Black & goldfish

I finally broke down and bought a pet in China. Actually two of them. My roommate’s just happy it wasn’t a dog, instead, two ordinary Chinese goldfish: one orange, one black. Over lunch break today, I was out buying bing down real China street when I came upon a man selling fish from a cart. I asked him what they ate and he showed me his stash of fish food, so I said, “give me two.” Now Jin Jin and Yu Yu are living in a bowl (also purchased from fish-cart man) in my room. Brilliant.

Being Chinese fish, I wanted to give the fishes good Chinese names, and settled on Jin Jin and Yu Yu for a couple reasons. It’s popular in China to give your kids double names, like Huan Huan or Ling Ling, sort of like a cute name for a kid or whatever. Americans do the same thing with pandas. And on top of that, “jin” (prounced “gene”) means gold, and “yu” (prounced “you”) means fish. Gold Gold and Fish Fish, basically, in cute sort-of little kid way. Couldn’t get more China than that. Jin Jin’s the gold one and Yu Yu’s black.



While we’re talking about black and gold (fish), I watched the Steelers World Champion DVD the other night and loved it (thanks, mom and dad). It’s been well-documented that I hadn’t seen any games prior to the Super Bowl, so I was on the edge of my seat the whole while, up and down with the crazy ride that was this year’s Steelers . It’s done by NFL Films so, of course, it was just awesome. They’ve got these things down to a science, and did a great job with the Bettis / Cowher story lines especially. A must-see.

Are you cold?

Chinese people have this thing about always wearing enough clothes. And they're really verbal about it, because they care of course. I have this thing about wearing short sleeves. I really like it. What follows is a funny exchance between me and a 5th or 6th grader in the hallway earlier today.

"Are you cold?" the girl says. She asks me this because I'm wearing short sleeves, and it's far too early in the year to be in short sleeves, no matter the weather. She's not really asking me if I'm cold, she's indirectly telling me I'm not wearing enough clothes. "No, I'm ok," I say. "Maybe a little," I confess, not wanting to be too direct/American. "I no like you have a cold," she says in a motherly sort-of very honestly concerned voice. Thank you, that's very nice, I reply and walk away. Short sleeves always makes you sick, you see, as does drinking too much cold water, by the way. (Chinese people drink their water hot.)

Later, I just so happen to pass this girl again in the hall. I'm wearing a light coat and this time I stop her. "Hi, I'm wearing a coat," I tell her, stating the obvious. She takes a hold of my arm, looks me straight in the eye and says, "It's because you are cold."

I guess she was right in the end.

Field trip fun

I'd been needing a field trip. Today could not have come at a better time...

We went to a nearby park, "Beijing International Sculpture Park" or something like that. The kids took along drawing pads to draw what they saw: birds, buildings, trees... and, curiously, though today was smoggy, nearly every one of their pictures had a big similing sun (guess you see what you want when you're five). They told me some Chinese word that meant "draw what you see," but I don't remember it. I chilled and caused trouble as always.


Above is my "pre-school" class, meaning next year they'll go on to first grade. There are three years of Kindergarten in China, so not all of my students will. These two boys below are named Tom and Scott (good names, huh. They were real enthusiastic about this picture, as they often are about English class.


This next guy is named Hanson. Not sure where he got the name, but he's way cool. Following Hanson is Elephant (his Chinese name as well, so that explains that), then Sunny (even cuter in person) and Kevin (a corker indeed).





Here they are hard at work...





And finally, showing off the finished product. This last guy is one of my new students this semester, Jake, or as he says, Jaker. He's got a great personality, already one of my favorites.

More pictures

And I guess that's it. Ollie pitched well in the opener, I see. He's gonna be huge this year... I really think so. The bad news: Casey grounded into two double plays and the Brewers walked Bay three times. As they say here in the Chiner: bu hao.

Nightmare averted

Congratulations to Pirates OF Nate McLouth and wunderkind reliever Matt Capps for making the Pirates 25-man roster. They'll head north to Milwaukee for Monday's game and I'll sleep better knowing Nate will see some time in center and lots of time off the bench, accoring to Post-Gazette reporter Dejan Kovacevik (see link).

On an unrelated note, despite Internet reports to the contrary, the bookstore at Xidan is way, WAY better than the foreign language bookstore at Wanfujing. Right off the subway at Xidan, find the Beijing Books Building, then head to the basement floor for a wonderland of English books from Harry Potter to Amy Tan to a veritable Barnes & Noble "Summer Reading" table of great books, from the classics to current best-sellers. They even had Dave Barry. I was real impressed upon my visit this afternoon. Speaking of new releases, has anyone read the book Life of Pi by Yann Martel? I almost picked it up but decided to wait. Needless to say, I was happy to find a new place to fill some time and spend some kuai.

On the missing home front, it'll be tough to miss Opening Day around the baseball world this weekend. Watch lots of games for me, cheer hard and go Bucs! Oh, and if anybody's got a copy of last year's Cabinet April Fool's edition, check it out and have a laugh for me. I thought of Stewie's giant mug today and smiled.