Shèngdàn kuàilè / 圣诞快乐 / Merry Christmas

Nonie filled the courtyard with festive lanterns to make sure Santa found us here in China.. It worked.

Chinese youth are embracing Santa and Christmas so I don't think it will be long before Santa adds another  1,300,000,000 people to his naughty or nice list and in all likelyhood will need to outsource his toy making.  But after viewing most of your gifts, you may have found that he has already outsourced much of his work. 



Hope Santa has found all of you and that your Christmas is everything you want it to be.



 

Made in China

They day started early, with Doctor J and I being coerced into decorating gingerbread cookies. All this before brunch. Nonie was on a mission to get ready for our 3rd annual "Get Free Decorations For The Christmas Tree" party.

Some called it a "sweat shop" but we preferred to call it a "sweet shop.' For a chance to indulge in Nonie's delicious desserts, our friends were required to produce not less then one Christmas tree decoration every 30 minutes with one fifteen minute coffee break and no Workman's Compensation, vacation pay or health benefits. 

With a lot of bah humbugs, they started slowly but with a warm, festive fire burning on the television and the sounds of Michael Buble singing Christmas carols in the background, they got busy.

















And voila, by the end of the night we had a fully decked out tree with all the trimmings. 











Awarding the prize for creativity was very difficult.

Ultimately the prize went to the newest members of our extended family. Helen and Konstantin, who were joined by their roommate Sveta, seen here in the middle.










We may have discovered a new business model. Still working on crunching the numbers but will keep all you prospective investors in the loop.

Thanks to Konstantin, for allowing me to use some of his picutres.  

CAR, CAR, CAR!

For my regular readers (all three of you), you have often heard me  comment on the number of  cars that are clogging up what was once a pristine car free campus.

With this in mind, I thought perhaps a little background research was necessary to confirm my  observations here at HIT. A microcosm of what is happening in China.

Even our young neighbor has been bitten by the car bug.

When we first visited Beijing in 2003, our impression then was of bicycles, bicycles and more bicycles. In 2003, 36% of all commuting (under 3 kilometres) in Beijing was done by either bicycle or walking.  Statistics for that period indicated that there were more bicycles in Beijing than people.

 







In 2011, less then 6% of commuting was done by bicycles. 

Some of the reduction can be attributed to the excellent Beijing public transit system that has developed, especially since the 2008 Summer Olympics. China has put the mass into mass transit. As well, there were over 80,000 taxis on the road in 2011 as compared to 50,000 in 2003.




In 2003 there were just over  3,000,000 private cars registered in China. In 2011, over 80,000,000 private cars are now registered. I am prepared to swear that most of them are driving at high speeds around the HIT campus.

In 2010, it was estimated that China would surpass all other countries and become the world's largest auto market outselling even the caraholic Americans. Mission accomplished.










Over 17,000,000 private cars were purchased by the Chinese in 2010 with that number expected to exceed 18,000,000 in 2012

Only 3 of  every 100 people in China own a car, as compared to 80 of every 100 people in North America. It is this number that has Chinese and World car manufacturers salivating. So many people, so little time.






 But China's road to the automobile has not been without cost. 
 
 
China has the highest rate of road fatalities and accidents in the world. While they have only 3% of all cars in the world, they have 22% all recorded highway accidents. I emphasize recorded. The Chinese are absolutely anal about reporting every little scrape and scratch. And there are a lot of them, amazingly not on taxis given their high mileage.  



The rise in automobile ownership in America brought stagnation and slow death  to the downtown cores of many North American cities. Cars gave people the freedom to live further from work. Their exodus to the "burbs" gave birth to the "mall" with their giant parking lots. This led to the creation of "freeways" to move these people back to the downtown which resulted in the invention of  "traffic jams" or as I like to call them, "slow parking lots".




The same problems are happening in Chinese cities.



There is no more rush in Harbin's rush hour.







China has put the jam into traffic jam with a recent one in Northwest China lasting more than three days. 



HIT's solution to the campus problem was to institute pay parking and install speed bumps along  with speed limit signs which for the most part are ignored.  The car is king in China and pedestrians are just mobile speed bumps.

I think we need to consider returning to the good old days.

Mission: Escape From China

Cue music.


Mr. Phelps, your mission, if you choose to accept it, will be a daring escape from China. You and your team will ex-filtrate yourselves from the Harbin Institute of Technology campus via public transportation and make your way to the Holiday Inn at 90 Jingwei Jie, Daoli District, Harbin.

 
Once there you will check in, using your real name. Go to your economy room immediately. Note, the first class room has more leg room.

Once there, shed several layers of clothes and slip into the hotel supplied warm, comfy terry towel robes.

Check out what movies are showing on HBO and watch some CNN while sipping inexpensive French wine.

Check the room service menu for North American like food and order as required. 

Spend the day reconnoitering the area near your hotel. In the evening, infiltrate a group of foreigners, posing as their friend. The designated meeting site has been set for the Starbucks on Zhongyang Dajie. The password is "Grande non-fat cappuccino."  Proceed to a wonderful, all be it expensive Japanese restaurant. Be careful of the saki.





Finish with a coffee dessert at at KFC before returning to base.


If you are prepared to accept this mission, make a reservation and ensure that your team enjoys itself. This tape will self destruct in 10 seconds.

Someone Forgot to Tell the Chinese

 
 The 5th Almost Annual HIT Foreign Teachers Invitational Open Ping Pong Tournament was held recently and came off with out a hitch. The only surprise, not a single event was won by a Chinese player. Shhhhh, don't tell the Chinese.

If you were to ask anyone from my generation, " What sport do the Chinese excel at?" and our immediate response would be "ping pong".  Ping pong was introduced to the Chinese at the beginning of the 20th Century by visiting/marauding Westerners.

 

China first appeared on the world stage at the World Championships in 1956, became world champions in 1961, a title they held for the next handful of years. . From 1965 to 1971, China closed itself off to the world (See history on Mao and Cultural Revolution), disappearing from international ping pong competition.

In 1971, ping pong became a bridge to once again open up China to the world.  Chinese and American teams met in competition, the event becoming known as "Ping Pong Diplomacy". It resulted in open communications between China and the USA for the first time in many decades and a visit by Nixon in 1972. By 1981, China once again dominated the sport, winning all the gold medals at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

So you are asking  yourself, "What happened in Harbin?" Once again the Powerful Persian, Abbas dominated defeating Doctor J in the final of the  A event. The B, C, D and E events were won by a Korean, Russian, Russian and a Korean respectively. Does this indicate a crack in China's continued dominance in ping pong.  If it is, the Chinese don't seem to worried, they are too busy dominating  other sports.

I first saw Wang Binyu in the World Univerisiade Games in Harbin in 2009 where she, much to my shock defeated the Canadian team in the gold medal event for curling.

 Yes, curling. She went on, a few weeks later to win the Women's World Curling Championships. I saw Binyu one more time when she captured the bronze medal in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.




 

She started curling for the first time in 2001 on a two sheet curling rink in Harbin and seen here in this picture. There are only two other curling facilities in China though I read, they are building a two sheet facility in Shanghai.

 
You can add swimming, diving, badminton, tennis, gymnastics and basketball to the list of China's current or future dominance in sports.  Yes basketball. Basketball has become huge in China. On most days, the 30 courts located outside our apartment are filled with students dribbling and slam dunking accompanied by the requisite yells and high fives. Even a little snow doesn't slow them down 

It hasn't exactly been an overnight sensation that some may think. Basketball was first introduced to China by the YMCA with the first recorded game played in 1895 by the Nankai Tigers.









China's first Olympic appearance was at the Berlin Olympics in 1936 where they actually won 1 game. They have since appeared in 10 more Olympics starting in 1975 at Montreal. They have dominated the sport in the Asian region for decades. The Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) is the most established  professional league in China, with 17 teams. Yao Ming is the most notable of seven players who started in the CBA and made it to the NBA. The NBA has a strong presence in China.

 At present there are about 10 ex-NBA players playing in the CBA with Tracy McGrady the most high profile player.

But I digress. We ended the tournament with a lovely dinner in a nice restaurant capped off by a delicious feed of Nonie's desserts. The perfect end to the 5th Almost Annual  HIT Invitational Open Ping Pong Tournament. 

 

Happy Thanksgiving

Where Halloween was beyond explanation, explaining Thanksgiving was a piece of cake. Just about every culture has a "harvest festival".

Mid-Autumn Festival- China                                             Sukkot- Israel
Têt-Trung-Thu- Vietnam                                                   Homowo Harvest Festival- Ghana
Ladainha- Goa                                                                Chu  Suk- Korea
Lughnasadh, Celtic Harvest Festival- Ireland                     Kadazan- Malaysia
Lohri- Northern India                                                       Onam- Southern India
Festival of Min, God of Vegetation and Fertility- Egypt      Martinmas- Holland      
Festival of Thesmosphoria, Goddess of Grain- Greece       Lammas- Scotland
Kinro Kansha no Hi- Japan        

You get the idea

So on Thursday, we celebrated American Thanksgiving at a local 5 Star hotel where I spent almost 10% of my monthly salary for the opportunity to tuck into the freshest turkey I have ever tucked into.

I am sure this baby had been strutting around the streets of Harbin just the day before. Given its pedigree, I am not sure we could call it a "free range" turkey, perhaps "freeway" or "boulevard" turkey might be more appropriate. But regardless which side of the tracks it grew up on, it was delicious.






Some illicit plastic baggies and voila, turkey sandwiches were available the next day. No cranberry sauce, so some  enjoyment was lost for Nonie. She sucked it up and still managed to make a few trips to the buffet.

The turkey came with all the trimmings, mashed potatoes, brown gravy, stuffing, whole crabs, squid slices with garlic shoots, mouth watering spareribs, pork steak, beef steak, smoked salmon and various amphibian parts, just to name a few of the 100+ dishes available to compliment our turkey.




For a finale, I marooned my self on the dessert island, intent on trying everything there. My buffet pants let me down and I had to be rescued about half way in. I think the cheesecake did me in.

Another successful Chinese Thanksgiving.

Spoooooky Gourds and Halloween Explanations

Explaining Halloween to our friends and our students at HIT has always been a challenge. It is a holiday that defies a simple explanation.







How can you explain:

• Dressing up in silly costumes. 

Nonie came as a Jacqueline-o-lantern while I came as a poisonous, endangered tree frog. What's silly about that. 

• Carving up a perfectly good pumpkin, then not eating it. 

New technology provided digital design suggestions for those pumpkin faces. I Pad to the rescue.

• Going from house to house threatening homeowners with tricks unless they give you treats

Here is Justin trying to look threatening and doing a very poor job. He did however receive his treats for placing second in the scariest pumpkin category. It should be known that the pumpkin judge had been taking pain medication for his bad back when he made that decision.


  

• Scaring the bejeezus out of people.

Irina trying to look scary. Not!  

Her pumpkin could be your best friend.


  

 

Most of our friends do not have a festival that remotely resembles Halloween so they had little to relate to.  It didn't stop them from having a good time.



 

All went home with a spooky gourd. Some of the gourds had a decidedly friendly demeanor but we didn't have the heart to tell our friends. After all, spooky is in the eye of the beholder.

A Quiet Trip To 香炉山

Our local tour guide, Mr. Doctor J, billed the trip as a tranquil hike in the mountains (snicker, snicker) near Harbin. But as savvy Chinaphiles, we know that quiet is a condition not easily found in China, so no surprises. Our destination was 香炉山, or as it is known in English, Mount (snicker, snicker) Incense Burner.

I



It was an early start to the day. Meeting Mr. Doctor J at 6:40, then a 20 minute walk to where we were to pick up our bus for a two hour ride to the mountain. (snicker, snicker) We arrived to find the street teeming with people and dozens of buses parked willy-nilly every where. No signage indicating where the buses were headed, our only clue to finding the bus was its license number provided by the tour company. We split up, going in different directions in hopes of finding it before the scheduled departure time. Eagle eyed Nonie was the first one to spot it and with a few cell phone calls got us all back to the right location.

We were scheduled to depart at 7:20. At 7:19, the bus was loaded and ready to roll.  The tour lady made a few announcements in Chinese and suddenly people were streaming off the bus and disappearing from sight. The cause for this exodus was her announcement that the trip would take about two hours with no bathroom breaks. We departed 20 minutes late, but with empty bladders.

The trip was quick with the emphasis on quick. The driver handled the 40 foot bus like an Indy car driver.  Two lanes magically became three lanes, anything smaller than us got the hell out of the way. The driver became one with the horn, honking at anything that moved or looked like it was going to move. Learned the Chinese phrase for "Aw shit". "Wa Choo!"






We arrived at the mountain (snicker, snicker) parking lot to find ourselves stalled behind a long line of buses waiting for their turn to park. The parking lot was a harbinger of what was to be our experience on the mountain. My two hour bladder required a trip to the public washroom before we shouldered our packs and waded into the crowd. It was the national holiday so it was going to be a crowded hike.









Our first view of the mountain (snicker, snicker) was impressive. The trees were just starting to change colour, with hints of yellow and red visible in scattered areas around the mountain. (snicker, snicker) We found that the mountain (snicker, snicker) was home to a large number of maple leaf trees which were providing these hints of colour.



I need to confess something at this point so I can quit using (snicker, snicker). I have been using the term, mountain (snicker, snicker) with some reservations, because living in B.C., I cannot honestly call Mount Incense Burner a mountain (snicker, snicker) but it is a darn fine hill.



The trail from the parking lot started out nice and wide with lots of room for the crowds of  mountaineers (snicker, snicker)(last one) that were here to tackle the mountain.

We discovered a newly constructed Buddhist temple about 15 minutes  into our climb. (snicker, snicker)(really my last one) Hence the name Mount Incense Burner. The temple was nice and shiny new, recently built as they were still finishing some patios and walkways surround the freshly painted shrines.

As we wandered about the mountain/hill we came across a number of other shrines, all considerably older. We have run into these temples and shrines  in other places. They don't really function as  temples anymore but are mostly maintained for the tourists who visit the sites.

A few tourists are practising Buddhists so take advantage of the shrines to burn incense and pray.

As we moved upward towards the peak, the trail started to get smaller. In many places, only room for one person on the trail.  Bottlenecks were becoming common. The trail started to follow a pretty stream that was as clear and clean as you would find anywhere. A definite anomoly in China.

The stream was crossed by several imaginative, concrete bridges. One was a  hollowed out log, another consisted of interlocking leaves.

One bridge that would have been a "law suit waiting to happen" in North America, was greatly enjoyed by the Chinese, with lots of yelling and laughing as they moved from swing to swing.

We summited about two hours into the hike and were rewarded with some great views of the countryside. Looking one way, you saw nothing but nature.

Looking in the opposite direction, the view consisted of thousands of acres of cultivated farmland dotted with small villages. 

Despite the crowds, the peak was very serene. I think the view took their breath away. Or perhaps it was the last  seriously steep 500 metre climb to the summit.

After enjoying the view for a few minutes, we continued down the mountain looking for a quiet spot to enjoy lunch. We became a topic of conversation for the hundreds of Chinese who passed us by as we ate our lunch and became a highlight in many Chinese family's holiday photos.The trip ended enjoying a Harbin Beer fresh from a mountain stream all the while fending off thousands of ladybugs. A number who attempted to commit suicide in my  beer.

One of the highlights/lowlights of our trip was the "ladybug" experience, something we have never seen before. The mountain/hill is home to a huge ladybug population. I could use the term "a plague of ladybugs". The air was so thick that you dare not open your mouth for fear they would fly in.