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Guide Page
老怪物
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It Ain't Easy Being Me 30 June 2008 Within a few days, The Old Codger will be living in a virtual "ghost town." The stores shelves on campus are almost empty as the merchants send stock back to their suppliers. The idea of a "clearance sale" is not part of the equation or quite possibly, even in the vocabulary of the Chinese. Students are slowly evacuating the campus for their homes. Soon, all that will be left is a skeleton staff and only a couple of teachers. A whole lot of peace and quiet, and perhaps a bit boring, to say nothing about being isolated. There has been a lot in the media lately about the security for the Olympics - all the "do's and don'ts" as it were. Since The Old Codger is staying in China during the Olympics, he is not exempt from the security cautions. Tomorrow he will be "visited and interviewed" by the local police who want to be assured that The Old Codger poses no security threats to the Olympics. The only threat that he poses is to himself after a session at Captain's, so it should be interesting. According to others that have already had their interviews, it is a very simple thing. They visit your apartment; ask what your plans are for August and take your picture. Hence, nothing to lose any sleep over. No water boarding. No bamboo shoots under the finger nails. Kind of 'ho-hum' is the over all assessment.
Wednesday evening, another free dinner and drinks at a Chinese teachers home. That was a totally different experience to say the least. Thursday evening, another free dinner and drinks sponsored by the University for all the foreign teachers at a local hotel. On Friday, a trip to Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu Province, again sponsored by the Nantong Foreign Trade Bureau. Then, to wrap up the week in style, a dinner and drinks sponsored by a foreign company that is based in Shanghai. This week is shaping up good as well. Dinner tomorrow night with the parents of some students who are willing to pay some big RMB for tutoring them this summer. So, with all these free meals and drinks, how is it possible that The Old Codger would insist, as the title of this letter says: It ain't easy being me? Well, let me tell you... Living with Chinese logic: Ever since The Old Codger moved into his apartment last September, he has had problems with his electricity. On a regular basis, when he would use his microwave oven, the fuse in the microwave would blow and all of the circuit breakers in his apartment. Getting the microwave fixed was usually a week long project - or longer at times. After a few times of this, he decided that perhaps the microwave was faulty, and attempted to get a new one. This was like pulling hen's teeth. Three different people came to look at the microwave, and all offered to get it fixed. The Old Codger declined the offers, pointing out that it would be about the 5th time that it had blown a fuse. The real probing question from one of the people that looked at it was: "You sure you know how to use microwave?" The only possible response was: "I've been using a microwave without problems since before you were born." Eventually, a new microwave was provided. The new microwave worked fine for two cooking sessions and then "Zap." Same problems all over again. Time to diagnose the problem. Conclusion: The outlets were faulty, and a ground wire was occasionally crossing with a live wire. Easy problem to fix. Extremely difficult problem to try to explain to people that knew nothing about electricity. The Old Codger had tried to explain and show the problem to the maintenance man one morning, which involved using two Chinese girls that could do a reasonable job of interpretation. That proved to be an exercise in futility. The maintenance man got out his circuit tester and showed The Old Codger that there was now electricity. No problem. As long as there was electricity after turning the circuit breaker back on, there was no problem. Forget the fact that once the microwave was fixed again, the problem would happen again. It appeared that the solution is to simply keep on fixing the microwave and not worry about the cause of the problem. Patience is a pre-requisite for living in Asia and China. One must always remember that there are solutions to every problem and that finding the solution is going to require some extremely creative thinking and planning. So, The Old Codger decided to sit back, and wait until the time was right to bring the problem up again. Of course, for the duration, he was also without a microwave oven, but that is a minor set back. Knowing that the biggest obstacle was language, The Old Codger decided to sit down and write a detailed explanation, step by step, of the problem and what was needed to fix the problem. He wrote it of course in English and then used a translation program to translate it into Simplified Chinese. He then presented it the foreign teachers advisor, who is about 25 years old or so, and a female. The odds of her knowing anything about electricity were equivalent to 10% of the world's population saying with a straight face that George Bush is a genius and linguistically capable of saying five complete sentences in a row without any mistakes. She took the written explanation and told The Old Codger that she would review it, That was the expected result. Ten minutes later she calls The Old Codger.
This is what we call "passing the buck." A common solution to problems throughout Asia. Decide that someone else should handle the problem that you do not understand or want to handle. Do not, under any circumstances, try to figure something out on your own. The next morning the liaison came to investigate the problem. It was patiently explained to her, slowly and clearly. She said that she understood, but somehow the blank look on her face defied that statement. Her known background, which is very far removed from the building trades, also belied that statement as well. After a bit more discussion, albeit a bit one sided, she reached a decision: "It will take too much work to fix. You move to new apartment." So, on Saturday the problem was resolved. The Old Codger moved to a new apartment. Of course, so far, there don't seem to be any problems in the new apartment, other than one light that doesn't work. He has decided that he will wait a while and recover from moving before attempting to have that minor problem fixed. Heaven knows what the decision will be. It ain't easy being me. A Student Speaks Out: The Old Codger received a text message on his phone the other day from a student from last term that he had spoken to briefly. The text stated: "Nice talking to u. Ur the best teacher I have never met n it is not flattery. :-)" Hmmm. Since she never met The Old Codger, he must be chopped liver. It ain't easy being me. The Foreign Trade Bureau: Given that The Old Codger's students have never met him, it should be a credible statement that The Old Codger spends a lot of his time sitting around minding his own business. Those who truly known him will no doubt strongly support that statement: "Oh yeah. That is The Old Codger. Minds his own business all the time. Sits around all the time minding his own business." So, The Old Codger has been sitting around since arriving here in China, minding his own business, when out of the blue, he gets an e-mail from a girl that works at the Nantong Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation Bureau. Here in China, there is a lot of interest in foreign trade and there are more foreign trade programs run by the government than you can shake a stick at. He is invited to attend a meeting with some people to discuss promoting Nantong to foreign visitors. The reason for the invitation was the writing that The Old Codger has done on his web site. Fair enough. The Old Codger goes to the meeting the next afternoon at his branch office, Captain's. (Business is best discussed over a cold beer at the very least, though in China it also usually includes an elaborate dinner or lunch as well.) At the meeting was the girl from the Foreign Trade Bureau and a young man who stated that he worked for a company in Nanjing. They are publishing a magazine to be handed out for free to people in Nantong promoting Nantong, and wanted The Old Codger to write for them. He looks at everything and tells them that what they are doing is not going to appeal to the foreigners in Nantong, nor most likely the businesses that cater to foreigners who would be possible advertisers in the magazine. The Old Codger then told them about another way that they could go about doing the whole thing, which got their interest all worked up. They loved the ideas that were presented. Loved them so much that they invited The Old Codger to a party on Saturday afternoon at a Chinese bar in Nantong, promising free beer. The offer of free beer was enough to motivate The Old Codger to go to the party on Saturday. It was being held in a true Chinese bar that is reportedly the first corporation in Nantong. The bar is about 25 feet underground - beneath a parking lot and at least one street. It is massive in size from all indications. The Old Codger wasn't able to see everything, but there were hallways and rooms all over the place. It was also very damp and musty, and after being there a short time, The Old Codger could envision some fairly serious upper respiratory problems surfacing at some point in the very near future. Apparently floods were common place in the facility, as there were wet floors and carpets throughout the place. A Hazardous Materials team would have had a field day down there in a Western country. Since the beer was free, and it would be impolite (really, it would be - an insult to one's hosts) to want to leave citing potential health problems, The Old Codger made a mental note to take at least a double dosage of Amoxicillin (an anti-biotic which attacks upper respiratory diseases) at the earliest possible time, and stuck it out for about 3 hours. The "master plan" was that the young man's bosses from Nanjing would come to Nantong the next week to discuss a bit of a business partnership with The Old Codger to implement his ideas, all for the betterment of Nantong. The arrangements for this were all completed over the phone, all in Chinese, so The Old Codger really has no idea of what was being said. Not speaking the language often will leave one out in the cold, and more or less at the mercy of one's hosts. The word "victim" may come to the minds of some who are familiar with Asia and not understanding the lingo. On Wednesday morning about 10:00, The Old Codger gets a phone call from another lady with the Foreign Trade Bureau, telling him that he will be attending a lunch at about noon. This method of notification is an appropriate way to invite someone to a function in Asia. Kind of takes all the decision making out of the process for the invitee, but, as we say, TIC - This Is China. (Same philosophy exists in Thailand as well.) A car came and collected The Old Codger and took him to a very quality Chinese restaurant in Nantong, called Tong Private Dish. The restaurant was very well appointed, and the food was, well, the absolute best Chinese food that The Old Codger has had in Nantong. Present at the meal, along with the Vice Director of European and US Section, Investment Promotion Center of the Nanjing Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation Bureau were two people from the company in Nanjing - both editors of some sort. There was very little discussion about the "job opportunity" - basically just a casual mention. During the lunch, The Old Codger was informed that he would be taken to Nanjing on Friday to meet with the Director of the company. Friday morning, as expected, a car came to take The Old Codger and the local company representative to Nanjing. It was his first trip there so he was looking forward to it a bit. It is about a 270 km (165 miles) which took about 3 and a half hours. Upon arrival in Nanjing, The Old Codger was almost immediately ushered into a meeting room The introductions were minimal and quite perfunctory. No one was wasting much oxygen saying much of anything. The Old Codger was asked to present his ideas to the accumulated company people, which he began to do. After about two minutes he was cut off, and invited to look at what the company was doing. First thing that they showed him was all of their demographic statistics. Of course, their demographics were based on their business experiences in Nanjing and Suzhou (Sue Joe: a city near Shanghai which is known as the 'Oriental Venice' because 42% of the city is covered by water). There is a very distinct distinction between those two cities and Nantong. Those cities are considered to varying degrees to be "cultural centers" whereas Nantong is largely considered to be an "industrial center." The foreigners that come to Nantong are primarily ship workers, and "culture" to them is a good "piss up" ('drunk' for the Americans) on a Friday and Saturday night. This could be a reason that The Old Codger fits in so well in Nantong... Anyway, it became fairly quickly obvious to The Old Codger that they believed that they had the best product and that they would like him to write for their publication - things like food and restaurant reviews, cultural things and interviews with interesting people in Nantong - which there may very well be some of, but not known to him, and so forth. The only problem is that The Old Codger doesn't write about stuff like that, and has no desire or intention to even try to. Food, for example, is something to be eaten, not written about in twenty paragraphs full of glowing and often pretentious adjectives. In any event, the job offer was declined. The company then took The Old Codger out to lunch. Upon looking at the menu, he decided very quickly that the food selection was not going to be to his liking. The offerings were things like cow brains, cow stomach, pig entrails and so forth. The Pizza Hut around the corner seemed to be much more appealing despite the fact that the words "Chinese" and "pizza" do not belong in the same sentence. After the lunch, they informed The Old Codger that they had to have a meeting, and that he could, if desired, wait in their office for the meeting to be over. He opted instead to wander around town for a bit. Two hours later, The Old Codger received a phone call and was advised that he could take a bus back to Nantong at either 6 o'clock or 8 o'clock. His reaction was predictable and extremely diplomatic: "What in the hell are you talking about?" A face to face conversation soon ensued. The car that The Old Codger had came to Nanjing in had gone back to Nantong already. The company would tell him where the bus station was and he could go whenever he wished to. Bye-bye. This of course, was not exactly agreeable to or with The Old Codger. At that point, he set aside all pretenses of diplomacy and got straight to the point. The company had "appointed" a fellow American to discuss the matter with The Old Codger. He was quickly informed that it was a "piss poor way to treat a visitor - to bring him to a strange city, and then just dump him off in the middle of the city and tell him to get home on his own." The conversation went on, back and forth, with the poor company representative claiming to be just the 'messenger.' Well, The Old Codger had heard that excuse before, and he really didn't care. The 'messenger' was going to have to get something arranged. After some going around and around, the company agreed to pay taxi fare in both Nanjing and Nantong, as well as the bus fare. All that The Old Codger would have to do is send the company the receipts. No - that would not work. The Old Codger wanted cash up front. More going around and around. Things started getting complicated about that time. The Nantong representative that had come down to Nanjing with The Old Codger would accompany him back, and pay for everything. The rub was that he would not be going back until 8:00. No good. The Old Codger was not amenable to waiting around for another 4 hours waiting for that to happen. More going around and around. Eventually, the decision was made that the Nantong representative would accompany The Old Codger at 5:30 PM. At 5:s0 The Old Codger and the Nantong representative left the office. If you think that things would go smoothly after that - guess again. The bus station is in an inconvenient location, and cab drivers do not like to go there during "rush hour." As a result, it took exactly one hour to finally catch a cab. The 6:00 bus to Nantong was long gone by then. Got to the bus station and discovered that the next bus to Nantong was at 7:20. Finally, things were looking up. The rest of the story: On the way back to Nantong, The Old Codger was finally able to make sense of everything that had happened. Putting the pieces together was not exactly easy given that the Nantong representative barely can speak English. Apparently, the Foreign Trade Bureau convinced the company in Nanjing to promote Nantong, and had considerable input in placing local representatives with the company. The Foreign Trade Bureau wanted the company to hire The Old Codger, so they were willing to do so, but without changing their original ideas and plans. The company pretty much has to go along with what the Bureau says in order to have permission to publish in Nantong. Ultimately, had The Old Codger gone to work for the company, the company most likely would have considered him to be the "token foreigner from Nantong." In the end, there were a lot of twists and turns in the plot. In reflection, The Old Codger was strongly reminded of the movie "The Sting." Fortunately, albeit after a bit of arguing, fighting and posturing, his only loss was a bit of time, which means he wasn't stung too bad. No doubt, knowing that this is China, there will be another session and chance in the future. Through it all, The Old Codger can tell everyone, without hesitation, "It ain't easy being me." Life in Asia can certainly be interesting. The Old Codger
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