Three Months and We're Out

The wait is finally over. The last say has been said. The fat lady has sung and we're not going to be able to stay in China. Earlier this week, my work permit application (needed to work and live in China) was rejected for the second and last time by the Chinese government. Apparently I don't have the post-graduate work experience I need to qualify as a "Foreign Expert" in my field. This means that I can not legally work in the country and all my reasonable hopes for spending a year here just evaporated.

Considering the astronomical efforts we've made over the past 10 months to get here, survive here and thrive here, it's quite a shock to know that everything just came to an abrupt end. But now, instead of taking time to reflect on things, we're forced to get on with our lives as soon as possible. My tourist visa expires in about a week and I need to be out of the country by then. Just imagine you'd struggled, fought and exhausted yourself to achieve a dream only to have it snuffed out by something beyond your control. Then, pack up your life in a week. It's tough. It's just sickening to think of the losses we've suffered since arriving here. We've put so much into this and I can't believe it's all over so soon. Unfortunately, our time for reflection has been cut short by our very pressing need to get on with things.

We've definitely built a life for ourselves here. We've settled into an apartment and the accompanying lease, we've learned our way around, learned how to get what we need, and made friends… All of which we need to cancel, abort, write off or let go in the next week. In order to say goodbye to some of our friends, we're having a bit of a Halloween/take our stuff party. Should be nice to see everyone one last time.

Side note: at 7pm on the 31st, Alexa and I will be on TV here in Shanghai. The local English TV channel did a feature on the day in the life of a friend of ours and he asked us to be in the show. We'll be getting foot massages with him at the end of his day. This ought to be a hit at our party.

That's not to say that there's a part of us that's grateful for this ending. We've been battered and bruised for the past 3 months and we've neared our breaking point on at least 6 occasions (the job loss before we left, the heat/smog, Alexa's terrible job, the flood, the fire, and the lay-off). Being here has taken a lot out of us and we really do need a break.

Though instead of just heading for home, we've decided to go ahead with the original post-china travel plans of Korea, Japan, SE Asia and Australia. While we're in Asia, we might as well be here and see all we can before we go home. Plus, when in our lives will we have the time, freedom and energy to do something like this ever again? Carpe Diem, my friends. We don't want this opportunity to be wasted. The only problem is that this throws an enormous heap of trip planning onto our already overloaded plates. But like my dad always says, you gotta do what you gotta do.

So here's the plan. We say goodbye to Shanghai on the 8th of November and head for Seoul, South Korea. We spend a few days there seeing the sights (possibly including the demilitarized border with North Korea), then head on to Japan for about 3 weeks. We're going to see most of the southern half of the country and do our best not to spend more than the GDP of Myanmar. Japan is brutally expensive, so we're doing as much on the cheap as we can.

From Japan, we head back to Shanghai for a quick overnight to change out our suitcases – trading cold weather clothes for warm ones. The next morning, we leave for Cambodia for a few days to see the temple of Angkor Wat (the overgrown jungle temple complex from the Tomb Raider movie). From there, we go on a surprise trip that I'm planning for Alexa for about a week before arriving in Singapore to board the cruise with Pat, Lisa and Ian. Phew… take a deep breath. The cruise ends in Hong Kong and we'll spend an extra day or two there seeing Macau with Pat. For the last leg, we're headed all the way down to Australia where we'll rent a small RV and hit the road. We're just going to plan as we go, not worrying about schedules or anything. We'll probably drive a loop around half of the continent or so before we turn in the keys and head home. We figure that with the US economy so bad, it's not like we'll be in high demand back home, so there's no use hurrying.

So as they say, when one door closes, another one opens. These just happen to be very different doors.

I want to know right now what will it be

So it’s been about a week since we last posted and not too much has happened. I was struck down with a pretty bad head cold after we got back from Beijing. I spent three days in bed, never leaving the apartment. I was grateful that I didn’t have to work and could enjoy the down time. I clearly needed it.

However, we had a nice weekend once I was better. On Saturday night we went out with Molly (from EF) and her cousin, Ryan (whom we affectionately call ‘cousin’ to prevent the confusion), to the vegetarian restaurant that I love. It helps that both Molly and cousin are veggies too! We had a feast. Afterwards, they came over to our apartment and we hung out. The Ryans played DJ and Molly and I lounged on the couch. Ryan was excited to have people over and he broke out some cheap Italian wine and a block of Gruyere. It was so nice to have a little taste of Europe in China. With the blinds closed I could almost pretend that we were all meeting at a new apartment in France. We laughed a lot. I wished we’d had a fresh baguette.

The next day we met Molly and cousin again. We took them to the Hongqiao Pearl Market, a place that Molly actually hadn’t been to yet. We introduced her to Alice, our friend who gives great deals on all sorts of pearl jewelry. She was able to buy gifts for her family back home in Maine. I felt happy that I was able to show Molly, who has been in China for 4 years, something new! After that we went to a fabulous Indian restaurant on Hong Mei Lu and had another feast. It’s so fun to have vegetarian friends because I finally get to share dishes! It makes for such a fun and tasty dining experience. If I was able to do this all the time, I think I’d like food a lot more.

Next, cousin took us to a curio market downtown. We meandered through the stalls selling everything from Mao watches (a saluting arm is the second hand!) to old jade carvings to birdcages to jarred crickets. It was interesting to see the stuff that people had accumulated over the years and were now trying to sell. Markets like this always fascinate me, no matter what the country. I’m convinced that you can tell a lot about a culture by its junk!

Yesterday was a good day too. Ryan and I had an interesting lunch at Ajisen, the cheap Japanese ramen place a block away from our apartment. We talk almost every day about our life and China. We talk about how we’re feeling about the whole situation that day and what we would do if we could just forget it and spend the rest of our lives as nomads. Spend three months in Qatar learning Arabic. Work in a pub in England. Work on an organic farm in Australia. Write a book. Float. What wouldn’t I do to just take off and float? And really, what do we do next if China kicks us out? Should we go home? Should we try another country? I hate this waiting game. I have that Paula Cole song, “I Don’t Wanna Wait” playing over and over in my head. “I don’t wanna wait for our lives to be over. I want to know right now what will it be.”…stay or go?

After that we went to a foreign bookstore to pick up some Lonely Planets: Japan and Australia. We decided that since we have some time, we might as well read up. If we have to leave China, we need to have a plan. If we stay, we’ll just postpone the plan a year until after we finish working. It’s a fun diversion from the waiting game.

Next, we caught a cab down to the fabric market just before it closed. We need outfits for four black tie nights on the cruise. Ryan had two tuxedos made. One looks a lot like the tux that James Bond wore in Casino Royale. Matte black, pointed lapels with a plain white collared shirt. The second one is a more classic British look (or so I’m told) with rounded lapels in black silk with a ruffled white shirt. We got both the suits and the shirts for about $295 and they’re be fitted exactly to Ryan’s body. Then we got a recommendation from our usual tailor for a dressmaker. I had two silk evening gowns made from pictures of a Calvin Klein dress I printed. One is dark navy blue and the other is bullet gray. If they come out like the picture, I’ll be looking pretty nice next to Ryan in his tuxes. Altogether the tailor-made dresses cost me about $120. Absurd considering the dress I modeled it after cost $238 for one dress!

We walked back to the subway station, a bit in shock of how much money we just spent. Rather than taking a $7 cab, we opted for the 75-cent subway ride ten stops back to Zhongshan Park. It was a long and crowded ride. We were shoulder to shoulder with the rush hour crowd for 7 stops. But, we did have the Japan Lonely Planet to keep us occupied and in the end, I was happy to have saved a little money. Every little bit counts when you’re unemployed.

So this is what the rhythm of our days look like here. We wake up late, work out in the empty gym and read travel books. It’s not a bad life at all really. Until that question starts gnawing at us…

We’ll keep you posted.

In the meantime, here are the links to the photos from Melanie's visit and Beijing:

Melanie and I explore the Yu Yuan Gardens in Shanghai:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2466906&l=b66bf&id=2209008
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2467008&l=b763d&id=2209008

The Great Wall Experience: (a favorite)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2467272&l=6006b&id=2209008

The Forbidden City, Tiananmen and the Olympic Park: (also a favorite)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2467500&l=2b5ba&id=2209008

Around Beijing:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2468586&l=88a75&id=2209008

Hutong (traditional Beijing neighborhood) Walking Tour:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2468954&l=ca22d&id=2209008

Melanie's visit and our trip to Beijing

Hey all,

Sorry it's been so long (again) but we've really had some problems accessing our blog in China. We can view it, but can't log in to publish anything. I think I've found a way around it though and we should be able to update a bit more regularly.

So to catch everyone up on the latest -

Alexa got laid off from English First a week and a half ago. Things had been really slow for a while due to the economy and because she was the last to be hired to the team, she was the first to be laid off. She didn't feel that the job was the right fit in the first place, plus, they gave her a nice severance package, so the layoff was ultimately a good thing. Unfortunately though, she now has less than a month to find a new job before her visa expires and she has to go home. She's got a couple potential opportunities in the works, so we'll keep you posted.

I'm still waiting on my work permit to come through. I should know whether it's going to work out in the next 2 weeks. If this doesn't come through, I'm not allowed to work in China and I have to come home. We just can't afford to hang out in China without the two incomes we were planning on from the start. I haven't worked since I arrived 9 weeks ago and it's really starting to take its toll.

So in short, unless my work permit comes through AND Alexa gets a job, we're coming home early. In a way, we'd feel defeated, but in another, it might be a relief to have something simply out of our control (the Chinese gov't) against us. Finally telling us that we can go with our dignity intact, never actually having given up.


Anyway... Our friend from Switzerland, Melanie (a girl I studied French with in France), came to visit us last week. We get to see her about every 6 months and it's always nice to catch up. She flew in early on the 3rd and I picked her up from the airport. We spent a bit of that day sleeping then met Alexa for lunch (on what would be her last day of work). I showed Mel around the town for a while that afternoon and we met Alexa here at the apartment after she got let go. She was in a great mood and we decided to live it up that night. We went out for dinner and had great foot massages.

We spent the rest of that weekend seeing the sights of Shanghai - the pearl market, the fabric market, the Bund, Pu Dong, etc but realized that we would run out of things to do during her 10 day stay. So, we decided to look into going to Beijing. The most common way to go is by overnight train. They have "soft sleeper" bunks that are four to a cabin and are really quite nice. We went to the train station to get tickets but were told that they were sold out and the only space they had were on "hard seats." The train is 12 hours and "hard seats" didn't appeal to us. We started looking into flights, but I realized that because my visa was being renewed and I didn't have my passport (it was at the visa center), I was unable to fly. Ultimately, I took the overnight train in a seat and the girls flew the next morning. The train was pretty rough. I didn't sleep much, but it ended up being ok. I arrived in Beijing several hours before they did and was able to get some sleep at the hotel.

We stayed at a 2ish star hotel toward the middle of of the city. It was nice enough but had some quirks. For example, the bathroom was the shower. There was simply a shower head on the wall of the bathroom and a drain in the floor. So everything got wet. Melanie's heater broke and they had to bring her a new one. Plus, the staff's english wasn't fantastic and it was kind of difficult to communicate. Other than that, it was close to the metro and wasn't too dirty so we can't really complain.

The first afternoon in Beijing was spent seeing the Temple of Heaven, an enormous temple complex in the center of the city that must have been more than 50 acres. It was pretty busy with tourists but still had a nice, peaceful sense to it. The buildings were beautiful and the walks through the green gardens were a nice break from the concrete expanse outside.


Afterwards, we visited the pearl market across the street (they sell all kinds of goods other than pearls) and we picked up a few gifts and necessities. That night, we planned on having Beijing Duck at a famous restaurant, but both the price and line were enormous. We walked down the street and stumbled upon a wonderful Japanese restaurant instead. That night, we collapsed from the long day and prepared ourselves for the next.

The next morning, we woke up bright and early to meet our tour guide to see the great wall of China. He met us in the lobby at 7am for our long day of sightseeing. What we thought was going to be a full day at the wall turned into a full day of getting stuck in traffic and getting the run around by the guide. We spent the first 2 hours picking up other tour guests (the driver got lost at least twice) then were stuck in traffic all the way to our first stop: the Ming Tombs. The tombs are a worthy site unto themselves, but that's not what we were there for. Besides, we had to pay full admission price for what was a 45 minute tour not going in any of the tombs. Then we stopped at a jade museum - total tourist trap. It's this enormous jade factory/store with rediculously overpriced jade bracelets and carvings. They make their money on unwitting tourists who are simply shuttled there and led to believe that they're getting great deals on these "rare Chinese treasures - all major credit cards accepted." Having lived in China for a while now, I know a rip off when I see it and made sure to spread the word to the other guests about the deals they weren't getting.

We had lunch at the in house restaurant of western style Chinese food and continued on our way to the Wall (finally...). When we arrived at the parking lot, we realized that we were not the only people hoping to see the wall that day. I would estimate that about 75% of China's 1.5 billlion people wanted to see the wall that day too and were waiting in the same line. That would be bad enough, except that the Chinese don't wait in line. They cut, push and herd like no other culture I've ever seen. Beware of bottlenecks and Chinese tourists - we were nearly crushed as we were pushed ahead in line. Honestly, it was dangerous. People were yelling and shoving and nearly trying to climb over each other to get in line for the cable car up the mountain. You would think that there was a pot of gold at the top or something. After doing our fair share of pushing and waiting in line for the better part of 2 hours, we finally made it to what we were told was a cable car. Indeed, it was not. It was more akin to a roller coaster than a gondola style cable car. Individual cars were on a roller coaster track and were pulled up the side of the hill. Boarding the cars was a continuous effort as they did not stop moving. They were old and beat up and were not very confidence inspiring. Talbot family, think Ghost Town in the Sky and you get the idea. Others, think of what a theme park would look like if maintenance had not been performed since 1982. Even still, we made it to the top of the hill intact. When we climbed up the last few stairs onto the wall, we were greeted with one of those moments that you only have when standing in front of something you've always wanted to see. Think of seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time, or the Eiffel Tower, or the Statue of Liberty or something. We looked out and saw the ribbon of wall cresting the mountains for as far as we could see. Fortunately, the weather was perfect and the visibility was as good as we could have hoped for. We took tons of pictures (they'll be posted soon) and enjoyed a brief walk on the wall. The crowds were still heavy, but the wall is so long that you can find some space for yourself. Unfortunately, we had only an hour or so until we had to be back to the bus and we had to make our way down. The ride down the roller coaster was much better than the ride up and provided us with some decent views.

After the wall, we had a long, traffic congested ride back to town for our last stop at a silk factory/store. By this point, we were exhausted from all the time in the bus and would have rather skipped the tour. No dice. It was the same experience as the jade museum but with far less interest by the tour group. We had a brief look around and reconveined to leave, but the guide told us that we needed to stay longer. After pressing him, I learned that the tour company has a deal with this store and the jade store to take their customers there. However, we must stay for a certain amount of time so we had to sit around for another 20 minutes, awkwardly, complaining about our captivity. Finally, we were free to go and the bus dropped us off at a metro stop so we could go to dinner. We had already decided that we'd had enough adventure for one day and opted for Papa John's for dinner. As usual, a foot massage followed but this one was way overpriced and the man in the next room was sleeping and snoring loudly. Despite the dissappointments that day, seeing the wall made it all worth it.

Saturday was the Forbidden City, Tianmen Square and the Olympic Park. We woke up early again and headed out on the subway to the stop for Tianmen. When we emerged from the stairs, we were standing at the edge of the square looking out towards the gate of the Forbidden City (The big red gate with the picture of Chairman Mao on it). It was amazing to be there. It was another one of those "Whoa... I'm really here..." moments. From there, we toured the Forbidden City. It's the palace complex where many emperors ruled. It's "forbidden" because the common people were never allowed inside under punishment of death. The servants and concubines were often never allowed to leave either. After the communist revolution in 1949, the complex was opened to the public for the first time since it was built in 1405. It's very elaborate and and very crowded but big enough to find some space. Again, the flow through the city was impeded by several narrow doorways that caused immense pedestrian traffic jams (though much smaller than the ones at the wall) so we tended to stay to the outskirts and let the Chinese people see their palace.

We took pedicabs to a pedestrian street for lunch and headed back to Tianmen Square. It's the largest public gathering space in the world and I believe it. It has a few monuments and museums and is flanked by the people's congress building and the national museum of China. Quite impressive (if not imposing) looking buildings no doubt built to showcase the power of the government. Throughout the square, we never saw any mention of the demonstrations there nearly 20 years ago. It's like it never actually happened.

From Tianmen, we headed up to the Olympic Park to see the Bird's Nest Stadium and the Watercube natatorium. Again, quite a site, quite crowded and very impressive. At this point in the day, we were getting pretty tired of sightseeing and decided to head off to find foot massages and dinner. We ended up eating at a great Irish pub and having far cheaper and far better massages than the night before.

Finally, the last day in town, we decided to have a more relaxed day and see some of the old neighborhoods. We had a walk prescribed by our guidebooks that turned out to be pretty nice. We saw some great little streets full of old Chinese charm, some nice lakes with people enjoying some time on the water, and got a look at what everyday life looks like for everyday people. We finally got our Beijing duck for lunch but I don't think we ordered the right kind. It was terrible... all fat and too spicy. Lunch was fun though due to some comical complications with the squatting toilets, all of which will not be posted to a public blog, thank you very much.

After lunch, we climbed an ancient tower to get a view of the city. The tower was originally used as a public alert and announcement system and housed massive drums at the top. When the drums were beat, they could be heard for miles. We got to see a short drumming show while we were up there then made our way down, ears ringing. We taxied back to our hotel and decided just to take it easy for the last few hours until we had to leave. Alexa took a solid nap and Mel and I went to a nearby mall to get some coffee. We happened upon a concert in the mall of some up and coming Chinese pop stars. It was so funny to hear a concert where absolutely nothing was inteligible. The most amusing aspect of it were the guards posted throughout the 200 or so people. Police in full, crisp uniforms stood perfectly still watching over the crowd of 14-19yr old girls as if they were going to incite a riot. Very funny. I could tell that they weren't totally thrilled with the assignment but weren't totally upset either about watching some short-skirted pop singer dance around for an hour or two.

We came back, packed up and left. Alexa and Mel got to fly back to Shanghai via the brand new Beijing airport (one of the biggest and most spectacular in the world) and on a sparkling clean 747. Once again, I was on the 12 hour train. This time, it wasn't so bad. I had a soft sleeper and was able to sleep through the night and arrive refreshed the next morning. Honestly, given the choice of waking up super early to fly or take a sleeper train the night before, I might take the train. It was stress free and pretty easy. Not to mention, it was a third of the price.

We had one more day with Mel in Shanghai before she had to leave, so we went back to an area of town that she particularly liked, had lunch at a cool 50's American diner and got more massages. We headed down to the river to see the lights that night but were too late for most of them. A fitting farewell to Melanie from China.

She left in a cab early the next morning and Alexa and I have been hanging out at the apartment since. Alexa's got a pretty bad cold that she's waiting out and I'm continuing to try not to go crazy waiting for my work permit. I just got an email from my (future?) boss saying that it might be tougher to get than he thought because I don't have 2 years of relevant work experience. Again... China, do you really want us here? Is there any way to win?

Until next time, still unemployed, still being beat up by the Middle Kingdom on a daily basis,

Ryan

Might this work?

Just a test.

As if it couldn't get any worse...

I got let go from EF today. Fired.

"They hired too many people."

And now I'm free.

Photos of the Apartment!

Hey everyone. Finally, here is the link to the pictures of our apartment: the safe haven...

http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2457794&l=5a02e&id=2204920

Enjoy and remember that you are all invited to come stay with us!