awful dancers, but it was fun to watch:

the dance instructor

After the dance lessons, the dating games started. I don't really know what was going on, but I think there was a host, a single lady, and a single man, all chosen in advance to participate. The dance instructor would teach them a dance, and then they're ask them a few questions. Dancing shows like this in China are huge. One of the most famous incidents occured when a female contestant said she's "rather be crying in the back of a mercedes, than laughing on the back of bike", indicating her preference for money over happiness. This incident set off a huge controversy over the values of young people in China today, which lit up the Chinese blogosphere for weeks. Anyways, nothing that exciting happened at our party...

The host is in the middle. Notice the big hair piece on the female contestant- these were all the rage that night.

After the dating show part ended, they took down the water barriers, and opened up the stage for dancing. As some point in the end, my friend Sophie and I ended up dancing gangnam style on the stage with a chinese guy, while the entire rest of the club watched us. It was pretty embarrassing, given that I don't really know the dance. But we were literally the ONLY foreigners at the party so the paparazzi were all over us. There were a lot of photographers there because of the sponsors, Olay and Cosmo. My friend Thomas and I decided to be extremely animated everytime the paparazzi came over so they loveddddd us. It was pretty hilarious. Who knows, maybe I'll be in the next chinese Cosmo? 

Last Friday we went to our favorite beer brewery, which just put up their winter heat lamps and such for the winter. It was pretty nice, and I got to hear inside scoop from my reporter friends about covering the 18th Party Congress last week. Summary (also a real summary here): No one knows ANYTHING about ANYTHING or ANYONE in the Chinese government, despite these politicians being over 50 years old. The government closely hides most information about their leaders, and only tells the press what they want so they have to be skeptical of everything. No surprises came out of the party congress. The reduced the Standing Committee from 9 to 7 people, presumably to be more efficient since they work on a consensus basis. 5 of the 7 people chosen were picks of Jiang Zemin (China's president in the 90s), indicating he still maintains a great deal of power in the party. Xi Jinping is the new president, starting March I believe. No women on the standing committee, duh. :( And Hu Jintao stepped down as chair of the Central Military Commission, which his predecessor Jiang did not do for 2 years in Hu's presidency. This means Xi Jinping can take up that post immediately, thus controlling all 3 of the most important aspects of Chinese governance: Party, Military, and State. 

Also this week, I had 3 great "culture sharing" discussions with some Chinese people (fulfulling my Fulbright mission of "sharing mutual respect and understanding"):

1. This week I had a great discussion with some Chinese 20-something women. Our conversation that started out as part of a homework assignment to interview 3 Chinese people about “早恋” (puppy love, or young love) turned into a 2 hr discussion on religion, abortion, Planned Parenthood, US Politics, and more! It was super interesting. For example, I said that abortions are very controversial in the US, and they were flabbergasted! "But the US is so open and progressive," they said. I then explained the influence of Christianity on many Americans, and the socially conservative nature of the Church. They thought it was all very strange.

2. As a sign of my appreciation for all the hard work my teachers from last semester put in (generally above and beyond the standard), I brought my 4 teachers special gifts from the US. The first item, Ghiradelli Peppermint Bark, was well received. My second gift sparked more controversy: a hanky panky thong from my parent's lingerie store, Intimacy. Giving lingerie to anyone might seem pretty weird, but I've been doing it since I was a little girl (I usually gave PJs back then since I refused to admit to anyone until high school that my parents owned lingerie, not PJ & swimwear, stores for fear of harassment and severe embarrassment). As hanky pankys are extremely popular in the US and are usually received as a great gift, I didn't think anything of it when my mom suggested in. It wasn't until I got back to Beijing that I realized that many people, and almost all Chinese people, don't wear thongs. Maybe I've been desensitized to them over the years as almost all of my friends and I exclusively wear thongs. And from my perspective, they're a fairly normal clothing item that don't need to be reserved solely for special occasions or anything. But again, maybe I just like in my own little pro-lingerie bubble and have no idea what's going on in the rest of America. (I was surprised when one of my best Australian girlfriends here in Beijing said that most young Australians girls don't wear them because they're uncomfortable. Thongs aren't popular there...) So anyways, I give my teachers these thongs and chocolate bars. Two of the teachers wrote me emails thanking me for the gifts and mentioned they'd already tried and loved the chocolate (NO mention of the thongs). My other two younger and generally more progressive teachers came up to me in the hallway after class, giggling and whispering like 12 year old girls. They thanked me for the gifts, and sheepishly asked "Are they really comfortable?" I explained to them that they may take some getting used to, but are really comfortable and especially useful if you're wearing tight clothes. They giggled and said they were really sexy- another thought I've never had about hanky pankys (I guess lace thongs are fairly sexy, but I've been spoiled to the point that hanky pankys are a basic to me). Then my teacher confided in me that "One time, I bought a g-string [a thong with literally just a string in the back]" but she hated it (naturally, those actually do suck). The idea that "this one time I bought a thong" was so funny to me. The next day, my teacher came up to me in the hall, looks around to check no one is nearby, and goes "I tried them!" She thought they weren't too comfortable but assured me she's going to work at it until she can wear them because they're so pretty. I loved this whole interaction so much because going into the situation, it hadn't even occurred to me that there was this big cultural divide about lingerie. I thought I was just giving a normal "American made" gift that had a personal touch since they'd all heard about my parents' store already. But even better, my gift came with a cultural lesson! 

3. In my independent research materials class, I read a passage about "a controversial" investment an NGO made for public welfare. I asked my teacher, "why is this controversial? It's an investment in public welfare by an NGO." She explained: From a young age in school, Chinese students are taught about the greatness of their nation and their government. Then they get out into the real world and realize it was all lies. Their trust in so-called "fact" is totally shattered. In China, "facts", "statistics", and "evidence" are all easily fabricated or manipulated (Take China's unemployement rate for example). This then led to the most honest discussion I've ever had with a Chinese person about the true power of the Chinese people to change their government or to influence politics. Needless to say, she was very pessimistic and said she's thought about leaving China and moving to the US for a long time. I won't put the details of our discussion here just in case I'm being watched (haha, but seriously...), but it was basically a live, engaged discussion about my college thesis- SO COOL. OMG NERD FREAK OUT. 

Also this week was Thanksgiving of course! This year, I've been lucky enough to celebrate Thanksgiving 4 times! The first occured when I was at home in the US. My darling, sweet mtoher cooked a 20 lb Turkey ("go big or go home" as they say...) for 7 people, along with all the typical American Thanksgiving dishes. My second dinner was Wednesday night, hosted by the US Embassy for China Fulbrighters at the Renaissance Hotel in Beijing. They had a buffet complete with Turkey, Beijing Duck, Sushi, Indian curries, Hamburgers, congee, fried rice, steamed buns, and more! My favorite dish was definitely the AMAZING chocolate cake. I also got to meet a current Fulbright who's living in Xi'an right now so he gave me some info about life there and now I have a friend in Xi'an! That makes 2 friends so far. haha. Last night on actual Thanksgiving, my friends and I went to a 北京烤鸭 (Peking Duck) restaurant. As my friend Nick described it, "What did the Pilgrims do when they went to the US? They ate the local food. What should we do on Thanksgiving in China? Eat Peking Duck!" Excellent reasoning. It was delicious as always. Tonight we're having our final celebration, an IUP Thanksgiving Potluck party. I don't think anyone is making turkey, but I brought Stove Top Stuffing all the way from the US so I'm bringing that. I'm also DJing the party with my outstanding Christmas music playlist! Let the holiday season begin! 

Tonight, my parents arrive in Beijing! WOO! They will be here for the next 2.5 weeks so expect my next post to be full of stories from the luxury life in Beijing! (and hopefully nice quality photos if my parents bring my finally fixed-camera!)