huayu cool

http://www.spring.gov.sg/Content/ModulePage.aspx?group=nw&id=b9870dee-12e6-4c6e-906a-27caf8c41655

that was what me and shuxin were involved in for the past 4 days.

punishing schedules, little sleep and basically being teleported from city to city. but overall, despite the fatigue and language handicap, we thoroughly enjoyed it and learnt a great deal from it.

they fed us non stop but i still lost weight. it was the walking, the lack of sleep and my sheer fussiness that kept me from partaking from china's delicacies.

we went from meeting to presentation to mall tours all covering 3 cities within a span of 3 days. delays in flights were occupied by blackberrying and stoning. occasionally, we entertained ourselves with our strange sense of humour that really really if exhibited, truly discredits us.

for eg, while waiting for the luggage to appear on the conveyor belt,

xin1:do you want to know how a sushi feels?
xin2:?
xin1: jump on the conveyor belt lor.

among other things.

i was also very embarassed by our language handicap but mostly shuxin's. we had so much trouble communicating to anyone. was talking to this chinese owner of a fashion chain and then he asked me to speak in mandarin..to which i replied 'i am huayuing!'

and then there was shuxin shopping and when she wanted to tell the sales asst 'let me think about it first', she went 'rang wo zi wo xiang xiang' (translated: let me own self think think)

and then while checking in for a domestic flight, i was told that if iw ant the aisle seat, i should inform the attendant that iwant a 'corridor seat' as they don't quite understand what's aisle. so i did so obediently only to realize that she didn't understand. so i raised my volume (as if that really helps but itend to do it alot when people dont understand and speak really slowly)

me:"IIIII WAAAANTTT A COOOOREEEEY DOOORRR SEAAATT"
her: huh??ting bu dong!
me:CORREE DOORRR
her:??
me: zai zou de pang ban (literal translaton: beside the walk)
her: oh...aisle seat.
me-embarassed-

we were treated like vips as we were shuffled from place to place, given the best food and put up in quite luxurious settings (at least for local standards). i also find it such an irony that poor and rich call the same street home. on one hand you see people shopping their socks off and two minutes later, you see someone picking trash from the bins.

also because we were considered to be quite vipish, which i totally dont understand why, i had people escorting me to the toilet and like really going all out of the way to treat me like a king, sans the red carpet and taking a lot of 'paparazzi shots'. its really like this:walk walk walk, snap snap snap.

only that sometimes, i'm like walk yawn scratch nose, snap snap snap.

gulp.

overall, i'm amazed at china and what it has become since the last time i saw it. my only regret for this trip is that i did not get to see tiananmen. in light of the debacle with tibet, i thought about the heavy persecution of MY brethren.

so a day before the trip while packing, i realized that a green jacket i am bringing is very 'maoish' and entertained thoughts of standing outside tiananmen and crying out 'let my people go'. to which meiling replied that the authorities might even be more convinced about incarcerating and containing religious fanaticism.

i also met alot of people whom i otherwise would never have if not for the trip. am so thankful for the company and just the crash course of china. yes, 4 days just went by and here i am back again before hong kong beckons in 2 weeks.

i even got recruited to join the fuqing association (my dialect grp which is uber rare with only 4000 of us ) in singapore because the treasurer happened to be on the trip. hurhur. i know not a word about my dialect sadfully but was told that the premises that the association occupies is worth alot. someone even advised thati shd probably join because as the youngest and theonly rep in my generation, if en bloc ah, i get alot of money.

want to go back to beijing. tiananmen.

selah.