 |
| Sunset on the Yangtze |
“I can more or less continue my life. I can give in or I can try.
Hit the ground running, hit the ground running for your life” Tim Finn
Believe me that
is what I did last year when I arrived in China and absolutely what I did this
year as well. I was so impressed with my body for not having jet lag. UNTIL,
yesterday, when I hit “the wall”. I don’t know the exact number of hours I
slept yesterday because it was interspersed with bouts of being charming for
the passengers, but I think I slept more than I was awake.
I try to learn
a few new facts about China and/or a few new words/phrases in Mandarin every
day that I am here. So far, so good, but we shall save the vocabulary lesson
for a later blog. My 115 member crew is
a great resource so here are some fun China facts --- in no particular order of hilarity or
“things that make you go “hmmmm”:
1. Dead Pigs. Nothing shouts, “READ ME” by being a blog about dead
swine! NBC news headline: “China river's dead pig toll passes 13,000 but
officials say water quality is 'normal'” In the Huangpu River, there were a
crazy amount of dead pigs pulled out of the river. This river supplies over 1/5
of all the drinking water in Shanghai.
Luckily, I am on the Yangtze River, however, note to self, don’t drink
the water in Shanghai if I ever go back there. Supposedly the pigs contracted
some type of virus, the porcine circovirus….which I’ve named the porcupine
circus virus. My favorite quote of the day: “The government is as corrupt as
these dead pigs”…..Ah, politics!
2. Pollution. Speaking of naming things, the Chinese have actually
named their “dusty weather”, or as we call it, pollution. The Chinese word is: 霾 Mai. I agree that “There’s so much Mai today” sounds way better that “There
is so much pollution today”!
3. New President , Xi Jinping . He gave
his first speech a few days ago. Funny, that I am starting my blog out with
political items, since I rarely, if ever, talk politics, but I find some aspects of the political process
very curious – I just know not to talk about it around the family dinner table.
I was here last year for the Chinese elections, which happen every 10 years. I
asked my River Guide Steven what he thought about the new President because in
all the news I’ve seen…..ok, just CNN….they are reporting that the Chinese
really like him. Well, Steven didn’t seem to have an opinion. He said that most
Chinese don’t care much about politics, they just care about how good their
daily lives are. Okay. He also told me they get paid to vote [maybe 5-10 yuan],
but for a lot of people it costs at least that, if not more, to take
transportation to get somewhere to vote.
The Chinese don’t actually vote for their President directly…..shocking,
I know!! They vote for village leaders, who vote for “county” leaders, who vote
for regional leaders, who vote for the President!
3. Alcohol. I saw on CNN that China is #2
in the world in total alcohol consumption. No, I don’t know if it that is per
capita. They are behind Great Britain and in front of France. That means in the
past 3 years I’ve lived in 2 of the top 3 countries for alcohol consumption.
That explains a lot!!!
4. No Green Hats! Finally, my favorite new
Chinese fact, or perhaps superstition is more apropos. And as it was recently,
St. Patty’s Day, I find this especially funny since some of our American pax
were wearing green. In China it is taboo to wear a green hat. If you wear a
green hat, it means that your spouse has not been loyal.
This blog entry
is probably much longer than my future ones will be, but there is so much
running through my mind at the moment I just had to spit it all out on paper.
Thank you for listening/reading!
