Golden Weekend Part I
October 10, 2008
I haven't yak-ked in a while but had so much going on recently.
Last Friday, Zoe and her family kindly offered to take me with them on their 2-day trip to Chengjiang, Yixi and the surrounding areas.
I met them 10am in the morning. They were leaving from their grandparent's house, which was convenient as they lived 2 minute away from the program house. We drove for about an hour and half, and arrived at a town where we had lunch at Wei Wei (Zoe's 16-year-old Chinese sister, she's incredibly good at rubics cube)'s aunt's place. After lunch, we headed to a lake where it was packed because it was golden week. We couldn't find a place to park for a while, but eventually got out onto the beach.
It was probably my first time swimming at a beach in October (except probably in New Zealand where the seasons are flipped). It was a small, artificial golden beach. There was a small beautiful island in the middle with some traditional structures on it. To get to the island, we rented a boat and got on a 10-seater bicycling boat. We were in the same boat with five other Chinese men and women in their late twenties and thirties, but we were slow to get started as we needed to push the boat off the beach initially and nobody bothered to do it. So Zoe and I got off the boat into the water and showed them how to get a boat started.
However, they were kind enough to let me sit at the back where I could steer the boat. They told us that since they had already been to the lake numerous times, we could go wherever we want which was very generous. When we got close to the island, Zoe, Wei Wei and I jumped off the boat and swam towards the lake. The water was very refreshing and we also clung on to the boats to help us navigate in water.
After we got back from the island, we chilled at the beach for a while. Zoe read as usual and Wei Wei and I built a castle with tunnels through it ("toad houses" in Korean as I used to call them when I was little) and were in the middle of digging a canal from the ocean to the castle to build a water city like Venice when we had to leave. It even had a Great Wall and trenches to stop rising tides but we didn't have time to see my golden city come to completion. There were also some guys playing beach soccer but I couldn't join them because they were leaving.
We then headed for dinner at a restaurant, and Wei Wei's dad was clearly displeased. Wei Wei told us that he had probably lost money while playing Ma-zhang with his friends, and as Wei wei told us Chinese people sometimes bet as much as 600 RMB ($100) per round, I could feel his pain. It was also interesting to see him use his lighter to set fire on bai jiu (white liquor?) to help him with his hand that was injured from running into a door or something. Wei Wei's dad loved to talk and he'd lecture on for hours to all of us. He didn't speak standard Mandarin (putonghua) and when we asked Wei Wei what his dad was talking about, Wei Wei said 'college.'
We had some of Wei Wei's family friends at the dinner, one of whom was a 14-year old boy whom both Zoe and I agreed looked more like 10. Mark had told me that because Chinese kids live sheltered lives with few chances to develop their independence, they often mature about two years slower than American kids and for many of the Chinese kids I met, this immaturity was even manifest in their physical appearance.
This boy followed us to our hotel, and I was asked to room with him. When I asked where he lived, however, I discovered that he lived 5 minutes away from the hotel. His parents were staying home, but they had paid for a night at hotel just so his son could practice his English with me, which reminded me of all those eager Chinese high schoolers and college students at the English corner night at the Green Lake Park.
Luckily, for me, the boy fell asleep by midnight and I could enjoy some quiet reading time.
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