Sweetmeats

Are you one of those people that mosquitoes just zone in on? Do you question God's sadistic intention for making you every mosquito's favorite feeder?

If so, hello and welcome to my camp.

Two days ago, I only managed to get 3 hours of sleep because this persistent mofosquito kept on trying to suck on my flesh. I couldn't find and squish it (offense is the best defense), so I wrapped myself up with a bedsheet. I thought I had completely covered my body, until I woke up in the middle of the night with this strange pain on the tip of my middle finger. Turns out it was the ONLY piece of my body that landed outside the forcefield, and yes, the mosquito managed to find this 0.5 square inch.

Total grouchzilla the next morning.

Some people say that your diet affects how attractive you are to mosquitos. Some people (Chinese old ladies) have told me to eat less meat, to consume more acidic food. So I Googled "Why do I get bit so much?" and found a really good scientifically based article. I don't believe witchcraft herbal stuff, sorry Mother.

Scientists have identified several proteins found in mosquitoes’ antennae and heads that latch on to chemical markers, or odorants, emitted from our skin. These markers are produced by the natural processes of our bodies and, like neon signs, they let the mosquitoes’ smell center know you’re around (though the process that then guides them to you is not well understood). Flies and mosquitoes share a number of the same genes that dictate production of these odorant-binding proteins, which have specific sites that will catch or bind with certain chemicals in the air. Some scientists suggest that certain characteristics attract mosquitoes, thereby leading us to have more bites than others. Some of the top candidates: the amount of carbon dioxide in the breath, pregnancy, body temperature, alcohol and odorant markers based on blood type.

Blood-type markers are chemicals released by people of a specific blood type – so if someone with AB blood emitted a marker, it would be different than that released by B. One study found persons with Type O blood suffered more mosquito landings because of the odorant markers they emit than any other blood type, making their juices a hot commodity for blood banks, as well as Asian Tiger Mosquitoes, which carry West Nile Virus. Not only were Type O’s more likely to be landed on, but the study found that for any blood type, people who secreted a chemical marker about their blood type through their skin (both blood type and secretor status are determined by genes) were bitten much more than non-secretors; 24 percent in the case of the Type O’s. Other researchers estimate about 15 percent of the population, based on their genes, don’t emit chemical markers of their blood type through their skin and saliva, so something else has to be calling the mosquitoes to them.

Pregnancy seems to be a big winner for mosquito attraction, probably because mothers-to-be exhale 21 percent more carbon dioxide (quite a turn-on to the six-legged species) and are on average 1.26 degrees Fahrenheit warmer around the belly than their non-pregnant counterparts, due to the temperature of amniotic fluid. Also, having just 12 ounces of beer increases your mosquito appeal, possibly because of the increase in body temperature it causes or because skin markers change when metabolizing cocktails – unfortunate since outdoor drinking is a highlight of summer anywhere.

Ah, well I'm blood type O. And I get really hot and flushed when I drink. That explains it. It's in my genes, nothing I can do about it except drench myself with DEET and vaccinate myself from Japanese Encephalitis.

Universal donors get all the flack, man.

Keyword FAIL

I just don't understand the search engine system here in China. I don't think they have whatever that operates the Great Firewall of China all figured out. In fact, I don't think they want me to write my paper. That's what I'll tell my professors at least.

My first paper is about foreign policy right after the Communists took power in 1949. There's going to be a lot of obvious statements about how China felt like they were bullied by imperialist countries such as America and England, so that's why they kicked everyone and their mothers out of the country. It has to be 2000 Chinese characters, which is probably like 5th grade level for a local, but it's kind of a high quota reach for me. I'm up to 1,200 characters right now, so I need to fill it in with more quotes. Like A LOT of quotes.

I search for this particular thing that Mao wrote on his "The Chinese Revolution and the CCP" (1939) reading that I found in an English book. Since the paper is in Chinese (and therefore the quotes as well), I type in "中国革命1939 中共” because I didn't know the Chinese title of the reading. Get blank page = blocked. FAIL. This is the 2nd time that I got blocked in a search, and I realize it's because I typed in 中共, which means Chinese Communist [Party]. The CCP doesn't want people to be searching for info about them online? What the hell?!?? It's as if the United States banned "democracy, freedom, justice for all" from search engines. I don't see this serving its grand purpose of quelling dissent... all it's doing is probably making it harder for me to write this damn paper!

So fine. You block me from searching the word "Chinese Communist". I managed to find the exact name of the reading anyway (which is "中国革命与中国共产党”), but I need the actual complete text. Yes, I find the link, but when I click it... blocked again... UBER FAIL.

Are you telling me you DON'T want me to have access to Maoist readings?

And the website is "http://www.marxists.org/chinese/maozedong/marxist.org-chinese-mao-193912aa.htm". I would have thought that Marxists.org would be a shoo-in under the Great Firewall.

Anyway so that's that. I'm still 800 characters short, but I wrote a new blog entry in 5 minutes. :)

Masters of Disguise

Instead of Ebay, China has an online marketplace called Taobao (淘宝). Taobao is AMAZING -- not only can you find everything that could possibly exist in the world, but it's also a community where people post the most ridonkulous stuff.

I was looking to replenish my concealer supply and stumbled upon the Taobao makeup forum. Well folks, let's just say that: 1) it's a strange source of pride for these young women to publicly metamorphosize into Madame Butterflies (I always thought that makeup should be shrouded in secretive mystery, perhaps I'm old-fashioned), 2) I'm absolutely stunned at their expertise and wonder why I don't see more attractive young women on the streets in Nanjing, and 3) for all you googly-eyed boys... just another case for why personality IS important!!! :)

In case you don't believe that these are actual Taobao forum posts:

• 1st Row - Youth Serum (she must have consumed babies' hearts to look so much younger)
• 2nd Row - MVP of the Year (*falls off chair*............... )
• 3rd Row - Asian Barbie (The always appealing rich 太太 look)
• 4th Row - Classic Taiwanese Club Girl (Taiwan's best export aside from bubble tea)

The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round

Riding the 13號 bus at night.

Photo credit: Gene

Usually the 13號 bus is insanely packed in the mornings, but I think the Chinese wake up early and sleep early, so you end up with more than enough space for yourself late at night. Public transportation here is amazingly convenient, and 13號, which takes us straight to school, comes probably every other 5 minutes if not less. It's 2Y per ride if you don't have have a metrocard, and 1.6Y if you do. That's about 30 cents. The bus drivers here maneuver their vehicles like rabid beasts on the road, which is great when you're always running 5 minutes late to class. ;)

You know what else was 30 cents the other day? Lamb kebobs. YUM.

Waterholes

I've been so busy getting used to Nanjing that I just haven't been in the photographer mood lately. I carry my camera with me most days, but I haven't been too inspired to pull it out of the recesses of my bag. BUT! Now that I have my own place with some basic comforts (toilet paper, linens, bedsheets oh my!!!), it's time to emerge from my lens and say harro world. :)

My conclusion after 2 weeks here is that I really like the people that I've met here at HNC. It takes a special kind of soul to try to conquer the Chinese language, something that takes a bit of persistence, passion, idealism, and insanity. Obviously I'm not including myself in this mix since I'm a cheater being a 華裔 (hua2yi4, overseas Chinese), but there's a bit of curious intensity that is required in learning Chinese to the graduate level... and I really admire that.

As for our Chinese counterparts, I haven't gotten to know them as well as the International students but there are a few girls that I absolutely adore. Generally speaking they're all 22-23 years old, straight out of undergrad. They're very innocent and wide-eyed, and simply charming (They're so fluffy!). Chinese boys on the other hand are totally on the opposite end of my spectrum. Most of the them are like uninteresting alien creatures to me. And I really hate shaggy permy haircuts on guys. In fact, I'm repulsed. :p

We had a fair measure of social events this week -- a HNC Happy Hour, beer @ Talking Bar...

Behind the magic @ Happy Hour

Our 班委 hard at work

老外s playing dice games, hahahaha.

The next day we all reconvened at "Talking Bar" right outside HNC (and across from the Nanjing University Foreigners building). Choice of poison: 15Y Tiger and 25Y local brewery magic (Oktoberfest Pilsner, wow it was ridiculously delicious and I'm not even a beer person). They even had Duvals and Chimays for less than $6 USD. LOVE the CPI here in China. :D

Gene drinking beer out of a pitcher, of course.

1 beautiful Casey and 2 sleepy schmoes. :p

Why of course, what party would be complete without white boys and Jagerbombs? :)

Vroom vroom!

I was waiting for this bike to Transform all night, but the guy moved it before it could. :(

Once in a Blue Sky.

Blue for a fleeting moment.

No freaking way. I can't believe it!!!

Quickly captured this image when I peered out my window this morning. Only one little puff of a cloud in the sky amidst a blue canvas. Are the factories preparing to shut down for the Moon Festival (中秋節) Holiday this week?

Already as I look back outside the sky is quickly turning back grey from the bottom up. You can see the smog in the horizon even in the picture above. Ah well, the only way you can deal with the weather here is with a heaping dose of resignation. :p

Simple(fied)?

My very first reading.

Bleeding pink and orange... each color symbolizing a simplified character that I couldn't understand. :p

Wowza, we have a ton of reading here!!! I printed out the readings for my Chinese History since 1949 class and it's probably 4 inches thick. I've been lucky in picking out good professors so far with interesting subjects, so I'm pretty optimistic about this semester. :D

I thought it'd be rough converting from Traditional Chinese to Simplified, but it hasn't been too hard. There are some conversions that actually make sense (phonetically or symbolically). For example:

認識 (ren4shi4, to understand) = 认识

The 言 radical on the left is always converted to that thing that looks like an "i", so that's a universal rule in Simplified Chinese. Then you have 認, which sounds like 人 (person), so they replace that whole 忍 section with 人. Then you have 識, which sounds like "zhi" or 只 (only), so ditto on that.

軍隊 (jun1dui4, army) = 军队

車 is always simplified into 车 in Simplified Chinese, so that's another universal rule for 軍/军. Then you have 隊, which means "group", so I process its conversion into the Simplified version of 队 as a bunch of people. At least that's how I make rules up in my head, but it works! :)

These words below look the same to me when I look at them individually. There's no real logic in their simplification. I don't really mind these being simplified though since my hand always cramped up each time I wrote them out at ICLP.

發, 實, 變 = 发, 实, 变 <-- ?!?!!! @_@ *confused face*

I think I'm adjusting to these bastardized (hahaha jk) characters relatively well since it's easy to guess in context, but I had to pick these words out through flashcards then it'd be total GG NO RE.

P.S. Comrade = 同志 in both Simplified in Traditional. It also means "homosexual", but I suspect there might be some KMT humor involved in that one, haha.

Air Allergies

As I mentioned in my previous post, I came down with a nasty nasty cold right before the first day of school. I left one of my classes early to make a run down to a Western clinic (I learned the HARD WAY in Taiwan that it's best not to leave these things unattended in a foreign country), and was properly medicated.

Now I'm feeling much better thanks to Herr German Doctor!!! :) The state of your health really tints your entire life. I've come to realize how valuable this is as time goes by (and why old people are always toasting to health... even though I usually still toast to cash/money/hoes).

Anyway, I think this is why Nanjing pwned me so quickly:

From my 17th floor pimp pad, a striking view of Nanjing.

I am being sarcastic.

Breathe it in, baby.

I would like to take a nice clear picture from my window someday, but it's been cloudy since the day I got here. I have not seen a single patch of blue sky, although it can be rather hot and bright during the day. It's all very strange... because sunlight can permeate all the cumulus/smog, yet there's no evidence of the sun at all. Hmm... I suspect some weather god action from the Chinese Government. :p

It's "shopping week" for classes right now, and I think I'm pretty much set on which ones that I'll be slaving over for the Fall semester. It's probably going to be:

- Comparative Chinese-American International Investment Law (中美國際投資法比較)

- Game Theory (博弈論)

- International Trade Theory and Policy (國際貿易理論與政策)

- Chinese History since 1949 (1949年後的中國史)

The way I picked my classes are so that they fulfill my SAIS requirements. It just so happens that all of these are also taught in Chinese as well... :/

Sound hardcore? We shall see -- I think the major obstacles are: 1) slogging through the Simplified Chinese since all I know is Traditional Chinese so far, 2) printing out 4390473204 pages of material that these professors think we can get through, 3) actually sitting my ass down and reading (aka resigning myself to a sad sad fate). Oh but guess what, I haven't done #1 or #2 yet, so there's no #3 for me today, muahhahaaha! The gun barrel is directly pointed at my foot. :)

Into the Rabbithole

Here I am, typing up my first blog entry in China on Microsoft Word. Yes, on Microsoft Word because of this bitch-ass molasses internet. Ah well, at least I have unblocked internet now. It’s not fun being behind the Great Firewall of China. :(

Look at what greeted me at the Nanjing Airport Arrivals Terminal!

My very first Engrish! :D

I landed here in Nanjing 7 days ago with 40kg of luggage and an address on hand. My temporary home was called Jin’s Place, a crappy overpriced motel near school that played host to lovely groups of people, including one anonymous individual that deposited a healthy amount of puke on the stairwell as I was on my way to my first day of orientation. Promising, indeed.

The first meal I had in Nanjing.

I was not very adventurous... :p

So much has happened in the last week, but mainly on the logistical and not the academic side. I probably skipped 75% of Orientation trying to figure out my living situation, which was priority in my book. Orientation from my perspective was a lot of ass-covering from the Hopkins-Nanjing Center (中美中心) administration to the incoming class on what not to do and what not to do. A lot of Don't, No's, and Nevers. There were a lot of rules going around that were better suited for 8th Grade summer camp, but now that I’ve been here for a bit longer, I realize that HNC has a lot to lose if there's a loose cannonball... the institution exists by the good graces of the Chinese Government.

A vast majority of HNC students live on campus, and the dorm building is literally next to the classrooms. Nanjing University also has a pretty large foreign student constituency, and they lived only 200m away. I realized that keeping all the international students quarantined in this sector was most likely a control mechanism.

Since I live off-campus though, I got to experience China for all its glory outside the Green Zone. Jin’s Puke Palace wasn’t my cup of tea, so I made quick work searching out a real estate agent around Gulou District (鼓樓區). It was actually quite easy, their office being just across the street from my 5-star motel. I made friends with 23-year old boys fresh out of college, who played my guide to Nanjing. 小貝，小農，小王 were all very very very nice and hard-working young men, albeit a little rough around the edges. I was prepared to be hustled as soon as I stepped into China, but I have yet to experience that… knock on wood. No matter where you go, people are always, always, always yelling at each other. That sort of behavior automatically puts me on edge. I was appalled at first – why are you verbally kicking that dude’s ass? But then you notice that they’re smiling at each other, or that the context is one in fun and jest. So don’t be alarmed, it’s just the way that they talk normally since I guess it’s the only way to be heard in a city of almost 8 million.

People huddled around a mesmorizing street game of cards. Big 2, perhaps?

Aside from dealing with the real estate agents, I had to interact extensively with the landlord, the internet people, the delivery people, the furniture set-up people, the police, the taxi drivers, the waiters… and I’m so happy that I do not live on campus, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to understand what real world Nanjing is like. This is my take thus far, and it is definitely subject to change: people in Nanjing are straight-forward, bossy, and relatively unhappy… but the ones that I have met have generally gone out of their way to complete a job, to answer a request, and to be an overall good person. Of course, maybe I’ve been lucky or perhaps my expectations were too low to begin with, but I haven’t had such a hard time settling in so far. Also unlike Taiwan, no one in Nanjing singles me out for being “not from this place (你看起來不是從這裡來的吧？)”, which is refreshing like hell. People here in Nanjing speak very different from how we were taught at ICLP, so even if you mispronounce or sound a bit funky, it won’t ring any alarms at all. The only way that they discern that you’re perhaps an Overseas Chinese is if you don’t understand what they mean about something (How do you say internet router in Chinese?!!!). Despite China being 97% Han Chinese, it really is quite heterogeneous.

[Edit: heterogenous purely if you're ethnically Chinese, but overwhelmingly homogeneous otherwise.]

The Chinese have no shame in square-dancing in open areas.

This usually happens very early in the morning or late at night.

Nanjing has a ridiculous population density. I almost had an aneurysm shopping at Wal-mart at Xinjiekou (新街口) the other day, and it’s possible that that experience is the exact reason why I have a terrible cold right now. Do not go out on weekends in Nanjing. It is extremely unpleasant and you will want to mow people down if you have a shopping cart at hand. And don’t be surprised with someone coughs/sneezes/farts/spits on you. Walking around is a bit stressful when you have to watch out for all sorts of vehicles that don’t give a rat’s ass that you end up plastered on their windshield. On the other hand, the pedestrians don’t seem like they care either if they get run over either. You’d be astonished by how adept they play Frogger.

I have yet to see blue skies here in Nanjing, and I think my nasty cold is being aggravated by the pollution as well as an elevated stress level. Oh well, this is China and most of the Chinese seem to be resigned to a certain health standard. I’ve had to eat out everyday this week and the sudden spike in sodium levels has made me perpetually lethargic. I’m going to hire a maid (阿姨 as they call it in China) to cook for me. Apparently they only cost 10-13 Yuan an hour, which is about $1.5-2.0 USD… a more than reasonable monetary exchange for my well-being I think!

First day of class tomorrow!

Dum dum dum...!

熬過個香港下雨天

Caffe Habitu @ Wan Chai

A rainy day like today is the perfect motivator to settle into a cafe and pound out some MMORPG translations. If you're curious, this is the game that I'm helping converting into English. No pressure to check it out though, I'm not even planning to play it myself. :p

I haven't even touched SC2 yet (sacrilege!). Saving myself for Diablo 3, which will probably never launch in this decade. :(