Preparing for China
May 14th, 2007 by Peter
About 1½ month, and I’ll be off to China to visit the in-laws and short sightseeing in Beijing. We’ll be in China for a full month.
I bought the tickets ages ago, well, at least 1 month so that’s all taken care of. Then there’s the obligatory insurance (well, obligatory for decease attractors like me anyway), and then the last of 2 vaccines for Japanese Brain Decease. Whatever that may be, and why ever that would apply to me (insert humorous rant about my brain in the comments). After paying the bill of 760DKr (140US$), I’d almost rather have taken my chances, but that’s too late now anyway.
Some time ago we purchased some gifts for Cs so that’s all well and taken care of too.
C is put in charge of finding a hotel in Beijing for a 3 day duration, and I trust her to find one that has both quality and cheapness attached to the big toe. Last I heard from her was a price of 180RMB a night, which by Danish standards is pretty cheap and way below budget. So that’s cool.
Last night as we had tugged in to bed, C told me it would be wise to bring our wedding certificate as well. I know China Expats may raise their brows and sigh, but I never thought about it for one second. Denmark really is a no fuzz country. C told me that not bringing this could bring us trouble at the hotel. Simply because some hotels would refuse us a single double bed room, as we couldn’t prove to be married (apparently having the same rings is not proof enough). Especially as I am a can’t-fool-anyone-Laowai and she is Chinese. Gotta seem suspicious right? Not that C in anyway could resemble a girl of divious profession at all, but the police apparently do raids to the hotels to round-up these girls. Would be some scene to have her dragged away for questioning in the middle of a jetlagged sleep one of our first nights in China. So I better grab a copy of those papers too just to be safe.
Last Friday I also sent my passport to the Chinese Embassy to get my visa in gear. As always that was done in a hurry, and I now fear that I may have forgotten to include the fee. I simply can’t remember if I put the bills inside the letter or not. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Hell, if all goes wrong, I still have enough time to fix this.
1½ month that’s freaking soon? We’ve been looking forward to this trip for more than 1 year, and I’ve done my best to keep expenses at a low for the whole time. That was pretty tough, but now it pays off. Now it seems alarmingly close.
I haven’t met C’s folks yet. I’ve only seen them on a webcam, and there’s nothing I can do to prepare myself or them except to keep my mind perfectly open and take things as they come. Neither C’s parents nor her sisters speak English. This means that C is the only link to them, and that vouch for some embarrassing situations. There are only so many times you can say ganbei a day. It does not scare me though. I’ll manage just fine but time may limb along a bit. I’ll just have to wait and see. Also in all fairness this is the same situation C has been in for more than a year now. Lots of talking and nothing she understood. At least now she has learned enough Danish to get by. So I better chew down my own medicine and shut the f up. It will be some experience for me to be lost in translation, but I think C will also get a glimpse of why I sometimes need a timeout from being a Danish/Chinese dictionary/translator 24/7.
I have plans on using my time seeing C’s home city Yilan. It is a small city by (Chinese standards) of about 30.000 inhabitants. Well, that’s what C’s best shot was, so it could be way bigger, or way smaller if I know my wife well enough. Yilan city, being unknown to most outsiders and not having many Laowai around, will be that much more interesting to me. Maybe I’ll even experience the much hyped stare-at-the-Laowai/celeb status that I’ve read so much about. Guess that grows old pretty fast. However, I hope to get a superb chance of seeing China behind the scenes and going on tiny adventures, that does not include famous sights you can see from space like: the Great Wall, Beijing Duck and so on (well hopefully do those on our 3 days in Beijing).
It may turn out to be the most boring time in my life, or the most interesting. That’s what makes the trip even more exciting to look forward to. No matter what I hope to learn a lot about C’s family, her background, China and hopefully myself too. I may even catch up with a few Chinese words, which I would welcome dearly. 25 straight days with the in-laws is too much to keep up appearances and that’s just great in its own way. No façade to maintain and that may prove the best way to really learn about my in-laws and for them to learn about their “new” laowai-son-in-law. Let’s just hope they feel the same way when they learn that I snore like a jackhammer.
No matter what, it well-deserved for C to meet her family again, and if I get a hard time I just have to suck it up or blog my way out of it, eh? Right now, this second, I can’t ask for a better spot to go for either of us. Thinking about it, there’s really nowhere else I’d rather go and that’s worth a lot. Let’s see how I feel when I get there. :-)
You still get 1½ month left,so u have enough time to prepare your journey.the most important thing is learning some useful chinese as possible as u can.not just Ganbei :)although u r capable of drinking. Try to say”我å¯ä»¥å–更多的,å†æ¥ä¸€ç“¶ç™½é…’”” I can drink more,one more bottle of liquor pls”,kidding!!~~
it is wise to take the marriage certificate with u,once u get the raid,it will probably help u out quickly,although the police seldom do like this.180 RMB a night is really cheap as far as I know in beijing.If u get some problems in beijing then ,u can call me anytime,probably I can do u a favor,email me,and I will tell u my cellphone No.
Ha ha… I think my Western DNA will probably undergo some sort of test regarding liquor. I am pretty sure my in-laws want to test if the rumour about laowai being able to drink a lot is true. :-)
Tnx for the tips Ray. I’ll get back to you bout that number. I think my wife has some friends in Beijing that can help out, but you never know :-)
Before going to China you maybe should learn some mandarin basics. Here is a nice page with free online courses:
http://www.chinese-tools.com/learn/chinese
Hope you’ll like it.
Good luck with the plans. That’s about the same time my family is coming to visit for my wedding here. Still have to plan travels around China during that time too.
Stop by Xinjiang and say “hi” on your tour.
Tnx Matt.
I better look up Xinjiang on the map first. I’m kindalost when it comes to Chinese cities. Good luck with your wedding plans and have fun meeting up with the in-laws too :-)
If your three days in Beijing aren\’t too packed how about we meet up for dinner? I\’ll be more or less free any evening until July 6, at which point a friend of mine is coming from the UK for a visit.
Kevin: Would be cool. I just talked a bit to the wife, and I think we can fit it in. We have to eat anyway, so won’t have to change any plans, right? :-)
We’ll be i Beijing at Sunday the 1st of July, and a few days ahead. I bet the 2nd or 3rd would be good days if you are free. By then our jetlag should have minized and we have a more detailed plan of what to see. We already have a few things on the list, but haven’t put them down on special days.
Dinner would fit perfectly, if you are free. Is your wife with you? Actually one of my must-do things is Beijing Duck. Maybe you’d like to meet up and have a bit of ducky? :-)
Chinese-Tools.com:
Sorry for answering this late, but Akismet Spam protection blocked your comment.
Anyway thank you for your link. I’ll check it out :-)
If you get down south, holler…
Best from GZ…
OMBW
Tnx Lonnie. :-)
Unfortunately the journey will only go to BJ and then north this time. But if you’re ever in Shenzhen you may hear the echo from my last holler there. It was due to the 2 men just watching in awe as I undressed my hairy laowai body at the hotel massage floor. No need to sneak a discreet peek when you can see it all by staring blankly at the fat foreigner. :-)
My research indicates Chinese in law trips typically generate 1.1 blog posts per day.
Lol… CLB. Please guide me to the period on your blog where you had that count. I would like to pinpoint the frustration level, just to prepare myself.
I do not have Chinese in laws, so I am basing it strictly on other blogs. These visits do seem to generate naturally a whole host of posts, not all out of frustration. I would think a place like Yilan (not that I have ever been there) would have to generate posts.
Hell, if my blog were not about China, visits to my in laws in Peru, IL (not one of the other 15 or so Perus in the US) would generate a whole slew of posts also. But how many times can I joke about setting my watch back 20 years?
Ha ha… Afaik setting back the watch won’t be necessary for me. There will for certain be something that will seem odd or unnatural to me, but hopefully not crisis situation odd. :-)
From what I know already, I won’t discover anything new to old expats, nor will find any new species Darwin style, but I may find some stuff that is new to me AND meet my in-laws, which I look forward to. This is what I count on. There will be something to blog about, I’m sure. Old or new – it won’t matter to me as long as I can reduce my curiausity by blogging about it. :-)
My initial 14 days in Shenzhen in 2005 really does not count as expatism, and my 1 month in BJ/Yilan won’t neither. I bet it will be some ride though. Haven’t done anything near this stunt for some time… Come think of it… maybe I never have.