prickly like a cactus

this is the market street up the block from me. it's about a heartbeat away from my friend steph's place, too.

i was walking home from the bus one night when i stopped by to pick up some fruit from one of the stalls that actually stays open late, and noticed the joint was swarming with gray-uniformed officials. i mean, swarming. there were groups of 8-10 all over the place. then i noticed that not only were a disproportionate amount of stalls closed, quite a few had were boards nailed across them with some sort of official notices plastered across. a few of the stalls were being bricked over as i watched. it was some sort of freaky scene from a movie. poof! and things disappear here overnight.

so i wandered by last week and the market is a ghost town. there is one guy selling pork, another stall with seafood, and about 3 stalls with produce of some kind. this used to be the liveliest place in my hood (which is saying a lot - it's a congested area). and i'm not even the biggest wet market fan. i generally think they stink and are unhygienic, and people try to ride over your feet or your entire person with their scooters and bikes, making you want to beat them with the pig leg hanging in that unrefrigerated stall next to you, covered in flies. the occasional car is stupid enough to try and drive down the street, too. but i would be amiss if i didn't also point out that these marketplaces are the sole livelihood of a lot of people, not to mention where the neighborhood does its shopping. if it's not captivating, clean, and beautiful, it's at least functional and i'm sure more than a few people were dependent on its existence.

there's no doubt it's because of the 5-ring circus going down in the capital in august. facades are being erected over storefronts overnight, places are getting spiffed up or spit out or just plain closed the hell down. people are getting rolled on - with a quickness. at my friend jill's apartment complex (a nice one with lots of foreigners) the other morning as she was leaving for work, cops set up a checkpoint at her complex gates and were stopping all the visibly non-asian people from leaving and asking for their residence permits. this pink slip of tissue-like paper is the key to your existence here, apparently. mine is buried somewhere in my tv cabinet, i think (luckily i 'pass' and don't normally get harassed.) 48 hours after moving into a new residence, foreigners are required to register at their nearest police station, like child molesters. military state, this place. anyway, jill saw one foreign girl detained because she didn't have her paper on her since she'd crashed at her boyfriend's place. the police wouldn't let her go, saying that she has to register at the police station even for an overnight.

it's just silly is what it is.

lots of things are changing now. the dvd places aren't worth a damn (ok fine, i get it, but it's annoying), the regulations on mail are ludicrous, and the air in beijing is still filthy and making international headlines.

in other news... steph's company is throwing some big bash (or someone they know is throwing a big bash, or there's just a big bash in general) and will have her own apartment in beijing for a weekend during the olympics, so the girls are all planning on flying up there and joining the madness. i've been scared of being in beijing during the games, but i guess at this point i just do like the romans, grab my stupid pink paper, and join the throngs.

england amorous feeling

that's the name of a shop i just passed on my way home. clever, no? better than ordinary shop names like 'liv tyler' or 'only' or 'belville.' my favorite shop name is 'big toe,' which is a shoe store. logically, you would think, but such logic rarely applies here.

many things have happened since i last checked in. well, not really. trevor left for the states, that's been the biggest news. we're suffering from not being able to text every 7.89 minutes, so consequently we've worked out a semi-schedule that consists of both of us constantly being on the computer no matter what time it is so we can chat. skype has been a rare beast, because mostly he's at his mom's house, which features no less than 2 or 3 people swarming around him at all times. the one time we did skype, his baby sister was at home and later his mom came in and teased him about how 'a certain someone was having an internet conference with a special someone.' trevor, despite his actual age, eventually ended up being flustered about having a skype conversation with me that wasn't a secret to begin with. either way, i log into gmail about 50 times a day to see if he's online. he does the same, often very patiently waiting hours for me to log in. i tell ya, there's got to be another way.

in other news... there really isn't any. yesterday i went to linhai for a factory visit. it is a 3-4 hour drive each way. of course, i slept most of the way in the car. luckily my colleague is shanghainese, so he could at least chop it up with the driver there and back. i cannot stay awake in a vehicle for anything, i'm not sure why. i am the worst road trip companion known to man. except for cynthia. we're tied for last place. once i woke up, however, i was pretty happy, since linhai is situated at the base of the mountains in zhejiang province and is really beautiful and green. much more beautiful than the flat swampland that is shanghai proper.

we met for a total of one hour with the factory execs, did a quick factory tour (15 minutes), then jumped back in the car for another 4 hour drive. this time we had with us the young president of the factory, whose english was excellent. turns out she grew up in linhai but has lived in shanghai the past 16 years, so we gave her a lift back to shanghai for the weekend. i thought for sure i'd stay awake, since there was someone in the car i didn't know too well, plus we had just signed a contract to do work with them, plus she speaks great english, but we managed to chat politely for about 10 minutes before i completely passed out again for 3 hours. i'm shameless, i tell you.

i got home, made myself some dinner, then chatted with trevor (aka helped him with his resume) for a few hours. sherry organized a trip to xitang today and even booked a driver, but i pulled a lame one and decided to stay home. i slept for 10 solid hours last night (despite the 6-odd hours i got in the car) and could not be convinced that touring a water town in 100-degree weather with 65% humidity was a good idea. water to me means mosquitoes, and i get enough of them here. we are looking to try and take more weekend trips before i leave (and just in general), and i applaud sherry for always being the inspired one on excursions.

today i happily spent chatting with trevor, who sent me about 100 pics of chicago and of his dad and brother, then finally getting my shit together to run errands and get my daily exercise. daily exercise is a piece of shit in the summer. my knee is questionable, so i am taking a break from yoga and 'walking' at trevor's urging. one of the first things he learned about me (besides my general dope-ness) is that my mom is diabetic (2) and that i am likely on her heels to be the same. it scares him to death, much more so than it scares me, so he has commenced operation harass-the-shit-out-of-me about exercising every day. the upside about operation-pain-in-the-ass (covert name) is that walking around for 30-40 minutes actually qualifies as exercise, so i am able to do it most days.

i feel a couple of different ways about it. one, i find it ironic and a bit sad that trevor believes it necessary to actually ride my ass about exercise. it means that i've become this inactive person in his eyes, someone that sits on her ass and eat chips. (mmmmm...) ok, sometimes i do that. but generally i'm healthy and active (note that generally = when i don't live in china). here the pollution is terrible, my asthma is terrible, and i've paid about a billion yuan for a yoga membership that doesn't include a stairmaster. it means that as long as trevor has known me, i've been relatively sedentary, which is sad to me for some reason.

two (did i lose ya?), i am a bit concerned myself about my potential for developing this disease, and incredulous that this is actually happening to me. my mom tested my blood sugar when she was here and it was really high. i can't swear that it was after a full 8-hour fast, but regardless is was high enough to be considered pre-diabetic and i am not about to end up like my mom. so i decided that my reasoning (aka excuses, see above) for not exercising outside are paltry and lame and that i just need to do it. so far it's been going ok. i joined the boys at their muay thai class last sunday (note: not easy on my knee but fun as hell and i'm going again), and i've been walking or running. i haven't done it every day, but 3 out of 6 and it will be 4 out of 7 tomorrow. it's better than 0 out of 7.

so that's whats been up over here. not a lot.

fido and spot in the wok

http://tinyurl.com/5wdpx7

not for long! sorry, poor, disillusioned, naive PETA lady.




would like to point out that eating dog is deeply rooted in chinese (and filipino, and anywhere else where there are lots of peoples and they hungry) culture. that poor PETA woman needs a reality check. it ain't going away. it's just for show. people love to eat dog here. even the foreigners (above, trev and his best buddy) chow on dog ribs, paws, whatever. it's considered a special treat. trevor gets all FOB on me sometimes and will point out the best type of dog for eating if we happen upon one trotting down the street. only my mom does that, normally.

lots of people here don't eat tofu because it's good for them, more like it fits the budget or tastes good with pork, or stretches that nodule of ground pork for 5 people into a whole dish.

i ain't condoning shit. i eat meat - not dog, but i'm sure i've unwittingly eaten cat or some shit at some hole in the wall here that was billed as 'beef' or 'lamb' - but i draw the line at dog. i've eaten horse sashimi in japan. and ostrich, too, if i'm not mistaken. have also eaten raw chicken in japan. i ain't picky, but the thought of eating dog is pretty nasty and i can't get over the cultural taboo that kinda, you know, forbids the consumption of your pets. but i've also always had plenty of food in my lifetime, so i'm not judging. i'm a proponent of 'nose-to-tail' eating because it both reduces waste and, well, i grew up eating pig feet and fish cheeks, what can i say.

it's your own decision. i'm just saying it sure ain't disappearing from china's horizon any time soon.

being a big girl

...means learning how to pull myself out of a funk. i'm envious of sherry who is on jet air on her way back to civilization for 2 weeks, with all-you-can-drink bloody marys to help her along the way. i'm jealous of trev who is heading back next week. i can't put my finger on why i care so much since i'm heading back more or less permanently in a few weeks myself, but it may have to do with the massive mosquito buffet i've become, making me hate heat and humidity as my limbs swell with little knobby additions that will turn bright purple and make me look like i'm sprouting oddly-colored nipples all over my legs and feet.

i still have the scars from last summer and the summer before. i hate mosquitoes.

i don't venture out of the house or office without a generous dousing in DEET, insuring that my future offspring be born with three eyes or some shit. i can't survive without blasting the a/c. i am so dependent on chemicals and cooling machinery i can't understand how most of the world's population lives like this.

ok. that was little girl time. big girl time means i button it, pop a valium, and say nighty night.

we're obsessed with

http://youtube.com/watch?v=8AVebYQNV10&feature=related

this ridiculousness.

we keep sending each other different vids.

yes, we are 11 years old.

sleeplessness

there's a sense that things are drawing to a close, even though i'm going to be around for another couple of months. i don't really feel like i'm going to be here for another 60-odd days. trev is already getting his stuff together to ship off into the neverneverland of china post, and he's gone as of next week. i still have a bit of time, however i choose to think about it.

basically rounding up the rest of my task list before i leave work (and jesus is it LONG) and trying to do survivalist things like find a job in where i'm going to be relocating, and thinking about what household shit trevor and i are going to need (read: everything). oh yeah, and wresting my belongings from my family members, who have been both secretly and openly appropriating shit from my boxes in the garage. i guess that's what happens when you're too broke / cheap to rent a storage space.

weeks are booking solid in terms of extracurricular activities. have to work to squeeze in the odd yoga class or stay-at-home-and-watch-the-wire nights. at the rate that my apartment appears to retain heat these days, there's not much incentive to be home anyway. i am going to weigh about 300 pounds by the time i leave here. every evening is an opportunity to try this or that place either for the first time or one last time before i leave.

must. reign. in. appetite.

the more or less chronic GI tract issues that i have in the summers in asia seem to have little to no impact on my actual appetite. i like to think it actually makes my body MORE efficient at calorie absorption, therefore accounting for the beer belly i'm cultivating on my frame. and, for the first time in my life, i can actually attribute beer consumption (and dinners no earlier than 9 pm every day) for this unwelcome addition to my physique. if i wasn't so busy all of the time, it would rather suck.


waiting for the melatonin to work...

gu rei hai

chatting with t-money - who believes himself to be one of the more healthy-like-a-healthnut individuals in china, except for his LIVER, mr. smartypants - i realized that it had been weeks since i'd eaten a fruit that wasn't in a cocktail.

what?

i've had a busy past 4-6 weeks, ok? shit. i'm also only eating meals that come either from a delivery person or a package. ramen diet. at least i'm eating plenty of EGGS, the protein everyone here seems to subsist off of. besides pork, of course.

hee hee. show me a chinese person with a vitamin E deficiency and i'll show you a north korean escapee.

get out of town.

no way: http://www.fldsdress.com/

you may recall me going off about this in a previous post. gives the term, 'throwback,' a whole new meaning.

thanks sarah!