Nick in Qufu - Goes to Haiti!: May 2009

So this is going to be a short post, because unfortunately, China has decided that Blogger is evil and has blocked access to the site. I am able to get around it using a proxy, but unfortunately uploading pictures isn't an option currently, and this post requires pictures for maximum effectiveness.

At any rate, yesterday I finally made the obligatory trip to Taishan (Mt. Tai), considered to be the most important of the five famous mountains in China. Taishan is conveniently located about an hour and a half north of Qufu, so getting there wasn't a problem. I was invited by Peter, and made the trip with him, his girlfriend, another friend of ours named Hawk, and his girlfriend.

Now, Taishan, standing at 1525 meters, is a decently sized mountain. Because of this we decided to give ourselves plenty of time, and headed out at around 7:30 in the morning. Peter and I had agreed on the phone the night before that we should get breakfast before heading out, to make sure we were all ready and rarin' to go hiking. So, at 7:30 when we all piled into the car, I casually asked Peter where we would be having breakfast. He lightheartedly replied what I thought sounded like "Dunkin Meat," and everybody in the car laughed. I took this to mean he was jokingly attempting to say "Dunkin Doughnuts," which didn't seem that strange because there is a Chinese breakfast food called Yu Tiao which is a very delicious, light pastry which you can dunk in warm soy milk. This is also how Peter usually works in words/phrases he has recently heard to try and figure out how exactly to use them day to day. So of course I half jokingly said, "Oh you mean Dunkin Doughnuts?? Sure!" And everybody in the car chuckled. Insert Mr. T saying, "I PITY THE FOOL!" here please.

What Peter had actually said, and had said it in a lighthearted way to insinuate that it was okay for me to decline, was DONKEY meat. I, of course, had warmly accepted this invitation to sup on a magnificent bounty of donkey meat soup, with a donkey meat pita on the side. Imagine a Reuben from a New York deli - meat and bread. Now imagine it containing donkey meat. This was my very unexpected breakfast, and the start of a very interesting day. The good news, is that donkey happens to be quite delicious, as I learned. Noah, you would have liked it - it's cooked extremely well done, but maintains a very flaky texture, and tastes kind of like beef. Also very lean. Maybe that's why all the signs in the restaurant proclaimed happily, "In heaven, dragon meat. On earth, donkey meat."

After breakfast we headed to Taishan straight away. Now, at this time it's important for me to bring up an odd phenomenon concerning Chinese music appreciation in general. Being that, by in large, they LOVE Avril Lavigne. Not only do they love her, but they are absolutely convinced that most westerners (and thus, me) love her. Just one of those things. At any rate, either Peter's girlfriend or Peter himself had very recently purchased the complete Avril Lavigne three CD box set, conveniently timed for our awesome trek to Taishan. After listening to "With You" and several soul-invigorating rounds of "Sk8ter Boi," I finally caved and furthered their stereotypical understanding of western music by loudly singing along to "Girlfriend." See title for opening lines, but substitute "girlfriend" for "donkey meat" (I think I might ACTUALLY like Avril if the lyrics were really "Hey hey, you you, I don't like your donkey meat...").

When we finally arrived at Taishan, we prepared ourselves, and made our way to the starting path - a big stone staircase, which conveniently extends the entirety of the mountain...

This is where pictures would be nice, but immagine a wide stone staircase steeply climbing four or so miles to the top of a mountain. Our group wasn't the strongest, so unfortunately we only made it half way and then decided it would be best to finish our journey by riding the cable car up the second half. In retrospect, our lunch at the middle was so leisurely that I would have just skipped it, hiked up, and met the rest of the group at the top. Oh well.

At any rate, I made it up Mt. Tai and back down, and it was really quite nice. We couldn't have asked for nicer weather - I haven't seen a clear day like the one we had yesterday in China as far back as I can remember... It had rained the day before which cleared out the air just in time for us to have a beautiful, cloudless day.

When/if I am able to access Blogger again under normal conditions, I'll upload some pictures so you can see what exactly a stairway to heaven looks like (at the top of the mountain is a gate called the "southern heavenly gate.").

Oh, in other news, on Friday when it was cold and rainy, I was walking home from class in the morning and happened upon a cold, shivering, wet puppy pathetically trying to warm itself by wedging between a stone wall and a pair of shoes. We gave him a bath and fed him, and he's become a totally new dog, full of energy and curiosity. He's really, really little - just old enough to eat solid food really. We named him Sneakers, given the unlikely place in which I found him. In conclusion, we now have a puppy. At least until one of our students takes him home next week.

That is all.

One of my favorite day to day experiences living in China is the inevitable encounters with English translations. Signs, warnings, advertisements, store names, etc. Often will have an English translation of the Chinese sign/warning/advertisement/store name, or sometimes you will encounter signs/warnings/advertisements/store names that simply are in English, and simply offer you a good, hearty, WTF?!

Suffice it to say, that English written by non-native speakers can end up hilarious. The ever infamous website Engrish details this phenomena with mostly Japanese-English translations. In China the blend of English-Chinese is often called "Chinglish." I'm assuming that this, in general, started out as a negative term. However, the idea of "Chinglish" is losing some of the negative connotation. Recently there was an endearing article in a Chinese newspaper about preserving Chinglish as a distinctly "Chinese" thing, for example.

What follows are some of my favorite encounters with Chinglish - both in it's hilarious, and more eloquent forms.

I agree. I always liked the teeny tiny grass.

This is some form of food, I think chocolate... anyway, the advanced technology promises "best enjoyment."

Wait does this mean I can re-use the cash I already used? F'N SWEET!

The cultural relics I understand, but protect the railings?

Screw you think days, nobody likes you.

I love this sign. This, I think, is the type of "Chinglish" they were discussing preserving in the news article. I mean, I'm not sure you could say "keep the hell off" any better.

Gotta keep that imagination in check. Don't let it become ill-mannered, as imaginations are prone to do...

Your tumble is inevitable. Just be careful while you do it.

What rolls down stairs
alone or in pairs,
and over your neighbor's dog?
What's great for a snack,
And fits on your back?
It's log, log, log

It's log, it's log,
It's big, it's heavy, it's wood.
It's log, it's log, it's better than bad, it's good."