I Walked the Wall

November 18, 2011

The Great Wall of China. This is what I have been waiting for all this time. I have learned a lot about China growing up and all throughout college. I got to visit this spectacular relic left from thousands of years ago. The Great Wall. The wall lies about 4,000 miles from the eastern part of China to Mongolia. It took roughly around 170 years to build. This wall was created mainly to protect the Chinese Empire from foreign attack. There were seven kingdoms and each kingdom built their own separate wall. The walls also represented a sign of power. This is especially in the case of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, who built the most significant portion of the wall and helped join the separated walls together. The merging of the walls helped unify the entire country. It is said that you are not a true person if you have never been to the wall. Well, I guess I’m about to become a true person.

Road Trip. It took a while to travel to the wall. It took about two hours to get there. So I used this time wisely and asked our tour guide numerous questions about Chinese culture. I was trying to relate Chinese culture to what I’ve learned about Japan and Korea. Weirdly enough, a lot of my questions diverted to the love and sexual aspects of the culture. Some topics included:

The Holiest of All. The Dalai Lama is a political and spiritual leader that has major influence in Asia and most of the world. The Dalai Lama has reign from the day that his followers pick him. It is believed that the Dalai Lama is reincarnated after he dies and his soul is placed into another young baby or child. But how do you know if someone is the reincarnated Dalai Lama when he is an infant and hasn’t even learned to speak? I heard that one strategy is to place a plethora of toys in front of the baby and if the baby picks the Buddhist beads among the frills, he is claimed to be the new Dalai Lama. This youngster then takes reign as the prestigious, spiritual figure renowned across the world. The 14^th Dalai Lama seems like a feisty one—I don’t mean any disrespect. He exiled himself and Tibetan followers away from the Chinese government and has spoken of issues that have caused global controversy. He has diverted from the more traditional opinions, claims to be a feminist (since he fights for women’s rights), and thinks that the Dalai Lama system should be abolished after his reign. The Chinese government is pretty upset with him. China believes that they should be the one to pick the next leader and doesn’t want to choose a successor based on reincarnation.

I didn’t go to Tibet during this trip. I wasn’t even close to Tibet and I probably wouldn’t have been able to go. But I’ve always wanted to meet the Dalai Lama. I know that sounds strange. It’s like me saying I’ve always wanted to meet the president or Bill Gates, someone who most people want to meet. From the little that I know of him, I’ve always been a big fan. The work he has done for the world and his serene yet exuberant outlook has inspired me. When I was at my university, I wanted to apply for an acclaimed world peace project. You had to create a display promoting peace and global awareness at the school. If your display was picked you were given money to promote your display. Best of all, the Dalai Lama would personally meet you and present you with an award. Imagine that, the Dalai Lama giving you a peace award. Sadly, I couldn’t finish the project in time because of my strenuous schedule at school and work. But it was always something I regretted. The Dalai Lama is supposed to come back to Tibet soon supposedly. Soctt mentioned that if the Dalai Lama doesn’t pass away in Tibet, something bad happens. I don’t remember exactly. And the Dalai Lama is definitely getting older. To clarify, this was obviously not one of the sexual topics.

The Dalai Lama with a UCI hat

Chinese Citizenship. China is very stingy about their citizen qualifications. Citizenship in China allows you to have a free education but doesn’t let you have many other freedoms (I do believe, being American and all). You are not allowed to have a dual citizenship when you are a Chinese citizen. Moreover, they don’t really provide too many opportunities for you to leave China anyways. They say it’s because the government is afraid that if there citizens leave, they may never come back. So leaving the country becomes a very tricky process, requiring a lot of money and a long wait. Additionally, citizens are able to vote during elections. But most people don’t vote, especially the younger generation. And even if they did, the government somehow alters the votes in their favor. I heard that they only give the alternative option just as a show.

One Child Only. It’s really strange. If you look around, there aren’t too many girls here. Men are a definite majority in China. The One Child Policy was implemented in the late 70’s as an attempt to halt the rapidly breeding Chinese population. China has about 1.3 billion people now. The policy prohibited Chinese citizens from having more than one child per family. Not all citizens had to follow this rule though. There were some of the exceptions:

Exception #1: If you are part of a minority ethnic group (Mung or Tibetan), you are exempted from the rule. More specifically, if you were part of the 10% minority group, you can have two children. If you were Tibetan, you can procreate as much as you like.

Exception #2:  If you came from a one child family, you can bear two children in your own family.

Exception #3: If you are part of the majority and had a female child as your one child, you can have another child in about 3-5 years. Men are put on a pedestal here. For a while, most families would depose or give away their baby girls in hopes of getting a chance to have a boy the next round. Orphanages are filled primarily with girls. It’s very difficult to adopt a baby boy from China because they are a high commodity of Chinese families.

Examples of propaganda posters promoting the joys of having only one child:

What happens if the baby is an oops or an “oops”? There are also consequences when you break this policy. If you are part of the 35% of Han Chinese, you had to follow this law and are only allowed one child. If you break this law and have more than one child (without qualifying for any of the exceptions), you have to pay about 5-8 times your annual salary to legally have the child. That child will not get free education and the other amenities the Chinese government (like all the freedom they get—jealous?). 

Tip: If you want more babies: If you do not qualify for any of the exceptions and you can’t afford to pay the money, go to Hong Kong to deliver your baby. The rules do not apply in Hong Kong so technically, that baby doesn’t exist to the government. But do it soon. You have about 40 years before the region merges back with China.

I apologize. This whole process is very confusing and I wrote a lot. I actually wrote a lot more down and I still don’t understand. There are just too many unusual and random exceptions (just like the English language). Presently, the ratio of males to females is about 120 to 100 (or 12:10). With a billion people, that is a huge difference between the two genders. Soctt joked that this policy is the reason he can’t get a girlfriend. There just aren’t enough women!

 

So many Chinese boys!

Chinese Sex and Drugs. I asked questions about relationship dynamics, abortion, prostitution, special massages, and more. Oh, my favorite questions to ask. This part of their culture is very similar to the other cultures I’ve learned about. They don’t have DVD rooms but they have their fair share of streetwalkers and Boom Boom parlors. The people in my group got wind of my vulgar questions and decided to chime in. Our conversation took a turn for the worst (and the very best) as our topics got to be pretty dirty. I won’t go into detail but issues discussed included the unfortunate and delightful effects of having crabs and the debate over glory hole experiences. Mom and dad, please don’t google these terms.

Internet. Trying to use the Internet was very difficult. I wanted to check my email, contact my friends and family, and even update this blog. But not too many of the websites were blocked on the Internet. Then, I remembered that China censors a lot of information from the Chinese citizens. Since the Internet is a portal to the outside world, its information is repressed the most. Not only that, the connection was extremely slow and I couldn’t navigate to more than one website within a five minute period. Maybe too many people in China are trying to navigate the limited amount of websites left over.

I asked Soctt about the censoring of the Internet to get some insight. I asked, “Does the Chinese government limit the use of the Internet? I can’t seem to get to some of the websites I want.” With a disappointed look and tone, he immediately responded, “Yes, they won’t let you look at porn on the Internet.” I looked around in wonderment. Was this directed to me? Did he think that I was asking that question because I was concerned about my porn fix? Why did he automatically assume that the website I wanted to view was porn? He doesn’t know me that well. Feeling rather judged, I timidly said, “Well, okay. I was talking more about other websites.” He told me that Facebook and many blog sites were blocked because of the government’s fear of outside influence. Though China has become more accepting of the effects of globalization and Western influence, the government still does not want its citizens to hear or say anything that denounces the government and the country. They have the same restriction on foreign movies. They only allow about four American movies to be screened per year. Avatar was just shy of the list last year.

Pug getting caught watching puggy porn!...I miss Ruby.

And back to the Great Wall…

A True Person. When setting foot upon the first step of the Great Wall, a surge of energy and triumph came over me. I couldn’t believe I was walking the Great Wall of China. Though the wall has been constructed and renovated many a time, the wall still had significant history ingrained into its worn stones. I couldn’t even imagine how many influential Chinese heroes and leaders (and villains) have stood upon this wall and walked my same walk.

There were two walking options: the easier more popular side of the wall or the steeper, less popular side of the wall. Some of the group mates were intense hikers. They climbed to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro last year! So we all chose the harder route. Though it is supposed to be a bit more scenic the other way, there were too many people on that side. It was nice having most of the walk to ourselves. It was difficult though. Each step of the stairs was extremely steep and tall. It makes you think that if Chinese people are particularly short—even more so in the past—how were they able to climb up these stairs? Every time I climbed a step, my knees would nearly go up to my chest. Even the flattened parts of the walls were slippery and vertical. We had a casualty on this hike. She failed to see an obstruction in the middle of the walk and she took a pretty hard fall to the ground. There were many protruding rocks and ledges on the wall. When surrounded by the view that we had, it’s more difficult to watch your step. At least she can say that she fell on the Great Wall of China. She probably left some skin there too. Not many people have done that I bet!

We were told not to go further than the 5^th watch tower but we didn’t listen. We didn’t know if Soctt was warning us because of the level of difficulty or if it would take too much time. But we wanted to see what lies beyond that point. We continued walking, and walking, and walking. It was tiring but I enjoyed the burn. Since my back injury, I haven’t been able to be active at all. My body was itching for some type of movement and even some sweat. The scene was spectacular. I’m so glad it didn’t rain this day because you can see everything. You can see mountain upon mountains, layering the skyline, in all types of shapes and shades of purple and blue. You could see the Great Wall and how it extends into the distance, looking so deceivingly minuscule. Four thousand miles! Oh man! I was hoping to walk far enough to reach Mongolia. I’ve always wanted to go to that country. So why not use the Great Wall as my direct passage?

Look at that! Amazing, huh?

Defiling Ancient Property. It was a good thing we decided to go further. No one else roamed this area of the wall so we were all by ourselves. Pictures came out better and we were free to act as we pleased. So we did some rather indecent things to the Great Wall. Don’t worry, no one was naked or anything. But we found a tiny passage way that led us to a small balcony extending from the original wall. In this balcony was a shrine-looking gazebo that had a large stone with Chinese characters on it. We didn’t know what it said but we started taking pictures of it and with it. Then, the guy in the group decided to climb up on it and pose in a fairly erotic position (lying on his back with his legs up in the air). I was envious that I just took a boring picture of me smiling in front of the stone. I kind of figured, no one is here and I can’t see any cameras so I got on top of this stone and started (and attempted) posing in some sensual positions (come hither posture). I refrained from humping the stone. Then everyone else in our group decided to do similar positions on the stone. We felt pretty satisfied taking those pictures and not getting caught. Later, we found out that the Chinese characters on the stone something like protect or respect the great wall. Oops!

Tiger Mom and her two tiger daughters

Tiger Mom.  My mom was definitely a tiger mom when I was growing up. Tiger mom is a term produced by Amy Chua, author of the book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. The book was a memoir expressing the detailed experiences of Chua’s traditional parenting approach. Some principles included academic achievement being the utmost priority (A-‘s are unacceptable) and errorless piano playing was a mandatory childhood hobby. In the states, there are several parents who take the hands-free, more passive approach. This is probably a reason for the controversy the book provoked. The negative and forceful method is a completely foreign concept to Westerners but for traditional Easterners it is pretty standard. I experienced this growing up. Although, I wasn’t left outside in the snow because I got an A-, my mom had a similar mentality towards my sister and me. The book’s message did not shock me. It was more nostalgic than anything. I wasn’t able to get anything lower than an A in school. And I definitely did not reach that expectation. Playing the piano was almost a full-time hobby that I despised. My former piano teacher even used to slap my wrists with a ruler every time I made a mistake. Still don’t appreciate that. Every recess, lunch break, or afterschool time (unless I was playing the piano) was dedicated to books and workbooks that needed to be complete and flawless. These books were not part of the school’s curriculum but my mother’s. I was the kid at school sitting alone and studying during playtime.

Honestly, I didn’t enjoy it. But I appreciate it now. I do believe that there should be more of a balance between both approaches. However, if I weren’t pushed, I wouldn’t be able to do everything that I can do now. I’m glad my mom didn’t give up trying to get me to play the piano because for a while I was pretty good. Now, I regret stopping at such a young age since I have forgotten a lot. Because of my short stature, I tried to stop playing volleyball several times. My mom wouldn’t let me and now I’ve been playing over 13 years and I have experienced so much from it.  I don’t know if my relationship with my mom would be as healthy and as close if she didn’t push me as hard as she did.

I think the most straining part of her parenting approach was experiencing the clash between cultures. Growing in the States, I saw a lot of my friends watch MTV, stay out late, and happily receive B’s in school. It was hard to get treated one way while observing others being treated another more appealing and different way. So I used to rebel a lot (especially during times that I would get grounded for two weeks because I was late for a dentist appointment or when I had a ten o’clock curfew during my senior prom). But my mom is also a very loving person. She wants what is best for us but she also wants us to be happy. She’ll have moments now where she’ll try to implement her own ideas onto mine. But she is much more understanding, accepting, and probably just exhausted from disciplining us for so many years.

Language. I haven’t told anyone in my tour group that I know some Chinese (Mandarin). I haven’t said anything because I’m very ashamed of my limited knowledge of the language. My mom is Taiwanese and speaks Mandarin fluently. She tried teaching me when I was younger and tried to send me to Chinese school. I was particularly reluctant and stubborn as I didn’t want to go to school on Saturdays and do any more work than I already was doing. Again, now this is something I deeply regret. I had the perfect opportunity and the best resource (my mom) to learn another language. But I fought it. Now at 24 years old and I am still desperately trying to learn the language. I have even taken opportunities to learn after college. I know enough Mandarin to get through a small conversation (maybe less now). But I can only recognize a few Chinese characters.

One thing I just realized on this trip is that my listening skills are much better than I thought. I can actually understand the gist of people’s conversations. Since no one knew that I can understand (and most assuming I am just white), I got to hear a lot of conversations I wasn’t supposed to. I was able to listen to locals making fun of our loud and obnoxious group. I was able to hear our tour guide talk to our bus driver about us. I even heard one Chinese man hit on me in Mandarin. To his surprise, I spoke back to him in Mandarin. It was funny to see the look on his face. Mandarin is very difficult to learn. There are many tones in their language that Westerners (or English speakers) have never developed a tongue for. If you say one word in Mandarin and use the wrong tone, you could be saying something completely different. This can get you into trouble.

The Emperor’s Tomb. We visited the Ming Tombs in the Changping region in Beijing. This tomb was created as a burial ground for the 13 emperors of the Ming Dynasty. It is very large as it covers about 32 miles of mountainous and rivers. I was so excited to see a tomb! Again, it is very strange that I’m attracted to the dark and twisty aspects of the world. We roamed around the tomb area and visited several ancient buildings and structures.

The Chinese Columbus. Did you know that Christopher Columbus was the first person to discover the Western World? Did you know that he was friends with all the Native Americans and then John Smith and Pocahontas lived happily ever after? B*&#S@*$. This may make me a very controversial teacher but when I teach my young kids about Christopher Columbus, I tell them the truth. I don’t teach them the sugar-coated version in the book. I tell them the darker side. Is that why they get nightmares? There are actually a few people who discovered the West before Columbus even got there, one of them being Zheng He. Zheng He was a bit of a Renaissance man as he had multiple skills and jobs. He was most well-known for navigating unknown waters of the Pacific and the Indian Ocean. He used this opportunity to trade and form strong ties with other countries. We learned more about Zheng He at the Ming Tomb museum where it seemed to have a whole shrine made out for him. We never actually got to see the tomb unfortunately. I don’t know why though. I think it might have been too far away or maybe not part of the tour package. I was most excited to see the concubines’ tombs. Once the emperor dies, the prostitutes die with him. What a waste of life, or…ehem.



Afterwards, we arrived at one of the main walkways at the tomb site. This walkway had several stone animals bordering both sides. The animals were arranged from most powerful to least significant. Some animals were standing up and some were sitting. This represented which animals were on duty, guarding the tombs and which were resting. We all posed with each of the animals. I took pictures sitting with the stone elephant. I felt this image was foreshadowing my future experience with the wandering elephants of Thailand. I also took a picture with this soldier-looking man. I don’t know if they did this on purpose but some people in my group told me to kiss the man. What I didn’t realize when taking the picture is my head was as tall as his crotchal region. So it looks like I’m doing something pretty naughty on this unwilling participant. He is unwilling because he is stationary by nature of course. Uh, nevermind. Next topic?

The Group. I started to become more comfortable with the group. After finally getting some rest and a couple nights to settle, I started to mesh rather well with these people. Let me introduce to the group.

The French Fungi. Brigitte is a woman who’s feisty in spirit and young at heart. I was most impressed by her extraordinary travel experience and adventurous attitude. She is very talkative and she talked a lot about a lot. This characteristic made her very personable and helped me learn a lot (probably more of the dirty things than anything). Since most Chinese toilets are squat toilets that don’t supply toilet paper, I’ve been holding it for as long as I can to avoid using them. Since the beginning she has been peer pressuring me to try it out for the first time. I don’t really know how to squat like that and I wasn’t too confident in my aiming accuracy. So she has been trying to coach me. She is even trying to make drip drying sound like a fun activity. Well, see.  

Ben Means Stupid. Ben is a young middle school boy, stuck in an older man’s body. I say middle school because he has the mentality of an awkward but assertive, developing teenager. I mean he laughs at the word balls every single time. He also tries to indecently wrap his leg around ancient artifacts. I say assertive because he says what he wants sometimes without the mental filter most people have. He is straight-forward to everyone, no matter who you are. He is the loudest person I know. I also thought Bridgette and Ben were married. They sure act like it as they would beat each other up and call each other derogatory names.

The Latina Samantha Jones. Norma (or Ronnie, you choose) is a confident woman with a whole lot of sex drive. She seems to be a heartbreaker of the group as I continue to hear “Well this one doctor I was with…” “This one guy…” “This other guy needed Viagra to keep up”. It seemed like she had guys chasing her left and right, some of which seem to not be able to catch up to her libido. She came to China with a one year visa in hopes to find an attractive, well-endowed Chinese man. She takes a lot of naps, even in the most uncomfortable positions and places. But she will wake immediately upon hearing anything sexual. She loves to shop, can’t turn down a good deal, a pestering vendor, or a good…time.

Mount Me Kilimanjaro. Carol seems like a very well-balanced person. She is outgoing but also subtle and calm in her demeanor and actions. Surprisingly, the first thing I heard come out of her mouth was, “He then told me, ‘you can see Mount Kilimanjaro from my room’ and so I saw Mount Kilimanjaro.” I did a double take. I had to make sure she said what I thought she said. “So when you say you saw Mount Kilimanjaro, you went to his room and ‘saw’ Mount Kilimanjaro.” It didn’t take much more prompting as the whole group (who went on this same trip) was snickering and Norma woke up from her nap. I did not expect this from her but love it!

The Communist Kardashian. Besides her fixation with Communism (or just the Communist hat sold at every street vendor), Ani seems like your typical girl next door. She actually only knows one other person on this trip and has met a few others. So she is almost as thrown in as I am. She seems to be a hopeless romantic and a spunky attitude. She is Armenian, which is maybe a reason why she likes the Kardashians so much. And she is better at window shopping than shopping at all. But those Communist hats. She couldn’t get enough.

I’m like a Bird. Nicki is a woman who is pure in her character and dialogue. I say pure because she seems to be untouched and unfazed by any unconstructive or petty issue. She is kind of in her own world, which is a quality I am envious of. She focuses on the more valuable things in life and doesn’t laugh at the word balls. She is the only one of us that is committed to a significant other. But she doesn’t have kids which makes it easier for her to make her worldly trips. She is big on nature and is a fanatic hiker and camper. She introduced me to the pee bag concept, which is a bag that solidifies your pee so you don’t have to sneak out to the bathroom in the middle of the night. It’s spill-proof!

Group picture at the Great Wall (minus the screamer)

This is so far what I know of them. But I’m sure we will learn more about each other.

I think that they started to connect to me more when I let them know of my knowledge of STDs. Sounds weird, I know. I know a whole ton about STDs. This of course, is not from personal experience but I have been trained to teach sex and health education. I have been teaching this class since I was in high school up until college. They seemed very intrigued so I informed them of all the STD’s, characteristics of chlamydia and syphilis, and most importantly how cute crabs are based on my description. I think I shocked them. And after that, it was done. The minor awkward ‘I just met you’ feeling was gone. I was part of this rowdy, juvenile-acting group and I loved every minute of my time with them.

A Local’s Abode. We were able to live it up like a local (kind of…). It was our last night with Soctt before we had to head over the Xian, so he invited us to come back to his place for a drink. We excitedly agreed, especially since Norma had a one year visa and needed to put it to good use. But most of all, we wanted to see a local area and a local’s home. Soctt’s house was in the outskirts of Beijing. It actually ended up taking a long time because of rush hour. We actually almost got into a pretty bad accident as well. I don’t know if Soctt wasn’t looking but one second we were driving on the highway laughing at Norma’s declaration of ‘screaming means that it is good’. The next second, we were swerving into another lane, inches away from smashing into the car ahead of us. I heard sharp gasps and maybe someone scream. I can’t really remember. I blocked that part out of my head. It was pretty scary. If it weren’t for Soctt’s fast reactions (oh yes, Asian reactions!) and the fact that there was just enough space for us to swerve into, we could’ve ended up in pretty bad condition.

After calming down and bringing up Norma’s screaming fixation again, we continued on our path to the local’s area. We stopped at a small grocery store to pick up some alcohol. Soctt informed us that if you want alcohol or groceries delivered to your house, it was quite common to do in China. Unfortunately, we didn’t do that but we got to experience grocery shopping like a Chinese local. We went back to his place and drank a couple beers. Soctt bought this potent liquor and had us all try it. It was disgusting. It tasted like tequila but much stronger. It reminded me of my horrible drinking experience on the past 4^th of July. A lot of public humiliation and not the good kind (wink*).I will not mention much more. But it was awful enough to stop me from drinking like that again. So after one tiny sip from this bottle, I was done with it. It put a bad taste in my mouth and I tried washing it down with beer. Didn’t help.

We had some of the most priceless conversations
while we drank. We continued to talk about Norma’s one year visa and subtly advertised her to Soctt. Even making it more obvious by mentioning the open bed tonight. A couple of us argued about marriage and whether or not it was just a piece of paper or a strong tie holding loved ones together during the roughest of times. We talked about Soctt’s love life (or as he said lack there of) and his hopeful career as a lawyer. Turns out, a couple years ago, China implemented a law restricting non-Beijinese (Beijing born residents) from practicing law in their city. Soctt was born outside of the city. Though Soctt has lived in Beijing for several years, he is still not permitted to work there. But since Soctt is an advocate of the city, he has been trying to get in the business for the last couple years. That is the reason he is our tour guide today. It is his default job. Though, it has helped him improve his English significantly.

We then got into a more uncomfortable topic about vaginas for some reason. Our drunken state led us to a conversation that went something like this:

……………………………………………..............................Well, I have a dozen stitches up there!...................................................... …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………Well, I have got my uterus removed and now it’s stitched up tighter. …………………………………………………………………….

Some comments were censored…not for China’s sake.

That led into all of us trying to figure out who would be the best fit for Soctt (yes, I said best fit) based on age, experience, and a go-getting attitude. Poor Soctt. I do think he was drunk enough to not be able to translate our rampant, crude speaking. Norma was sleeping most of the time. She only perked up when anything sexual was said.