为了梦中的橄榄树

There are (relatively) cheap new apartments way out in the middle of nowwhere going on sale at the end of this month and ZX's parents want to buy one for him. Which is pretty normal; parents buy apartments for their kids if they can afford it.  But ZX's mad about the high prices of the housing market in general and says even if he had the money, he wouldn't buy a house, on principle. And he doesn't want them to buy one for him. You could start ten businesses with that money, he says.

And when we meet HF (who buys and sells houses for a living) for tea in the park, he's on our side. Don't buy a new house, he says. There's the added cost of the interior decoration, and the location's terrible. Buy a used apartment downtown - a good location, and already decorated, for a sixth of the cost. 

When they ask me what I think, I say, "I'm a wanderer, what do I want with a house?" At the price we're renting now, it would take us 100 years, literally, to make even a low-priced apartment pay off. And for now we're happy with our open-air, plaster-peeling, pull the lights on with a string little place. Homemade strawberry jam tastes just as sweet here, and it's still no chore to squeeze by him to get to the sink.

high hopes for this one

The boy is relieved that his tutor will be a woman. Because they're, you know, not as "fierce-stern" as men. He is not shy but also very smart, and that makes me happy because it will be easier. His mother is obviously rich but also very sweet, and that makes me happy because, while I have and will work for real jerks, I prefer nice people. 

The father is not present, and I guess he will likely remain a mystery. When we're exchanging info the boy whispers to his mother, "Don't give him my dad's number," and later when we leave the teahouse together he tells me - in Mandarin - how his father takes him to school and picks him up everyday in the car . . . and how he envies the classmates he sees walking home by themselves. 

He promises to teach me to skateboard. Then he tells me that he thinks I speak the best Mandarin of any foreigner. I think he probably means "in the world." He's twelve. (His frame of reference includes one foreigner who taught in the English training school last summer). But still, who says I don't like kids?

early fruits

The tiny kitchen where I'm learning to bake bread.

My second attempt at ciabatta. I felt more comfortable with the wet dough, and it did turn out a bit better . . . but still a long way to go!

Almost everything possible is broken on this old, stolen, well-traveled oven. But it still bakes!

 

The poolish baguettes made me proud. Textured flavor, cool crumb, crispy crust.  Yay!

I would've bought all the lemons for one picture

The bagels turned out less than perfect. But they're bagels, I tell myself. My first try. And look at the oven I have to work with! A real bakery with a real oven, ZX and I agree, is going to feel like heaven after three bagels at a time in the boiling pot and the baking pan.

Meanwhile the freshman are so easy and fun that I'm asking for more classes. Willingly hanging around after the bell with patient smiles and the expected advice . . . but in the end I sail back into my anonymous life in the city. Where every day people I meet - the McDonald's workers waiting in line in the women's bathroom, the teenage girl and her father come to Nanchong to visit relatives, the girls selling dried snacks on the street - are friends for a few minutes. But it's not like I can invite them over for dinner.

On the busy market sidewalk this evening, one basket held less than ten lemons, and some ginger root. Behind the basket, the seller sat, but he was half-turned away, fully absorbed in a game of chess (or something like it) with another old man. Normal street activity. Like the crowd of seven or so clustered around the regular game down the street. They'll be there all day, only thin out later in the evening, and the die-hards will stay into the wee hours of the morning. Down the street they've got a real board though, and stools, to go with their real players and their real audience. Here behind the lemons there are just a few scratched lines on the sidewalk, and torn bits of lemon and orange peel to serve as pieces. Just two old men, but no less a game of chess.

it'll grow

ZX was invited over by the American (and Canadian) students for dinner, but I felt weird crashing the party again (even though it means third night in a row eating alone). So after a scary ride home after class in the private (read: illegal) van-taxi-bus thing and not buying fake perfume by the gate of the old campus, I ducked into the 送包子 by the school for some xifan and cold dishes. 

It was busy and they plopped my metal bowl down beside a mother (her son across the table) who had some sort of relationship with the money-collecting aiyi. There was a slight scene when mom wanted to pay that involved aiyi forcing the purse back down onto her lap and lots of discussion about who would be more embarrassed . . . In the end there was a five-yuan compromise - so she'd at least be left with enough face to come back some other time.

Meanwhile the little boy (he's in second grade) has been scooping loads of xifan into his mouth, and has emptied the mushroom plate. He's picked up the plate and looks like he might just march over to get more. Argument done. The mother fakes embarrassment but laughs affectionately, with the aiyi, who's taking the plate to get it refilled. Aren't kids great? Later he asks me how to spell his name in English and what places I've been to. I tell him Thailand (that's a country) and Beijing and when he prompts me to keep going his mother says, "She's been to lots of places that you've never heard of. Now keep eating." Earlier she'd been telling him not to lick his fingers. "This foreigner is going to see you doing that and say, 'this is what little Chinese boys are like!'"

The other day I was checking out a bakery near the center of town, one of the nice ones, and suddenly this bagged roll falls off it's plexiglass shelf and onto the floor. There was no one near it, so we all kinda laughed quietly, and the fuyuan put it back. One minute later, it falls again, and we (I, at least) laugh loudly. And this time when the fuyuan puts it back she mutters with perfect dry humor, 它不给我面子 - It won't give me face!

I've been making it my habit to stroll through every bakery I see. You know, research. Since I am newly poor (relative to before, at least, when I was a "volunteer") everything seems ridiculously expensive and I manage to restrain myself. I prefer the little misshapen cakes from ZX's market street. The ones you buy by the pound, or for one yuan, instead of five. The crispy sesame cookies that get tossed in one of those thinner-than-thin plastic bags (production of which was supposedly stopped a year ago) instead of coming all hard plastic binned or shiny plastic bagged.

On the other hand, it's encouraging to see a growing diversity of baked goods being produced (and bought) in Nanchong. When he was in high school, says ZX, there were just a few bakeries in the whole town. Now there are bakeries - and nice ones - on every corner.

And oh, Regina Spektor. Oh my, she sings pretty.

friday night there were roses

Up at five and six to manipulate hunks of dough make it feel like I'm working hard, but then at 7 and 8 I'm back in bed with that giant tattered gray sweatshirt that once was Robbie's and the laptop, appropriately, on my lap.

As expected, the teaching schedule has been changed one week in and Tuesday I will have an unknown percentage of new students and never see again an unknown percentage of the old ones. They rearranged everything so the classes are thirty-some rather than forty-some. Which is really good. The slightly more questionable detail is how one class gets four straight periods on Thursday afternoon. That's 2:30 - 5:30 and a heck of a lot of oral English. We're going to have to do yoga in the middle or something. I can't really imagine that it will work well. I pushed a bit to see if schedules could be switched, but Mr. Z the secretary wasn't budging.

LW and a cousin talked and talked and talked over tea by the river. ZX listened, mostly, and occasionally wondered over to stare at the water. I pulled my chair out into direct bright sun and studied radicals. Thought I should like to tell Tim about 思, which is a field over a heart, and means to consider or miss deeply.

After xifan at ZX's parents' we lingered a bit longer than usual in the dining room drinking in the warm, scented air of spring by the window. The TV showed long shots of HuJintao being greeted in Mali by great cheering crowds. The Chinese expats and then Malians dancing on the sides of the street. We didn't actually hear how much money had been loaned, only that it is interest free, and probably includes plenty of infrastructure projects (for Chinese contractors and workers to complete, of course). ZX's father said with humor, "My money goes to Africa, and your money goes to the banks in the US" . . . then tied on the apron and moved into the kitchen to wash the dishes.

all these good things

My sweet boy cooked dinner and washed the dishes after we got back from the mountain tired, and put on the new headphones he bought exactly for this reason, so while he is on the computer I can enjoy the night sounds, and the sound of the erhu somebody is playing drift in the open door.

And this morning he and ZG went out and bought a wireless router and set it all up for me. I hugged ZG, who accepted it gracefully, and took us over to the medical college in his car.

It was a gorgeous day, once the morning fog burned away. I especially loved the return bike ride after the afternoon class. The street shared with other riders and walkers. The green off the sides of the little bridges. The first class went well, though, as always, there's a steep remembering curve about how to speak slowly and how much less they can handle than you imagined.

new path

An old racing bike, a destination (and a purpose) of my own, and sun after two days of none. We went to see the old bike guy on YiXueJie (though the shop is a new one I didn't know, down the road). He's worked on at least four different bikes for me, and always works for almost nothing. Raise the seat and they both think it's too high. But it's just how I like it. And there are curved handlebars and all. The hole-in-the-wall jewelry shop owner stopped me to say hello. Explained that her shop was closed for the holiday until next week but wouldn't I come by? And could she have my phone number? I told her I didn't have on yet, my first lie. "What if she asks again?" I worried for a minute. Then I realized that she won't.

In the afternoon I loaded mildew-smelling clothes into a duffel bag and headed out on the bike for Karen's apartment. She had soft cushions on the coach and stories of spring festival travel to laugh to.

in my new life, I blog every day

The apartment is smaller than I remember, but there's a freezer full of xiangchang, and it's so good to be starting the new life, finally. By this second morning the suitcases are unpacked and coffee is going. I set the school desk out on the balcony where the sounds of the street almost manage to overpower iTunes at full volume. Classes could begin as early as tomorrow, but I haven't been in touch yet with Y at the foreign affairs office. ZX's mother says I can buy whole wheat flour from the little cart at the gate of this building. She calls ZX's cousin back to try to convince her to come to the house to see us. We laugh at her enthusiasm, and again later, when SanJie calls us to say we should go out instead. She and her husband are near forty, roosters like me, but look so much younger. Except for his eyes, where you can see the work harder than he wants to at his research job with the oil company. They were classmates in elementary school. They live in Shandong but come back each Spring Festival to see their parents.

planes and things

ZX sleeps, burning off the cold I think I brought from the plane. How do you travel twelve hours in that tiny space with a couple hundred other people (some of them sneezing) and not pick up something? The tiny Chinese woman in the seat in front of me bounced constantly (to keep up her circulation, I'm sure) leaned forward and swayed back and forth until I wanted to smack her. I was trying to watch Sex and the City and then The Banquet. I listened surreptitiously to the couple who shared the middle four seats and thought I might go the whole way without speaking to them. the woman alternated between sudoku puzzles she'd clipped from newspapers and sleeping stretched out across the empty seat between she and I, her own seat, and her husband's lap. They were affectionate in a way that I'm not used to seeing in China. When the man finally asked me if I was going to Beijing to travel, I answered that no, I was going home, without explanation. He and she were both Beijingers, who led tours for Americans, and so kind. the winter season isn't that busy, so they'd spent three weeks traveling in the US.

ZX was at the Chongqing airport, along with his friend ZG, who had driven his old black sedan. He stepped from the crowd saying, "Laoshi hao!", his hands jammed in the pockets of his trench coat, and his eyes that are never quite serious. They'd come up on the two lanes, ZX explained as we tried to navigate the maze of concrete that would point us toward home. Like my father, ZG prefers the back roads, and they don't have to pay the tolls. The natural gas tank takes up most of the room in the trunk, so I slept beside my big suitcase in the backseat and it only cost 25 yuan to fill up when we stopped halfway home. So ridiculously cheap. ZG asked why we don't use natural gas in the US? "We don't have that much?" I suggested. ZX said, "because Americans like to spend money."

one home for another

Ryan and Christen took the morning off to take me out for breakfast and drop me off at the BART. I shouldn't have been surprised at their selflessness - the characteristic that has surprised me over and over again these three weeks that I've squatted in their kitchen, pulling out the foldout couch mattress at night, hopping up on the bed and squaring up my shoulders with theirs to watch Jon Stewart and the Office on the laptop.

Christen shifted her day off to today, and after we hugged goodbye drove then the hour with Ryan to work, where they would spend the night and she'd have the commute in the morning for a change. I love this couple who have learned, as much as anyone I know, to think outside the boxes. Move into the VW van for the two interim summer months. It snowed the first night, but later htere were plenty of sky blue lakes to reward long hikes. They hosted evne in that small space, and still seem to think of the Sierras as "theirs." Ryan, eXpecially, loves the land. Like John Muir and Wendell Berry, with a sense of stepping into the slow movement of centuries.

At Holly and Andrew's we all fit onto the wide couch with mugs and cookies and turned off the lights to watch Being Caribou with proper awe. As a twelve-year-old, I thought nature documentaries were so lame, but last night it was as exciting as any feature film, maybe more. The story of a sweet young couple and their six month trek in  Alaska wilderness after the migrating caribou. The calving lands near the coast - threatened by US oil-hunger - still looked quiet and remote in their footage. There was warped time and dreams that held in reality, and when canoeing out they bumped into the Gwich'en hunter who'd sent them off, and I felt flare in me the desire to believe. In DC no Congressperson seemed to care, but at least a small George W. had been there to see it all.

slow ferment

It feels good to sit in the kitchen waiting for the ciabatta loaves to finish their final proof, and the onions for tomorrow's "Roasted Onion and Asiago Miche" to finish roasting. Ryan and Christen do food like I want to - bright vegetables from grocery stores that feel like markets; oatmeal and flour and dried cranberries scooped from the big plastic bulk food bins. Homemade salsa and homemade hummus. The food processor stays out on the tiny counter that wasn't big enough for a toaster. 

Fresh bread we sometimes buy and slowly I've been attempting to make it. I created my own wild yeast (the Bay area's supposed to have an extraordinary strain) starter, and after babying it for a week, it's finally ready to start going into bread. The first sourdough loaves will be ready to shape within the hour.

Christen's off for most of the afternoon, and we catch a few NPR shows between job-searching and cooking and laundry and dishes, but nothing to Ryan's seven hours each day. We laugh at his intensity over dinner. Last night we went back to the class on suffering at the Presbyterian church. It was suggested that the kingdom of God might be built with a lot of laughter. We all thought we ought to work on that.

Another glitch in the visa-getting. John from the visa-service in DC said the embassy sent it back to them asking for the original documents . . . which were attached. He said he's submitting it again - this time for one-day service. I think about the prayer in Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love, which was actually a petition to the Universe, and think I might try. I'm signing you all on.

up, up, and up

Three out of the last four days on the hill to watch the sun set over the bay  - not too shabby, even if it did take me 'til this week to get up there. This afternoon there were all sorts of people out. A wild and gray-haired auntie talking adult with the not yet teenage girl who held onto the back of her shirt as they hiked. Two men and little matching black and white speckled dogs, one of which was scared of me. The golden retriever puppy ignored my outstretched hand and got reprimanded by his owner. "Luca, come back here and say hello to this girl!" he scolded. Later we passed again and he said, "Look Luca, it's the girl you ignored before!" The shirtless man who jogs in hiking pants and boots and long gray hair and beard greeted me when he passed. On Wednesday evening he was the tiny figure picking his way down into the jaws of the great gorge. The bigness of the trees and the hills, and the littleness of the man. The scene was a Chinese painting. On Friday I saw it again and Ryan said he could see it too.

This afternoon I came from around the hill and scrambled down and down near the big tree and down into the cover of the brush and then up just as the orange sun was being squashed into the city haze by the line of smog overtop. I hurried up the path past the blanket holding members of multiple small-kid-families. Past the guy set up with his camera and tripod on a boulder facing out over the city. I liked that he gestured meaningfully toward the horizon, concerned that I was just going to walk on by. I smiled and sat down to watch.

C.S. Lewis wrote we are kids who refuse a trip to the beach because we're content making our mudpies. He was thinking about sin, and grace, and GOD!!! I think. I'm just thinking about life, about every day that I wake up and the world's offering me these chances, but it's just that - an offer - and no one's gonna make me do anything at all. There've been a lot of those days recently. Sometimes I choose to go out and see. Sometimes I fail.

I realized recently though (with surprise) that I haven't done a single Sudoku since I left Harrisonburg. Nope, not true. None except for the one I found on the single sheet of newspaper on a street near Chinatown. It had been used for sitting and was dimpled all over with the sidewalk impression. I bought a $1.00 bottle of fake orange juice to sit in the little bakery and filled in the numbers easy while I tried to figure out what language they were speaking.

Chinatown, as expected, was significantly not-familiar, because everything there is Cantonese, or dialects a lot like it. I did buy a bag of fresh green beans for $.90 at a tiny little market-grocery. Smiled to myself at being pressed in the line for the counter with all the aiyi's.

Today I almost convinced myself it'd be just as good to sit in the little backyard soaking up the sunshine comes in just as hard. With Zantu on my lap, stretching into every caress. (I thought, "I want a husband who craves my touch like this cat.") Reading about biga, poolish, sourdough again. I could have stayed contented.

But I put on my Chacos and found Arden steps and climbed up and up and up, and then up the steepest, sharpest hill in the history of everything, I'm sure. Lots of other people climbed up there too, but that didn't stop me from feeling pretty great about it. When I stood at the top and breathed my weight down into my feet-roots, and up through my straight hard back, stretching, breathing, it wasn't even happiness like a surge but happiness like underwater don't move and feel the water quiet around your legs.

Is the first line of Regina's "Samson" not the most beautiful line in such a long time? It floated just under my breath the whole walk. The towering Eucalyptus dropping it's bark reminded me again how different this place feels. Different from the American landscape that I know.