China is a different world than America! I’ve made a list of some funny and interesting things I have noticed while being here:
-“Ha” means “yeah”. We often heard people saying “hahaha” while talking on the phone, and we quickly realized that they weren’t laughing!
-People randomly come up to us and take selfies with us. Sometimes they ask, sometimes they don’t. One time I was on a train and the man next to me FaceTimed his wife and immediately turned the phone to me! Smile and wave, boys, smile and wave.
-People kept asking me how tall I am, and 5 foot 8 means nothing to them, so I had to figure out my height in centimeters: 178. (In the rural towns, I was taller than most people. But in Beijing, there are a lot of people my height.)
-Every store has a barcode at the cash register, and most people pay for everything with an app. Even at the little hole-in-the-wall restaurants!
-A popular ramen brand in this part of the world is Mi Goring. We had noticed several times that people said a word similar to that around us, and we were wondering why they were talking about ramen! Then we found out the word for Americans is Meiguo Ren.
-In the parks or any open area on the sidewalk in the evening, people gather around a speaker and do dance workouts.
-Driving is organized chaos. Cars are constantly weaving between lanes, and will drive through red lights if the road is open. Mopeds are everywhere, and seem to have no laws—they often are driving on the wrong side of the street or on the sidewalk! Yet somehow it is very safe, and they are quick to stop for pedestrians.
-Car horns are used all the time, and it’s not to show that they are angry, but to alert others that they are there.
Common food we eat here:
1. Green onion pancakes (think a fried flaky tortilla with green onions and an egg wrapped inside of it)
2. Steam buns are sold everywhere, with thousands of fillings: meat, vegetables, red bean, etc.
3. Boiled dumplings
4. Tofu in many forms. Stinky tofu is famous here—smelly, but delicious!
5. Hot pot: there is a big boiling pot of broth in the middle of the table and you put meat, veggies, tofu, etc in the pot, let it cook, take it out and eat it! (When I ask Chinese people what their favorite food is, most people say hot pot!)
6. A lot of food has Sechuan pepper in it, which is spicy, but it also leaves a numbing feeling on your tongue.
7. A bowl of noodles is a very common breakfast food.
8. Many restaurants/vendors sell soy milk. Not because of allergies—the people here just really like soy milk! (A bonus for Allie on my team, who is lactose intolerant!)
9. Mochi (pounded rice cakes) Pumpkin mochi was popular in one of the towns we were in!
Strange foods I have eaten:
-Pig brain
-Chicken feet (they give you disposable gloves to eat them with!)
-Pomegranate flowers
-A plate of gray skin with dry ice in it. When I asked what it was, it translated as “hairy loin”!?!
-I ordered shrimp and they gave me a plate of tiny 1 centimeter size shrimp in the shell!
-lots of food that I have no idea what it was!
Fun chip flavors I found at the grocery store:
Grilled squid, Mexican tomato chicken, tomato, and cucumber
We are having debrief in northern Beijing right now, in the mountains. We drove next to the Great Wall on our way here! We will be leaving for Mongolia in a few days. I can’t wait to tell you some more stories of our time here soon!
