1. Missing family - It goes without saying that first and foremost I miss my boys!!! But Matthew is in China as I write and he has had some wonderful experiences here and if nothing else, I have been able to give him (and Jonathan) this opportunity to have new experiences and do new things in a part of the world that most would deem “difficult”. I have several friends coming over and I hope my parents will also take advantage of my time here.
2. Hoicking and spitting and bodily functions- Starting at the airport you hear this distinctive “achhhhhhhh” as they clear their throats. If this gutteral noise is BEHIND you, you will certainly cringe, in case the resultant spitting might miss the mark and hit you!!! If you turn around, you just might find that the person involved is a WOMAN! Apparently this is illegal so as not to spread TB, but find me a policeman who enforces it! People pick their noses regularly, in public, never mind who is watching or what they might touch next. Toilets - the more basic public ones, ladies, have no doors, a squat hole and if you don’t take toilet paper, you won’t have THAT luxury!!! Luckily I can usually find the European facilities but there are times........!!! First thing when you arrive home - take off your shoes. Second thing - wash your hands!!!
3. Hard to cook - Today I found some of the things to make my wonderful pesto sauce. Trouble is, I had to search for the rest of them before some things went bad. That is a down side for cooking or baking here. Just getting the ingredients can take several days. The ingredients may not work right. Then, because the cupboards are so small, it takes about an hour to get all the items needed to mix, bake, line, measure, etc together. Then, no dishwasher, so you have to wash and dry everything. Oh yes, then another hour to rearrange everything to return everything to the back of over-full cupboards. It is easy to be be “over it”!! I don’t cook very often and I bake even more infrequently.
4. Dry and humid - Thanks to my lovely friends who provided me with various lip balms. They were sooooo much appreciated!!! The winter here is very, very dry. I have never had dry skin, but here my lips were very dry and so was the rest of my skin. But in the summer, it is very, very hot and humid. Not a great combination.
5. Traffic - Ha! Just think lawless! A colleague arrived here and was trying to make sense of the traffic. “What are the road rules?” she asked. Simple - there are some but nobody pays any attention to them. They drive on the wrong side of the road and I have seen them go the wrong way onto an OFFRAMP onto a motorway. They turn in front of you or into oncoming traffic. Taxis will simply stop anywhere (which CAN be a bonus!) Spatial awareness - what is that??? They honk all the time - mostly to let you know that they are near rather than in any nasty sense (as would be the case in NZ)! They cut across up to 5 lanes, drive at breakneck speeds and can do the “accelerate - decelerate” which makes me absolutely sick (literally)!
6. Language - I find that although the basic language structure is easy, the tones are hard and I don’t have enough opportunities to use the language. Written language is absolutely a non-starter for me!! I would love to do better at this.
7. Lack of good wines - Coming from NZ this is truly a penance. Yes, I do drink “Great Wall”, but it is not great (William thinks it will make me go blind). You can buy a real variety of wines here - from California, to NZ and Aus, to France and Germany. However, they are quite expensive......
8. Smells of summer - Now don’t get me wrong, some of these are great. There were some blossoms this spring that smelled wonderful. But they are short-lived in the scheme of things and compared to the frequency of sewer smells wafting by on the streets, well, the sewer smells last for at least 6 months of the year!!!! (Including in your own bathroom at home!!)
9. Being stared at - Do you get used to it? Yes, you become somewhat immune to it although when you aren’t feeling well or are tired, this is not so easy to cope with. If you can be graceful about it, that is great. But the Chinese are NOT used to large breasts and they are fascinated. Even that apart, you cannot get away from being stared at for your hair colour, eye colour and shape, build, height, etc..... When back in NZ last, I kept waiting for the adulation that I get here. But nobody thought I looked different enough to stare at!!!
10. Stranger in a strange land - As everywhere else in the world, some people will help you and try to be understanding that it can be hard to live in a foreign country, speak a foreign language and read a script that you have never seen before. Some will try to understand the sincere but sometimes pathetic attempts at talking to them. Others will turn up their noses and not try. Some taxi drivers just laugh, which is really a nervous reaction to picking up a “loweye” that they are afraid they won’t be able to speak or understand!!
Well, to conclude, I can say how much of an education it is living here. Someone once accused me of not being flexible. I would love to see those words eaten!!
xxx,
Shanghaisuz
