China!! Week One.

Well, life in Tianjin is different, but not exactly like what I expected.

I arrived at Nankai University around 2am Monday morning, after a turbulent flight from DC to Minneapolis, a long and cramped flight to Tokyo (Tokyo's airport is amazing, so cheerful and technologically advanced), a smooth flight to Beijing, and a hair-raising 2hr bus ride to Tianjin.

Traffic here was the first thing I noticed - there are 8-lane freeways mostly, some with lane lines and some without (there's constant construction here, and our route didn't always consist of fully-completed highways). In town, there is a constant flow of vehicles, pedestrians, and bicycles. Traffic lights seem optional, and I would guess the average speed is about 30-40mph. Honking and bike bells are the communication used on a VERY frequent basis, but to alert other vehicles of your presence, not as an expression of road rage like the U.S. All mesh with each other on a dangerously fluid system, and I'm always amazed there aren't more collisions and deaths than there are.

Aside from the traffic, the pollution here is not as bad as I expected, but enough so that I am coughing at night, and walking in brown air during the day. The joke here is that there is never a sunny day in Tianjin because the sunshine hardly ever makes it through the constant artifically overcast air.

We as Americans stick out pretty obviously here, and the locals have no qualms about staring you in the face until you pass by. Interactions have all been very friendly, and very few people speak English. My Chinese is not at a functional every-day level, but the people of Tianjin are more than willing to help me get by with my "Chinglish."

I ventured to "Yi Mai De" aka E-Mart today by myself, armed with a shopping list of fruits, a calling card, and laundry detergent, and my limited knowledge of Mandarin, and made it there and back in one piece. The cash registers are stationed by two employees, not one; one does everything the one employee at grocery stores at home would do, and the other stands next to him/her and simply checks to see the items on the belt are properly on the belt. Maybe they do more; I haven't seen them do anything else yet. E-mart is this amazing business that is the equivalent of a Wal-Mart (but they have a real Wal-Mart here too, next to KFC and McDonald's and Starbucks, or "Xing Ba Ke Kafei"), but more upscale and with much friendlier personnel. As I was checking out, I noticed the Tesco logo, a United Kingdom chain, so I'm guessing they are partners or perhaps E-Mart is a subdivision.

Nutrition here is an active pursuit. Meals offered here are rich in carbohydrates, salt, and oil, with the occasional vegetable and meat, which I am not always in the mood for. It's mostly chicken and beef, noodles, rice, and tofu with some beef concoction on top. Dumplings made-to-order are abundant, and by far the best tasting dish on campus (so far). Breakfast is mostly different forms of bread, although omelettes were served once too. To get fruit and water isn't impossible, it is simply a separate action. No fruit is offered anywhere in restaurants; you have to go to grocery stores or outdoor markets and haggle for them. I was always diet-conscious at home, but it was generally satisfied by making differentiating decisions from within the refrigerator, not "what vitamins and minerals are now totally absent from my diet that I need to make a separate trip for?"

My time at the internet cafe built into the concrete wall under a freeway a block from the university is about up, so I will post again as soon as I can.

Hello to everyone from home, hope you all are doing well!

Zaijian!
~Robyn