Marine Life Quiz

Presenting the first Dalian Web Quiz of 2008. Dalian is important as China's northernmost ice-free harbor and boasts the third-largest amount of ocean-going traffic of any of the nation's seaports. Therefore, it seems appropriate that our first topic is Marine Life. The quiz consists of five multiple-choice questions to test your aquatic IQ. To play the game, simply click on the following link and answer the incredibly repetitious questions. The correct answers appear in the caption to the fifth and final picture in the album. Good luck to all our contestants!

http://picasaweb.google.com/SteveDC505/MarineLifeQuiz

How did you score? Did you qualify to take away the home version of our game?

(Hint: The fifth picture shows a tank of sea cucumbers, a rare, expensive, and health-giving local delicacy that has been served to us twice alongside sea anemone and sea urchins. They are also the main ingredient in sea cucumber wine, a pricey concoction that one presents to one's host on special occasions.)

New HGTV episode: Design on a Yuan

It's about time! Some blog entries ago we promised to give an update when we got the apartment squared away. Not that we have been living in a hotel all this time, mind you, but it always takes a bit of time when you land in a new city (country) to find just what you need to make your space feel like home -- we have always referred to his concept as "outfitting the nest." I won't elaborate on how to get your sometimes cumbersome (4" thick double-bed, mattress), purchases home.

In our photoalbum, you will see that we have developed a decorating scheme that utilizes craft items from our new country with a New Mexico twist of color. It is always fun to discover just exactly what your new country has to offer in terms of household fitout (http://picasaweb.google.com/trucknmama/DesignOnAYuan). The smallest thing can sometimes be the biggest challenge (dish drainer, ice cube trays). I'm sad to say that I have not found a HomeDepot or Lowe's. But then again the university probably would not appreciate my tearing down a wall to enlarge the livingroom space. I was eventually successful in acquring a hammer, multi-head screwdriver and box of nails/screws. (Note: Before I found the tools, I was able to repair the vacuum cleaner and install a water filter only using Steve's swiss army knife!).

Of course, in an earlier blog we made reference to WalMart. Let me just say that options in an American WalMart vastly overshadow the options an average Chinese person has to purchase utilitarian household items. Where we would find a row of seemingly infinite choice of towels, sheets, bathmats in every color, size, style, & quality imaginable, here there is a single row with maybe 12-15 choices. Higher end stores carry imported goods -- organized by brand, not by function. So if you are shopping for towels, you might find them in several different locations or even on several different floors throughout the store. Makes for interesting (and always lengthy) shopping experiences. We have been very hard-pressed to find dental floss an only recently found this product at a store that caters to western clientele in the "development zone." This is an area where those who represent foreign companies live and work in Dalian, but have very little interaction with their host country and its culture. I much prefer shopping at the neighborhood grocery -- there will be another blog on that shortly.

I am pleased to say we have discovered several locations that carry very good quality local arts and crafts. These range from simple, but intricately tied "luck knots" to beautifully carved jade. Alas, the beautifully carved jade is out of our decorating budget, but we have been able to acquire one or two very nice, hand-painted scrolls that are now decorating our rather bland, white walls. In addition, we have a very nice Lucky Knot that offers all visitors good luck when they enter our home. The scroll at left hangs in our main room and represents the craggy, karst landscape that occurs more in the southern part of China (note small sailboat at bottom right) than in the area where we live. There is an area just north of Dalian, the Bingyu Valley, that we hope to visit on a week-end trip in the near future. This smaller scroll depicts red berries on a thorny bough. Works with the color scheme!

Daily Life in Dalian

Pictures from daily life:

Here is a link to another captioned slideshow featuring twelve pictures of people and places we see around us in Dalian: http://picasaweb.google.com/trucknmama/DalianDailyLife

We get out into the city every day to do various errands and see what we can see. We walk down a little side street (Lanyu Jie) to the main road (Huanghe Lu) where we catch the bus to town. The buses run about every five minutes, the trip takes about 10 minutes from campus to city center, and the fare (paid with a simple swipe of our electronic ID cards) costs about 14 cents.

Susie has had incredible fun finding bargain essentials for our flat (coffee maker, tea pot, cookware, utensils, small appliances, radio, lamps, etc) as well as bargaining for some decorative items (houseplants, wall hangings, placemats) that have made our place truly our own.

We now have Internet access at the flat! We can send and read email, surf the web, and download movies right here at home. In fact, this blog post is coming to you from our living room, much to the dismay of the friendly baristas at Starbucks.

Water Works:

A few random notes on the theme of H2O (excluding our thoughts on the phenomenal Michael Phelps).

1. Tap water: It is simply undrinkable even for natives of Dalian. We have to boil our water or else buy it in stores. We also found a filter that takes out the yellowish color and metallic flavor. Susie and I performed a virtuoso two-party pantomime in the store to get the filter we needed. The audience of seven clerks was very patient and gave us a standing ovation when we completed the transaction. Next time we must remember to pass the hat among the onlookers.

2. Hot water: When we first moved in, we were baffled by the seemingly random availability of hot water in the flat. In fact, it is not random at all but on a strict and regular schedule. We get hot water from 7-9 AM and 7-10 PM daily, with an extra hour on Sunday evenings.

3. Cold water: Since we have a freezer and like cold drinks, we wanted to make ice. This is tricky business without an ice cube tray. Susie, resourceful as ever, devised a cheap and elegant solution. Eggs come in a carton like those in the USA except made out of clear plastic. Cut off the top, fill with (purified) water and voila!! Instant ice cube tray!

4. Sea water: The seafood section in the grocery store is not to be believed. There are strange but apparently edible critters of every description splashing around in tanks: live fish, live turtles, sea cucumbers, spiky anemones, cockles and mussles alive-alive-oh, fresh and salted seaweed, etc. Today, for instance, Susie brought home a bag of live prawns for us to boil (oh the humanity!) for dinner. Last time I was in the market I witnessed a mishap that I had never seen at the 14th Street Safeway. The man beside me dropped a bag of live eels onto the floor and they went skittering away live a dozen slithy toves. A crowd gathered to watch the show and offer free advice. The entertainment was stylish but short-lived, as the gentleman soon obtained a long plastic tube from an onlooker and used it to herd his dinner into its open end one by one before depositing them back into the bag and proceeding to the cashier.

5. Watered down paint: A team of painters has begun painting the walls of our stairwell. Susie triumphs once again! She befriended the workers, borrowed a pot of (watery) white paint and a brush, and painted the walls in our flat so the place looks all clean and bright. She borrowed a pair of pliers from the maintenance shop the other day to do some plumbing repairs, and she has also fixed the electrical cord on the vacuum cleaner used by the residents of our building. I think she will soon be invited to come out of retirement and take over as supervisor of facilities around here.

Moving Furniture

Well, we've been here long enough to get the apartment rearranged, the refrigerator filled (I found ice trays!!!), and a few necessities purchased (extension cords, lamp, soap dish ). Here is a floorplan which shows the furniture placement.

We are anxiously awaiting the return of the administrative guru who will negotiate the bureaucracy so that we will have internet access in the apartment. Right now, we have successfully located wifi points around the city. This has been by complete happenstance -- seeing people with laptops when we pass by shop windows. We did find a Starbucks on the 2nd day, which provided a much needed iced tea and free internet. As it turns out, it is near a shopping area that we will visit fairly often because there are some western goods available.

I am still looking for a place that sells green plants.

Update on Settling In

Apartment

So, I think I mentioned in my emails to friends & family that we got our key to the apartment on the very first day. We were thrilled as sometimes this process doesn't work so quickly. In fact, we got 2 keys!, no need to find a locksmith, what a relief. Despite having access to the flat, we elected to stay in our hotel for a few nights while we acquired provisions to actually "live" there.

I will post pictures of the apartment very shortly. You will see the place pretty much as we did when we first opened the door. I am also working on a floorplan so everyone can see the layout. We are on the 2nd floor of a building that was previously used to house military personnel?

Despite it's original purpose (?), the accommodations are very nice. We are ecstatic to have both a refrigerator (with freezer!!!) and a washing machine. Both unusual and highly prized appliances. Our first purchases were fans. Though the temperature here is 80 to 85, the humidity is about 90 percent ... UGH!!! And I thought I was escaping the DC weather. I am anxiously awaiting the September breezes.

Even though it is only Sunday (8/10) and we are beginning our 4th day, we have accomplished a good bit. Each day brings a least one big push to acquire the items we need to set up house. When our sponsors said "completely furnished," they didn't mean pots/pans, dishes, towels, sheets, etc. We are just about ready to cook our first meal at the house (now having checked out of our safety net hotel -- after 3 nights). What an adventure to negotiate the household goods aisles at various department stores. We will be posting pictures "after" we get the apartment setup -- this will be a big contrast to the first set of pix upon arrival.

Furners (foreigners)

We are foreigners with a capitol F ... known in Chinese in wei guo (weigh gwo). It is amazing to us everyday that we stroll the avenues, shop in the stores, hail cabs and enter the hotel, that we are the ONLY westerners on the streets. I know Dalian is a huge conference city, but I think the western visitors must stay at the conference and in the conference hotels because the are NOT on the streets with the local Chinese. In a city of about 3 million folks, we rarely see another western face -- when we do, we point at each other it is such a rarity. The residents think we are pretty amazing as well, as we draw stares wherever we go. Sometimes mothers will bring there children up to shake our hands with a friendly "nihao" (knee how) ... hello. Pretty amazing!

Dazed and Confuzed

Blog Virgin:

This is Steve's first-ever blog post, so please bear with me while I learn how to do this.

We were met at the Dalian airport on the afternoon of Aug 7 by Victor (the chair of the English Dept) with a driver and a big black air-conditioned Audi sedan (Ernie Suarez, please take note) to take us to our flat on the LNU campus. We have a very comfy second-floor two-bedroom flat with a bathroom and kitchen, complete with fridge, 2-burner gas stove, and a washing machine. Susie has already re-arranged the furniture (pictures to follow) to give us a roomy main bedroom, a central study/dining area, and a living room/guest room (hint hint).

We stayed the first 3 nights at a downtown hotel while we learned to hail taxis, count money, navigate to shopping areas, and purchase essentials for the flat. In less than 3 days, we are pretty well squared away and moved in. Shopping is both an adventure and a pleasure. We are often tailed by a school of several clerks, all eager to show us products, plug things in to demonstrate how they work, etc. Given our somewhat limited skills in Mandarin, we purchase by means of elaborate pantomimes. So far, the outstanding nominee in this category is Susie's Oscar-worthy performance of asking where to look for an electric fan. Here are some pictures of the town and the apartment: http://picasaweb.google.com/trucknmama/LifeInDalian

Dinner for Six:

On our second night here, the Dean and his wife invited Victor and his wife and Susie and me to dinner in a private dining room on the LNU campus. This turned out to be an incredible feast and an unforgettable evening. We all sat around a round table with a huge lazy-susan in the middle. The Dean kicked things off by ordering a bottle of local "whiskey" (bai-jiu) that he shared generously all around. It tastes slightly sweet and very strong, like an excellent German plum schnapps. The server began bringing dishes of appetizers (fish, apples, vegetables, pork strips, fruit). Before long, this escalated into a seemingly unending parade of perhaps 20-30 main dishes (various kinds of fish, beef, pork, veggies, dumplings, soup, sesame cakes, etc). Everything was indescribably delicious. The lazy susan is spun slowly around and around and each diner simply plucks a bite here and a morsel there, all accompanied by a good local beer. I began nibbling cautiously but soon was diving in to every dish with joyful abandon. The conversation flowed friendly and free. Our hosts are making us feel very welcome and very much at home.

Car and Driver:
On Saturday, Victor brought the car and driver to give us a tour of Dalian's coastline. The city is located on a peninsula jutting out into the Yellow Sea, between the Chinese mainland and Korea. As a result, it has many miles of coastline. The tour began at Xinhai Square, the largest public space in Asia that dwarfs even Tianamnen Square in Beijing, where many familes were enjoying a sunny holiday. The drive took us along the steep coastline, past swimming beaches, amusement parks, woods, gardens, and parks. We drove through a special enclave of exquisite villas reserved for visiting officilas and dignitaries, public beaches, and the huge working harbor. Dalian's coast is a combination of the central California coastline (minus the vineyards) and Baltimore's commerial seaport (but with better food).

Dancing in the Dark:
Last night (Saturday) we took our first stroll through the neighborhood around the campus. It was a very hot, still, humid night so thousands of our new neighbors were outdoors enjoying themselves in the evening air. There were cardplayers, diners, dog-walkers, families and couples, and gangs of middle-aged guys on tricked-out motorcycles with running lights and crocheted/beaded seats reminding me of the Mods of the late 60s. The best was a group of women doing a group line-dance to a boombox, and another group of women drummer/dancers. Susie and I did our best to reciprocate by providing free entertainment by simply strolling down the street. For an encore, we regaled customers and clerks as we bought bakery goods for breakfast. It takes very little talent on our part to amuse our hosts and neighbors.

Visitors welcome!!!!!!!

I think that I mentioned we have space for guests. Just to clarify, you will not have to sleep in Steve's office. Our good friends, Charlie and Conni Ess (at right) visited last week from Missouri and can verify the accommodations if needs be. Since leaving TCU in 1972, we have been fortunate enough to visit with Charlie and Conni on and off over the years.

I think Charlie and Conni are some of the few folks who travel even more than we do. They reached our cabin having just de-planed from France and Bulgaria.

In fact, it has been our good fortune to keep up with many TCU folks. Ralph and Jan Stone, our neighbors here in Jemez Springs and TCU allies, are a magnet for the TCU crowd. We were veryf fortunate that our arrival brought us just in time to celebrate the Stone's anniversary (50 and counting)! We enjoyed a wonderful lunch and a leisurely, scenic drive through the mountains north of Santa Fe (thanks to Jan).

Whether you attended TCU or not, friends and family are always welcome at our humble abode. We guarantee that we will show you a good time, not the least of which will the be unbelievable scenery on the drive up to our cabin. Don't forget that both Santa Fe (huge art market and opera) and Albuquerque (museums, route 66) are just an hour away ... not to mention the wonderful opportunities for hiking in our lovely mountains.