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Everyday she waits outside of my apartment complex for potential customers. She drives a little red four door Chevy Spark, which in my opinion says a lot about her personality. Every time she sees me, she starts waving and laughing and I can’t help but accept her offer of a ride. She usually drives me to work in the morning, because lately I have been unable to wake up early enough to catch our 7:15AM work bus.

Even though I have taken plenty of rides with her, I have never really been able to have a conversation with her. (I’m pretty much incapable of true Mandarin conversation with anyone, but even less so with her.) We don’t understand each other, but that doesn’t stop her from gabbing away the entire ride. I just sit there thinking I am so stupid because I can’t understand anything she says. Anyway, today I told her that the weather was good, not cold and I guess Spring is here… and she understood me. Then something strange happened. She explained to me, and again I understood her, that I speak Putonghua, but she doesn’t. So it turns out that all this time I couldn’t make out what she was saying because she speaks some kind of local dialect, that probably uses words very similar to Putonghua (and surely they are written with the same characters) but her pronunciation is all wacky. So when she spoke in Putonghua, I could understand her a lot better (but not everything – she talks a mile a minute.)

Finally she figured out that if she speaks slow Putonghua, I might understand her. This is how I came to know that she is 46 years old. When I told her I am 34, she freaked out. And this is the moment I decided she is my favorite Chinese person. She went on and on about how I look younger, how I don’t have any eye wrinkles, how I am not fat, how my skin is so pale. Keeping up with Chinese modesty values, I told her that it was all untrue… but I could have hugged her.

(Putonghua = Mandarin Chinese)

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Market Day sellers in front of our apartment complex

Every five days a moving market sets up in the street in front of our apartment complex. You can buy books, shoes, toys, clothes, small tools, fruit, plants and household items such as brooms, dustpans, dishes, etc. I snapped this quick pic as I waited for my gypsy cab lady to pick me up today for work.

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Friends at Julia’s Cafe

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How come we don’t celebrate this in the US?

The DH & I decided to eat hot pot and then go to our friend Julia’s cafe. She was holding a promotion to get a free cocktail just by wearing a qipao. Yes, I did spend the evening in a cafe/bar wearing a Chinese dress. None of the Chinese girls were even wearing one.

We took a gypsy cab to the restaurant and the driver had the strangest tick. Every three seconds or so he’d grip the steering wheel tightly and pull himself forward. He did this repeatedly throughout the drive. The worst the traffic, the more frequently he rocked himself forward. Hilarious. But not as funny as this guy:

Photograph hanging on the wall at our fave hot pot place.
I know, it is revolting. You should see this kind of thing in real life!

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I like that I got a month and a half reprieve from non-lunar calendar New Year Resolutions, since my number one top resolution is, as always, to stop procrastinating so much. A month and a half of procrastinating before I must give it up! Consulting the calendar (lunar or not) I see that we are officially three weeks into the year of the tiger so yet again my goal to end procrastination this year is FAIL. Oh well.

Resolutions for the Year of the Tiger:

1. Procrastinate less FAIL (But I swear I will keep trying.)
2. Drastically improve Mandarin and finish the Heisig book (such good intentions here, honestly!)
   After I recommitted myself to this goal last year, I worked very hard for a while… and then I just didn’t. It’s frustrating here in Linyi because I can’t understand anything local people say. Then I seem to do okay in Beijing so I think I must be learning something. It’s gotten to the point where when people ask me how long I’ve lived here, I’m tempted to say “six months” so I don’t have to deal with the shame of not speaking Mandarin after four years…
3. Incorporate more creative pursuits into daily life
   Create something! Take more photographs, write a story, sew something, draw. I don’t know, I just feel like I don’t do enough of this anymore. I just watch movies and look at magazines. And then I read my friend Tova’s blog and she’s making ball gowns and hair accessories and cooking up a storm and I feel like a big lazy loser.
4. Exercise (another perennial favorite)
5. Learn to love Linyi again, or at least tolerate her better
   There are cracks in my fine expat existence. Linyi is not all she used to be. When I go out for walks, all I see are the coal-stained buildings and the litter in the street and I know I can be more positive than this. When the warm weather comes, if it ever does, the DH and I are going bike riding. Bike riding always makes us appreciate Linyi.

I would add something about eating more nutritious and healthy foods to the list, but in Linyi the kind of foods I think are healthy and nutritious are nowhere to be found. Besides, for the first time in my life I have normal cholesterol levels. So maybe the Linyi diet – indiscriminate consumption of lamb fat/pork fat, the way-too-occasional McDonald’s cheeseburger and lots of fried everything – is the secret to good health.

In addition to these resolutions, I have a big wish for the new year, but I’m afraid to type it here, don’t want to jinx it or anything. Just a favor – can you send some positive thoughts and good energy my way? Because I’m a firm believer in the power of the mind and maybe we can make my wish come true!

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I’ve just began an online creativity course, because sometimes it is hard to be creative in a gray little city still holding on to winter. The course is called Unravelling and I suspect it is about a lot more than just creativity.

“The Unravelling process is a new way to view your world, taking time to appreciate the beauty around you. And we do this in the simplest way – we stop and look.”

If all goes as planned, On the Fringe might take a step towards my other alter-ego and become a bit artsy-smartsy. (Global Gal and artsy-smartsy being my two online personas.) I used to be a pretty creative person… hoping to get back to that. (Beyond just creating interesting headers for the blog that is, haha.)

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