The First Two Years of Conquering the Tundra

January 28, 2010

A Creepy Invitation

The students that I'm teaching now have a horrible schedule. They basically have class from 7 to 9 every day of the week. This weekend will be their first weekend off since coming to the school two weeks ago so many will go home to see their families (the students are all adults from various electrical engineering firms around the province), but some will stay on campus at the hotel connected to my apartment building. Below is a fantastically creepy conversation that I had with one of the students who will be staying here.

Student: What will you do this weekend?
Me: I don't know, probably sleep.

Student: I think you can come in my bedroom and we can play with each other.

I try to contain my laughter and explain the difference between "room" and "bedroom" to the class. I also explain that "hang out" would be a much better word than "play". I explain to the class the American English meaning of his statement. The class erupts with laughter, but the student isn't listening...

Me: So maybe I will hang out with you but I don't want to play with you, or go to your bedroom.

Student: Why not?
Me: Did you here what I just said to the class? About what you said?
Student: I didn't listen.

Later

Student: If I come to your room, will you let me come in?
Me: That depends, since I live by myself, most of the time I don't wear pants. It's more comfortable that way. If I'm wearing pants, you can come in.

Student: We're men. We can not wear pants together. I think its okay.

Me: Uh... Okay class does anyone else have any questions before we end class?
Student: I have a question.

Me: Okay, but is it about me coming to your bedroom?
Student: Yes...
Me: That's it, class is over.

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January 26, 2010

Cabernet Flavored Ice Cream Popsicle

Chinese convenience stores are full of frozen treats. Some are full of chocolatey deliciousness, while others seem odd and down right disgusting to my western taste buds. I've seen pea flavored popsicles and cucumber ice cream. I've had ice cream pops that have the flavor and consistency of butter and once I had one with a flavor that can only be described as dirt. Every time I look through the freezer near the checkout stand at my local shop, its like a frozen snack adventure. So obviously I was excited when I found this cabernet wine flavored ice cream treat.

My Chinese isn't so good (its basically nonexistent), so I wasn't sure what to expect. I assumed it would just be a popsicle that tasted like wine. Turns out, not so much. The ice cream on the outside has a chocolatey, corky flavor with a chocolate coated cap on top. After the first bite I thought "maybe that's it, maybe it's just cabernet wine cork flavored ice cream." Then I bit into the goo. The goo actually tasted exactly like red wine, but with a thick, mayonaisey texture. I couldn't finish the whole thing, it was just too weird.

Next time I'll just go for the chocolate one.

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January 24, 2010

China, Google and Illegal Flower Tribute

At this point, everyone knows about Google's decision to channel Rage Against the Machine's "Killing in the Name" and more or less say "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me" when it comes to complying with China's internet censorship laws. In its January 12 blog post, Google stated that the company does in fact recognize that leaving search results unfiltered could mean the end of Google.cn and the end of their business in China as whole.

Since the Google announcement last week, Chinese Googlers have traveled to Google China's headquarters in Beijing to pay tribute to the search engine by laying flowers and lighting candles. As more Googlers come to pay their respect, they've noticed that the previous visitors' flowers have been removed by alleged "security guards". A local security guard has reportedly said that in order to lay flowers, people would need to apply for a permit from the relevant department. Without said permit, Googlers would be conducting an "illegal flower tribute".

The phrase "illegal flower tribute" is now a Chinese internet meme. Though like many things on the internet, it's blocked by numerous Chinese websites, including Baidu, Google's biggest competitor in China. The California based custom goods website Zazzle.com has already jumped on board with multiple shirts sporting the phrase in Chinese (非法献花) as well as a "no flowers" logo for the steep, steep price of $22.95 (157RMB) not including the international shipping that would be required for anyone around you to understand what your shirt even means.

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January 9, 2010

Rambo Arcade

Sent from A Whale's Vagina

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January 7, 2010

IMDB Rant

A large chunk of my week-long break has been spent watching movies and tv shows. The average temperature during the day is a frosty -22C so you can't really blame me for being lazy and refusing to go outdoors. In the past seven days I've watched the entire first season of Bored to Death and John Safran vs God (a fantastically hilarious Australian show about religion). I've watched all three Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live action movies, the Star Wars prequels, The Invention of Lying, Taking Woodstock, Home Alone, Purple Rain (twice), and I've kept up with all the new episodes of the Colbert Report and The Daily Show.

Two things have helped me feel like I'm not completely devolving into some kind of Jabba the Hutt type blob: A) I regularly watch TV whilst perched atop my exercise bike and 2) I'm almost always on my iPod Touch looking up new and interesting bits of information about the movie or TV show I'm watching with the IMDB app (I feel like this makes me smarter but really I'm just preparing for future games of Trivial Pursuit Pop Culture).

Today, the Great Firewall rocked my world by blocking IMDB for no apparent reason. I understand why social networks like Twitter and Facebook are blocked by the GFW. They're vile, disturbing sites where people can share photos of cute kittens. Disgusting. But I really don't understand why IMDB would be restricted. What's so bad about looking up the Avengers movie every single day just to see if Ed Norton has been officially cast or if it still says "(rumored)"? And how does looking up the release date for Resident Evil: After Life force me to support the Dalai Lama? Earlier today I had to use Wikipedia to look up whether or not I saw Sam Rockwell in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (dude's totally in that movie). WIKIPEDIA! This makes no sense.

Oh yeah, also if I search "IMDB" on Google and then click the link, Google ends up being blocked for the next 2-5 minutes.

Hey, Australia, get ready for this to be your life.

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December 27, 2009

Drunk or a Reindeer?

Perhaps a little of both?

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December 26, 2009

Christmas Eve Party

Some Diana F+ shots of the Christmas Eve party with my students Grace, Yolanda, and Sarah and their boyfriends who were visiting from various out of town locations. We cooked hot pot and played some games. The guys wanted me to drink a lot of beer but I didn't really plan on doing that so I told them I'd drink as much as Sarah, the quietest and shyest of the three girls. Bad decision. Turns out she's the drinker of the group, consistently out-drinking the boys whenever they go out or have a party. When I said I'd stay on par with her, she immediately cracked open a beer and chugged the whole thing. Always in teacher-mode, I instructed her and the others on how to shotgun a beer. She beat me at that too. Twice.

As you can probably tell from the way the developer cut the film, I tried to turn this roll into one continuous shot. It worked out alright and I was pretty happy with the resulting pictures. However, last week I got incredibly frustrated with something my computer was doing and I threw my Mighty Mouse across the room and into the wall. Turns out, not so "mighty" after all. I can't be bothered to stitch all these shots together with my computer's trackpad. Maybe once I get a Magic Mouse. Probably not. Do it in your mind.

Click here to download:

Christmas_Eve_Party.zip (13486 KB)

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December 26, 2009

Christmas Eve Party

Some Diana F+ shots of the Christmas Eve party with my students Grace, Yolanda, and Sarah and their boyfriends who were visiting from various out of town locations. We cooked hot pot and played some games. The guys wanted me to drink a lot of beer but I didn't really plan on doing that so I told them I'd drink as much as Sarah, the quietest and shyest of the three girls. Bad decision. Turns out she's the drinker of the group, consistently out-drinking the boys whenever they go out or have a party. When I said I'd stay on par with her, she immediately cracked open a beer and chugged the whole thing. Always in teacher-mode, I instructed her and the others on how to shotgun a beer. She beat me at that too. Twice.

As you can probably tell from the way the developer cut the film, I tried to turn this roll into one continuous shot. It worked out alright and I was pretty happy with the resulting pictures. However, last week I got incredibly frustrated with something my computer was doing and I threw my Mighty Mouse across the room and into the wall. Turns out, not so "mighty" after all. I can't be bothered to stitch all these shots together with my computer's trackpad. Maybe once I get a Magic Mouse. Probably not. Do it in your mind.

Click here to download:

Christmas_Eve_Party.zip (14448 KB)

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December 24, 2009

Some top notch student gifts

The lighter is from Adam. Zippo lighters are a pretty common gift for dudes in China and this one is fantastic. I laughed hysterically when I opened it.

The card is from Grace, one of the students who treated me to a Christmas Eve party last night. She's fun but she always calls me stupid and threatens to kill me. Her card included some coupons for me to use in the future. Definitely going to take advantage of the "Do not kill me" one.

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December 24, 2009

Majiang

Sent from A Whale's Vagina

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