Coming up the escalator, he was easy to pick out of a crowd.
He was tall, easily two or three heads taller than I am.
“Figured out the subway already,” he said as we walked up to
street level.
“Ya I have,” I said. “Seems pretty easy.”
As we rode up the escalator, he asked about what I had done
so far. I listed off the Bund, Yuyuan Gardens, Tianzifang, and Xitiandi. He
told me I should check out this temple and I told him I had.
“It’s not one of the best temples,” he said, “but it’s pretty
easy to get to compared to most of the others.”
At street level he quickly got me oriented to the temple,
and pointed out a small park across the street. “There’s a Subway there if you
ever get a hankering for American food.”
He pointed out a number of streets as we walked and I
noticed all of them ended in “Lou.” Lou
must mean “road” I thought.
“That right there,” he said pointing at a restaurant “is a really
cheap place to eat. You can get like five dumplings for like 5 bucks or so. I
don’t know what your budget is. I don’t eat super cheap but I don’t eat super
expensive. You’ll find most things in Shanghai cost about 15 bucks. If you want
to eat at an Americanized place it will be more than that. You’ll find a few
for less, but 10 to 15 is average.”
That did seem to be about what I had been paying.
“This right here,” he said pointing at a building with a
bright neon sign that kept changing colors, “is a pretty famous place in
Shanghai. They are known around their world for their…less than innocent
massages. If you see any place that advertises ‘oil massage’ it is not a traditional
Chinese parlor and you want to avoid it.”
“This place here has a food court with a lot of options,” we
went into a mall. “Why don’t you take a look around and I’ll use the bathroom.”
I took a few laps and noted some of the prices. It was all
in about the same price range as everywhere else I’ve eaten. When he came back
he asked what I thought. “It isn’t cheap, but it doesn’t seem outrageous.”
“No it isn’t,” he said. “I mean it will add up quickly, but
it might be a good way to try some variety. Do you like Chinese food?”
“As long as it doesn’t have bones in it,” I said. I told him
about one of my early conversations with Sabrina. After having the spicy
chicken and the sweet and sour pork I told her how surprised I was by all the
food. She told me that none of it was traditional for them, they just brought
it for us because they thought we would like it.
“Ya,” he said, “They like the stuff that has bones in it.”
The restaurant he took me too featured food from the Xinjang
province. “Xinjang is an area with a lot of Turkish settlers,” John explained. “There
is a lot of poverty and unrest there, but the Chinese government doesn’t want
the world to know about it.”
“They must be doing a pretty good job,” I said. “I’ve never
heard of it.”
When we sat down, he opened the menu. “See they don’t look
like most Chinese people, but they are.” There was a picture of the family that
owned the restaurant. Admittedly, they looked more Middle Eastern than Chinese.
“So what do you like?” John asked. “How adventuresome do you
want to be?”
“I’ll try anything,” I said. “I’d prefer no bones, but I’m
up for anything.”
“You eat meat?” He asked.
“I do,” I said. “I’m trying to stay away from shellfish,
because I’m a little sensitive, but it probably won’t kill me.”
“Do you like potatoes?” he asked.
“Ya,” I said.
“How about spicy?”
“I’ve had some super spicy stuff here,”I said. “So far it
has all been really good.”
“Vegetables okay?”
“Yep,” I said.
“Cool,” he said “I’ll order a bunch of stuff and we’ll go
from there.”
We got five dishes. The first to come looked like thick flat
noodles in a watery brown sauce with lots of spices piled on top. Picking them
up, I realized they were cold. I wasn’t expecting that, but they tasted great.
John explained they were made from potatoes. It was a little bit spicy, but more
in flavor than in heat.
The next to arrive was flat bread with sesame seeds on it.
It came with cups of yogurt for dipping. The yogurt was really sour, but the
combination with the salty bread was fantastic.
Out next were skewers with a brown fatty meat on them. John
explained they were lamb. We ate them by picking them up and sliding the meat
of the skewers with our teeth. They were super spicy (in a heat sense) and did
burn a little on my lips. But it was by far the best lamb I’ve ever tasted.
We got another dish that was potato slices in a hot red
sauce with diced peppers and a final one that was little chunks of pasta in a
spicy pepper sauce. It all tasted so good.
As we ate, I asked John about some of what I had learned
regarding restaurant etiquette and chopstick use. He pretty much dispelled all
of it. He confirmed that eating in public wasn’t really done in China, but it
was more odd than rude to do it. Waving—something we had been told could be
rude—he said was very much socially acceptable. While there are some chopstick
rules (like don’t stab food and don’t point) they aren’t as strict as the
internet makes them sound.
“What about leaving food,” I asked. “Is it rude to finish
all our food?”
He laughed. “Of course not! It’s your food! I mean if a Chinese
local took you out to dinner, you might want to leave a little so that he doesn’t
feel bad about not ordering enough, but if you go out to eat, you paid for it,
so you can eat it all.”
As I asked more questions, he explained, “Part of the
problem is, most of what American’s know about China is actually true of
Taiwan. That’s because most immigrants from China to America are from Taiwan
and very few are from mainland China. The culture down there is very different,
so a lot of American perceptions are based on that culture instead of actual
China.”
When he went to bite off a piece of lamb, some of the spicy
sauce flew into his eye. For 2 or 3 minutes he dabbed at his eye with a napkin
to get it to stop tearing. “Lesson one,” he said, “don’t get the spicy stuff in
your eye.”
When he asked for the check(in Chinese) I told him the
story of our night in Tianzifang. “Sabrina taught us the word ‘Fapiao’ for receipt,”
I explained. “We got a funny a look from the waiter and the document he gave us
was nowhere close to a receipt.”
“Let me explain that to you,” he said, “so you can
understand how ridiculous this system is. So in the US, everyone self reports
their income and the IRS checks to make sure that’s your income. You can write
off certain expenditures, all that, and then they determine if you get your
return or if you owe. Here, no one ever owes, because everyone self reports
their income and they under report it. But the government has decided that in
order to prove your expenditures and get your write off, you need a fapioa
proving the expenditure. So the person issuing the fapiao has to purchase it
from the government in order to issue it to you. That’s how they get their
money.”
“That makes sense,” I said. “They told us if we ever take a
cab, to ask for a fapioa in case you lose a cell phone. My thought was ‘don’t
lose your cell phone.’”
I went to slurp up some of the potato noodle. As I did,
sure enough, some of the brown sauce got in my eye.
“Seriously,” he joked, “after I just told you not it.”
“I know,” I said. “It was that one this time.” I pointed at
the noodle.
“Oh that’s just vinegar,” he said. I didn’t know if that
made it better or worse.
After we finished dinner, we continued walking to the
office. It was located in an old Turkish bath house that has been renovated to
office space. The inside is beautiful. I immediately recognized the staircase
from the website, and John pointed out how much natural light there is during
the day. The office was on the top floor (third) with a glass entry way. The
entire office was probably 18 feet by 12 feet and had desks for six people.
“You’ll either sit here or there,” he said, “pointing to a
couple of different options.”
There was a bathroom on the floor, as well as a communal
kitchen, and a beautiful patio with another great view of the skyline. John
explained to me that this side of the river is Shanghai, while the other side
is known is as Pudong. The two cities have a similar association as New York
and New Jersey.
“How are you getting home?” John asked.
“I was going to take the subway,” I said.
“Do you mind walking?” he asked. “I have a few more things I’d
like to talk about.”
“Not at all,” I said.
We walked a few more blocks and he pointed out a few more
shops (including a not seedy massage parlor.) “It’s hard to find a place that
is cheap and authentic. If the sign is rainbow, they advertise oil, or the
people are scantly dressed, it isn’t a massage parlor. At the same time they
can get expensive fast, so it’s hard. That place is good though and really
cheap. Like 7 bucks for an hour.”
We also talked about some of my duties which are going to
include learning Chinese language as well as some different marketing tasks.
John shared with me his background in developing Chinese language curriculum
and eventually starting his own business.
Within about 10 minutes we reached the station I normally
catch the Subway at. “That’s not a bad walk,” he said. “I’d actually recommend you
walk. I think you’ll learn more about the people and see more if you aren’t
underground all the time.”
That made sense to me. “Maybe I’ll walk in the mornings and
take the subway in the evenings so I can experience the commute,” I said.
He laughed. “Trust me, you’ll do that once and you’ll be
sold on walking after that.”
We shook hands and I told him I’d see him in the morning. “Call
me John by the way,” he said, since I’d been referring to him by his last name.
“Everyone at work just calls me John.”
“I’ll see you in the morning John,” I said.
Walking home, I was so excited! This was going to be an
awesome position! I’d be able to practice some hard business skills, learn
about language and culture, and experience a work place environment in China. While
boney meat was an experience, this is the adventure I signed on for!
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