In March my sister (Courtney) and father (Lee) arrived. This was a trip several months in the making and I was extremely excited that they actually made it out here. Courtney had been to Asia before, on a trip in 1998 that included Thailand, Hong Kong and Singapore. My father had never been in Asia. It is not as if previous Asia experience can prepare one for modern Beijing, but it does make you aware of the toilet situation. They arrived on a Sunday and stayed for about nine days. I secured four days off which was phenomenal.
I had done my research before their arrival and found that the new Terminal 3 was receiving flights from Korea. As Courtney and Dad were arriving from Korea I thought it best to meet them at Terminal 3. T3 is as awesome as the movie with the same name (I am not being sarcastic here, I loved T3 the movie). It is said to be the largest building in the world but I don't know who is counting or how they count. The building is quite nice and, as they only send two flights out and receive two flights a day, still quite shiny and new looking. After I realized neither flight arriving that day was theirs, I hurried over to Terminal 2 to collect them.
It was so great to see them strolling out of customs with their heads on a swivel looking for me as I was looking for them. Once collected we caught a taxi and headed for my apartment. After we arrived they settled in and we caught up with each other for a bit. They were both pretty tired but pressed on in order to reset their internal clocks. This was an impressive feat because my father is famous for his inability to sleep on planes. Courtney and I headed to the supermarket to pick up a few things and my dad stayed back and rested. The supermarket was an interesting experience for Courtney. She was able to see some of that famous yet increasingly elusive 'real China'. There is a lot of construction on me street so she was treated to an exhibition of strength by the 70 year old men working at the site when they made their own concrete with sand and water. She also bore witness to the diaper-less babies that excrete judiciously. We wondered whether a diaper-less baby would become potty trained more quickly due to its diaper-less circumstance. Yep, this is me and my sister, two reasonably intelligent people having this discussion. We returned back to the apartment, groceries in tow, and soon afterwards both of my visitors were asleep for the evening.
I must mention that their trip coincided with the 'unrest' in Tibet. I am limited in the comments I can make on these events because I am not up for the scrutiny but..... These events, as I'm sure you all heard, were...'under reported' here on the mainland. CNN was especially frustrating in that regard. Every time pictures of the police and military doing what they do came on the screen the whole thing went black. These events and the Chinese response to them definitely impacted Courtney and Lee's trip. Because the unrest coincided with the annual meeting of the National Peoples Congress which is an annual event where representatives from districts within all provinces meet to vote yes on things, my father and sister were treated to the full show of China's power and control. Security had been ramped up all over town, the news redacted, and on top of all of this a sand storm rolled into town. They were treated to the full show. Their second day in town we headed down to Wangfujing (where I work), Tienanmen Square, and the hutongs near Houhai Lake. We were able to get up close and
personal with the new Grand National Theater before heading to Tienanmen which was a madhouse. The entire square was shut down due to the congressional meetings there and because of the Tibet situation, security was at an all time high. This is one of the first images of China that my father and sister had. We walked around in the opening area of the Forbidden City but decided to not go inside as I had arranged for one of my students to take them on a tour while I had to work. From there we went to Houhai Lake and walked around the hutongs for a bit. It was a long day so we returned to my apartment and ate at a Chinese restaurant located nearby. The restaurant specialized in Sichuan food which is notoriously spice. I thought my dad would see it as a challenge. He enjoyed the food and didn't sweat too much. From there it was back to the apartment for some DVD's and a good night's sleep.The next day we went to the Silk Market where, as anyone who comes to China knows, things can be crazy. I lectured my guests on the finer points of Silk Market etiquette such as "don't show any interest", and "never ask the price if you don't want to buy it." These tips and the etiquette you must follow make a trip to the Silk Market more of a competitive event than a shopping experience. I must say that they did a good job and we got some good deals. The trip
went well, due mostly to my impeccable instructions and maneuvers in the market. Things fell apart at the end. We were heading for the exit when one of the stall workers said she remembered me from before. Knowing this tactic and knowing that I had never seen this woman before I said, "This is my first time here." Within nanoseconds of these words exiting my mouth a chorus of stall workers shouted in unison, "First TIME? and we were pounced upon, divided, and assaulted. One lady distracted Dad with some leather jackets or mock turtlenecks or something. Another lady manhandled Courtney and physically dragged her into the stall. A human shield of stall workers prevented me from reaching Courtney momentarily, I then made it over and was able to pry open the death grip that the stall worker had on Courtney's arm. Dad, still jet lagged, was confused and befuddled by the pace with which this very tactical operation took place. I broke Courtney free, we grabbed Dad and we made it out still having some money to our name. I love the Silk Market.
That evening we had a delicious roast duck dinner and made an early night of it. On Wednesday we woke up a bit early and headed to the fruit and vegetable market near my house. The market is divided into meat and vegetable sections for obvious sanitary reasons although precautions taken in the name of sanitation ended there. The meat section was best described by Upton Sinclair in The Jungle. There was blood all over the floors, pig heads just staring people down, organ meat of all kinds, and bullfrogs. I never buy meat from this market but it is a good place to go to see how real Chinese people buy meat. The veggie part is loaded with an incredible assortment of mysterious fruits and vegetables. We had fun walking around there for a while before making out way out east, to Tongzhou, to visit my old stomping grounds from last year and have lunch with Cindy. We headed out by subway and Cindy picked us up from the station. Her erratic and distracted driving was on full display. We had a delightful lunch and then went to LuHe High School so I could show them the grounds. While at LuHe we ran into some of my old students. It was great to see all of them as it was the first time I had seen any of them since the last day of school last year. The kids that seemed to hate me the most were surprised and actually excited to see me. I was happy to see all of them, especially Hot Sauce and Liberty.The next day I had to return to work so I set Courtney and Dad up with a tour with one of my students. They went to the Forbidden City for the day and endured a Chinglish tour by my student, Apple. The next day they went to The Great Wall with Wendy whose English is considerably better than Apple's. I had to work and in the evening my school had a basketball game against a school from the university district in Beijing. I did not play as to give more students an opportunity to play. Before they game I riled them up with a few famous sports quotes but the one that stuck, and really displayed the character of the team, was, "No autopsy, no foul." This seems appropriate for a team that is coached by yours truly. The game was an epic battle of David verses Goliath. Our team, a bunch of scrappy young professionals fresh out of college with real high powered jobs, against their team, a bunch of students from the sports university. Collegiate athletics are very different here. There are entire universities devoted to sports with no other type of education. These were the students we were up against. Their shortest player was taller than our tallest. It was like all of those 80's movies with all the Russian automatons facing off against the emotional, passionate American team. This time both side was made of communist automatons but theirs were bigger and stronger. (Only kidding) Our players were quite passionate and emotional through out. I couldn't tell if it was due to my pre-game pep talk where I told them I would be fired if we lost, or if it was all the things I told them the other team said about their mothers, but this team was playing great. It was a physical match. I was at times John Thompson, Jerry Tarkanian, and Bob Knight (to the uninitiated, this means I had a towel on my shoulder that I sometimes bit and I also did a lot of yelling). When one of our players took an elbow to the lip I got to play trainer as well. I walked over too him while blood dripped from his chin and asked him, "Are you ok?"
"Sure", he replied but it sounded more like a question.
"He needs to go to the hospital", said one concerned fan.
I asked him, "Do you want to go to the hospital or do you want to play?"
Without hesitation he replied, "Play"
We took a few minutes to stop the bleeding then I subbed him back in. It was a close game but in the end the opposition was too good. After the game my injured student went to the hospital where he received five stitches. After the basketball match I met Bryne, Courtney, Lee, Cromwell and Steve for dinner at a Xinjiani restaurant where we enjoyed a stage performance while we ate. The next day my dad left Beijing so Courtney and I accompanied him to the airport. Of course, this was the best weather over the week he was here. After seeing him off Courtney and I headed to a park and then did some more shopping. The next day I returned to work but not before Courtney took me to get my haircut. My hair was the source of much controversy and she aimed to get my mane shorn, a scary prospect for any Samson. We went to a salon near my
office. It was a good haircut. After the haircut, I headed to work and she went on shopping. At worked I looked at the schedule for the day to see what classes I would be teaching and noticed that I was not teaching. A mistake on my part. I left the office in a hurry to track Courtney down so we could take advantage of this new found time by going to see some more sites. Serendipitously, I ran into her as she was about to board the subway. We went back home, I changed, and we headed out to the Temple of Heaven. Again, it was a beautiful day and the pictures we took there were great.
The next day Courtney boarded a plane and went back home. It was great to see the both of them. When I was a child I could have never imagined having a rendezvous in Beijing with my father and sister. It was a great little vacation for me and I think they had a good time as well. The next week it was back to work for me. I told my boss about my basketball failure and hoped my claim to my students wouldn't turn into a self fulfilling prophecy. It wasn't and I keep on working and awaiting more visitors.
