How about 3 yuan?

First, some background, then the punch line.

Big Purple class has been learning about going to the market and how to bargain (albeit simply) in English. For example, the student will tell me, “I want to buy apples,” to which I reply “that’ll be 5 yuan” to which they say, “No, no, no. How about 3 yuan?” Simple enough, right?

Next background: Foreigners have big, ugly noses. This is a well-known fact in China. In fact, even my nose is big and ugly—which I suppose it is compared to most Chinese noses, as they run pretty small and cute. This doesn’t bug me all that much (really at all), but when my students are kind enough to point this out to me (that my nose is big and ugly), I tickle them or give them some sort of hard time. After all, that’s my job. One of the other things I do is cut them off at the pass by asking them questions about my nose: if my nose is beautiful, if they like my nose, etc. I do this in Chinese so they know they can’t talk about my nose right in front of my nose, because, hey, I ting de dong (understand). Or I just do it to get a laugh out of them, which it does. Today, however, one of them got a good laugh out of me.

I was goofing around with some girls from Big Purple on the playground. They’d ask me to say things in Chinese and would laugh hysterically when I said them. So I said in Chinese, “You know, I can speak a little Chinese?” “We know,” they said, and kept on laughing. We continued chatting and eventually, I asked this one girl Cocoa a question. “Cocoa, is my nose beautiful?”

To which she replied, in English, “No, no, no. How about 3 yuan.”

Stuff vs. things (or is it all a bunch of dongxi?)

The Chinese word for “stuff” and “things” is the same: “Dongxi.”

Dongxi literally means east (dong) – west (xi), and comes from the old center street, which would run east-west, where all the markets would be set up. It’s where you went to buy all your stuff and all your things. To me, the two are different. You don’t really need stuff; you need things. Stuff you can do without; I really like my things. Get where I’m going with this?

I’ll admit I’ve always been a pretty materialistic person (as in I like my stuff and my things), but I’ve tried this year to think more about stuff and things and see how different they really are. Whether I’m going to buy necessary apartment “things” or just to spend money on silly Chinese “stuff,” it’s all the same in the pu tong hua (common language): mai dongxi. In my head, “mai dongxi” (buying things) sounds negative. Bored wives with their husband’s credit card “mai dongxi,” foreigners with their Meiguode qian (US dollars) “mai dongxi.”

How much of my life do I want to “mai dongxi?” How much of my “dongxi” do I really need? China’s made me ask these questions, and I think that’s a good thing, stuff, whatever.

Apologies

It's been way too long since I've posted, so for that I apologize. I've been slacking off for sure of late, but I guess I feel less of an urgency considering home is now less than 2 weeks away. Actually I'm trying to figure this out: It's currently 5:10 a.m. on Wednesday at home, which means in 2 weeks I'll be somewhere 30,000 feet over the Midwest, 1 hour and 40 minutes away from landing in Pittsburgh. Craziness. Anyway, expect more stuff between now and then, but if you don't see much, you'll see me soon enough, and hopefully all of this will be even better in person.