6/15/07

Updates:

Silvy might take work at The National Academy of Chinese Theatre Arts, teaching English to acrobats and opera singers. It sounds incredible, but it would require she move to Fengtai district (on campus) in two months. We'll see what happens, although I wouldn't mind living someone other than Wudaokou, but I don't know exactly where I'd live. Maybe a more Chinese neighborhood with less Korean groceries and seedy clubs.

I'm being given a legit work visa, meaning I had to get a physical yesterday. I was led into various room, blood was drawn and I was given a chest x-ray. The staff was very friendly, everything was clean and designed for us picky, money-to-burn foreigners. Hopefully I'm completely healthy. This full work visa is a very big deal; it means that I can come in and out of the country as often as I'd like for as long as I'm hired by the company and gives me the option to apply for a Chinese green card. (not sure if I'll do that...) It also gives me a lot more protection in case things go wrong. Most English teachers, especially younger, barely qualified ones like me, work on F visas, which are not legit, but are usually not scrutinized so heavily.

I'll never be able to pronounce the Chinese "r" or speak like a native Beijinger. I'm owning my strong American accent.

We hired a maid, or an 阿姨 (a yi, or "ah ee") which is what Chinese called maids, which actually means "auntie." She cleans our place ridiculously well for a ridiculously low amount of money. I feel like a real imperialist.

Last week I saw a very funny man with a long beard and a traditional Chinese men's jacket with knot buttons near the wudaokou subway station selling bootleg DVDs, but only extremely arty ones like Pasolini, Derek Jarman movies, and lots of bootleg albums. He also sold banned stuff like the BBC documentary on China (with Chinese subtitles) and certain art films that would never pass the censors here. I bought some stuff from him and he told me to come back the next day, but he wasn't there and hasn't been there since. Hope he's okay.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

hiya :)
hope your arty movie guy returns with more films soon. is it hard to look for specific foreign films there? can you rent movies the same way you do in america or do you depend solely on bootleggers for that? and also, there was a big deal made a few weeks ago here about official beijing olympic merchandise being made by barely paid kids and some crazy stuff with the olympic committee and this other story about the yuan being kept artificially low so that it benefits china in trade questions. do things like that make the news over there? and what do hear on chinese news about america? do they care about paris hilton going to jail? is there a chinese paris hilton? so many questions... you don;t have to answer them all, but i'd appreciate it :) love you lots... your bunny

ross said...

bunny,

Finding foreign films or art films isn't hard, but very specific ones can be. I know some arty DVD shops, though, but they're a bit more expensive (like $2 a DVD, so I shouldn't complain) You can find anything here, even banned stuff.

That kind of news NEVER hits China, but it's absolutely no surprise. The China daily, the English newspaper here, tends to report local news in a USA Today style and devotes a LOT of space to anti-Japanese news. Not real.

No Chinese Paris Hilton. Chinese pop idols are very tame. Chinese don't even know who Oprah is.

Anonymous said...

I wish I didn't know who Paris is.....

Anonymous said...

What's this? I though I was your bunny! You have another bunny?
Ms. Bunny Foo

Anonymous said...

don't be jealous, bi-otch. i'm the one and only bunny! :) ARiel

Anonymous said...

I am the real bunny!Face it!There is only one real bunny, the easter bunny....