China IV - Noodles for Breakfast - 早餐面条

Noodles for breakfast. Noodles again for lunch. I received a Chinese name from Lydia: Wei Lai (魏莱). She said that the way it was pronounced meant future even though the characters themselves didn't mean anything together. She decided to take the middle part of Claire and use that, adding Wei as a family name. I like how it sounds and strangely, it feels nice to be given a new name.

***

I had my first cultural class one afternoon - calligraphy.
Calligraphy... How do I feel about calligraphy? Pretty frustrated actually. The art has a long history and many different schools, and it is a lot more complicated than I had at first realised. The importance of the seal, how to hold the brush properly, the angle, the different brush stroke endings, the paper used, fresh ink, bottled ink, the ink's origin... The rules are not what frustrate me however. No, what frustrates me the most is that whilst I can perfectly picture what I wish to paint in my mind, my hand can't quite meet my expectations. These brush strokes, gently flowing across the paper before stopping, at times abruptly, in order to produce beautiful characters become something else at my hand. What I end up painting seems rigid and plain compared to the beautiful examples we are meant to copy from.. My mind and muscles appear disconnected...

***

I had dinner with Lydia and her roommate Sophia (Noodles again, not complaining.)

Whilst I was debating whether I should try and finish the whole bowl at a risk of harming myself or concede defeat, Lydia suddenly said:

"-My roommate belongs to the Party."

Party? What Party? the Communist Party? Is it normal to suddenly announce this? What do I say back? 

"-Oh.. that's .. nice? Do.. do you get any uh.. advantages?" 

Am I allowed to ask that? 

Turns out it's not a big deal, or at least they didn't make it seem like it was. As Sophia put it:
"It doesn't change much, except that if I want to be a civil servant I need to be in the Party, so I joined. 
-Yeah, if she gets a job with the government it's pretty great: high pay, good security and you work little.", Lydia added.

With the growing suspicion that meals are not actually meant to be finished here in China I gave up on my giant bowl of noodles and we parted ways as I ruminated over my preconceptions that I had/ still carry with me on the world and life...

So much for thinking people living in China didn't care or were aware of politics. How naive of me.

***

KTV. Otherwise known as Karaoke. I finally had my first experience of it and.. it was bizarre and I loved it.

First, I needed to find the place. After hesitating in front of what appeared to be an abandoned looking tower block fronted by a bright neon KTV sign, I walked in. I walked through the abandoned looking lobby into one lift, the other being out of order.
4th floor. Rubbish everywhere. Wrong floor.
5th Floor. Sparkling lights, mirrors and loud music. Right floor.
I walked underneath the giant crystal chandeliers, past the strange (fake) gold statues of mermaids and angels, pass the men in shiny suits into room 14.
It was even stranger inside. The room was full of Chinese students belting out Disney songs with television screens showing what could only be best described as soft-porn whilst British students sat down on the sides, huddled together in their shared awkwardness.

Alcohol. That's what I need to deal with this. 

And that's probably what the rest of the Brits felt too as the drinks started coming, and the awkward tension in the air dissipated. Soon we were all screaming along to Queen, trying to work out how the  spinning table drinking game worked and shouting at each other about how much we loved karaoke and wouldn't it be great if we could have the same back in the UK?

But, maybe the experience only felt special because it was in China, 'somewhere else'..?

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