A Little Less Conversation

"Good morning."

I thought for a second, confirmed in my mind that it was definitely 2pm and then returned the greeting to the young guy who had appeared from behind me in the train car.

"I am from Hangzhou," he declared. Pause. "Where are you from?"

"America," I said, not really wanting to get into too much detail with this stranger on the Metro. No one ever talks to me on the subway.

"What stop are you going to?" He seemed to be fumbling for things to talk about in English, so I took it as a harmless question.

"People's Square." It wasn't my final destination anyhow, just a line change. "Where are you going?" I asked, hoping he wouldn't say People's Square.

"I'm going to see my sister," he said. "Nice to meet you," he added, somewhat abruptly and stuck out his hand. I shook it briefly. He stepped back and I assumed the conversation was over. I stared at my reflection in the glass of the doors.

"You have very white skin."

I turned and glanced at him and then looked down at my arm. This was one of the first in a handful of days that had been warm enough to wear short sleeves. Excited about the warm weather, I was on my way to a large park in the northwest part of town to eat a sandwich on a blanket on some actual grass.

"Yeah, I haven't had much sun lately." I'm not quite sure if I am the envy of the Chinese folks here, as they are definitely all about remaining white as opposed to working on a tan, or if they think I look unhealthy, so unlike my tanned fellow countrymen. I prefer to think that pale is beautiful here, even for Westerners, because if it isn't fashionable here, I'm plumb outta luck.

"I have a girlfriend from Mexico," he said. I had no real idea what to say to this. "She's white."

"Oh, she's a white Mexican. Okay." Like I said, I had no real idea what to say to these things, but he kept leaving such long gaps in between sentences it made me more uncomfortable to listen to the silence. He then said something I couldn't quite hear over the noise of the train.

"What?"

"I wash her feet every morning."

Uh...

The pauses got much more awkward at this point.

"Your skin is white like snow."

Okay. Creep-o-meter just went off. I looked at my reflection again as we pulled away from the next stop. Only one more stop to go...

"Your eyes are like my mother's," he said.

"Oh? Does she have light eyes?" He nodded in a way that made me think he hadn't understood what I really said.

"Her eyes are very big."

"Where is she from?" I asked, glad to be off the skin topic.

"She's from Hangzhou, too." Pause. "But her father was Korean."

"Oh," I said, not really sure if that explained the big eyes.

"Your eyes are very pretty." Aw jeez. I looked away again. "Have a good day," he said and held out his hand again. The disturbance in the Force made me reluctant to shake his hand again, but I did anyway, out of habit from those darn societal expectations. I made a note not to touch my face though.

He apparently thought we were at the stop. I wished we were at the stop, but we were only slowing down. On a normal day, the train doesn't seem to slow down until we are upon the terminal. Figures I would get the one cautious subway driver in all of Shanghai today. He realized we weren't there yet, too. I could have sworn he took a step closer.

"Your hair is also very pretty."

"Thanks." Come on baby, get to the damn station!

"Do you have any brothers?"

"No."

"Your skin is very pretty." Yikes, buddy! Cool it, will ya? He mumbled something again, but I didn't ask him to repeat this time, just hoping he hadn't said "I have a collection". I only caught the last bit.

"She is the queen." I assumed he was referring to the girlfriend again, if she even existed. "Okay, nice to meet you." His hand reached forward again. My insides curled.

What I wanted to say at this point: "Dude, stop. Really. You said goodbye twice already. I don't want to shake your hand again. I don't want you in my air space. You lost me at the feet thing and the way you keep glancing at my arm is giving me a serious case of the heebie jeebies."

What I actually said, "Uh huh."

The train slowed and I could finally see the station. I said a firm good bye and he moved back to the opposite wall as I bolted. I counted to 5 before I wiped my hand off on my jeans. I involuntarily shuddered. I looked back once to make sure he wasn't behind me. It felt like a bad thriller.

~ Girl rushes through subway station, searching the crowd behind her wildly as she runs like mad, pushing through turnstiles. ~

I didn't run. I walked briskly and with purpose. I got on Line 2 and I made my way to the park, enjoyed my sandwich and read a book for a while. People were lounging, flying kites, playing badminton, and encouraging small children to walk and chase bubbles. The sun was warm and I felt very relaxed.

A guy with a kite reel walked up next to me, one of several people entering my bubble that afternoon. It happens often here. I continued to read. I realized he had stopped walking.

"Good morning."

I almost choked. I looked up and saw this much older man with his kite reel looking down at me. I smiled.

"Good mor...Good afternoon."

Wide Open Spaces

"Methinks I see the sky over yonder!"

Yes, this Sunday there was indeed clear, blue sky. It even had puffy white clouds! I cannot even describe what these rare days do for me!

I always knew I was a big weather person. I mean, I used to watch the Weather Channel for entertainment. "Whoa look at that radar! The red part is heading straight towards us!" Not only that, but I talk about the weather, not because of small talk scenarios, but because I actually like to talk about sunshine and rain and temperature drops of 30 degrees at a time. I also remember the weather. As in, my Junior year of college, the first weekend of November was in the 70s, while the next weekend was down in the 30s.

I am a bit weird, I know.

So anyway, for a girl who used to take walks, not for health but for sunsets, I am delighted at lovely weather. This is doubly true now that I live in a city known for smog. Ugh. Smog. How I hate thee.

I have recently let a few beautiful days slip by unappreciated, so this time I was determined to get outside. So I convinced David that we should check out Century Park, which is on the other side of the river. It's supposed to be pretty big, comparable to Central Park in scale, although it's pretty new and therefore more man-made feeling. (Get it? Central Park/Century Park? Designer bags aren't the only things the Chinese copy!)

So we rode our bikes to the subway station south of our house and took the 4 line over to Pudong and then switched to 2. Line 2 goes straight to the park, so it's really easy. There were many food vendors outside and we were hungry, so we tried it out. We bought some corn on the cob, which was edible, but not even close to Ohio corn. Plus, it needed butter! Then we bought some skewers of meat from one of many guys selling such things. We had it once before with a Chinese friend of ours after some beers one night and it was pretty tasty. This time, well, not so much.

"It's all fat!" David declared as he slid a second piece off the skewer with his teeth. I remembered that the mutton we had the last time was pretty fatty, but he was right. It was almost exclusively fat. "Aw man," he said, scrunching his nose, "I'm not eating this!" I nibbled, tempted only by the spices to search for bits of meat, but gave up quickly. It was indeed pretty disgusting.

David and I have developed a new phrase that we now use quite frequently: "Brace yourself for disappointment!"

A few examples:
"They have pizza!"
"Brace yourself for disappointment!"
"Are those brownies? They look a lot like brownies..."
"Brace yourself for disappointment!"
"Is that a real live..."
"Brace yourself..."
You get the idea. It just keeps our expectations low enough so as not to be crushed when the truth is revealed. Adding punchlines is essential to survival in this world.

So we threw the fat skewers away, neglected to try Chinese cotton candy and went into the park. I enjoyed it all thoroughly just because it was gorgeous outside and I could actually see the sky! Pudong is more spaced out than our side of the river, with wider streets and fewer trees. While I really like the charm of our neighborhood, it is still nice to get out in the "open" such as it is, once in a while. There were trees and my goodness, stretches of grass! A lack of benches was disappointing, but there were a great number of multiple person bikes and bike cars rolling about and I daresay I saw some Chinese people actually having fun! But for me, the best part, or at least the most endearing, was the occasional small tent set up amongst some wooded spots throughout the park, sometimes complete with a pair of feet sticking out. It struck me that this was the closest thing that most of these folks will ever get to camping. So sad. I think a campfire with s'mores would blow their minds.

David and I had the blandest Chinese food ever for a late lunch, complete with a strange pile of pink discs. I think they were rice based and fried. I think.


Then we enjoyed a stroll by the "lake" complete with a washed out sunset and loads of the slowest boats you could possibly find, all filled with Chinese folks in bright (and I mean bright) orange vests. They looked like stranded rubber ducks in a huge pond.

We only saw half the park before the evening got too dark to see anything more. David said he liked other parks in this city better, citing better layouts, etc. (Oh, engineers!) But for me it didn't matter much. It was green space without too many people where I could almost believe that I could smell fall in the air. True, my vivid images of a lush natural wonderland are a bit diminished now, but oh well. This is China after all. I mean, what were you expecting, really?

I had braced myself, but this time, I didn't find it disappointing at all.