Chinalbeit

Ah Xi’an – the cradle of Chinese civilization, home of the first emperor, site of the historic Terracotta Warriors, seated at the base of majestic Hua Mountain.  Yeah…I can’t stand it.

For the most part I’ve been pretty lucky in China…well, except for getting deported, requiring 25 stitches in my face thanks to Chinese hospitality, nearly getting my juggular cut by a crazed Chinese female.  OK, actually, I haven’t really been that lucky at all.  I’d still take it over my life back in the States, which though it was quite a bit safer and saner bored me into addictions with online video games and all-night raiding parties.  Never again, I say.  My wonderful trip to the center of Chinese civilization in September of 2008 certainly takes the cake for run bad, however, which is saying something considering its competition.

I wasn’t even supposed to go to Xi’an in the first place.  I had my trip already booked and planned for Guilin / Yangshuo.  I got a dirt cheap flight from Beijing into Guilin: the only problem was that the departure time was 7AM.  No problem, I thought, I can get up early.  I had just bought a brand new phone with alarm function (yeah I’m a little behind the technical curve here, I realize this), so the night before the flight I set it to wake me up at a very early 4:30AM and off I drifted into slumberland.

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Inspired by this great blog post at Sinosplice “10 Vegetables China Taught Me to Love“, I thought I would take the opportunity to reflect on some the daily activities I do here that I never would have considered doing back home in America, or that I had to do but hated.  To start off, I couldn’t agree more with the above blog post.  I wasn’t completely anti-vegetable in my old days.  I’d often order the “garden salad” instead of the french fries with my burger, but I rarely ventured away from the safe pastures of iceberg lettuce, romaine, carrots, or broccoli.  My daily diet now consists of all sorts of crazy vegetables I pick up at the wet market near my house (a soon to be blog post about this wet market) and fry them up or grill them on my new barbecue.  The lifestyle changes haven’t stopped there, oh no.  So, without further ado…

1. Riding a Bicycle

I was actually quite an avid bike rider back home, but it was strictly a leisure activity.  The thought of trying to navigate a bicycle around the mayhem otherwise known as the Northwest Suburbs of Chicago sends more shivers down my spine than taking a bath in a tub full of Chinese loogies.  Well, okay…perhaps it’s  not that bad.  During the summer of my 17th year, I actually spent a month or so trying to ride a bike around those streets (due to an unfortuante accident I incurred just months after receiving my driver’s license).  It wasn’t quite so bad, but then again, it was summer and I was seventeen.  I didn’t really have anywhere to be, and I wasn’t in any hurry to get there.  If I had to rely on a bicycle as my main method of transportation to get to and from work, I’m quite sure I’d end up in the unemployment line pretty quickly, and not because of the current economic troubles. Read more…