Food -- Gotta Have It!

Food – Gotta Have It!

We hope you ate some turkey for us on Thanksgiving! Actually, we ate at a Western hotel dinner buffet and had some turkey ourselves! Kitchens here don't have ovens, so the many foods we bake in America are not very popular here, or even possible. Meat is pretty expensive, so it’s usually cut into small pieces to make it spread further--usually chicken or pork, and all the fat is chopped up with it as well. Many non-meat products are flavored with meat, and every bit of the animal is utilized.

 We're eating a lot of peanut butter, eggs, and cheese. We get cheese from a small business that imports Western foods, however much of it is quite expensive. A box of Kraft mac and cheese is $4, and a Betty Crocker cake mix is about $5.  The local food is pretty cheap. Fruits and vegetables (some I don't recognize) cost less than at home, but its only available when in season. Butter and milk are sometimes hard to find but yogurt is a big seller.

Every week we try to find some comfort food—there are a couple of places that have burgers, and we have found a Turkish restaurant that is very good. If we’re really desperate for Western food, the chains we have here include Subway, Pizza Hut, McDonalds, and KFC.  Of course, to get to any of them is a long walk or a bus ride, so we really have to want them badly! 

We aren’t too far from a fairly good grocery store, and it’s always an adventure to shop. For example, there are probably ten to fifteen different kinds of eggs—you can choose on the basis of color (blue, gray, white, brown, speckled, clean or straight from the farm),the bird it comes from (type of chicken, goose, duck, quail, pigeon etc.) or the way you would like it prepared—raw, hard-boiled, fermented, or pickled, and how you would like it packaged-- vacuum-packed, in a carton, or loose (sold individually), to take home with you or as a quick on-the-go snack. 

That process can be repeated for any number of things from oil, rice, soy sauce, yogurt to chips and snacks. Of course, don’t try to find ketchup, jam or pickles!

Oils by the gallon--not apple ju

rice of many varities

chicken head soup?

Many things are not quite what the picture on the label represents.  How helpful it would be, we think, to have English to tell us what it is!

or maybe duck is more your taste

Tofu---we think!

Of course, sometimes the translation doesn’t really help identify the item!! Or make you want to sample it! Tofu, anyone?

The Chinese don't do candy!  We had some that tasted a little like milk-flavored dry noodles-let us know if you want us to bring some home for you!  Richard has found something he recognizes, even in Chinese!  So things aren't so bad!

Goodies!

And it tastes the same!

The majority of the foot traffic opts for street food.  There are many open air markets selling foods we don’t recognize. You can get your duck cooked, or pick out your favorite for Peking duck!

We only eat foods that we see cooked in boiling oil, so we know it’s safe!

Seaweed must be a delicacy

One of our staples at home is ice cream. It is almost nonexistant here. We did find Haagen Dazs, but at 99 RMB or $16 a pint. So eat some ice cream and think of us!

 

The Chinese are catching up with us by offering more quick prepackaged foods.  We enjoy finding those that have been translated into English or are recognizable by the picture portraying what’s inside. How about American prunes, anyone? Scarlet says they’re great! Of course we can't see why anyone in China would EVER need prunes!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 A Trip to the Dentist

We have been told numerous times by our students that the food in China is delicious. It must be an acquired taste. Since meat is at a premium around here, I try to consume it when available. Herein is the saga resulting from a single ox tail soup bone. One day, Suzanne had a helping of what appeared to be beef stew in our faculty dining hall. It turned out to be ox tail soup, complete with bones. A hidden bone assaulted a molar and broke off the back half.  After the initial insult from the ox tail bone, Suzanne was faced with several fundamental questions.

store front dental work, anyone?

The possibilities were: 1. Ignore it  2. Go to a street dentist or 3. Try to find a real dentist. One of Suzanne’s students gave a report on the Chinese medical system. She stated that everyone knows that the medical system is not very good, so the best thing to do is to stay healthy!  That’s sometimes easier said than done! Perhaps ignoring the problem until we were back in America would be a good option, but we have many months to go before returning home. One of the American teachers gave us a referral to a dentist. We only knew that he spoke English and he had at least one American satisfied customer. We made an appointment at the Fourth Military Medical Hospital. It turns out that this is the dental training hospital for the People’s Army. High government officials come here for dental work, which most need because they lived through the Cultural Revolution and therefore have fairly bad teeth.

The first visit was to determine if the tooth could be saved. The dentist ordered x-rays. We traveled to another floor in the building for x-rays. (10RMB = $1.60). The root looked good, so  step one was to drill and insert pins into the dentin to rebuild the shape of the tooth with filling material. (No Novocain). Two hour procedure, 350 RMB = $56. Then she waited two weeks to see if the tooth survived the procedure.

 

Survival meant a crown was in order, tooth death meant root canal. It was a long two weeks. We appreciate the prayers of each of you and knowing that we are included in most prayer circles. The tooth survived, so two weeks later Suzanne met with another dentist who was a crown specialist. There was a lot of grinding and weeping and wailing but no gnashing of teeth. This time there was Novocain ! (10 RMB for the shot.) She left with a temp. crown.

We celebrated by eating a long donut-like thing that had been boiled in oil! Two more weeks and the final visit saw the permanent crown installed. The crown came with a one year guarantee on workmanship and materials. Total cost was $570. Less than the copay in the good old USA. We’ll spare you the photo of the tooth! 

We’re surviving and are well and happy.  Every day brings a new adventure!

 

 

 

 

Marathons and Speech Contests - Chinese Style

Xi’an International Marathon

 

 

  

 

We participated in the Xi’an International Marathon on Nov 3 here in Xi’an.  There is an ancient wall surrounding the old Tang Dynasty capital, which is the city center today.  The race is an international event that is run on the top of the 13.8 km wall.  The wall, in fact, is the oldest complete city wall in the world. (Started in 600s AD) Each participant received a race shirt and number to run in the 5K, half marathon or the full marathon.  The university encouraged all of the foreign teachers to participate. They paid the entry fee, got us official race uniforms, hauled us to the wall in the university bus, cheered us on and even took us to lunch in the Muslim Quarter for dumplings after the race. Since we are old, out of shape and one of us has artificial joints, we opted for the 5K, and reported promptly at 8 a.m.  There were 30,000 participants!  Even some runners from Kenya had flown in!  There were cash prizes for the top ten finishers in each category: boy/girl marathon, boy/girl half marathon and boy/girl 5K. There were even guards dressed as terra cotta warriors on duty to honor the past and the location of the race.  As we waited our turn for the 5K to begin, we tried to keep warm—the day started out about 36 degrees!  The men started first, and then the women a few minutes later.  I found my running mate walking slowly, waiting for me, and we “power-walked” the wall!  We completed the race, receiving green ribbons as our rewards. And the photographers went wild! Our goal was to not finish last! We accomplished our goal. There were several wheelchairs and one-legged runners behind us. But then we were busy taking pictures and admiring all those young sleek serious runners. Our Xi’an Marathon shirts (nice running shirts, not cheap Chinese t-shirts!) will be one of our most prized souvenirs.  

A Speech Contest –Chinese Style

Suzanne and I were invited (to refuse would be a faux pas) to judge our department’s speech contest. Since we speak English, we are automatically qualified to perform this task. A Chinese teacher picked us up at our apartment at 4:30 PM for the ride to the new campus 45 minutes away. (remember that we live at the old campus). The speech contest was to start at 7:00 so we had some time to kill after we arrived. Since Suzanne’s classes are over at noon each day, she never gets to hang around the campus like I do, so I treated her to dinner in the faculty dining room. I recognized the name “beef” on one of the choices that looked like beef stew. Chunks of meat and potatoes were recognizable. We got some, how bad could it be? The meat turned out to be ox tails. Complete with genuine ox tail bones. Suzanne broke a tooth on a bone, but that dental experience will be reported in a future blog.

After dinner we settled ourselves in the judge’s chairs to await the speeches. We had scoring sheets, bottles of water, fancy pens – everything we needed to pass judgment on the participants. We had a great time. Several of Suzanne’s students were the entertainment at intermission. Two of my students won 1^st and 2^nd place. Several more placed. It was our first time to interact with the students outside of class. It was a wonderful experience. It was so much fun that I volunteered to judge the University Speech Contest the following week. I am the public speaking teacher so I coached our departmental students on their grammar and delivery style. They were locked and loaded!

The day arrived, the judges were introduced, the speeches started. After the first three speeches, it was announced that the judges would be excused to confer. The head judge asked me the order of my choices. I said my ranking was #2, #3 and #1 in that order. The second American judge agreed with me. He then stated that his ranking was #2, #1, and #3. He then asked the other Chinese judges who (surprise, surprise) agreed with him. We went back to the hall and proceeded to listen to 25 speeches; some were very good and some were pretty lame. This whole process took the better part of three hours. At the end, after drum rolls, balloons and confetti, the winners were announced. My students won 3^rd and 4^th place. The winner was a speaker that I had put way down on my list. In class the next day, I tracked down my students and told them what a great job they had done and that I had scored them much higher than the girl who won the competition. They were both OK with the outcome and told me that the winner was the Dean’s graduate student and everyone knew that she would win! Of course, the main Chinese judge that the others always agreed with was—you guessed it—the Dean!  Speech Contest –Chinese Style!

 

Do you need to be married to travel the Silk Road?

We are Married!

When you come to China as a tourist, you must pay ~$170 to get an L visa, which is good for six months. We upgraded to a Z visa which is good for 360 days. You have 30 days after your arrival in China with a Z visa to apply for your work permit, which we needed to work in China and to travel. We arrived on Thursday, Sept 6, 2012 and started “work” on the following Monday. On Sept 23, our waiban (foreign teacher handler) called us up to say that she would take us to the police station the next day to get our work permit. 

We went to her office and filled out a bunch of papers that were all in Chinese. She told us what to write in each blank. She then attached 4 of our passport photos in different places on the forms and then they received the customary red stamp that everything in China requires. As we were leaving her office she told us to bring 400¥ each, our passports and our marriage certificate to take to the police station the following day. MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE??? No one said that we needed to bring a marriage certificate to China. We said that we didn’t have it with us and could we register as two single people? “Of course not”, we were told, “that would be illegal”. 
We explained that our house was packed up and people were living there. We were left with the prospect of having one of our kids go to the house, look where we think it might be, maybe finding it, scanning it and emailing it to us within 12 hours. Suzanne hit on the idea of Microsoft Office document center.  A few short hours later we were married, complete with the Seal of the State of Utah.  Our “marriage certificate” was rushed to the university translation department. After a few hours of careful scrutiny, it made its way back, complete with the required red   stamp! Whew, that was a close one.  We had a work permit to travel and to continue to teach our classes in China!

Silk Road Trip

Uighur musician

Urumqi International Bazaar

We flew from Xi’an to Urumqi in the far northwest China, near the borders of Russia and Mongolia. Ninety five percent of the Chinese are Han Chinese. This region is inhabited by some of the 5% minority, the Uighur (weiger) and Hui peoples. These folks are followers of Islam. The people of the northwest are closer to eastern Europeans and central Asians than to the Chinese. They have their own language, customs and culture. Since the discovery of vast natural resources in the area, the mother country was concerned with local ideas of separation and independence, so a modern railroad was constructed from China proper to the western regions and millions of Han moved (were sent) to the western province to fill most positions of responsibility. There is still much separation between them to this day.

We went to the Grand International Bazaar, touted to be the largest bazaar in the world. I could hardly wait. Stuff from everywhere, right here under one roof, what a deal! Well, after the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, the bazaars in Cairo and Jerusalem, the Grand International Bazaar in Urumqi was like a yard sale in Snellville, GA.  But it was a lot of fun to haggle over dried fruit prices and see 15 varieties of almonds.  Suzanne managed to find a few more silk scarves to add to her collection.

 

An interesting aside:  In most Muslim countries, you are aroused in the wee hours of the morning by the call to prayers. In China, since the Socialists are not exactly church-going-folks, the Muslims are not allowed to have any amplification to the call to prayers. Therefore, us Christians can sleep right through them. In my opinion, this is Carl Marx’s most significant contribution to the modern world.

Muslim Cemetery

We visited several ruins of ancient cities and Buddhist temples. We saw the Cave of 1000 Buddha’s.  Of course, no photos were allowed. These ruins Date from the 7^th to 10^th centuries. Most of the artifacts of the area were spirited away by European archeology “collectors” in the 1800s. The locals are still upset about that. However, if the artifacts had not been safe in European museums, then they would have been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution of China in the 1960s. 

    

One of the best things about getting out of Xi’an was seeing the blue sky. Our city air is brown, unless it’s the day after a rain. Then it’s a little better.  We’re anxiously awaiting the addition of the coal fired steam plants that will provide heat starting November 15, when the government decides we can have heat. Then we’ll wonder—what sky?



After poking around in the ruins of 13^th century mud huts we had the distinct privilege of an overnight trip in a “soft sleeper” train compartment to the city of Dunghuang. This is in contrast to a “hard sleeper” compartment which costs less. Let me give you an idea of a Chinese bed. Imagine a slab of concrete. Do you have that “firmly” fixed in your mind? If you take a luxurious bath towel and lay it on the concrete slab – that is a typical Chinese bed. Well, the soft sleeper had TWO bath towels under us!  

We rode camels in the Gobi Desert and then visited more Buddhist caves along with half the population of the province (because all the 1.3 billion Chinese take the same week of vacation. The mid-autumn festival was in full swing. As far as we can tell, all Chinese go outside, look at the moon and eat a Moon Cake.  I must take a minute to describe a Moon Cake. We received them as gifts from our students, they were in every store, they were sold on every street corner. They were wrapped in bright colored foil, in elaborate gift bags and boxes. We were gracious as we accepted them and opened them with great anticipation. Unfortunately, the closest comparison to them would be a 5 year old fruit cake. We have been using several as door stops.

Cave of 1000 Buddhas

Satillite Dish and Skylight in mud hut

Moon Cakes in Gift Box

 

Duck dumplings anyone?

Then came a treat-- we attended a cultural variety show that rivals any BYU production (well, maybe BYU Idaho, or possibly a Stake Dance competition!) which included a dumpling dinner. The shape of the dumplings gives a hint of what delicacy is found inside. After this we lugged our suitcases onto the subway of Xian and headed home to our Chinese bed that has a foam pad on top to rest from our vacation! Monday it’s back to the classroom.