Susan Jackson

Every American college kid knows the recipe for quick, cheap, and intense food-happiness is simple—just add hot water and a seasoning packet. Of course, I’m talking about that staple of campus life, the Ramen noodle. Ramen’s reign as king of the collegiate food chain is historic, but there is treason in my heart. The Communication University of China is blowing my mind with it’s dining hall gladiator—the freshly made and ridiculously delicious hand-rolled noodles I just had for lunch.

For the bargain price of about $.55, I had the pleasure of watching someone take a lump of dough and work it into a pile of foot-long noodles, cover it with some slightly identifiable brown and green stuff, and throw it in a big bowl for me to slurp up.

Long live the new noodle dynasty.

Now you can see it too.

For those who haven’t picked up one of the 14 Chinese newspapers featuring a few familiar faces enjoying Oolong in a Beijing tea shop, let me get you up to speed. Our boy Bob is not only a civil servant when he isn’t working for the Olympics, but he also owns a tea shop together with his wife. Tian Si Yuan, or Heaven 4 Source (4 being a lucky number), is located a block or two from a busy road in a Beijing suburb. Technically, it is in Beijing, but because the city is so huge, the locals consider the outermost reaches of the subway system to be the suburbs.

Crysty, Janis, my roommate Anna and I, and our local friends Sally and Yonny arrived there one day with a box of Chinese pastries that easily weighed-in at 12 pounds, no joke. The bakery we had visited on our way offered an array of goodies, including a version of the minced-meat-rock-candy pastries (actually they are meatless and called moon cakes) I mentioned having at the Peking Opera. All together, the dense treats tipped the scale towards “need two hands to carry.” We weren’t sure if the custom of giving a host a gift translated to our situation, but fortunately, Bob accepted. As volunteers dining with a superior, we didn’t want to embarrass him with too big a display of generosity, a bit of a quandary in a place where the exchange rate is so in our favor.

It turns out that nothing less than 12 pounds of pastry would have been enough to say thank you. We spent the entire day drinking tea, eating dumplings, learning to write Chinese characters, and getting to see another side of our coworkers at the venue, many of whom joined us. A journalist and photographer from China’s Xinhua News also sat in on the fun. Their interview and photos of us ran the next day and Bob let us know the astounding (to us) number of publications that picked up the story.

More exciting to my stomach than national news coverage though, the dumplings Bob and his wife made from scratch were amazing. One batch featured egg and Chinese green onion, and the other pork. I’ve never had better, and may never again as the next time I eat them, they might partially be made by me. Bob extended us a standing invitation to come to the shop, drink tea, play Mahjong, and learn how to make dumplings ourselves. While I’m not too shabby in the kitchen, I’m not sure if even years of practice could duplicate the deliciousness of the dumplings, enhanced by the care put into making them to honor budding friendships. Bookending the dumpling lunch and dessert of dragon fruit, watermelon, and pastries, Bob’s tea master brought us through the different tea ceremonies for Oolong and a black tea aged 38 years. The procedures for properly preparing both teas are very different, but equally fascinating.

Check out a clip from the Oolong ceremony where Yonny explains the reasons for drinking each tiny cup of tea in three sips, and the rest of the photos in the gallery.

The general pushing, lack of common courtesy, and disregard for personal space I’ve experienced so far in China haven’t been too aggravating other than on early-morning subway rides when I’m at my most chipper. My approach is such: When the cultural rule is that there are no rules, how one is expected to behave in public becomes much more clear. For example, in the arena of elbows and shoving that is the Beijing subway platform, it’s much easier to take your mark and unabashedly sprint to a seat the instant the train doors open than to politely avoid body-slamming someone into a wall, thereby loosing your shot at a place to park it for the 1.5-hour ride to your venue. With everyone else scratching the ground like bulls to do the same thing, it’s easy to adopt the necessary every-man-for-himself attitude. Elderly person or pregnant lady in you way? No problem! School group of 25 about to block your view of a sign in the Forbidden City? Book it through them to the front and receive zero dirty looks!

If I sound crass, let me leave you with this real-world example to illustrate that I’m only slightly kidding here. Outside the back gate of the Forbidden City, there is a nightly pick-up dance party. Someone rolls up with a cart carrying a large speaker on the back and pumps out traditional Chinese tunes, ballroom favorites, and horrendous pop remixes. Locals of every age show up to line dance and twirl each other around under the star (Yes, “star” singular. I’m trying to make it romantic but honestly, you can’t really see anything through the smog). The other evening, a compact car needed to make it’s way from the gate, through the spectacle, and to the street. Instead of creeping around the half of the area filled with spectators, the guy flashed his high beams and gunned it through the dancers, horn blaring. My classmates and I howled with laughter as we jumped from his path, but the joke was on us. The dancers had gracefully waltzed out of the way, not missing a beat, and our fellow onlookers glanced at us like we were the crazy ones. What was so funny?

Check out a video of the dancing, minus the brush with vehicular manslaughter.

Let’s get a little more in depth as to why our deputy manager Bob is the coolest guy I’ve met, maybe ever. First, a little background. According to my intel, Bob used to be an actor, is now a civil servant of some sort, and has a mean karaoke voice. In my experiences, I’d add to that list, “the guy you call if you need anything in Beijing.”

I told you already about him magically whipping out a phone, charger, and extra battery when we first met and I mentioned I didn’t have a cell yet. He also promised to take me to the electronics flea market to purchase one of my own and do the haggling for me. Well, Bob didn’t exactly come through on that one, he came in one better. Instead of doing battle over prices on my behalf, he had his friend, the electronics market landlord, shop with us. The guy didn’t speak a lick of English but Bob explained that with him around, we’d have to get the best price.

For the next 30 minutes, we became the center of attention in the large indoor market. At least six people waited on us and insisted we enjoy free bottles of the Chinese answer to Vitamin Water while we looked over the goods. The Olympic credentials around our necks and that we have Western faces contributed to the hype. It was the equivalent of all those Hollywood celebrities sipping complimentary champagne during private shopping sessions in posh Beverly Hill boutiques. . .except for the whole sweaty electronics market in China part.

When I asked whether or not a particular phone was quad-band and would work in the United States, Bob spoke to the shop manager and translated the following answer in complete seriousness: “Yes. And if you go home and this phone doesn’t work, he will be punished.” Of course, my reaction was surprise and dismissal, but the absurdity of such a thing didn’t register with Bob or the store manager. I don’t know what the punishment would be, but Crysty and I each ended up with a phone, and I have the manager’s business card if discipline is in order.

I should mention that Crysty could purchase the phone only because Bob also took us to a bank for her to exchange money. Using his Bob-ish ways, and a few gestures to our credentials, he managed to get Crysty in front of 139 other people waiting to do their banking. On the way out, we started chatting with two managers of other banks who were there for a meeting. They encouraged us to contact them if we had absolutely any financial needs while in China. Bob later let us know that their respective banks don’t even exchange money (not uncommon, we’ve found) but that they said they’d do it for us.

As we walked to Bob’s car from the bank, he insisted we get a drink from the corner store. Each of us picked out an ice cream pop and had an iced tea thrust into our hands, but the shopkeepers refused our money. Bob had it covered and may or may not be paying for the items in the future. Bob’s house is just around the corner from the store and apparently, the shopkeepers also know that Bob is the man.

Another of Bob’s friends (or cousin, maybe?) can get us tickets to the amusement park next to our venue. I’ll let you know how the fake Epcot ball looks from up close.

For further proof of Bob’s indisputable coolness, check out the post on Bob’s tea shop.

Crysty, Janis, and I were interviewed for Chinese television today at the BMX course. Check out the video for our confused reactions to translated questions.

I believe it will take a little while to load, so go ahead and boil an egg while you wait. Maybe two.

UPDATE: Someone asked what else, besides crashing scooters, we’ve been doing at the velodrome. The answer is, so far, not too much. Official training for all volunteers begins next week, so this week was about getting to know our new “Chinese family,” finding our way around the building, taking Chinese lessons, and getting a few quick overviews of how the whole operation will run during games time.

While the scooting is certainly fun, it has some competition for the title of “coolest part of our job” to this point. In a practice I can only hope U.S. companies embrace, napping is perfectly acceptable as an after-lunch activity. When I first walked into our office and saw a girl catching a few Zs with her head down on a table, I thought, “Busted!” But our managers actually encourage a quick nap if we “need a rest,” a phrase we hear form them quite a lot. In their experiences, lunch breaks tend to last for 90 minutes, so there is plenty of time to snooze.

The day of our TV interview, we caught a nap and had some extensive scooter time, complete with photo shoots at scenic points around the venue. Our manager Alex acted as creative director, setting up the bikes and our poses. Then, we called it a day.

At the moment, it seems everyone’s primary concern is that we have fun and build relationships. As several of only 200–300 overseas volunteers (there are roughly 70,000 Chinese volunteers), we’re a bit of a novelty and people are very excited to show us a good time. We’re happy to cooperate.