Now, we need to learn Mandarin. If only so that we're not constantly answering our waitresses with blank stares and "Hen bao qian, wo bu dong", which translates roughly as "Yeah, I'm an idiot", or more accurately as, "I'm sorry, I don't understand." Although the longer the imploring looks from them last, and the longer we wear our own blankly confused expressions, the more idiotic we (ok, I) feel.
Another good reason to learn Mandarin is so that I'm better able to deflect eager "students" who wish to "practice their English" and "just" "walk" "with me". "Awhile."
Allow me to recap: Val's first full day of work, I decided to venture out to get a sim card for my Blackberry (I'd need to have it unlocked, but I didn't know that then). I was maybe five minutes into my walk when I sensed a dude walking along beside me. I nodded at him, and he at me, before he popped a, "Hello. Where are you from?" We chatted as we walked, he flattering my halting Mandarin. Eager to practice his own English, he told me he could walk with me to find a place that sells sim cards. Note: one can buy these pretty much anywhere, but I didn't know that, and I found the chat really refreshing and informative. He told me that he was a student, studying calligraphy and painting, and that he had some work in an exhibition currently running. "Oh really?", says I, "Maybe I'll come take a look sometime."
So, sometime became immediately. "Peter" led me into a small office building and to a room with dozens of scroll paintings hung on the walls. After explaining the symbolism inherent in much of Chinese painting, he introduced me to his "teacher" (um, a guy who looked about 23), who in turn showed a few more original works of art. Then the sell came. It was the classic definition of a soft sale, as Peter had walked with me about twenty to twenty-five minutes, and spent another ten to fifteen explaining the finer points of Chinese art to me. And I am soft, in both heart and head.
I paid less than half of what they were originally asking for what I'm now sure was a factory-produced scroll painting of cherry-blossoms, but I'm also sure I still paid at least four times as much as I should have. It's pretty. I gave it to Valerie in celebration for her first day at her new office. (Then I confessed all when she looked so damn grateful.)
I felt like a sucker, but after I considered the whole ordeal, It seemed worth the price: Peter gave me a lot of insights about Beijing, gave me a chance to practice a bit of spoken Mandarin, and after all was said and done, still took me to find that all-important sim card. I was ripped off, sure, but I didn't feel that bad about it. And I evidently hadn't yet read this passage from our Frommer's Chinese Phrasebook & Culture Guide:
"Art students" can be pests: They approach you with a story about raising funds for a show overseas, but ain fact are merely enticing you into a shop where you will be lied to extravagantly about the authenticity, uniqueness, originality and true cost of various paintings, which you will then be pressured into buying for dozens times their actual value.
Okay, so maybe when I said four times too much, I was just trying to make myself feel better.
Oh, and I've also been getting texts nearly every day that I can't read, but that have pictures supposedly meant to titillate, if not for their poor quality and over-pixellation. To explain: as I left the shop and installed my sim card, I was approached by a college-aged girl looking to, guess what, practice her English. I explained that I had just purchased I sim card for my phone and was headed to a China mobile store to now have it unlocked. Before I knew it, she snatched the sim card envelope and had input my number in phone, so she could, "Call me! Practice English!"
Yay me. "Call me!" really meant "I will send you pictures of bikini-clad Chinese women and script you can't read every other day!"
I did (kinda) learn from this: the following day, on my way back to China Mobile to pick up my (hopefully) unlocked Blackberry, I was approached by two more "art students" looking to "practice their English" with me. This time I led them to China Mobile, used them as translators to make sure my phone was indeed unlocked, and made one of them give me his phone number so that I could call him to verify that my phone really worked. It did. Score me. (Should have asked them to help set up my voicemail too, dammit.) When they invited me to their "exhibition", I politely declined, and hustled off to my "very important meeting". In flip-flops, a backpack and a dirty tee.
I'd like to say this will be the last tourist scam I'll fall for here, but then I'm reminded of the 6 RMB ice cream bar I bought today. They should cost about half that.
Oh, and if anyone wants to purchase a "brand new, totally original piece of Chinese scroll art", I've got one. 90 RMB o.b.o.
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