After 16 months in China it is still a weird and wonderful place that makes me double take on a regular basis, and keeps me asking "Why?" all the time.
52. The incredible fitness of the elderly. Their strength and flexibility in the outside gyms amazes me.
53. How small children will come up to you and ask you "Are you a foreigner?" in Chinese.
54. Everything about Chinese clubs, but especially how no one dances and they never play any music with actual words
55. How a club isn't considered decent unless it has an entourage of scantily clad Russian dancers
56. Putting mayonnaise on fruit salad, and not having the wisdom to know a cherry tomato doesn't belong in a fruit salad.
57. Bus drivers of particularly old vehicles refusing to ever actually stop at traffic lights and just moving very, very slowly up to the lights until they eventually change.
58. Dressing children in party dresses to go to English school. And I mean full blown party outfits with tiaras and tiny high heels for the girls, and bow ties and waistcoats for the boys.
59. The 'accidentally camp' men who are happy to lie across each others laps, stroke each others hair, sometimes even hold hands, and yet are extremely homophobic.
60. How Chinese children are scared of other people's socks. Actually scared. I brought in a pair of clean socks to teach clothes and the whole class freaked out and started screaming.
61. How you can never really tell how old someone is because of the general youthfullness of the Chinese. We thought a guy at work was in his early 30's - he's actually in his mid-40's.
62. Summer bellies, where men roll their shirts up over their beer bellies when it gets hot outside.
63. Squatting, Chinese people can squat for literally hours. Not like gym squatting, but sitting without touching the floor.
64. Not only squatting, but squatting on the curb facing away from the road, or squatting facing a blank wall.
65. Women, and men, wearing skin coloured pop socks under all kinds of shoes. Particularly open toes sandals.
66. The obsessive love of taking selfies. On the bus, in the supermarket...anywhere and everywhere is fair game.
67. Honking at pedestrians when they try to cross the road, even if they are no where near your car.
68. Clothes shops often have very strange names; Titty & Co., and Hoe being personal favourites.
69. How it's acceptable to spit bones and food you don't want directly from your mouth onto the table.
70. How the majority of Chinese people seem to find it impossible to park in a parking space, preferring to park diagonally across multiple parking spaces.
Almost exactly a year ago I posted a list of all the weird and wonderful things that my friends and I had noticed in China, and looking back 99% of the points still stand. But moving from Suzhou to Yinchuan has opened up a whole new world of weird and wonderful, and also highlights how diverse China is as a country. Culture and behaviour really do change so much as you move around the country, especially between North and South, and some of the things I've found bizarre in the South the Northern Chinese will find just as strange.
Case in point: recently I was in the car with my (Northern Chinese) boyfriend when a motorbike crammed with 3 men on the back drove past. Living in Suzhou, and visiting many other more Southern cities, the sight of multiple people crammed on a motorbike became normal but when my boyfriend saw these men he couldn't stop laughing. Apparently in Northern China people don't cram on bikes like that and men definitely don't sit so snuggly close together (at least in the light of day) - it's a much more macho life up here!
One of the best things about travelling is seeing how different things are to what you consider the norm. My last list topped 35 oddities so I'll continue the list from there. Without further ado, number 36.
This is China - Part II .
This is China - Part II .
36. Boyfriends carrying their girlfriends handbags.
37. Never being entirely sure what meat you are eating. Is it chicken? Is it something more sinister? No one is ever really sure.
38. The groups of elderly ladies (and those few brave men) who gather every evening in public squares and do dance routines to energetic dance music.
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39. Men clipping their nails, and occasionally nose hair, on the train.
40. The people whose job it is to hit trees with sticks in autumn to make all the leaves fall off.
41. Couples perfectly coordinating outfits, from head to toe.
42. How a 5 on 1 fight is still a fair fight.
43. The "subtle" stares and photo-taking skills when any foreigner is around. Just because I'm foreign doesn't mean I can't see you taking photos and pointing at me.
44. The way young men want to say hello to you but are too scared to say anything until they've walked past you; and then they freak out and run off giggling if you say hello back.
42. How a 5 on 1 fight is still a fair fight.
43. The "subtle" stares and photo-taking skills when any foreigner is around. Just because I'm foreign doesn't mean I can't see you taking photos and pointing at me.
44. The way young men want to say hello to you but are too scared to say anything until they've walked past you; and then they freak out and run off giggling if you say hello back.
45. How the majority of people who pluck up the courage to speak to you in English are 50+, and the last person you would expected to be able to speak English.
46. Calling a spade a spade. "You got fat!" is not an uncommon, or particularly rude greeting to give someone.
47. The coloured contacts young women wear to look more "Western", but end up giving them more of a robot look. Bright purple is not a natural eye colour.
48. Aspiring to Western "beauty" by using strips of sticky tape to give them the much sought after 'double lid'.
49. The huge crowds that people handing out promotional flyers can draw, god forbid anyone ever misses out on a deal.
50. How drinking shots of 60% volume alcohol with dinner is totally normal, "干杯 (gan bei)!" or "bottoms up!" is periodically shouted throughout the meal.
51. Unexpectedly frugal use of soya sauce, Chinese much more commonly use vinegar on their noodles and rice.
52. The incredible fitness of the elderly. Their strength and flexibility in the outside gyms amazes me.
53. How small children will come up to you and ask you "Are you a foreigner?" in Chinese.
54. Everything about Chinese clubs, but especially how no one dances and they never play any music with actual words
55. How a club isn't considered decent unless it has an entourage of scantily clad Russian dancers
56. Putting mayonnaise on fruit salad, and not having the wisdom to know a cherry tomato doesn't belong in a fruit salad.
57. Bus drivers of particularly old vehicles refusing to ever actually stop at traffic lights and just moving very, very slowly up to the lights until they eventually change.
58. Dressing children in party dresses to go to English school. And I mean full blown party outfits with tiaras and tiny high heels for the girls, and bow ties and waistcoats for the boys.
59. The 'accidentally camp' men who are happy to lie across each others laps, stroke each others hair, sometimes even hold hands, and yet are extremely homophobic.
60. How Chinese children are scared of other people's socks. Actually scared. I brought in a pair of clean socks to teach clothes and the whole class freaked out and started screaming.
61. How you can never really tell how old someone is because of the general youthfullness of the Chinese. We thought a guy at work was in his early 30's - he's actually in his mid-40's.
62. Summer bellies, where men roll their shirts up over their beer bellies when it gets hot outside.
63. Squatting, Chinese people can squat for literally hours. Not like gym squatting, but sitting without touching the floor.
64. Not only squatting, but squatting on the curb facing away from the road, or squatting facing a blank wall.
65. Women, and men, wearing skin coloured pop socks under all kinds of shoes. Particularly open toes sandals.
66. The obsessive love of taking selfies. On the bus, in the supermarket...anywhere and everywhere is fair game.
67. Honking at pedestrians when they try to cross the road, even if they are no where near your car.
68. Clothes shops often have very strange names; Titty & Co., and Hoe being personal favourites.
69. How it's acceptable to spit bones and food you don't want directly from your mouth onto the table.
70. How the majority of Chinese people seem to find it impossible to park in a parking space, preferring to park diagonally across multiple parking spaces.
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