I opened December 2016 with some bouts
of road rage that occurred as I took my son Tony to his school in the
mornings.
One driver didn't put on their turn
signals as they changed lane in front of me. I first tooted my honk
for a long stretch at them followed by several shorter blasts.
Another driver was on his mobile phone
and as well didn't use his turn signals. I tried to block him in his
lane further lane changes as I blared my horn at him.
*
Jenny's natural father has a tumor in
his liver I learned on December 1st. A tumor so big that
it was sure to explode at any moment.
My wife Jenny has issues with her
natural parents because they pawned her off after she was born. She
was a third daughter: an unwanted girl.
*
There was a beggar on the Wuxi Metro.
I gave her two rmb.
*
Andis Kaulins in Jewish Gematria
Equals: 514 (The same as George Soros and rudeness)
Andis Kaulins in English Gematria
Equals: 804 (The same as quietly)
Andis Kaulins in Simple Gematria
Equals: 134 (The same as words Reagan and Michael Caine)
*
I passed a four car fender-bender one
morning as I drove Tony to his school. It happened either because
the drivers were riding each other's asses or the driver at the front
decided to stop where he shouldn't have.
*
On a day off, I wanted to drive the
area around Casa Kaulins but the amount of cars and e-bikes and the
stupidity of their drivers was dispiriting.
It was even a sunny day but the haze,
probably from pollution, made the area seem grimy and communist.
*
Mad Dog Mattis, Trump's defense
secretary, is a warrior monk. Awesome! I say.
There ought to be teacher monks as well
instead of the predator pervert types that far too many in education
have proven to be.
*
Coming home from work one evening, I
saw a man, walking down the street, who was wearing a full length
housecoat. I took photos of him – I was walking right behind him –
but they were blurry. Passing him and then turning around to look at
his front, I saw a middle-aged Chinese man, with a plump Xi Jing Ping
style face. He was smoking.
*
I very much have to watch my road rage
tendencies. Another person cut me off as I was coming back from
having dropped Tony off at school. I made a point of cutting her off
and driving slowly so as to slow her down and annoy her back.
*
Tony says he wants to go to school in
Canada, he says, because China is boring. How I wish I could arrange
that.
Jenny has talked of putting him in an
International school but that would be more expensive and involve us
having to work harder....
*
Trump ties one on. I am very eager to
get student reaction to Trump phone conversation with the Taiwanese
president.
With the Taiwanese president being a
chick and all, you would think his leftie detractors would give him a
break. But women who are not on board with the progressive cause
aren't women, at least according to progressives.
[I mentioned Trump in a Speaker's
Corner after the Taiwan phone call and one student actually growled
in disapproval.]
*
One student at our school – a kid he
seems to be – is going to Montreal. He is a little chubby, wears
glasses and whines like a teenage girl. His English is not
particularly good [I couldn't never have gotten it out of him that he
was going to Montreal.] and he sits in classes where he doesn't
understand anything at a level much lower than all the other
students. I made some attempts to get him to talk but he didn't seem
to appreciate the attention. All he does at our school is sit in the
library and play games on his computer or on his laptop. He eats
lots of junk food for his meals.
If I were his parent, I would beat the
living snot out of him. What a waste of a life. What bad effects
being affluent in China can have on one's children.
But having him move over is just what
Canada deserves.
*
I have seen a wide variety of student
personalities in my time. Some students you just not going to like.
Really, one should feel sorry for them and not let them get under
your skin.
Examples?
The teenage kid with the attitude.
*
I had a one-on-one class with a male
student who, like me, has a son in grade three. [My son Tony is in
grade three.]
It was a Friday evening so I asked him
what he was going to do on the weekend. He told me he was going to
take his son to extra classes. I asked if him if he thought this was
crazy. He said it was but he had to do it because everyone else was
doing it. I asked him if he thought there was any benefit to all the
extra classes and he said he didn't think there was.
When it was almost 9:00 PM, I asked him
if his wife and his son was doing homework. (Jenny & Tony are
doing homework at that time, much to my consternation.) He said,
with a grimace, that they were.
I ended the class by asking him if he
let his son play computer games. (I do because I feel sorry for
Tony's rigorous academic regimen) He said he did as well.
So I was just a foreigner look at the
primary school education and hating it. Many local parents feel
trapped by it too.
*
I went to Maoye Mall with a colleague
for lunch one Friday. Afterwards, we walked about in the mall and
then walked to a subway station closer to the Qing Yang Carrefour.
So, we were taking a stroll down Qing Yang Road. The area we walked
past seemed overbuilt. There was a fifty floor skyscraper but walk
away from it and then you saw abandoned infrastructure, like a
escalator leading to an abandoned tunnel, and empty storefronts.
*
Jenny & I went to another mall:
Hui Ju which is possibly the biggest of Wuxi's many shopping malls.
I was surprised to see that the skating rink there had been turned in
a pool of balls: the kind in which kids like to play and are a
staple at many kid oriented places.
I wondered if the ball thing was
temporary or because the ice rink was not a paying proposition.
[AKIC Critic: Think of all the
kiddies who like balls!
Me: Don't
go sounding like a leftist progressive about the children! There are
higher truths at stake here.]
*
A student, who had been to Thailand,
observed to me that many of the European and North American males who
go to Thailand, do so for sex tourism.
I happily agreed with the student.
Seeing how I have never been to Thailand myself.
Of course the reason I haven't been to
Thailand is not so much that I chose not to go as to the fact that I
am in a situation where I couldn't swing it. I don't make enough
money and what free time I do have, I have to save for going back to
Canada. I can't afford to go back to Canada that often, having only
gone back three times in twelve years.
*
At the primary school I would love to
ask the students this:
Do you shit a tree, a stump or a log?
[There is a story in a book I am using for the class that features a
tree stump.]
I can imagine, a few of the students –
the ones that raise their hand to answer questions without knowing
what they are going to say – stuttering and saying “I shit, shit,
shit shit ...” At which point I would go to another student who
might say “I shit my deskmate” or “I shit my homework” or “I
shit a Samsung Notebook 7.”
*
In early December, I was thinking of
going out and having a fancy (almost authentic) Christmas Dinner
somewhere in Wuxi where I could even have someone agreeable with whom
I could socialize.
I delayed making any effort about it
for a week.
I then broached the idea to a Wechat
Wuxi Expat contact but he said he was doing something for his
business on Christmas day.
I then thought to ask the colleagues at
work. Most of them expressed skepticism about being able to find an
affordable and authentic Christmas dinner in Wuxi. Most of them
planned to stay home on the 25th and do their own thing.
I was thinking that I was just going to end up going to a fancy
restaurant that day but not having anything really Christmasy and
that I would have no one with whom I could chat.
But I persisted, sort of.
On the weekend before Christmas weekend
(Christmas on Saturday and Sunday) this year, I thought of going to
the Ikea Buffet again if someone could accompany us.
But by Tuesday, I was in despair. It
seemed that on Christmas weekend, there weren't any options for me.
Because Christmas was on Sunday and in China, I couldn't see myself
having a decent meal out without parting with money or my time.
But that very evening, I got something
on WeChat and we ended up going to the Kempenski Hotel for a family
Christmas buffet.
How was the buffet? Read below.
*
I have this VIP student with whom I do
two hour one-on-one classes. (Whether I am improving his English is
another story.) He was scheduled to do a class with me on the
morning of Saturday, December 24th: my birthday. I was
going to mention it to him and try to book the class at another time
but it turned out that I wouldn't have been able to get this change
to happen. And then he mentioned to me that another of our classes
happened to be scheduled on his birthday: Saturday the 17th.
*
Meanwhile our school Christmas party
was lame. We were lied to about there being booze at the party. We
had to buy cans of Heineken from a nearby convenience store.
Still, the people who attended were
alright and the beer I did drink made me overcome my morose feeling
as the party started.
*
It was very foggy one Wednesday
morning. But, believe it or not, I saw only one car not have on its
headlights or fog lights. It was actually more shocking than the fog
which may well have been smog.
Later that day, I was at the Big Bridge
Primary School where I was teachings some classes. There was so much
water in the air that the bathroom mirrors at the school were fogged
up completely.
*
Walking to school one morning, on
Zhongshan Road, I passed three men who were squatting in a doorway
all looking at their mobile phones. I should have taken a photo.
What struck me about it was how old they were. To have seen
teenagers or young adults squatting very close together while all
were concentrating on their smart phones would hot have seen so
strange to me.
*
I showed Tony the nativity scene from
Franco Zeffirelli's Jesus of Nazareth mini series. Slowly, and not
quickly enough (I know), I am trying to make Tony aware of
Christianity.
Christianity is perhaps my only way out
of this bind I feel I am in with living in China and having Tony in
its education system.
*
Sadly, the person whose departure from
our school I deemed a good riddance is back in Wuxi. Much as I was
happy to see the departures of Clinton and Castro, and Brexit, it is
the departures in one's personal life that really stick to my craw,
as the saying goes. So, I am living in the sequel of a bad horror
film where the crazed maniac was not killed.
*
My Birthday (December 24th)
and Christmas were days full of anticipation, some small joys and
some big disappointments.
I only had a two hour class in the
morning to do on my birthday which was better than other birthdays
where I had worked all day, as late as 9:00 PM at night.
The afternoon was spent anticipating
the buffet dinner we were to go to at the Kempenski. I first sat
around in the office at school not knowing what to do with myself.
Eventually, I went to a nearby expat restaurant with a colleague
where I had a beer and a western breakfast. This was all on Eric.
This little gesture made my day. (Also I got a wonderful email from
Archduke Harry Moore and a message from a student from one of my
history classes) I then took the bus to Ling Ling's. She, who is a
close friend of my wife Jenny, gave me a watch. While this was very
unexpected and thus nice, I was very antsy as I stayed in her
apartment. I was looking forward to going to the dinner at the
Kempenski and imagined all the expats I would meet.
When Jenny, Tony & I finally
arrived at the Kempenski, we were ultimately were filled with
disappointment. First off, our seats were horrible. We were sat at
a table tightly packed against another table right by the entrance to
the restaurant area. We were right behind the backdrop for a stage
set up for a show. The whole restaurant was set up in an area that
was not conducive for a show at all. Set up on the third floor of
the lobby area of the Kempenski Hotel, the buffet area was filled
with columns, barriers, a huge decorative pool and curved hallways.
I realized that the setup was a commercial activity done with the
intention of packing as many people in the place as possible.
Furthermore, I was the only expat at the whole affair, apart from
staff. To end up going to what could easily have been a run of the
mill hotel buffet in a Chinese restaurant was a big letdown. After
30 minutes, I was wanting to go home.
All that said, the food was okay, but
again the atmosphere and seating arrangements of the place were a
letdown and I had not much of appetite as a result.
Tony and I wanted to go home so we
could check out the VPN router which had just been dropped off at a
locker in the Wanda Plaza near Casa Kaulins.
Walking to Wanda, the traffic was
something. The road that goes from our apartment complex to the mall
was packed full of cars which were parked in every conceivable knook
and cranny the road had to offer for parking, including in the two
bus stop areas.
Christmas day was spent at home. It
rained all that day and Tony had to do homework for three hours in
the afternoon after which I went to pick up KFC for our Christmas
dinner. Walking to the mall, I saw huge traffic jams. Cars were
stuck in the intersections because they couldn't get through before
the change of traffic lights.
I passed the time by exchanging
Christmas wishes on social media.
*
The excitement of Christmas, for me and
Tony, was all about the VPN router we got.
It was nice to get on Facebook and
Youtube. But I want the VPN so I can download podcasts that are
blocked in China as well as for downloading books from archive.org.
*
I should stop complaining about Chinese
driving, but I can't help myself. The extent of the stupidity of
local drivers is such that I can't go a week without being astounded.
First, there is a certain intersection
that I go through where I know to look out for cars on my right that
make right turns without looking. I either have to slow down for
them or go into the left lane to avoid them. Well one day, I
approached that intersection from the road of the crazy right turning
drivers, and I was surprised – though I shouldn't have been –
that there was a yield sign on that corner. So those drivers were
all ignoring a yield sign or didn't know was a yield sign meant.
Second, I saw a woman put her turn
signals as she was making a turn, not before when she was stopped in
a lane where cars had the option of turning left or going straight,
and the information would have been useful to cars stopped behind
her. What the hell was she thinking?!? Clearly she was thinking in
an way that was alien to a westerner.
I suppose I should just do a monthly
Chinese driver report instead of interspersing them with my other
blog entries.
*
I asked students what they had gotten
for Christmas. Many of the ones at primary school told me that they
had gotten apples. They didn't mean Ipads or Macbooks or Iphones.
They meant the fruit.
An adult student told me that he had
given his child apples for Christmas. He then asked me about this
tradition came about. I told him that I didn't think it was a
Western tradition.
*
Much to my consternation and surprise,
the McDonalds near our school, which had been there since before I
came to our school in 2004, was shut down. It seemed strange that it
had because it always seemed busy. But thinking about it a little
more, I do remember how the restaurant was often filled with seniors
who sat at the tables but never bought anything.
What were these seniors to do? Some of
them I spotted at the Briant cafe that is above the Nanchang Temple
Subway station in late December. The cafe had been filled with lots
of empty tables when I began to buy coffee there in late November.
But then I saw a table of four seniors eating sunflower seeds, making
a big mess and not one of them consuming a product from the cafe.
*
Talking about 2016 in a Speaker's
Corner, the students and I agreed that Donald Trump was the year's
most interesting personality.
*
Early in December, I had gotten
comfortable with my probably spending Western New Year's Eve at home.
David Warren said of New Year's, something to the effect of it
having no civilizational significance anyway, deserving to pale in
comparison to Christmas and Easter.
*
A tunnel from the Nanchang Temple
market area to the Nanchang Temple subway stations has opened. I can
take this tunnel to get to the Nanchang Temple Market McDonalds: the
nearest McDonalds to our school.
*
It is good to not have any
expectations. Sometimes good things will happen.
New Year's Eve, Tony & I
went to a party at Casa Zoe, a Mexican Restaurant near the Nanchang
Jie bar street area. I had a better time then than at Christmas as
there were people with whom I could talk. I didn't stay till
midnight as Tony wanted to leave early.
