I can’t say I’ve always been proud to be Chinese. Sure, I didn’t mind the positive Asian stereotypes (like being bundled with the “model minority”), and hell, I might’ve even unabashedly fed to them in my lifetime… but I don’t think I can recall a time when I was truly thrilled to say – aside from being American – that I was, in fact, Chinese.

Reality struck during Memorial Day Weekend of this year. I was with a couple of friends in Arizona visiting Antelope Canyon. We were casually chatting with our tour guide, Buddy, when I asked him a question out of curiosity: “Buddy, in your time as a tour guide, would you say there are certain tourist groups that are worse than others?”

(Admittedly, I can’t say I wasn’t predicting the answer.)

Buddy: *long pause* Well……..

He hesitated for a long time, clearly having processed my ethnicity. I decided to help him out.

Me: …. Is it the Chinese groups? *chuckles* It’s okay, Buddy. I’ve been on those Chinese tours myself,  and I would’ve guessed it all the same.

Buddy just laughed and sighed.

I don’t mean to generalize here, but to me, it’s not even subjective: Chinese tour groups are often loud, aggressive, and are not the greatest at following rules. It makes me wince to hear people like Buddy admit these things to me. I’ve caught myself saying many times in my travels when I see Chinese tour groups: “Whyyyyy guys, why do you do this to give us a bad name?”

And so, you see, I was a bit hesitant myself to travel to China for the first time. But given my dad has been working there for almost twenty years now, I couldn’t hold off forever… So I did it – I flew to Shanghai with my mom for Christmas.

To be honest, I initially hesitated to write this post recapping the recent trip. I didn’t want to sound like a snooty-nosed American. But please bear with me here. What I reflected upon on this trip was that, no, it wasn’t that I didn’t approve of what they did……. but that I simply didn’t understand their culture. I realized in reflection that I wasn’t – I am not – Chinese. I am Chinese-American and therefore I lacked empathy for those who were born and raised in a country where separate ideals and values exist.

It’s not that our or their ideals and values are wrong, it’s the simple fact that they are different. This was my main takeaway from the trip.

I lacked empathy for a culture unlike my own. 

Enough rambling: let me recap my trip for you guys and hopefully explain some of what I mean above.

So, without further ado, in no particular order, here are my observations of China.

The food is pretty amazing, as long as you don’t think about it too much.

• Tip #1: Do everything in your power not to think if what you’re eating is actually rat meat.
• Tip #2: Do everything in your power to forget that China likely does not have stringent health code standards. (Side note: I didn’t get irritable bowel syndrome, though, WOO!)

Everything pictured below: exquisite. I currently have 2 lbs of new belly fat that agrees.

(Note: It’s 4:45AM at the moment and I’m drooling looking through these photos, so let me make the pictures as small as possible to limit the sensory load.)

Some honorable mentions…

Despite it looking extremely unappetizing (tmi, but I personally think it looks like it should be coming out of the other end of the body instead of eaten)……. my grandparents made this incredible “stew” every morning for breakfast that included everything healthy you could possibly imagine (e.g. goji berries, purple yam, sea cucumber, walnuts, etc). It was actually wildly delicious so I thought I’d make a special shoutout to this healthpoop stew – U DA REAL MVP.

Who do you think I am? I can’t make a trip to Asia and NOT have heaping servings of stinky tofu……. twice 😉 nomnomnomnom fermented goodness.

On the flip side, I must say, going to China, I’ve come back with a minor case of PTSD. If you think of the nuttiest of health nuts you know in your life, my grandfather is that…..  times 23502375. He hasn’t eaten a simple carb in probably 60 years. And eats zero fatty proteins, sticking to seafood 90% of the time. Always steamed, never sautéed or fried.

…. Ergo, we were also forced to eat seafood 90% of the time. To the point where I, A FREAKING PESCATARIAN, got sick of seafood.

Here is us at a restaurant that steams live seafood on the table in front of us. My grandfather’s haven.

This is what we selected from the aquarium. Honestly, looking at live seafood makes me more grossed out about eating it than it should…..

More of what we selected. Looking at freshly slaughtered fish is an instant appetite-killer, IMO.

…… WELL THAT JUST ABOUT REVERSED MY APPETITE.

And of course, in true Asian fashion, there was the typical “fight for the check”. Classic. (And here I am snapping away on my camera at the scene. Truly comical.)

More often than not, it hurts to breathe in China.

• Observation: It’s completely normal to literally see the air you are breathing (*points* it’s that gray shit over there)
• Average visibility: probably 50 meters or something equally ridiculous

So… before I travel anywhere, I always look at the local weather to see how I should pack.

This was 2 days before the trip …… I didn’t even know these types of messages even existed on Apple Weather -____-

1 day before the trip… IT’S GETTING WORSE. Half expected the next day’s message to be “You are now entering Dante’s Inferno”.

Smog. Smog everywhere. (Though, I must say, these photos make it look much better than reality.)

Me: LOOK HOW PRETTY THE CLOUDS AND SKY ARE. *snaps photo*

Dad: …. It’s the pollution.

Me: o.

I didn’t realize until this trip that pollution ACTUALLY affects your breathing. I thought it was one of those things where your lungs kind of just take it (and then you suffer some behind-the-scenes impact). But NOPE. My throat was incredibly irritated and I couldn’t stop coughing. I thought I was developing a cold, but then my dad reminded me – nope, rest assured, you’re just breathing in poopy air.

This was after like 5 days in China…. my mom was paparazzi-ing the sun because we hadn’t been able to see it through the pollution since we landed. California truly spoils us.

Wanna hear the joke of the century?  No Smoking signs. No Smoking signs are the joke of the century.

Here is my dad smoking…….. next to a No Smoking sign.

My mom and I nearly fainted when we were at a restaurant on our last night. No Smoking signs everywhere and yet 25 cigarettes within eyesight. SMH.

According to my extremely accurate, scientifically-grounded calculations, I am now ~354.8 times more likely to develop lung cancer.

Every time I used a public bathroom, I died a little on the inside.

(Though, given my current risk of lung cancer, might not actually be a bad thing…)

Long story short: Never have I ever had more of an urge to bathe/breaststroke in hand sanitizer.

I’m no stranger to the squat toilet (it’s very common in Taiwan). But CHINA’S SQUAT TOILETS ARE NEXT-LEVEL-ICK. I have seen things I wish to unsee.

Here is a photo of one: I had to curate this photo carefully so I didn’t trigger any gag reflexes. THIS IS AN IMMACULATELY CLEAN SQUAT TOILET (which was encountered once in a blue moon).

I have a story for you about butts. The human kind.

I can’t say I’m not a fan of them, I can’t say I am a fan of them. That said, one of the days my mom and I were at a train station and we both needed to use the restroom before our 1.5 hour bus ride. I walked into the restroom first.

I stopped in my tracks.

In front of me were 20 WHITE-ASS-NAKED BUTTS staring me in the face (not actually). It was a thing of nightmares.

GOOD GOD, THIS BATHROOM DOESN’T HAVE A SINGLE DOOR. IT WAS 25 SQUAT TOILETS OUT IN THE OPEN FOR EVERYONE TO ADMIRE YOU DOING YOUR BUSINESS. GOD FORBID YOU HAD TO GO #2.

My mom walked in after me and gasped. “What do we do? Might as well….”

…… I’m not going to go into any more detail but I can say with confidence, I’ve never peed so fast in my life.

I wish I had more photos for you (and I know you wish the same). But perhaps this would’ve been insensitive to those butts.

And let’s not mention the fact that there is zero soap to be found in any bathroom in the entire country, and the toilet paper (if it even existed, which was 3% of the time) is the texture of sandpaper. My poor derriére.

If you are a stranger to squat toilets, here’s an amazingly hilarious article that does an expert job coaching you through the process (Thanks, Alex!):  http://www.banterist.com/china_dispatch/

Being a tourist on weekdays in the freezing cold is surprisingly #winning.

I honestly thought visiting any place in China meant expecting to be shoulder-to-shoulder with selfie-stick-bearing tourists. But in fact, it was the opposite. Of course, we visited during a non-peak time, when it was very cold and wet, but this ended up being such a blessing in disguise, as we had each place to ourselves to do whatever we chose, with more freedom and attention than we really  needed.

Okay, CAN YOU IMAGINE THIS ENTIRE PLAZA BEING EMPTY OF TOURISTS IN ANY OTHER SEASON?????

We stumbled across this paper cutting studio and decided to make a family portrait. Haidee (my sister) didn’t come on this trip so we had to show the guy a photo of her.

Haidee, after I showed this to her: “WTF WHY DO I HAVE AN ALMOST-UNIBROW”

This adorable clock was next to the Disney store! (Which, of course, I had to raid.)

Chongming Island was one of my favorite parts of the trip. We rode rental bikes around the (mostly empty) island, and stopped for snacks and tea at a nice lakeside cafe.

I hadn’t ridden a bike in ~15 years!

I can’t believe I caught my mom doing this because she held this “no hands!” look for about 0.0003 seconds. Her face of pure terror, though: priceless.

LOL Mama Sui “meditating”:

Proven: No matter where you are in the world, dogs will be cute.

Ugh.

UGH.

UGHHHHH x2

I am my mother’s daughter, after all.

Dawg luvers 4 lyfe.

And lastly: Don’t ask permission. Don’t ask forgiveness.

This is the thing I admire most and least about China.

You know that saying: “Ask for forgiveness, don’t ask for permission”?

Well, the Chinese don’t ask for either. They just do it – and if it’s wrong? They don’t give a fuck. Zero fucks given, ever.

It seems that I could forget everything I ever learned in etiquette school about common courtesy, and I’d still be a high-functioning member of Chinese society.

For instance, if I had a penny for every time a person ran into my foot with their luggage cart at the airport to/from Shanghai……..

And I mentioned it wasn’t really that crowded anywhere we went on this trip… and yet I experienced so many instances when people would stand right next to me and BREATHE DOWN MY NECK on the bus, when there were plenty of other places to stand. I mean, was I not aware of the sign around my neck that said “PLEASE INVADE MY PERSONAL SPACE”? And then when they needed to get off the bus, instead of saying a simple “excuse me” would just push me out of the way. I assure you, it felt awesome each time it happened.

On the more comical side, Chinese people REALLY give no fucks about their signage/translations. Being there for a week, I almost became calloused to how ridiculous they were. The poorly-translated ranged from store names to warning signs. It was a cesspool of “Engrish” hilarity.

I didn’t photograph many (because, like I said, I stopped reacting to them after a while), but here are a couple:

I feel like Google Translate would do a much better job….. or at least spell “information” correctly…or use more “polity words”…

Sad times: My mom, grandmother and I definitely got scammed while we were in Suzhou. Originally, we had planned to go see a few sights on our own, but my grandma came across this tour agency which allowed us admission into 3 of the gardens we wanted to go to anyway at 50% discount, including transportation. We received no details beyond that. It sounded too good to be true……… and it ended up being just that.

The day started out great – our tour guide was extremely engaging and personable. My mother, seeing all the effort he put into making this an enjoyable experience, was ready to tip him extremely well at the end of the day.

But what we quickly realized  was that, yes, we would see each of these gardens we were promised, but that the tour guide would severely limit our times there… and would instead use the lion’s share of our day going to different factories and coercing us to buy their products.

After seeing that our tour group wasn’t going to spend much money at the factories – everyone was equally surprised why we were going there instead of the promised gardens – the tour guide began to insult us repeatedly for how “in all the years he’s been a tour guide, he’s never seen a cheaper crowd”. By the end of the tour, he was begging us to buy stuff and had assumed such a repulsive demeanor – pathetic, really.

What my dad (he had to work that day so didn’t join us) explained to me later is that… you get what you pay for in China. Don’t think you’re ever getting a discount. There is always a catch, so just pay the full price, and you won’t be caught off guard.

Lesson learned.

Mind you – this was a FULL DAY. A full day wasted, if you ask me. I spent the entire day wanting to jump ship.

We got very few photos (I wasn’t in the mood, obviously).

This was before we discovered we were being scammed.

Buddha statue made of pearl at the second factory we went to.

Tour guide, in Chinese: “I saw a bunch of you have faces full of pimples… just spend some money, why don’t you, and buy some pearl powder for that? I beg of you…”

How I felt the entire emotionally-exhausting day. So aggravating.

On a more positive note, one of the days, my dad, mom and I drove out to sightsee and wanted to see the Yangtze River, the longest river in Asia.

We drove for about 45 minutes after visiting Chongming Island, and for some reason, couldn’t get to the shore of the river. Honestly, if it were for me, I would’ve turned back right then and there, since we were on a time crunch to get back before dinner. But no, my dad, having lived in China for the last 20 years, had different plans.

There’s no road to get to the shore of the river? I’ll drive onto a little sidewalk….that turns into a tiny alley….that turns into a small road in the boonies…..where we’ll park on the side….and WALK TO THE SHORE OF THE RIVER.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way, am I right?

I mean, the view wasn’t great (like, at all…) but just the sheer determination of my dad to get my mom and me to the river was a reward all in itself – and I admire him greatly for it.

This is not a road. And yet we drove on it for 10 minutes. BTW, LOL that is my dad peeing into the bushes. Like I said, no fucks.

We had to climb ONTO this wall to get to the Yangtze River.

You’d think after all that effort, the river would be grand and beautiful and totally worth it. Pause.

I mean, I personally thought it was worth it :). My dad – determined China man.

I spoke to my dad about my frustration re: how so many Chinese people are, quite frankly, extremely rude and have zero sense of common courtesy. I told him the story about Buddy, my tour guide in Arizona, who agreed Chinese tourists are the most difficult to deal with.

He explained that, in all honesty, most Chinese people don’t think or know they’re being rude. It’s just how they are and how they were brought up. Back during the Cultural Revolution between 1966 and 1976, if you weren’t fighting to acquire resources, you’d most certainly die. So that mindset has been ingrained in each of their minds henceforth. Fight to get what you want, or perish.

It’s survival of the fittest in its truest form – aggressiveness is the key to surviving and thriving in China.

My dad says the same can be said about business in China. If you don’t safeguard your money, if you leave any room for misconduct, you could lose all of it. It’s a “do or die” atmosphere and it’s inescapable.

I asked if he knew about the perception of foreigners regarding China. He says yes. And then he went to explain how if China didn’t have this chip on their shoulder, if the world coddled this country, how could it ever become the economic super power it is today?

Don’t ask for permission. Don’t ask for forgiveness.

It is this very mindset that makes China a force to be reckoned with.

When my dad explained this to me – not to say he’s completely right or wrong – but it made sense. Who was I to judge this culture who clearly has different values and ideals from my own? I wasn’t born there, I wasn’t raised there – I have no basis to pass judgement.

Was I high and mighty just because I was American?

(Well, evidently, with this past election, the answer is “no”.)

My disdain for how Chinese people act is clearly a lack of empathy. And so, my New Years Resolution for 2017 is just that: Empathy.

To reserve my judgement when it is unfounded; to vicariously understand and have compassion for different cultures and values.

…. But of course, that doesn’t mean I’ll just neglect all semblance of common courtesy and insult people from now on :).

In any case, my mom and I made a point of being courteous everywhere we went in China – almost nauseatingly so. To our amusement, each person we greeted or thanked replied with an equally perplexed look of “?!?!?!”

No, my core values and ideals will never change: KILL ‘EM WITH KINDNESS.

That ideal will stay.

With love,

Mendi

02 Jan This entry was published on January 2, 2017 at 8:23 am. It’s filed under Asia and tagged China, Shanghai, Suzhou, travel. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.