Written by Greg
|
28 May 2010
Don't let the title fool you, China is awesome, but there's a few things that really grate my nerves.
Let's take a look...
SPITTING - You're strolling down a quiet path in a park, enjoying the warm sun and the light breeze on your skin. Deep in thought and on the verge of solving one of life's mysteries, the silence is suddenly broken by the sound of someone behind you horking up a mouthful of lung butter before spitting it on the ground. This happens all the time. Day or night, (my favorite is early in the morning) somebody is HAWKING and PEE-TOOing nearby. On the sidewalk, in front of a building, on the stairs (inside and outside), and in cars. Oh my god, in cars...I don't even blink anymore when I see someone stop at a red light, open the driver side door, lean out and splatter the pavement. Then there's the snot rockets....
HORNS - Do driving instructors tell their students that the horn can be used as a replacement for the brakes? Or is it just trendy? Is the horn the new brake? Whatever the hell the logic is, drivers honk like it's going out of style. Did someone cut you off? HONK at them! Did YOU cut someone off? Fucker! The audacity - HONK at THEM! Is someone crossing the street 500 yards in front of you? HONK! Hey, do you recognize that guy walking on the sidewalk? HONK at him! Is that guy over there wearing a blue shirt? HONK a couple times! Is it Tuesday? You know what to do! Dammit - did you forget to pick up the milk? HONK away your frustration!
STARING - I know I'm ridiculously good-looking (and modest), but seriously - if you're turning your head more than 45 degrees, then you're staring TOO much. When I lived in Korea, I didn't get stared at as much as I do here. In the Philippines the only time I got stared at was when I took off my shirt at the beach and everyone's heads snapped in my direction to see where the blinding white light was coming from... Of course living in Italy provided no issues, since just like child molesters, I blended right in.
But it's not even just the children, the adults do it to. I've actually seen parents turn their child's head around to see me. And it's not to say "Holy crap! It's Michael Buble!" either... I think when I head back West, I'm going to reciprocate by running up to each Chinese person I see and bark "Ni Hao!" at the top of my lungs while pointing at them.
THE SUN - Hey China - your country is huge. Ever heard of time zones? I know the sun rises and sets nicely in Beijing, but guess what? Here in Changun, the sun is up at 4:00am. Completely up by 4:20. How do I know this? I timed it one morning when I had the misfortune of needing to pee in the wee hours of the morning. And you know how hard it is to fall asleep in the afternoon because of that darn sun? Yeah, you know what I'm getting at... But the good news is when I'm tossing and turning, dreading the fact that it's Saturday - which means I also have to get up for work at 7:30, I've got PLENTY of time to ponder life and think up article ideas like this one...
INTERNET - The Great Firewall of China stands between me and the rest of the world. I stand behind my theory that the government has put all this shit up just to piss me off. And do you know what? It works.
First and most obvious is the prevention of access to my favorite sites. Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and even WWTDD have been deemed inappropriate for public consumption. This is from a country who's mainstream sexual fetishes include barefoot women crushing the heads of kittens and chicks with their heels and toes. And internet piracy? You don't even need it since you can walk down any street and get a pristine DVD box set of LOST - complete with holograms on the box, for 6 dollars.
Of course, you can easily bypass this nonsense with a VPN which should only cost you 60 dollars a year. But hey, did you just log into Paypal? Your account is now frozen. Jump through hoops for a few days to get your access back after sending them copies of your passport and other goodies and you're all set to use Paypal (WITH YOUR VPN TURNED OFF) to buy some credit on Skype so you can talk to your family at home. With your VPN still off, you go to Skype.com and are mysteriously rerouted to TOM TOM - China's version of Skype. Well that's no good, fire up your VPN and you can happily log into Skype.com. It get's tricky now, you're on Skype.com using VPN, but can't pay with Paypal while using it. You're clever - turn it off prior to hitting the "Confirm Payment" button. You're so sneaky! Until five minutes later when you receive emails from both Skype and Paypal saying your accounts are locked. Ugh....
And secondly, the speed. Or lack thereof. It's so painfully slow - I got faster speeds with the crappy satellite connection when I worked on cruise ships! Going from 1500kb per second to less than 200 is a shock, let me tell you. And downloading any kind of online video is now a chore that I don't look forward to.
It's faster to just walk down the street to that dvd shop for this weeks episode of Two and a Half Men - it's only 30 cents...
