-- is the witty title of this week's installment. No, that wasn't a blatant attempt to be punny by combining a cheery song title with the only prominent Chinese figure I could think of. What are you talking about? But would you look at that masterpiece of reference? I think I should be called The Allusionist. (Ha! I just got tears in my eyes from laughing at how clever I am. I really amaze myself sometimes.)
Most of you are probably raising your eyebrows in a most condescending manner at the ambiguity of the title. Waltzing Maotilda? Confucius Baggins? What on earth can that brilliant, clever, amazingly wonderful teenager mean? Well, flattered as I am by your generous thoughts, you will have to wait a little bit to uncover those mysteries as I am going to work in chronological order this week.
Monday was the Moon festival, as I spoke about last time. I won't go over that again. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you probably didn't get last week's email, don't remember it, or didn't read it (in which case I will try and give you the benefit of the doubt and suppose that it was somehow sent to your junk mail, all the while thinking that it's more likely that you ignored it and that I'm not sure if I want to be your friend anymore). Any way it is, let me know if you want me to send you any of the previous weeks' emails. This is email #5, FYI.
Tuesday… I don't even remember what I did Tuesday. Probably school. It must have not been very important (I mean, uh, school is important! If you go to school you can do learn good!).
Wednesday I dubbed my Solo Adventure Day. Actually, I haven't ever thought of it as such until this very minute, but suddenly think it is such a good idea that from now on, Wednesday will forever have that glorious title. Doesn't it just make you think of a Horatio Hornblower-esque figure standing at the prow of a boat, searching for adventure? That analogy doesn't work very well because a ship needs a whole crew, and as such cannot be a Solo Adventure. But you get the gist. I'll save my analogizing (that's a real word, I just found out!) for olive trees and animal farms. Oh, those are already taken. Too bad.
What was I even talking about? Oh yeah, Solo Adventures (great, now I'm thinking of some sort of computer game where you have to sing your way through obstacles, fighting dragons and evil robots. I'm not sure this title is going to work out very well. Or maybe its versatility makes it more exciting! Yes, that's the right attitude). Well, Wednesday I ventured out by myself to Sanlitun Village, which is a nice modern mall with a bargaining market next door. I bought a coat for too much money because I wasn't brave enough to stick to the price I wanted to pay. Lesson learned. That's all I really have to say about Wednesday. Quite a ramp-up, eh? The point was that I went off by myself without really knowing where I was going, and I made it back alive. I even called a taxi for myself! Look how urban I am!
So, that was the majority of time this week. It wasn't the majority of excitement, however, as you will soon found out. Stay in your seat, grab some popcorn if you like. 'Twill be an interesting read.
Friday I finished my schoolwork, packed up a bag, and mi madre and Daniel headed off on the subway to go to the train station, to take the CRH Speed train (as much as I wished it to be the A train, it wasn't). We met up with papa and sat down. It was very exciting. I've never really been on a modern train before. Well, maybe I have. I don't really think the Heber Creeper counts, but I think I might have been on one in Europe. Either way, I haven't been on a modern Chinese train before, and that makes all the difference. For one, they have the speed you're going in chinese characters at the front of the train. 310 km/hr, guys. That's like 200mph. Is crazy.
The fancy train
Where did we go on this exciting train ride, you ask? Qufu! (Who do? Do what?) Yes, Qufu. What, you haven't heard of it? It's only the birthplace of Confucius. I don't know how you would have not heard of it. Although, really, Confucius was born in like 550 B.C. (or A.C., as most of the signs said. We still haven't really figured out if it meant B.C. or A.D. Whatever, TIC.*) so how are they really sure that's where he was born? Who knows. So yes, we traveled to Qufu to visit my sister at her kung fu school.
Confucius: So important they put him in the train station.
No, you didn't read that wrong. My sister Sarah is currently learning Kung Fu at a Shaolin Academy in Qufu, China. Inorite? It's pretty cool. We went down there to visit her and make sure she's not dead. Mom almost took her back after we saw her school. Not luxurious, I have to say. But the people are there to learn to bend the elements**, not live in a lap. Of luxury, I mean. It's really a neat school. I'm thinking about going there for a week (eek!). We'll see.
We didn't see her school till Saturday, though, stop distracting me! Once we got down to Qufu we met up with Sarah at the Econolodge of China, times 3. It was dingy and smelled like smoke, but at least it didn't have a bag of jalepenos in the freezer (don't ask. You have no idea what you can find in the Econolodges in Oregon.). It had three stars at the front of the hotel, though, so I would hate to see what 2 or 1 star joints look like. We got out of there as fast as we could to find dinner.
That was quite the experience. Can you say, language barrier?! It turns out that not every restaurant in China has pictures of the food. Sometimes they will just hand you a list of Chinese characters and expect you to know how to read them. And then your family will look at you desperately because you speak the most Chinese out of all of them. And then you will remember phrases like 'chicken', 'pork', 'not spicy' and 'broccoli' and hope for the best. It also turns out that asking for the cheapest chicken dish that is not spicy will sometimes result in them bringing out THE ENTIRE CHICKEN, complete with claws and its cute little head curled around its body. It also turns out that simply saying "I dare you" to Sarah is enough to get her to bite into a chicken neck. These are just a few of the things we found out as we dined in a smelly restaurant in Qufu.
You thought I was kidding, didn't you.
Not wishing to go back to Hotel Smoke, we then decided (you do realize that previous paragraph was what actually happened during dinner, right? Just checking.) to take a pleasant stroll down the street. We soon discovered the scintillating nightlife of Qufu: men playing cards under the streetlights, teenagers loitering down the sidewalk, little boys chasing grasshoppers, and full-out dance parties. Yes, it's true. They weren't mosh-pitting to "Sandstorm" and "Everytime We Touch", no sir, they weren't. They were the Red-Hat club of China, doing their line dances in the dimly lit square in military-type rows with absolutely Vulcan countenances. Literally at least a hundred women over 50, dancing in the parking lot. There wasn't even a leader up front showing them what to do! It was like a musical, they all knew the dance! How do they all know the dance?! And then the next song would come on and they would start the new dance like they had known it all their lives (well, maybe they have!). And of course they couldn't look like they were having fun. When you have dance parties outside at 9:00 at night, do you ever show any expression on your face? No way, Josephina! That would be the epitome of gauchity! (totally a word! Maybe.)
This was my attempt to capture the dancers.
Across the square from the line dancers was a group of people who did look like they were having some fun, at least a little bit. They were waltzing and we of course had to join them. I considered hopping into a line dance at one point but I think I might have ended up looking silly. At the waltz, however, Sarah and I excel, much to the amusement of the Chinese nationals standing on the sidelines. They were just jealous. That, everybody, is the point of the "Waltzing Maotilda" section of the title. Clever, no? No, not really. I can hear your pity laughs.
Well, Saturday morning we got out of our smelly hotel room and into the pouring rain, which didn't let up ALL DAY. It was kind of miserable, but still fun because we got to see the Confucius Temple. Dude. Some of those buildings were built in 1018 A.D. Literally a thousand years old. It was pretty cool. My favorite parts were the gardens and the round hobbit doors in random places. It really was a beautiful place. Places, I should say, as you can go to the Confucius mansion (family home of his succeeding generations) and the Temple. So, the mansion was really near our hotel so we went there first, saw all that, pretty cool, etc, and on the way out we were like, Where my Confucius Temple at? We walk around for a bit and find something that looks like it could be the temple and we walk in. The ticket guys look at us funny but still let us in.
Hobbit doors
We find out when we get to the very end of the complex and there is no back door, that that was in fact NOT the Confucius Temple. It was like, his best friend's place or something. Forty-five minutes wasted. I mean, it was pretty and all, but come on. I suppose we should have figured that out from the very beginning, when it didn't match the pictures in the guide book and there was literally no one else there.
See? Pretty. But still not Confucius' house.
Oh well. A horse and carriage ride later, we were at the real Confucius Temple and were able to go through that, which was pretty cool as stated. Did you get that it was pretty cool? Good. Just makin sure.
Still not kidding.
On the way out there are of course lots of vendors selling little trinkets and statues of Confucius. I had had my eye on some cool wooden bracelets with carved beads and found some that I liked. We were sort of in a hurry to get back to our hotel, so I stopped, pointed, and said, "Ten kuai?" The vendor said, "Okay." I only had a 20, so she said, "Two bracelets?" and I said, "Sure." She picked out two different ones, I paid her and walked off. Literally ten seconds of my time. That was a satisfying business deal. One of them has dragons on it, so I'm pretty happy about it. I wish bargaining could be like that all the time. Compare that transaction with the Silk Market, all the time! Is crazy go nuts.
After the pretty cool buildings and a very unsatisfying lunch (with terrible service! I mean, they give us saucers for plates and when I asked for some bigger plates they brought us one, when we had five people. Very annoying. Smelly restaurant, too. That must be a thing in Fufu.), we went to see Sarah's school. It seems like a nice place to be when it's sunny. It sure was dreary in the rain, but the other students seem nice and it could be a whole lot worse. It's got a pond and some pretty trees and some old Chinese-style buildings, so that's nice. And they get to learn Tai Chi and Sword and Shaolin Kung Fu and acupuncture and calligraphy and a whole bunch of other stuff. Seems pretty neat. If you're ever looking for an adventure or just a break from regular life, go there.
An hour walking in the rain, a much better dinner, and a train ride later, we were back in Beijing, and it felt like home. That's a good sign, isn't it? I think so. On Sunday I thought about my outfit for at least twenty minutes, got dressed very stylishly, and as we got onto the elevator in the church building saw a girl wearing the exact same thing (albeit a different scarf). She even had the same hair color. I immediately disliked her. Okay, fine, I didn't. But still, the nerve!
So there you go, that's more of life in China. Turns out, you have the same problems occur wherever you go in the world.
I'm going to wrap up before I give you anymore unnecessary details or unwanted advice. Let's say, au revoir!
No, let's just say goodbye,
Zai jian!
Ellyn
At the Confucius mansion
*This Is China. My new favorite eye-roll phrase. It seems more PC than "Silly Communists".
**From Avatar: The Last Airbender. People have the power to bend the elements, like move them around however they want, and the creators based different bending styles on martial arts. Waterbending is Tai Chi, Firebending is Shaolin kung fu, airbending is Ba Gua, and earthbending is Hun Gar. Yep, Sarah's pretty much going to be the Avatar when she comes home :)
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