China | Speaking of China

Guest Post: Larry – a Short Tale of Ignorance or Cross-Cultural Misunderstanding

Cross-cultural misunderstandings are a huge pitfall in dating abroad, including here in China.

Just imagine what it must have felt like for Ava Ming, the English blogger behind My Oriental Life, when she heard these words from her date for the evening, a Chinese guy she met in Shenzhen: “I really want to kiss you, Ava, but I’m scared that I might get AIDS because all Africans have AIDS.”

Whoa!

Read on to learn the whole story of how things fell apart between her and Larry.

Do you have a shocking tale of cross-cultural misunderstandings or other guest post you’d like to see featured here on Speaking of China? Visit the submit a post page to learn more about becoming a guest poster for this blog.
—–

Shenzhen, China (photo by Ramon Boersbroek via Flickr.com)

I’ve often considered telling the story of my first Chinese date. But usually I’ve declined, thinking it was too personal, perhaps too upsetting and might also give the impression that I dislike Chinese men, which is really not the case at all.

But the event occurred a while ago now back in 2013. After reading about others who’ve braved their souls on Jocelyn Eikenburg’s fabulous blog, I’ve decided to share. Besides, who knows, maybe someone else could have or has had a similar experience?

I met Larry at the terminal subway station. There were very few commuters around. I was curious as to why he came so close, sitting right next to me on an empty train, leaving a small space between us.

I noticed his glances in my direction, wondering if he was trying to work up the courage to ask if he could practice his English with me. Pretty soon he introduced himself and asked me where I was from, which led to a conversation.

He told me that he was a professional who’d travelled to various European cities but never England. He was 37, unmarried and feeling the pressure from his parents to change his single status. I enjoyed our talk during the long ride but initially didn’t read anything into it. Around that time I seemed to be making a lot of new Chinese friends while on various subway rides. I guess I must have exuded an approachable air!

As we approached his stop he told me that he thought I was pretty. He couldn’t believe no other Chinese guy had made me his girlfriend. Then he asked for my number and if we could go to dinner.

Have to admit I was pretty surprised. Until then I’d been under the impression that Chinese guys would never be so forward due to a natural or cultural shyness. I said I wasn’t sure about a date but we could talk from time to time.

Over the next fortnight he sent regular messages via text and email usually beginning with ‘hello, my angel.’ Yes, Larry was a charmer but the messages did make me smile.

Eventually we set up a date and met on a hot and sticky Friday evening. By now I knew that I wasn’t romantically attracted to him, but I did like his personality and I was interested in meeting more people and expanding my circle of Chinese friends. I also assumed that he didn’t have intentions of getting serious with me either. His parents probably weren’t expecting him to marry a foreign girl.

The date was nothing special. The best word to describe it would probably be ‘nice,’ well up to a point anyway. We ate rice in a Japanese restaurant and then went for a walk in the park. He kept guiding me towards secluded places, which I thought was a bit strange. But then he’d comment on the sculpture, or lotus flower pond, or round leafy bush we’d stumbled upon.

I still wasn’t feeling any chemistry towards him. But he had a gentle humour and I thought perhaps we could be friends in the future.

Approaching 10pm I wanted to leave, having made plans to go dancing, but Larry wasn’t ready. He insisted on ‘just ten more minutes’ and took me to a bench by the side of the river, again another secluded place. When we sat down he made a confession.

“I really want to kiss you, Ava, but I’m scared that I might get AIDS because all Africans have AIDS.”

I was literally struck dumb at his ignorance. Then I became so angry I actually felt tears welling up. Angry tears have a whole different feeling to ones of sadness or joy.

We’d already discussed my family history, him being impressed that my parents were from Jamaica and that I was born in England. But regardless of place of birth, how could he be so naive? In addition, was there no filter in his brain to tell him exactly when to shut-up?

I told him that AIDS didn’t originate from Africa, but was initially a disease among gay white men in New York. I pointed out that he should really think before he speaks and that he shouldn’t believe so strongly in stereotypes. On top of this, why on earth had he asked me out if he’d thought I was ‘unclean?’

Seeing my distress he insisted that I’d misunderstood when we both knew that I hadn’t. To make matters worse, he then pulled me close and tried to kiss me! Saying; “look, see, I know you don’t really have AIDS!”

I wanted to storm off in a huff, but it’s kind of difficult when you don’t know where you are, so we caught the bus back together. He begged me not to tell anyone because he didn’t want to lose face. I made no such promise. If he’d just ended the date at 10pm before his confession maybe we would have become friends, although then I would never have known what he was really thinking.

For a long time I dismissed the idea of dating another Chinese guy. If this was the common school of thought then what would be the point?

A short while later I discussed his theory with my Chinese friends, many of whom also believed that AIDS originated in Africa, but none of whom believed that all Africans have it.

As for Larry, he called and emailed several times to apologise for upsetting me. I accepted his apology but declined his offers to go for a drink. Making someone cry on a first date, even if they were tears of frustration, is really not an auspicious beginning!

As I mentioned this was a while ago and I have since relaxed my guard, becoming more open to Chinese men who just want to talk. But as for dating? Not sure. For that I think I’ll need a little more time.

I’m Ava Ming, born in England to Jamaican parents and currently living in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, China where I write and teach English.
—–

Speaking of China is always on the lookout for outstanding guest posts! If you have something you’d like us to feature, visit the submit a post page for details — and then submit yours today.

Share/Save

I Never Expected to End up in China, but It Changed My Life (and Love) Forever (Pub’d on Ninglidating.com)

Ning Li of Ning Li Dating has just published a guest post I wrote for him titled I Never Expected to End up in China, but It Changed My Life (and Love) Forever. Here’s an excerpt from the full post:

China? You want to go to China?

I’ll never forget the way friends and family questioned me back in 1999 when I announced my decision to spend a year teaching English in Zhengzhou, China after my graduation that year. And who could blame them? Nothing about my life suggested all roads lead to China.

I studied environmental biology in college, minored in Spanish and chemistry, and the only foreign country I had ever lived in was Spain (when I studied abroad in Granada for a semester). I hadn’t spent my childhood dreaming of visits to the Great Wall or the Terracotta Warriors. I couldn’t even speak a word of Mandarin Chinese and hadn’t read much about Chinese history since my sophomore year in high school.

It was one of the craziest decisions I had ever made – a total detour from everything I had planned before.

Head on over to Ning Li Dating to read the full post. And if you love it, share it!

P.S.: Ning Li also penned a fantastic guest post for my blog titled She Broke My Heart and Saved My Life – the Cheerio Girl Story. It has attracted a ton of comments and Ning is even planning a part 2 to the story. Check it out!

Share/Save

Father-In-Law on the Roof? Strange Scenes During Extreme Cold in Southern China

There are things you never expect to see in a lifetime. Like watching a grown man whack snow off the roof with a bamboo pole.

My father-in-law standing on the roof of the house, whacking snow away with his bamboo pole.

I still couldn’t believe it when I caught a glimpse of this. Was that really my father-in-law balancing himself up there, pole in hand? Or was I having a strange hallucination induced by the bitter cold?

Nope, that was him all right. My husband even snapped a photo to prove it.

Then again, I’m still in shock over the thick white blanket of snow covering my husband’s home village these past few days. And the -4 degree temperatures outside my window.

I have to admit, the weather is messing with my head. It’s completely turned upside down my perceptions of winters here in the Hangzhou, China region. Everyone (including my husband) has always assured me that winters here are mild and, generally speaking, that’s what I’ve experienced in all the years I’ve lived here.

But now arctic cold from the North Pole has invaded China as far South as Zhejiang Province – our province – and it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced here. Suddenly I feel as if I’m back in Cleveland, Ohio all over again, where I grew up. Except, instead of the things I’m accustomed to having in the face of freezing winter cold and snow (like indoor heating and insulated plumbing), we have to manage without them.

Strange things have happened too – beyond just seeing my father-in-law on the roof of the house. For example, the window in my bedroom won’t budge because it has frozen itself shut. We’ll have to wait until the temperatures rise above zero (which we expect tomorrow, according to the weather forecasts) before we can open them.

Shoveling snow in the front yard with my niece.

I’ve always said I never knew the winter cold until I lived here in Hangzhou – which is ironic for a woman who grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, a city renowned for its bone-chilling winters complete with heavy snowfall and even the occasional blizzard. But in Cleveland, Ohio, we are well-armed against the winter, comfortably tucked behind our insulated walls and indoor heating. Here in Hangzhou, we have none of that – and instead just make do with electric blankets, space heaters and hot coals.

These days of extreme winter cold, however, have felt like an intimate introduction to the most frigid and forbidding side of the season. I’ve never felt more grateful for the warmth of my electric blanket and my sturdy space heater.

We will survive.

And fortunately, the weather forecasts promise a business-as-usual winter to resume in the next few days. The temperatures will once again hover above freezing. We’ll be able to open the windows again. And with the melting snow, my father-in-law will no longer need to visit the roof with his sturdy bamboo pole.

I expect this won’t be the last time we’ll have some unusual winter days here. Global warming is wreaking havoc with weather patterns around the world, which means the season could become as unpredictable as my five-year-old niece’s mood swings.

Still, who’s to say it’ll always be like this in the family home? After all, the family has plans to rebuild the house in the next few years. And just the other day at lunch, while discussing the new home, my husband couldn’t help but ask, “What about adding in a little central heating?”

Share/Save

Surviving Winter in a South China Family Used to Living Without Heating

‘Tis the season to be sneezing. And I should know. I’ve had three cases of common colds/flus last month alone. That’s right – more often than not, you could find me reaching for the Kleenex or a throat lozenge in December (thank you, Golden Throat Lozenges).

Of course, it’s one thing to come down with a cold – and another to be sick when you’re living in a part of China (rural Hangzhou) that doesn’t have heating in the winter. Consider the following comments I heard one evening from my husband and his parents when I was coughing and sneezing at the dinner table:

“You should wear more clothing,” said my mother-in-law, admonishing me for only wearing three layers of clothing and a scarf.

Then my husband, who shot me a disapproving glance, added, “You haven’t been keeping warm enough.”

It was an echo of the way my mother used to warn us not to catch cold when playing outdoors in the snow. But here I was, sitting inside their home and – by their measure – still putting myself at risk for more sickness.

Like myself, everyone else at the dinner table was bundled up in their jackets and multiple layers — something I would have never seen back at my parents’ home in the US.

I grew up in a little white house in the suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio, a world where every house had insulation and central heating, including ours. As someone with a particular aversion to the cold, I’m pretty certain I was the biggest fan of our household thermostat (much to my parents’ chagrin, since they had to foot the bills). I recall many a snowy afternoon bounding into the home after school, when I would promptly turn up the thermostat and prop myself up against one of the heating ducts in the living room. This, combined with the occasional hot bath, was what helped me through the long and often bitter winters in Cleveland.

Leave it to me to marry into a family in Southern China, where people are used to winters without heating in their homes.

Rural Hangzhou is below China’s “Mason-Dixon line” for heating — Anhui’s Huai River and the Qinling Mountain Range – which means that while folks North of that line enjoy steam heating in the winter, we don’t. Granted, Hangzhou isn’t that Northern overall. The city sits at the same latitude as New Orleans and Houston, and would never have the kind of winters I knew as a child — plenty of well-below-freezing temperatures, guaranteed snowfall every year, and even the occasional blizzard. But the high humidity of this subtropical climate means that when it gets cold, you feel it deep in your bones. It’s days like that when I pine for a thermostat to turn up or a heating duct of my own.

But I know, central heating just isn’t what people do here, including my family. They’ve adapted to the winter in ways that I’m not accustomed to — such as always wearing a winter jacket, even when you’re indoors. That means that sometimes, we don’t agree on what constitutes being warm enough inside the house, or how many layers you need to wear to prove that common cold wasn’t your fault.

Through my family, I’ve come to accept that this is what people do here to survive the winter. It just works for them.

For me, it’s another story. I’d love to say I’ve completely embraced how people manage the winter here, but I haven’t. I still fear those one or two days of the season when it’s zero degrees Celsius outside, causing the indoor temperatures to plummet.

I have learned, though, that it’s possible even for me to survive with the right preparations, like a good electric mattress pad and a space heater. (In fact, most days in the winter you’ll probably find me tucked in bed under the covers, staying warm!)

And while I’ll never have the same courage before the cold as my mother-in-law, at least she understands that I need extra preparations to make it through. A month ago, she gifted me with another heavy winter quilt that I never asked her to buy for me. Now that’s love.

Meanwhile, my husband is proof that anyone can change their perspective on heating. He may still side with his mom when it comes to whether I’m wearing enough clothing or actually kept myself warm these days. But he always sides with me about the electric mattress pad and the space heater. “Ahhh, a nice, snug, warm bed!” That’s what he always says when he crawls under the perfectly preheated covers.

I think it’s only a matter of time before I convert him to the “dark side” of central heating. 😉

Share/Save

Photo Essay: Walking in a (China) Winter Wonderland

Okay, don’t hate me for saying this, but…here in China, I actually look forward to the winter.

I know, I know. This is winter after all. The coldest season of the year!

But here in the Hangzhou region, winter happens to be one of the best seasons for hiking. And ever since we’ve discovered a beautiful little hideaway in the mountains, it’s become our own private “winter wonderland” for evening walks.

When John and I happen to stay at his family home in rural Hangzhou, the best part of our afternoon comes when we pull on our fleece (or nowadays, down) jackets and head for the hills.

The first time we discovered this corner of the mountains, I think my heart stopped. I couldn’t believe how utterly beautiful the scenery was. Or how it was literally just a short drive from his parents’ home in the countryside.

It always feels like these hills are filled with treasures, even in the winter. Just look at the Persimmon trees just behind me. They may have lost their leaves long ago, but those ruby-red persimmons still cling to the branches, just daring you to pick them.

Mountain springs flow down the hillside, creating lovely little waterfalls like this one.

There’s even quite the waterfall running straight through this gorge — and it’s best viewed in the wintertime.

Sometimes the clouds even put on a show for us.

Wishing you a a very happy holiday season! And may you too find your own private winter wonderland, wherever you are in the world!

Share/Save

Things I’ve Learned from my Chinese Husband: Single’s Day (China’s Version of Black Friday) Can Be Cool

My heart pounded as if it was only a few minutes to midnight on New Year’s Eve. Yet my only resolution revolved around the little black and white mobile phone in my hands and its Alibaba online shopping cart. Every single item in that cart represented hours of online “research”, scouring through reviews, search results and an often dizzying array of products with all of the seriousness prepping for finals. My husband and I took turns combing through Alibaba’s Tmall marketplace. Then we discussed strategy. Should we go for everything at once? Would pressing the purchase button at midnight – putting us virtually neck and neck with millions of online shoppers at the same moment – lock us out? What were my chances of snagging that 100 percent wool Metersbonwe red sweater with only two in my size?

Of course, in these last few minutes to the big moment, I couldn’t help but giggle at the ridiculousness of it all. I was on the cusp of spending my way into the world’s biggest shopping day ever – me, the woman who had always sworn off Black Friday.

Ah Black Friday, how I loathed you – and scorned the people who dared to chase after your bargains. I always pointed to news stories of nameless Black Friday shoppers fighting over flat-screen TVs or Elmo dolls as proof of everything wrong with the holiday. See, that’s what you get when you go elbow to elbow with millions of shoppers at once.

(Famous last words.)

So what changed? What lured me into the dark side of holiday retail hoopla? One word: Taobao.

It’s China’s answer to eBay and Amazon, but on steroids. Even better, Taobao rolled out its own virtual mall in 2008, packed with official stores for every single brand I’ve ever loved in China and beyond – from Adidas to Zara. It’s all just a click away, and they ship straight to your door. Tmall fast became our best friend after we moved back to China in late 2013 for a very simple reason – we were based out in the countryside, without a car or any convenient means for getting to the supermarket. Tmall supermarket purchases over around US$14 came with free delivery, they were cheaper than the nearest supermarket in the county, and everything could arrive at your door in less than 24 hours. Even better, I could do it all from the comfort of my own bed (in my pajamas, of course). What’s not to love?

However, it wasn’t just Taobao that pushed me over the (retail) edge…it was also my husband. John is totally enamored with all things Taobao and online shopping – even more than me. Whenever I’m in need of anything here, his first response is always, “Let’s buy it online.” He considers the Tmall supermarket and its insanely fast delivery straight to your door as proof of just how magical China really is.

So when Tmall started promoting Double 11 (that’s Single’s Day to the rest of you) as China’s answer to Black Friday, John wanted in. He figured, why not make a few purchases that day? There are plenty of things we really need – like those vitamins we always buy online – and if we bought on Double 11, we might get a few good deals.

Of course, as much as I liked Tmall, I had my doubts. After all, I’d heard the reports of Double 11 shopping woes. Getting locked out of the system. Hot items that sold out within minutes. Waiting for weeks for stuff to arrive from overburdened express delivery companies. I asked John, “What if I can’t buy the down jacket I so desperately need, all because I didn’t press “buy” fast enough?”

He flashed me a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry. Just think of it as something for fun. And if we can’t get it, we’ll find you one later, I promise.”

Fun? The idea never even crossed my mind. And even though those images of Black Friday in the news looked nothing even close to fun, I had to remember that this was, after all, online shopping in the comfort of our home. We could do it from our mobile phones, dressed in our comfy robes and pajamas. That had to count for something.

Beyond all expectations, I found myself saying in return, “Okay, why not?”

That one simple statement set in motion all of those weeks of preparation leading up to those adrenaline filled final moments before midnight of November 11, where I couldn’t even help laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. Of how I had changed so much. Of how utterly silly I must have looked hunched over a mobile phone in my pajamas and that flowery salmon pink robe.

In the end, we managed to get everything on our list – even the soft 100 percent wool sweater that I swore would be impossible to buy. But maybe the best deal of all was a new perspective on holiday shopping.

So go ahead, call me contradictory. You still couldn’t get me to do Black Friday, but I’d gladly go for Double 11/ China’s Single’s Day. Maybe it’s Taobao, maybe it’s my husband, maybe it’s both. But whatever it is, my holiday shopping season will never be the same.

How do you feel about holiday shopping?

Share/Save

Interview with Anna Zech, Artist and China TV Celeb with a Passion for Chinese Culture

I came to know Anna Zech through her fantastic blogging (first as the Mandarin Duck, and now at China’s Lost Panda) – but as I’ve discovered, she’s more than just an outstanding writer and blogger.

Anna also excels as an artist (she does portraits for commission and has even written and illustrated a children’s book titled Maomao and the Nian Monster). A lifelong martial arts enthusiast, she has studied Shaolin-style kungfu (she met her husband Jinlong while training one winter). She has hosted TV shows and documentaries on Chinese television, turning her into a local celebrity (see this adorable video of her and her husband during Chinese New Year). And did I mention she’s fluent in Chinese and went to the finals for the 2014 Chinese Bridge Competition in Beijing, fulfilling a personal dream of hers?

Anna has so many talents and fascinating stories to share, it’s no wonder she has caught the attention of China Central Television, who will be broadcasting a documentary about her life in rural Anhui Province this weekend for the program “Foreigners in China” on CCTV Channel 4.

It’s my great pleasure to feature Anna Zech through this interview.

Here’s Anna’s bio from her blog, China’s Lost Panda:

Anna is a freelance illustrator and portrait artist in her late 20s, with a passion for Martial Arts and Chinese culture. She was born in Russia, grew up in Germany and studied in the UK. She is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and graduated with a masters degree in China and International Relations from London University in 2014.

Following the slogan Home is where the heart is, she joined her husband Jinlong, a Chinese national from Anhui province in his hometown, after living in Boading (Hebei) and Shanghai. Currently they both reside in Bozhou, a city in Anhui province. Being the center of Chinese Medicine and boosting thousands of years of history, Bozhou makes a great place for inspiration….

Aside from her passion for Chinese culture, Anna is spends her free time working on new drawings. Because art and Chinese culture hold such an important place in her life, she has fused her China blog with her art hobby, blogging about her new creations, sharing tips and tricks for beginner artists and gives free tutorials in traditional art, eg. pencil portraits, pastel or marker paintings.

You can find out more about Anna and her husband, and read Anna’s blog, at China’s Lost Panda. Visit Anna Z. Art to learn more about her artwork and how to commission Anna to do a portrait for you. If you’re in China, catch Anna this weekend on CCTV Channel 4’s broadcast of “Foreigners in China” at 1pm Beijing time Saturday, October 31.

—–

What originally brought you to China?

I have always been fascinated with martial arts. When I was 13, a friend introduced me to a Kungfu School in Germany. I was hooked from the first day. All my teachers were Chinese nationals from the Shaolin temple, and when they invited a small group to go to China to visit their home town and train in Shaolin, I was the first one to sign up. After this first experience in China I fell in love with not only Chinese martial arts, but also China’s culture, its people and, of course, the food.

How did you end up meeting your husband?

Since my first visit to China to train in Kungfu, I have been coming and going whenever the time allowed me to travel. I remember it clearly. It was 2010, and I was on a university exchange studying in Shanghai. During my university studies I had actually more or less given up on my Kungfu training. But, some strange thing happened that winter. All of a sudden I decided to pack my stuff and go visit my old Trainer. He had opened a new Kungfu school, and I thought I had to check it out. Who would have thought that this decision would change my whole life? I met my husband in that school. He was a good friend of my trainer, and back then teaching a few foreigners Chinese Kickboxing. Even though he was very shy, he still managed to win me over. In the end it wasn’t me who made the first move. And within a month we were a couple. It was never a question for me. I just felt it was right and meant to be. For me, everything that had happened up to that moment was meant to be. It was fate.

You had the chance to participate in the Chinese Bridge Competition, and were even flown to Beijing for the finals. What was your most memorable experience in the competition?

The day I started learning Chinese, I have always wanted to one day take part in the Chinese Bridge Competition. I almost gave up on the idea, until last year when my Chinese teacher in London decided to push me to take part. When I won the finals in the UK and was invited to take part in the finals in China, I was actually really surprised.

The most memorable experience was the friends I made with people from all over the world. But, except that, I found the experience quite exhausting. I am fluent in Chinese, but I only speak a local Chinese dialect (blame my husband), and so the competition was my own little hell. We had special Standard Chinese teachers who tried to make sure we only speak Standard Chinese Putonghua. Every time I opened my mouth people started laughing at me. I got very self-conscious and even stopped talking Chinese for a while after the competition. I have now come to terms with my Chinese dialect. After all, where I live, everyone speaks it, and no one looks weird at me for speaking it as well. On the contrary, they accept me as one of them.

Many of us know you through your blogs — first, the Mandarin Duck and later the Lost Panda. How did you decide to start blogging?

I have always been writing a diary. I find it helps to structure thoughts. Since my first adventures in China, people had been suggesting I should share my stories with the world. It was 2013 when I finally had the courage (and a little push by my husband) that I decided to enter the blog world. I chose The Mandarin Duck at first because I thought they were really fitting. After all the male and female Mandarin duck look very different, but they still are together; a bit like our intercultural relationship with all its differences. But after blogging for a few months and moving to China for good, I realized it’s not just only about our relationship. Living in China, especially living in rural China has its own obstacles, and problems you have to overcome. And sometimes I just feel lost in this Chinese world of old traditions and superstitions. So, I became the Lost Panda. Who doesn’t love a panda? Now I am sharing the real life in rural China. It’s very different from the big Chinese cities, but it gives a glimpse into an old traditional side of living in China. The good and the bad.

Anna Zech's portrait of me — Anna Zech’s portrait of me

You’re also an outstanding artist and you’ve started selling your work online. How would you describe your artistic style?

I have never formally learned art. Actually, I just learned by watching my mother painting when I was a child. She gave up on art altogether, which is a pity. And to be honest I was on the same path over a year ago. It was my husband who encouraged me to pick up pencil and paper and do something with the gift that was given to me. I have found over the past months what I enjoy most are portraits. I have always been fascinated with eyes. When I was in school, I would draw little eyes all over my homework (creepy yeah). I am still a work in progress. Art is something you never stop improving in. I feel that during the past few months my portrait art has changed a lot. I have found my favourite medium to draw with and am now striving for realism. I want to capture the true character of every person I draw and make the portrait look as life like as possible. I hope I will get more opportunities in the future to practice these skills and share my knowledge I gain on the way with everyone else who is interested. Occasionally I also enjoy the freer art. I do many illustrations for my Lost Panda Blog and I have self-published a small children’s book called Maomao and the Nian Monster. I have so many more ideas and projects I am working on at the moment. Since moving to China, and finally being with my husband every day, I feel like my creativity has reached its peak, and every day I am excited to keep on working hard.

You’ve been a TV host for a local station in Anhui. Could you tell us about how you came to land this gig, and talk about what it was like being a TV host in China?

Being the only female foreigner here in the city it wasn’t that difficult to be noticed. I had been doing a few documentaries with Anhui International TV and through them got introduced to our local TV station. We’ve done a few small shows, like filming me and my Chinese family spending Chinese New Year. Naturally, I am a very introverted person, and it took me quite a bit of convincing to enter the world of a News presenter. The first day they invited me to the TV station, it was supposed to be a simple “Meet and Greet”, where we could get to know each other and slowly get a feeling for what it could be like. As is usual in China, things never are as they say they will be. That Saturday, they put me into new clothes, put on make-up and sat me in front of the camera. I thought they were just testing, and so I complied, reading the lines running in front of me. But when the nice lady said, “Ok, we are done,” I found I out that what we just had filmed would be broadcasted later that day! To the whole of Anhui province! Chinese TV can be chaotic and very exhausting. I have already given up on the News host gig. Without the right support from the TV station, it is impossible for a non-native speaker to read out an unknown Chinese script right off the screen without preparation.

China Central Television Channel 4 will be broadcasting a documentary about your life in rural Anhui Province. What was it like being filmed for China’s biggest TV network?

After having filmed a few documentaries for Anhui International TV, I was really relaxed about the CCTV 4 film crew coming to our home to film another documentary about our life.

I think my husband had different feelings. He hates the camera and always forgets how to speak as soon as the camera is facing him. This, combined with a funny director, made for a memorable experience. They followed us for five days, which was the longest I have ever worked on a TV production. In the beginning I wasn’t sure what there is to film about our life again. We don’t do anything spectacular at the moment. So, I am really curious how they have structured the documentary. Also, they did interview my Chinese parents-in-law and my sister-in-law and my husband separately, so I have no idea what they said and I am very curious to know. It is definitely something you should think about before agreeing to. A film crew will come to your home and film everything from you waking up in the morning, cleaning the house, cooking to how you are with your husband and family. It’s very personal, but I made the decision to join. I think it’s a great way to capture a moment of your life and share it with the world. Maybe even our simple life can inspire someone.

—–

Thank you so much to Anna Zech for this interview! Find out more about Anna and all of her many talents at her blog China’s Lost Panda. Visit Anna Z. Art to learn more about her artwork and how to commission Anna to do a portrait for you. You can buy Anna’s children’s book Maomao and the Nian Monster on Amazon.com, where your purchase helps support this blog. If you’re in China, catch Anna this weekend on CCTV Channel 4’s broadcast of “Foreigners in China” at 1pm Beijing time Saturday, October 31.

Share/Save

From the Archives: Thinking of My Grandma Here in China

Hanging out with John's grandmother at the front door of the family house. — Hanging out with John’s grandmother at the front door of the family house.

It has been one whirlwind week with way too much going on — including the discovery that my grandmother here in China isn’t feeling well.

She has a heart condition (which put her in the hospital multiple times in 2013 and early 2014). While she’s doing much better this year, she hasn’t been sleeping well recently, and the result is she may be returning to the hospital today.

Since I’m taking a break from posting today, I wanted to honor my grandmother by sharing several posts I’ve written about my close relationship with her. It’s funny — I still can only hold simple conversations with her (she only speaks the local dialect) and yet I sense the deep love between us.

Here’s hoping she gets well soon.

My Chinese Grandma, Frying Up Rice Noodles — And Lots of Love. Grandma has never hugged or kissed me, nor told me she loves me. But these days — and especially after this impromptu dinner — I’ve never felt closer to her.

To learn dialect or not? When your Chinese family doesn’t speak Mandarin Chinese. You should have seen the way John’s Grandma beamed at me when I opened her door and finally called her “Abu!” It warmed my soul to know that we were finally communicating for the first time in years.

Ask the Yangxifu: Why Does My Chinese Family Refuse My Gifts? Giving gifts to your Chinese family (and even friends) can feel like a battle. Take my Chinese grandmother, for example. When I gave her some American ginseng tablets from the US, she scowled at me and even pushed them away with her hands, saying “I don’t want them, I don’t want them” while she shook her head.

Share/Save

Things I’ve Learned from My Chinese Husband: Not Everyone Does DTR (Defining the Relationship)

One of my favorite stories from when John and I started dating is the day when he moved into my apartment without any “should we move in together” conversation.

In America, we all know about the conversation, even if we’ve never had it before. We’ve seen it on TV and in the movies, that pivotal moment when someone says, “Let’s move in together” – a simple question that’s never all that simple. People agonize over this, to the point of proliferating totally conflicting advice (from “You’ve got to move in with him to test things out!” to “If he moves in with you, he’ll never propose!).

Well, we never had that conversation. Instead, I came home one day after work and, lo and behold, there was a duffel bag lying in the guest room of my apartment, filled with a soccer ball, a pair of soccer shoes, and some rather familiar T-shirts. When John returned back later that evening, the conversation went like this:

Me: “Is that your bag?”

John: “Uh, yeah.”

Me: “Oh, okay.”

You might wonder, why did I just answer “okay” and not grill him about furtively depositing his things in my apartment? Well, for starters, I did give him a key to my place and told him to come over whenever he wanted. I figured he just interpreted that more liberally – that “whenever he wanted” could mean all the time. (And, besides, I was under the deep, romantic spell of love, which has a way of clouding your judgment, especially whenever you think of that hot weekend the two of you just enjoyed at your place.)

Years later, when I asked John about this “moving in without a discussion” thing, he had a very simple explanation for it. “Our relationship was already settled. We didn’t need to discuss things like that.”

I discovered that the fact he kissed me beside the West Lake – and later spent the night at my place – qualified as evidence of our relationship as the real deal. We didn’t have to hash out our relationship status over coffee, debating whether we should just “keep it casual” or “make it serious.” In John’s eyes, we were a serious couple.

This was like a revelation to me – that people could actually enter into a relationship, secure in what it was without ever having some big, nervewracking conversation about it.

I’m reminded of a post I saw a few years back on VOA written by a Chinese girl titled Everything You Need to Know about Dating an American and Having the ‘Relationship Talk’:

Why do Americans have these big relationship talks?

Well, there are so many types of relationships in the U.S.: dating, casual dating, relationship, open relationship (this one does not make any sense to me), serious relationship, etc. It’s easy to see how people could be confused about which stage they are and which stage their partners are….

In China, and I believe in other Asian countries as well, there is only ONE type of relationship. You are either boyfriend and girlfriend, or pure friends, so there is no chance to be confused. In other words, when it comes to V-Day [Valentine’s Day], people either have it for sure, or don’t even think of it. No discussion needed.

It’s fascinating that a relationship could either be really simple and obvious, or incredibly complicated and worthy of long discussions, depending on who you are and the cultural background you grew up with.

Share/Save

People Who Feel Like They Own the Opposite Sex of Their Race and Culture

mmexport1439450389962 — This photo of a marriage registration in Beijing was taken two days before the woman was stabbed to death by a Chinese man who hated Americans. I wondered, did he mean “American men” by that, and was he another example of someone who thinks they own the opposite sex of their own race/culture?

It’s funny how things in life mysteriously collide – that two seemingly unrelated events I’ve heard about recently actually have something in common. Specifically, the concept of people who feel like they own the opposite sex of their race or culture.

The first is the stabbing murder of an innocent Chinese woman in Beijing just married to a French man, a confirmed hate crime prompting my recent post, Is Beijing Becoming Dangerous for Couples of Foreign Men and Chinese Women?

In the discussion in the comments section, I noticed that people started linking this murder to the idea of people who feel like they own the opposite sex of their race/culture. See this comment from A. Madhavan:

I can’t help but notice the deep misogyny in this murder – many times when we date out of our race/nationality, men of our race will try to “claim” us and shame us for dating/marrying outside of it. As if we are pieces of property and only belong to them. I have seen this happen with white men to white women; black men to black women; Indian men to Indian woman – how dare a [sic] we women marry outside her race and have complete autonomy over our decisions? It is threatening to A LOT of people…

And this comment from R Zhao:

This sometimes happens in America, too. It happened to me when I was dating a black American man. I was accused by a small group of black women (who I didn’t know) of “taking one of theirs.” I didn’t realize it at the time, but I think there is a lot of frustration. Black women face a lot of discrimination while dating and have a significant smaller dating pool than white women do because of cross-race dating preferences. This happens to Asian men as well.

To be sure, there is a shortage of women here in China because of the gender imbalance, leading to a growing population of unmarried bachelors in China’s countryside known as “bare branches”. According to this article from Tea Leaf Nation, “an estimated 12 to 15 percent of Chinese men — a population nearly the size of Texas — will be unable to find a mate within the next seven years.” Personally, I’ve even heard Chinese men who lament that China is “exporting” far too many of its women overseas.

The Shanghaiist confirms in a recent story that the Sanlitun killer “said he ‘hated Americans’ before attacking Chinese-French couple in Beijing,” specifically asking the woman’s husband if he was an American before stabbing him and his wife. And while it’s never explicitly stated, I can’t help but wonder, does this man represent the anger and frustration of millions who feel a certain entitlement to Chinese women over foreigners because of the shrinking dating pool?

Obviously, this is an incredibly complicated and potentially delicate issue, depending on who you are and whether you’re one of the folks facing a more limited dating pool simply because of your race and/or culture.

What’s your take on this? What do you think about the idea of people who think they own the opposite sex of their own race/culture? Is it ever justified? Sound off in the comments.

UPDATE: I’ve edited this post because that some of the content was inappropriate and insensitive towards the Jewish community. I made some poor choices in what I had written and failed to consider how my words might actually come across to readers (including the individuals I had specifically mentioned in this post). I want to apologize for this mistake.

Thank you to those people who were courageous enough to reach out to me to point out the errors in the original content. I wanted to append this apology to let you know I’ve learned a tremendous lesson in the importance of being sensitive about how groups of people are portrayed on this blog, as well as what should and should not be quoted in posts.

Share/Save