Poking and Prodding

12 Yuan, approximately $1.90, the amount that I paid for my hair cut this week.  I figure for 12 Yuan, one patch of hair missing isn't all that bad.  The fun part about getting your hair cut in China is that even if you know how to describe how you want your hair cut using Chinese, the hair cutter is still going to cut it as they please.  If you're a guy you're going to get this kind of short sided, long top, push over kind of thing that most Asian guys have, and if you're a girl, well...good luck=).

^Small patch missing from the hair line.

Beyond haircuts, my suit didn’t exactly come out as planned.  The custom-tailor experience in China certainly takes a little patience as I found out when I went to pick up my suit for the first time a few weeks ago.  They wrote my measurements wrong and when I tried on the suit for the first time I nearly exploded about how big it was.  I knew then that they would have to alter the suit so much to get it within reason that it would never be right.  Well after they fixed it two times, it was wearable still not tolerable, but its just an example of the chance you take when you have them make your clothes.  I also recently had a long caramel colored cashmere jacket made, and they nailed the fit, so it is a little hit or miss, certainly worth experimenting with though!

^Blue suit with a lighter blue pin stripe.  Red silk with golden dragons that I chose to have the suit lined with.

The weekend was jam packed from Friday afternoon until now, Monday afternoon, as I'm riding the metro to start my first day at my internship at Vance Info.  My teachers asked me to participate in an OPI (Oral Proficiency Interview) on Friday afternoon to help train some of the teachers learning how to administer the test.  So I arrive at the Howard Johnson and they tell me they're ready for me to come in.  I walked in to a room thinking it would just be me and one other teacher.  Well they sat me at the front of a boardroom table with nearly 20 teachers there.  45 minutes of Chinese education’s specialty, poking and prodding!

^Literally one or two mouthfuls of every snack Nanjing had to offer.  Best way to discover local food!

From the interview, I got right in the car and headed to Nanjing for the weekend with my roommate and his family for a Chinese wedding.  Fortunately, Friday night was pretty relaxed; we went to Fuzimiao (Confucius’s Temple), which is also an ancient site for administering imperial entrance exams in dynastic china.  Well, it's a little more touristy now.  We rode a boat around the whole area and the ancient architecture was all decorated in red lanterns, bright lights, etc.  Saturday was even more eventful with a trip to the ancient Nanjing city wall, Taicheng, in the morning, a trip to Zhongshan Ling, Dr. Sun Yat Sen's tomb/memorial, in the afternoon, and the Chinese wedding at night. Walking into the wedding was certainly an experience.

^Base of Zhongshanling, great workout hiking those stairs.

Being the only foreigner there, when I walked in the room, there was a solid 2 seconds of silence, and as I walked to my seat, I could just feel every set of eyes in the room burning a hole right through me.  The MC also couldn't resist coming over to the table to see the "foreign friend" and see how my Chinese was.  Fortunately, I managed to get out a few good luck wishes to the newly weds, and thanked them for having me.  Then after as they progressed through the rigmarole that is a Chinese wedding and the bride had changed at least 5 times, they arrived at an event where people would teach the bride to say I love you in other languages. Someone taught them English, so my roommate told me I had to go on stage and teach them Italian. I said, "The Amo!" and thought phew, I'm in the clear let me go sit down. Of course that wasn't good enough and the MC went on to ask me to introduce myself, describe the brides beauty, and describe what my level of satisfaction would be if she were my wife. Umm, well…

^MC getting the show on the road.