Out and about! (Marcus)

Well I would have to say the number of blog posts we're putting up is definitely dwindling with time - perhaps the initial excitement of being on Mars is wearing off, or perhaps we've just been tired and unmotivated. I think it's probably a combination of the two as while most things now don't seem as out there as they initially did, stuff's still out there, don't you worry about that.

We get into so many situations on a daily basis that just feel like they're - well they just remind me of the movie Lost in Translation; a favourite of mine and one i totally reccomend if you haven't seen it. In the movie Bill Murray is in Japan and goes from place to place experiencing the weird and wonderful and basically reacts with a complete lack of surprise as if it's the norm. This is effectively how we feel most of the time, surrounded by the completely abnormal and the longer we're here the less we react to it. It just is and we enjoy that feeling.

Last night for example we went out to see a movie in a place called the Peninsula Plaza, which is sort of in the direction of Lake Tai Hu(which we have still yet to explore further since our first 30 minute visit).

The plaza itself was your typical shopping mall but had possibly the worst design I have ever seen. Getting around it was completely and utterly illogical. The cinema was on level 5 - yet of course the lift only went up to lvl 4. On one side of it were the lifts, the other escalators - but they were only in one location. To get anywhere you had to practically circle the whole damned place. We found the cinema by going to level four and just 'exploring'. That's right, exploring. There was nothing even up there, just empty shops. We walked through one such empty shop to what looked like an internet cafe/gaming arcade(which was naturally filled with people - computer games = no.1 chinese past time). From there we hopped in a lift which happened to then have a level 5. We went up and voila, modern looking cinema!

We bought our tickets, which involved matching the chinese characters on the Iron Man poster to the characters above the ticket office and then went back downstairs to a German restaurant/bar called HB's(haussenbroff or something germanish!) Now we took the elevator straight down to level 1(1 being ground floor in China) and were in the middle of a busy shopping centre. Do you think we could find our way back to the goddamned massive middle area of the shopping centre? Christ no! I knew what direction it was in, and it was roughly 20 metres away, but we could not find it - unbelievably. So back up we went to level 5, back through the empty shop, around the whole centre middle, down 3-4 banks of escalators and finally we're there. Even Jesus would have been phased by this.

So we went and had a meal of Curry Sausages which was on their weekly special menu. The meal itself was delicious but I have my doubts as to whether they were german sausages or not. They tasted like just regular frankfurts covered in tomato sauce, served with chips(good chips mind you - a rarity in most chinese places that have chips), and the whole thing was sprinkled with curry powder.

It was very tasty regardless. As the chef delivered the meal he said to us - have a taste first then I will come back and maybe you can give me some advice! Um ok!

So we ate the meal, complete with 2 cans of sprite - sprite being more expensive than beer at _30rmb_ (like 10 bucks) - you can get a corona at a bar for 26 rmb etc. Then over came the chef whose name was Michael, and we chatted about the meal, his history as a chef etc etc. Nothing unusual here, this is China. He was really nice, and wanted our email address so he could keep in touch, so we gave it to him and he gave us each his card.

As we're chatting the band was setting up then started performing. The band consisted of two guys and two girls, both in hotpants. They were all colour co-ordinated and their instruments consisted of a pair of bongos, a keyboard and some microphones. They were playing to what was basically an empty restaurant. There was one table across the other side of the room with 4 chinese people at it, then us. So they spent most of the time looking at the waiter staff at the rear of the room...and us. It was so uncomfortable. Almost like a private performance. I am sitting there trying not to make eye contact with the two women singers who every time I looked at the stage I somehow achieved. I wanted to be wearing horse blinkers. So we finished chatting with Michael as we had to leave, we both went to the bathroom - the female's apparently stunk to high hell as one of the toilets was blocked off with 'issues', then left. As we left I glanced at the band and they waved to me - one of the girls waving mid-bongo beat :) Ah i love this stuff.

So the movie itself was enjoyable and another experience, but again it didn't feel anything other than normal really. I wanted to see Iron Man at a cinema and was glad to find one via the expat forum that was playing it in English. We bought our tickets without issue and we received a card which gave us a free popcorn(naturally it was sweetened) and two free cokes. Good deal really. We went in and it was a nice modern cinema, just like back home - in fact the seats were probably more comfortable. There were around 20 people total I would say in the cinema - basically empty.

I had read about what to expect during a movie in China and was not let down. I couldn't help thinking about how much Sam would have loved it - as if anyone has been to a movie with Sam in the last few years they'll understand how much he loves it when people talk or makes noise around him :) Ok he's the cinema monster!

So the movie volume was up pretty damned high and I think that was because the Chinese present..talked at normal volume all the way through the movie. Talked and dicked around with their mobile phones. Courtney commented during the movie, "It is like being in our living room", yep - exactly like it. I was surprised no-one was talking on their phone actually - or maybe they were - it was all Chinese to me. I am also surprised there was no-one smoking in there. The girl beside Courtney had two mobile phones in her hand and from the beeping coming out of them, she was transferring MP3's or something between them. Oh by the way check it out THERE'S A MOVIE ON DONCHA KNOW!

Anyhow it was enjoyable enough. Thankfully the volume on the movie was loud enough that the chatter and phone sounds didn't really bother me. Sam on the other hand... ;)

And now for some random unrelated photographs that I've collected with my own mobile over the past few weeks.

When we went to Xi Hui park a week or two ago, I grabbed a photo of this woman riding her scooter. You can't see it very clearly, but between her legs, and completely blocking her view forward..was of course an ironing board.

If you remember after the park we went to Pizza Hut. The man who served us was Allison. I tried to get a ninja shot of the name tag but this was the best I could manage. My damned phone make's an anti-upskirt sound effect :(

Every Tuesday I teach my first of two gifted classes. These are super smart, younger kids and without doubt my favourite classes. If you look closely you can see a little boy with a white shirt tucked into brown pants - and pulled up nice and high, chinese style! This little guy is named Taylor and he runs to meet me before class. He is my welcome wagon. I always joke to Courtney that if I leave late he'll be right outside our apartment door when I leave - well sure enough last class he was almost there! I met him and two others just across from our apartment! They crack me up, they're so damned cute. We have a nice little chat as we walk to class.

In my second gifted class on Wednesday I was watching one of the kids - whose name I think is Tom(named after Tom and Jerry - and yes there is a Jerry in the class as well), spraying something on his arm then rubbing it in. I was curious as I thought it might have been fly repellent, and sure enough it was. I asked to have a look at it as I have been bug target no.1 and sure enough, it's toilet water. Colour me surprised!

Now this was a rare treat. Top right, we have curls of chicken meat that have been deep friend. And that's it. It tasted exactly as it looked. There were no hidden bones, nothing, the meat was good. The bowl they came in was largely untouched, the Chinese preferring to go for the plate of fish heads beside it(Heh and you think i'm trying to be funny by saying that too!). We had these twice this day, for lunch and dinner and it was damned nice to have something normal for one. Any time there's meat of any kind, you bite into it and there's bone in it. It's never EVER as easy as it looks. The only thing, and i mean only thing that was a little weird about these was one of Courtney's had what appeared to be...feathers, poking through the batter on one of hers. Hmmm. Top left of course we have the over-boiled Bok Choy. We are so utterly over Bok Choy it's not funny. Spit!