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17 Nov 09
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Ok, So I learned Chinese…Now why can’t I find a job??? Earlier this week I received an e-mail from an American friend of mine who had recently moved from China back to the US. My friend had spent three years in the Middle Kingdom, taught English, studied Chinese, and even worked a “real” job in Shanghai... |
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07 Nov 09
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Tone in, Tone on, Drop out: 10 Ways to Study Chinese which are More Useful than Going to Class So you read my last post and now you’re motivated. You’ve been intimidated a long time, but now that you understand Chinese is only difficult in the beginning, you’re ready to make the jump and begin your studies. What’s next? Maybe you should... |
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29 Oct 09
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Journey Across the Great Hump of China: Debunking the Myth that Chinese is the World’s Most Difficult Language For those of you who have never met me in person, nor seen my personal pictures on this blog or on Facebook, I am six feet half an inch tall, have a brown complexion, and often sport a full beard or goatee. In China, people tell me I look ... |
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17 Oct 09
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State of the Blog; Plans and happenings, present and future Hello readers. It’s been a while since I’ve done a “state of the blog” post, and although I generally try not to convolute this blog with my own personal affairs, it’s been over two months since the last post, so I figured an update was necess... |
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08 Aug 09
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Beijing Olympics…was it really only a year ago? Today (8/8/09) marks the beginning of the one year anniversary of the Beijing Olympics, an event which through a fortuitous work-related coincidence, I was able to attend first hand. Looking back, here are some of my favorite memories of those seventee... |
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23 Jul 09
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“The Snakehead” in review; new title on Fuzhou -> New York Illegal Immigration Racket Since I first commenced “Midwesterner in the Middle Kingdom” in 2007, I have periodically received offers from authors and book publishers for promo copies of soon to be released books, presumably in the hope I will take a look and dispense some free ... |
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16 Jul 09
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Neil Armstrong and Chinese Urinals On multiple occasions during my stop through Zhejiang this past March, I noticed stickers such as the one below, posted above urinals in Internet bar bathrooms.
It reads 上前一小步， 文明一大步, or in English "Step forward one... |
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01 Jul 09
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Making a Fashion Statement in China It's been several months since I've stepped foot in the Middle Kingdom. However, my old cohort Rebecca McQuillen, is still in Fuzhou and recently logged these colorful snapshots (and captions) about fashion in China on her Facebook. I have reproduc... |
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26 Jun 09
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The 4th of July and Michael Jackson (repost) originally posted 7/3/07
The 4th of July is the one time a year when us Americans can dress up in red, white, and blue, and drink beer and light fireworks as we sing off-key versions The Battle Hymn of the Republic. Its a day to eat bar-b-que, have block... |
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12 Jun 09
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Obama’s House Two weekends ago, my old friend Jiang Yueting from Fuqing came to visit me in Chicago. I first met Yueting in 2004 in Fuqing's only McDonalds. I didn't speak much Chinese at the time, and seeing as I was having trouble ordering a Spicy Chicken Combo ... |
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08 Jun 09
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Yangzhou, Home of the World’s Most Famous Fried Rice…and Jiang Zemin This is the 8th entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
After two weeks of traveling, I had reached the end of the line. Nanjing was to be the last stop on my journey from the Yangtze Delta to th... |
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05 Jun 09
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Nanjing: Cultural Oasis of the South This is the 7th entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
In Anhui, Tex and I saw what we went to see, namely under-developed, low income, areas of rural China with little outside contact. Now it was time t... |
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29 May 09
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Watch me get mobbed by 3rd graders in Taihe! This little episode from my recent stop in Taihe was certainly too surreal of an experience not to get on film. Kudos to Tex for the live narration. |
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21 May 09
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Taihe; Rural Anhui in all its Glory and Grit This is the 6th entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
After spending two days exploring Hefei and wandering the streets Fuyang, Tex and I still wanted to travel deeper into the backwoods of Anhui. O... |
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10 May 09
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The New Face of Sports in China Note: Due to the timeliness of the following post, I've taken a short break from "From the Delta to the Backwoods." Expect another update to the series by the end of the week.... |
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06 May 09
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Fuyang; Into the Backwoods This is the 5th entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
Chinese capital cities are funny. In many ways, they are all exactly the same. The same boxy buildings, with the new ones all being built by the... |
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21 Apr 09
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Hefei This is the 4th entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
Located just west of glitzy Jiangsu province is a land which bares little in common with its affluent neighbors. There are few skyscrapers, no Dairy... |
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09 Apr 09
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Huang Shan: the Famous Yellow Mountain This is the 3nd entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
After six days of travel by myself, I was met in Hangzhou by my old friend James L. Goode, who is currently working in Wenzhou. I had taken the on... |
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03 Apr 09
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Linan: Stomping Grounds of the Chinese Small Town Upper-Middle Class This is the 2nd entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
After two and a half days, I had seen all I had intended see in Suzhou, and decided to head south, to the city of Linan. Linan is a county-level-cit... |
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31 Mar 09
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Suzhou: Ancient Capital of the Wu This is the 1st entry in a series titled From the Delta to the Backwoods about my recent trip to China.
It was a rainy afternoon on March 3. It had rained every single day since I had arrived in Shanghai on February 17. Temperatures had been constant... |
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29 Mar 09
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From the Delta to the Backwoods: Two weeks in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Anhui Recently I returned from a month-long stint in China during which I was consulting for PacEth for two and a half weeks, and then traveling independently for another two. At exactly 30 days, it was the shortest duration I have even stayed in the Middl... |
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18 Mar 09
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Final Update from the Road Looking down at the clock, I have approximately 31 hours left in this most recent journey into the Middle Kingdom. It's been a short, sweet, trip, but like all good things, must come to an end. Ever since this summer, I've been thinking that my ide... |
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14 Mar 09
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Another Brief Update…Anhui -> Nanjing It's Saturday afternoon in Nanjing, the pre-Mao capital of China, and here's another brief, raw, update from the road.
Tex and I just finished a 2 hour walkthrough of the Nanjing Massacre Museum. In terms of layout and information, it was probably... |
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11 Mar 09
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Another brief update, this one coming from Hefei It's been a few days since the last short update, and this one is coming to you from another smokey net bar, this time in Hefei, capital city of China's Anhui province. Tex and I met up yesterday in Hangzhou (he was coming from Wenzhou, and me fro... |
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08 Mar 09
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Quick Update from Lingan, Zhejiang Well, I had an excellent 3 days in Suzhou, and have now continued on the next leg of my brief Yangtze River Delta excursion. I'm writing this from a smokey internet bar in Lingan, a 县及市 (county-level city) about an hour outside of Hangzhou. An old... |
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06 Mar 09
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Suzhou Octoballs I generally like to think of myself as pretty adventurous when it comes to food, as well as pretty well traveled when it comes to China. Therefore it really isn't too often that I come across a new Chinese snack which I have yet to encounter. But toda... |
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02 Mar 09
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What’s Ben eating in Shanghai? Over the past couple weeks I've written about Chinese graffiti, signs floating in the Huangpu River, escalators, and the late great Mitch Hedberg. But when it comes to a trip to the Middle Kingdom, I think we all know which topic causes all others to pale... |
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28 Feb 09
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China and Mitch Hedberg…It’s Gotta be the Face. The late, great comedian/philosopher Mitch Hedberg once quipped:
An escalator can never break: It can only become stairs. You would never see an “Escalator Temporarily Out Of Order” sign, just “Escalator Temporarily Stairs.” Sorr... |
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26 Feb 09
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Graffiti in the Middle Kingdom While certainly popular among certain circles of Chinese youth, hip hop culture hasn't quite achieved the cultural relevance in the Middle Kingdom as it has in say...the middle-class Midwestern 99% white suburb where I grew up. So it came as a pleasan... |
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25 Feb 09
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Signs, Signs, Everywhere There’s Signs There may be no better space to advertise than one where you are guaranteed to have thousands of eyes constantly staring at every day of the year. Unlike most blatant examples of commercialization, I have to say this one actually blends favorably wit... |
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24 Feb 09
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Chinese, Japanese, Shanghainese, Look at these! Well, I’ve been in Shanghai for closing in on one week now, and just as my sleep is beginning to acclimate to the time difference, I thought it would be appropriate to give a little update of what’s going on. The first two and a half weeks of... |
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23 Feb 09
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Caption Contest This image is begging some kind of explanation. It comes from the wall of a Hunan Restaurant. FYI, the English script just above the girl's knee reads "Get well soon."
...and yes, in case you were wondering, that is a Hanukkah menorah on the right. |
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22 Feb 09
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What do the Chinese eat for breakfast? As people travel the world, one aspect of their lives which is usually the last to become assimilated to their new culture is their breakfast. There is no place this is better exhibited than in the globalization of food over the past century, whic... |
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21 Feb 09
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Follow me on Twitter Well, I’ve been in China now for a good 72 hours, and due to a busy work schedule and jet lag, have been a little slow on the blogging. I am, however, updating my Twitter pretty regularly, so if you’re interested in more rapid and brief updates, ad... |
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18 Feb 09
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Siberia Pics Made it into Shanghai about 12 hours ago. Weather is cold and rainy, but still considerably warmer than Chicago. Here are some pictures of Siberia taken from the plane. |
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14 Feb 09
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Fly to China Roundtrip, Now for Less than $800 USD! The economy’s down, times are tough, and corporations across the globe are fighting tooth and nail for your expendable income. With all the lost income and doomsday talk, people often overlook the greatest virtue of recession: The cornucopi... |
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06 Feb 09
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Quick Winter Trip Back to the Middle Kingdom Well, I knew it wouldn't be long, but I didn't expect it to be quite so soon. Later this month, I'm going to be heading back to China for a quick month-long stay. A couple weeks ago, I got the call from Pacific Ethnography, and they're going to be ... |
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02 Feb 09
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A Chicago Chinese Spring Festival Parade (in blog format) In addition to being Super Bowl Sunday, today was the annual Chicago Chinatown Parade. I've never actually blogged a parade before, so here goes.
Last year's parade was witnessed by a miniscule crowd and in abbreviated form due to sub-zer... |
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25 Jan 09
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Chinese New Year, in all it’s Glory There may be no other moment in time in which the sheer madness of the environment eclipses that of the Chinese New Year. For during this brief moment (and by brief moment I am also including the half hour before and after midnight), the Chines... |
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17 Jan 09
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Cultural Revolution Propaganda Part 3 Here is the next batch of propaganda posters. I'm going to try to get the remainder up by the end of next week.
The regime will come out of the gun
The Selected Works of Mao Zedong
Take over the fight, fight till the end.
note: “fight... |
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05 Jan 09
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Cultural Revolution Propaganda Part 2 Here's the next batch of posters. I'll have more up as I get them scanned and translated. Corrections welcome.
Long Live the invincible Marxism, Leninism, and Mao Zedong Thought!
The Red Army does not fear difficult expeditions.
Carry o... |
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31 Dec 08
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Cultural Revolution Propaganda This past summer, my former fellow Fuzhouite Ron Sims (aka "Black Man in China"), asked me to find some of those old Cultural Revolution style posters and bring them back to the US. In addition to being a prolific podcaster, Ron is also a talented artis... |
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25 Dec 08
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Merry Jewish Christmas! Once again Christmas is here, and for all you fellow Jews out there, that means Chinese food and a movie. See, while America’s majority Christian population celebrates the Christmas season, Jews (as well as other non-Christian groups) are left with ... |
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06 Dec 08
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Chinese Old Man Exercises Looking to join a gym? Don’t have the money to pay for a high-tech super-sophisticated 24-hour fitness megaplex? Why not go to China where public exercise equipment is free and abundant in parks and squares across the nation? I call it the 老... |
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21 Nov 08
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Sexual Education and Family Planning with Chinese Characteristics This past summer, during my trip to the Yu Village in Southern Hebei, I came across a jovial series of public health/sex education signs. They were constructed out of tile and affixed to the sides of stone buildings lining the main road of the Yu... |
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05 Nov 08
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Obamapalooza at Grant Park: Pics and Thoughts Last evening was allegedly the largest public gathering in the history of the city of Chicago. Regardless of any political affiliations, this was an event I was not going to miss. Here are some pics and thoughts from Obamapalooza '08.
In addition... |
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04 Nov 08
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Chinese Writing: Is it really worth all the hassle to learn? Earlier this month I spent two weeks in an interpreter training seminar for a new agency I am now working for. As part of the seminar, each participant was required to complete a ten-page glossary of medical terminology in their respective language.... |
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30 Oct 08
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Barack Obama Targeting Chinese Voters? During a routine walk through Chinatown today, I noticed that (like most neighborhoods in Chicago these days) the streetscape was blanketed with Barack Obama signage. The Chinese are not usually viewed as a major voting bloc in the United States, bu... |
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21 Oct 08
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To Fuqing and Back…我的中国老家 For those of you who have followed my blog since its inception, you probably remember when I lived in Fuzhou. In posts, I often cite that I lived in Fuzhou for 3 years, but this is not completely accurate. In fact, my first 15 months in the Midd... |
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13 Oct 08
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Glad to be back in America As interesting as life can be in the Middle Kingdom, it's scenes like this that remind me why I love the good ol' US of A. |
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