More October Activities

Sorry for the delay in publishing our adventures, but we have been very busy with our classes and local trips.  Now that we have finished our first semester of teaching, we will have some time to catch up with everything else.

Friday, 10/10/2014
We only get CCTV (a Chinese version of the news in English) and the Discovery channel (mostly re-runs) on our TV; we decided to buy some DVD movies.  We were perfectly willing to buy legitimate ones if we could only find any.  But apparently they are not worth selling on the open market.  We visited some stores in the area they call “Computer City” and asked on every floor about purchasing DVDs (after a lot of miming and sign language).  Everyone shook their head “NO”.  And then on the 4th floor a man came running up to us and motioned that we should follow him.  

First he took us up a couple of floors on the elevator.  Then we got out and followed him to a back stairway.  As we were climbing several flights of dingy stairway, I started to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into.  Were we going to be thrown off the roof for asking about DVDs?  We were then led down a dark hallway, past rooms with doors slightly ajar, filled with people hovering around computers (hackers?).  We were taken into a dirty maintenance room where a man was asleep in the corner on a makeshift bed, and the door was closed behind us.  So were we now going to be shot, like in some kind of drug deal?!

Our guide then took out a key, opened up a tall utility cabinet, and pulled out two large boxes filled with DVDs in flattened packages.  He placed them on a low table and then put up a cardboard shield around them and us, in case anyone walked in and tried to see what we were doing.  There was quite a selection, but we just pulled out two we hadn’t seen before:  “Divergent” and “Maleficent”.  They cost 10 yuan each, which is about $1.60 apiece.  After that we just got out of that building as fast as we could.  Since then, we got up our courage again and went back to purchase some other movies to watch over the long winter break.  We have since heard of a couple of other places on the street at night were you can buy DVDs.  It’s kind of like a “back alley” thing. 

We tried a few more city field trips and learned a new way to get around town, this time on the 2^nd ring road.  Chengdu has concentric roads that circle the city center.  We’d call them “Loops” in the states.  The 2^nd ring has an elevated bus lane that is dedicated only for bus usage.  We primarily use it now to get to get around town.  It’s much cheaper and more reliable than the taxis.  

A member in our Branch, invited us to go to a dinner and a show with her and her family/friends.  She and her son live here, while her husband lives and works in Houston – the Chinese way.  After a long bus ride, waiting on a street corner for a taxi (45 minutes) and then getting stuck in traffic, we finally arrived at the restaurant a little late.  We ate typical China Chinese food (not at all like “Chinese” food in America), served family style with a large glass lazy Susan in the middle of the round table.  The show came after the dinner.  We watched some dancing, acrobats, and stylized tea pouring.  The tea people dance round with tea pots with very long and skinny spouts.  They stop quickly and pour water into tiny tea cups from far away without spilling a drop.  The highlight was the “face changing” masks.  Dressed in Chinese Opera outfits, the men dance around wearing fabric masks on their faces.  Somehow they turn their face quickly and then they are wearing a different face mask.  It’s kind of like a magic trick where you see it but you don’t know how they do it. 

Stylized Tea Pouring

Face Changing Opera

We try to go out to eat on Thursday nights with the Hadds.  One night we went with them and one of Marilyn’s Chinese students to a “Hot Pot” restaurant.  This area of China is famous for their spicy Hot Pot dishes, and the student took us to a popular spot.  The meal was 150 yuan each, or about $25.  They don’t have tax or tipping here.  We sat at a table with a sunken square shaped pot in the middle.  The pot was divided into two sections and was filled with a white “broth” in one side and a red one in the other.   The white side was supposed to be less spicy.  The waitress turned the heat on under the pot and started it boiling.

There was a small conveyor belt going past our table which also traveled throughout the restaurant to the other tables as well.  On this were little bowls of food that passed along.  We were supposed to take a bowl we liked and dump it into the pot (either side).  Mostly they contained bit of pork, chicken, vegetables or mushrooms.  But one had raw, sliced eels and another had a whole pig brain.  Ewwww!  But the table after ours was thrilled to see it and snatched it up.  You boil the food in the liquid until you think it is done and then you fish it out and eat it.  We will check this off our list of things to do in Chengdu, but we probably won’t want to do it again.  

Anne and Marilyn at Hot Pot

Mmmmm - Pig Brains

Sliced Eel for the Hot Pot

  

At some point during the meal, a small live band started to play some contemporary American music.  We were pretty much over the food by then, so Anne and I got up and went to their little dance floor.  We will always be glad we took that BYU social dance class many years ago!  Pretty soon the customers, waiters, and kitchen staff were all around us taking our pictures.  The student who came with us got out his phone and started filming us.  A few moments later Jerry Hadd asked him, “So when are you going to put that on the internet?”  The kid answered, “Oh, it’s already on there.”  Now we are instant celebrities in China but you would never know it! 

Saturday, 10/18/2014
Today we visited the Jin Li street market and Wuhou Temple.  Jin Li is a touristy rebuilt Chinese market.  It’s full of quaint little shops and photo ops.  The temple is a large park like area with many buildings and statues.  Our favorite place inside was the Bonsai garden.  It made us think of our son's family and the bonsai collection we have seen in Seattle.   

WoHou Temple Gardens

Jin Li Street - each red thing represents a prayer

Bonsai Gardens

The following week we went to the People’s Park near the center of town.  An interesting feature there is that parents seeking a mate for their child put up posters on easels along the sidewalk.  A few had pictures but most just advertised (so we are told) their child’s age, education, and how much money they make.  (Hmmmmmm . . . I wonder if we’ve got a current picture of Leanna we could use? . . .)  We were also exposed to some terrible karaoke singing: different people close by each other all singing different songs, but at the same time and very loud.  Karaoke is a big deal here and you can go to KTV stations and have yourself filmed doing it.  There were amateur dance groups to watch too.  It was entertaining.

Saturday/Sunday 10/25-26/2014

Church this week was District Conference and we have a very large district - like half of China.  We attended at the same place we usually do, but we were hooked up via Skype audio to the other locations.  Clyde was asked to speak at the Saturday evening session.  Although we couldn’t see them, we heard talks from several of the BYU teachers we trained with in Provo.  

We have figured out how to go to the movies here.  We take a picture on our phone of the movie ad we want too see and show it at the ticket counter.  But there are different prices on different days at different times and we haven’t got a clue about that.  We have seen The Maze Runner, and Interstellar.  We’ve been told there is some rule about only 22 foreign films can come into China per year.  I guess it may have something to do with outside competition for the national film industry.  They’ve hit their limit this year so we will have to wait awhile for any others to come.