03.18.09
Posted in Travel Log (Asia) at 9:48 am by Benjamin Ross
Looking down at the clock, I have approximately 31 hours left in this most recent journey into the Middle Kingdom. It’s been a short, sweet, trip, but like all good things, must come to an end. Ever since this summer, I’ve been thinking that my ideal situation would be to somehow split my time between China and the US, and after being up North for 3 months this summer, and here around the Yangtze River Delta for the past month, I have a lot to be thankful with how things have been working out.
Tex and I spent our first week of travel, in hyper-efficiency mode, visiting a new locale every day, waking up at 8, and maximizing each day with full immersion into China and no contact whatsoever with foreigners or the Western world. As our journey began to wrap up, we decided to relax in Nanjing for a few days, stay at a laowai friendly youth hostel, and enjoy Nanjing for an extended day stay. On Monday, we took a day trip to Yangzhou where we explored the town (reminded me of a mini-Suzhou), and ate copious quantities of Yangzhou fried rice.
Tex headed back to Yangzhou last night, and I’m going to be flying back to Chicago (via Shanghai) tomorrow afternoon. I’ll be sure to begin logging our adventure in deeper detail (plus images) when I get back home this weekend. Thanks to everybody who has been following thus far, and I’ll see you from the other side.
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03.14.09
Posted in Travel Log (Asia) at 1:29 pm by Benjamin Ross
It’s Saturday afternoon in Nanjing, the pre-Mao capital of China, and here’s another brief, raw, update from the road.
Tex and I just finished a 2 hour walkthrough of the Nanjing Massacre Museum. In terms of layout and information, it was probably the best museum I have ever seen in the Middle Kingdom. It did come with the typical Chinese propaganda to ensure that viewers believed 100% in the facts which were already plainly obvious from all the images and artifacts (not to mention general worldwide historical consensus), but that’s a topic for a later post.
Before arriving in Nanjing this morning, Tex and I spent the past two days wandering around Northwestern Anhui, one of the poorest regions of the PRC. Our goal for this trip was to experience locales which had nothing extraordinary about them, thus no tourism industry, and very little contact with outsiders. Our first day was spent wandering around Fuyang, the poorest (in terms of per capita GDP) city in Anhui. Fuyang was surprisingly much larger than we had anticipated, but indeed quite economically disadvantaged. The locals were quite friendly to us, but absolutely baffled at why we would ever come to Fuyang, with most thinking we were either secret businessmen, journalists, spies or some combination of the three. One interesting little catch to Fuyang is that it is virtually impossible to find a restaurant with a menu. Instead, sit-down restaurants consist mostly of ramshackle little abodes where you simply pick foodstuffs out of a refrigerator, tell the cook how to make it, and then get quoted a price. There was however, an absolute cornicopia of street food, which is mainly what we subsisted upon. But I’ll save more elaboration for Fuyang until I get back to the US, and have more time to write.
From Fuyang, we traveled to a small town （县城）called Tianhe, where the locals were equally baffled at these two strange tall (I am 6′1 and Tex is 6′5) white men who had descended on their humble town. Like Fuyang, Tianhe was much larger than we had anticipated as well, containing by our estimates, at least 100,000 residents. We spent the day scowering the town on foot, consuming local snacks, and chatting with the locals, many of whom had never before seen a foreigner. At one point, when we happened to pass by an elementary school gate around lunch time, we were accosted by a mob of eager sixth graders watching us eat street food. After one of them pulled out his notebook and a pen and asked us to sign it, the others followed suit, and we spent close to half an hour signing autographs. It was difficult to go anywhere without making a scene.
I’ve taken several hundred pictures on this trip, and learned a lot about life in the Central Chinese Plain, which I’ll be sure to write up once I get back to the US. We plan to spend 2 or 3 days here in Nanjing, and time permitting, may head out to a 县城 in Jiangsu (one of China’s richer provinces) to experience the contrast between small town life in Anhui and Jiangsu. Until then, I’ll try to keep up with the quick updates.
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03.11.09
Posted in Travel Log (Asia) at 7:17 pm by Benjamin Ross
It’s been a few days since the last short update, and this one is coming to you from another smokey net bar, this time in Hefei, capital city of China’s Anhui province. Tex and I met up yesterday in Hangzhou (he was coming from Wenzhou, and me from Linan), and from there made the trip out Huang Shan (Yellow Mountain).
Generally as a traveler, I’m not too interested in “scenic spots” of which China has hundreds, but Huang Shan has been recommended to me by enough people (Westerners and Chinese) that I decided we couldn’t come all the way to Anhui without checking it out.
First off, I must say Huang is expensive, very expensive, even during this relatively dead tourism season. The ticket to the mountain itself was 200 RMB, however women could get in for 100 due to a special Women’s Day week discount. If my memory serves me correctly, neither the Great Wall nor the Forbidden City in Beijing, both sites of presumably greater tourism magnitude than Huang Shan, eclipsed the 100 RMB mark, let alone 200. In addition to the fee to enter the park, there was another 80 RMB fee to ride the cable car up (yes, I know we’re both wimps, no need to comment), plus an additional 80 RMB to ride the cable car down. All said and done, I spent about the same amount of money in an afternoon at Huangshan, than I did in my 3 days in Suzhou and 2 days in Linan combined.
As for the mountain itself, it was nice…I’ll leave it at that. The scenery was picturesque, but not the best I have ever seen, and not the best I have ever seen in the Middle Kingdom. Hanging out at the summit is a pleasant experience, but in reality, not all that different from the various other “famous mountains” I have “climbed” in China. The main attraction at the top seems to be various rocks and peaks which are officially described as resembling a particular animal or object. Of note was 手机石, which resembles a cell phone, complete with pretruding antenna. Passing guides could be heard asking the tourists what brand of cell phone the rock resembled.
We we were fortunate in that we were able to go to Huang Shan this time of year, because I imagine that during the summar and holidays, it is absolutely swamped by herds of tourists. As we climbed up to the cable car, we passed a sign which read “From this point 2 hour wait to cable car.” We had no wait at all. All in all, Huang Shan is a nice site, but I’m glad I didn’t travel all the way to Anhui just to see it.
So immediately after Huang Shan, Tex and I headed to Hefei to see the capital city of Anhui. Like much of Anhui (excluding Huang Shan) Hefei is one of the more anonomyous capital cities in China. It’s one of those cities few people would ever travel to for tourism. We spent the day meandering through the streets of Hefei, exploring one of China’s more industrial capital cities, and taking in the local sites and sounds. There is so much dust in the air that I can feel it between my teeth, but overall I like the friendly, innocent vibe of this town. As soon as I finish this e-mail, we are off to a small alley along the downtown “walking street” where earlier today we found an excellent array of local street food (future blog post to come as well).
In accordance with our original desire to experience some of Chna’s least fortunate parts, tomorow morning, we are heading off to Fuyang, the city with the lowest per capita GDP in Anhui. We aren’t really sure to expect, but at least we know we won’t be paying through the wazoo like we did yesterday. After that our plan (subject to change) is to pass through Bengbu, and then finally Nanjing. More updates to come, and of course lots of pictures when I get back to the US on the 19th.
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03.08.09
Posted in Travel Log (Asia) at 4:28 pm by Benjamin Ross
Well, I had an excellent 3 days in Suzhou, and have now continued on the next leg of my brief Yangtze River Delta excursion. I’m writing this from a smokey internet bar in Linan, a 县及市 (county-level city) about an hour outside of Hangzhou. An old friend of mine who I met while living in Fuzhou is living here now, and I decided to drop in and pay her a visit for a few days. On the 10th, my old buddy Tex (also met in Fuzhou) and I are going to meet up for the final leg of the trip, which will go through Nanjing and Anhui province.
Since this trip in China is a relatively short one (I go back home on the 19th), I’ve decided not to spend too much time blogging from the road, and instead will document most of my travels when I get back to Chicago. I have been taking a lot of pictures, which I will post when I get back home, and also have been Twittering daily (@BenRoss) which can be done much quicker than blogging I am rapidly figuring out.
So as for Linan, I am actually quite stoked to be here. Thus far, my entire trip has consisted of 2 weeks in Shanghai (huge city, tons of foreign influence), and 3 days in Suzhou (relatively large city, lots of foreign influence as well). Linan, on the other hand, is reminding me a lot of Fuqing, where I spent my first year and a half in the Middle Kingdom. It’s a small city (probably a couple hundred thousand people) easily transversed on foot, or by cab for 5 RMB to virtually any location, I’m able to walk the streets without having watches, handbags, and prostitutes solicited to me, and the locals have a rural innocense to them that is typically lost in big city life.
I’m going to save most of my elaboration (I could go on for pages about Chinese small towns like this) until I get back to Chicago, but just wanted to give everybody a quick update of the trip so far. Next post will probably be coming to you from Anhui, home of Yellow Mouintain, excellent tea, and point of origination for most of Shanghai’s migrant labor force.
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03.06.09
Posted in Food and Drink, Travel Log (Asia) at 10:39 am by Benjamin Ross
I generally like to think of myself as pretty adventurous when it comes to food, as well as pretty well traveled when it comes to China. Therefore it really isn’t too often that I come across a new Chinese snack which I have yet to encounter. But today, while walking through Suzhou’s Guan Qian Jie (did I mention I finally busted out of Shanghai on Wednesday?), I came across a sign advertising 章鱼丸 (octopus balls)….
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| Before anybody gets the wrong idea, let me just clarify that the term “balls” refers to the round shape into which the octopus meat is molded. |
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| Having previously lived in Fuzhou for several years, I had been exposed to my fair share of fish balls (their local specialty), as well as a decent amount of octopus meat, which occasionally makes its way into Fuzhou cuisine as well. But this was to be my first time ever consuming an eight-armed mollusk in spherical format. The final product came in this specially designed box which actually refers to the balls as “Japanese style.” |
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| The balls were then topped with a sauce which had both the look and consistency of mucous. With its sweet and somewhat tangy flavor, it was the perfect condiment for my fried octoballs, and tasted nothing like the snot it so very much resembled The vendor referred to it as 萨拉将, the common Chinese word for “mayonnaise.” Sprinkled on top of the “mayo” were dried fish shavings for extra flavor. |
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| The final product was served with wooden skewers as utensils, and at 7 RMB for a box of 6, was rather pricey for Chinese street fare. However, they were quite filling, and I would certainly recommend them to anyone who has a chance to try.
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By the way, my consulting project is all wrapped up, and I will be backpacking around the Yangtze River Delta region for the next couple weeks, until I head back to Chicago on 3/19.
Also, special thanks to Ryan McLaughlin and his wife Maggie for putting me up in Suzhou (not to mention letting me use his MacBook to blog). Be sure to check out Ryan’s various China-related sites sites Lost Laowai, haohaoreport, Dao by Design, and The Humanaught.
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02.18.09
Posted in Travel Log (Asia) at 4:36 pm by Benjamin Ross
Made it into Shanghai about 12 hours ago. Weather is cold and rainy, but still considerably warmer than Chicago. Here are some pictures of Siberia taken from the plane.
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02.14.09
Posted in Business 'n Economics, Travel Log (Asia) at 1:23 pm by Benjamin Ross
The economy’s down, times are tough, and corporations across the globe are fighting tooth and nail for your expendable income. With all the lost income and doomsday talk, people often overlook the greatest virtue of recession: The cornucopia of steal-of-a-lifetime deals on everything from resort hotels to toaster ovens. Case in point…plane tickets to China.
Whenever I shop for a plane ticket to the Middle Kingdom, my first step is to check United Airlines’ website for a rough gauge of ticket prices. On first shot, tickets usually price anywhere between $1400 and $4500 for a round trip ticket (does anybody know who actually purchases those $4500 tickets?). After searching around online, finagling with the dates, and consulting with various travel agents, I’m usually able to come to a deal somewhere in the range of $1100 to $1300…Which is why it took me completely off guard when I did the old United Airlines cold check last week, and the first round trip fare that came up was $790.84! Yes, that’s $790.84, United Airlines, tax included, direct flight, round trip O’Hare to Pudong, leaving 2/17 returning 3/19.
After a little tinkering around with the dates, I was able to find fares as low as $720. Since my travel dates for this trip are not flexible, (and since I’m not paying for the ticket myself anyway), I ended up booking the $790.84 ticket. For comparison sake, my roundtrip flight this summer from Chicago to Beijing came to a walloping $1850, granted this was a) summer b) when fuel prices were considerably higher, and c) around the time of the Olympics.
As of now though, it seems the earlier the reservation (in other words, the more last minute) the cheaper, generally speaking. There are still fares in the $700s and $800s for February, and March, but move up to April and it jumps up to the $1400 range. My best guess is that what’s probably happening is that the airlines know the economy is in the crapper, and that people aren’t buying plane tickets to China. In a last ditch effort to fill up the planes, they are offering seats at ridiculously low prices. This also probably means that most flights will be half empty, thus enabling passengers to sprawl out across multiple seats, an invaluable luxury on a 14 hour flight. I would also imagine, that prices for flights later in the year could drop considerably as well, provided no miraculous economic recovery occurs within the next few months.
So for anybody in search of an international vacation but not wanting to cough up a lot of dough, right now may be the best time to head over to China. And for anybody planning a trip for later in the year, it may be advisable to wait and see if fares continue to drop. Then again, the pricing for US airline tickets has never really had much rhyme to reason to it anyway, so take anything I’m saying with two grains of salt and a heaping teaspoon of MSG. I’ll be in the Middle Kingdom from February 18 until March 19. See y’all on the other side.
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10.20.08
Posted in Fujian, Travel Log (Asia) at 7:44 pm by Benjamin Ross
For those of you who have followed my blog since its inception, you probably remember when I lived in Fuzhou. In posts, I often cite that I lived in Fuzhou for 3 years, but this is not completely accurate. In fact, my first 15 months in the Middle Kingdom were spent in a town called Fuqing, a county-level city (县级市) under the jurisdiction of Fuzhou, but an hour outside of the city proper. This past summer, I spent 6 days in Fuzhou which included two day-trips back to Fuqing. Here are some pictures I took to give you a little taste of my adopted Chinese 老家.
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| In terms of size and city layout, Fuqing is very typical Chinese city, containing a population of several hundred thousand people cramped into an area which can be traversed by bicycle in about twenty minutes. |
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| My original reasons for going to China were to experience a foreign culture (and learn its language) in a developing country, and do so by being completely isolated from my own. When I first arrived in Fuqing in March of 2004, I did not see another white person for my first three months. Today still, the sight of a foreigner is uncommon on the streets of Fuqing, and bound to draw attention. |
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| Fuqing is dysected by the 龙江 (Dragon River) and several bridges connect the old downtown (background) to the new downtown and surrounding areas. The building seen here is the 天河酒店 (tian1 he2 jiu2 dian4), a hotel/restaurant/KTV which is the tallest building in town. |
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| Up until about 2005, this is what most of Fuqing’s housing stock looked like, rows and rows and rows of the infamous bathroom tile style buildings. |
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| This is the infamous ICBC branch which formerly had frozen my assets. For all the flack I give ICBC, the one thing they are good is managing to open a branch in every single imaginable stretch of civilization across the Middle Kingdom. I’ve never looked this up, but I would not be surprised if ICBC had more branches than any other bank in the world. |
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At the center of Fuqing is 街心公园 (jie1 xin1 gong1 yuan2), which translates romantically into English as “Street Center Park.” As is the case of central parks/squares in many small Chinese cities, 街心公园 serves as a community center for many of the locals, especially the elderly. When weather conditions are favorable, crowds gather in the park to play card games or Chinese chess, smack around a shuttlecock, sell items ranging from remote-control cars to kitchen utensils, or just chat and enjoy the sun shade. It’s the place to go to have your shoes shined, bust out the megaphone and promote your new product or service to the masses, or simply to catch up on the latest gossip and people-watch.街心公园 will always bear a special significance to me as my de facto Chinese classroom. For the better part of 15 months, I would spend 3 or 4 afternnoons per week hanging out in the park and conversing with the locals. The beauty of this arrangement was its symbiosis. Most elderly Fuqingers can probably count on one hand the number of Westerners they have encountered throughout the course of their entire lives. Chances are, even if they have seen Westerners, they had never had the opportunity (nor the ability) to communicate with them. Therefore, the sight of me chatting with a random local would often draw a small crowd to eavesdrop on our conversation. Before I knew it, I would often be surrounded by a mob of Chinese senior citizens, eager to ask me all sorts of personal questions about my job, my salary, George W. Bush, how many Chinese women I had slept with, etc.
Under normal conditions, this would have been quite an annoying situation. But since my main goal was practicing the language, and their main goal was drawing as much information out of Whitey McForeigner as possible, it was the perfect match. To this day, I can still objectively point to afternoons at 街心公园 as my most valuable Chinese language training. And as a side note, I usually didn’t respond to the sexual inquiries. |
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| Speaking of Whitey McForeigner, 街心公园 also sits adjacent to Fuqing’s one and only McDonald’s. Like most single-McDonald’s towns in China, Fuqing’s McD’s is located right smack dab in the middle of the downtown. It’s on the second floor of one of Fuqing’s most expensive pieces of commercial real estate. McDonald’s is one of Fuqing’s hipper establishments, especially for youth, and a common spot for dates and social gatherings. |
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| No introduction to Fuqing would be complete without a thorough disclosure of the 福清光饼 (fu2 qing1 guang1 bing3). While there are countless bread creations across the Middle Kingdom referred to as 光饼, Fuqing’s 光饼 are distinct in their hardness…typically not a quality sought after in bread. |
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| In and of themselves 光饼 are nothing to write home about. However, it’s what is put inside them that make them so unique, and mouthwateringly delicious. Jokingly referred to as the 福清汉堡包 (Fuqing hamburger), the 光饼夹 (guang1 bing3 jia1) is a sandwich created by slicing the 光饼 in half, and filling it with marinated pork and tofu. Hot sauce is optional, and highly recommended by yours truly. The 光饼夹 is possibly the tastiest street food concoction I have ever encountered anywhere in the Middle Kingdom. This is a distinction I do not throw around casually. |
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| 光饼夹 cost only 1 RMB each (approx 15 cents USD), and they can ONLY be bought in Fuqing. There are vendors in Fuzhou who sell what they claim to be Fuqing 光饼夹, but in fact they are the 光饼夹 from another town called Jian’ou, and are completely different from (and disappointingly inferior to) the Fuqing ones. To find the real 光饼夹, simply go to 街心公园, and look for elderly countryside women seated near over-shoulder baskets with the 光饼 in one, the pork/tofu/spice goodness in the other (see picture above). Unless it is raining (or an Olympic Opening Ceremony is taking place on Chines soil) they will always be there. |
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| Fuqing is only 15 miles from the Taiwan Strait, and thus its topography is full of small rivers, creeks, and canals. The coast near Fuqing has bountiful stone deposits, and thus nearly all buildings (like these pictured above) are constructed from stone or concrete. |
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| One benefit of living in Southern China as opposed to the North is that air pollution is much less severe. To be fair, I took these pictures on a day which was extrordinarly clear for Fuqing. Even so, on an average day in any town of Fujian, the air quality would be much, much cleaner than an average day in say, Henan or Hebei. |
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| An additional benefit of living in a small town (this goes for North and South) is that cost of living is cheap…dirt cheap! Cab fare to anywhere within Fuqing city limits is 6 RMB (approx 90 cents USD). It was 5 RMB when I lived there. And due to Fuqing’s dearth of nightlife and quality dining, it is virtually impossible to spend much money, even if you tried. That is, unless you are one of the locals who wear Japanese designer clothes and live in luxurious 6 story mansions. Due to its large contingent of residents working in kitchens of Chinese restaurants abroad, and to a somewhat lesser extent, the recent boom in Fujian’s export market, Fuqing’s people have amassed enormous amounts of personal wealth over the past two decades. |
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| The funny thing about Fuqing however is that after taking a casual stroll through the city, one would never realize it was one of the wealthiest cities in China. Since much of the Fuqing elite’s income comes from graft, undocumented international employment, and other mischievous means, the city itself is not nearly as wealthy as the people whom it governs. This is quite apparent by examining the public infrastructure, especially in contrast to the private homes which it supports. |
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| Back when I lived in Fuqing, it’s most heinous eyesore was probably the Dragon River itself. With its stench of feces, endless flow of trash, layer of industrial oil floating on the surface, and complete lack of fish or any other livng aquatic creatures, I had never seen a more polluted body of water in my life before. |
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| However, since the time I left, a massive cleanup effort has been undertaken by the city government, and the Dragon River is actually starting to look like…well…a river again! |
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| In addition, much of the infrastructure around the river is being replaced as well. That tall structure in the background is a pagoda from the Ming Dynasty, one of the very few standing relics of Fuqing’s past. I am assuming it won’t be torn down in the latest wave of construction. |
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| Another one of Fuqing’s older structures (although not nearly as old as the pagoda) is the Min Opera House which like most of Fuqing, also sits on the bank of the Dragon River. At the Opera House are regular live performances of 闽剧 (Fujian Opera). The performances are all done in the local dialect with a flashing sign off to the side of the stage displaying subtitles in Chinese characters. Even if you can’t understand what is said, it is still worth stepping in for a few minutes to check out a performance. You can usually hear them from across the river as well. |
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| Throughout the time I lived in Fuqing the downtown area was always the center of daily life and commerce. |
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| However, during the time I lived in Fuzhou (05-07), the Fuqing city government began rapidly developing an entirely new downtown on the other side of the Dragon River, to the west of the old one. |
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| If there is one thing that China can do better than anyone, it’s rapidly throw up new buildings. This patch of real estate went from farmland to high-rise mega-commercial development in a period of less than 12 months. It was also given the Chinglishly hilarious official English name “Long Wang Great Town,” translated from 龙旺名城. |
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| Sites like Long Wang Great Town were nowhere to be seen in Fuqing when I first arrived. Keep in mind, that was only four years ago. My recent trip back to Fuqing underscored the fact that you don’t have to live in China very long before you begin to notice drastic changes in the landscape and architecture of familiar areas. Contrast that to the neighborhood where I grew up in Overland Park, KS, which looks virtually identical now as to how it looked when I my family moved there in 1985. |
Of all the various locales I have visited in the Middle Kingdom, none will ever have the same personal significance as my first Chinese stomping grounds. Fuqing is generally not viewed as a desirable destination in the eyes of Chinese from other cities and provinces. Most of my students at the university where I worked would tell me that Fuqing was dirty, ugly, boring, and that the people were rude and uncivilized. I was frequently informed by cab drivers that out of the thousands of Chinese cities, I was stupid for choosing to live in Fuqing. One student even told me that when her parents dropped her off her freshman year, she cried at the first sight of downtown. But for me, this is exactly why I loved Fuqing. There was nothing whatsoever which would have attracted anyone to travel there without reason. To me it was a beautifully intact Chinese city, completely spared from the effects of tourism and large-scale Western influence, the perfect spot to begin my journey through the Middle Kingdom.
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10.01.08
Posted in Food and Drink, Japan, Travel Log (Asia) at 6:24 am by Benjamin Ross
It’s been almost two weeks since my most recent repatriation, and I wanted to give a final pictorial recap of my brief stopover in Tokyo. Enjoy.
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| On my first night in Tokyo, my American friend asked if I wanted to go out for a “cylinder” of beer. Originally, I thought this was some new English slang phrase I which had yet to make its way into my lexicon. But no…in Tokyo they do in fact serve beer…in cylinders. |
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| Here’s a shot of a cubicle from a Japanese Internet cafe, basically the same setup as a Chinese net bar. You can see the computer, webcam, headphones, a food menu to order from, and so on. The only things missing were the clouds of cigarette smoke, the grime on the keys, the cacophony of pop music, and the empty peanut soup cans filled to the brim with cigarette ash. Other than that, it was just like any old Internet Cafe in the Middle Kingdom. The cost was roughly $3 USD per hour. |
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| You can’t really see it so well from this picture, but Tokyo is easily the cleanest major city I have ever been to. Even down the restrooms in public parks, Tokyo looks as if they have an army of Japanese Danny Tanners running around the city 24/7. |
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| One of the highlights of any trip to Japan is the food. Sometimes I find myself seriously wondering why more food isn’t served via conveyor belt. |
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| Sometimes I also wonder why the human race ever came up with the crazy idea to cook its fish. |
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| In addition to all of the endemic Japanese snacks, baozi have now fully been thrust into the Japanese culinary radar. In Chinatown, those lovable steamed buns are now the hot item sold in every nook and cranny, as shown by this Chinese woman preparing her baozi for Japanese patrons. |
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| Outside my friends apartment in Ikebukuro, I had the chance to experience this Japanese street festival. |
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| Groups of men and women, each dressed in matching outfits, carried several of these sedan chairs through the street, as the surrounding people banged drums and other musical instruments. |
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| My knowledge of Japanese folk customs is quite lacking, so if anybody has more insight into what is going on, please feel free to comment. |
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| Tokyo has the best rail-transit network I have ever seen in Asia, and arguably the best one in the world as well. Train tracks, such as these, run all throughout, above, and below the city, making it so that virtually any destination is conveniently reachable via public transit. |
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| Signs in most stations are written in both Japanese and English transliteration, making the subway system easy to figure out, even for those who don’t read Japanese. |
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| The one downfall of the Tokyo transit system, and this is a major downfall, is that the entire thing shuts down from midnight until 5 am. Since a cab ride in Tokyo can cost as much as a routine surgical operation in China, a typical night out in Tokyo forces the decision to either stay in one’s own neighborhood, be home before midnight, or party until 5. |
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| It’s really a shame that the main frame of reference for a “hamburger” in the Middle Kingdom is KFC and McDonald’s. After three months in China, I couldn’t help myself, and had to splurge on Wendy’s in Tokyo. If by chance anybody within the Wendy’s organization is reading this, will you please, please, please, consider expanding your operation into mainland China??? |
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| Like my own country, Japan (or at least Tokyo) is vigilant on the anti-public smoking trail. In order to light up in public places (city streets included) smokers must do so in designated smoking areas. |
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| Every day, Tokyo police stations publish a count of how many traffic fatalities and injuries occurred during the previous day. The figure in red is for deaths, and the one in black for those injured. |
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| The big gambling rage in Tokyo these days is Pachinko, which according to Wikipedia is a “cross between pinball and a video slot machine.” Day and night, Tokyoers can be seen staring at the screen, following the balls, and playing for hours on end. |
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| This is the name of a clothing store. I am at a loss for more words. |
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| And finally, one of the busiest street corners in all of Japan. This view is just a few feet from the exit of Shibuya Station. Possibly my all-time favorite venue to people watch, Shibuya is one of the hotter, trendier areas in Tokyo for night life and shopping…definitely a must see on any Japanese excursion. |
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09.26.08
Posted in Down in Chinatown, Immigration, Japan, Travel Log (Asia) at 1:02 am by Benjamin Ross
Note: I am now back in the US, and have been taking a little hiatus from blogging while I catch up on time, sleep, and Mexican food. I will be in Chicago for the foreseeable future, and the blog should be back up to speed this week.
Japan is home to one of the world’s largest overseas Chinese communities, and the Tokyo Chinatown is a major attraction that I missed in my first round to Japan in 2007. For me, Tokyo’s Chinatown bears a special significance. I spent my first fifteen months in the Middle Kingdom living in Fuqing, a small town in Fujian. Like most small towns in Fujian, Fuqing’s primary export is people, mainly in the form of commissary staff. For many small towns in Fujian, they have corresponding locations abroad where its residents sneak over to, and then in turn help their friends and relatives make the journey. Whether by arranged marriage, fraudulent passport, transit via shipping container, or in the rare instances with legitimate credentials, the Fujianese have spread themselves further across the globe than any other Chinese demographic. Once abroad, the typical program is to find a job in a Chinese restaurant, work 70-80 hours a week for an interlude of 5-10 years, and then head back to Fujian with a veritable pile of money. Even within Fujian, the residents of Fuqing are known for their prowess in sneaking across borders. As for their destination, Tokyo is number one.
Where specifically do all of Fuqing’s emigrants end up? A trip to Tokyo’s Chinatown was in order. For starters, it’s actually a misnomer to say “Tokyo Chinatown,” as the Chinatown is technically located in Yokohama, a separate city which has now been completely engulfed by the Tokyo megalopolis. On my second day in Japan, I made the 25 minute pilgrimage from Tokyo to Yokohama, in search of anything Chinese.
Like most Chinatowns, the entrance to Yokohama’s Chinatown is marked off by a large 牌坊 (pai2 fang1)*, with the characters 中华街 (zhong1 hua2 jie1), one of the various translations of “Chinatown,” written on it. Behind the gate is a tangled web of streets and alleys, swamped by mobs of people. The streets are jammed with stores selling Chinese spices and trinkets, restaurants with names such as “Shanxi Family Chinese Restaurant,” and street vendors galore. By far, the most common items were smoked chestnuts (板栗) and baozi (包子).
But what was different about this Chinatown were the linguistic sounds emanating from the streets. The racket of a typical Chinatown is usually dominated by the hyper-tonal sounds of Cantonese, the glottal emanations of various Fujian dialects, and a competing amount of Mandarin, usually spoken with a rough southern accent. In Yokohama’s Chinatown, all I heard was Japanese. In fact, it took me seven minutes from the time I walked through the 牌坊 until I first heard any spoken Chinese, during which time I had easily passed several hundred individuals.
If I had to give an estimate, I would say that on any corner of Chinatown, 90% of the people are Japanese, and that’s being conservative. Like many famous “ethnic areas” in the US, Yokohama’s Chinatown seems to have long expired as an ethnic enclave, and is now merely a destination for Japanese tourists. Although many of the businesses are still run by Chinese owners, their clientele are primarily Japanese. The young wait staff can be seen outside storefronts yelling their sales pitches in fluent, but heavily Chinese accented, Japanese. Even the “Chinese food” (see picture below), looked and smelled Japanese. I couldn’t help but conjure images of Homer Simpson eating at Americatown during his own visit to Japan.
So what has happened to the Chinese community in Tokyo? My best guess (and I would love some feedback from those with more knowledge of the situation) is that as cost of living has risen in Yokohama, the Chinese community has dispersed to other parts of Tokyo. During my previous visit to Japan, I had been eating Yakitori with a Japanese-speaking American friend in an old neighborhood in Tokyo when it came up that our waitress was Chinese. She had been from Changle (a neighboring town of Fuqing), and told me that all of the store owners on that particular street were from Fuqing. In another instance, on my way to Narita airport, I stopped to explore the area near Nippori Station. While wandering through one of Tokyo’s more neglected neighborhoods, I was startled by an old woman on the street yelling “国际电话卡,” (Get your international phone cards!) As I meandered through the run down neighborhood, I encountered a disproportionate number of Chinese restaurants, and even a 刀削面馆 (cut noodle restaurant). And if that weren’t enough, on my first evening out in Ikebukuro with the same American friend, we were repeatedly solicited services by Chinese hookers standing on street corners. (I wonder if I could have worked a discount by speaking to them in their native language?)
So as it stands, Tokyo seems to still be a hotbed of Chinese activity. It’s just no longer confined to a single Chinatown. If I had more than three days, I probably would have dug deeper into the Japanese-Chinese community, but ultimately I was too distracted by people watching, conveyor-belt sushi, and all of the other stimuli which come with spending three days a city where you constantly feel as if you are inside of a cartoon. Bottom line, if you’re going to Tokyo and interested in overseas Chinese communities, you might want to take Chinatown off of your must-see list. Below are some pics from my afternoon in Yokohama.
*I honestly have no idea what you would call a 牌坊 in English. Maybe “big overhead Chinatown gate thingy,” but that’s my best shot.
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| Yokohama has less of an urban feel to it than Tokyo…which now that I think of it, that probably applies to just about every other inch of space in the world, save for possibly Manhattan. |
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| This is the entrance to Chinatown with the 牌坊. The characters read 中华街, (zhong1 hua2 jie1), one of the various Chinese words for “Chinatown.“ |
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| This shot probably could have come from just about any other Chinatown in the world. |
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| However, I must admit, Yokohama’s Chinatown probably has the cleanest streets of any Chinatown I have been to. |
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| Like most Chinatowns around the world, the primary reason non-Chinese go there is to eat. The picture above showcases the typical fare of most Chinese restaurants in Tokyo. Usually there is 麻婆豆腐 (ma2 po2 dou4 fu2, spicy Sichuan tofu), some variation of beef with green peppers, and everything else is about as Chinese sashimi and a ham sandwich. |
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| All in all, I knew I couldn’t make it two trips to Tokyo without a single visit to Chinatown, but it certainly was not a highlight of my trip. I am quite sure Homer’s experience at Americatown was infinitely more cultural than mine in this assumed hotbed of Chinese activity. But hey, they got great baozi, so how much can I really complain? |
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