I wrote a post a while back and never posted it! Sorry, all. I've just decided that we're going to aim for at least one post a week. Many apologies that the site has been neglected - we've been very busy (well, I work every day on top of going to class, but Tom doesn't, so you'll have to ask him for his excuse). I get online once a week, so expect a post about every weekend.
The last post was about getting my hair cut (always an adventure; the guy gave me a very bad bob and was so nervous it took him an hour and a half!) and buying coats and warm shoes. So don't worry, everybody, we have warm coats. (Mine, a knee length goose down coat, cost $13!)
Yesterday was a strange moment for me. I was outside with my coat on but unzipped, and I was sweating. I thought, "Wow, the weather is really nice today! It's warmed up!" Then, I noticed the ice around our building wasn't melted... and when I got the weather report, I discovered the temperature was a high of 20F. Hah!
Anyway, things have been good recently. I've been very busy with work, and today is my day off! The school wants me to teach preschoolers at 9am on Saturdays, but I flat out refused (I even told them that I needed one day off a week, which is so spoiled and excessive here - but I don't care! Ha!). So today Tom gets a taste of working while I lounge around the house - but there is a lot of work to be done around here, so I don't think I'm actually going to be doing much lounging anyway.
Aside from work, we're busy with class and fun things, too. We've been hanging out with the Americans about once a week and our class has been spending more time together too. I hear tonight we're going bowling again, hurray! Thanksgiving was a little sad here, but not much. We went out with the Russians for dumplings, which was good. Later we heard that the Americans went out for a big American meal, but we missed that memo. Oh well. We did make a trip to Metro, the big German warehouse/grocery store that is full of imported stuff and bought some cheese (Irish cheddar and camembert!) and wine.
My adult students, whom I love, took me out to dinner last weekend. It was a lot of fun and my first experience of a meal out with a bunch of Chinese people. Let me tell you, it's exhausting - and not just because we speak exclusively in Chinese. Here's how it goes: everybody orders way more food than they could possibly eat, and a (big) bottle of beer for each person. At your place you have a saucer-sized plate, chopsticks, a spoon, a teacup, and a small glass.
The food is placed in the middle of the table on a lazy susan, which people turn as they want to eat dishes on the other side of the table. You eat out of the main dishes with your own spoon and chopsticks - I hear there was a movement to use "common use chopsticks," a set placed in each dish, but it's such a pain that practically nobody does. Also, it's a big no-no to dig around with your own chopsticks in a dish - that combined with the fact that people are extremely proficient with using them that hygiene is not too big of an issue.
At the start, everybody is poured a glass of beer - and everybody drinks it. (In fact, the Chinese word for "cheers" means "dry your glass" - and it's not a figure of speech.) Another glass is poured. You don't leisurely sip your beer. As everybody eats, picking from each plate, people "jing jiu" - I'm not sure how this is normally translated but it basically means you each chug a glass of beer. This, along with the rowdy (and increasingly so) conversation, functions as the entertainment of the night. More beer is inevitably ordered.
I hear that forcing people to drink is a common thing here - yes, bad, but maybe not as bad as it sounds. If you really can't drink, people won't make you, and it's not a frat party where they'll make you drink until you pass out - or die. That said, lines like "bu zui bu gui" ("if you're not drunk, you can't go home") are common. Refusing to drink when somebody "jing"s you is like refusing their friendship. However, my students were very clear that you only drink what you want - which really means if someone "jing"s you, you can drink a sip instead of the whole glass.
The drinking culture is so important here, especially in the Northeast, that we studied it in our Chinese class! It's not all bad, though. For example, when you make a toast and clink glasses, it's respectful for the mouth of your glass to be below the mouth of the other person. Usually this is to show respect to older people and important people, but between friends it means that they wrestle glasses to the table and even sometimes to the ground to have the lowest cup. It's quite cute. (I heard from a Canadian that the first time he drank in China he gave a hearty "cheers" and threw his glass up high, like we do in the West... and really offended all the people he was drinking with. Oops.)
So there you have it, drinking culture in China in a nutshell. In the end, by the way, we only ended up drinking about a bottle or two per person and the only people who got drunk were the baby of the group, a 17 year old (because he was trying to get drunk - he kept saying "I can still drink!" and of course if you do that somebody is going to "jing" you), and the oldest woman, a 30 year old (because everybody wanted to drink with "big sister," her nickname - it's a respectful term of address for people a little older than you. I can call elementary school kids "little brother/sister" and they call me "big sister" back. But I digress). So, for everybody at home concerned about our safety (or livers), no worries.
After dinner, the class went to sing karaoke - actually cool here, and a legitimate weekend activity! I tried to explain that in America singing karaoke is embarrassing and people usually only do it spur-of-the-moment while drunk at a bar, but they said, "Don't you like to sing?" (Well, yeah.) "So when you want to sing, where do you go?" (Uh... I sing in my apartment.) "But nobody can hear you that way!" Haha. Maybe next time I'll go with them and give you a full report on what it's like.
Well, that's all for now. I promise we'll be better about posting from now on - promise! We miss you all and hope all is well wherever you are.
Friday, November 30, 2007
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Super Bowling
I bring you a tired, post-bowling update! Here's a reverse recap:
Our whole class (excluding two of the Russian girls - one is home for the weekend and one is visiting a friend in Shenzhen) went bowling tonight. We split up into two teams and had a very exciting, low-scoring competition, with a high score of 120 and a low of 7 (with 5 of those points scored in the 10th frame). I proudly announce that I clinched a win for my team... after bowling a horrendous game. Oh well. Each team won one and lost one, and we had a lot of fun together.
This all happened after we ate dinner together. We had that Chinese Competition this afternoon - more on that in a second! - and our class decided to go for Korean food. Best of all, our teacher came with us. She's really fun and about our age (25 I think?), so it's always good when she comes along... even with the obligatory reminder to review our vocab before class tomorrow. We tried to treat her to dinner, but she gave us 100 kuai and told us that she was treating us to bowling! She's so nice.
Anyway, that Chinese Competition! It ended up being a lot of fun. There were three parts: speeches, trivia, and performance. I missed the speeches because I was working, but I saw the other two sections and the performances were the best. I don't know why they wait so late in the year to do this, because there were at least 100 of us crammed in a classroom laughing and cheering on our fellow students, and it was a lot of fun. Today, all in all, was a lot of fun. Not bad for a Thursday!
Work is going well. I teach adults every week day and middle schoolers on the weekend - 8 hours a week in total. I'm not the best teacher, I guess, but I'm not the worst in this city either, so that's good. The adults are more fun but their English is horrible to non-existent, and the middle schoolers' English isn't bad but they're middle schoolers, not my specialty. Most - but not all - of them are well-behaved though.
Class is also going well. We have all our midterm grades back, and as usual Tom and I scored almost exactly the same: 100% for writing, 95% for speaking, 80% for comprehensive and 70% for reading. Our reading teacher... is not very good, which explains the two low scores (I lost most of my points on my comprehensive exam in the reading section... grr). Luckily, these grades don't count for anything! Woohoo!
The weather is getting cold. We haven't broken freezing for a few days and I think it's supposed to get to 0F tonight. Best of all, Tom and I still haven't bought coats, and I'm still wearing thin ballet flats. Actually, I get stopped several times every day with strangers telling me to buy warmer shoes. So we're going Saturday at the latest... perhaps even tomorrow after evening class. But on the bright side, we're adjusting to the cold. I almost don't want to give in so early in the winter.
Tom's about to run to the net bar, so I'll give this to him to post. Hope things are good at home. We'll try not to go so long between updates next time - but we're busy with fun things, so if we do, take it as a good sign.
Our whole class (excluding two of the Russian girls - one is home for the weekend and one is visiting a friend in Shenzhen) went bowling tonight. We split up into two teams and had a very exciting, low-scoring competition, with a high score of 120 and a low of 7 (with 5 of those points scored in the 10th frame). I proudly announce that I clinched a win for my team... after bowling a horrendous game. Oh well. Each team won one and lost one, and we had a lot of fun together.
This all happened after we ate dinner together. We had that Chinese Competition this afternoon - more on that in a second! - and our class decided to go for Korean food. Best of all, our teacher came with us. She's really fun and about our age (25 I think?), so it's always good when she comes along... even with the obligatory reminder to review our vocab before class tomorrow. We tried to treat her to dinner, but she gave us 100 kuai and told us that she was treating us to bowling! She's so nice.
Anyway, that Chinese Competition! It ended up being a lot of fun. There were three parts: speeches, trivia, and performance. I missed the speeches because I was working, but I saw the other two sections and the performances were the best. I don't know why they wait so late in the year to do this, because there were at least 100 of us crammed in a classroom laughing and cheering on our fellow students, and it was a lot of fun. Today, all in all, was a lot of fun. Not bad for a Thursday!
Work is going well. I teach adults every week day and middle schoolers on the weekend - 8 hours a week in total. I'm not the best teacher, I guess, but I'm not the worst in this city either, so that's good. The adults are more fun but their English is horrible to non-existent, and the middle schoolers' English isn't bad but they're middle schoolers, not my specialty. Most - but not all - of them are well-behaved though.
Class is also going well. We have all our midterm grades back, and as usual Tom and I scored almost exactly the same: 100% for writing, 95% for speaking, 80% for comprehensive and 70% for reading. Our reading teacher... is not very good, which explains the two low scores (I lost most of my points on my comprehensive exam in the reading section... grr). Luckily, these grades don't count for anything! Woohoo!
The weather is getting cold. We haven't broken freezing for a few days and I think it's supposed to get to 0F tonight. Best of all, Tom and I still haven't bought coats, and I'm still wearing thin ballet flats. Actually, I get stopped several times every day with strangers telling me to buy warmer shoes. So we're going Saturday at the latest... perhaps even tomorrow after evening class. But on the bright side, we're adjusting to the cold. I almost don't want to give in so early in the winter.
Tom's about to run to the net bar, so I'll give this to him to post. Hope things are good at home. We'll try not to go so long between updates next time - but we're busy with fun things, so if we do, take it as a good sign.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Happy Belated Halloween
A post written a few days ago by Lisa. An update will be coming soon.
Happy Halloween from Harbin!
Unfortunately, no one celebrates Halloween here, except for the clubs who cater to foreigners - and they celebrate it just like any other bar or club in America. No thanks. In keeping with tradition, however, Tom and I went to the grocery store and bought a bag of sour Skittles, a bag of M&Ms, and a Snickers bar. They're much smaller than in America - go figure!
I actually had a cute discussion with Kyla via text messaging about Halloween, which was so illuminating that I shall type it up for you to read:
Kyla: Thursday is All Saints' Day!
Lisa: Oh, it is! How do you know that? And what do you know about it?
Kyla: I found it when I was surfing the web. Plus my Canadian friend has told me before. I guess on that day people wear strange clothes and masks. Like ghosts.
Lisa: No, that's Halloween, which is tomorrow. Everybody dresses up in costumes and at night the kids go "trick or treating," which means they go to all the neighbor houses and ask for candy. All Saints' Day is Thursday, but it's a church holiday and no one celebrates it. Thursday is also "Reformation Day," another church holiday. Too much information? :)
Kyla: Sounds interesting! I will go to your home to ask for candy Ho Ho (@^@) [I wanted to say, no, silly, that's Christmas! But I didn't.]
Lisa: Okay, but we won't give you any if you're not wearing a costume :)
I must say today was a good day. One point of note is that we had very positive interactions with virtually every salesperson we came in contact with, which is unusual as business transactions in Chinese culture always seem very rude to foreigners. One of the food vendors was extraordinarily kind - often, Chinese people assume that foreigners can't speak Chinese, so they grunt and point even when you speak Chinese to them - and even the grumpy lady who sells snacks and drinks was polite today. I suppose it would seem strange that people being polite would make my day, but it really does.
Another exciting thing is that I woke up to my phone ringing (actually, I thought it was my alarm and groggily shut it off, whoops) - I got a call from an English school who offered me a job! I am meeting with Ralph, the Chinese guy who runs the school, on Friday, and if everything works out I'll be teaching middle and high schoolers English three hours a week. Hurray! I hope this doesn't mean I have to buy work clothes.
We're supposed to have many, many CouchSurfers this week - four, to be precise: two Australians and two Spaniards. We've cleaned house and made up beds, but even though the Aussies were supposed to call us this morning, we haven't heard from them yet. We shall see.
Despite the recent happiness, today was also a sad day because our friends left this morning for Yunnan. And we got our grades back for our reading class midterm - everybody did terribly. I got a C- and probably was one of the higher scorers in the class. Most frustrating was that (aside from the fact that the teacher scored our answers somewhat arbitrarily) not only did the essays have words we didn't know in them, which we all agree is fair game for a reading class, the questions did too - words that we've never studied and were not in the essay! The whole class erupted about that one.
Next weekend is a "Chinese competition," which means the class picks representatives to compete in speech, singing, and trivia competitions. My family will not be surprised to hear that I got picked for the trivia section, so now I have to memorize 100 trivia questions and their answers about Chinese culture and history (not hard) in Chinese (extremely hard!). Also, it just so happens that, because of the way the school split up the class levels, we, level D, will be competing against levels E, F, and G. We have no hope! So at least I hope we won't be embarrassed. And to think I was going to volunteer to paint "Go D6!" signs! Aiya.
Anyway, I have my work cut out for me, so I better go to it! Until soon!
Happy Halloween from Harbin!
Unfortunately, no one celebrates Halloween here, except for the clubs who cater to foreigners - and they celebrate it just like any other bar or club in America. No thanks. In keeping with tradition, however, Tom and I went to the grocery store and bought a bag of sour Skittles, a bag of M&Ms, and a Snickers bar. They're much smaller than in America - go figure!
I actually had a cute discussion with Kyla via text messaging about Halloween, which was so illuminating that I shall type it up for you to read:
Kyla: Thursday is All Saints' Day!
Lisa: Oh, it is! How do you know that? And what do you know about it?
Kyla: I found it when I was surfing the web. Plus my Canadian friend has told me before. I guess on that day people wear strange clothes and masks. Like ghosts.
Lisa: No, that's Halloween, which is tomorrow. Everybody dresses up in costumes and at night the kids go "trick or treating," which means they go to all the neighbor houses and ask for candy. All Saints' Day is Thursday, but it's a church holiday and no one celebrates it. Thursday is also "Reformation Day," another church holiday. Too much information? :)
Kyla: Sounds interesting! I will go to your home to ask for candy Ho Ho (@^@) [I wanted to say, no, silly, that's Christmas! But I didn't.]
Lisa: Okay, but we won't give you any if you're not wearing a costume :)
I must say today was a good day. One point of note is that we had very positive interactions with virtually every salesperson we came in contact with, which is unusual as business transactions in Chinese culture always seem very rude to foreigners. One of the food vendors was extraordinarily kind - often, Chinese people assume that foreigners can't speak Chinese, so they grunt and point even when you speak Chinese to them - and even the grumpy lady who sells snacks and drinks was polite today. I suppose it would seem strange that people being polite would make my day, but it really does.
Another exciting thing is that I woke up to my phone ringing (actually, I thought it was my alarm and groggily shut it off, whoops) - I got a call from an English school who offered me a job! I am meeting with Ralph, the Chinese guy who runs the school, on Friday, and if everything works out I'll be teaching middle and high schoolers English three hours a week. Hurray! I hope this doesn't mean I have to buy work clothes.
We're supposed to have many, many CouchSurfers this week - four, to be precise: two Australians and two Spaniards. We've cleaned house and made up beds, but even though the Aussies were supposed to call us this morning, we haven't heard from them yet. We shall see.
Despite the recent happiness, today was also a sad day because our friends left this morning for Yunnan. And we got our grades back for our reading class midterm - everybody did terribly. I got a C- and probably was one of the higher scorers in the class. Most frustrating was that (aside from the fact that the teacher scored our answers somewhat arbitrarily) not only did the essays have words we didn't know in them, which we all agree is fair game for a reading class, the questions did too - words that we've never studied and were not in the essay! The whole class erupted about that one.
Next weekend is a "Chinese competition," which means the class picks representatives to compete in speech, singing, and trivia competitions. My family will not be surprised to hear that I got picked for the trivia section, so now I have to memorize 100 trivia questions and their answers about Chinese culture and history (not hard) in Chinese (extremely hard!). Also, it just so happens that, because of the way the school split up the class levels, we, level D, will be competing against levels E, F, and G. We have no hope! So at least I hope we won't be embarrassed. And to think I was going to volunteer to paint "Go D6!" signs! Aiya.
Anyway, I have my work cut out for me, so I better go to it! Until soon!
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Address-ing the Issues at Hand
At last, the long-awaited update that's been in the works for weeks!
Not really. This is just a short post to keep our eager readers satisfied even though we've been inactive for so long.
Last night, we had a gathering with some of our classmates. First, we ate at the Korean restaurant located on the first floor of the building of our apartment, the one we pass every day and sigh with delight at the pleasant fragrances it exudes. With a little help with ordering from our Korean classmates, it lived up to its expectations, every dish being delicious. Afterward, all seven of us (a few of our classmates were absent) went up to our apartment to watch a movie and munch on all kinds of snacks that we brought with us. The movie was a typical Hong Kong romantic comedy - a little predictable but still fun, and good Chinese practice for us all.
The other big news here is that our dear friend and nearby coffee shop owner Jinpeng is moving on Wednesday. He's heading to Yunnan province (which is southwest China, down near Vietnam) to train for 11 months with an organization that teaches the ropes to people looking to be involved with NGOs and non-profit organizations. Also, he's taking our other Chinese friend and chef extraordinaire Kevin and Swedish wanderer Bjorn with him. Basically, half of our friends here are leaving. We're glad for them and wish them luck, but all the while wishing they'd stay here with us for a little longer.
The other strange thing about Jinpeng & Co's move is how quickly it happened. A couple weeks ago, they were accepted into the program, and they decided that if they could sell the coffee shop, they'd head out. Well, they sold the place two days ago, at which point it immediately changed hands, and now they instead hold train tickets for the 40-hour ride to Yunnan. I suppose that's how things work here. We had to basically accept our apartment 5 minutes after we saw it or it would be rented to somebody else. In China, one must act quickly or be left in the dust. Well, it's good training for life, I hear.
Thus, you all can no longer send us mail via Jinpeng's coffee shop, and so here's a new address:
Tom/Lisa (Ma Tai Ming/Zu Li Sha, if you want to use our Chinese names)
c/o International Student Center
Harbin Institute of Technology
11 Si Ling Jie
Nan'gang District
Harbin, China 110004
We still encourage you to send us mail. It's cold and lonely here (actually, our apartment's pretty nicely heated, and we still do have a few friends), and we appreciate whatever you send us from back home.
The coming two weeks are the midway point in the semester and that means one thing: MIDTERMS! Hooray! So we must get back to the studying of hundreds of Chinese characters. I hope all is well back home. Send us emails, mails, packages, boxes, bags, toys, coffee, etc. We'll try to return the favor.
Editor's (which means Lisa's) note: Best not to send us packages at that address quite yet. We haven't made sure that the Student Center won't mind the deluge of mail. But we will check this week and let you know.
Not really. This is just a short post to keep our eager readers satisfied even though we've been inactive for so long.
Last night, we had a gathering with some of our classmates. First, we ate at the Korean restaurant located on the first floor of the building of our apartment, the one we pass every day and sigh with delight at the pleasant fragrances it exudes. With a little help with ordering from our Korean classmates, it lived up to its expectations, every dish being delicious. Afterward, all seven of us (a few of our classmates were absent) went up to our apartment to watch a movie and munch on all kinds of snacks that we brought with us. The movie was a typical Hong Kong romantic comedy - a little predictable but still fun, and good Chinese practice for us all.
The other big news here is that our dear friend and nearby coffee shop owner Jinpeng is moving on Wednesday. He's heading to Yunnan province (which is southwest China, down near Vietnam) to train for 11 months with an organization that teaches the ropes to people looking to be involved with NGOs and non-profit organizations. Also, he's taking our other Chinese friend and chef extraordinaire Kevin and Swedish wanderer Bjorn with him. Basically, half of our friends here are leaving. We're glad for them and wish them luck, but all the while wishing they'd stay here with us for a little longer.
The other strange thing about Jinpeng & Co's move is how quickly it happened. A couple weeks ago, they were accepted into the program, and they decided that if they could sell the coffee shop, they'd head out. Well, they sold the place two days ago, at which point it immediately changed hands, and now they instead hold train tickets for the 40-hour ride to Yunnan. I suppose that's how things work here. We had to basically accept our apartment 5 minutes after we saw it or it would be rented to somebody else. In China, one must act quickly or be left in the dust. Well, it's good training for life, I hear.
Thus, you all can no longer send us mail via Jinpeng's coffee shop, and so here's a new address:
Tom/Lisa (Ma Tai Ming/Zu Li Sha, if you want to use our Chinese names)
c/o International Student Center
Harbin Institute of Technology
11 Si Ling Jie
Nan'gang District
Harbin, China 110004
We still encourage you to send us mail. It's cold and lonely here (actually, our apartment's pretty nicely heated, and we still do have a few friends), and we appreciate whatever you send us from back home.
The coming two weeks are the midway point in the semester and that means one thing: MIDTERMS! Hooray! So we must get back to the studying of hundreds of Chinese characters. I hope all is well back home. Send us emails, mails, packages, boxes, bags, toys, coffee, etc. We'll try to return the favor.
Editor's (which means Lisa's) note: Best not to send us packages at that address quite yet. We haven't made sure that the Student Center won't mind the deluge of mail. But we will check this week and let you know.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Some Observations
Here's the post I wrote on the 14th. I'm able to post it because we found (with Bjorn's help, but more about him in a minute) a cafe with Wifi! And not just a cafe, but just about the cutest cafe I've ever seen. The latte they brought me was almost too pretty to drink. But, with no further ado:
Back to school for us study bugs, which explains the recent lack of posts. Not only have we been busy with school, but nothing interesting has happened lately. I'll see if I can scavenge up a few tidbits. Here are three observations:
1. A recent phenomenon: everybody is buying ridiculous amounts of Chinese cabbage (bai cai - you may know it as bok choy) and Chinese onion (looks like a green onion, but about ten times bigger) - and also potatoes and other root vegetables, though it seems to a lesser extent. Stranger still is that they line them up in neat rows and columns and leave them to dry? air out? sun? in the cool autumn air. The hall of our apartment was stacked with cabbages, and people tie the onions by their green stalks and hang them on strings out their windows.
We asked our teacher about this and she told us that because vegetables are so expensive in the winter, people buy and stockpile vegetables. In case you were wondering, you apparently can leave a cabbage on your patio for months at a time and find it nearly as fresh as the day you bought it. Crazy, I know. The other thing they do with these cabbages is make sour cabbage. Each family has a large wooden cask outside of their door, and I've spied a neighbor filling hers up with whole cabbages and water, so my powers of assumption tell me that the hallway will be very odorous this winter as the cabbage sours.
2. Even more interesting - our friend Kyla was going through all of my pictures from home and school. We ran across a picture of my stomach after the worst sunburn of my life - i was covered in blisters (hence why I took the picture). But she couldn't figure out what was wrong; she thought I was covered in pimples. I said, no, it's a bad sunburn. Sunburn? You know, when you're out in the sun for too long... But then I realized that Chinese people, especially women, go to such great lengths to stay pale - we're talking SPF 100, parasols, gloves, UV shades, skin bleaching cream, the works - that Kyla had no idea what a sunburn actually was. Incredible.
3. In the same vein, we ran across the word "kou yin" in our text. Literally translated, it means "mouth sound" - accent. But she was quick to tell us that it only meant a local accent. Taking the US for example, you could have a Southern "kou yin," a Boston "kou yin," a Michigan "kou yin" - but you couldn't have a Spanish "kou yin" or a Chinese "kou yin." So we asked her how we could say "I speak Chinese with an American accent." She thought, puzzled, for at least a full minute before answering, "Well, foreigners really never learned to speak Chinese before, so we don't have a way to say that." Crazy!
The best part was that, after giving us many complicated and specific ways of explaining that we were foreigners from our respective countries studying Chinese and that that's the reason why our pronunciation isn't standard (as if it isn't obvious by looking at us), she ended the whole discussion by saying, "Oh well. You guys just need to start saying that you have an American/Russian/Korean 'kou yin,' and then it will catch on. That's how language works!" She's so cute.
In other, less interesting news, we had another couch surfer come through this week, a Swedish guy named Bjorn. He's actually settling down here for a little while to study Chinese (on his own, never having studied it before - don't ask me how), and we invited him to move in with us, but he decided to rent a room in a guest house instead. I think he's crazy, but to each his own I suppose... Anyway, he was quite nice, and it will be good to have another "CSer" around town.
The heat still hasn't come on in our apartment. In an attempt to control pollution and ration fuel, the government decides who gets heat and when they get it. According to Jinpeng, it should turn on by the 20th. Our patio gets toasty warm during the day and heats our apartment - and we're on the 7th floor, which helps - but it has been getting cooler and cooler at night, so I'm anxious for the radiator next to my bed to start keeping me warm.
Anyway, that's the news for now. Your turn to return the favor and update us on life at home!
Back to school for us study bugs, which explains the recent lack of posts. Not only have we been busy with school, but nothing interesting has happened lately. I'll see if I can scavenge up a few tidbits. Here are three observations:
1. A recent phenomenon: everybody is buying ridiculous amounts of Chinese cabbage (bai cai - you may know it as bok choy) and Chinese onion (looks like a green onion, but about ten times bigger) - and also potatoes and other root vegetables, though it seems to a lesser extent. Stranger still is that they line them up in neat rows and columns and leave them to dry? air out? sun? in the cool autumn air. The hall of our apartment was stacked with cabbages, and people tie the onions by their green stalks and hang them on strings out their windows.
We asked our teacher about this and she told us that because vegetables are so expensive in the winter, people buy and stockpile vegetables. In case you were wondering, you apparently can leave a cabbage on your patio for months at a time and find it nearly as fresh as the day you bought it. Crazy, I know. The other thing they do with these cabbages is make sour cabbage. Each family has a large wooden cask outside of their door, and I've spied a neighbor filling hers up with whole cabbages and water, so my powers of assumption tell me that the hallway will be very odorous this winter as the cabbage sours.
2. Even more interesting - our friend Kyla was going through all of my pictures from home and school. We ran across a picture of my stomach after the worst sunburn of my life - i was covered in blisters (hence why I took the picture). But she couldn't figure out what was wrong; she thought I was covered in pimples. I said, no, it's a bad sunburn. Sunburn? You know, when you're out in the sun for too long... But then I realized that Chinese people, especially women, go to such great lengths to stay pale - we're talking SPF 100, parasols, gloves, UV shades, skin bleaching cream, the works - that Kyla had no idea what a sunburn actually was. Incredible.
3. In the same vein, we ran across the word "kou yin" in our text. Literally translated, it means "mouth sound" - accent. But she was quick to tell us that it only meant a local accent. Taking the US for example, you could have a Southern "kou yin," a Boston "kou yin," a Michigan "kou yin" - but you couldn't have a Spanish "kou yin" or a Chinese "kou yin." So we asked her how we could say "I speak Chinese with an American accent." She thought, puzzled, for at least a full minute before answering, "Well, foreigners really never learned to speak Chinese before, so we don't have a way to say that." Crazy!
The best part was that, after giving us many complicated and specific ways of explaining that we were foreigners from our respective countries studying Chinese and that that's the reason why our pronunciation isn't standard (as if it isn't obvious by looking at us), she ended the whole discussion by saying, "Oh well. You guys just need to start saying that you have an American/Russian/Korean 'kou yin,' and then it will catch on. That's how language works!" She's so cute.
In other, less interesting news, we had another couch surfer come through this week, a Swedish guy named Bjorn. He's actually settling down here for a little while to study Chinese (on his own, never having studied it before - don't ask me how), and we invited him to move in with us, but he decided to rent a room in a guest house instead. I think he's crazy, but to each his own I suppose... Anyway, he was quite nice, and it will be good to have another "CSer" around town.
The heat still hasn't come on in our apartment. In an attempt to control pollution and ration fuel, the government decides who gets heat and when they get it. According to Jinpeng, it should turn on by the 20th. Our patio gets toasty warm during the day and heats our apartment - and we're on the 7th floor, which helps - but it has been getting cooler and cooler at night, so I'm anxious for the radiator next to my bed to start keeping me warm.
Anyway, that's the news for now. Your turn to return the favor and update us on life at home!
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Argh!
Well. I wrote a nice post a few days ago, and every time we head to the net bar I try to post them, but it appears that a faulty USB port on one of the computers fried my thumb drive and now, it won't work. Grr. So, I'm working on it.
But we miss you! And we hope everybody is doing well at home. We're doing well here.
But we miss you! And we hope everybody is doing well at home. We're doing well here.
Friday, October 5, 2007
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Picture Update!
LOOOOONG picture post today, folks. This one gets us through September - expect another with our most recent happenings and an apartment tour! (And we still have that one to post about the Daoist temple - we haven't forgotten.)
Again, if the lettering is too small, you should be able to click on each panel to enlarge it in a new window. Also, if you haven't read Tom's post from yesterday, be sure to do that too! With no further ado:
Again, if the lettering is too small, you should be able to click on each panel to enlarge it in a new window. Also, if you haven't read Tom's post from yesterday, be sure to do that too! With no further ado:
P.S. For all of you who complain that we don't post enough, consider the fact that Tom's post yesterday took us about two hours and this one took over five! But we do it to keep you happy. (On that note, you should let us know that you read them. We're curious to know who's keeping up with the blog.)
Arrestin' A-Restin'
A Blogpost
By
Thomas J. Mask-on-neck
Edited By
Lisa A. Zoomy-yak
Table of Contents:
I. Confucius' 2558th Birthday Bash!
II. National Day (or is it Week?)
III. Book City
IV. Sloth: Our Favorite Deadly Sin
------
Chapter I:
Confucius' 2558th Birthday Bash!
*I promise this is the longest chapter*
Thursday afternoon, amidst the crooning saxophone solo of Kenny G that signifies "class dismissed," our teacher asked us to see her after class, a request that strikes fear into the heart of any schoolchild. As we perspired from the fear that our passports had been revoked or that CCP had finally come to take us away for good, she pulled out a newspaper clipping and explained to us that the next day, at the Harbin Confucian Temple, there was a ceremony for Confucius' birthday, with traditional music, costumes, etc., and that the school would like us to go. Being good Confucians in training, we were unable to say no to our teacher and thus planned to attend. Oh yeah, and we had to meet up at 8 AM on a day when we have afternoon classes.
That night, we cursed our filial piety and tried to hurriedly do all our homework in the few hours remaining before bedtime. We had planned to do this work Friday morning, but with our new plan, all hope was lost and we failed to finish all our homework on time for the first time. It's okay, though, because homework and in-class work and participation together is only worth 10% of our grade (not that the grade even matters).
So Friday morning, we loaded bus with our fellow exchange students, including a handful of Korean girls, a few fellow Americans, a kind Polish gent, a few African guys, a smarmy (and really short, ha ha ha) American guy who's been living in Harbin for 6 years and refuses to speak English, and, of course, faculty and staff. A guy from Portland told us that they asked us on such short notice because they needed more white faces for the pictures in the papers, and we laughed that all but one of the Russians had skipped out on the excursion.
The temple we found was beautifully restored and/or maintained, with newly-painted roofs, a red carpet, streamers, slogan-banners everywhere. Traditionally-robed Chinese people stood, lined in perfect formation like imperial steles, in preparation for the festival. Groups of schoolchildren in jumpsuits and businesspeople (or teachers?) in pantsuits waited at the sidelines with baskets of flowers. It was a beautiful sight to behold on first glance.
Yet, as the festival began and on a closer inspection, all the cracks in the surface became apparent. The people standing by ancient lutes (guqin) never moved the whole time; instead, cheesy synthesizer-lute music was blared through crackling speakers at a deafening volume. The traditionally-robed dancers wore barely-concealed tennis shoes beneath black cloth foot-coverings, and half of these dancers, once relieved of their duty, were finally allowed to put their glasses on. The bringing of baskets to the Confucian altar took more than 30 minutes, and all the while, no one besides the MC was actually paying attention.
So, the ceremony itself was quite boring, but what was more interesting to me was the fact that they still did it, even though the Communist government (in the Mao era) condemned Confucianism as feudalistic and reactionary, even though you'd be hard-pressed to find Chinese youths who can recite from the Analects, even though most people here know more about Bill Gates than about Mozi, even though no one really cared. Something about Confucianism has stuck with the Chinese people, and it seems at least the form, at least going through the motions is important. The toppling of the imperial system in 1911, the May Fourth Movement of 1919, the chaotic half-republic half-warlord era of the 1920s, the Japanese oppression of the 1930s, the civil war of the 1940s, the Communist overturning of life in the 1950s, the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 70s, the opening and reforms since the 1980s - none of these have been able to completely stamp out the Confucian tradition, thought now it may be burrowed in meaningless ceremonies and in the deep recesses of the Chinese subconscious.
[Editor's note: Yes, boring, and cold and irritating because people were constantly, shamelessly taking our pictures just because we're foreigners and did I mention boring? - EXCEPT for the performance of the cutest little boys and girls who did a little dance on a giant "ink bowl" and then danced with a seven foot long calligraphy "brush" to "paint" the characters for China on a giant poster. AWWW.]
Chapter II:
National Day (or is it Week?)
It seems this time of year has an abundance of celebrations: Moon Festival, Confucius' birthday, and National Day. To us, though, National Day is the only one that matters because it means we get a week off of school (this week). Also, we don't have to eat mooncakes again. National Day is a time when Chinese children carry around bright red-and-yellow flags and shops close early and students satisfy their wanderlust by traveling around. We, however, love Harbin so much that we're just hanging around the city and seeing the sites! We want to go to the siberian tiger park, some shopping areas, the temples, and just explore the city now that we have some free time.
Oh yeah, and we're almost broke. But that has nothing to do with why we're staying here. Absolutely nothing.
Chapter III:
Book City
So, we've been spending our mornings with slowly-cooked (due to our grogginess, not our culinary methods) diner-style breakfasts of hash browns or home fries or fried eggs or french toast or whatever and COFFEE. This is a wonderful little treat that reminds us of the good ol' US of A.
Sunday, we decided to go to the gigantic bookstore on Xue Fu Lu (Study-vicinity-road) that I had heard would have good English-language books. The place is a hub of all kinds of trade, including clothes, food, maps, footwear, school supplies, and more - the kind of hub that develops around any busy area in China. The bookstore consists of five giant floors, and is so large that it's not called a bookstore (shu dian) but a book city (shu cheng). The English-language stuff was on the fifth floor, so we made our climb through swarms of people, hoping for a little bit of paradise.
What we found was quite eclectic. There was a whole section of literary anthologies and books of literary criticism, which I'm guessing is a bunch of textbooks for college students majoring in English - they even had critical books on such difficult postmodern authors as Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo (neither of which I could imagine would be understandable to anyone without a near-native grasp of English). In another section, they had the entire Chicken Soup for the Soul series, plus many dozens more that were clear spin-offs from the original series (you should now be thinking, as we were, why? Regardless of how you feel about the books, weren't there plenty the first time around?), and a bunch of abridged classics. There were also poorly-translated books of Chinese poetry, shelves about Dale Carnegie and Bill Gates, and racks of books on American culture, customs, humor, etc.
After browsing though all of this, we finally found a few things that we really wanted: 1) several books by Lin Yutang, a Chinese author from the early 20th century who wrote in English about Chinese culture, 2) a table of fiction in English, from which we chose Kafka's The Castle, and 3) a series of comic books about traditional Chinese culture, from which we chose a book on Zen stories. It was a successful trip after all.
Chapter IV:Sloth: Our Favorite Deadly Sin
The downside of this trip to the book store is that it has practically immobilized us. We've become glued to our books, only getting up for the bathroom or the kitchen, and immediately re-immersing ourselves in those other worlds contained within softbound covers. Yesterday (Monday), we barely left the apartment all day, and today's not looking much better.
But I think we deserve this. We've been working hard at our Chinese language classes and have barely had time for good, creative, critical thinking. Besides, even God took a rest on his seventh day. I think I'll just consider this a good old-fashioned Sabbath.
------
About the Author
Thomas J. Mask-on-neck is a self-aggrandizing blogger who grew up in Northeast Ohio as a relatively normal child. One day, a bucket of toxic waste fell from the sky and onto Thomas, burning into his spinal column, just beneath his skull, super-powers of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Gradually, the arithmetic wore off, but what remained was the makings of a hopeful literary giant who would conceal the scar on his neck with his famous mask. Currently, he lives in Harbin, China, where he studies Chinese language.
About the Editor
Lisa A. Zoomy-yak is exasperated.
Acknowledgments
I'd like to thank Lisa for experiencing all of this with me and always being there. I'd also like to thank our wonderful families for their love and support, as well as you, the readers, who make this possible.
Critical Acclaim for Arrestin' A-Restin'
"The blogpost burst like a shell over the Western world." -The New York Times Blog Review
"It cured my cod!" -Billy Graham
"You're so weird!" -Zoomy-yak
"He's got the magic stick" -50 Cent
********************************
FACT-HAPPENING POST-SCRIPT
********************************
We're working on a long, photographic (dare I say, cinematic?) update in comic-book style. We will publish it in parts . . . whenever we feel like it! Aww, snap!
By
Thomas J. Mask-on-neck
Edited By
Lisa A. Zoomy-yak
Table of Contents:
I. Confucius' 2558th Birthday Bash!
II. National Day (or is it Week?)
III. Book City
IV. Sloth: Our Favorite Deadly Sin
------
Chapter I:
Confucius' 2558th Birthday Bash!
*I promise this is the longest chapter*
Thursday afternoon, amidst the crooning saxophone solo of Kenny G that signifies "class dismissed," our teacher asked us to see her after class, a request that strikes fear into the heart of any schoolchild. As we perspired from the fear that our passports had been revoked or that CCP had finally come to take us away for good, she pulled out a newspaper clipping and explained to us that the next day, at the Harbin Confucian Temple, there was a ceremony for Confucius' birthday, with traditional music, costumes, etc., and that the school would like us to go. Being good Confucians in training, we were unable to say no to our teacher and thus planned to attend. Oh yeah, and we had to meet up at 8 AM on a day when we have afternoon classes.
That night, we cursed our filial piety and tried to hurriedly do all our homework in the few hours remaining before bedtime. We had planned to do this work Friday morning, but with our new plan, all hope was lost and we failed to finish all our homework on time for the first time. It's okay, though, because homework and in-class work and participation together is only worth 10% of our grade (not that the grade even matters).
So Friday morning, we loaded bus with our fellow exchange students, including a handful of Korean girls, a few fellow Americans, a kind Polish gent, a few African guys, a smarmy (and really short, ha ha ha) American guy who's been living in Harbin for 6 years and refuses to speak English, and, of course, faculty and staff. A guy from Portland told us that they asked us on such short notice because they needed more white faces for the pictures in the papers, and we laughed that all but one of the Russians had skipped out on the excursion.
The temple we found was beautifully restored and/or maintained, with newly-painted roofs, a red carpet, streamers, slogan-banners everywhere. Traditionally-robed Chinese people stood, lined in perfect formation like imperial steles, in preparation for the festival. Groups of schoolchildren in jumpsuits and businesspeople (or teachers?) in pantsuits waited at the sidelines with baskets of flowers. It was a beautiful sight to behold on first glance.
Yet, as the festival began and on a closer inspection, all the cracks in the surface became apparent. The people standing by ancient lutes (guqin) never moved the whole time; instead, cheesy synthesizer-lute music was blared through crackling speakers at a deafening volume. The traditionally-robed dancers wore barely-concealed tennis shoes beneath black cloth foot-coverings, and half of these dancers, once relieved of their duty, were finally allowed to put their glasses on. The bringing of baskets to the Confucian altar took more than 30 minutes, and all the while, no one besides the MC was actually paying attention.
So, the ceremony itself was quite boring, but what was more interesting to me was the fact that they still did it, even though the Communist government (in the Mao era) condemned Confucianism as feudalistic and reactionary, even though you'd be hard-pressed to find Chinese youths who can recite from the Analects, even though most people here know more about Bill Gates than about Mozi, even though no one really cared. Something about Confucianism has stuck with the Chinese people, and it seems at least the form, at least going through the motions is important. The toppling of the imperial system in 1911, the May Fourth Movement of 1919, the chaotic half-republic half-warlord era of the 1920s, the Japanese oppression of the 1930s, the civil war of the 1940s, the Communist overturning of life in the 1950s, the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and 70s, the opening and reforms since the 1980s - none of these have been able to completely stamp out the Confucian tradition, thought now it may be burrowed in meaningless ceremonies and in the deep recesses of the Chinese subconscious.
[Editor's note: Yes, boring, and cold and irritating because people were constantly, shamelessly taking our pictures just because we're foreigners and did I mention boring? - EXCEPT for the performance of the cutest little boys and girls who did a little dance on a giant "ink bowl" and then danced with a seven foot long calligraphy "brush" to "paint" the characters for China on a giant poster. AWWW.]
Chapter II:
National Day (or is it Week?)
It seems this time of year has an abundance of celebrations: Moon Festival, Confucius' birthday, and National Day. To us, though, National Day is the only one that matters because it means we get a week off of school (this week). Also, we don't have to eat mooncakes again. National Day is a time when Chinese children carry around bright red-and-yellow flags and shops close early and students satisfy their wanderlust by traveling around. We, however, love Harbin so much that we're just hanging around the city and seeing the sites! We want to go to the siberian tiger park, some shopping areas, the temples, and just explore the city now that we have some free time.
Oh yeah, and we're almost broke. But that has nothing to do with why we're staying here. Absolutely nothing.
Chapter III:
Book City
So, we've been spending our mornings with slowly-cooked (due to our grogginess, not our culinary methods) diner-style breakfasts of hash browns or home fries or fried eggs or french toast or whatever and COFFEE. This is a wonderful little treat that reminds us of the good ol' US of A.
Sunday, we decided to go to the gigantic bookstore on Xue Fu Lu (Study-vicinity-road) that I had heard would have good English-language books. The place is a hub of all kinds of trade, including clothes, food, maps, footwear, school supplies, and more - the kind of hub that develops around any busy area in China. The bookstore consists of five giant floors, and is so large that it's not called a bookstore (shu dian) but a book city (shu cheng). The English-language stuff was on the fifth floor, so we made our climb through swarms of people, hoping for a little bit of paradise.
What we found was quite eclectic. There was a whole section of literary anthologies and books of literary criticism, which I'm guessing is a bunch of textbooks for college students majoring in English - they even had critical books on such difficult postmodern authors as Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo (neither of which I could imagine would be understandable to anyone without a near-native grasp of English). In another section, they had the entire Chicken Soup for the Soul series, plus many dozens more that were clear spin-offs from the original series (you should now be thinking, as we were, why? Regardless of how you feel about the books, weren't there plenty the first time around?), and a bunch of abridged classics. There were also poorly-translated books of Chinese poetry, shelves about Dale Carnegie and Bill Gates, and racks of books on American culture, customs, humor, etc.
After browsing though all of this, we finally found a few things that we really wanted: 1) several books by Lin Yutang, a Chinese author from the early 20th century who wrote in English about Chinese culture, 2) a table of fiction in English, from which we chose Kafka's The Castle, and 3) a series of comic books about traditional Chinese culture, from which we chose a book on Zen stories. It was a successful trip after all.
Chapter IV:Sloth: Our Favorite Deadly Sin
The downside of this trip to the book store is that it has practically immobilized us. We've become glued to our books, only getting up for the bathroom or the kitchen, and immediately re-immersing ourselves in those other worlds contained within softbound covers. Yesterday (Monday), we barely left the apartment all day, and today's not looking much better.
But I think we deserve this. We've been working hard at our Chinese language classes and have barely had time for good, creative, critical thinking. Besides, even God took a rest on his seventh day. I think I'll just consider this a good old-fashioned Sabbath.
------
About the Author
Thomas J. Mask-on-neck is a self-aggrandizing blogger who grew up in Northeast Ohio as a relatively normal child. One day, a bucket of toxic waste fell from the sky and onto Thomas, burning into his spinal column, just beneath his skull, super-powers of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Gradually, the arithmetic wore off, but what remained was the makings of a hopeful literary giant who would conceal the scar on his neck with his famous mask. Currently, he lives in Harbin, China, where he studies Chinese language.
About the Editor
Lisa A. Zoomy-yak is exasperated.
Acknowledgments
I'd like to thank Lisa for experiencing all of this with me and always being there. I'd also like to thank our wonderful families for their love and support, as well as you, the readers, who make this possible.
Critical Acclaim for Arrestin' A-Restin'
"The blogpost burst like a shell over the Western world." -The New York Times Blog Review
"It cured my cod!" -Billy Graham
"You're so weird!" -Zoomy-yak
"He's got the magic stick" -50 Cent
********************************
FACT-HAPPENING POST-SCRIPT
********************************
We're working on a long, photographic (dare I say, cinematic?) update in comic-book style. We will publish it in parts . . . whenever we feel like it! Aww, snap!
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
中秋节快乐!
Note: We wrote this post together last night, which was the actual festival day. Now it is Wednesday morning and we are in a net bar. Read on...
Happy Mid-Autumn Festival from Harbin! A few words of explanation: Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival, is a time when families gather together to gaze at the round moon and eat the round mooncakes to signify their eternal unity. Despite the happy sentiment of this tradition, moon cakes are, in fact, utterly disgusting. Of all the Chinese people we asked, literally everyone responded that they do not actually like to eat mooncakes. However, everybody also told us that they eat mooncakes every year to celebrate the festival. We suggested that perhaps they eat other round foods, such as eggs or even peaches, to celebrate the eternal unity of their family, but they seemed perplexed by the suggestion. Oh well, we tried.
In keeping with tradition, we bought two mooncakes filled with egg yolks - actually the variety closest to edible, surprisingly enough. (There are many other varieties, filled with such delicacies as flower petals and bean paste.) We hurriedly ate them with a little help from what Tom likes to call "good ol' Mr. Coffee," although I suppose that is not very Chinese of us. Nonetheless, we stared at the moon through the hazy sky (and the warped glass of our porch) and thus celebrated the holiday along with a billion other people.
In other news, I had a very nice birthday. Rather, I had a nice birthday week, as the celebration was dragged out for several days (I didn't complain). I cooked a birthday dinner for Tom and me - pasta, tomato sauce, and a bottle of red wine which was actually decent. On my actual birthday, some of my classmates decorated the room, which was very fun because the teachers didn't want to erase the drawings on the blackboard but were subsequently left with a tiny square in which to write. That night, our class - and even two of our teachers - went out to eat together at a nice restaurant. I also received many nice gifts, the highlights including a Chinese Bible and a stuffed Fuwa - one of the Beijing 2008 Olympic mascots.
Here, I intended to post some pictures, but the computer that I'm using will not read my thumb drive, no matter what I try (which isn't much because everything is in Chinese). So, next time!
Next week we have a whole week off of school for National Day. We don't have much planned (except a potential visitor: our friend and fellow Calvin student Tabitha), so hopefully we can catch up on many of the posts - and all those pictures - we've promised over the past month!
Happy Mid-Autumn Festival from Harbin! A few words of explanation: Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival, is a time when families gather together to gaze at the round moon and eat the round mooncakes to signify their eternal unity. Despite the happy sentiment of this tradition, moon cakes are, in fact, utterly disgusting. Of all the Chinese people we asked, literally everyone responded that they do not actually like to eat mooncakes. However, everybody also told us that they eat mooncakes every year to celebrate the festival. We suggested that perhaps they eat other round foods, such as eggs or even peaches, to celebrate the eternal unity of their family, but they seemed perplexed by the suggestion. Oh well, we tried.
In keeping with tradition, we bought two mooncakes filled with egg yolks - actually the variety closest to edible, surprisingly enough. (There are many other varieties, filled with such delicacies as flower petals and bean paste.) We hurriedly ate them with a little help from what Tom likes to call "good ol' Mr. Coffee," although I suppose that is not very Chinese of us. Nonetheless, we stared at the moon through the hazy sky (and the warped glass of our porch) and thus celebrated the holiday along with a billion other people.
In other news, I had a very nice birthday. Rather, I had a nice birthday week, as the celebration was dragged out for several days (I didn't complain). I cooked a birthday dinner for Tom and me - pasta, tomato sauce, and a bottle of red wine which was actually decent. On my actual birthday, some of my classmates decorated the room, which was very fun because the teachers didn't want to erase the drawings on the blackboard but were subsequently left with a tiny square in which to write. That night, our class - and even two of our teachers - went out to eat together at a nice restaurant. I also received many nice gifts, the highlights including a Chinese Bible and a stuffed Fuwa - one of the Beijing 2008 Olympic mascots.
Here, I intended to post some pictures, but the computer that I'm using will not read my thumb drive, no matter what I try (which isn't much because everything is in Chinese). So, next time!
Next week we have a whole week off of school for National Day. We don't have much planned (except a potential visitor: our friend and fellow Calvin student Tabitha), so hopefully we can catch up on many of the posts - and all those pictures - we've promised over the past month!
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