A Ray of Light

(Colin)

After an 18 hour train ride, during which I slept like a baby and saw 5 nuclear power plants, a new chapter of my Chinese experience (not to be confused with my upcoming novel about a Chinese space pilot named Hangzhou-lo, who flies the Millenium Dragon), began ...

Immediately upon my arrival, I was whisked away by my host family to their home near the beautiful West Lake.  We had a delicious lunch, and I had just settled in when my host brother, Ray, asked if I wanted to go play basketball with some of his friends.  As I am not one to sit around all day on the computer, or at least, haven’t been one since January, I accepted.  Athletics, of course, are not my strong suit.  Basketball, especially, is something is excel at being terrible at.  Not only am I short, but I also have the coordination of a tub of OxyClean.  As I am a good writer and give credit to my readers, you can just draw conclusions from there.

In the hours following the Failsketball game, Ray, Ray’s friend whose name I forgot and/or can’t pronounce (we’ll call him Bob), and I went to a market-street, which was full of vendors selling all kinds of curios and oddities.  As I had, at the time, no desire for a custom made bust of my head, nor the luggage space for a ming vase, I simply browsed the tables.  We circled through the market, then climbed up a hill, stopping halfway to enter a museum.  The museum had historical tidbits, mostly, and as I walked through the museum I saw a giant sign that read “Stamps”.  I told myself that it couldn’t be any worse than the snake wine, and walked in.

Though the prospect of a room full of stamps doesn’t seem that exciting, I was pleased to find that it was a collection of stamps from around the world.  I immediately made it my quest to find the American collection.  And there it was, the largest collection other than the Chinese one, of course, and it was quite a group of bits of paper.  Stamps advocating the purchase of war bonds during World War Two, showing the new invention of air travel, and even advertising the US Naval Academy, were seen.  As Ray, Bob, and I walked through the room, I was intrigued at the number of foreign countries that had, at one time or another, pasted Franklin Roosevelt’s likeness upon their stamps.  Am I still talking about the stamps?  Sorry.  I’ll move on.

After the museum, we continued up the hill, past a temple, and walked back down.  Ray and I went home, and parted ways with Bob, and I took a well-deserved shower, the first in at least 5 days.  Not to leave me bored for an instant, I was told that we were going out to dinner, so I got dressed in a (slightly) tasteful manner, and we walked to a restaurant on the market street that I mentioned earlier.

During dinner, Ray’s parents, who speak English just as well as I speak Chinese, which is barely, told me, through Ray, of course, that by the time I leave their house I will be able to say ten sentences in Chinese.  Already knowing three, I was excited to add seven sentences to my vocabulary.  We ate a dinner that was quite delicious, and returned home.  Before I went to bed, I set the alarm clock that was in my room, which insisted on loudly narrating the time as I changed it.  I slept quite well, given that my host family, like many families in China, insists on keeping their windows open during every season, and a construction site was going for what seemed like all night.

I was awakened by my alarm clock, which, instead of beeping quietly or playing music, screamed me awake with rooster noises.  In a panic, which repeats every morning, I rushed to shut the electronic fowl up.  I emerged from my slumber to a breakfast of bread that was labled “Toast”, though it was not toasted, some kind of sweet loaf, apples, and peanut butter.  Having not had peanut butter in an unhealthily long amount of time, I engorged myself on two slices of peanut butter-logged bread.  I then proceeded to add some PB to some slices of apple, much to Ray’s confusion.  After breakfast, Ray’s mother drove us to school, which is quite a sight to behold.

Across from a KFC, Hangzhou High School’s main gate is guarded by two men, holding nightsticks, and wearing helmets and what seem like Kevlar vests.  Feeling both safe and confused, I walked past them. The campus is stunning, the buildings are pretty, and, unlike DS, the observatory is functional.  We had a small welcome ceremony in a meeting room, which I have to say is much better than any conference room at DS, which featured a welcome committee of administrators and teachers who we would be seeing a lot of during our stay.  We took a tour of the campus with Dawn, a senior who went to DS last year with her school, exactly as I am doing now, and were relieved to know that she speaks near-perfect English.

We were brought to the cafeteria to eat lunch, which, I thought, was going to be as the students had told me and be less than delicious.  But, as China continues to surpass my expectations, the Sarcastic Four, with our new fifth member, was brought to a private room with cloth napkins and tea waiting for us.  The head chef, almost as soon as we had sat down, brought each of us a platter of food.  This occurs daily, and the food is consistently diverse and delicious.

The rest of the day featured classes, the first two hours of which was a Chinese class for us, and the second two hours of which were the three Americans sitting in on our host siblings’ classes.  Though my Chinese language skills are rivaled by those of  a banana, I enjoyed watching the classes go down, just as I enjoyed comparing teaching and learning styles between China and the US.

The rest of the week followed suit with Monday, until Friday afternoon, when the three of us, along with our host siblings and Dawn, went to Lizzy’s host sister’s grandparents’ house to make dumplings.  Though normally, when you enter a house in China you are given a pair of slippers to wear, as it is cold, which is a problem easily solved by closing windows, upon our arrival at Apple’s Grandparents’, we were given each a pair of blue plastic booties to cover our shoes with, a plan that not only kept our feet warm, but also kept the floors sparkling clean.  With the assistance of the seasoned dumpling veterans, we created a plethora of dumplings that exuded happiness and porkness, and which were fantastic.

After we had consumed the weight of a small moon in dumplings, we played Uno, a game which I, along with the host siblings and Dawn, had never played.  Due to a lack of understanding of rules on everyone’s part, the game lasted for what seemed like two hours.  At an unnatural hour, we bid Apple’s Grandparents farewell, and returned to our host houses.  Ray and I took a bus back home, which passed by a Rolls Royce dealership, a Ferrari dealership, a Lamborghini dealership, a Maserati dealership, a Porsche dealership, and an Aston Martin dealership.  Sadly, the bus was not made by any of these companies, and its only luxary was a small TV in the front, which played a discovery channel program on the Titanic, which was in all Chinese.

Saturday, while the host siblings were at school, the Sarcastic Four went on a tour of the West Lake with Dawn, Derek, and Ms. Wu, who is one of the leaders of our stay.  We walked through many a plum blossom, ate lunch, and went on a two-hour boat ride, powered by a man constantly pulling on an oar.  After we returned back to dry land, my host parents drove me back home, as did Lizzy’s and Ryan’s.  Ray returned from school, on a Saturday (crazy, I know), with an old friend and a plan.  He said that his parents are going out for dinner, and that the three of us were going out ourselves.  We departed soon after, and played pool at a pool hall, where I saw another American.  We then had dinner at KFC, which I have to say I needed after having nothing but Chinese food for 3 weeks.  We went to go see The Tourist, with Johnny Depp, nothing to write home about, and then went to get coffee.

After coffee, Ray and Ray’s other friend, who we’ll call Jim, went to a night market, which was composed of things for sale that I actually wanted to buy.  Fake designer goods, counterfeit Rolexes, and powerful laser-pointers are but a small fraction of the market’s goods.  I brought out my bartering skills, and got a good haul of great souvenirs.

We walked home soon after, and I got myself some well deserved sleep.  I’d talk about Sunday right now, but I think that a 2.5 page blog post is enough for now.  Perhaps later this week I shall regale you with such stories.