I don’t think I have
an especially large backside. I may be
wrong. I am, alas, bigger than you’re
average Shanghainese. That’s probably safe
to say. Sitting now on the number 4
train line and there are two seats with a slight rise between them, meant to
signify the divider. But there is a
modest sized man beside me and to give him the politeness of an inch or so of
space my ass, spans way over the middle divider. Should one more person sit down, its all
over.
Now a beggar is passing by.
An older gentleman, who is most assuredly in for a crummy Chinese New
Year, presumably doubly undignified to be poor and without any filial care on this
symbolic time. I wonder if anyone comes
through signing songs, or playing bongos or doing some controversial street
theatre that doesn’t expect any money. Unlikely.
I felt like some elemental Masai nomad in Karen Blixen’s
stories of East Africa as I walked out my hotel this afternoon. It was dark out, people darted about under
umbrellas and uncharacteristically I was overjoyed. Rain!
Nice to see you. How long has it
been? I walked out under the awning and
felt it hit my skin. I might have sung a
different tune if I’d had to walk for a few hundred yards in a deluge, but it
was a simple drizzle and the moisture was like a morning shower, completely
welcome.
I haven’t been tracking.
I’m sure it’s easily locatable on line somewhere but it has been many
months without any precipitation, rain or snow, in Beijing. And it shows. Here the presence of moisture,
the 潇潇细雨[1]conveys
something civilized.
I’d been out walking around two hours earlier and no rain
was falling. I had to walk a few blocks
to find a café with espresso. Costa
Coffee: That’ll do. There must have been a check out design
flaw, because these three young ladies were working indefatigably and yet the
line to pick up your coffee snaked around behind the garbage can for eight
people or so.
I heard one of the ladies finally call out the word “dopio” and
I butted in, in Mandarin that it wasn’t a dopio but a triple shot. She replied in English that she was aware of
this and then commented kindly on my Chinese, to which I replied that we should
speak the local dialect, Shanghai-hua.
And as has happened probably five hundred other times I’ve uttered that
cheeky line, she of course replied “you can speak Shanghai-hua?” Which is my queue to say, “I can’t speak
Shanghai-hua” in the local dialect.
This, being one of a dozen phrases I know. I should be tired of this silly routine but
it is pleasure inducing, nearly every time.
The day is always a bit easier when you make someone smile.
Then, kindly switching to Mandarin she asked me something I
don’t think anyone ever said before, which was “ahh, so you must be married to
a Shanghainese woman?” I told her I was the husband of a Shandong gal, which
she and the woman in front all found entertaining. Walking out with my triple shot, I mused on
the classic Shanghai dichotomy of kiss up to foreigners, kick-down to Chinese who
are not from Shanghai. And theoretically
it is a drag, something less than fair.
And that analysis may all be a bit anachronistic. But in the moment, it was pure fun to speak
bits of Shanghai-hua and elicit animated, flattery and engagement.
OK. Next stop is my
change station. Back later, if I get a
seat or two.
No such luck. Those
five stops were done standing. At the
Hong Qiao Terminal Two departure hall Starbucks now. Just before switching trains I was distracted
by two people speaking in sign language.
Of course it is impolite to stare, even if that is the native
custom. And of course it is even less
polite to smirk, unwittingly at someone’s exaggerated facial gestures as they
use their hands to communicate. And it
is then, the depths of poor taste to connect the mental dots from this
remarkable language to the South African gentleman who recently did
translations for world leaders at Mandela’s funeral that were, it became clear
later, utter nonsense, but that’s what my mind did, sitting there on the train.
Orchestral jazz, Gil Evans “Big Stuff”, from “Gil Evans
& Ten” on the mix. Calming
sophistication to watch the holiday traffic promenade by. Still enjoy looking out at the rainy road out
there, within site. There won’t be any puddles
where I’m heading. Tomorrow we join the
other five hundred million or so and head to the “old home” in our case Shandong,
where things are scrupulously traditional.
This is a three-hour drive that will likely take us five or more hours with
the traffic. There won’t be any puddles out
there either. Dry, overworked farm land
that’s been worked hard since not long after Peking Man. But that’s OK. It’s dry and rough, but it is magical, and
medieval, particularly at this time.
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