Panthera Sapiens Ellipsis: The Blog

I had a better time today, visiting the Great Wall and the Cheng Long Mausoleum. I woke at 6 this morning, to the sweet sound of my brother and the driver snoring in concert, each one apparently trying to outdo the other. Needless to say I entertained thought of pouring ice water down their necks but didn’t, and ended up not in the best of moods during breakfast. The journey to the Wall took about ½ an hour by car, during which we passed the time by telling (blonde) jokes and (not blonde) riddles as well as discussing the relative merits of each character in a movie. (We were travelling with another family which my father somehow got to know. The three kids are Jon, Joanna, and Amanda.) The Great Wall was great (well, duh). The scenery was incredible, and I’ve photographs to prove it; the sun was shining brightly; it was warm—I sweated; and the incline wasn’t too steep. It’s more like lots and lots of flights of stairs piled together, really. A strong wind was blowing, but that on...

I am again in Beijing, but I now feel the warmer for it. Having arrived from Harbin this morning how could I not? The temperatures there are—but I’ll talk (read: complain) of that in its place. Shopping the last time I was here got me thick gloves and a pair of greater thermal pants. I later got a face mask which made me appear like something out of Counter-strike or something from Afghanistan. Wearing the thick, woollen, itchy, static-laden thing kept fogging up my glasses with my breath, but it was a necessary evil: Harbin’s air is such that all unprotected skin turns numb in seconds. About Harbin itself…well, I once heard that if one has nothing good to say, then one ought to shut up. Fortunately I don’t buy that adage, or I’d say nothing at all about Harbin, which, I am sure, is a short, innocent-sounding name for the Harbinger of Icy Doom. The first day (the 25th), I had breakfast in the hotel. It was a buffet. It was quite nice, but not much so, because of the near-tot...

I am now in Beijing, and am much the colder for it. To the layers previously mentioned, I have now added a thick overcoat and a long-sleeved shirt. They help keep out the cold somewhat. Travelling here took all yesterday and most of today; I am by now quite bored of the view of the inside of the car; I am cold and sick of it. It shouldn’t have taken this long, of course, but a snowfall on Beijing caused all major highways leading here to be closed down, so we spent yesterday negotiating country roads that are nowhere on a map. Nearly every road seemed to have been cut off by fallen trees, accidents, or bureaucracy. Thank God we did at least get to a hotel last night, and that the snow was cleared off the highways today. That’s how we got here. I just had dinner, and lots of it. Apparently the people here are even more generous with raw material than in the big S; and they don’t seem to ever have heard of Aristotle’s Golden Mean. If the food is spicy, it’s burning fiery; if sweet, pot...

Well, Fuzhou Road was disappointing. The books weren’t as cheap as I’d hoped (inflation, I suppose), I didn’t have as much time as I’d wanted, and I couldn’t find Wolf’s wish list. But I did manage to read Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (3 hours), the Artemis Fowl Files (1 hour plus), and I did manage to buy 5 classics and a Christie mystery. Total spent, RMB 120. I had to pick something at random for Wolf, so I did; also, I noticed a book entitled ‘Homosexuality in Ancient Art’, with full-colour illustrations, but I doubted if the price were right or if Wolf would want it anyway since I don’t think he’s gay. Besides, it was a large book and heavy. This morning, I had my shoes’ soles refastened. Now I have one pair of increasingly tattered shoes with wonderfully fixed soles. I and my siblings then proceeded to my father’s office to sing carols to his colleagues, none of whom we knew or had seen. They also had never before seen so many children on one family, as Chinese regu...

I bathed today, with the nearest experience so far to a KK cold-water bath as the hot water was all being used up by another sibling in another bathroom. At least it helped get rid of some of my fatigue; I woke at 8 this morning and, again, have been out all morning, afternoon, and evening. Sleeping at 11 last night didn’t help. I was up last night setting up my second G-mail account. Herr Robson, who was online at that hour, suggested the name for it: panthera.sapiens@gmail.com . It’s based on a nickname I’ve had since 11 years old, slightly modified and paraphrased to sound more imposing. I am, after all, a science student. I have watched ‘White Chicks’ on DVD. It was pirated, of course. Fake DVDs are everywhere in the place; one can’t walk five hundred metres without seeing one. It’s not too bad, but the plot could do with a lot of help. Maybe these things are the reason for the spate of book-based movies; books’ plots, generally, are better than those of movies. I shall be going...

I am very tired now, in the full sense of the term; I am suffering from a lack of sleep. Having slept at midnight this morning because of a late cell group meeting and gambling sans money, I woke up at 8:30 this morning hardly refreshed. Having been on my feet since 9 this morning till now hasn’t helped one tiny, little, whit. I have been listening to discussions about the trip to Beijing and Harbin, and am now very pessimistic about my chances of getting a rest while on holiday. The temperatures—I have already told you about them, so I shan’t bother you with redundancy—gangrene is reputed to result from entering a warm room directly from the outdoors; ice and snow are warmer than the air; we are supposed to wake at 6:30 every morning and sleep at 10; and we shall have to walk nearly everywhere! It all sounds quite chillingly un-restful and exhausting. Wonderful holiday, this. I should, of course, be preparing to rest by now, as I have a full day of church to look forward to tomorrow...

It appears that I have a habit of breaking resolutions. Observe the never-ending “Last post before SPM” s! I have just seen Canal, Ice, and family again (I presume for the last time this year). And not only have I seen them, but I have watched them play basketball for about 1 ¾ hours, returned them several DVDs, gotten a plate of baked sweetmeats as well as a box of cookies, and had a Bible study with them. Oh, and I also got lost momentarily in an LRT station. It wasn’t my entire fault—my ticket wasn’t expensive enough, and I got held up to repay the balance, during which my accompaniments vanished. So I got lost. They did find me eventually, though. Plans have now been laid to go to Beijing and then to Harbin soon; I shudder metaphorically and literally. Beijing is 2 days away by car and about 7 to 8 degrees colder than the Big S; Harbin is 12 hours away from Beijing by train and has an average winter temperature of minus 29 degrees in the afternoon. Pros: I’ll see snow. Cons: I’ll ...

I have just returned from a long and tiring day out, most of it spent at Canal’s. Well, it’s not really tiring in the popular sense of the word; fatigued would be a more accurate description of me at the current moment. I awoke at 7:30—late by KK standards but early for my current schedule—for a quick breakfast before setting out for a local shopping street, whose name literally translates to Orange-Yellow Temple. (My father and my brother had left the house one hour earlier for an hour of extremely early tennis.) None of the four of us knew the way, but my father had insisted that the 911 or 926 buses would deposit us right at its front door, so we set out after obtaining a little money. (The brother who played tennis got tired and declined to come.) Well, he was very wrong. We had to ask directions several times before being directed to the number 26 bus. And even then we had to walk quite a distance before we arrived. The Orange-Yellow Temple is a huge market, located in the older...

I have been vomiting and having diarrhoea for most of the past 3 days. Treatment administered by family: plenty of walking, abstinence from all beverages but plain cold water (and I do mean cold), and absolutely no sympathy. It’s irritating, to say the least. Anyway, I’ll now recapitulate the events of the past few days (behold my sacrifice: for this blog I prevail against sickness!). on Friday, nothing occurred but that we went to a local cell group, some of which’s members I later saw in church. On Saturday, we went to Suzhou and stayed there for about 6 hours, during which we bought nightgowns, thick hats, shawls, fans, and other trifling stuff for a fraction of the prices written on their tags. Yesterday, we went to Canal’s in the morning for a house church service and to get our left-behind things back. After that, we went to the church proper for the English services and a cantata, which was quite well done and enjoyable. At night, I had some fries and ½ a burger for dinner,...

I was laid up for most of today by a terrible stomach-ache that has been hypothetically traced to the bowl of noodles that I had for lunch yesterday. Drat that oily, unhygienic bowl of slimy noodles! The experience has been most uncomfortable; I began today with a bout of vomiting that turned the toilet bowl murky green and turned the toilet odorous, after which I had absolutely no appetite for breakfast or lunch. Woe is me—and my cough isn’t gone yet! It, however, seems to be temporarily abated (by the absence of food to throw up or dispose of via diarrhoea); so I had a very little dinner at Canal’s. It was, I suppose, a typical gweilo dinner, by which I mean that it had plenty of meat and little or no fibre. That’s the end of my nonexistent weight-loss plan. However, it was enjoyable, if only because the sight of soft drinks being guzzled down in huge quantities by 16 people at once is a sight worth seeing. Not, though, during normal meals. I have gotten G-mail, thanks to Kelvin. I...

I went shopping with most of my family (my father was absent) this morning at a nearby flea market. (Note: My definition of ‘near’ has now been changed to ‘within 30 minutes’ walk from a subway station’.) It was fun, especially as we went there early and got some pretty good bargains, although we really should’ve driven the prices much lower. Anyway, I did manage to chop a bag from RMB 400++ to 140, T-shirts from RMB 185 to 35, and others. Quite enjoyable, the haggling, especially when the sellers have enough wit to banter and come up with the most outlandish reasons why the price should be higher (‘My sister’s friend’s husband’s second babysitter just went bankrupt and I’m trying to help them’), upon which one has to come up with one’s own reasons and replies (‘Go tell someone who cares, sister’). Canal did not enjoy it one bit as his gweilo temperament is impatient—even though I was haggling on his account! (I had no money of my own to buy things with.) From his expression, the poor ...

I just bathed for the first time since arriving here, but I have not changed my long johns because I haven’t any others. Otherwise, I am wearing clean clothes. I also just finished reading The Hobbit. Quite a nice book, but I wish all good books lasted longer. J.R.R. Tolkien writes in a similar, albeit more long-winded and detailed, fashion to C.S. Lewis’ books; both have a knack of writing about the magical or mystic in a familiar yet charming way, as if they were next-door neighbours or some such thing. I have just realised that I am an oddity of nature and that my DNA should be preserved for the lasting benefit and close study of future generations. I am destined never to have a beard or moustache and never to use a razor or other shaving equipment while always preserving a full head of hair. The Pig shaves; Canal—2 years younger than I!—shaves; I do not have the least bit of stubble on any part of my face but the scalp. Not that I care; it’s all the more money saved for me. The mo...

As I expected yesterday, this morning, my mother went into a spring-cleaning frenzy although it’s the middle of winter. As a direct result of the ensuing flurry of activity, the floor is gleaming, the windows and furniture wiped, and the piles of assorted stuff on the floor put in relative order. It took all morning to get them that way. I also went to the local market whit my mother—or, rather, what’s left of the local market. Most of the streets where it used to be have been torn down, and so the market disbanded. The sellers are still around, though, just not so apparent to the eye. Anyhow, we found it and I got a chance to see a chicken slaughtered before my very eyes. The sight is gory, so I’m not going to describe it here in the interests of better taste. I played some ping-pong for part of the afternoon. I’d rather play badminton, of course, but the weather being inclement (too windy), I had to make do and pick up a new sport as best I could, which was not very well. My brother...

I have just returned home from a long day out. This is easily proven from the fact that I left the house at 9:20 this morning and, as just mentioned, just got back. I have also walked more in this one day than I usually do in a week. It is somewhat surprising that I should have so quickly gotten used to calling the dim little flat that I now inhabit with my family ‘home’, but then the old bromide—are there any new bromides?—says that home is where the heart is, and what better place is there for the heart to be than where one’s family is also? I have met Canal and family (Father: Leaf, mother: Trace, brother: Ice, sister: Broccoli, kid sister: Mercedes, kid brother: Jo, last brother: Ben), as well as several other gweilo families, including a Chinese American one, which is the first one I have met so far (outside my own family) that speaks both good English and Chinese. Unfortunately, he is a rugby enthusiast, which I am not. In fact it seems that a large part of the local English...

It seems incredible that I should be at last out of the grip of the Slimy Purple Muck, although it did turn out as evil as its name. The Biology test was a killer, and I mean that wholeheartedly. Half the class was in a daze after the exams! It just goes to show the amazing ability of the teenage mind that less than four hours later, most of my class and the next few classes were at a prom at Silk Harbour. Yes, I went to the prom, notwithstanding the numerous objections I put up to it in my last post. (Incidentally, I’ve noticed that I have about three ‘last posts before SPM’. Wonderful how resolutions can never be stuck to, isn’t it?) And I did, surprisingly, enjoy myself somewhat, so the 40 bucks wasn’t totally wasted after all. I went with Wolf. He, also, had planned not to go, but when he found that he was going to have a dinner with his extended family, he suddenly remembered that he had to go to the prom. So he went in my car, since he lives near me and didn’t have other transp...